What is it like being drunk? How much control do you have?

Submitted ⁨⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨darthelmet@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨[deleted]⁩

So, I’ve never gotten drunk before. I’ve had a drink or two on occasion, but never enough to get more than buzzed. And realistically now that I’m on antidepressants I probably won’t any time in the near future.

Something I’ve wondered about is when it comes up in movies or real life news stories is: Exactly how responsible are you for things you do while drunk? Not legally, that’s more concrete, but practically. If alcohol inhibits your decision making capabilities, to what extent is anything done while drunk something you “decided” to do? You could still be held accountable for getting so drunk in the first place that this was able to happen, but that seems at least somewhat different from the actual act made during inebriation. Like say, drunk driving: Is the act of deciding to drive drunk merely the act of drinking a lot plus a roll of the dice to see if you end up making a decision you wouldn’t have made sober?

Like I said though, I have no personal experience with this, so maybe I’m way off base in understanding the nature of how in control a drunk person is of their behavior.

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Miller@lemmy.world ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
You still have complete control you just start to believe that you might actually do the things that are possible. So for example you don’t jump out of a window thinking you can fly but you do tell Wendy her eyes are like a cool breeze on a hot day and whenever you reach out you want her to be there. Then you sleep and forget it all and wake up sober and have flashbacks all day about what you said to your ex teacher that you just happened to bump into last night. You have those flashbacks for the rest of your life.

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nylo@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
it’s crazy how many people are confidently answering “you never lose control from alcohol” when they’ve obviously never been blackout drunk.

like, sure, there’s definitely a varying degree of effects to some point but when you black out (drink so much that you don’t remember it) you lose control of your actions. when you black out you do things that you would never do sober.

most people don’t black out more than a few times in their life because it happens, they go “wow that was awful I sure don’t want to do that again” and then don’t. they are the lucky ones. then you have people like me (alcoholics) who want to be anything but themselves and want to feel anything but what they’re feeling so desperately that it happens a lot.

no it’s not just “lowered inhibitions so you do what you want to do sober but stop yourself from doing,” your body goes into autopilot. it’s more like sleepwalking than staying up so late that you start feeling loopy once it hits that point. for an example, the first time I ever blacked out I tried to convince my mom that my dugout (block of wood for holding weed and pipe) would open the hotel room door… that’s not “lowered inhibitions” that’s a brain that’s not working

now I’m a little annoyed by the amount of confidently incorrect in this thread but on a serious note I’m glad so many of y’all don’t get it. alcoholism is a terrible affliction that I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. it’s a bad time, through and through.

i think a part of why there are so many wrong answers though is because of the word “responsible.” you’re responsible for what you do while blackout drunk because you are the one who got blackout drunk. nobody else poured the booze down your throat for you. so, while what you do in that state is out of your control, you are entirely responsible for it.

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- darthelmet@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Thanks for the insight. That sounds pretty rough. I hope you can get better soon.
  
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Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
The best description I’ve come up with:

Alcohol makes you act without thinking, and cannabis makes you think without action.

Drunken actions can be understandable, but you’re still responsible for them. If you set a valuable antique on the edge of the roof, and a stiff breeze knocks it to the ground, it’s still your fault. Sure, you didn’t cause the wind that made it fall, but if you hadn’t put it in such a stupid place, it would still be in one piece.

Most drunk accidents are exactly that. You don’t really think things through like you normally would, so you can get up and sing karaoke without worrying about embarrassing yourself and talk to people that intimidate you, or things get misplaced or broken, or you agree to temptations that you would otherwise resist.

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- Menschlicher_Fehler@feddit.org ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  
  Alcohol makes you act without thinking, and cannabis makes you think without action
  
  I like that one.
  
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takenaps@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
The drunker I get, the less thinking I do for before acting. Still kinda in control but more easily swayed by myself to do whatever tf.

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sunsofold@lemmy.zip ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I have a particularly weird view on this so I don’t know how helpful it will be, but I share it when people discuss alcohol.

You, as a person, are basically an imaginary construct given meaning by consistency. Your friends trust you because you consistently behave in a way that says they can trust you. The pattern of behaviours is you because the physical parts swap out all the time. When you drink, you distort yourself a little, because it distorts the behaviour. Anyone who says it doesn’t is delusional. For some people, the distortion is minor. For others, it distorts them a great deal. The drunk you is always so distorted as to be essentially a different person, but one for whom you have total responsibility, because you ‘gave them the keys’ as it were. You are letting the funhouse mirror version of yourself take control of your body so you can be amused by the distortions. Everybody’s mirror is different, but they are all distorted. How much do you trust someone who is much like you, but distorted?

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TheJesusaurus@piefed.ca ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
It’s such a hard question to answer because it varies by person, by dose, by context, etc.

It’s not like you are there at the time feeling “oh I’m only 80% in control of myself here” there’s no little sober pilot inside your flesh-mech running things, the person trying to determine how in control they are is impaired by alcohol.

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- AskewLord@piefed.social ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I mean I am like that when I’m drunk, but that’s also who I am in general. When I was super drunk in college I would self-regulate and stop drinking and like go somewhere safe to sober up. I also never hooked up with people drunk and stuff like that.
  
  But many folks aren’t like that, you’re right. They are not monitoring their sobriety and thinking about how impaired they are… they are just in the moment feeling what they feel and reacting accordingly.
  
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  - TheJesusaurus@piefed.ca ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    You might have a pilot you trust, but he’s still drunk
    
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- socsa@piefed.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  There’s still a little rational thread though. Like last week I was way too drunk to ride my bike home and I thought I was fine. After I fell twice I was like “ok, we have reviewed the data and it says perhaps we are too drunk.”
  
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Z745812939054@lemmy.zip ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
if i notice myself trying to convince myself that i’m fine to drive, i don’t drive

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- victorz@lemmy.world ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  “If my mind is doing things to my mind on its own, I just use my mind to tell my mind not to do that to my mind.”
  
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AskewLord@piefed.social ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
get drunk.

it’s different for everyone. some people lose total control, others don’t.

generally drunk people are not falling down or slurring words… for most people who aren’t alcoholics being that drunk is dangerous and is a sign of alcohol poisoning.

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- rowrowrowyourboat@sh.itjust.works ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  That is an often repeated but false and downright stupid saying.
  
  People are not who they truly are when drunk.
  
  If someone is going through a tough time they might act out when drunk, and deeply regret it the next day because they acted exactly how they are not.
  
  Or someone might be going through a great time and revel a bit too much and in ways they would normally not. And again feel great shame and regret the day after.
  
  Anyone that’s been really drunk has done stupid shit. That stupid shit definitely doesn’t define who they are.
  
  It’s such a nonsense. Imagine telling every alcoholic that has gotten sober that they are defined by all the fucked up shit they did when drunk and that’s who they really are.
  
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  - AskewLord@piefed.social ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    what you do is who you are. whether you regret it or not.
    
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HubertManne@piefed.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
alcohol is a depressent and like any drug it depends on how much you have had, your weight, and metabolism. Basicaly how much you have had vs how much it effects you. You might hear the term take the edge off. This is like a first stage. Depressent effect the nervous system and so it makes you less noticable of things which is relaxing. Next you have buzzed. Buzzed effects your reasoning and you are less inhibited. Assuming you where drinking in a good frame of mind and your atmosphere is good you get more chill and relaxed and also say stuff off the top of my brain more and just are easier being happy to be happy. Once you really drunk your senses and your sense of time is effected. Your decision making ability is way down and moving around is kinda clumsy but you usually find it kinda fun and funny. You likely have little to no filter at this point. At this point forward you may puke from over drinking. Then you get to stumbling or falling down drunk. Your now not walking properly and maybe you can a bit if you concentrate enough but your ability to concentrate is pretty gone. Your getting sleepy but often do not want to. Your like a kid or a golden retriever obsessed with any shiny or whatever. Next you will fall asleep and if you drank to much to fast you might go unconcious or you can even die but you have to be pretty irresponsible in your drinking to get to that point. People who drink a lot for a long time can function often times more at the various stages which gets them to drink more which makes it even more dangerous. you might hear alchol before beer and your in the clear, booze before beer and your going to lose. This is because most people, most of the time, want to get anywhere from mildly buzzed to mildly drunk. Having harder stuff early jump starts getting to there but if you don’t go to lighter fair you will overshoot and end up barfing or having a horrible hangover. While again it is highly dependent on the individual the rule of thumb is a person detoxifies about one light drink like a beer per hour. Theoretically one shot but its hard to nurse that for an hour. So the person goes to drinking beer at a slow pace. The other option of course is to just drink many beers an hour and then slow down.

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MrOtingocni@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Lol, buncha normies up in this thread.

Being drunk can be, and often is, a lot of fun. There’s a reason why it’s probably one of the oldest and most frequently used mind alterants in history.

That said, getting drunk by itself is a pretty neutral, if not unpleasant, experience. What it does do is make everything else you’re doing more enjoyable. The music is hitting harder, the person you’re talking to is more attractive, YOU’RE more attractive, the joke you told is funnier, etc. It amplifies all the emotions, and since it also reduces anxiety, often the whole of those emotions experiences are positive.

As for how much control you have, it’s like a sliding scale. As one becomes drunker a multitude of things happen that undermine one’s self-control until there is very little or none left and people run on a kind of autopilot that is a combination of basic human instincts and the behavioral patterns developed over their lifetime.

There is a type of mental fog that gets stronger as the scale moves farther into drunkeness. This fog begins to inhibit higher order thinking until you can’t make any decisions besides satisfying the most immediate physical needs, or deep seated psychological drives.

Anyway, it’s a lot of fun until it isn’t.

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- nomy@lemmy.zip ⁨6⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  
  Anyway, it’s a lot of fun until it isn’t.
  
  This sums it up pretty well.
  
  Someone once told me “getting drunk is fun, being drunk isn’t.” and it rings pretty true.
  
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- zenforyen@feddit.org ⁨8⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Funny how you explain alcohol like I would explain weed.
  
  Weed for me is the universal emotion amplifier. It amplifies enjoyment (music, food, anything) as much as it amplifies anxiety. In fact weed helped me confront my anxieties and become a more chill person overall. I had to choose between keeping my unprocessed fears and continue vaping weed and decided to work through it, confront and think through the weird fears that my anxious brain constantly produced, repressed and weed surfaced. In that sense, I believe weed can be a therapeutic drug, when combined with some proper self-reflection, CBT skills, and not using absurdly high THC strains.
  
  Alcohol for me primarily increases the “not giving a fuck”-ness, causing mild relaxation in the beginning and removing self control and filters at higher dosage. It quickly becomes physically unpleasant for me to I learned “my limits” when I was younger, its not fun at all to go beyond them and not worth it so I stick to a few beer or glasses of wine at most and avoid stuff that gets you drunk quicker than you can control it. The “buzzed” sweet spot is really narrow for me, probably I’m lucky that my body rejects alcohol so that overdoing it is self-torture.
  
  But of course everyone is different.
  
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  - MrOtingocni@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Right on
    
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RaoulDook@lemmy.world ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Being drunk doesn’t change who you are or make your body perform actions that you didn’t choose (other than digestive system side effects like puking). It’s always you in control of your body, making choices to do things or to not do things. It won’t make a good person turn bad. It can make you less inhibited and make it harder to think clearly, but that’s not going to make you forget how to be decent.

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- justOnePersistentKbinPlease@fedia.io ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  To expand on that if I may:
  
  What alcohol does is impair your judgement and your motor control(reaction time)
  
  So things you normally would not do for a variety of reasons(like, yell at a giant easily angered bouncer), now seem like a great idea.
  
  It doesn't make you do things, it allows you to do things your sober self might find reprehensible into outright vile.
  
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  - snooggums@piefed.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    This is also true of all drugs in my experience. People that don’t even consider doing things that harm themselves and others don’t start doing it when high/drunk/wasted.
    
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glasratz@feddit.org ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I think the best way to describe is that you still have total control, but infinite courage. So you might do very stupid stuff that you kind of always wanted to do but never dared to.

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- jumjummy@lemmy.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I always like the quote: “Sober thoughts, drunk words”.
  
  Usually explains how some people become drunk assholes.
  
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Zephyr@sh.itjust.works ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
To answer both questions, it really depends how drunk you are. To the extreme of black out, what is the experience like? You wake up somewhere hungover or still a bit drunk not knowing how you got there and not able to remember anything past a certain moment. How much control did you have? Not much. In that state any flying by emotion or idea can really take charge regardless of how bad it is. Most don’t remember doing or saying any of the things they did or said.

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Nomad@infosec.pub ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Drinking is about experience. Usually people overdo it a few times when young and from that point on know how drunk on their way to too much they are.

Personally I have gotten drunk to the point of vomiting and needing to sleep it off. Never more than that, so I can’t report on blackout drunk.

But I’m personally of the impression that drunk people that get aggressive or do irresponsible shit usually want to do this anyways and alcohol is just a way to excuse for them acting that out. The reduced inhibition and the social stigma is a good combination to dare and have cover because you are a drunk.

As to why people want to act that out, I’m assuming they have unresolved issues that come out that way. And those issues are probably hard to control. So these people should probably not drink and get therapy instead.

Least, there is a factor of mild drinking that helps talk about things. So there is a factor of alcohol that can help with certain issues like social anxiety or daring to talk to somebody about a long held problem. So its a mixed bag.

Alcohol is not healthy, no amount is. But it helps to cope with reality, so with care and the right measure it can be a plus in life.

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Kolanaki@pawb.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
IDK if it’s just because I am autistic and have adhd but I never felt like it dropped mg inhibitions as is commonly described. I feel, mentally, exactly the same as when I am sober. It’s my body that ends up feeling different, and it’s only pleasant for a little while before I feel sick as fuck and get the spins (feeling like you’re spinning around even when you’re laying down). The physical numbness is kinda nice tho.

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sgh@lemmy.ml ⁨15⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I don’t handle alcohol well, so I don’t use it that much.

Almost always, I find myself heavy-headed, and if I insist, it takes me a bit of effort to stay upright, although it’s manageable, just it’s not “automatic” anymore.

Other than that, I tend to talk and rant a bit too much, and even in the moment I tend to realize that I shouldn’t be saying some things or shouldn’t be talking as much but I just “ignore” this instinct, like “do I need to really bother with stopping my mouth?”

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ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net ⁨9⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I’ve only been properly drunk once. For myself, at no point did I feel out of control, and my reasoning ability still seemed perfectly intact.

It was interesting to observe the effects of the drunkenness on my balance and ever increasing ‘lag’ type feeling, and I did notice I was a bit less inhibited, though I was around friends I already was quite comfortable with so I wasn’t that inhibited to begin with, but even still I did catch myself saying something I might’ve held back or said in a less direct way. At that point I was satisfied with the experiment and didn’t drink any more that night.

The experience did make me wonder how other people could convince themselves to drive while drunk, as even while I was wobbling to the bathroom, I was fully aware that I was totally incapable of safely driving.

I also had no issues recalling that night, so I didn’t get drunk enough to get ‘blackout’ drunk.

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Corporal_Punishment@feddit.uk ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I get chattier, friendlier and then really tired. Then I fall asleep.

It also loosens inhibitions but I’ve never done anything illegal/immoral whilst drunk

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agent_nycto@lemmy.world ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
You ever stay up so late you get loopy, maybe even giggly? Can’t think straight because you’re tired? It’s about that level. It feels different and more fun, but it’s about comparable to the level of loss of control and mental capabilities.

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IWW4@lemmy.zip ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
How much control of yourself depends on how drunk you get and how fast you drink. Now on the question of are you responsible or not for you actions when drunk. You are completely responsible for your actions.

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FinjaminPoach@lemmy.world ⁨10⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
It’s completely lame as f*** and nothing at all like how its hyped up to be

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snooggums@piefed.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Drunk driving is dangerous because your mental processes are slowed and your physical reactions are slowed. So if you make a bad decision that requires a quick reaction it is more likely to have a bad outcome. Driving tired or distracted are very comparable to being drunk because it also involves slowed thought processes and slowed reaction times.

Outside of driving it varies widely from person to person, and in general people tend to be more of who they really are because it lowers inhibitions and scales with the amount of intoxication for that person. It doesn’t give you ideas or anything, it just removes some guardrails from doing things you might be keeping from doing while sober.

People don’t cheat or start violence unless they were already inclined to do so while sober.

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HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
There was a meme online of “drunk or a toddler”, which is a decent explanation of being drunk. You are still yourself, but your id is far more in control than typical. For some people who self medicate with alcohol (bad idea), they’ll likely describe their drunk selves as a more open and honest version of themselves; in the wine, truth.

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Fleppensteijn@sh.itjust.works ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
First it makes me happy, then tired, then sick. Movements get a little slower. It depends on the person I guess but I always felt doing things you otherwise wouldn’t seems more like an act or an excuse.

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schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
The main effect for me is to lower inhibitions. Things that in a sober state I would merely think of doing or saying are things that in a drunk state I might actually do or say. It exaggerates personality traits which is probably why it makes some people more fun (eg. me) and others more aggressive…

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Witchfire@lemmy.world ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
It’s very very very dependent on the person. I rarely go past two drinks, which is enough to feel more socially relaxed and a little tipsy but I still have all my sensibilities. I do enjoy a nice long night walk home after a bar (avoiding the city zombies)

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brendansimms@lemmy.world ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
If you choose to put the substance in your body you are responsible. ‘Its not my fault, I was drunk’ is a shit excuse used by irresponsible people that do not respect others.

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- darthelmet@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I agree. I’m more wondering at what point the fault occurs. Is it the action itself? The decision to drink? The point at which you drank too much to be safe?
  
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