Having quite comfortably completed Dry January in, well, January this year, I thought giving up alcohol for a month would be a breeze. But things are different now. In January, I wasn’t really going out much. In January, I wasn’t seeing friends. In January, life was a little calmer.
In October, life was very up and down, and my emotions were all over the place.
Contrary to the ill-informed accusations of some members of my extended family, I don’t drink so much these days. I joke about it a lot for comedy value, but as I’m always saying, you really shouldn’t believe everything you see on social media.
I definitely enjoy a drink, though, and being the sociable bunny that I am, I’m out and about with friends regularly and we do partake of a little harmless libation.
A difficult month
October was a difficult month for several reasons, and I had a real depression low for a couple of weeks. Mum took a turn for the worse and a few other things compounded to hit me with a prolonged period of the black fog.
There were times during the month where I’d have happily broken my resolve, but, actually, drinking doesn’t help when I feel like that. It helps at the time to take the edge off my emotions and make me a bit giggly, but the next day and the days after are even blacker than they would have been, so it’s extremely counter-productive.
If you’ve ever experienced depression, you’ll know what I mean.
Anyway, here we are in November, and I can now enjoy a drink or two again knowing that I completed my challenge, and it’s all for a good cause.
Very quaffable
I discovered during Dry January that most non-alcoholic wines taste like watered down fruit juice (think Shloer), which is pretty pointless. And most non-alcoholic beers are too sweet or leave a bitter taste in your mouth, but Heineken have nailed it. Their 0% lager is bang on. Very quaffable.
If you’re keeping up, you’ll twig that I attended the singles night without the crutch of alcohol. That did not help my feeling of awkwardness, but I enjoyed the cheaper bar bill. Seedlip 0% gin made a nice alternative that meant I didn’t break the challenge.
So, a massive thank you to my lovely cousin Claire for this challenge; to reset one’s relationship with booze is never a bad thing. Cheers!
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