How I got here pt.2

College was the greatest gift of my life at that time. Escape from a household of shame and punishment. Due to being so poor there was no shortage of government $ to send me to higher learning. Grants and loans suddenly had me with disposable cash most of my peers envied. Guess who bought the booze? I was notorious and imfamous for the tabs I would pick up. I still ran at college but without my taskmaster uncle to appease I finally quit my sophomore year.
The only logical move for a budding young alcoholic after that was to join a fraternity! Now it was on. What a wonderful environment. Booze, Brotherhood and Booze. (Bet you thought the 3rd "B" was gonna be Brauds:) We drank and fought and drank and fought. At some point those fools even saw fit to elect me president. I had arrived!
Along with my alcoholism I am also a workaholic. I supplemented my drinking habit in college by working in a restaurant. It was an easy fit since I had been working in restaurants since I was 11. After a few semesters of partying, work and school there just wern't enough hours in the day. Somthing had to give. Betcha can't guess what went? :) I worked hard and played hard. All the while dismissing that I had a problem. I was an excellent chef and alcoholics were bums with cardboard signs. That wasn't me I'd say.
It was in those restaurant/fraternity years when the greatest and worst thing ever happened to me. One night I was at a bar with friends when a really drunk girl got confrontational with my friends and me. At first it was funny as she slurred and made no sense. She swung at me as I taunted her. She and her boyfriend were tossed out as my friends and I kept drinking. At closing time we all poured out of the bar. Guess who was waiting? As she started to scream and yell at me I returned several unkind words back. The boyfriend took exception and produced a set of brass knuckles with a knife attached. Calmly and quickly he punched me right in the gut. I went to swing back at him and fell to my knees. I looked down to see blood gushing out. As I was scooped into a car and rushed off I saw as a big group of my friends/aquiatences mob them both into thier van. I woke up in a hospital bed with an incision from my ribcage to below my navel. The doctor came in and said, "You almost didn't make it. We gave you 8 units of blood and did exploitory surgery. Your liver was lacerated." My mom sat there and wept and all I could say was I'm sorry. I was released from the hospital 2 weeks later. At discharge the Doc said to me I would mend because the liver is the only organ that repairs itself. However, I had to not drink for 1 year.