Posted on 01/23/2020 7:26:51 PM PST by nickcarraway
Stephen Walder spent £1,000 a week on cocktails of drink and cocaine
“In two 36-hour binges on my own I drank 112 cans of Red Stripe,” Stephen Walder confesses.
Spending £1,000 a week on his alcohol addiction - washed down with cocaine - was something he didn’t think twice about.
But he admits he “doesn’t know” how he is still alive after drinking can after can after can in his last ever binge.
From an innocent sip of cider at 13 he started regularly drinking pints of lager at 16 one or two nights a week.
But his habit soon spiralled to six or seven nights in a row and he would be the last one in the pub as time was called and the door was about to shut.
He admits himself he didn’t fully understand why he started to drink - both his parents were practically teetotal, only having a rare sherry of a lunchtime.
But a lack of confidence and fear of failure compounded his problems and led him to drink to numb the pain.
His arms still bear the scars of years of self-harm with the slash marks hidden away by long sleeved jumpers.
Now 18 months sober and living in Mumbles, he looks back at his mammoth drink sessions and is grateful to have survived it.
Stephen Walder spent £1,000 a week on booze and drank 112 cans of Red Stripe in his last two drinking sessions (Image: Media Wales) “Some weeks I would spend £1,000 on drinking and cocaine - I was being secretive about it,” he said.
“It comes before everything, I wouldn’t buy food.
“There was a week that all I ingested outside of drink was half a tube of toothpaste and a tub of margarine.
“I wasn’t going to stop until I killed myself, I did not think I worried about my health.
“As a kid it was a lager I would drink and after a day’s work I would go and have a couple of pints.
“When I got a reputation as a drinker I would play up to it. The main reason I would get out of bed was to have a drink.
He added: “I did not know about the dangers of alcohol withdrawal - I have never been so ill.
“It’s been a psychological addiction.
“That was what it felt like to deal with, you can have withdrawal following dependency and that is really tough.
“It’s self-inflicted but it’s not a choice someone makes - it’s been a rough ride.
“I badly self-harmed and it brought me to the brink.
“Two years ago I was in a downward spiral and had lost a beloved dog, I took all my anti-depressants in an attempt to take my life.”
Stephen, who is originally from Bromley in Kent, said he would “beg, borrow and steal” what he needed just to get a drink.
He revealed he hoped moving to Swansea in 2006 would help him turn his life around after his Christian parents decided to come to live in the city.
“I moved to Swansea to get away from the drinking and the drugs and I had mental health problems which exacerbated everything,” he said.
“I had a great upbringing and supportive parents but I always lacked confidence - the fear of failure became a thing that stopped me from achieving anything.
“On the weekends I would have a few cans a night.
“All of a sudden I would stay in the pub every night until it closed, I started prolonging that at 17 and 18.
“It would be six or seven nights a week, the weekends I would sit in the pub - it was a culture.
“There was always someone to have a drink with.
“It was a rite of passage, as I grew older I would continue to go to the pub.
“I had an emotional breakdown and a number of suicide attempts.
“It’s been a rough ride, when you are there and it’s the people around you suffering.
“You are blinkered and are in a self-spiral.”
He added: “The association of alcohol and anxiety - a sip of lager is an instant cure.
“The drinking helped me with a lack of confidence from my mid to late teens.”
But he knew in his heart and for the sake of his health he had to stop.
He said a supportive GP and help from city-based organisation Barod, which offers free and confidential support to anyone affected by drug or alcohol use, along with UK Smart Recovery, helped get his life back on track.
On a Wednesday morning he takes a group to help others suffering with alcohol addiction.
“I really didn’t like myself for a quarter of a century plus - but I am really positive now,” he said.
“I knew I needed to step off the drink and it has been 18 months since I have had a drink.
“It was something I needed to sort out - my life is just better without drink.
“The drink and the drugs were not helping my mental health, it was always to forget about things and the problems were still there.”
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Stephen said going to the pub has always been seen as normal but now he is able to walk through the door with his dog and can sit back and enjoy a pint of orange juice and lemonade and not even consider hitting the harder stuff.
His ordeal has led him to write his autobiography entitled The Day I Chose To Live, which is due to be made available later this year.
“I would go to Mind and a Smart Recovery meeting when someone said ‘Do you want to do something about this?’ and I started to go,” he said.
“For a quarter of my life I have been despondent but the story has a happy ending.”
Not that it’s a competition between former boozehounds mind you, but I’m not all that impressed.
What a mess, and he still looks remarkably good after all that? The Lord gives everyone a second chance, unless they killed their first....
Red Stripe is good but not quite that good.
112 beers in 72 hours? Piker.
welfare pays a LOT better there than in the US
Less than 1.6 per hour. I concur.
Wow. Sad. Hope he doesn’t relapse.
“Piker” is correct.
Went on R&R to Hong Kong ——— Did that the first day!
I think! :>)
Wimpy lightweight, he is!
While the article was fascinating, especially the line ....
“Stephen only ate half a tube of toothpaste and a tub of margarine when he was an alcoholic “
What is the story, Nick, behind you finding this story ?
The numbers are not impressive. Drinking that many RedStripes is. The dude shouldn’t have a digestive system left!
It's not that big an accomplishment I mean problem ( heh heh ) to drink a little more than a half gallon between Saturday morning and Sunday night. Now of course that's just intuition, I wouldn't know from personal experience. Except that I would.
The ACCOMPLISHMENT would be doing that a number of times in short succession and sobering up without dying of a seizure. But spreading that much booze over 36 hours is ... well maybe like running a half marathon but not a marathon. It's really the consistent buzz maintained over a long period of time where coming out of it your life is at risk. A couple binges ... not so much.
I am very glad if this guy got better. There is a special love of life, of just feeling normal, among those of us who wandered through (and escaped intact) that particular region of Hell.
Now I will read the article :-)
Yeah - exactly.
Wing. Nut.
He was drinking, doing coke and taking anti-depressants?
Good gravy!
Impossible as it sounds. Red stripe beer is about four percent alcohol. To consume 56 cans in 18 hours is nearly impossible. That is three cans per hour, never mind trips to the toilet and sleeping? Something does not make sense.
Ok wait now there brother - drugs were not my thing - but that's just a nonsensical analogy regardless of the subject. You don't wash down a liquid with a powder. For example, you don't 'wash down' a glass of water with sugar.
My brother is a recovering alcoholic. He always told me that 12 beers isn’t enough, and one’s too many.
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