I'm joining this time. I've just reinstalled the dry days app.

I only drink 1-2 days a week but I get absolutely wrecked when I do. 2 bottles of wine in 1 evening, or 8 large beers.

I feel depressed for about 4 days afterwards and I feel so fat.

I'd really like to be done this time.

Hey 👋 checking in on the new thread, day 11 now, thanks for starting the new one @BunniesBunniesBunnies!
@mybroomstick - I can relate to that, don't drink too often but when I do the wheels can completely come off and it takes me out for days so have started to seriously question if it's worth it. And the answer is a big fat NO!

Thanks for new thread and for all the great positivity on the last one. It's really helping me. Day 18.

Thanks for the thread, @BunniesBunniesBunnies.

I’m Day 24 alcohol free, and I’m struggling a bit at the moment. Not with the urge to drink, particularly, but just with feeling generally rubbish. I felt dreadful the first week, great the second week, then I think I got a virus or something in the third week, because I’ve felt crap; exhausted, flat, unmotivated, achey, want to sleep all the time, no enthusiasm or energy for anything, anxious, depressed.

I felt so much calmer and clearer in the second week… I want to feel like that! I know I’m being ridiculous and self pitying, but I keep reading about how amazing it feels to be alcohol free, and I just feel so bleargh.

When I think about it, all the previous dry months I did (none of which I managed the full month, I don’t think), the reason I got fed up with it and started drinking again was because I felt so flat and lacking in … well, dopamine, probably!

I’m not intending to dive back into the booze; I’m going to keep going and hope it gets better. Feeling fed up, though.

Hope everyone else is doing ok.

Hi PromisesMeanNothingSue. I'm not on this thread but was on much earlier ones and am now on day 334. I noticed your post and just wanted to say to hang on in there. It also took me a long, long time to experience anything like the positives that everyone talks about; I actually felt quite flat and despondent for some months and the benefits then sort of crept in bit by bit rather than arriving with a bang that I was hoping for. They do eventually make an appearance though and are worth the wait so just keep going! All the best.

... THE bang that I was hoping for ...
(must learn to proofread!)

@PromisesMeanNothingSue, I totally relate. I'm 30 days or thereabouts in and I've been feeling so flat, upset, irritable at times.

I cried this morning when I read the lovely replies folk had Written at the end of the last thread to a post I'd made (thank you!). I Just feel so crap most of the time and on the edge of tears. None of the good things I've read about but your reply @MacavityTheDentistsCat is really helpful. It just feels like head down is probably the best policy, keep trudging on and trust that the light will slowly come on in.

And in the meantime I can see some immediate positives in that the rosacea on my face is so much better and I'm fitting into clothes I've not worn for over a year or so. So much so that it made me want to order some new bits and pieces but when I went to look online for stuff it was really triggering as it made me want to plan a night out and not an AF one. Quickly decided i didn't need any new clothes

X post with Bunnies! So true, need to remember it's the long game we are playing.

Evening all, checking in, thanks for the nee thread @BunniesBunniesBunnies

Day 21. Officially my longest AF spell ever.

New thread!!! Checking in 120 days - skin much better and I’m still thrilled with mornings that start so much better with a clear head 👍

Thank you @MacavityTheDentistsCat for delurking to give me some encouragement!

Thank you too to @BunniesBunniesBunnies and @Kittensgalore.

I am going to stick with it; I’ve committed to being alcohol free until next summer (and I know it needs to be permanent, really… just not quite ready for the ‘forever’ concept). I’m glad I did make that commitment during the second week when I was feeling all fresh and motivated, because otherwise I’d be eyeing the end of the 30 days and telling myself ‘well what’s the point in continuing after that when you feel so rubbish’. 🙄 That’s what I’ve done the other times, and it’s ridiculous really - I haven’t gone more than a month without getting drunk (and mostly a whole lot less than a month!) since I was 15 years old, so my body isn’t going to rebalance itself in a few weeks, is it. I’m not a patient person, can you tell?!

I did commit to it, though, and I’m glad I did… I wouldn’t have joined this thread otherwise, either. I shall keep on keeping on and try to be patient about feeling better.

Evening lads.

spreads out selection of vegan confectionery

How are we all?

Just calmer and happier and more like “me”.

I don’t really know who I am without alcohol (or other drugs, in the years when I didn’t drink quite so much) in my system. That’s really sad, isn’t it. I’d rather like to get to know my unvarnished, sober self before I turn 50.

Evening. Thanks for the new thread @BunniesBunniesBunnies.

I’m up and down emotionally but overall I’m in a better place than I have been for ages. @PromisesMeanNothingSue I know exactly where you’re coming from, I also don’t know who I am without alcohol- I started drinking because it seemed really fun and I felt less self conscious and more sociable but then I started to use it to numb my emotions and now I don’t know how to manage emotions either.
Without sounding too cringeworthy, I am on a journey of discovery which I am enjoying

Good on you @BunniesBunniesBunnies grabbing the baton and sprinting forward with a bright new thread!
I hope everyone is doing well in these dark November days. I have been super busy with little time to post, but I will be back with you all properly soon. AF Day85 here. Night all.

….and I totally relate to the dealing with emotions and self reflection. It’s not easy but will hopefully get easier and be so worth it in the long term…..But what I want to discover is the really deep fundamental stuff. Like when am I going to lose my wobbly bum & chubby thighs!! 85 days and I’m still a little pudding! 😂

Hello! New person incoming.
Along with great big essay. Where to start.....
I've done long spells AF (for me, anyway.) I've done several 90 day spells on OYNB and also followed an Annie grace programme. It will be a familiar story to many- the fading affect syndrome that William porter talks about starts to hit me once I get into 100+ days and I tell myself I'm cured, I never really had a big problem anyway, what harm would one small glass of fizz do on my birthday and while the slippery slope has been gradual for me, certainly within as many days as I'd been fully alcohol free, I'd find old familiar thought processes creeping in, and before we know it, a few months on I find myself having a glass of wine on a Monday night for the sheer hell of it. I've come to the decision that I need to do another AF spell but unlike previous occasions, when I was really just counting down days with a view to drinking again at some point, this time I'm coming to terms with this being a one way road with no going back. I'm a couple of weeks in and have been mostly happy. However I have a business trip coming up (tomorrow) where I'm going to be among so many hard and heavy triggers. A long journey (with the trappings of first class), the boredom of waiting about for departures and connections, an unfamiliar city and then a celebratory drinks reception and dinner with some macho clients (who I am very much there to woo.) a hotel room with a mini bar and an expense account . On my return leg I'm catching up with two sets of friends during my layover in a city I used to live in. These were people I partied hard with. While I love them dearly I now see that the years I spent in their company were precisely when my grip on "normal"'drinking had become dangerous and out of control. It was part of my decision to leave that country and move home and while my drinking has improved immeasurably since moving away from that culture, the damage is done. My brain can't go back to before these times- I truly believe that and that my only way is to stop drinking. Done. So, hoiking up my big girl pants here- I am going to do my absolute damndest not to drink on this trip. It's very early on in this latest AF run to take on something so huge, but it's now or never. If I choose not to do the business trip then I have a career problem. If I make myself unavailable to my friends on the return leg then alcohol has won and I have lost. I'm going to tell them (clients and friends) I'm not drinking just now and take it from there. The clients will be fine- I can always order some tonic water and pretend if I have to. As for the friends, that tactic won't fly and I feel it's dishonest and I need to tell them I'm not drinking. I suppose it will be a helpful litmus test as to whether these are friendships that I need to, sadly, let go. Wish me luck!
I wish all of you beautiful pink fluffy clouds of love and unmumsnetty hugs

Good luck CardinalCat.. Like you I have done a couple of months before then decided I can moderate now. Or 'oh I will start to drink beer now instead of wine because I don't like it as much'. Or some other self deceit. Love and strength to you.

Welcome @CardinalCat ! Sounds like a big challenge ahead of you but sounds like you have a good plan. Would it be worth telling your friends in advance that you're not drinking and it's not that easy so you'd appreciate if they didn't try to tempt you? It could take away that impulsive fuck it button that I know I would be likely to hit in the moment but if I had put it out there before far less likely to.
Interesting about the 100 day mark, that's around how long I did the last time and just the sort of thought process that led to the one one time, a couple the times after that...then bang into full on session, hangovers, self loathing etc...I haven't read William Porter yet, I'm saving him for the week before Christmas as I heard he is a good one!

Thanks for the new thread bunnies. The last one seemed to fill up so quickly by the end.

Lovely to see old faces hangingover et al.
And welcome to all the newbies whether it's your first time on the rodeo or your seasoned at day 1s.

bunnies I was thinking of what you asked at the end of the last thread. You're right in that if I can do this then I can do anything!! I do have some creative things I'd like to get back into, I used to enjoy life drawing and generally being arty, i did a bit at college. But time is not on my side for that at the moment so I'm putting it on the back burner for when I'm not quite so squeezed in the sandwich generation.

But I still do have the food as comfort thing that I want to address. And I do keep thinking that if I can give up alcohol I can sort this out too. I have to admit to thinking similar thoughts as I used to about drinking. I decided the other day that in the New Year I'm really going to go for it!! 2022 will be the year I get to a comfortable weight and move more. Then I thought that , like stopping drinking, there will always be a birthday, a Christmas, a Friday, a tired crap day or a day to celebrate. So theres no day like the present.
So, here I am on day one (of food)... just bloody do it Breath.