When you let people know you no longer drink alcohol, the most important but not necessarily the easiest to tell are those friends and family you know best and who matter most. When they turn out to be the least surprised, and the most quietly understanding, you know you have taken the right turn. Further afield, it is hard for people in full time work to be honest about any form of unhealthy, unwise, or simply unthinking relationship with drinking, no matter how well “managed” or how ubiquitous alcohol itself is.
Like most people I know, I developed a constant relationship with alcohol over several decades. I relied on it as a social propellant, conscious that very little socially in the UK is not organised with alcohol at its centre. The embarrassments, scrapes or apologies that ensued – aside from the hangovers – were the quid pro quo of access to our favourite social “wing-man”.
I relied on it as a social propellant, conscious that very little socially in the UK is not organised with alcohol at its centre.
There were enjoyable, if forgotten, times to be had. Alcohol certainly helped lower some of the social barriers that my background and upbringing had built, but washed away any of the judgment and self-control that the same culture also built in. Every happy reminiscence of good, and often private, moments that followed must be laid alongside every cringe and shameful recollection that litters the memory too.
In short, it took time and reflection to realise that (almost) all the bad times in life had been alcohol-related too, along with a few of the good ones. I have worked for over 25 years in public facing roles, and across a range of subjects and sectors. For a substantial number of those years, alcohol was a constant in the social fringes of work, if not a constituent part through receptions, official dinners and after-work hangouts. In all that time, I never once stopped to consider alcohol-free options, save for the occasional glass of still water or warm orange juice.
For a substantial number of those years, alcohol was a constant in the social fringes of work, if not a constituent part through receptions, official dinners and after-work hangouts.
My dependency was not of a nature that I needed alcohol to start the day, to "escape", or to absent myself from life. Moments of darkness or depression were rarely triggers to drink, although I remained woefully unaware for far too long that alcohol conversely had certainly been the trigger for many of those moments. My enjoyment of alcohol was simple and powerful - it tasted and “felt” too good for me to stop when I should. As a politics devotee, it was a scene with Aaron Sorkin’s character Leo McGarry in “The West Wing” that rang a first distant bell of self-recognition:
“I don't understand people who have one drink. I don't understand people who leave half a glass of wine on the table. I don't understand people who say they've had enough. How can you have enough of feeling like this? How can you not want to feel like this longer?”
Time and events did start to offer resistance. The arrival of children required pure unconditional energy at first, followed by a sense of examples needing set and behaviour needing recognised. There was the justified exasperation, and worse, of a saintly partner often unsure where a night-out, an unanswered ‘phone or a missed dinner might end. My body failed to reproduce the elasticity and enthusiasm of earlier years, offering occasional glimpses of bigger problems or pains that might lie ahead. Added to all was a growing list of ordinary or special moments sadly and needlessly forgotten, spoiled and/or endangered.
I had my last drink one weekend in summer 2018.
I came to realise that, luckily for me, abstinence was easier and less conflicted than reduction. I had my last drink one weekend in summer 2018. I am sure it is easier at my age and in the changing social climate than it might have been previously, but only if you had disregarded a lot of damning evidence along the way. I remain conscious always of the underlying exercise of will and the unwritten contract with myself that has existed since that day.
The questions as to my motive have not stopped seven years later. Non-drinkers, as opposed to never-drinkers, will be well aware of the range of questions – sometimes well-intentioned, sometimes genuinely concerned, other times understandably selfish – that follow. I am delighted to talk anyone through my various reason, triggers and motivations, should they ask.
Becoming the safe lift home, never waking up uncertain of what explanations are expected from you, and genuinely forgetting what the aches of your guts, your head and more feel like are more of a reward than I ever expected.
Becoming the safe lift home, never waking up uncertain of what explanations are expected from you, and genuinely forgetting what the aches of your guts, your head and more feel like are more of a reward than I ever expected. So is a full night’s sleep – again, and again, and again.
I will do anything I can to help demystify, support and be open about turning your back on the nation's favourite depressant. I'm fortunate I still can.
