Forever Free - a life without booze, 2020 onwards.

[Drybird2020]

This thread is a supportive place for anyone who no longer wants alcohol to be part of their life.
This is the 4th thread in a series. I started the first 30th December last year and have been sober ever since. I couldn't have done it without the tremendous support other posters have given me.
Previous threads are linked below and are useful reading for anyone starting out, as they are full of useful advice, suggestions for reading, and strategies for managing the tricky times. Plus you will see how similarly alcohol affects so many of us, and track the journeys of people who are successfully making the change and embraced a new and rewarding life.

Thread 1
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/alcohol_support/3781133-Anyone-else-stopping-completely-in-2020

Thread 2
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/alcohol_support/3810419-Still-stopped-in-2020-a-thread-for-anyone-abstaining-from-alcohol

Thread 3 www.mumsnet.com/Talk/alcohol_support/3910349-Staying-Stopped-Alcohol-Free-permanently

The only rules are that you are committing to an alcohol free life, and that you have stopped drinking before you begin to post.

If anyone would like to use the new thread to (re)introduce themselves and give a wee summary of where they are at, please do!

Thank you @SparklingLime.

Yes I think you’re right. No need for any drama or fanfare. It was nice to feel a bit of normality I think with DP. Our local at the end of the road reopened a few weeks ago and they were very pleased to see him. But last night I had 3 pints and really couldn’t sleep at all and today has been a write off. In fact I am in bed!

hangingover I'm so sorry, that sounds a hard thing to go through.

My mum is 73. Which might seem old but our family seems to live forever so in comparison to my gran who only dies a year ago at 94 and i along with 2 of my children were at my great grandmother 103rd birthday then this seems a shock to us. We are aware we've been very lucky up til now though. My mum was only diagnosed just before her 69th birthday. She was dancing, hillwalking and very much a young person for her age. Then boomph! 4 years later she can't walk, she's in a wheelchair stuck in a home during a lockdown. She started to deteriorate in January this year and has just fallen off a cliff mentally. She needs touch and care from her family. Hut of course we can't give her that at the moment. She was moved from hospital to the home at the beginning of lockdown and I have seen her only twice. It's heartbreaking. Going through the decision that she needed to go into a home and her losing capacity was a big part of why I fell off the dry January wagon. Then well..lockdown and having to move her in to a nursing home blind just sent me into a spiral of bad habits again.

But....here I am. Feeling so much better for stopping again. On Friday it will be my 2 month milestone. I feel the need to celebrate with something.

Maybe not a vegan magnum as i had two of them yesterday after you talking about them.

Hi,
Sorry for intruding, especially so late in the thread, but I've been lurking here for a good while and just wanted to say I'm 91 days alcohol free today thanks to you guys🙂
A couple of times I've had to 'play the video to the end' which has really helped me keep going with this, and as pp has said, with all the other shit going on, why would you add alcohol into the mix. My new mantras!
The Craig beck and Allen Carr books have been great, with the message that wine is nothing more than attractively wrapped poison.
I've gone from a lockdown of drinking 4-5 bottles a week to none, and re-visiting running and yoga.
Thank you all, and I hope you all keep on going too 🙂

@StillDumDeDumming 200 days is amazing. If you did it once you can do it again.

Welcome 100percentme

I was a serial lurker for years and got so much support from threads. It's great to think that not only the posters that are on here are supported but lots more who are lurking.

Welcome @100percentme, great that you are here. I did the same as you, lurked and read before jumping in, there is such good support on here. I'm 1 day ahead of you so we are almost twins

Thank you @Breathmiller @Ravenswick ☺️ I might still lurk a bit and turn up on important milestones!

Look forward to hearing about your milestones 100
I'm celebrating 7 weeks tonight. Yeehaaa!!

Oh no!!!!! Wait!!! 8 weeks!!!!
Double Yeehaaaa

That's fantastic @Breathmiller, when I started out I couldn't envisage getting to the end of one week let alone 8.
Kudos to you!

Wow @Breathmiller and @Hangingover. That sounds so so hard. I can’t imagine what it must be like.

@100percentme welcome, you are doing great! There are many sober runners on here...!

@StillDumDeDumming welcome back🙂 I think your attitude is great. No drama about the slip up, just the realisation that you prefer life sober. 200 days was amazing, you’ve got this!

Executing another of my periodic thread plops to say that you’re all AMAZING!

I posted a few weeks back saying I was anxious about the prospect of an AF holiday. I breezed it! Didn’t think about drinking at all, wasn’t bothered, and had an amazing time

So while I can’t quite say I’m nine months dry, I can say that in nine months I have had three glasses of champagne, total. I’m so, so, pleased and proud because I have a health issue at the moment, and in the midst of all the tests and biopsies and doctor interrogations, it’s been like a rock to be able to say ”I don’t drink”. So whatever else is going on, at least I’m not worried about whether to fib to doctors about what I drink.

Well done on 8 weeks, breathmiller! And on 90 days plus 100 and ravenswick, and on four months, hanging. Sorry about your slips, but welcome back still and sparkling. I love not drinking, too bunnies, it just makes me...happy.

9 months is amazing, drybird. Congratulations!

@Breathmiller and @hangingover I found it very affecting to read your accounts of watching your mothers' declines and I'm sorry you have had to suffer so much.

And @Hangingover I'm sorry, I didnt say congrats on the four month milestone!!! I hope that, like I did, you will feel it all seems to click in to place and happen more easily from this point.

@StillDumDeDumming you're back! And you @SophoclesTheFox, with a perfectly executed thread plop! Hugs all round and the Mumsnet hug police can piss off.

11SophocIestheFox nothing beats the feeling of saying "I don't drink" when the doctor asks you. If you watch closely you can see a little satisfied look on their face as you say it.

@Hangingover

11SophocIestheFox nothing beats the feeling of saying "I don't drink" when the doctor asks you. If you watch closely you can see a little satisfied look on their face as you say it.

It’s a great feeling. No more panicky thought train when asked: trying to tot up what I drink, panicking that it sounds too much, or did I underestimate, or did I actually really have four days off last week, or did that work thing on the Monday where I had a glass of acidic Sauvignon blanc that I didn’t even want count, and how much gin does my husband really put in the glass when he pours, is it one unit or two or maybe even three, and how much do I actually drink? On and on and on!!

And now, it’s just an easy answer: I don’t drink. I used to, but now I don’t. Done ✅

Thanks, drybird

I used to mentally add up my units then tell them a third of whatever the number was 😬

Also this is a good thing to remember when you look around at everyone around you drinking responsibly and hating them for it...in one of my books it says 50% of the alcohol sold in the UK is not accounted for in the amounts people say they drink. Ergo A LOT of people are lying!

Me again. Horrific mood dip today. Want to get drunk very very badly.

Do all the things, @Hangingover. Eat, exercise, call a friend, whatever you need to do to distract yourself and get though the day.

And most of all, imagine how fucking pissed off you would be to wake up in the morning with a hangover and have to come back here and tell us about it.

@Hangingover just take it hour by hour or even minute by minute.

What can you do right now as a distraction?
And yes, throw ALL your tools at it.

Chat here? A walk? A bath or shower? A treat? A vegan magnum ? (Mmmmm - vegan magnums) phone someone. Read? Run? Go kick something? (Something inanimate rather than moving). Go to the beach and shout "CUNTINGFUCKNUGGETS!" at the top of your voice?

I'll give you a (not such a funny) laugh. I'm a yoga teacher laid up with a pulled back - from yawning!!! Yawning!! FFS. I stand on my head most mornings and I put my back out fucking yawning!!
It was a particularly intense yawn admittedly but nevertheless . Maybe yawning should be taken up as an extreme sport.

sophociestheFox
Well done on the AF holiday. That's fantastic.

I agree about not having to worry about how much you admit to drinking.

Hang in there @Hangingover and do talk about the trigger for this dip, if you want to. I had a horrific day last week but I did come out the other end, we always do! The key is just to hang in there in the mean time. You can do it!

Thinking of you @Hangingover, as Drybird said, just picture the crashing head and the sheer misery of it afterwards...Hope you are ok and feeling better by now.
Definitely think beach graffiti spelling CuntingFuckNuggets would be a good way of dealing with the cravings...
@Breathmiller, that must have been some yawn...

Oh you're all so lovely thank you

I'm just really struggling about coming back to the UK and no job/industry to go back to and probably having to give up my lovely flat and leave London.

Actually trigger was listening to Dawn O'Porters new book where she's chugging her way through lockdown (no judgement from me, especially as she'd just lost The Flack). But the way she describes having got wasted with her mates/husband and the great times they've had made me obviously want to drink in bed, alone not quite the same thing

I totally sympathize with the pulled back!! I am in rhomboid HELL atm and the tennis ball makes it worse. I promised myself of rest it for a week but the lack of activity is killing me.

Anyway I had some peanut butter and watched a show about elephants with DP and now I feel a bit better.

You are doing great Hangingover I totally get anxiety over your return to the Uk but I’m sure you will get a great new job, hopefully one you like!
Well, I’m afraid I’ve screwed up again. I had some wine both Saturday & Sunday evening and I really don’t feel good about it now. Nobody needs to read my wingeing on here tonight, I’m really just throwing this down for accountability.

I decided to drink because:

1. September was absolutely crap. My whole family stuck in house for weeks on end as we all had covid- staggered infections. My dad is still stuck all alone in hospital too which is rubbish.(not covid).
2. I haven’t been getting on fabulously with DH in these circumstances, and we have been together 24-7 for months now as we are both working from home too. He also drinks quite a lot which hasn’t made things easy.
3. I haven’t been reaping the health benefits As much as I hoped. And I’ve felt so crap in the mornings since getting covid I just reverted to the ‘what’s the point’ mentality.
4. I have only lost 4lbs since May, and that’s whilst trying hard and counting all my bloody calories all the time. This was one of the benefits I was most looking forward to going sober and I’ve felt a bit cheated (shallow I know).
5. I was just feeling like I am really dull and have nothing to say, given my whole life at present seems to be work; household chores; sleep, repeat. I thought having a drink would make a ‘great night in’ with DH.
6. And this is the stupidest of all. Stuck in the house and in my boredom I’ve been reading a lot about French food, culture, wellbeing. Taking the pleasure/balance/French paradox thing to its conclusion, I felt it was crazy stupid not to enjoy a glass of red with my lasagna or a glass of fizz as aperitif.

Anyway, there we go. I had 2 large wines both nights, but I slept badly and felt yukky getting up today and I can see that ruining my sobriety for the above reasons hasn’t been worth it. I just don’t know what to do now as I feel like I’m just not getting the most out of this but I really don’t want to go back to where I was before I quit, drinking 5-6 nights a week and feeling a groggy failure every morning. Sorry for that, I just wanted to get it off my chest and can’t tell anyone in RL. X