Teresa’s Dry January® story: “I feel happy and full of life”

I guess I was aware that my drinking habit was getting out of control for quite some time. Family and friends had jokingly started to remark on the amount of wine I was drinking and the time of day I opened the wine – always by 4pm, and I would work my way through a bottle an evening and sometimes more at the weekend.

The December 2020 lockdown meant that it would be impossible to get together on Christmas Day with my family who live 250 miles away. I drank more wine than ever over the holiday period to make up for the disappointment of not having the family Christmas we had planned. And I didn’t even enjoy the wine! My turning point was 29 December; that morning I woke with a thumping headache, the most awful heartburn and the usual self-loathing, and I thought: “what on earth am I doing to myself? This has got to stop.” and I really meant it.

I looked up Dry January that morning and signed up whilst it was fresh in my mind – I committed to the challenge right there, before I could change my mind. That was the best decision I have made in a very long time, and without a doubt has changed my life for the better.

Some of my close family had been worried about my daily wine drinking for a while. They could see it slowly creeping up but didn’t feel they could approach me about it. They were both pleased and relieved that I had signed up for Dry January, so much so that my husband, sister, my youngest son and his partner joined me in taking part, which has been brilliant.

The Try Dry App has been a massive motivator for me. I love collecting my teacup at the end of each day. I put my baseline drinking as an average of a bottle of wine each evening, and seeing the units, money and calories accumulating each day has been a huge reality check for me – I cannot believe just how much alcohol I was putting into my body! I also enjoyed the daily emails which were incredibly helpful. The Dry January Facebook group has also been a great source of support and encouragement. Sharing the journey with others in similar situations made me realise that I wasn’t alone.

I have also greatly benefitted from reading a few good quit lit books. I found The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober and The Sober diaries really good reads – funny but also full of sobering facts, scary statistics and tips. Different things work for different people, but it was the scary statistics that helped me stave off any cravings in the early days. Although I knew deep down that I was drinking way too much wine, I was still shocked at just how much damage I was doing to my body by drinking a bottle each day. That had to stop, my body deserves better! To break the habit of opening a bottle of wine at 4pm, finding other things to do during the early evening helped. I started a 2000-piece jigsaw that kept me going for quite a while!

There are so many positive differences I have seen: weight loss, the night sweats have disappeared, along with the bloated feeling which I had previously blamed on the menopause! I feel happy and full of life, but the most important thing for me is the sense of freedom I feel. It’s so liberating not to have that awful feeling of self-loathing each morning.

Here I am, ten months down the line, and I have truly found the unexpected joy of being sober. I got there by reading quit-lit and setting small goals initially, gradually building myself a toolkit of strategies that helped me along the way. I kept a journal of my progress and I also used the strategy of fast-forwarding a scenario and playing out the ending of what it would feel like if I gave in and had a drink. That never failed to keep me on track.

I also didn’t use any alcohol-free substitutes during the first three months until I felt confident that I had broken the habit. Reaching 100 days was a big turning point for me and I started to really feel the benefits of being alcohol-free. I then felt confident to try a few different alcohol-free alternatives and I have found myself enjoying an alcohol-free lager when going out to the pub and I love the Thomson and Scott alcohol-free sparkling Chardonnay for those special celebrations. I drank that at my son’s wedding in May and I will definitely be having that on my 60th birthday! I also started running again – it took me quite a few months of run/walks but I am now enjoying comfortably running 5k, three times a week and I’ve lost over three stone in the last ten months.

I have embraced sobriety and can honestly say that I feel happier, healthier, and fitter than I have felt in years, and I have Dry January to thank for helping me find my way off that slippery slope.