Is it me, or is BEER the solution?

  Every week, I come closer and closer to understanding why Japan uses alcohol so much in almost any situation. With my job, we are forbidden to talk about drugs of any kind....drugs excluding alcohol. Apparently, beer and other intoxicating beverages are not considered to be one  of drug nature, but rather, a common social subject.  I am starting to think this is because beer is practically the lubricant of survival here. After work, you need a beer. Not just want, you need one.  I feel myself headed for some kind of mental break at times, and then i am reminded of the beer waiting for me. It seems to present some small fragment of release when everything else during that day seems to bind you so tightly, you can hardly breathe. 
      I am really not finding any relief from pressure. In fact, I'd say that it grows almost every day I go to work. I try. Hard. I work very hard...in fact, today I was the first to arrive and the last to leave...if I had been able to go inside my company at the time of my initial arrival, I would have worked well over 13 hours today. What I find the most disturbing is not the fact that I work so much, I think I have always been this kind of person....but the fact that I have started to be near a panic attack before work with all the stress I feel. It takes great effort to meditate and try to rid myself of how I feel and start each day new, but... it shouldn't even be this way. I love working, but I also love to live. Something feels wrong, and I am not sure what to do, other than try harder to find the "middle path" and to survive one day at a time.   I know this won't be my end, but it is definitely a semi unsuccessful beginning. I feel pressure from all sides- from those I work with, from those I work for, from those I work in front of, and from those I left to start anew. I feel like I am failing the promises and expectations made, and it really is a crushing feeling to carry every day. I can't look in the mirror now, because all I'll see is the disappointment I have with myself. 
   For the first time today, i truly recognized myself in a student. She sat tense and completely unsure of herself. As she spoke to me, her hands shook from nerves, and her fear of doing wrong was almost disabling. I watched as hesitation and anxiety danced across her contorting face, the words dropping from her lips with heavy uncertainty. I couldn't believe what I saw- the exact way I have felt today, embodied by a person I can barely communicate with. 
   The training head office has me second-guessing myself so much that I have no idea what is right anymore...and thus my growing  anxiety. I am getting more and more tired of all the pressure I feel almost every day. I have recently gotten the feeling that as soon as I start to gain more confidence and feel more comfortable, something has to change and make me freak out inside all over again. 
   The challenge I see developing from living like this is deciding where to go if things do not change, and how to find the correct path. For now, it is a battle of frustration and day-to-day survival. This is a test...and right now, I am not sure of the outcome. Uncertainty...it diminishes one's true character, I think.