The Freedom Thread; for those embracing a life without alcohol.

[Drybird2020]

Welcome to the 7th thread in this series, which has helped me and many others find the way to a life free of and free from alcohol.

Anyone is welcome! Newbies, you will find emotional support, tips for handling cravings, strategies for handling social occasions and plenty of first-hand experiences to mirror your own. An alcohol problem makes you feel lonely and isolated, but you are not alone.

Please be aware that this is an abstinence thread – it can be difficult and triggering in the early stages to be around alcohol related chat (however, it might help to know that one of the gifts of long-term sobriety is not being at all bothered by people drinking or talking about drinking in your presence!) So, if you feel that moderation is for you, or if you feel you need to cut down before stopping, there are other threads in Alcohol Support that can help, or you can start one for the specific support you need.

Oldies, come and share milestones, enjoy the chat, and pay forward the kindness and non-judgemental support we have all benefitted from. And when you have the time, do yourselves a favour by finding where you started and reading through all your posts, it will show you how far you have come and what you have achieved! (I'll add links to previous threads in my next post).

Thanks nails & bunnies. I think the pandemic has changed things for me massively, giving up alcohol being part of it. I've come to realise that only a very few friends seem to make contact with me - I was the one driving London meet-ups, camping trips, etc. So now I've decided to hold back, with consequent low feelings.

We also realised how much money we were spending on going out drinking & eating, so we don't think we'll be going back to that either.

But I'm wondering if all of this isolation is too much for my mental health - now I'm retired, I don't even have work colleagues to interact with all day, as DH does. Perhaps when the pandemic is properly over, I'll try to find some local groups - and I might return to the OU in autumn.

Maybe I do have to consider moderating? Except that I keep thinking I should only have a drink if I don't really want one very much - and if that were ever the case, why would I even have the drink?

Morning all
11 months today here! Next stop a year. 😊
After my little blip last week in my thoughts about it all, I am happy again with my plan of a life free from alcohol.

Well done @Breathmiller
I agree @CardiganOfDoom that not drinking (and the pandemic) has affected socialising. I’m definitely lonelier. I too have become quite apathetic at arranging meet ups and no one else has taken over. Going out was maybe more about drinking than the people? But I don’t know. I need to explore that. Interesting isn’t it?

Yes, it is interesting, Staying. I definitely had a pattern of making friends with the drinkers in every company I worked for - it was easier to make friends with them, for a start, and then I felt that they were more fun that the types who had a quick coke and got straight back to work. But I do wonder if all we had in common was the job and the drinking. Apart from my current DH of course, who was one of those drinking buddies :)

I do find myself wishing I had more sober friends, particularly locally. It would be so nice to have drink taken out of the equation! I've considered doing AA, as people seem to make connections there, and there is a local group (unlike SMART). But I don't really think I can hack the "powerless over alcohol" thing - because I'm not!

Has anyone had any luck making friends through sober groups?

I’ve only been sober 6 months and don’t have any sober friends locally. I’ve not many local friends as only moved here a couple of years ago and it’s a slow process esp with a pandemic. Not sure where I’d start to be honest. AA wouldn’t be for me either.

Well done breathmiller
Like some of you are saying I'm just realising our social friendships were all based on drinking- some shared interests to talk about but any / all shared activity was drinking

Its very difficult if your social life is based around booze. Interestingly, since I quit, quite a few of my old friends have addressed their own relationships with alcohol. Going back through early adult life, University and school we all drank a lot together, but it seems I was not alone in feeling the need for change. I tend to see my local mum-friends during the day or in situations when I am driving anyway so it doesn't tend to come up. I know I'm lucky in this respect.

Does anyone else find it super easy to avoid alcohol all week but fall foul of decade long habit of drinking on a weekend?

I keep drinking once on a weekend and regretting it, because I'd much rather go AF completely.
But this is my last hurdle, which I struggle to change.

That's the challenge @DontBiteTheBoobThatFeedsYou and it gets easier but you have get past the first few weekends. Brain chemistry - neurons that fire together, wire together. Create new habits and associations. I'm 8 months in, I don't know if this is forever, I stay with each day as best I can but whatever happens this is the bedrock on which my future will rest. I never want to be a regular drinker again and for me abstaining entirely is working to break that habit. Still a work in progress, this thread is proof that it take work but it is so worth it. I observe so many come here determined and this is it and then they're gone within a short time, that's nine of my business but it does show that the first burst of energy around it is just that a burst... there's the next stage where the brain starts to trick you back, we've all been there sure I'm fine... I don't really need to be so extreme about it.... until we're back again in the habit we are sick of. Try get through that stage and you'll start to feel the pull fall away, in my experience.

I think I may be over that burst.
Funnily enough I was thinking exactly this today.

The 'high' of stopping is over. This, I don't mind. Although it would have been nice if it had stayed.
But this is the tricky part. The bit that I will fall foul if I start listening to that flee in my ear.

I know, after many years, that cutting down only works for so long before I slip back into 'most nights' and total abstinence is the answer.
I find it SO easy to abstain from alcohol in pregnancy because there's no choice. There's no "ooh but I could though...." feeling which is the fucker that trips me up.

I'm reading a lot of quit lit at the moment which helps a lot.

I have a feeling this also doesn't help with my weekend issues.

I drive a lot for work, I listen to 1-2 hours a day of quit lit.
On weekends I go from that to having three kids on my own (DH at work) with nothing to keep my mind on track and all the the triggers that don't (stress, tiredness, boredom, habit, sunshine).

Cardiganofdoom I'm the same as Drybird I have found that since I've stopped drinking, more of these friends of mine who used to be drinking buddies are coming out the closet and saying they are glad of an opportunity not to drink as much. I quite like that. That, instead of thinking they wouldn't want anything to do with me, they are actually inspired by the decision.

Can you unpick why you made the decision to stop drinking? I find if I start to focus on what I'm missing then I can get a bit wistful. But, if I am really honest about what it was like then I remember why I am doing this. Then I start to think about what I'm gaining. It then feels more of a positive step in choosing a better lifestyle for myself rather than feeling I'm missing out or depriving me of anything. Can you say why you came to this decision to stop drinking?

Can you reframe the things you enjoy? You said you enjoyed going out for dinner. You can still go out and really enjoy a nice dinner out. In fact, the dinner and the delicious food and the restaurant become the treat in itself.

I am going away for a night with dh tomorrow. We have a lovely spa hotel booked. Dinner at a lovely restaurant and a trip to an art gallery. I might even go to a cocktail bar after dinner and have a virgin cocktail or two. These things are all massive treats on their own, I don't need alcohol to be part of it. In fact, I am 100% sure I will enjoy it all so much more without alcohol. I will be present for each part of it and won't struggle with the hotel breakfast or the art gallery on Sunday because I won't have a hangover.

That sounds tough. You are on the right thread though as this thread is about abstaining entirely as, like you say, it's the easiest really and everyone here has so much to give to keep you going. I'd try read back through the threads, some people pop their heads in to cheer us on from much further down the road. I find those voices more relatable than the quit lit myself. We also talk about toolboxes and what's in ours to keep us going. I journaled every day the first month and wrote down things people here said, drew pictures, wrote first thing in the morning to record how great it felt waking up alcohol free. I might add that I could count on one hand the hangovers I've had in the 18 months prior so I wasn't dealing with a massive problem just a slow burn habit I'd started to hate and I love being free of thinking about it! Mostly

I've been thinking this over since I reached one year a few days ago.

I have no real inclination to drink. It won't add anything to what I'm doing. I don't miss it though I sometimes ask myself if I'm missing out by not drinking. But I remember why I stopped and I reflect on this past year without it.

I've been able to relax perfectly well without it, have a laugh without it, and despite the lockdown actually feel like I'm properly 'living' without it.
Through my dc hobby I've met some other nice women who also don't drink. They are too busy for it, or just don't see it or factor it in as something to be doing. And there's no fuss around it, it's liberating. It's like meeting a new world out there.

Even also just in terms of realising I can enjoy life and that alcohol is not actually required! It's a story we've been told and we then tell each other the story that we have to drink alcohol to enjoy life. We don't.

I don't need it to help me with anything even though there have been difficult experiences re family health over this last year.

Sorry if this all sounds a bit trite, its just my reflections of the last year where I've been checking with myself if I've lost out through not drinking!

But at the same time, I told someone today that I don't drink and they were sort of shocked and I felt ashamed, as though this was a problem and that they probably thought I had been severely alcohol dependent, which I wasn't. I just didn't like who I was turning into and that my life and sense of self were diminishing with 3 bottles of wine a week. But yet today I had to give my head a wobble for almost feeling ashamed that I wasn't still drinking and that my reasons for stopping were silly.

It's not better, for me anyway, to drink than not drink. It just doesn't make sense to friends or to society or to the media who would like to have us think otherwise.

breathmiller your break sounds lovely 😍 Hope you have a lovely time!

Excellent words @100PercentMe.

Dontbite - the problem with drinking once per week (I saw your other thread too) is that you are not allowing all the positive changes in your brain and body that being totally AF brings. You're probably taking most of the week to recover fully from that one session.

I've been struggling with feeling flat and low in this thread, but one of the things that keeps me going is the knowledge that it can take a considerable time to recover from excessive drinking and feel naturally happy again. Alcohol triggers an intense release of dopamine, and so if this is a regular occurrence, your brain is forced to reduce the number of its dopamine receptors to maintain the balance it prefers. When you remove alcohol from your life, you have much less dopamine (the normal amount), but because of having fewer receptors, the world can seem a little flat and grey. You can feel low, and lack motivation. I've yet to find an accurate figure for how long it can take to recover, but have read anything from 3 to 14 months.

Natural boosters of dopamine are things like being outside on a lovely day, a hug, sex, music, chocolate, getting something done. It's your brains way of saying yes, do this again please! (Hence the links to addiction.)

Has anyone felt themselves recover like this? I don't think it's happening for me.

Breathmiller - good point. Why did I stop? I was drinking about 4-5 bottles of wine a week in lockdown, trying for two days a week without drinking and usually not even managing that. Although I never got headachy, nauseous hangovers, I was often tired, sometimes to the point of not doing what I wanted to do that day. I'd also often eat junk food on hangover days. Even though I took a blue Nytol every night, I still tended to wake at 3am, heart racing. I was aware that this was no good at all for my health.

Possibly more importantly, I was starting to become aware that I wanted alcohol too much. If we were out for lunch, I was twitchy until the glass of wine arrived. Once I'd drunk it, before anyone else, I wanted another. I wouldn't have wanted an AF free picnic, or an AF visit to the cinema. It was just far too much in my head - and this led me to think that moderation would not be any better, it might in fact be worse.

I'm now just over 3 months in, and I've seen some positive changes. My resting heart rate is down, and my blood pressure is down. I was managing to maintain my weight without having to fast 2 days a week and with a lot more sugar in my life (although a week's holiday means 2lb on, despite climbing two fair size mountains!). I possibly look better, although I might be fooling myself. I don't think about wanting a drink in pub lunches, and I'm happy to do 6 hour hikes without thinking about missing a pub lunch or getting back for a drink - so my headspace is clearer already.

I do still often wake at 3am, like today, but my heart isn't pounding, and I've not taken a Nytol. I do hope this will improve over time too.

Wow, that was a small novel! Sorry!

This is quite a good article on the brain and addiction.

pronghornpsych.com/how-long-for-the-brain-to-recover-from-addiction/

Dontbite yes, for me the time most challenging was/is always a Friday night. I could take or leave Saturday more but it was still there in thr background. We all have these trigger points.

Many years ago when I was a 5 o'clock wine o'clock person every night (if I could hold out to 5 oclock) then that time of day was my trigger. I started thinking about lessening my drinking when I started going to a yoga class one evening a week. Apart from the class itself I had to drive to it so obviously I didn't drink. I'd often come home though and pour the wine when I got home.

Then it trickled into not drinking when I came home that night. Then I wouldn't want to drink the night before as I felt so awful in class with a hangover.
Then I went to more classes a week, one evening one and one afternoon, then seminars at the weekend.

I wouldn't want to drink the day before then either. So it trickled into my routine. I then went on to teach and it be my career.

Even laterally though when I didn't drink through the week or if I was teaching at the weekend I would find Friday night's were still my drinking nights. A hangover (ha) from my hardcore party days. So, after a long week of work, if i had nothing on the next day I would hit the wine/gin/whatever hard on a Friday night. I had to use a few things to get through this last trigger point. Some healthy some not so much.

AF drinks helped and I still look forward to an AF cider or 2 on a Friday night. Treat foods - which I still rely on but am trying to lessen. For a while at the beginning I was almost asleep on my feet after work and Id go for the shopping after work. Not going to the booze aisle was physically hard at times. And I'd get quite pissed off or feel like crying that I couldn't go grab my poison. It was habit. So, dh started going for that shop sometimes. Now i know if i haven't eaten enough then it doesn't help. So I grab something to eat at work before going for the shop.

I still very rarely venture down the wine aisle, the AF drinks are at the top of it and the beer aisle for dh and ds are in the next aisle and that doesn't bother me so much. But, i avoid the wine aisle, i don't need to do that to myself.

So, you can look at your witching hour or your trigger points and swap for other 'treats' to get you through. You can change your routine and find something else to replace it until the craving has gone. Come on here at the time and hopefully someone will be around to talk you through it.

But, I'm afraid to say that part of it is just getting through it. Recognising you have a craving at that point or a desire for a drink and not acting on it. Its just a thought. There will always be these moments. They will get less and less and much smaller. But everytime you do it you are refiring your brain and that gives a big high five hit of dopamine in it's own right. And i find that the most powerful cheerleader. Everytime I have a moment where I feel like having a drink (and they are crazily few and far between these days) then I have strengthened my resolve and shown me again that I can do this. That 5 o'clock wine o'clock person from the past never believed she could do it. But turns out she could. Who knew?

Good luck.

@Breathmiller enjoy your trip that sounds amazing!

@DontBiteTheBoobThatFeedsYou everyone is different but for me, if I kept drinking on the weekends I would be denying myself the best bits about being alcohol free, which is never to have to think or worry about alcohol at all! I love being completely free from it, I did used to really really (really😅) love wine but now the best thing about my weekends is never having a hangover😂 I’m going to go to bed tonight knowing I’ll wake up refreshed tomorrow, and then I’m going to go for a nice long run which I will love.

Not drinking does get easier and before you know it you will have broken the association with weekend = booze.

Having a fab time away.
Had the most delicious 'Nojhito' at Tony Macaroni of all places for lunch.

As an aside, my main meal out last night... I can't believe how much cheaper it was when I haven't added in masses of wine to the bill!

I also didn't feel any guilt at all about having dessert. 3 courses? Why not? I was only having sparkling water to drink and it was delicious. There was a moment when a couple next to us ordered a bottle of white wine and started to pour it then I looked again and realised ot looked...I don't know...claggy and thick. It was hot and my sparkling water felt light amd refreshing instead of clawing. The wine at the other table then looked like a hangover in a glass.

I bought some new pyjamas as I'd forgotten mine. No guilt as I would think nothing of 'treating' myself to loads of extra expensive alcohol normally on a trip like this.

And of course, the best thing...no hangover today. It's like a new way of living life that I didn't know existed. And I love it.

Brought my yoga mat so off to some yoga in a bit while dh sleeps.

Hope you're all having a good weekend and an easy, enjoyable AF time.

Sounds like a lovely trip breathmiller - enjoyed reading your previous post too. I think I should give yoga a try. Some really interesting thoughts from everyone. I can’t contribute much to the weekend trigger as I don’t think I’ve had it. Everyday was an equally potential trigger initially. Now it’s more about what we are doing and the associations and they just happen to occur more often on weekends as that’s when we are free. My saviour is having nice fancy drinks; creating different ones and focusing on that creativity in a way.
My parents are down this weekend. We don’t get on well so it’s always very stressful. Really really stressful and I usually drink A LOT. They’re not big drinkers but they do drink. They know I’m AF as I told them pre-Christmas. They sent gin for my Xmas present with a note saying they know it won’t last. They’ve never bought me alcohol before. Yes, that’s what they’re like. Simply not nice. This is the first time we’ve caught up properly face to face since I stopped (and since Feb last year). Im usually stressing several days before they arrive but was ok really and bizarrely I’ve found them a lot less annoying. They are annoying but I’m not stressed/bothered about it. I’m kind of seeing the funny side. Maybe their behaviour is different or maybe, just maybe, me being sober has made me more tolerant, less stressed. Who knows. But it’s actually turning out to be an ok weekend. I’m ignoring the ‘don’t you want gin in that?’ , ‘it’s really nice with gin in’ , comments regarding my gorgeous concoctions with Urban Cordials. They go today.

I’m rather envious of your friendships 100percent - I’m struggling to meet people let alone AF ones. I need to work on that; get more proactive!

Friday nights were really tough in the beginning and for a while afterwards they felt a bit flat. Now I'm as excited as ever when Friday comes round, but it did take a while to rewire my brain for it.

@StayingVigilant your parents sound really difficult. I can sympathise and I am glad for you that they are leaving today.

@Breathmiller "hangover in a glass" is EXACTLY how I see wine now. Or any booze. I know if I had a glass I would immediately feel absolutely awful, and it's one of the things that cements my resolve. Looking back on my drinking days it was always the case - the enjoyment was in the anticipation and the first few sips, after which the fuzzy head, headache and fatigue would quickly take hold and I would go on drinking to stave off The Badness, trying and failing to reclaim the joy of the first sip. Its so much simpler not to do it in the first place.

So, I effed up. Not just Friday, but last night as well.

However, I'm not going to beat myself up because I have realised a few things.

1- I really want to do this. In the past it's been too easy to stop the abstinence or cutting down just because I effed up one time.
This time, I still really really want to stop. And I really feel like I can and will. Something just feels different this time and I like it. I'm looking forward to stopping.

2- I need a tool box. I don't have one, and Friday showed me that I clearly need one.
Saturdays are stressful for me and they will continue to be therefore I need strategies.

And there was a 3 but I've forgotten what it was.

Thank you for the suggestions of what I could do instead.
Can I ask what everyone else's tool box contains? This is something I need to work on.

@DontBiteTheBoobThatFeedsYou well done dusting yourself down and moving on. My toolbox is full of AF beers, Nosecco, flashy cordials, nice tonics, lovely glasses, frozen ginger strips, frozen berries, mint etc. All to faff and experiment with. This 1) keeps me busy, 2) still feels special 3) definitely would not taste any better with alcohol added despite what my mother thinks. Things like going for a walk, exercise or yoga just aren’t appropriate when I’m feeling tempted as it’s ALWAYS when others are boozing and it’s a bit of a ‘fear of missing out’ thing with me. Except when I make a great concoction I know my drink is waaay better than whatever they’re having. I hope that’s a little bit helpful.
I’d not realised until I wrote the above that the feeling of missing out is massively lessening.