KEY POINTS:
Ever woken up with the uneasy feeling you did something terrible the night before but can't remember what it was?
Ever hit the phone in the early hours and rambled on and on, expecting the person on the other end of the line to be there for you, then forgot you ever rang?
You might think, oh well, you don't do that very often, that it's okay because you're only a binge drinker. And you may only be a binge drinker.
It's just that being a binge drinker doesn't rule you out as an alcoholic.
So says Roger Green, 70 and sober for 28 years. Someone who on reflection thinks his own drinking so long ago ruined his chances of being an All Black.
The scenarios above are part of the addiction counsellor's battery of questionnaires and psychometric tests designed to ascertain whether someone is dependent on alcohol.
And many a binge-drinker is actually an alcoholic, says Green, who is presenting some of the awful facts about New Zealand's drinking habits to corporate leaders - he points out that 77 per cent of heavy alcohol users are fulltime employees and cost a fortune in lost productivity - in the hope he will gain financial support to get a new retreat off the ground, a place where people with alcohol addiction can go to begin to confront their usually long-denied illness and start the recovery process.
The Stepping Stones Recovery Trust is a non-profit organisation and its formula will be based on a cutting-edge and successful model in America, where Green trained in addiction counselling.
Though not affiliated to Alcoholics Anonymous, the programme goes back to the basics, following the principles of AA's famous 12 Steps and immersing people in them for 30 days, in an environment where they can't go home and have someone tell them, "Come on, just one drink is all right".
Green believes programmes in New Zealand are not effective enough and that the retreat will be a breakthrough for one of our main killers and causes of misery in the home, the workplace and the community.
As for those in denial, Green has this to say: "Binge drinking is a symptom of addiction to alcohol.
"There are different types of addiction to alcohol, or alcoholism."
Some people can lay off the drink after bingeing but others can't.
The hidden cost of addiction in this country is simply huge, he says.
"It's all the hours and the energy that goes down the drain with addiction. Huge energy.
"And I'll tell you what: for every addict/alcoholic there are five people directly affected, five people whose energy is directly affected because they are focused on the addict/alcoholic in the family or the workplace or their friend."
New Zealand, he says, is light years behind other Western countries in attitudes towards alcohol. New Zealanders do not accept that alcoholism is a "no fault" illness.
Green veers into his own past when, as a young man, he was determined to become an All Black - and had the willpower to do so. He made it into the Junior All Blacks but became unstuck because of booze.
He didn't drink during the rugby season but throughout the long summers he would get plastered.
"The point is, my willpower didn't help when it came to addiction. There are people in this country saying, 'Just pull your socks up'."
Alcoholism is huge here, he says, and stopping takes much more than pulling your socks up.
"We all know one but we don't know that we know one. It is acceptable in this culture."
He believes around 10 per cent of the nation are addicted to alcohol and many are people who don't think they are.
"The trouble is with it, the symptoms are antisocial. It's not as if you become a nice person if you drink heavily. Some do for a while and they're cosy and lovely. And then it bites."
* NO ESCAPING REALITY
The Alcohol Advisory Council says it's not the drinking that is the problem, it's the getting drunk.
It describes its advertising campaigns - including the toddler being swung by his drunk uncle and being smashed into the wall - as holding a mirror up to ourselves.
The scary statistics:
125,000 teenagers are binge drinkers.
75,000 teenagers will binge once every two weeks, and 50,000 at least once a week, with the intention of getting drunk.
635,000 adults drink at least once a week and binge.
785,000 adults drink regularly, often every day, and many binge.
450,000 of us were binge drinking on our last drinking occasion.
1.2 million drinkers are accepting of bingeing and regularly do so.
The costs:
Alcohol harm costs between $1 billion and $4 billion a year.
It costs the public health sector $655 million a year.
The costs in crime are $240 million.
The costs in social welfare spending are $200 million
Other government spending comes to $330 million.
The cost in lost productivity is $1.17 billion.
Alcohol is responsible for 70 per cent of A&E admissions.
75 to 90 per cent of weekend crime is attributable to alcohol.
One in four women can't remember what they did while drinking.
Source: Alac
