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Most people but not all, who quit drinking or cut down drinking after a long period of heavy or binge drinking will experience withdrawal symptoms of some description.

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Withdrawals

Most people but not all, who quit drinking or cut down drinking after a long period of heavy or binge drinking will experience withdrawal symptoms of some description. These withdrawals can range from the relatively mild, for example feeling slightly anxious, to the severe, for example delirium tremens and convulsions. The severity of the withdrawals are usually depend on the level of dependence the drinker was exhibiting prior to stopping drinking.

Withdrawal symptoms may have for some time been the driving force in you continuing to drink. For example you may have been drinking in the morning or at least early in the day to get rid of the shakes and/or feelings of anxiety. So there is a danger that if you again experience these withdrawals then you will again start drinking. If on the assessment before you joined this website your scores showed you to be a moderate to high dependent drinker and the withdrawals are severe, then as suggested before, you should seek help to cope with the withdrawal symptoms and then return to use the website to help with your recovery. Severe withdrawal symptoms and DTs are a medical emergency and require medication to reduce the effects of withdrawals.

The types of withdrawal symptoms that one might expect to see are as follows

Mild to moderate psychological symptoms:

• Feeling of jumpiness or nervousness
• Feeling of shakiness
• Anxiety
• Irritability or easily excited
• Emotional volatility, rapid emotional changes
• Depression
• Fatigue
• Difficulty with thinking clearly
• Bad dreams

Mild to moderate physical symptoms:

• Headache - general, pulsating
• Sweating, especially the palms of the hands or the face
• Nausea
• Vomiting
• Loss of appetite
• Insomnia, sleeping difficulty
• Paleness
• Rapid heart rate (palpitations)
• Eyes, pupils dilated