The Giving Up/ Cutting Down alcohol support thread - number 13

ElusiveLucy

Honey_Bear wrote: »

Elusive Lucy, 18 is quite something. Honestly. You should be really, really chuffed with yourself for achieving such a great number. Don't be too hard on yourself - it takes quite a bit of self-discipline to change habits and the longer you hang around on the thread the easier it'll be to make your target.

Thanks Honey Bear. In fact your comment made me realise that in March I did conquer one of my challenges, and that was not to drink Mon-Thur. I had found myself slipping into mid-week drinking as my OH is working away during the week. At least I have knocked that on the head. My main issue now is that even though I am only drinking weekends (Fri/Sat/Sun) I am still going way over the 14 unit recommended max per week. I can easily do the equivalent of 3 large glasses of wine each evening. So, my next challenge is not to drink on Sundays. I probably won't start this weekend though as we are going to a family get together this sunday.

Dizzy_Imp

1/30 for me please - I actually gave away three bottles of wine to our builders today, as a thank you for a job well done. Not even a pang of regret at their departure :A

Honey_Bear

Wow Dizzy, you've really turned the juggernaut around, haven't you? If you're anything like me, the relief is absolutely overwhelming when you realise that you've finally found a way of not reaching for that first glass in the evening. Considering how topsy turvy your world is at the moment it's an amazing and rather wonderful achievement. :T I bet the recipients of the bottles were really chuffed with them, too.

Arkers wrote: »

I've cut back and he hasn't. I hope things improve, but at the moment I find myself sitting in a different room from him most evenings (his choice) so he can drink the night away without me. Now I'm no relationship expert, but even I know this isn't good. For the first time in 22 years I don't know what to say or do. I'm going to leave it there for now.

Arkers, I had to spend most of the early boozeless evenings in another room, too, and for a very long time I found watching TV with OH too uncomfortable. That had been our boozing time, and even though he might have cut down now to one or two glasses (instead of one or two bottles between us every night), I just didn't feel comfortable in there, with him, for months. Nothing happened instantly.

I now go to bed early and read after I've seen everything I want to watch, and never, ever stay up to just keep him company, even though I do now spend some time with him most nights. I won't watch a film or programme I'm not interested in just to be with him, which I did in our drinking days. (I, too, have a penchant for trash TV which I now indulge in secret on my laptop in bed while he's watching worthy documentaries.)

This adjustment process takes quite some time, I think, and the more changes there are, the more complicated it is. You're cutting down, he's not, you're changing your normal evening behaviour by not spending time with him in the way you used to, and you're seeing behaviour that you find difficult to deal with if I'm reading correctly between the lines. They're all different aspects, none of which can be foreseen when we decide to deal with our own drinking, which we perceive as a problem all of its own, in isolation. It's not.

The knock on effect of doing so reveals stresses that were always there, but masked by the alcohol. For women in particular, I think we judge ourselves and find ourselves guilty if we think we've let ourselves and/or our loved ones down. That then seems to morph into taking on the guilt and responsibility of any stresses and strains in the relationship. Stopping drinking can expose that as a bit of a myth.

If I had one suggestion it would be to tread lightly while you work out how you want to spend this new time and energy you've got from cutting down, and leave him out of the equation for the moment. In other words, focus on yourself.

The rest will fall into place, eventually, and you can deal with that as and when.

Well done on what you've achieved, even if it is sometimes a bit uncomfortable.

maman wrote: »

:T to all the AFDs rolling in. You've done so well and, if anything like me, every single one is one more than you might have had without the thread.:A

Incidentally, we spend the evenings mostly in separate rooms but that's because I'm happy with junk telly and he's not!!:rotfl:

So true about how important this thread is, Maman. I don't know if I've ever told you but when I joined, you and Shaggy were the two people who I clung to, to get me through. I'll never be able to thank you both enough. Good to know you're someone else with a penchant for trash!

ElusiveLucy wrote: »

Thanks Honey Bear. In fact your comment made me realise that in March I did conquer one of my challenges, and that was not to drink Mon-Thur.

Under-estimating our achievements is so, so easy to do, Elusive Lucy and it is a fatal mistake. If we feel we've failed and then think we're repeatedly failing, after a while we lose the impetus to keep going. It's really, really important to take stock and mark the successes. I've always thought that's what Shaggy's scoring system does so well, and is one of the secret triumphs of the thread. Hang on in there - you're getting there, but in the meantime enjoy the weekend guilt-free.

Just in case the scoring isn't enough to keep me motivated, when I reach one of my milestones I go out and spend some of the saved boozing money on things I really, really want that will last and give me a lot of pleasure. Last year it was a large number of huge blue ceramic pots for our sundeck. I think the two year mark will be a brand new ipod. I love my little secondhand bashed about nano, but it's got a fault that can't be fixed and as I'm going to be 60 in a little bit I think I'll combine the two opportunities and indulge myself.

2/30 please, Shaggy.

Arkers

Thank you HoneyB, have you given thought to writing a book/blog about your advice? To me you appear to be the voice of reason. My DH is a really laid back chap (nick name of "slippers" so there is nothing demonstrative in terms of behaviour on his part that I can complain about. I guess that it is my problem and not his. I can't make him cut down, but by the same token I don't want to be part of it when I'm not having a drink, I think there may be a lot of truth in what you are saying. I am now off to resurrect my knitting I started ages ago, I shall now try and knit one pearl one instead of drink one:A:p.


Maman, thanks for your words of wisdom too. I guess I watch completely different genre to my DH so that might be something to do with it .


Wasn't AF last night, woke up at 0300 with a headache, an then up at 0600 and now feel like carp. I was going to have a few tonight, but I'm too tired after last night so probably won't bother.


Thanks again everyone, enjoy this lovely Spring weather.
Arkers x

maman

Thank you for your kind words HB.:A One of the many things I like about this thread is that it's a very broad church and not judgemental in any way at all (suppose that's two things;)). All I ever wanted to achieve was to cut down and behave 'normally' around drink on social occasions. I'm delighted that there's room for me alongside people like yourself who've chosen the total abstinence route.


I'm so pleased I'm not the only one that enjoys a bit of trash TV. I've no real interest in animal programmes or documentaries unless they're on a subject of particular interest. I particularly like to record the formulaic programmes (the ones that repeat things after the break as if you have the attention span of a gnat!) and then fast forward over the boring bits:D.


I wasn't AF last night but I did stop mid-evening for a cup of tea and a break. Finding my stop button was a real bonus!!

New_Me

2/20 for last night and tonight please

CuppaTea

New_Me wrote: »

2/20 for last night and tonight please

Fantastic for a Friday and Saturday night. Brilliant stuff.

Dizzy_Imp

2/31 for me please Shaggy - DSS tentatively offered me a pear cider this afternoon, which I declined and there were no raised eyebrows in surprise, just an "OK, cool.." response.

Honey_Bear wrote: »

Wow Dizzy, you've really turned the juggernaut around, haven't you? If you're anything like me, the relief is absolutely overwhelming when you realise that you've finally found a way of not reaching for that first glass in the evening. Considering how topsy turvy your world is at the moment it's an amazing and rather wonderful achievement. :T I bet the recipients of the bottles were really chuffed with them, too.

Thank you I am really pleased I've managed to do this. Although, thankfully, my drinking didn't lead to injury to me or anyone else, and I've been assured I was happy and slightly flirty when tipsy (very reserved with men when sober, but as I'm married that's a good thing), I always felt my reputation for "holding my own" wasn't very ladylike and I didn't enjoy the mornings after.

Arkers is right - there's a book waiting to be written. It would be a bestseller I'm sure!

maman wrote: »

Thank you for your kind words HB.:A One of the many things I like about this thread is that it's a very broad church and not judgemental in any way at all (suppose that's two things;)). All I ever wanted to achieve was to cut down and behave 'normally' around drink on social occasions. I'm delighted that there's room for me alongside people like yourself who've chosen the total abstinence route.

Me too - we are a varied and eclectic bunch. I've got to tackle the weight gain now to ensure my podgy bottom can fit in next to you guys :rotfl:

Arkers

Good morning 1AFD for me for last night please Shaggy.




Arkers x

Honey_Bear

Thanks Dizzy and Arkers, but no, no blog or book. It's this thread that's important to me, the people who contribute it, the general ethos as Maman says, of both cutting down or giving up, the mutual support, the lack of judgemental language and myth-busting about alcohol and giving up alcohol, generally.

It's actually too late for me to start a blog - the really, really important days are the first few days and weeks of successfully stopping, what Belle calls 'building up sober momentum.' That's when people need most support to get through each day AF, and whatever I had to say at that point was said at the time in posts on here. I'm pretty sure I didn't put anything in about wanting to bite chunks out of table legs when the craving struck problematically, but they passed, just as they did when I gave up smoking. They certainly weren't any worse, and because I only ever drank habitually in the evenings, probably a lot less stressful. The key was changing the rest of my habitual evening behaviours for a few weeks, hence not watching TV with OH. If I knitted, I'd have taken up that up again, particularly as it gives you something to do with your hands.

The reason I say the things I say is that either a comment that another poster has made sparks off a train of thought in my mind, or things I haven't heard or read someone else say keep occurring to me and I feel the need to add them to the debate.

The latest thing that has really surprised me which I haven't come across elsewhere, is just that the idea of my drinking, and booze generally, now seems faintly ridiculous to me. I've mentioned that a couple of times in passing but not explained it, although it's very real to me. Last weekend after the feast when everyone else was nursing their hangovers, shambling about feeling very sorry for themselves and needing to scoff a recovery breakfast while knowing they were going to write off the rest of the day, I found myself thinking about what it took to get me to where I used to be on those mornings.

1. Acquire money.
2. Use it to go out and buy booze.
3. Drink lots of it.
4. Feel crap afterwards.
5. Look forward to the next time.

When I say 'faintly ridiculous' is that meaning clearer? It's not that I think booze is evil, I think that me being someone who drinks like that regularly is faintly ridiculous because, on reflection, I can't see what I found constructive or fun about it.

I still see the silly side of things and fall about crying with laughter with OH just as much as I used to, and it doesn't take booze to make that happen - which I always thought it did. I love, love, love going to bed earlier, switching the light out earlier and waking up earlier without a headache. I've got more done in the last 18 months than I could ever have dreamed about when I was drinking, and if I get the one last monster done in my in tray today - I've caught up on the backlog of all of the things I simply had to do that I let slide when I was drinking. I've lost about a stone in weight and am still under my target weight and if anyone had told me all of that was possible within such a comparatively short timespan, I genuinely would not have believed them.

I can't say I'll never drink again. I know that if I took one drink I'd be okay that time, but the temptation would be to repeat that a few days later, and I accept completely that if I started drinking again I'd pick up where I left off. No-one goes back to the start; we all pick up where we left off. Going back to that life doesn't even sound remotely attractive to me, but there are enough people who've fallen off the wagon for me to know that it's really, really easy to do. I'm not good at denying myself stuff I want (Chocolate? Why not? A bit won't hurt. etc etc) but booze is just one of the few things in life I used to have and now, apparently, can't. This life seems a fair exchange.

I want other people to know that getting past the hurdle of the idea, and then the first few weeks is possible, do-able and fairly straightforward.

I wish I'd known years ago there were non-sugary AF drinks I could enjoy like B**** Blue before I stopped drinking. If I could have had a night a week off the booze every week I'd have known I could stretch that to a few more with the B**** Blue when I started to get worried my drinking was out of control. OH now does two AF nights a week most weeks and I'm really pleased he's made that decision himself.

In all honesty, I drank more than anyone should for 23 years and it was very, very rare day that I didn't have one or two in the evening.

Anyone on this thread who can go one evening a week without booze is doing better than I was, and I'm in awe of everyone who has enough self-discipline to go two nights or more a week regularly, or use their Stop button after a couple.

3/30 please, Shaggy.