Got Punched By A Drunken Friend - Totally Unprovoked

0:00Hey, how are you doing? Welcome to another video. Today I want to, this is another question or another comment that I got and I thought I'd weigh in on this one a little bit. This person says that they found themselves in the unenviable position of watching a good friend destroy herself with alcohol. I've tried to point it out to her and told her to stop, but she says she'll never stop and that I should just accept, accept her as she is. Things got out of hand recently when she attacked me and started throwing punches at me. Drunk, of course, and totally unprovoked. Her behaviour is getting worse and I can see her decline right in front of my eyes. I don't know there go eye but for the grace of God, but I think I will be losing a friend soon. It's a horrible thing to witness. So look, it's sad, it's a sad thing to watch anyone you care about going down this road. I've seen a couple of friends of myself. I remember going back to Ireland and there was a good friend of mine, my best drinking buddy in Ireland. I came off to Spain, I left him in Ireland and I went

1:06back a few years later and he just carried on drinking and had just lost all sense of himself, just really. It was like he just rusted away with the alcohol. I think it does help if you, in terms of trying to help somebody else, it does help if you don't drink yourself, it puts you on a much sound or footing if you like. If you're trying to encourage someone else not to drink, actions speak way louder than words. And of course words are useful, but there's a time and a place. I've got the advantage in that I can sit here and I can make these videos and I can pretty much talk about whatever I want. Anyone who's listening, anyone who switches on their phone or their computer and is listening to these things, they want to hear what I'm saying or there wouldn't be listening, right? So, if I were to say these things in front

2:10of somebody that I cared about, if I spoke in this way to a friend or a family member, especially if they weren't asking for it, regardless of who they were and what situation they were in, how do you think that would go down? Not really well, I can tell you that much. It would just come across as proselytizing or preaching or whatever, it wouldn't come across well. If somebody comes to me and asks me for help, then I'm quite happy to give them help. I've had friends and family members saying, I have to have a chat with you about this, you know, a ranger talk and then in a couple of when the talk is about to happen, they'll back out of it and I've never had anyone having to talk with me and that's understandable, right? I would much refer to talk about these things. I think in the moment when somebody's going through these things and they can say to me, they think about me and they think, well, you know, he's the one that's going to, he does this for a living but then when they think about it and think, yeah,

3:13I'm the brother or the sister or the brother or the friend or whatever, then it's different, it's a different situation so I can't tell you how many times somebody else a friend has said, you know, they found out what I do for a living or an acquaintance or something like that, you know, and they immediately know somebody then in their life who needs help, who has a problem with alcohol and they'll ask me if I might have a chat with them and I always say, of course, yeah, but it always gives them that thing of, you know, tell them to give me a call, use my phone number, tell them to give me a call and I've yet to have a person from that type of a conversation, give me a call, right? Even though sometimes they're that friend or that acquaintance who's said to me that they've got a friend, they'll come back to me and say, oh, I gave them your number, did they get in contact with you? And it's always now, so you can't directly help somebody who doesn't want to be helped, right? You can't directly help somebody who doesn't want to be helped,

4:17you know, you can indirectly help them in many different ways, for instance, by, you know, not being a drinking partner for them, you know, refusing to go out and get drunk with them, refusing to be a shoulder to cry on for people, you know, when somebody comes to you and you know that somebody needs help and they're saying to you, oh, this happened or that happened when I was drunk, you know, unless they're going to do something about it and you know they're going to do something about it, there's no point you're enabling that kind of behaviour by doing it, by being that shoulder to cram, so don't do that, you know, you also have to think about it from your own perspective, right? You know, you're also part of this friendship, it's a two-way street, right? These things, and there are rules, you know, some of these rules are most of the rules, nobody ever talks about the rules and goes, oh, well, these are the rules that we have to follow, these are unspoken things, right? Rules that shouldn't have to be spelled out to a friend

5:21or a family member, you know, within a friendship there are certain things that are just not done, you know, the reliance that you don't cross even among friends, and as far as I'm concerned, somebody starts throwing punches at me, it ain't going to end well, no fucking way, I wouldn't put up with that for two seconds, I've had that too much in my past, and that friendship would end, it would be over for me, that's a personal thing, right? You know, since I stop drinking alcohol, I can't tolerate drunken people, I don't like being around drunken people, it's nothing to do with them, but I won't be around a drunk, when they're drinking, you know, it's just not for me, especially for people that I care about, it's, it is what it is, right? It is what it is, and there's a guy down there, he's, they're hurting cattle, but there's like a barrier on the road,

6:22there's a road coming up all the way around here, and there's a barrier on certain parts of it, so he's banging the barriers, that's what the noise is, but like I said, you know, it is what it is with, with these type of relationships and with myself, you know, everyone to their own on this, but when it comes to, when it comes to drinking, I'm responsible for myself, right? Everyone, and when it comes to personal responsibility, you can only be responsible for your own self, right? You know, you're not responsible for somebody else's behavior, you know, responsible for what they do or what they say, right? But part of that personal responsibility is not leaving yourself open, not leaving yourself open to other people's abuse, not leaving yourself open to other people's physical abuse, physical injury, not leaving yourself open to injury, but not also that includes mental injury, you know, mental abuse, you know, I prefer not being around people who are drunk

7:29because they don't realise the effect that their drunk behaviour has on me, no, should they? I'm not saying that they should, you know, it's any of their responsibility, it's not, I don't have to put myself in that situation, I don't have to be there, I'm not, I'm responsible for being there, I'm responsible, if I put myself in a pub at night, like night everyone's drunk and stuff, but that I'm responsible for that going inside my head, you know, if I'm with my family and I stay and I listen to them when they're all drunk, you know, I'm responsible for that, I don't have to stay there, it's like me sitting in the middle of a busy fucking road and then complaining when I get hit by a car, you know, but I don't want to see my family in that situation, I don't want to see the members of my family, my sisters or my brothers, I don't want to see my best friends in that situation, right, I don't want to see anyone I care about slurring their words or saying things that they wouldn't normally say, I don't want to see them acting stupid, right, and it's not, it's nothing to

8:32do with the fact that they're slurring the words, everyone does that when they're drunk or it's or that they're acting stupid, everyone does that when they're drunk, it's nothing to do with that, it's the fact, these are people that I care about, that I have an image of them in my head, right, they're not going to remember any of this, but I will, I will, and the certain things that will stick in your mind, have a look back at your life, right, and the certain things that stick in your mind and they stick there for a reason, right, and it doesn't matter that they were drunk when they did it, or drunk when they said it, maybe I won't even remember that they were drunk, but I will remember the behaviour, I will remember the words that they said, you know, somebody says something really nasty to me, I might not remember that they were drunk when they said it, but I will remember that they said it to me, somebody hits me, might not remember that they were drunk, but I'll certainly remember that they hit me, right, it's like a stain,

9:33not on them, on what you think of them, you know, on who they are in your mind, you know, when I was a drinker and I was out getting drunk with my family and my friends or whatever, you know, this wasn't an issue for me, it didn't happen to be an issue, and I never thought that, you know, you don't think about these things when you're when you're getting sober, but now it is an issue because I remember, right, and these are things that are going to stick because they're out of the ordinary in your life, right, so you know, the person who made this comment, are you ever going to forget the fact that your so-called friend was throwing fork and punches at you, do you know, it doesn't matter if she was drunk, it doesn't matter if it was a male or a female, right, and it shouldn't matter in any situation, if somebody throws a punch at you, you know, if you assault a stranger, right, when you're drunk and you're hold up in front of the

10:38court, in front of a judge, that's no defense, the judge will not look at that as a defense that you're drunk, so you know, think hard and fast about keeping this person in your life, you know, unless they change, and even then, you know, give it some time to make sure that the change sticks, but you know, it's one of those things in life where you look at this and you think, you know, is this person even a friend, you know, it's like not a question of me keeping them as a friend, are they acting like a friend, do you know, they don't have to change, she said it herself, or the person in the comment, I don't know if it's a man or a woman, they said it themselves, that, or the woman in the comment said it herself, she said that she's not going to stop drinking and that you have to accept her as she is, right, punches and all, right, punches and all, right, so that means that any time she wants to use you as a punch bag, she can, you know, well,

11:42that's true, if you decide to stay in that relationship, it is where it is, people are as they are, right, and people are not going to change unless they want to change, but you also get to choose, you know, you've got to accept that a person will be who they are, but you must also have decided that person is acceptable to you, not only as a friend, but as a person in your life, as anyone in your life, so, you know, I'll leave it there for today, look, if you want to support what we do here on YouTube, I'd really appreciate it if you consider supporting us on Patreon, the links in the description down below, and I want to really thank everyone who's already a patron, your support is very much appreciated, thank you very much, take care of yourself, and I'll speak to you in the next video, I want to report to you, bye now.