I stopped drinking last year for 3.5 months after feeling I needed a break as it wasn’t serving me at that time. I’m by no means an alcoholic but more of a ‘grey area’ drinker and felt like I was starting to fancy a drink far too often, and on the odd occasion of drinking socially I often struggled to moderate and would end up with an awful hangovers and anxiety that lasted all week. So I stopped. I didn’t plan on stopping forever, I didn’t really know what my plan was I was just taking one day at a time.
I really threw myself into it and bought ‘quit lit’ and became a member of a new sober app and was really open and honest about my experience on there and received lots of support from other ex ‘grey drinkers’. I found it helpful at first, but as time went by, I started to feel pressure and like the environment was actually becoming accidentally a bit toxic, and I also started to find it quite difficult to imagine my life never being able to have a drink socially ever again. Long story short over Christmas I had a drink in moderation, and since then I’ve found I really have changed my relationship with alcohol. I am drinking again but only at the weekend and maybe 2 glasses of wine. Sometimes if I fancy a drink I still buy the AF beers some of which I love. When drinking socially I mix it up between soft drinks and alcoholic drinks and am so much more mindful - the break really did the trick.
However I’m now noticing the online sober community, as supportive as they may be when you’re sober are slightly condescending if you then decided to drink (albeit moderately) again. I spoke openly on the app about this (there are groups on there for tactical breakers and also ‘mostly’ sober people) but I felt like the general vibe from the comments was more one of pity and superiority. As if I hadn’t made a conscious choice to drink and it was a bit “we all make mistakes”. I’ve also noticed certain sober figures on Instagram who I follow saying things like “when you see a picture of someone all dressed up for a night out and you feel like you’re missing out, remember in a few hours they’ll be making a fool out of themselves and be throwing up in the toilet and will wake up hating life” and “moderating does NOT work!” And “if you drink alcohol your going to find reaching your goals so much harder than if you were alcohol free”. I feel a lot (not all) of the sober community seem to assume everyone who drinks is beneath them and they all perhaps do the same things they maybe did when they drank.
AIBU for thinking this sort of thing is really pretentious and judgmental? For the record I think anyone choosing to go completely AF is incredible whatever their reasons, and whether they had a big problem beforehand or not. I also understand that the sober community are really brilliant at supporting each other, but to those who have simply changed and improved their relationship with alcohol (but still do drink) does their support extend that far?
What are your thoughts?