My Experience with Alcohol Use: Embracing Harm Reduction

This article was written by a young person with lived/ living experience with alcohol for the foundrybc.ca website.

—-

The first time I had a drink, I was a teenager. I was with my friends, and they were drinking. I was curious what it would feel like, and I wasn’t disappointed. We stayed up late, we laughed, I felt free, adventurous, happy. Over the next couple months, I would drink with friends or at parties. I didn’t drink to the point of blacking out or feeling sick, only until it made things more fun. But my relationship with alcohol changed over time. 

One summer, something really difficult happened, and I began to struggle with terrible feelings of sadness. At this point, alcohol went from being fun to being an escape. I would still drink with friends but for the sole purpose of not having to feel the terrible emotions that I was constantly feeling. Sometimes I would drink just to function. I would drink before school, just so I could bring myself to go without crying or breaking down. 

I made different choices when I was drunk. In hindsight, the worst part of my drinking was not the terrible hangover – it was what happened to me while I was drinking. I was more vulnerable to harmful situations and harmful people. Traumatic events occurred when I was under the influence of alcohol. These events were in no way my fault, but I recognize now they may not have happened had I been sober.

Up until this point, I had been seen by a host of counsellors, psychologists, doctors and other specialists, but none of them ever talked to me about my substance use. That changed when I began seeing a paediatrician at BC Children’s Hospital. For the first time, this doctor looked at all aspects of my life: my physical health, my mental health, my spiritual health and my relationship with substances. He simply asked me about my drinking, and, unlike other adults in my life, he didn’t scold me or tell me to stop. Instead he immediately began to brainstorm with me: How could we make my substance use safer? We talked about harm reduction techniques (which focus on safer ways of using rather than focusing on stopping use), such as making sure I didn’t walk home alone when I was drinking or making sure I was drinking lots of water while consuming alcohol. He didn’t have to tell me my drinking could be harmful; by talking about ways to make it safer (a harm reduction approach), I began to recognize on my own the ways it could be impacting me negatively.

Everyone’s journey is different. For me, working on using safely helped me recognize when I might be using alcohol in ways that were harmful to me. As time went on, I would learn skills to help me cope with painful emotions and events, and alcohol went back to being something I used socially with friends in a way that didn’t feel harmful. 

If I’ve learned anything, it’s that mental health and substance use recovery is never linear. Over the years, I have had times in which I’ve needed to be mindful of my drinking and implement harm reduction techniques again. Other times, I’ve decided to stop drinking alcohol completely and spend some time sober. By talking about ways to use safely and not being judged for using, I was able to understand why I might be using, which helped me do it in a way that was safer for me.