Cutting Down Alcohol Thread

Your are absolutely right Honey Bear. You have to justify not drinking, you never have to justify having a drink! Had another couple of drinks last night and I'm feeling pretty ropey this morning, despite interspersing wine and soft drinks. Determined not to waver again, my body is not coping well with alcohol at the moment. I should start listening

DelightedMum wrote: »

I did the dry January a couple of years ago and it really made me aware of how on TV drinking is showed more or less constantly. That's not normal life but runs the danger of making people think it is. Probably not explained myself very well but you get my drift :rotfl:

I'm afraid it is normal life for a lot of people now. TV in particular has normalised it. Watching the very first series of Forgotten a senior femail police officer poured herself a glass of wine as soon as she walked into the house at the end of the working day, no cup of tea, just reached straight for the booze. After each tricky conversation with her father - poured herself a glass of wine. We're being taught that's how women deal with stress now - they have a drink. It's monsterous.



Can anyone on this thread honestly say that they don't immediately think of wine, or a g and t or a bottle of champagne to celebrate a birthday / Christmas / their annivesary / a family member graduating? It was one of the biggest hurdles I had to overcome when contemplating stopping completely, and it that thought alone stopped me even considering it for at least a couple of years.


Booze is how we Brits celebrate and console ourselves, and we think it's completely okay, because apparently everyone else does.

GlendaSugarbean wrote: »

Your are absolutely right Honey Bear. You have to justify not drinking, you never have to justify having a drink! Had another couple of drinks last night and I'm feeling pretty ropey this morning, despite interspersing wine and soft drinks. Determined not to waver again, my body is not coping well with alcohol at the moment. I should start listening

I may be unusual Glenda, but nearly all my friends have been 100% supportive of my decision not to drink at all, ever, any more. A couple told me that I didn't have a drink problem (like they'd know!) and to begin with the conversations were a bit 'Really? Wow! That's a bit drastic' but that's actually been the sum total of comments. I think someone may have said they really admired me for doing it eventually, but it was four years ago and it all fades a bit after a while.


I worry about friends who I know, even if they don't, that have a problem with booze, but I've never said anything to them, and I never will. They'll either deal with it or they won't, and absolutely nothing I can ever say will make a jot of difference to their drinking. I know, because that's the way I was before I decided to quit. Someone had actually said, at least 10 if not 15 years before I stopped that I might want to think about my drinking - Nope. I didn't want to think about my drinking, so I didn't. I felt judged though, and that didn't really make me feel that good around that person.



Not drinking is now so normal for me that I never get cravings, and I never realise anyone around me is drunk!



8/30 please, Shaggy.

DelightedMum wrote: »

I want those dancing Homers Shaggy....put me down for 5 next week please!

Hi Shaggy, I’m back on Monday, please can you put me down for the SNC with a target of 4 Homers - thanks for restarting these and counting for us this month.

Honeybear, thanks for your post, as always it was really thought provoking. You are such a valuable part of this thread - thank you!

billy2shots wrote: »

I would like to join in with this please. A little confused with all the numbers but am guessing it's alcohol free days out of total number of days, 18/25 would be 18 days of no drink out of a possible 25?

Anyway I haven't drank for a week and I'm intending to go the month in the same manor. Don't want to set unrealistic targets so will evaluate things then.

Hi Billy2shots, welcome to the thread! You’ve done brilliantly not to drink for a week already. So we all set a target number of days not to drink out of the 30 there were on offer in September and then report in each day with how it’s going. You can write as little or as much as you find useful, anything that helps you reduce your alcohol is fine.

If you intend not to drink tomorrow until Thursday you might also sign up for the full school night challenge (SNC) which runs Sunday to Thursday inclusive. The badge this week is Homer Simpson which is why I said 4 Homers in my earlier post. Some of the threads stars will be a long later I’m sure. I’m not one to emulate as you’ll see from my signature I haven’t been hitting my targets but I wanted to say welcome on here when I saw your post!

Many thanks for the clarification and welcome wanna bee free.