First of all I want to apologize to anyone who reads this entire summary of my life I know its all over the place like tarantino film but Id be very thankful to hear from anyone really

So I recently put down drinking about a week ago after drinking a minimum of 6 beers daily for the past 3 years. I tried quitting in the past but to no success, as soon I attempted to quit within 3 days of quitting I would feel like a low grade fever would be coming in and only relief by drinking more. I also recently quit smoking after 9 years which I will elaborate more further in this post.

Last week I made the decision I wanted to improve my health after many warnings from my family. Exactly what kind of warnings? My family kept stressing that they knew people of my age who passed away from blood clots/heart attacks awhile back and they worry that my sedentary lifestyle and overall health puts me at a huge risk. Reasonable enough. 

As of right now I haven't drank any alcohol in the last 8 days and I feel like crap. tension headaches, neck stiffness, hot flashes, back pain a burning/stabbing chest pain that comes and goes briefly (thankfully no shortness of breath unless I get a panic attack), and some indigestion. I do want to note that I have many medical conditions that have been diagnosed by doctors in the past that I will list below and a few of these symptoms existed prior to quitting but they have been greatly amplified after I quit drinking/smoking.

Before I continue I do want to add that Im 5'8", weight is approximately 275lbs and am 23yo hispanic male. I suffer from scoliosis (12° curving) might be worse now as my last x-ray was 4 years ago and then I didnt have as much chronic back pain as I do now, so I have terrible posture and as I gain more weight the more trouble I have trying to fix my posture. I also suffer from GERD(acid reflux) and have general/social anxiety simply making eye contact with some people can trigger it.

In the past I've felt everything Im feeling today when I was first diagnosed with my medical conditions nearly 4 years ago. I was advised to lose weight and at the time my weight was 254lbs when I was 19yo and in 4 months I managed to lose 52lbs and almost all my troubles went away but I wasn't an alcoholic then and had temporarily quit smoking because I had anxiety and smoking would just amplify it even more. 

It did take me nearly 3 years to gain the intial 52lbs I lost + 23lbs, so my weight loss program was legit but it didn't take into consideration alcoholism where I would drink up to 900 extra calories per day depending on what beverage I picked plus late night Doordash orders +1,500 calories more on cheeseburgers.

I started my same regiment I did many years ago and in just a week I felt a burst of energy, I get better sleep now when my neck isn't stiff-like at night but my anxiety has gone berserk, my assumption is I have too much psychological stress. I cut alcohol off after years of abuse and originally I did not want to give up smoking because it makes me really anxious when I stop but I had to give it up the other day(10/23) because I noticed that after a brief smoke break I had a burning sensation on my chest, shortness of breath, and thigh/feet spasms it all went away after 30 minutes or so. I also easily cut about 1k-2k calories per day by not drinking or getting munchies which that itself can be very taxing on the body especially the brain.

I do know that since I put down both drinking and smoking my body will temporarily feel overwhelmed during this detoxing period.

The last time I felt like this or better yet the first time I felt like this I was going in and out of the ER because I felt like I was having a heart attack every other day but as mentioned it was GERD and Anxiety the whole time. So applying past experiences I assumed as much, and since ER bills tend to get really expensive, and doctors hit you with that "your wasting my time on actual patients that really need help". Right now the way I see it is if I dont feel very overwhelmed I will not go to the ER. I did schedule a physical/blood work for tomorrow as a preventative measure incase something is up. Mostly incase if I turned Diabetic as, I had a bad habit of fasting up to 16 hours every day so I could drink alcohol before my very first meal so I can buzz hard on it


It really sucks because my Anxiety, GERD, Scoliosis all give a similar chest tightness/stabbing/pressure. Ive amatuerly tested my cardiac health by jogging a 1/4 mile and felt no angina, which it was something my aunt would get( she had bad heart valve) she couldn't even go check the mail without feeling chest pain and shortness of breath,(dont worry she had surgery and is doin okay) so I do find some relief knowing that exercise does not cause my chest pain but unfortunately my anxiety dominates my mind.(Also my aunt is not blood related so no heart conditions run in the family but diabetes does on both sides)

Before I wrote this I had an anxiety attack and I just jogged in place, did some jumping jacks and squats and just like that my anxiety went down a bit(no more pains as of right now) 

I guess what I really want is to hear your stories, people of reddit, I desire to hear if you had a similar experiences so I do not feel alone in these mildly trying times, again. 

Also I do want to add that just over a year ago I had a car accident, hit a curb at 70mph and my seat belt (thankfully I had one), hooked up around my gut and bruised me up pretty bad. After the bruising went away I noticed a lump, likely a hernia but I never got it checked out and it disappeared or I probably got fatter but either way I think its somewhat crucial information.


Dont worry I don't get triggered, I will gladly accept constructive criticism especially if I could really use it. Again thank you if you read all of this or at least some of it, anxious to hear from anyone.