Love or Alcohol??

Love is Like Alcohol

Love is like alcohol. It makes you wander. It makes you fall. It makes you hallucinate. And the hangover is worse.

I know this. Not because I read it in a book. Because I have been drunk on both. The bottle and the body. The glass and the gaze. The poison that comes in liquid form and the poison that comes in the shape of someone saying your name like you matter.

Both of them lied to me. Both of them promised me something they could not deliver. Both of them left me on the floor at 3 AM, wondering how I got there and why I kept coming back.

---

The Wandering

When you drink, you wander. You leave the bar and end up somewhere you do not recognize. You wake up in a room that is not yours. You find receipts in your pocket for things you do not remember buying.

Love does the same.

I wandered into relationships I had no business being in. I wandered across cities, across compromises, across lines I said I would never cross. I wandered away from myself. Slowly. One yes at a time. One text at a time. One night at a time.

You do not notice you are wandering when you are wandering. You think you are going somewhere. You think there is a destination. A point. A reason for all the walking.

There is not. There is just the wandering. The beautiful, drunk, aimless wandering. And then the moment you look up and realize you are lost.

---

The Falling

Alcohol makes you fall. Off stools. Off curbs. Off the wagon. Off the story you told yourself about being in control.

Love makes you fall too.

I fell for potential. I fell for promises. I fell for the way they looked at me in the beginning, before the looking turned into something else. I fell for the idea of them. The version I built in my head. The one who would finally stay. The one who would finally see me. The one who would not leave like the others.

They were never that person. I knew that. Somewhere, in the sober part of my brain, I knew. But I was already falling. And when you are falling, you do not stop to check if the ground is still there.

It never was.

---

The Hallucination

Alcohol shows you things that are not there. Conversations you did not have. Affection that was not real. Solutions that do not work.

Love is the same.

I hallucinated a future. A house. A quiet evening. A hand to hold when the medication fog got thick. I saw it so clearly. The colors. The sounds. The feeling of not being alone.

None of it was real. It was a projection. A movie I was playing on the wall of someone who was just standing there, not even watching.

But the hallucination was beautiful. That is why I stayed. That is why I drank. That is why I loved. Because the hallucination was better than the room I was actually standing in. Empty. Quiet. Just me and the cigarette and the memory of every other time I had hallucinated and been wrong.

---

The Hangover

With alcohol, the hangover comes in the morning. The headache. The shame. The fragments. The texts you should not have sent. The calls you should not have made. The realization that you are exactly where you promised yourself you would never be again.

With love, the hangover is worse.

It does not come in the morning. It comes in the weeks. The months. The years after. It comes when you see their name somewhere and your stomach drops. It comes when you hear their song and you cannot breathe. It comes when you are fine, finally fine, and then something small reminds you and you are not fine anymore.

The hangover of love is not a headache. It is a hole. Shaped like them. And nothing fills it. Not time. Not therapy. Not the next person who comes along and promises to be different.

They are not different. You are not different. The hangover is always the same.

---

The Relapse

You quit drinking. You swear off love. You are done. You are free. You are finally sane.

Then a bad day comes. Or a lonely night. Or a familiar smell. Or a face that looks like theirs. And you think: one drink won't hurt. One message won't matter.

Then you are back. In the bar. In their bed. In the same loop you swore you had escaped.

The only difference is the shame is heavier now because you knew better. You always knew better. You knew the wandering would lead nowhere. You knew the fall would hurt. You knew the hallucination was fake. You knew the hangover would come.

You did it anyway.

That is not stupidity. That is thirst. The thirst for something to take the edge off. Something to make the silence less loud. Something to hold, even if it is holding you down.

---

The Memory That Does Not Leave

I remember a particular hangover. Not from alcohol. From her.

I woke up in my own bed. Alone. Which was good. But I reached for her anyway. Out of habit. Out of hope. Out of the stupid, stubborn belief that maybe this time the hallucination had been real.

My hand found nothing. Just the cold sheet. Just the space where she used to be. Just the echo of a voice that had promised me forever and then left before Tuesday.

I lay there for an hour. Not moving. Not crying. Just lying in the shape of the hangover. The hollow. The absence.

I have had many hangovers from many bottles. None of them felt like that. None of them sat in my chest for weeks. None of them changed the way I hear certain songs. None of them made me afraid to sleep because I might dream of her.

Alcohol gives you a hangover for a day. Love gives you a hangover for years. Sometimes forever.

---

The Question I Keep Asking

Why do I keep drinking? Why do I keep loving?

I know what will happen. I know the wandering. I know the fall. I know the hallucination. I know the hangover.

And still.

I pick up the glass. I swipe right. I say yes when I should say no. I stay when I should leave. I love when I know better.

Maybe because the first sip is so good. The first glance. The first text. The first night when the world feels possible and you are not alone and the hallucination has not yet been exposed as a lie.

Maybe because I am addicted to the beginning. The part before the hangover. The part where love is not like alcohol yet. It is just warmth. Just hope. Just the beautiful, temporary feeling that this time, maybe, the bottle will not empty. The person will not leave. The hallucination will turn out to be real.

It never does. But the beginning keeps me coming back. The same way the first cigarette kept me smoking long after I knew it was killing me.

The loyal betrayer. Love is the same. Just in a different bottle.

---

Last Note

I am not writing this to warn you. I am not writing this to tell you to stop drinking or stop loving. That would be hypocritical. I have not stopped. I will not stop. I am thirsty. I am human. I am addicted to the beginning.

I am writing this so you know you are not alone in the hangover.

The hollow chest. The sleepless nights. The songs you cannot listen to. The name you cannot say without your voice breaking.

Everyone talks about the high of love. No one talks about the hangover. Because the hangover is not romantic. The hangover is just pain. Just absence. Just the space where someone used to be and now is not.

I know that space. I have lived in that space. I am writing to you from that space.

If you are there too, I am sorry. I wish I had something better to offer than company. But company is not nothing. You are not the only one who woke up alone this morning. You are not the only one who reached for someone who was not there.

The hangover will pass. Or it will not. Either way, you will survive it. You have survived worse. The cigarette. The medication. The brain that will not rest. You are still here.

So am I.

We are still here. Hungover. Wandering. Falling. Hallucinating. Knowing better. Doing it anyway.

That is not wisdom. That is not stupidity. That is just love. And love is like alcohol. It makes you wander, fall, and hallucinate. The hangover is worse. And you will still take the first sip again.

I know you will. I know I will.

Cheers.

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