Does anyone know they drink too much....but don't care? 🤷‍♀️

[PunchitBishop]

Hi,

Just wondering this. I'm not one of them. I do drink too much, but I do care. Typical 'middle class drinker' I suppose. Don't drink to get drunk. Just drink wine mostly, not every day, but definitely too much at the weekends. Certainly more than the RWA.

I go from really worrying about it and consider going teetotal, to thinking life's too short, it's my only real vice etc.

I've noticed a lot or my friends have split between two categories in recent years - pretty much don't drink at all anymore or drink way too much. I do have a friend who genuinely doesn't care and gets very irritated if people interfere with her lifestyle. Again, she doesn't get drunk, may have seen her tipsy a few times, but that's it. In a way, I kind of admire her for just saying, "no, I'm an adult and I love a few glasses of wine, leave me alone".

I know there are health risks, premature aging etc, which is why I'm often at war with myself, but I did wonder how common my friends attitude is now...so thought I'd come on here 🙂

Thanks.

I too don't care. I work long hours in a senior role with a big international team. I have an asd child. I exercise daily and my diet is healthy although the wine belt is real. I enjoy the wind down at night and my brain will not shut down without it. I don't get drunk, I don't harm anyone except my own health long term I suppose but I don't want to live til 90 so meh.

@ComtesseDeSpair A sub 3hr marathon and drinking that amount - really?! Really and truly?
As you well know, that's an incredibly good marathon time for anyone, but particularly for a woman. I'm a decent enough club runner (GFA marathon time) but personally know only three women who've gone sub 3 - all were teetotal, running 50+ mile weeks, in their 20s and pre-kids when they did it.

If you've honestly run a sub 3 marathon while putting that amount of booze away on a regular basis, surely you could be winning big city races if you stopped...!

If I wasn't vain and didn't worry about weight and dehydrated skin I'd drink a bottle of white wine a day

I am so shocked more ppl haven't mentioned their kids.
My dm drank too much and it was absolutely shit for me as a child.
As yes a lot of your kids know even if you think they don't.

DP and I definitely drink too much according to guidelines. Share at least a bottle of wine most nights, rarely ever get drunk. If I was getting shitfaced every night I would worry, but this feels normal to me. It’s how my parents drank, and still do in their late 70s/early 80s.

I moderate more now due to peri menopause- wine affects my sleep and I look a bit shit the next day.

But also life is short. And I love wine. So I make silly deals with myself. If I drink on Sunday then I must wait until Thursday for a few glasses. If I don’t drink on Sunday I can have a few on Wednesday.

I can stop after one. I don’t want to be tee total.
I am slim, run 30 miles a week. Eat healthily. I need one vice.

Also, the units per week are an arbitrary number not based on any science. Some people can get away with drinking lots and others not so much.

I have an alcoholic mum so these types of chats are always really hard to skip by, and I am also conscious of not taking what many see as a lovely daily enjoyment, and turning it into something really heavy! So forgive a long post, but all that being said…

My observation of alcohol is that the majority of people are really lacking in understanding when it comes to the seriousness of alcohol addiction. For some reason we see drug addiction as totally separate to alcohol addiction. Presumably because it’s so accepted by us culturally (particularly with women and wine I would say) you tend to not really hear much about functioning addicts because they get away with it for so long. But having seen it up close firsthand it’s such a slippy, slippy slope and I think more people are already further down the slide than they realise. Alcohol withdrawal is also more serious than heroin withdrawal, it’s not to be messed with.

I have watched my mum go from the most normal lovely respectable woman to an absolute shell of herself. It started with daily white wine spritzers after work, and this went on for probably 15 years. Totally manageable at first, totally normalised. But what a lot of people don’t understand is that once you are addicted your tolerance ups and really quite quickly. You can go from a few glasses a night to a bottle a night to multiple bottles of wine a week. Then before you know it the wine just isn’t cutting it anymore and you’re drinking more spirits. My mum probably managed drinking every day for 30 years, whilst being a great mum and having a great job, before it began to totally ravage her. She had cirrhosis of the liver, and the doctors told us it was very very common in women of her age (at this point 60). In the end she was carrying so much fluid in her abdomen she looked pregnant, she ate maybe one meal a week as it killed her appetite completely, she could barely walk up the stairs. Her skin was grey, eyes yellow, teeth yellow. She thought of nothing but having a drink morning to night. It is a horrendous, horrendous disease on the body and on the mind.

And that’s just the physical impact on the person who is drinking, which brings me to my biggest bug bear. It is not an independent act, to drink and get drunk. So many drinkers fail to understand the impact their drinking has on others. But ultimately this is a behaviour and personality altering substance. It’s really shortsighted to think “well it’s my life, it’s my body, who cares if it’s bad for my health - I love wine, and life is too short to cut out what you love”. Because the thing you are engaging with is ultimately changing you with every sip you take. That can be a really weird roller coaster for the people around you, and for the sober people in the room. The hardest thing about loving someone who drinks is learning to live and tolerate the various versions of them. Every day with my mum I wondered which version I would get, sometimes in the space of one conversation. I would just never want to put the people around me through that for the sake of me enjoying a drink.

Alcoholism has an extreme label attached to it that most people can’t / think they can’t relate to, but my mum started off on white wine spritzers.

Mumsnet had me convinced I was alcoholic. I was waiting for an uncomfortable dextox that never came, horrified by my units per week. I'd been seduced by the eyerolly mum wine culture! Now I know I really can take it or leave it. I might have a glass or two a week. But yes, during stressful times with my 3 young kids I'll reach for a wine rather than biting their heads off. And I don't care.

I virtually stopped drinking during lockdown and enjoyed being teetotal so much that I decided to only drink one cocktail every few months on a special occasion. To be honest, it is quite likely I will stop that too now though as it seems a bit pointless. My skin is better, I look really healthy and my thinking is clearer and more creative. Hangovers in my late 40s had also become unbearable and some of my binge drinking in the past had led to embarrassing or unpleasant situations. My sister drinks everyday however and doesn’t seem to think it is an issue. I try not to be that judgey person or become preachy now I have stopped, but I do recommend stopping as it feels so much better!

I don't think whether you get drunk should be the measure. The more you drink you more you tolerate. I know a man who drinks 12 pints over an afternoon and evening out. Because he isn't staggering around he thinks it's fine.

I've had a lot of problems with chronic pain and since being on lots of tablets, it's made me unable to tolerate even a glass of wine. I used to drink a lot, big after work culture in my industry, would have 4 beers easily most nights.

The fact that now even a mouthful of wine makes me feel ropey makes me think how bad it must be for you.

I would like to be able to enjoy a wine but I've adjusted to life as teetotal it's been about 8 months now. I'm happy really as I know it's so much better for you.

I’ve spent the last ten years with cancer. I have had every painkiller that can be legally prescribed and one that can’t but they only way I can sleep is with a couple of glasses of wine. If that makes me a alcoholic then I don’t give a fuck.

But the fact that your body is tolerating the alcohol doesn't mean that it isn't having an impact on you.

Sorry you have experienced this

my parents particularly my dad are similar. Drink driving etc too. It does impact on relationships in so many ways

We definitely drink more than RWA. Have 3-4 alcohol free days a week. I can easily drink a bottle of wine with no ill effects, or 3 double gins. Not both together!
I have tried non alcoholic options...far too sweet. I hate fizzy drinks and never drink them.
I did 6 months no alcohol last year and can't say I felt any different.....I ate more.
We are in our 60s and don't eat sweets, chocolate, red meat or processed food. Never smoked or done drugs. We hike, spin, go to the gym.
So am not concerned about my alcohol intake

Hollow I think the point is a lot of people aren't fussed.

presumably a lot of us are seeing our relatives in 80s and it's pretty awful. I was hoping to go mid 50s. Clearly I should start drinking! But the calories. And how are some people not constantly on the loo? 12 pints?!

I think one of the key things is that loads of people say they don’t care about drinking too much - until they do have health issues from it and then it’s too late. As someone with chronic autoimmune related disabilities I think generally people just don’t appreciate how important good health is. It gives you choices and independence. Until you have something impact on that it’s very easy for people to say they don’t care about drinking too much.

Quite a few examples on this thread of people drinking partly because of health problems though.

I have a number of chronic conditions which is one reason I fancy an early exit.

agree that some people have zero experience of health problems though. That's really surprised me the last couple of years.

Oh I understand that and if the medication I take was incompatible with drinking then I’d probably drink as well! But I think people always tend to assume if you die from drinking too much you’ll just drop down dead suddenly- and that often isn’t the case at all. So many people saying they’d rather die at 60/70 than live to 90 etc without actually considering that it may be they’ll live to those ages with horrendous long term illnesses related to alcohol.

My mum had Crohn’s disease and copd and drank to medicate those conditions because it was the only thing that helped her - and I have sympathy for this- but she ended up dying of liver cancer. It was a long and painful death.

*wasn’t

Afterfire I don't know what the stats are but most deaths are long and painful, that I've seen.

having something you enjoy in life is so important.

Of course. I mean I can’t lecture anyone - I have huge issues with eating far too much chocolate, I’ve replaced alcohol with milkybar effectively and eat a large family sized bar every single day. Awful I know. Done it for about 10 years now. My life is really stressful with a disabled child and my own disabilities and it’s the one thing I really enjoy.

I just think it’s odd when people say they want to die before they get “old” - my Mum said the same thing but at 70 when she was in the last few weeks of terminal cancer she wanted to live more than ever.

Yeah, I think this is very true. A family member of mine was a lifelong smoker. He knew the risks, but was very much someone who wanted to live his life, his way and bugger the consequences. He got cancer at 72 and the last two years of his life were truly horrible - full of pain, chemo, vomiting, frailty, a bad fall, broken hip and dead at 74. He probably lost 10 years of his life, 10 years with his kids and grand kids and for what? So he could smoke all he pleased. What a waste! I bet he'd have made a different choice if he'd truly understood what he was throwing away and how he'd feel when he was facing death from a horrible illness when he could otherwise have been facing 10 more years of healthy life.

As @MsTSwift writes ".......It's a right pain that lovely enjoyable things are so bad for you...."

This 💯 🙁

I was always one of those people who drank to get drunk, so it wasn't exactly a shock that I descended into alcoholism. I was on a litre of vodka a day at my worst. Sober three years.

I was extremely lucky with my health, other than a series of potentially fatal withdrawal seizures.

I don't judge other people's alcohol use. I just wish the more sanctimonious types would understand that it's a very slippery slope that can get anyone. Nobody is exempt when it comes to the very real possibility of addiction.