AIBU to think my sister is overreacting about our drinking?

[ByJollyQuail]

Just after some outside opinions because I'm genuinely not sure whether my sister has a point or whether she's being overly judgemental.

DH and I have been together since university and are now in our early 50s. We have two sons. Our eldest has just finished university and starts a graduate scheme in investment banking in London in a few weeks. Our youngest gets his A-level results in a couple of weeks and, hopefully, will be applying to study Economics and Maths and will be going to university sept 2026 after taking a gap year travelling. He plans to go after Christmas and is using money we saved for him to spend on whatever he wanted, he’s chosen to go travel all over South America solo we plan to meet him in a few countries.

DH retired early a couple of years ago. He's not old enough to draw his private pension yet, but we'd planned well financially and he reached the point where he simply didn't need to work anymore. I still work two days a week because I enjoy it.

We've always been sociable people and, if I'm honest, we've always enjoyed a drink. Even back at university we were the ones organising nights out, and that side of us has never really changed. We travel a lot, go away for weekends, love jazz bars with live music and dancing, go out for meals, have friends over regularly and I absolutely love hosting dinner parties. Our house has always been the one where people gather.

Life has changed recently though. Our boys are adults now and quite rightly have their own lives. They both have girlfriends, they're building their own futures and we've naturally had to take a bit of a back seat as parents. That's exactly how it should be, and we're proud of them, but it does mean our lives are much quieter than they were when they were younger.

In a few weeks our eldest will move into London for work, and next year our youngest will head off travelling before university, so it'll just be the two of us most of the time. We actually like each other's company and have always enjoyed going out together, so that's never worried either of us.

The issue is this. My sister stayed with us for a long weekend recently. One evening we had friends over for dinner. We opened wine while I was cooking and everyone had a couple of glasses over the course of the evening. The next night we went to the pub with friends and I had three glasses of wine over several hours while DH had a couple of pints and a whisky. The following evening we stayed in, cooked dinner together and shared a bottle of wine while watching a film.

A few days after she'd gone home she rang me and said she was actually worried about us. She said she'd noticed we seemed to drink every day and thought we'd normalised alcohol to an unhealthy extent. She even used the word "alcoholics", which completely took me aback. I’ve said to her we just like having fun, we aren’t drinking at 8am every morning, we aren’t arguing, we like good alcohol that’s all and we don’t really have any responsibilities.

The thing is, she's not entirely wrong that we drink most evenings. If I'm not commuting into London the next day I'll often have a couple of glasses of wine with dinner. If I'm off the following day we might share a bottle. If we're out with friends we'll drink then too.

Neither of us has ever missed work because of drinking. We don't drink in the mornings, don't hide alcohol, don't become unpleasant after drinking and we can easily go without if one of us is driving, we're travelling somewhere or we're doing something where drinking isn't appropriate.

My sister barely drinks herself. She might have a glass of prosecco at Christmas or a wedding and that's about it, so perhaps her idea of normal is very different from ours.
DH thinks she's being ridiculous and says we've simply reached a stage in life where we have time, disposable income and enjoy good food, entertaining and a drink together. He says we're not neglecting anyone or anything because there really aren't many day-to-day responsibilities anymore.

I wasn't worried until she said it, but now I'm wondering if we've drifted into drinking so regularly that we've stopped noticing it.

AIBU to think she's overreacting?

So much judgment I’d like more good sex with my hudhabd not drunken sex everytime we drink

YABU for posting this thread and then being unwilling to tot up your alcohol unit intake per week (for sure the easiest way to settle the question of whether you drink too much).

Then half way through the thread your posts start to read as if they're being typed by a very tipsy person. Time for bed, I think.

I don’t know my units

Hang on. A few posts ago you were saying that sex is only any good when you're drunk.
Which is it?

Please, go get a cuppa and off MN for tonight. Have a really good kip and hopefully you'll see that the responses on here are on what you've written. It's not judgement, it's concern and observation.
Go easy OP.

Well, tomorrow, when you're sober, count them.

Alcoholism is not just blacking out. And you don’t know if she gets abusive or weepy.

OP is demonstrating annoyance at being told she’s drinking too much. She’s also thought of cutting down. She scores 2 already on the CAGE questionnaire just from what she’s disclosed here.

she’s also drinking every day and seems unable to have a good time without alcohol. She definitely has a problem

I’d like to face good sex sober is that a crime

Of course not.
Please have a cup of tea and go to bed.

This is a very wise post.

Stop judging so much just because your lives are quote on wuote Perfect

I suppose you could say It isn't really her business but you do drink a lot and every day. Not good. You could end up with liver failure.

So why the judgment

This is really telling more than anything else (as someone whose Mum, Gran and Dad were all functioning alcoholics). What you mean here is what else is there to do for fun except drink? That’s what you really mean.

If you really think that way you definitely have a problem.

You describe your husband as "crazy, insane" and that you only have sex when drunk.

Is that one of the causes of your dependency on alcohol?

Looking at the spelling in the ops latest posts I’d say she fairly drunk now!

I miss my husband I’ve only spoken to him twice today I won’t see him for a few days it’s hard. Sorry that some of u are so judgmental on how I fell I’m allowed to miss hinage he says I’m happy when I’m with him

You should do. If you don’t care about dying early or your health that’s up to you, it’s your body. But if you do care you need to know how much you’re drinking.

As time goes on, OP seems to reveal that their drinking is a way of self-medicating which indicates greater problems. On reflection, I’d say, if you have to ask yourself if you have a drinking problem, you probably do. I hope OP find healthy ways of managing whatever greater problems she has.

We have sex when we aren’t drinking it just seems as though it better when he’s been drinking he’s more spontaneous

So much judgement not everyone us oxford soeller

I'm like your sister and barely drink but your level of drinking doesn't sound.unreasonable to me. I would suggest you have some nights off a week but surely you can let loose a bit over the weekend/3 nights?

WHY THE JUDGEMENT!
£@@6;& %###

😬

Gosh no, not around here. Nightly wine with dinner is not a thing.

Hi @ByJollyQuail .

You started an AIBU post, so that is going to attract judgement.

Here's what you've told us:
your DH is "crazy insane";
he's having a midlife crisis;
he's always drunk too much, and doesn't want to change;
he's not interested in sex with you unless he's drunk;
he often goes away and leaves you alone;
your sons now have their own lives;
you're lonely, even though you have friends;
socialising HAS to involve drinking.

You have several problems, @ByJollyQuail, drinking a lot is one of them. You are using alcohol as a crutch, to cover up the problems in your marriage.

Your sister is right to be concerned.