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!

I think you are right. I'm not overweight and never have been. I really enjoy food so I am not one of these people who pushes food around their plate and would rather not bother eating if they didn't have to but I can be very rational about food. Sometimes I eat a bit too much so I cut back; I would sometimes like another portion but I know I'm actually pretty full so I don't have it. I have friends who have struggled with their weight their whole lives and it is very clear to me that food occupies a very different place in their psyche than it does in mine. However, whilst i can be very 'rational' about food, I can not behave this way when I am drinking. I find it hard to say no. I lean on it when I am unhappy and it elevates my celebrations. I suspect alcohol for me is very much like food to my overweight friends.

Half a bottle on Friday night and same on Saturday - maybe 1 glass or a small beer if I go to a gig in week

i try to stick to 9 to 12 units a week

but I do drink every evening on holiday - never drink in daytime

I haven't had alcohol for 9 and a half years.

I probably have one bottle of wine a week. Maybe one and a half if there are a lot of social events that week. I’m not sure how many units that is.

Nothing. Haven't had a drink in about 15 years. Just never enjoyed it and I always got awful reflux. My husband has probably has a pint a week, after his football game. He never drinks at home.

Same as you OP

I very, very rarely drink, I might have a Baileys at Christmas and occasionally in the summer will have a cider if we're sitting outside a pub but often don't finish it, there's no real reason I just prefer soft drinks.
You say you think it's insane that some people don't drink but I find it insane to think people will drink several bottles of wine a week, it's just different tastes, same as some people will eat a whole packet of biscuits and others are happy after one.

I'm a mid-50s man and have two or three pints of beer on a Friday or Saturday. Rarely I'll drink on both Friday and Saturday. I never drink on more than two days a week

I drank a lot in my 20s as much of my social life revolved around it. I ended up in a relationship with an alcoholic and stopped drinking entirely myself as it was a lot easier to deal with the drunken bullshit it if at least I was sober. Since the end of that relationship I've resumed drinking but I'm always acutely aware of how much I drink and I'd stop in an instant if I thought it was getting out of control.

I don't drink at all anymore; was always a lager drinker, never drank anything over 5% ABV and never really suffered from hangovers. Routine bloods showed up high liver enzymes and raised cholesterol levels. Diet & exercise was spot on, the medics suggested cutting out alcohol to see if they improved. They did. So I stopped. I have done a lot of reading around the subject - alcohol is seriously bad news for every cell in the body & I say that as someone who works in the industry. There are some fantastic low or no alcohol choices around now. Drink them instead.

My point being you obviously mix with people for whom alcohol consumption is seen as normal.

Well my friend groups are from school - I haven't gone out of my way to find friends who drink! But yeah I guess we all used to drink from being late teens and it was something we had in common?

But - and why I say it's strange that people on here mostly say they don't drink - pretty much everyone I work with drinks to some degree. And we're all completely different ages / different stages in life / different social circles so quite a varied demographic!

Also everyone at my (sports!) hobby drinks. We love nothing more than playing our sport and then going for a beer / wine in the clubhouse afterwards. Again, all different ages and personalities!

I drink alcohol about every tenth time if out for a meal - so five wines per year. And I have about two at a wedding. I love the taste of some drinks but actually prefer the lighter taste of sparkling water and juice. I sometimes enjoy Grand Marnier, Tia Maria,a pedro or a tawney port drizzled over ice-cream - about three times per year. I love grilled peaches brushed with vodka but eat them rarely. My husband is tea total and I'm fine with that.

You are drinking a lot and in a pattern. You don't have to be rolling around drunk in the street to have an alcohol problem. I'm certain that stopping won't be easy for you. You need help.

I drink once a year at Christmas which would be a couple of glasses of Prosecco.

Then maybe a beer once a year in the Summer for a barbeque.

So very, very rarely. It just doesn’t appeal to me.

Varies for me, sometimes nothing for months, occasionally a bottle of wine over about 3 days. I often don’t open a bottle when I fancy a glass, depends if we have plans to go somewhere. Stopped having wine out because of the costs of meals.

Last weekend we did a BBQ, didn’t have any alcohol and I had a small measure of Amoretto in my coffee (decaf) in the evening.

DH hardly drinks either so it’s just occasional.

Oh and neither I, my hubby, our three adult kids or any of their friends drink at all. It's definitely dying out

Honestly I average between 2 and 4 units a week. I say average because if I open a bottle of wine, I might drink it over a week but then won't open another bottle for quite a while. Its been the same for most of my life. I used to travel with my husband on oil tankers which were dry ships...sometimes there was beer which i dislike. When he came ashore his job had periods of on call where no alcohol could be consumed at all for the on call period and in any case there was random alcohol testing so no binging on a work night. I really enjoy a drink when I have one but never crave it.

One glass of wine every lunchtime
Two glasses of double scotch n coke at weekends

i agree with OP : most of my friends and family regularly drink alcohol, any excuse for a booze up 😅

I haven’t drunk alcohol for many years - however, I could and did drink up to four bottles of wine a day before I realised that I wanted sobriety more than anything else.

My first sponsor (in AA) said to me that if she could stop at one bottle, she wouldn’t have considered that she had a problem.

2 drinks a week typically, one on a Friday evening, one on Saturday. More on holiday or on (rare) nights out. I'm not a huge drinker.

I LOVE wine. Genuinely love the taste. If it wasn't bad for you – or if they made a non-alcoholic wine that didn't taste disgusting – I would drink it every night. However, my liver and my waistline couldn't handle that, so I don't drink outside the weekends. That said, I can easily have two bottles over the course of Friday/Saturday/Sunday – I love a glass or two while I'm cooking, then one with dinner, one after and that's a bottle gone.

It's definitely my greatest vice – I've given up basically everything else in my continuing weight loss journey (6 stone and counting!) but I refuse to give up wine. Although I do Dry January every year just to check that I still can! I never enjoy it though, I don't get all the benefits everyone else seems to – just have a slightly less enjoyable month!

ETA: I don't drink any spirits, other than a margarita if I'm at a Mexican restaurant, and will have the occasional pint if I'm at the pub, but in general, I can take or leave other alcoholic drinks. It's just wine (and champagne 😳) that is my weakness!

Nothing currently as I’m pregnant. But before, I probably had about 20 units most weeks which is obviously over the guidelines. I would sometimes be good and track it and stick to the 14 but if I wasn’t paying attention, I’d always go over. Probably 1-2 drinks a few evenings during the working week and then 3ish drinks on Friday and Saturday. Sometimes more for special occasions. Mostly just wine and beer.

When I drink wine at home, it’s a small or medium glass so I never even get close to finishing a whole bottle to muself

But - and why I say it's strange that people on here mostly say they don't drink - pretty much everyone I work with drinks to some degree. And we're all completely different ages / different stages in life / different social circles so quite a varied demographic!

I have found the complete opposite in my (also varied) social group. We used to all be able to drink each other under the table but now, none of us drink. I feel like times have really changed - myself and my friends are way more into health and fitness now and I am seeing a very similar trend in my teenagers and their friends. Many of them dont drink at all either.

I grew up in 90s ladette culture where falling out of nightclubs was the norm but things are most definitely changing as most of those people from the 90s have had to go sober due to the damage they did to themselves.

My mum drinks a lot.

mostly from a wine box but averages half a bottle a night.

it’s actually a bit of a problem because she gets drunk and starts wheeling out the old stories again and takes over the conversation and is generally a bit of a nightmare.

my brother (early 40s) does drink but is also health conscious and runs and does healthy stuff like that so while he drinks he has two alcohol free days a week and generally prefers expensive wine and less of it.

i haven’t drunk for 11 years as I’m on anti depressants which are no alcohol. I went to uni in the 90s with all the drinking culture and O definitely drank than.

my kids (early twenties) don’t really drink. They look at my mum (who thinks she is the life and soul of the party and that she can handle her drink) with pity and a bit of disgust to be honest.

their generation aren’t really big on alcohol. The did do a few teenage parties and getting drunk and my DS especially decided it wasn’t for him.

he goes clubbing a lot but no drinking. “Getting drunk on the vibes”.

Purposely cut down, about 15 years ago, as part of a general lifestyle change. I gave up the booze for a month, and that was by far the longest I had ever been sober since I was 18! It reset my relationship with alcohol, and when I started drinking again it was a fraction of what I had drank before.

I've cut down even more since then. I really enjoy alcohol, so not interested in giving up, but I think the less you drink the better, for health reasons

Same! Met friends and my kids are hanging after a night out but I’m ok 😊