Tell me how you manage your alcohol triggers...

[Scaramoose]

I have decided to stay off the booze until Christmas. I have previously been able to drink pretty much every night and have recently been getting sick of it, and so have decided to give myself a proper break (and hopefully loose weight and look better for it too!)

I tend to only have a couple of beers if we are in the pub, and can hopefully swap them easily enough with non alcoholic (if I still want something beery) but at home it is harder. I often drink while watching something on TV, and if it's tense or emotional say, I often have a drink after (or during) to calm down - realise this sounds odd written down! This, for example, might be a less obvious trigger.

Can you tell me what your triggers can be, and how you manage them...?

Is there any way you can just remove alcohol from your house? My red wine habit was getting out of hand so now I don't keep any in the house and just buy a bottle once a week. I find that if I'm on the sofa watching TV or whatever I may fancy a drink but not enough to make the effort to go out and buy it!

I drink tea! I always have San Pellegrino in the house, but if I drink my platelet count drops and I get ill, so I limit the booze to one drink a fortnight, or a month.

DH drinks it too so it's not that easy, also I often use a splash in cooking (really!) TBH I am finding it reasonably easy so far as I was fed up with it, but I also think I am yet to come across a proper trigger!

Not that I am trying to put you off giving it up, but I know lots of people who do these dry months here and there but then go back to what they were drinking before when it's over. I think drinking is a bit like dieting. In that I feel it's better to aim for a long term change, rather than a few months dry but then drinking too much again. Alcohol in moderation is fine. Would moderation be a better aim? Just curious!

Get a litre of really shitty cooking wine in a plastic bottle.

Freeze it into ice-cube trays if that would be too tempting.

@Storm4Star I know what you mean, but I think I am generally bored of it. I’m not giving up something I am currently enjoying, I am just trying to change a habit but also don’t want to lapse before the three months are up. I want to do it for longer, 90 days as opposed to 30, because I want to hopefully have more obvious health benefits than I would if I just stopped for a month

I see what you're saying. I like Mawkish's idea of freezing wine into ice cubes!

Read ‘ditch the drink’ by Jason Vale

I found drinking sparkling water with nice syrup elderflower etc but still in a wine glass worked for me, as it’s the habit more than anything. 9pm I have a cup of herbal tea.

Although I’m pregnant now and just don’t fancy it that’s probably the easiest way!

Have you tried Becks Blue?

I also love sparkling water, if you add some squeezed lemon it helps flush and detox your liver too and has other health benefits

I used to drink almost every night too, I found I didn't enjoy those times I wanted to enjoy a drink at the weekend I just felt guilty and it wasn't pleasurable any longer, it was just a wind down mechanism - anyway ... fizzy water and lemon is good! You'll find you get loads more sleep and feel so much better too

Wish I could do three months!! I'll continue feeling proud I drink less nights per week than I don't drink now ... plus Friday is a hair down night so I tend to drink a few 🍾

I keep sofa water, lime cordial and bitters in the house - if I want a gin and tonic then I’ll make a soda, lime and bitters in a gin balloon glass with ice and that usually does the trick. I am also keeping off the booze for weight reason. A lot of it is just habit!

Bitters does havealcohol in it but you literally use a few drops.

@Fleuriepeninsula I love the soda, lime and bitters thing too - it's my go-to non boozy grown up drink. Ive never met anyone else who's heard of it though!

My mum used to drink it growing up! It was big in the 80s in Australia, I suspect it’s probably made a comeback since then

Soda lime and bitters sounds lovely

Breaking a habit takes 3 weeks I think.

Going for a walk instead of watching TV - so if you always sit down and watch something at 8 - record it - go for a walk instead - come back and sit down with a cup of tea and watch it at 8.30....or do the ironing instead. Just something different.

Replace all alcohol with low alcohol beer/cider. I found that it was the taste I liked more than the feeling booze gave me.

Bedweiser do a 'Prohibition Beer'. Tastes ok.

'Budweiser'.

I was exactly like you a few months ago and decided enough was enough, I initially went dry for 2 full weeks to prove to myself that I could do it now I'm down to 2 nights a week - Friday & Saturday

Agree - not having it in the house is the best, then there's nothing to crave

I treat myself to chocolate / cake / ice cream instead of booze at night when watching TV - not helpful health wise really but it's really helped me stop, and giving up the food next will be easier in the long run than the booze

My favourite drinks are: Becks Blue and a dash of PLJ lemon (it's in the cordial aisle and made from 90% lemon juice) in schwepps tonic

We've cut right, right down in our house - TTC for far too long and heading into fertility treatment and my husband works in booze so it's always around/he definitely has a bit of a thing with it. Non-alcoholic beer is brilliant, we've tried bloody loads of them and I reckon the Heineken 0.0 def the best. Tastes (pretty much) like the real thing and actually really refreshing as there's nothing in it (beware some of them are really sweet, e.g Budwiser, but there's nowt but barley and water in Heineken). That said, use that when you really want a drink/Friday night/whatever your trigger is not 'just because' as I don't think that helps at all with behavioural/psychological shift (we reined in buying it when we realised DH had had 8 one Sunday!). Other things that have made it easier are doing stuff instead of telly in evening (even if it's sorting knicker drawer!) and arranging social stuff in the morning/day (e.g Saturday breakfast -which was lovely btw) or a 9am yoga class so you're happy to go to bed/don't want to feel rough. Sounds boring but weekend feels SO much longer without any sort of hangover and I can actually remember conversations with friends! Other obvious one, is just don't have it in house.
I agree with the points about moderation. Maybe have a couple of weeks totally off and then have odd ones, as may be a more lasting change?
I prob have about two drinks a week now and really enjoy them.

God that was long, sorry!