*sigh* this may take a while

savingholmes

Dry January sounds a good plan. Perhaps keep a diary too of how you feel after drinking / not drinking and what the quality of your sleep was like. Some friends of mine really noticed an improvement.

crunchy_time

Think I might do dry January too. I’m relying on the thought of a few gins on a Friday night getting me through the week which isn’t healthy. I feel like a good clean break will change my perspective xx

ohdearhowdidthathappen

Thanks SH and Crunchy
I've been reading 'The n@ked mind' and it's been a bit of an eye opener on alcohol... I know my own (lack of) will power, so not tempted to go sober at this time of year, but January will be perfect and I'll go from there and see where it leads me.
I'm finding on my 3-4 days off that I find it perfectly easy, but as soon as I pour one on a drinking day I always have more than I planned.  I do have an off switch and never get completely drunk/blackout/hungover, but I've begun to question how good it is for me.

EssexHebridean

A slightly different take on doing dry January - be slightly cautious if you feel, being realistic, that it's unlikely that you'll get through it without having a lapse, as the mental aspect of "failing" could be a bit problematic, perhaps. Of course there is also the viewpoint that if you find you CAN'T get through it without a lapse, that in itself is worth giving further consideration to? Could be a good time to try to move towards a scenario where drinking was something that only happened on a Friday/Saturday night though, perhaps (or whatever suits you as "weekend" depending on your own work commitments). 

It's a really interesting area - although I don't drink regularly - I've never been someone who has a glass of wine most evenings, for example - I have switched mindset rather over the last year or so to the concept of drinking more mindfully. I know it affects my sleep, so for me, even at a weekend I will now stop and consider whether it's "worth" the trade-off of a poor night's sleep for even a single drink. Quite often - and particularly where I have a few busier days coming up, I might decide that actually, I'd rather have a soft drink or a cuppa instead. More and more when I do drink I'd prefer that it was for a specific reason - for example this weekend we were at a beer festival with friends on Friday, I didn't drink anything the other days at all. The week before we were out round some pubs with pals on the saturday - again, that was the only night I drank. 

ohdearhowdidthathappen

-NSD -2 this week again
-any unexpected spends that may need to be worked into future budgets - £0
-average step count for the week -8500 this week, worse than last week... poo weather and family commitments did not help
-number of strength training sessions -none again this week
-alcohol free days, 2 this week, aiming to do 4 each week, so bit of a fail
-podcasts listened to - 2x n@ked mind, 2 x s0ber @wkward, 2 x DR, 2 x s0ber life.  I'm liking the drinking podcasts, much as I'm not planning on giving up alcohol completely, they're very motivating for cutting back.
-books, still reading DR's TMM

ohdearhowdidthathappen

Have done all the Christmas shopping within our budget.
Our washing machine decided to break this week   and as a family of 7, didn't hesitate to buy a new one, on the CC.  Highlighting again why we should have an EF! 
Cats had their jabs this week, but we have of those cat plans, so included under that

Honeysucklelou2

Totally get the washing machine purchase...it’s the one appliance I dread going wrong! Well done on getting all the Christmas shopping done.

savingholmes

Been there with the WM

lucielle

Agree of all the appliances the em going wrong is the worst!
L

enthusiasticsaver

Oh dear yes a washing machine is definitely a necessity. I didn’t realise you didn’t have an EF. When you became debt free did you not start diverting some spare cash to savings? 

Well done on getting Christmas shopping done in budget.