Alcohol Gives Me Hangexity

“Never lie, steal, cheat, or drink. But if you must lie, lie in the arms of the one you love. If you must steal, steal away from bad company. If you must cheat, cheat death. And if you must drink, drink in the moments that take your breath away.” — Alex Hitch, Hitch

Hangxiety

New Word Suggestion — feelings of shame and anxiety experienced after drinking too much alcohol

Alcohol and I have been enmeshed for a long time — it’s pretty complicated, as ever. It became a good friend of mine at a young age. I even loved the pungent taste of the sherry my mother allowed us kids, along with celebratory meals, albeit only a shot-sized glass.

My Italian aunts would homebrew their brand of red wine and beer. The beer tasted vile, and the wine was yeasty. I innocently honoured the taste, although it was more about the ethanol part that made my head feel funny.

My twin and I discovered Merrydown Cider at fourteen years old, on top of my dabbling with cigarettes and solvents. I had turned a defiant corner after Mum dragged us, kicking and screaming, to a new district, and then to add insult to injury, she married a man my twin and I abhorred. I crashed into the rebellious crowd at school, after once being a studious, loving soul; my anger finally erupting from the strain of my dysfunctional life.

These new highs were upgrades from my sugar fetish. I had to eat chocolate or sugar every day during my childhood — it gave me the warm hug of love I needed in my ever-growing, unhappy numbness.

We would sneak away from our house, our mother newly married to this man we detested, and off up to the local Off License. I have no idea how we managed to purchase alcohol at that age, but it was the 1980s.

From that moment on, a love-hate relationship with alcohol began to unfold; I loved it, and it despised me with a vengeance — regularly transferring its ugliness into countless remorseful outcomes and mishaps in my life.

I was a shy and sensitive child, leaving home too young and unworldly. Alcohol made me feel like I was okay: Yeah, you’re good, it'd say, because without it, I felt anything but good. I had thought it made me confident and smart, but I couldn’t handle that evil carnage.

Being so young and easily influenced by the wrong type of people in my life led me down a slippery path, and so when I became intoxicated, anything went, and in the morning, I tried my hardest to bury the shame felt from my inebriated decisions. And as the years went by, my inner guilt and remorse cemented my lack of self-worth.

As I reached my twenties, I had learned to stay away from alcohol and just get stoned, yet somehow, that was a habit I could easily leave behind. I landed on my feet with a manager’s role in a boutique, and I loved it. I upgraded my personality to girl about town.

I took a trip to Israel, met a guy, dropped everything, and moved out there. Voila, my beautiful self-destruct mode — dormant for a healthy number of years — reawakened. Looking back, I can see it was prodding and poking at me to let me know I had been rejecting and hating myself all along.

Reflecting over those decades, I cringe. Alcohol sucks when we use it as a crutch. It anaesthetised all my pain, but its cost bore so much havoc , aiding exponential toxic consequences.

The last time I allowed alcohol use me up like a bitch was in 2020. My partner had shut down on me when my beautiful nephew drowned. I climbed up to that mother fucker high diving board and jumped in the hopes of drowning amongst my pain, yet going as low as I did actually ended up saving me.

I took six months off from drinking, ate clean and did weights — I still do. I now naturally pray and hold a constant internal inquiry, and I’ve grown the size of a metaphorical oak tree after years and years of changing my habits and mindset.

But …my body cannot forget those yesteryear foolish and mortifying mistakes. I wake up, panic, check I’ve got my keys, cards, money, and receipts, scan my last calls and texts — and then — relax, my shoulders dropping back to their natural position and my chest decompresses.

The hangxiety feels like a noose. Then two days later — phew, ‘Hello Chantal, yeah, you’re good, chill!’

© Chantal Weiss 2025. All Rights Reserved