While drinking, there was a blissful two hour period where life was great. Of course it only lasted about two hours until I'd get mad or sad. ;-) This two hour period could best be described as the "***** it" zone. Zoned out without a care and happy. My "abuse" period probably lasted from 15 to 18. When I was 17 I wondered if I was an alcoholic. By 25 I knew I was and began to drink alone. Once we move to the dependence side the reason we still do it is laregely the same for us all. But the abusing stage I think widley varies. Numbness being a bottom line. I have some Adult ADD so my mind can get terribly busy and alcohol quieted it, or seemed too. I'm also bi-polar and didn't get properly treated until I was sober. An interesting thing is that none of my bi-polar symptoms showed up until well after sobriety. When my chemicals got back to normal it turned out that my normal wasn't so "normal" after all. So some of it was self-medicating without having a clue something was wrong chemically to begin with.