Do you believe that you are addicted to drinking? I have overused drinking sometimes but only when I couldn't sleep, as a substitute for the habit of emotionally beating myself up at night in order to numb out. So I substituted alcohol use for a very toxic emotional habit over which I had little control. Definitely a mental health issue for which there was no effective treatment and that was the primary thing to me.

Sounds good that you were able to get some help with the substance abuse counselor but I think they are pretty focused on drinking as addiction and not every heavy drinker is necessarily addicted, according to an addiction medical doctor I once heard speak.

How are things with your mental health issues? Do you think you could try a change of therapist or something different there? Doesn't sound like hospitalization would be very good for those.

It's your body and your mind and I know with my mental health issues it's been hard to trust myself at times but eventually I've had to.