Cutting Down Alcohol Thread

Morning all, 9/21 for me please.


Hey welcome back Maman - I was missing you! I nearly posted to say so yesterday. :wave:

wintersunshine wrote: »

Hope it's ok I post here. I really need to STOP drinking. So I'm setting myself a 365 day challenge.

This is day 1.

Wish me luck.

wintersunshine

Welcome WinterSunshine! :wave: Of course it's okay to post here, that's what the thread's for.

You're saying exactly the same thing as I did when I first posted on this thread - it was time I had to stop, as well. I simply couldn't go on living like that any more and I knew it. Without everyone on this thread and Belle's support I don't know that I would have made it, so if you find yourself tempted please remember that we're here for you. There are strategies you can adopt to get you through situations that might be tricky. It's a tough habit to crack but it's do-able and well worth it. I wouldn't go back to drinking even if I thought I could manage to stop after one or two - which is doubtful because I never could in the past.

The thing I remember most vividly about stopping overnight was that I was utterly exhausted for the first two weeks, and even after that my energy levels weren't brilliant. We forget how much sugar there is in alcohol and if you've been over-indulging for a while, you're probably used to functioning on high sugar levels. Now is absolutely not the right time to be dieting - eat chocolate or whatever your secret indulgence is to keep your sugar levels topped up. It'll help get you through the first few weeks and it really, really helps. You can worry about other health concerns like losing weight (if you think you need to) later. One thing at a time is enough.

I took to going to be early and reading books and blogs written by people who sounded a lot like me who were stopping or had stopped drinking. It informed my journey massively and I'm not sure I'd be where I am without all of the reading I did, either.

Good luck and please post every day. It works.

cathybird wrote: »

Ah, thank God for AFDs.

That's an impressively quick weight loss, Honey Bear - I'm trying to cut down on sugar and carby things myself, though haven't really organised myself to do it properly yet. Are you cutting out all sugars (eg fruit, honey) or just refined sugar, if you don't mind my asking?

I couldn't agree more about the AFDs! :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Added sugar, CathyBird. I'm still addicted to sugar and I know it - if I buy myself a box of Malte$ers as a treet I can't stop eating them until the box is empty. And the same with a T3rry's choc orange - one session and it's gone. So for me, fruit is fine - I'm never tempted to eat a whole bag of apples! - but added sugar is absolutely not. No sugar on strawberries, no honey, nothing. And yesterday I decided that carbs aren't helping me one bit, so they're off the menu until this weight is gone.

Having said that, I'm at this for a few events over the course of 10 days and it's really easy to get chatting with lovely people coming out of a talk, which almost always ends up with going to tea/coffee and cake. I've been taking my own food when I'm there all day but yesterday OH joined me for two talks in the evening and we had dinner in between. I was very good and took the batter off the fish but the chips were fab, as was the sticky toffee pudding, and I think I may have had half a slice of chocolate cake :whistle: with him when he arrived in the afternoon as well. Not one of my better days and I'm not going to weigh myself until a few days after the festival is over.

I am, however, going to be carb and sugar-free until this spare tyre is gone because even losing a kilo I can feel the difference and it feels, okay felt, fab. It's only for a few weeks because if I don't over-indulge with boxes of chocolates or a handful of Twinks every single day, my weight doesn't fluctuate that much.

I have a 5kg bag of sugar in the store cupboard for when I make jam, marmalade and chutneys. It's really, really heavy when I pick it up and that's the excess me that I'm dragging around all the time. Pointless. It's got to go.

10/31 please, Baileys.

Honey_Bear wrote: »

Cross-posted with you, FatRab.

Congratulations on the weightloss, sorry about the way it happened, huge congratulations on the 100 Days and happy birthday!

Lol, thanks


I'm also cutting down carbs for the next few months. I'm determined to get down to my target weight by the end of September, and I know carbs don't agree with me. When I've done fad-diets in the past the low-or-no carb options always had the best results but were so hard to stick to.


Bloomin' carbs are everywhere - most fruit and some veg are going to be off the table for me too.


I am also a firm believer that "diet" soft drinks don't help. I know there's all the hoo-ha about artificial sweeteners, but a few years ago Mrs fatrab lost 6lbs in 2 weeks by simply cutting out a well known Scottish diet drink (made in Scotland - from girders!) and switching to water.


Best of luck

2/7 please.

antonic wrote: »

Hi Wintershine you can do it !.
I have been AF for 2457 days now (6 years 8months and 22 days).
I have done it by concentrating my mind on doing the things I used to do when I was drinking but doing them without the booze.
At the height of my drinking I was drinking 24-36 500ml cans of Belgian Stella Artois per weekend - I never drank during the week as I work.
Now my weekends include playing my favourite PC games and listening to the football - and remembering it !.
Please take my story as an inspiration that you can do it !.

Thank You!



And Well Done yourself!