What was your first experience with drinking alcohol?

I was six and my dad was drinking a glass of wine. I asked for a drink and he let me take one. My lips puckered, my body shivered and everyone laughed, except me.

Unless you count NyQuil, I haven’t had the experience yet.

My story is very, very similar to @jonsblond‘s with the main difference being that I was probably 3 or 4 and my dad was drinking whisky instead of wine. I think that’s what put me off of alcohol and, in my 24 years of life, have never been drunk or even close to it…

@jonsblond… SIX…? oh me? That’s when I tripped acid for the first time.

Alcohol? I remember sophomore year in high school puking up in front of the cops on one side, and my parents on the other. They let me go unto the wrath of my parents. I wish to this day they’d just locked me up.

I was 18, a sophomore in college, and attending a party off campus. I’d never tasted alcohol before or even been very close to it. There was none of any kind in my upbringing among religious folk. Somehow that was the night.

I started with sherry, which I’d expected would be wonderful because of all the British novels I’d read. It really wasn’t very pleasant, so next I tried beer, which I thought was nasty and gross. I ended up with Southern Comfort, and by then I was already too wasted to care what it tasted like, but it wasn’t very comforting.

I distinctly remember my date’s telling me, “You have ceased to be an intelligent conversationalist.” I thought that was hysterical.

The next morning I woke up (in my dorm, quite safe and unharmed) with a powerful thirst and gulped down two Cokes, and somehow I ended up feeling drunk all over again. All the girls in my dorm came in to view the spectacle. I’d had a reputation for being pretty strait-laced up until then—much more so, in fact, than I actually was.

I think my uncle on my moms side might have given me a sip of his beer when I was around 10 or so, but remember, I was brought up in a Mormon family. As an adult, I began social drinking when I was around 25 and I joined a bowling team.

I was 14. I told my mum I was going to the pictures with a friend and then staying over at hers ( which I genuinely did, every other Friday). Her big sister was 18 and she got us into a pub. I felt so grown up, I could actually knock all these drinks back and feel fine. I was so grown up. Until I got outside. My head spun, I felt sick. We got back to her house and I couldnt stop being sick. They had to call my mum. She wasn’t very happy.

First time I had a sip I was elementary age, my dad let me try his drink.

First time I drank on my own was a few sips when I was 12 or 13.

During my teen and college years I probably had less than 10 drinks total all years combined. Never more than one in a single night.

The first time I was drunk was my college graduation at age 22.

I think I was 15 and at a friend’s cabin at Tahoe. I had it mixed with something; back then one shot would have gotten me plastered out of my mind. What I had was a very small amount and I remember feeling buzzed and liking it, but I also remember feeling nauseous later that night. So it was so-so :P

I wasn’t born yet.

I was 13 and we (four girlfriends) bought cidar and drank way too much of it. We were all completely drunk. I can’t stand cidar to this day.

Age 12, about this time of year, I stole a bottle of wine from my parents, and split it with a neighbor kid and his older sister and her boy friend. And then we went cruising El Camino Real on the San Francisco peninsula, and listened to the Doors on a brand new 8-track.

I think I got a little drunk at a seder when I was five but basically I didn’t drink until college.

My parents drank only socially, and not often nor to excess (as far as I could see). In high school, when some of my friends were sneaking around drinking beer and stronger stuff and thinking it was cool, the policy in my house was that if I wanted to drink alcohol, I could do it in a parent’s presence. (Sounds pretty old-fashioned by today’s standards, doesn’t it?)

The only time I remember actually doing that was on a deep-sea fishing trip with dad when I was still pretty young. I took a few swigs of cold beer on the boat and gave the rest of the can to dad. I didn’t like it. And except for brief martini and then single malt scotch phases in my 30s, I, like my folks, still imbibe only socially and never often nor to excess. (And trust me, the social occasions are coming up less and less!)

Whether dad’s policy was an intentional way of demystifying alcohol for me or not, it seems to have worked.

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Confirmation celebration (affirmation of baptism) when I was 15. A very small glass of wine.

Throughout my childhood I’ve always tasted what my parents were drinking. Tasting, not drinking. I was at a party when I was 14 and got very drunk. I had a blast at the party and I thought it was really fun to be drunk. The next day it wasn’t so fun.

On holiday in France we went wine tasting, I was 11yrs old & was meant to eat cheesy nibbles & watch.
Uh-huh, not me, gimme that pretty red stuff…#mistake #puked #toomuchtooyoung.

I can’t remember the first time I tasted alcohol, I know I had a few sips as a child. The first time I got drunk was on my friend’s 16th birthday, I was 15. I remember having to be up for work (waitressing the breakfast shift in a hotel) at 5.30am the next day and feeling like absolute shit! That really did put me off and I didn’t get drunk again (to the point of getting a hangover the next day) until I was about 23 years old and since that time I have pretty much given up alcohol altogether.

Two days after I graduated from high school, I headed east and lived with a French family for the summer. They had a small vineyard in Burgundy that produced (I later learned) world-class red burgundies. I took for granted having watered wine daily for lunch and the real stuff at dinner. I never got drunk but had a tannin-induced headache often.

Before that, nothing. After that, not much. An occasional ½ glass of wine, an attempt (short-lived) at drinking Jack Daniels because of a boyfriend, and the record held for beer consumption. Probably not the equivalent of a can during my entire adult life.

Once I had a small glass of sherry on an empty stomach and passed out.

When I was skiing above my ability in the Swiss and French Alps, I used to drink tea with sugar, cream and a shot of rum for Dutch courage and to get me off the mountain top.

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I was about 12, it was new years eve and my family had a big party at home. My dad gave me a small glass of Babycham. I liked it, and from then on I’d be given some at any family party or celebration. It was no big deal; my parents are not big drinkers (my mum never touches it at all) and it did not lead me into alcoholism.

My brother’s first encounter with alcohol was the funniest. When he was about 5 we were all sat around the dinner table and my dad had a glass of beer (dark ale) with his meal. My brother watched it for ages, and finally asked dad if he could have a taste. He took a sip, pulled a face, and about five minutes later he asked for some more.

There are baby pictures in which I’m guzzling Budweiser.

These are completely different than the pictures I have of my son, in which he’s pumping a keg or carrying around a couple of bottles of booze. Promise. The ones of my kid are hilarious and harmless. The ones of me are, well, a baby drinking beer, and my legal guardians capturing that for posterity.

My grandmother used to make a virgin batch of eggnog just for me every Christmas. When I was eight, I actually made my OWN batch, under her instruction. When my back was turned, Nanny SPIKED MY EGGNOG, with a shit-ton of rum. I was all dizzy and uncomfortable, and spent Christmas dinner angry at Nanny for ruining my special Christmas drink. Everyone else thought it was funny.

My parents let us have a taste of anything they were drinking.I kind of liked beer.
In my teens I was alone in the house and decided to try something from their liquor cabinet. I poured a small glass from the first bottle I pulled from the shelf. It was so bad that I poured the rest down the drain. It was white vermouth which my dad would pour a bit into a martini.
I didn’t drink again until college and enjoyed all the sweet cocktails first, working up to harder and harder drinks. Single malt scotch was my last favorite.
I don’t drink at all any more.

I think when I was 14. A friend and I got our hands on a 6 pack of 3.2 beer (nasty stuff) and we were camping on the lower level of the acre my house was on. I’ll never forget, Elton John singing. “Saturday Night’s Alright For Fighting,” “Gonna get a belly full of beer!”

I don’t remember the first time I tried alcohol(I’d had sips of wine/beer here and there from an early age and some champagne on new years eve) but the first time I really drank I was around 13–14. I was over a friends house and his parents went out somewhere for the night so it was just us and his older brother (who was maybe 3 years older) . Well they were helping their grandmom move at the time so a lot of her stuff was in their basement, including a very large box of a ton of different alcohols.

So, we got this brilliant idea to try some shots. Of course since there were like 10 different alcohols we had to sample all of them…. So we started doing shots. Then we got the even more brilliant idea to see who could drink more. The very important aside to note at this point of the story is we were both young and stupid(clearly) and didn’t realize that alcohol actually takes a little while until you feel the effects, it’s not instant like we believed. Shots…. and more shots…. 20 shots later in the span of less than an hour we both say something along the lines of “ya know….alcohol is bullshit…. I don’t feel anything at all, I think grown ups just exaggerate it.” And that my friends is one of the last things I remember from that night aside from laying on his kitchen floor in a pool of my own vomit.

Luckily my friends aunt worked at the ER so she was able to get some pills for us to help with the alcohol poisoning so we didn’t have to go into the ER. My mom obviously pissed but she knew I’d learned my lesson, to further make this point to me I had to get up the next morning at 630 for school.(YAyyy first hang over…) I remember being in gym class that day and sweating a lot and the teacher asking me why I absolutely reeked of alcohol lol.

Needless to say I didn’t drink for a good 3 years after that experience lol

I was a little girl (somewhere between 4 and 8 years old), at a huge party my grandparents were having around Christmas/New Years. I’m talking about a party big enough to rent out a hall for, not one in their own house. Anyway, they had these big trashcans (brand new) full of something they called either White Lightning or Jungle Juice, basically a shit-ton of alcohol mixed together to make a sort of punch. People would just dip their cups into the trashcans and fill up. When nobody was paying attention, I drank quite a bit of this stuff. My mother later found me outside with no coat on, “ice skating” on the iced up sidewalks, barefoot. Busted!

I started drinking on a semi-regular basis when I was around 14 years old. Stopped by the time I was 19 (it made me horribly sick), had a few drinks here and there to see if it still made me sick (it did), and wasn’t able to drink again until I was in my late 30s. Now I can drink, but I’m a major lightweight. I just had a beer, and am thoroughly buzzed.