Ocsober

[FanGirlX]

Anyone fancy joining me for Ocsober?

If so, we could make this into a support thread and maybe list ideas for non alcoholic drinks, good films and tv programmes to watch etc.

Morning!

I have to go shopping later and plan to stock up on drinks. I was on a Dry January thread years ago and someone said they liked Belvoir ginger cordial with ginger ale with a squeeze of lime. That was a very delicious and 'adult' type of drink that was not too sweet so that might be today's go-to drink. I am hoping to lose weight as well though so plan to use a drink like that for my early evening trigger time then switch to water. That is the plan anyway.....

Good morning all,

I've only just woken up after ten hours of sleep, just off to make a coffee now but feeling reasonable considering I am not a morning person.

@5BlackDoors how is your DDog doing? I hope he/she is recovering from whatever is unsettling them.

I plan to lose this hard to shift half a stone over the month, but we'll see.

I'm doing an ad hoc night shift due to staff holidays and no agency cover being available tonight so it will be an easy night to stay AF for me at least.

Congrats on day one everybody

Morning!

Thanks @ZednotZee DDog is just an incredibly old dog- he will be 18 in January. So he ate a little bit much last night of his poached chicken dinner and was a bit vomity and is also largely incontinent. He's currently curled up in front of the fire. It cannot be too long before we have to make the hard decisions I think. :(

Ah poor old guy....eighteen is such a good age though, shows how well he has been loved and cared for.

Would love to join. Drinking has become too routine after a spectacularly awful couple of years - close bereavements ongoing impact of this, plus working in the NHS… plus the pandemic that has affected us all.
I’m on a couple of bottles of wi d and couple of small G&ts a week, so although not ridiculously high, double the advised limit and not many AF days.
As well as general health reasons, is impacting on inability to lose weight, and really worsens peri menopause symptoms - even after 1 unit, I will get to sleep a bit quicker, but wake at least once in the wee small hours, heart racing, and feeling like I’ve had several bottles!
I need to shake the ingrained belief that a glass of wine with relax me/help sleep, because it doesn’t any more!

Trying to have low- cal or no-cal alternatives. Tried and liked:
Sparkling water with a slice and squeeze of any citrus, esp pink grapefruit
Slimline bog-standard tonic water or bitter lemon
Fancy tonic mini-cans, esp Fevertree
Coke Zero
Diet ginger beer, M&S or waitrose
M&S still fresh lemonade - sugar-free
Lots of strong tea!
Old-fashioned horlicks or ovaltine
Pukka tea - womankind/3 ginger/nightime

@30kgtogo

Would love to join. Drinking has become too routine after a spectacularly awful couple of years - close bereavements ongoing impact of this, plus working in the NHS… plus the pandemic that has affected us all. I’m on a couple of bottles of wi d and couple of small G&ts a week, so although not ridiculously high, double the advised limit and not many AF days. As well as general health reasons, is impacting on inability to lose weight, and really worsens peri menopause symptoms - even after 1 unit, I will get to sleep a bit quicker, but wake at least once in the wee small hours, heart racing, and feeling like I’ve had several bottles! I need to shake the ingrained belief that a glass of wine with relax me/help sleep, because it doesn’t any more!

Trying to have low- cal or no-cal alternatives. Tried and liked:
Sparkling water with a slice and squeeze of any citrus, esp pink grapefruit
Slimline bog-standard tonic water or bitter lemon
Fancy tonic mini-cans, esp Fevertree
Coke Zero
Diet ginger beer, M&S or waitrose
M&S still fresh lemonade - sugar-free
Lots of strong tea!
Old-fashioned horlicks or ovaltine
Pukka tea - womankind/3 ginger/nightime

You're on about the same number of units as me. Not at a problematic level but definitely a lot higher than recommended and I think is probably having an impact on our health longer term.

I have friends who drink a bottle of wine every night, so they are on 60-70 units a week - they still manage to hold down jobs, manage their home life etc. I also have friends who drink about 10 units a week over a Friday and Saturday night. There does seem to be quite a range of consumption.

It would be interesting to see some stats on how many people drink more than the recommended 14 units a week but aren't at either end of the spectrum ie alcoholic or teetotal because I suspect there are a lot of people drinking 20-30 units a week but it's not being noticed by their workplaces, GPs, family because they aren't falling over drunk / getting into fights / having their stomachs pumped etc.

@5BlackDoors

Morning!

Thanks @ZednotZee DDog is just an incredibly old dog- he will be 18 in January. So he ate a little bit much last night of his poached chicken dinner and was a bit vomity and is also largely incontinent. He's currently curled up in front of the fire. It cannot be too long before we have to make the hard decisions I think. :(

Bless, give DDog a hug from DD and I. Hope he is feeling better.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/sep/22/generation-x-heavy-drinkers-will-anything-persuade-us-to-stop?CMP=ShareiOSAppp_Other

I'm Gen X and this rings very true.

Thanks for the wishes re DDog. He sleeps most of the time but it's really hard to guage the 'right time' for the end, really. :(

I have been quite active today and have just done my weekly meal planning and also a good chunk of life admin I have been putting off.

Gen X also here!

I just counted up my units using the drinkaware calculator. I am too embarrassed to reveal them but it is at dangerous levels for sure. I need this month off. And then possibly more.

I'm generation X as well.
Plan for this evening is sorting through a box of old schoolbooks/ children's paintings. etc. It's been on top of my wardrobe for years. A bit chilly so will have hot drinks.
Good luck all.

Evening all, we are pretty tired and damp. Had fish and chips for dinner with water, now on the lemon and ginger tea.

@FanGirlX, great article; there is a very marked normalisation of daily alcohol amongst all social groups of Generation X.
I certainly used to drink a lot more wine every night pre-children, and am amazed some of my friends (late 40’s - early 50’s) can still do so,,whilst parenting and holding down responsible jobs.

After a break of at least a month, I’d like to get to a couple nights a week with a large G&T or glass of wine, maximum.

I’ve had some not great non alcoholic wine (McGuigans 0% chardonnay - do not recommend), but about to have stuffed roast lamb and potatoes, so cheered by that!

Gen X here too

I have a kombucha this evening as recommended somewhere on MN. Its very pleasant!

[quote 30kgtogo]@FanGirlX, great article; there is a very marked normalisation of daily alcohol amongst all social groups of Generation X.
I certainly used to drink a lot more wine every night pre-children, and am amazed some of my friends (late 40’s - early 50’s) can still do so,,whilst parenting and holding down responsible jobs.

After a break of at least a month, I’d like to get to a couple nights a week with a large G&T or glass of wine, maximum.

I’ve had some not great non alcoholic wine (McGuigans 0% chardonnay - do not recommend), but about to have stuffed roast lamb and potatoes, so cheered by that![/quote]
My friends and I are mostly early to mid 40s, so late Gen X. We were all ladettes back in the late 90s / early 2000s. Im surprised by the amount of friends who quietly confess to drinking a lot whenever I mention I'm doing OcSober / Dry January and mutter "maybe I should do something like that". I'm not aware of anyone who's family has fallen apart, don't know anyone who has lost their driving license or job, had any run ins with the police but they quietly admit to drinking a bottle of wine most nights, which is way more than recommended but not enough to cause any immediate problems. It's interesting that the article says we vastly underestimate the amount we drink, whether consciously or subconsciously - as a population we admit to drinking 60% of the alcohol that HMRC say is sold.

I also wonder if it's a class thing, staying home and drinking wine means you're unlikely to run into problems with authorities and if you suddenly needed to get anywhere you would just get a taxi, rather than risk driving because you can afford the taxi.

Enjoy the roast lamb 😀.

Must try the kombucha - it’s pretty lo cal too

Lamb was lovely!
Yes, a bottle of wine a day, as lots of friends do, is really an astounding amount.
I feel that there is a lot of inherent snobbery - if someone is drinking that equivalent in Tenant’s extra/vodka/alcopops (may be showing my age here…) they are judged more harshly than a middle-class person drinking a pre- dinner Sherry, G&T, and decent wine. It’s still alcohol.

Hi Everyone I have had a hell of a day and came so close to opening the wine but I have brushed my teeth and have some sparkling water.

Did you all realise that this year October has 5! Weekends? This is going to be tough.

Did you all realise that this year October has 5! Weekends? This is going to be tough.

I hadn't but if I can do 5 consecutive weekends I'll be really proud of myself.

Isn't it known as Sober October? Anyway I'm up for it!

@30kgtogo

Must try the kombucha - it’s pretty lo cal too

Excellent, I'm getting some this week too. Couldn't find it last week but someone mentioned below that it's in the fridge section.

I'm a millennial from 1983 but my exH was eleven years older and my friends are all mainly early to mid forties so.perhaps I have absorbed their drinking habits more than those of my generation.
Interestingly my DH is younger than me so smack bang in the middle of the millennial generation and is almost teetotal. Smokes like a trouper though so not a saint by any means.

A fair proportion of my friends will drink at least a bottle of wine a night. Most of us are nurses/HCPs so we arent naive to the inherent dangers either. My direct superior at work admits to being a functioning alcoholic and even jokes about it. She is early fifties, so again a gen Xer.
And yes it does seem to be accepted in MC circles, in a way that the same number of units wouldn't be in lower socioeconomic classes.

Anyway I have bought a case of san pellegrino, lemons and limes to have tomorrow night in place of any wine.

Five weekends this month! Christ on a bike...

Night everyone, hope you all had a good sober Saturday 😁

Morning all. Up at 5 am this morning and have a load of washing on.

Have a good day!