As a 33 year old woman, I drank about a fifth of vodka a day combined with Xanax or klonopin. I did this daily for a few weeks though I would go on weekly drinking binges. I decided "ENOUGH" when, in our very large house and basement, we found one of our cats that had gone missing... we found it by smell. The cat fell between some boxes in the basement and died which was full of boxes from moving. I stopped drinking and taking pills cold turkey.
Following was a nightmare - I actually wrote a book about what ensued, but no words could really describe it.
By the 2nd day of me quitting, I was shaking horribly, sweating, and pacing... pacing... pacing the floors of the house. It was afternoon and I hallucinated that I looked out of the second story window to see my husband get in his parents' car (they lived 4 hours away and were elderly). I reasoned that he's probably leaving me due to my drinking. After about an hour, I saw him again and asked where he went with his parents. He had no idea what I was talking about and began interrogating me about drinking and pills. I had no idea how much I'd been drinking or what was happening.
That 2nd day... around evening, he made me take the phone to call places for help with alcoholism. NEITHER of us knew I was going through the DTs and that my life was in danger. Hotline after hotline, they just told me to go to some meetings. The night of the 2nd day of my withdrawals, I knew I was dying and I called 911 from the upstairs of our house. My husband was downstairs ironing and simply watched me run out the front door to wait for the ambulance.
I was so shaky, nervous, and paranoid, that the EMTs had to strap me down to the gurney for the ride. Once I got to the hospital ER, I received fluids but couldn't sit in the bed and I paced, paced, paced. When the doctor asked me what was wrong, I STILL couldn't come to grips with my drinking and Xanax use. I lied. I faked that I was okay to go home - the bag of fluid helped a bit with being able to pull this off. The hospital released me and I called my husband to pick me up.
I went home to die. I was afraid to die at the hospital and knew that if they restrained me again, I would surely die. I didn't want it to happen at the hospital.
I got home at 3am and paced the floors until 7am when my body gave out, music was playing all around, and the light looked so beautiful. I laid on the downstairs guest bed to die. My breathing slowed... slower and slower it went. The music played and I reached for the light. I saw people from college in bunk beds all around me, talking to me as if we were still in school.
The music continued to play - slow, angelic, uplifting music... and I started to come out of the haze. I was still shaky, sweaty, and paranoid, but at some time that 3rd day, I got up from the bed and walked through the house. I was surprised to be alive.
My husband berated me more, he printed out articles on alcoholism and abuse, and made me read them day until night. That 3rd night, I finally slept lightly for 2 hours.
On the 4th day of my alcohol withdrawal (and full DTs), I woke up from the most horrible nightmare. My husband was rushing around the room getting ready for work (I was supposed to be getting ready also, but not THIS day). The nightmare I "woke" from was real. I could hear a funeral dirge as zombies were making their way to our house. They were taking over the whole U.S. I told my husband that no one was going to work today and he simply yelled at me furiously. I asked him if he could hear the music and the sounds that were coming our way. His face twisted so angrily that he wouldn't even answer me. He stormed away pissed off.
That 4th morning of alcohol withdrawal, yes, indeed I believed that zombies were coming for my husband and myself. I looked outside to two other houses in my viewing distance. I could see the zombies were already there. Trucks were overturned, windows were broken. And now they were at my house. They were downstairs and I knew they were going to eat my cats first. (REMEMBER, I WAS STILL HALLUCINATING THE 4TH DAY OF ALCOHOL WITHDRAWAL).
My husband left for work. I obviously couldn't go to work... but reality began to seep in and the hallucinating slowed. I knew I had to do 3 things: 1. call my family doctor for help, 2. get a temporary, low dose prescription of Xanax to help overcome the severe DTs, and 3. get in my car to drive to the pharmacy 1 mile away. It took me about 5 times to finally dial the correct number for my doctor. He agreed to see me 11am that morning and gave a small prescription of Xanax to the pharmacy. The hardest part this 4th day was driving a car. I actually forgot how to drive a car. I concentrated for the longest time, figured out how to put the car in "Drive" and drove 10 miles per hour to the pharmacy. As soon as my prescription was filled, I took 1 Xanax. I IMMEDIATELY felt human again.
The scariest thing now was to realize that I kept having hallucinations and that something was very wrong. I went home and Googled "alcohol withdrawal" and sure enough, it described what I had: the DTs. Up until this point, I never heard of the word. I printed out the articles I found and brought them to my doctor.
He said I was lucky that I did not die. He said the DTs are fatal 30% of the time. Ironically enough, the antidote to the DTs was a benzodiazepine like Xanax or Librium.
BUT... BUT... after all of this, NO ONE suggested I go to Rehab. I ALMOST DIED and yet my husband continued to enable me and my doctor just gave me a prescription for Xanax and said "don't drink."
Okay, you would think that would scare me enough to never drink again. Ha! Four years later, after drinking a fifth of tequila daily after losing a job and in post partum after having my first child, I called a friend who was a psychologist. She got me right into 28-day patient rehab.
Life has been much better since. But I don't drink. AT ALL. Taking that first drink would be starting to dance with the devil again. My husband and I are still together and I just had a baby boy 10 months ago. Because I didn't die and eventually gave up alcohol, I am able to be a parent to 2 beautiful kids - the best thing in my life. I was able to hold my mom's hand as she died and I never would have been able to do these things had I continued drinking. I'd be in the ground.
I hope this helps someone out there.
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