Am I an alcoholic? Former drinker reveals the warning signs
'Either I went to rehab, or I was going to lose my family and my job, which at 58 years old, I couldn’t do,' says Dudley Stops.
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Clarence Ford speaks to recovering alcoholic Dudley Stops who shares his story of quitting booze.
Click below to listen to the interview.
Dudley Stops (58) knows he can't drink like 'normal' people.
He's an alcoholic, but it took him a long time to face the truth about his drinking.
Things got so bad that his drinking nearly cost him his job and his family.
"I would pass out early at night, I wouldn't sleep well, I'd wake up at 4 am and have a couple of glasses to try and get back to sleep and I would drag myself to work..."
- Dudley Stops
"I would often sleep at my desk."
- Dudley Stops
Eventually Stops' wife confronted him, making him take a long hard look in the mirror.
"She said, 'Listen, if you don't get it under control, there are two things that are going to happen. You're gonna lose your job, and if you lose your job, you'll lose your income and that's going to affect the whole family.'"
- Dudley Stops
Stops says things got bad when South Africa began to emerge from the Covid-19 lockdown and he was forced to return to work.
"I couldn't cope," he says.
"It was a case of, 'Let's just have a couple of sips of vodka to strengthen the nerves, to get the courage up to get into the meeting.'"
- Dudley Stops
After agreeing to see a psychologist, he was advised to enter a rehabilitation facility.
Today Stops is celebrating 206 days without a drink.
He says it's an ongoing process of recovery.
"I attend AA meetings regularly and that's a big part of it, the weekly reminder that it's one day at a time."
- Dudley Stops
Stops says there are some obvious warning signs that people should look out for when they think they may have a drinking problem.
"When you are doing it continuously, when you cannot remember how much you've drunk or what happened the night before, not just on a Friday night bender, but all the time."
- Dudley Stops
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