As far as addiction, any physiological withdrawals don’t last more than three days or so, and all physical effects are gone within a month or so.
I have gone three months with no alcohol, with no reduction in symptoms, which leads to me to conclude that my shaking and other symptoms have nothing to do with drinking, although short term withdrawals may exacerbate them.
Having tried every other possibility, it seems my only option is to go through these things and learn to live without fear.
Last night was particularly bad. It was like someone hit me with an electric shock about every ten minutes the first half of the night. At some point, I was hit about every 5 seconds for minutes at a time. Eventually, I fell asleep from sheer body fatigue.
At some point, I found myself saying DOWENT TAYEEK, which I realized was probably an infant version of “don’t take”. I am told I was very, very attached to my pacifier–which was likely one of the only things I trusted to calm me down–and as with everything else they did, my parents likely took it precipitously one day without explanation.
But here is the interesting thing: I calmed down after that came out. It was a moment, frozen within me, which thawed, finally. I reached, got in touch with, some primal part of me, and opened a line of communication, of understanding, of respect and listening.
On many surface and internal layers I have neurosis and difficult emotional pain. But I really think at the very core of the thing, of my self, there is an indefatigable and absolutely committed warrior. I fight battles continually, and even though they are in my mind, even thought nothing external is going on, they FEEL the same as real battles.
I share this, because I know I’m not the only one.
And later in the night, I was surrounded by zombie children in a library, in a dream. I told them: I don’t fear you, you need to fear ME.
And I look at my own history. Everything in my past worked to destroy my core sense of self, but I survived. Everyone in my family is crazy, but they told me I was crazy. I persisted.
All my life, I have seen things a bit–sometimes a lot–differently. This is because I am not afraid to pay the cost of being different. I am not afraid of mockery, or personal attack. I do not fear for the sense of reality and sound thought I have fought so hard and long to attain.
I have created myself, at great cost of effort and pain. I have created a world view, a philosophy, a path to a better future. I have offered solutions to all the problems confronting human kind, and I have been able to do so because on some level I do not fear the dark. I am the one who lives in the dark, and points the way to the light.
The terror impulse must weaken over time. I can look it in the eye, and know from long experience that I can take what it deals out. I am getting stronger by the day.
At some point, I will become truly interesting.