How much do you drink? Honestly!

[Starlight1984]

And yes, yes I know there is an "alcohol support" section of MN but this isn't for help or advice or anything other than curiosity!

Just been reading on another thread about what people do and don't do which others would find unusual and a LOT of the posts include people saying they don't drink alcohol which I find insane as pretty much everyone I know drinks to some degree!

Anyway I'll start, I don't (or try not to!) drink from Mon - Thurs but on average will have a bottle of wine on Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings. So 3 x bottles of wine a week. I know it's above the guidelines of "normal" drinking and know I need to cut down but it's something I genuinely enjoy. DH is the same. We never get drunk. We just slowly drink 3-4 glasses over the course of the evening (from about 6pm to 11ish) whilst making dinner, sitting down to eat, watching a film / reading a book... It's just something that helps us to unwind after a busy week!

So for AIBU

YABU - No thanks, would rather have a cup of tea.
YANBU - Pour me a large one!

varies. I'm not drinking regularly every Friday, Saturday, Sunday but have often done this on holidays, Xmas, summer etc.

Currently pregnant so not drinking but I know once baby is born I'll be making up for lost time and probably will drink a couple nights a week (a bit more than half a bottle) might do this for a few months then realise the hangovers aren't worth it on top of sleep deprivation and raging hormones and cut down. Then summer will come round with all the BBQs and weddings and I'll probably drink a bit more.

So it ebs and flows for me as I try and balance having fun and my health and well-being.

A whole bottle of wine would get me pretty drunk to be honest so I generally would drink much more than half a bottle (as not worth a hangover) unless I'm on a night out or something which is very rare these days.

Monday to Thursday I don’t drink. Friday I have a bottle and a half of wine or prosecco in the pub, Saturday I have a bottle if at home or bottle and a half if out and Sunday a couple of glasses to a bottle.

I have a glass of wine or a G&T each evening, usually while I am making supper.

I'm coffee more than tea, although mainly out of habit. I quite like tea, so should probably switch.

Admiring the discipline to make it to 9pm. I do too, although sometimes I have to pretend I'm east of anywhere 3.5 hours ahead of us 😮

I don’t drink, I haven’t in 2 years.

Genuinely drink once a year, if that. However I find I go through a stage of going out a few weekends in a row, drinking quite a lot and then I’m put off for another year / year and a half then!

Hugely variable. I drank half a bottle of wine with dinner on Saturday plus a cocktail. On Sunday I finished the bottle of wine. Haven’t had another drink so far this week.

I’m sixty something so can’t tolerate it so much now. Problem is, alcohol tastes divine. Zero beer is ok but zero wine and spirits a waste of time. So I’ll have a glass of wine or Campari and Soda 3 nights a week. I really enjoy it. But I’d polish off a bottle of whisky if it didn’t have such a lousy effect. I see it as something nice to have-like a bowl of ice cream or a doughnut. Not something to have every day but a couple of times a week is fine.

I don’t particularly drink alcohol. Occasionally have a nice bottle of wine with a meal at home on a special occasion or when out and about.

I didn’t cut down for health reasons or because I don’t like the taste but because I can’t afford to drink! Used to love a couple of drinks after work in the pub but the same pubs is charging £13 for a glass of wine now and before you know it you’ve sunk £50 on a random Tuesday after work.

We are saving for a big house Reno so every time I look at alcohol, I just think of all the other things I could be buying 🤣

I don’t drink at all, haven’t had a sip for years. I’m completely tee total.

Although judging from the ‘what did you eat today’ threads, I suspect I consume more sugar in a week than some of you do in a year. It’s all relative.

Very little now, except when eating out or we have guests. Can then easily put away e.g. a G&T and a couple of glasses of wine.

I used to have a small glass of wine every night while cooking the dinner, but after 3 weeks in hospital, and 5 weeks of ABs that made everything taste weird or horrible, I got out of the habit and have never started again.

Dh used to have a large glass of red wine every evening, but stopped when trying to lose weight, and hasn’t started again.

Come December, I will be enjoying quite a bit of mulled wine though…🎄😋

Your OP is too black and white with the either/or voting. You’d probably get a more useful answer with voting options on a sliding scale.

I definitely drink, love it, it’s delicious and lovely. But not nearly as much as you and your OH. Six bottles between you both over the weekend seems like a lot.

We’d share one or maybe two bottles of wine over the weekend, probably a couple of gin and tonics each and a beer. More if we’re on holiday or something. Maybe another bottle in there occasionally. Some weekends just a gin and tonic, or we’ll open a bottle and some of it will get left. I might have a beer during the week or one glass of wine. If I’m at a night out with friends (rare!) I think about 2/3 will be drinking and 1/3 won’t, either because they just don’t drink or because they’ve got something on or are driving.

Basically went teetotal when I hit my 40s. A couple of G&Ts on a special occasion, or a glass of bubbles for a toast.

A bottle of Baileys over the xmas period most years. Rest of the year, none. I'm just turned 40. I've never drunk much alcohol though and I've never been really drunk.

I'm thinking of not getting one this year. I drink Baileys in spite of it being an alcoholic drink rather than because it is one, I just like the taste and often have just a little bit in hot chocolate. I'd easily switch to a non-alcoholic alternative.

Alcohol is horrible for our bodies. It causes cancer, increases risk of dementia and worsens heart disease - there isn't a safe dose health-wise. I don't think it's worth it. It's not quite as pointless as smoking stuff that destroys lungs and makes it harder to breathe. Which as an asthmatic has always seemed a bizarre thing for humans to do but I still don't really get the attraction - I don't like the taste of most stuff, and things that I do like the taste of usually have a non alcoholic version.

I have my own struggles with things that aren't good for me (food and my weight) so I understand that it's hard to change ingrained patterns of behaviour that are actively harming us. So I'm not being judgemental about smoking and alcohol, I feel lucky that I wasn't tempted by them when I was young and so didn't set up bad coping methods that used them or have a ton of positive association with them.

But these things cause so much suffering (and cost so much money), if we can move away from harmful patterns of behaviour and find methods to cope with stress that actually are good for us, I think that's something worth doing. You are worth being healthy.

Its MN, of course they dont drink! Too busy cooking from scratch and making their own organic clothes!

I probs drink way to much, especially on holiday!! Love an 11am beer.

I had a life changing experience June 1st, so now do what i want (within reason) and dont worry about what others do or dont do.

I used to drink red wine, now it makes me feel sick and I can't touch it. I like a glass of white wine but any more than that and I feel awful. I can have one beer before it makes me a bit queasy. I do like a drink but it doesn't agree with me so the most I'll have is one very small glass of wine or a single beer. Every so often I'll have a few cocktails and I always regret it - the hangovers are horrendous. I can't seem to metabolise the stuff at all.

I think the same is true generally now too though, a lot of younger people I know, in their late teens, early 20’s don’t drink at all. My sister is mid twenties and doesn’t drink at all, I stopped drinking a couple months ago, I’m 30 next year. I think it’s becoming more norm Tto feel that to be social you must drink, or that drinking is a way to unwind if relax.. because for most it’s the opposite. I genuinely do think alcohol is seeming.. going out of trend?

I think almost 3 bottles a week, if I am going to be honest. It's too much for me and I need to cut back a lot. I feel better without it, but I enjoy it very much and am somewhat dependent on it.

I drink a couple of drinks a couple of times a year on special occasions and that's it.

Most of my friends and acquaintances drink though, usually wine or beer.

It’s largely an age thing though.

I drank moderately heavily in my 20s and early 30s without (as far as I’m aware) any real harm but that’s consistent with the lifestyle of a young, single person without children or a very onerous job.

As you get older its hard to sustain this, partly because its not something you can really do with young children and also for health reasons. A lot of women find the menopause totally resets their relationship with alcohol because the way the body metabolises alcohol changes. And as you get older you are likely to have a more demanding job.

To be honest I find people boozing heavily beyond their 40s a bit pathetic. The risk of negative consequences for health goes up exponentially, (I know several people whose drinking has made them very ill), its shit for children to grow up with heavy drinking parents and it almost certainly impacts on your job and hobbies.

I can’t see much upside to heavy drinking beyond a certain age.

Nothing, I don't drink. I used to enjoy the occasional glass of wine, or a Scotch, but as I've got older, I can't be bothered! I'm too knackered anyway, and it makes me sleepy!

A single pint of Guinness or a glass of Baileys at Christmas when socialising is my limit otherwise I feel horribly sick for ages. I don’t touch the stuff during the rest of the year and never drink wine or cocktails as they’d give me an instant migraine.

DH doesn’t drink at all so we don’t bother with booze on Christmas Day itself as it’s just us. DH does make great non alcoholic cocktails though!

I’d say the majority of our friends are more like me and rarely drink booze and probably around 10% of my friends will drink when having lunch out so maybe they drink at home, I don’t know?

ETA you won’t get any meaningful stats by just asking on here, but this is how much people who drink alcohol drink on average per week- closer to one bottle of wine a week for women for late 40’s. https://www.statista.com/statistics/369808/alcohol-units-consumed-by-gender-and-age-in-england/?srsltid=AfmBOopKSFWdOci9PVCANYTNtVJF1fttPyKSltccyZZ4C_Ag99Y65MfB

On the same site elsewhere I think it says that about 22% of women don’t drink alcohol at all, and I think that’s across all age groups. It’s generally trending to be less drinking I think, as time goes on.

So from this, I’d say you’re “normal” that you drink, but you have more than average.

32 with no kids yet, we stopped casually drinking at home a few years ago unless we have people over. Amounts vary depending on social plans but a typical week would involve 2 pints at the pub on Weds or Thurs and then always drinks at whatever pub/restaurant/party plans we have at the weekend.

If we have children I suspect we'll replace the pub trips with a few glasses of wine in front of the TV once or twice a week and weekend social plans will be tamer.

2 drinks in an evening seems to be my limit to wakeup without a hangover, so I try to only go past that if it feels "worth it" rather than just randomly midweek.

Exactly. My friend works different shifts on different days and she’s pretty much a functioning alcoholic. She said she drank two bottles wine the other day and some bottles of larger, so that must be at least 25 units as a minimum. I couldn’t drink that much in one day or I’d be dying off for three days after….. she was up at 9am going about her business so that tells me her body is much more accustomed to that level of drinking than me.

I do think it’s her shifts play a huge part though, a Monday as her day off could be a Friday- Saturday so there is no limits in the way M-F is a school day for me. I alway say if I ever cross that line then I know I’ve got a problem