Hylton's story: “In a nanosecond, I’d decided I’d had enough”

Trigger warning – discussion about alcohol dependency and withdrawal.

I went to a party that lasted 43 years, and that’s only a fraction of how I lived my 1000mph life from being a 15-year-old until I was 58.

My mother died suddenly in October 1980, which left me with a turbulent and chaotic mind. I hated the world and all who were in it. Mine wasn’t a slow descent, but more a plummet into the abyss. I needed to escape from ‘normality’, which didn’t mean a dereliction of duty…my father was only 52 and widowed. While he sought his own way of dealing with grief, I began to drink steadily each day. These were school days still, and I'm ashamed now that I sometimes drank before school, whilst at school (drinking whisky on the football pitch) and afterwards.

At this time, I was young, super fit and indestructible - I couldn't and wouldn’t die! So, my love affair with alcohol commenced, living life in the fastest lane I could find. My first marriage was in 1992, to a lady who (unfortunately for me) loved a drink too. In our years together, we never got into debt; we owned beautiful homes, two cars and took foreign holidays every year.

Early 30s and I was still living a high-speed existence, going to parties every weekend. With housefuls of like-minded souls filling my life, life couldn’t get better. However, I also had very dark moments; remorse, regret, self-loathing, hatred of what I'd become. Several times I promised myself that life wasn’t in a bottle. My weakness was my extremely addictive personality, which meant everything in excess otherwise it didn’t work for me. The stronger the alcohol, the better life was (yeah right!).

Eventually, the game for me changed in December 2018. After a ridiculous amount of heavy drinking, I woke up in intensive care. The blood to both my legs had been cut off, leaving me in a bad way. Eight operations followed, along with acute kidney failure, four days in a coma and a hospitalised infection. I cheated death three times in those months in hospital, but hey! I’m indestructible Hylton, right? WRONG! This was the worst period in my entire life. I experienced: hallucinations, seizures, dialysis, several major surgical procedures & extreme paranoia (at the time I believed nursing staff were drugging me against my will and luring me into an evil cult).It took me six weeks of physiotherapy, to learn to even walk again, as I'd been in a hospital bed for two months by this point. At this time I was divorced, I went through my ‘whisky and water’ period for the next five years.

In February 2023 I was then diagnosed with stage 4 cirrhosis, after 47 pints of fluid were drained from me. Doctors told me that if I continued drinking, I would have six months to live. In a nanosecond, I decided I'd had enough. I couldn’t do this to my family, my deceased parents would be so disappointed in me. I didn’t want the epitaph of “Hylton drank himself to death”,I was worth a great deal more than that. I thought back to my travels across the world & realised that I still had many more adventures inside me. To think I could have so easily thrown all this away, and for what?

15 March 2025 was two years since I’ve had a drink, and long may it continue. My liver specialist told me recently that I now have a short life expectancy. That’s the price I'm paying for years of harmful drinking. I’d tell my younger self that life is a privilege not a right, I’m proud when I tell people I don’t drink, and I cringe watching TV at characters who glorify alcohol. There is no glory in it whatsoever.