Lots of bells ringing there. Mine ended up very differently though, I'm married to her.
My girlfriend was aggressive and nasty, but rather bafflingly it took me a while to connect it with booze. This was despite obvious warnings such as her her sister wigging out on me once for bringing the gf a bottle of Johnny Walker back from a biz trip.

What finally ended it was me videoing her in one of her booze fueled rages. She honestly had no idea of how she acted when she was pissed.

I sat her down, stuck the video on, said "This is what you are expecting me and everybody else to put up with".

She stopped drinking there and then. It wasn't like she was an alcoholic or anything, just that when she did drink, she became a monster.

That was 15 years ago. She will occasionally have a glass of wine or a beer with food, but if she starts looking like she wants another one, I'll just raise an eyebrow and she orders a coke.
(username failed moderation, Wed 23 Oct 2013, 9:01, 2 replies)

I had a mate a Uni like that
He was okay at first then he got into getting pissed in a big way

He'd drink 2 bottles of thunderbird to get himself in the mood before hitting the pubs and wondered why he was loosing friends. This was before camera phones but someone had a Dictaphone. He stopped the trampjuice starter and shied away from export larger and became an altogether nicer person
(sittingduck Attention seeking, bullshitting fuck-knuckle, Wed 23 Oct 2013, 9:17, closed)

Good idea re videoing,
however, a) towards the end she was a total bitch even when sober and it now appears a pathological liar, and b) I had no interest in fixing it or her past a certain point and was happy to walk away. I certainly wouldn't have risked marrying her!

(Glad your gamble paid off for you however. :))
(Isaac Hunt., Wed 23 Oct 2013, 12:51, closed)

I don't blame you at all.
One of the things I remember thinking was 'Why am I putting up with this'?

The vid was the final try. Luckily that worked, but I'd have done the same as you.
(username failed moderation, Wed 23 Oct 2013, 15:49, closed)