When I first quit drinking, I felt sorry for myself, "Why Me" and in AA that only lasted a short time. I soon realized I'm not exempt from having problems, and one of them was alcohol. I simply didn't know when to stop drinking.
In the past 20 years I did miss that occasional buzz, you know that buzz when you sit around talking to people and relaxing, doing something like painting and refinishing furniture, cleaning the house, working on hobbies, personal projects, etc.
It's not an easy road. These are very stressful times. A lot of us lost jobs in the early '90's and we are struggling to survive without a retirement that we lost and had been saving for. There are times when you want to say screw it. But you don't, you just go one more day......