
This story discusses addiction and suicidal ideation. It might be triggering for some readers
I first picked up a drink at 17. I was extremely shy, crippled with social anxiety and it gave me a major confidence boost.
Looking back, I can see that I never drank like other people, but, of course, hindsight is 20/20.
At university my drinking went up a gear. But that’s just what people do, right?
While you're here, watch Shanna Whan on staying 'Sober in the Country'. Story continues below.
I started working in magazines in London and my drinking went up a gear again.
But I was a driven, ambitious, hard worker, right? As the years ticked by, and my career was my only focus, I became a hard-partying workaholic alcoholic.
I did not know that I was either. I was either at work or at the bar; until I got barred from the bar(s) and then I’d do (another) geographical - which is an AA term for 'thinking that moving location will stop you from drinking'.
My job took me to New York. Well, no, that’s not quite right: I worked for a year and a half trying to get offered a job on a magazine there and then cried on the plane filled with regret that I’d made it happen. I’d packed up my little life in London and arrived in New York not even sure why.