Curious View

My name is Sam Warren. I am a writer, researcher, DJ, music producer and a Professor at the University of Portsmouth's Faculty of Business and Law. My project 'In the Key of She' explores the career experiences of female electronic music producers. To find out more about that project, head over to  www.inthekeyofshe.org

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The weird old world of ‘soft drinks’

This is Part 19 of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. It’s a series in which I am sharing my reflections and tips on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

When I stopped drinking, I never really thought about what I would drink instead. But nothing could have prepared me for the utter drought of nice, non-alcoholic drinks that I would encounter in pubs, restaurants and clubs. This was in 2011, and although things have definitely improved since then (I’m writing this ten years later in 2021) it’s frankly still a bit shit in most of the places you’ll go on a night out with friends. Especially nightclubs.

One of the reasons I didn't feel instantly well after quitting alcohol was because my sugar intake went through the roof. Pretty much the only alternative to an alcoholic drink in a pub or club is sugar laden fizzy pop or calorific fruit juice (which is a goddamn meal FFS!) unless you can bear to drink diet coke, or are happy to just drink water. And of course you’re not happy to just drink water… YOU WANT A FUCKING GIN AND TONIC. This makes the lack of appealing alternatives even more crushing to the newly sober human. As if this weren’t enough, there's the expense of the horrible things. Dear sweet Lord paying through the nose for a drink you don't want or need that won't even get you pissed!? Talk about rubbing salt in your still smarting sober scars.

One of the more obvious realisations I came to - quite quickly - was that I only wanted a soft drink when I was thirsty. Who knew, huh?! Sure, having something to hold at a party/ In a club/ at dinner is really really important, but as for actually drinking it because you want to? Well, you'll have had your fill after one or two, but your well meaning friends will continue to cajole you into 'having another'. When I was quite newly sober, I went to stay with heavy drinking friends who'd kindly bought in THREE bottles of non-alcoholic red wine, just for me. Which tasted disgusting. I barely managed to make it through three glasses… but even if it had been nice, I had no desire to drink 2.25 litres (half a builder's bucket) of slightly slimy, watered down grape juice, bless them. I’d have probably done the same in their shoes to be fair. I’m pleased to say that there are now some excellent no-alcohol, or de-alcoholised wines available in supermarkets, but sadly, almost no pubs or restaurants have them on the menu, which is pretty much exactly when you want them most. Even if they did, the fact remains that you don’t really want more than a couple of glasses of them, because there’s no alcohol in them whispering you into having another, and then another.

The McGuigan Zero range (available in Tesco) is one I have especially been enjoying lately. 

The only effect of having drink after drink when you are sober is to fill your bladder, make you fat/ rot your teeth/ give you Type 2 diabetes. Sugary drinks are kids drinks. Alcoholics have battered adult palates - bitter ales, dry whites, robust reds, the acidic tang of gin, the throaty burn of vodka… And that, my friend, is when Lime and Soda Is your absolute saviour. I actually think Lime & Soda is the sober person’s superhero. Like the chickpea is to vegans… In some pubs it’s as cheap as 50p a pint, In others you'll be fleeced for as much as £2.50… But it's not too sweet, sparkles like fizz (buttery effervescence on the tongue, you know) and if you have it in a tall glass with ice and a slice, no-one will ever know it's not a G&T. Another good one is ginger beer - it has the kick of alcohol and leaves you feeling warm in your mouth. Take care though as it's often high in sugar, although that can be great for a buzz from time to time too.

But as I said at the start, things are getting better for non-drinkers. The world (well, the UK) seems to be slowly waking up to the fact that non-alcoholics still want the 'fun and treat' of something nice AND FUCKING GROWN UP to drink when we go out (nightclubs are a pathetically sad exception to this). There are now no-alcohol cocktails on lots of restaurant and bar menus - we'll leave aside the disparaging and ‘goody-two-shoes’ labels of 'mocktails' and 'virgins' to one side for now and just say thanks. I've also found bar-tenders are happy to whip you up a fruity creation off-piste if you ask. And there are coffee syrups If you're not feeling the fruit. The Dead Canary in Cardiff made me the most amazing concoction once - like a Brandy Alexander, creamy, chocolatey coffee with a dash of chilli for a kick. 

Me at The Dead Canary in Cardiff, December 2016

Another kind barmaid in Piccadilly fashioned me a long delicious thing to die for that tasted of cherry bakewell and looked as beautiful as could be. My visit to a skyscraper restaurant Manhatta in New York was topped off with a lovely alcohol-free martini, and pretty much every pub now stocks at least one brand of no-alcohol lager - which is frankly so awesome that I have devoted a forthcoming chapter to the stuff, and other ways to ‘be in disguise’.

My birthday ‘Martini’ at Manhatta in New York, March 2019

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In spite of, not because of: the myth of the ‘high functioning alcoholic’

For 18 weeks now, I have been sharing my writing: ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. It’s a series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

For a long time I wore my ‘high functioning alcoholic’ badge with pride. It’s a term used in psychology and addiction sciences to refer to heavy drinkers who – as the name suggests – by and large, have functioning lives, and may even be over-achievers. I’d fall into that category for sure. My friends and I romped through our 20s and 30s being very successful, while lurching from drunken adventure to drunken dramas. During my most chaotic drinking years, I raised two teenage boys, achieved a PhD, a string of academic publications, teaching awards and research grants, which culminated in securing a tenured Professorship within five years of graduating from my doctoral studies. Finally, aged 40, I moved to a different part of the country for the first time in my life. No-one could ever accuse me of fitting the pattern of ‘the typical alcoholic’ down-and-out – crashing cars, losing jobs, shoplifting, being homeless and all the other wildly inaccurate assumptions we make about alcoholism.

The new Dr. Warren throwing her hat at graduation (2006)

Lots of my academic friends were/are heavy drinking high achievers, and if you’re reading this as someone who’s questioning their drinking choices, I have no doubt that you’ve also stacked up successes in your life while spending half your life (or more) drunk – career, family, even sports? And this is what stops us from stopping because nothing has got so bad that it gives us a sobering slap in the face. Never mind that all these achievements are marked by extreme pressure, chaos, remedial work, lies and the need to push through debilitating hangovers with violently shaking hands, and heads down toilets… We’re the high functioning gang, right? Hell, we NEED this mess to do our best!

I once got ‘accidentally’ paralytic the night before flying to Dublin to do a research interview. On the audio recording you hear me excuse myself to go to the bathroom to be sick. Later, the taxi had to pull over so I could dry retch into the gutter. High functioning? High functioning shame, more like. Another time, on the night before the first day of term, we had a lock-in at our local pub. It was a Tuesday night. I went out at 10:30pm ‘for one’ with the pool team to share their post-match sandwiches and don’t remember getting home. Somehow I managed to pour myself onto the train after 4 hours sleep max, still drunk, and take my opening class. I was more worried about the fact that I had hairy legs and was wearing a summer dress than I was about the fact that I was about to teach a class whilst intoxicated. I have SO MANY stories of conference benders, two hours sleep and throwing up minutes before I presented important work… crawling into work almost on my hands and knees to teach, or pulling all nighters to make up lost drunk time in the days and weeks before to meet my deadlines. It was addictively exciting. I told myself I loved it.

Art of Management Conference (2004) The night culminated in a tequila bar at 6am. I missed the whole of the next day’s sessions as I was so violently ill. I probably earned kudos for it.

I’m not telling you this to show off my stripes. I’m not recounting these tales as part of the glorification of getting pissed in our society. I’m telling them to myself (as well as you) because I need to remember how unbelievably shit it was. I’m telling them to counter the rosy memories I also carry with me, that in a funny old way I miss those days. It’s what I used to believe made me interesting. Wild and funny. As you’ll read in various ways in these posts, I am a person who enjoys intensity – the rush you get when you pull something off against the odds is incredibly seductive for me. Rather than standing as a clear lesson not to ever do that IDIOTIC thing again, instead my adrenalin pumps and I think FUCK YEAH!!, high five-ing myself and anyone in reaching distance. All I ever remember from that experience is ‘Ha! I can do this, no sweat… Now quick, get the beers in, my hangover is thundering in’…

I still have the same patterns in my life now I’m sober. I’m an accomplished procrastinator and replicating the same kind of frenzied deadline pushing. So its slowly dawned on me that maybe my achievements were in spite of the drink, not because of it. I need the excitement and pressure of having too much to do in a short space of time, and a big lesson from my sobriety has been to see that drink was just a tool of these behavioural traits and not the root cause. If you are the kind of person who puts everything off until it’s almost too late, taking on so much that its humanly impossible to get through your to-do list, or someone who works in erratic bursts of energy interspersed with long naps and faffing time, then you’ll still be this person when you’re not drinking too.

It’s been a while since I wrote these words and my reflex is to feel more than a little sad that over three years later this kind of procrastinating pattern is still happening in my life. Not least because I boldly wrote a post on this blog a few years ago declaring my procrastination habits were gone for good!! But maybe it’s just something about me I need to accept. I am a ‘just in time’ person, and actually I do some fucking brilliant work against the odds. And it was not alcohol that drove the great work, but me. Elizabeth Gilbert talks at length about how much she detests the ‘tortured artist’ stereotype in her book Big Magic – that somehow we have to be anguished, or behave like an utter c*nt to those around us in order for our creativity to fly. I think the idea of the high-functioning alcoholic is very similar and it’s yet another myth that ensures we continue to drink. I did great work, even though I continually put the most debilitating blocks in my own path to see how badly I could trip myself up. And what that taught me was to hurdle and swerve extremely well, I won gold in that race and it’s still paying dividends. This post is a day late because I left it to the last minute to edit. What beautiful synergy.

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Views from my sober self (1)

Chapter 17 of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

Sober hindsight is a wonderful thing. Like looking at a jigsaw puzzle you’ve just finished and wondering how it took so long to put the pieces together as the picture is so obvious. As the tangled jumbled mess gets laid out out piece by piece, you can see things you didn't know were there. Although I didn’t know it then, two of these pieces were corner ones - you know, the ones you always start the puzzle with? These were ANXIETY and BOREDOM shaped. My twin enemies, and big reasons why I drank like I did. I don’t have space to tell you about both of them today, so I’ll leave one for a later post. Let’s start with anxiety.

I don’t like to think of myself as a nervous, anxious person. As a child I was confident and made friends easily despite what I’m also going to tell you in a minute. I’m the same as an adult, always meeting new people and getting in amongst it at social gatherings, when we’re not having global pandemics. But it’s taken me until now to realise that none of this is easy. I do it all in spite of the nerves and even terror. Everything you’ve read on this blog about how much I’ve loved getting to know the sober me, making new friends and relationships without alcohol and so on is perfectly true. But I still find social gatherings so stressful at first that I sometimes cancel going altogether, and any kind of get together sparks a twinge of longing for the familiar comfort of a drink to ‘relax with’.

Packing up my tiny bedroom to move into my first flat at 18... with a can of Grolsch

All this began with a vodka and orange squash at The Thatched House pub in Portsmouth, aged 15. It was easy to get served underage in the 80s. I still remember how it tasted. Sweet and burning. Grown up, yet still the drink of a child. I was drinking because it made me feel normal and like I fitted in. I was doing something bad and exciting that would earn the respect and admiration of peers – especially boys – because I hated being different. I was clever, wore glasses, didn’t share the local accent of my district, and had a double-barrelled “posh” surname. Yet we weren’t posh at all, and had to watch every penny. My Mum cleverly and thriftily made a lot of my clothes, and my home-made lunch didn’t have the same branded “junk” in my box like the other kids. Of course these were wonderful things for her to do really, but it didn’t feel so much like that for me then. I wasn’t lithe and sporty, I was the last to be picked for teams in PE, I did no dance classes and wasn't into ‘girly’ hobbies like horses and ballet (although I secretly longed to be a gymnast despite the fact I could barely do a forward roll!). 

Everything about me felt different. Aged 8 or 9 I was given the ‘reward’ of using the Upper School library (I read Tolkein’s The Hobbit when I was 7) but this felt like a punishment! I remember the journey across two playgrounds and up into the terrifying Big School building. Cold concrete steps, tiled walls, my eyes rooted downwards to avoid the stares and sniggers of the bigger kids. It was loud and echoey. A walk of shame, not pleasure and certainly not the reward my teachers intended it to be! I look back with on that little girl with such compassion now, and my parents and teachers were truly trying to do their best, but the awfulness of ‘not belonging’ drove me to overcompensate by trying to belong with people who weren’t like me at all. The thing is, I wasn’t like the good girls either. I wasn't quiet and studious, even though I was bright. I simply didn't know many other girls like me until I was in my mid 20’s. 

Real ale ‘recovery’ after the graduation party, 1999

I had been habitually using alcohol for some time by then, as a way to be cool with my peers and often much older boys. I came of age in the 1980s, at the height of ‘ladette’ culture and prided myself on being able to down pint after pint of beer in the pub with the blokes (NEVER a half…) Thankfully, born too early for “shot culture” I became a young adult just at the time the wine drinking woman – Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio and these days Prosecco it seems – became the must have accessory for the professional woman, busy Mum, glitzy, sexy girlfriend and boy, was I IN.

Alcohol meant I belonged. The anxiety and awkwardness of always feeling like a square peg in a round hole melted away with the first glass. Yet even in the late stages of addition I would have strenuously argued that the one thing I definitely didn't do was use alcohol as a crutch. But I did. And although I went to university as a mature student where I did start to fit better, because we were students we all drank like fish, this just normalised my habit further.  It had become hard-wired, second nature to me to reach for a drink to alleviate the slightest onset of anxiety about social situations. So much so that it wasn't until I stopped that could see that’s what I was doing. 

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Taking off your liquid mask

Thanks so much for still being here! We’re on Part 16 of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

It’s been a source of wonder and amazement to me how strong I actually am. An interesting thing happens when you are no longer drunk, or busy thinking about how good you are for not being drunk. You start to feel… well… just how you feel. Without alcohol, your moods and mental health are unmasked. 

After the initial elation of FUCK YEAH, I’m doing this! has simmered down, it came as quite a shock to me that I still felt rather depressed some days. It was a shock because when I was a drinker I’d attribute depression to hangovers, or the fact that I felt trapped by alcohol, knowing I needed to quit but finding that future too grim to contemplate. So I’d have a drink to feel better. Often I didn’t feel better for very long as inevitably happens, because alcohol is a highly addictive depressive substance. The glass of wine to ‘cheer me up’ turned into the whole bottle, then another, then secret swigs from bizarre, impulse-purchase-holiday-souvenir-spirits at the back of the kitchen cupboards, a slew of awful tears and a snotty half-remembered fight with my partner. Finally I saw the light, as they say: I learned that alcohol caused my black moods and I was a miserable drunk. That's why I quit, right? So when I was sober it would all go away and we would live happily ever after.

But sometimes my life is out of balance, or just generally sucks, and sometimes I wake up and the damp grey fog is there for no discernible reason, like the weather. My heart is full of clouds, or the nothingness of a still grey-white sky. Sometimes I still get sad even though I’m sober. Well how RUDE! What is that all about?! I was a teenager when I started binge drinking (like all good 80’s girls) and I was 41 when I quit. I’d never learned that moods are just part of life, especially for feelings-led emotional beings like me, with tendencies towards depression. I didn’t realise I might still get sad even when I was sober – or rather I’d never really given it much thought because alcohol was always there to wash the sad away. And for a while I thought I’d never cope because I couldn’t drink my sadness away, or at least go through those motions (see above!). For a while this loss made me feel quite depressed in itself. It’s one of the reasons recovery is often referred to as grief, or the loss of a relationship. Something that you have relied on for so much of your life has vanished. Its not coming back so you miss it terribly, achingly but you’ve yet to rebuild your life without it.

The most wonderful thing about sober sadness, though, is that the clouds can lift and dissipate just as quickly as they came – either by themselves, or by taking some exercise, having a good cry, WhatsApp-ing a friend, napping, yoga, or writing it out – just put those things in your desired order and add whatever works for you! I’m not saying it’s easy or pleasant at the time, and I’m not saying that there aren’t occasions when there’s a need for professional help. But always remember: you are coping even though you are sober. It’s just that you’re feeling all the shades of blue in a lot more detail, like one of those artists’ pencil sets with more shades than you ever realised existed. Sometimes it’s just a melancholic tinge of that peculiar aquamarine that only appears when the sun starts to rise, and sometimes it’s the gloopy petrol of a stormy ocean sky looming on the horizon. This is your body telling you what it feels about the way you’re choosing to be in the world right now. And because you are sober you can hear it much more clearly than through alcoholic earmuffs. How utterly wonderful to be so in tune with your body! Now all you have to do is learn to listen, and you’ll cope. You really will, and I will leave you with the wise and beautiful words of Tracy Verdugo on the matter...

Image credit: Tracey Verdugo Art

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You Never Knew Me Drunk

Chapter 15 of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

I’ve been sober for more than ten years now, and in that time I have left a marriage, lived in two new areas of the country, become a granny (and a DJ!), moved back to my home town again, and had three new jobs - to list just a few of the life changes I’ve lived through without alcohol. I have made a whole bunch of new friends over those years too, including meeting the love of my life. And the most wonderful thing of all is that none of these people have ever known me drunk. Of course I still have friends who have seen me through recovery and are marvelling in the new sober me, but there’s something extra fabulous about making new friends as the ‘real you’. Straight up, no drink involved, what you see is what you get. 

The best bit is that the old you – the drinking you – is history to them. All they see and know is how you are now. Your sobriety is normal to them and that’s such a refreshing place to be, because it’s as if you never drank. Even more wonderful is the distance of that history from where you are now. When you tell your new friends tales of crazy adventures, terrible mishaps and recount the story of your rock bottom, they simply won’t believe it. When I tell my partner about the afternoon binges, late-night lock-ins, hysterical violent rows and blackouts that my drinking enabled, he literally cannot imagine me ever being like that. And that is magical to me because I feel nothing short of reborn through his eyes.

Now don't get me wrong, making friends without a drink in your hand is a nerve wracking business even for a confident person (much less dating, aargh!), and I’m certainly not going to pretend it’s not. But once you're over the nerves, the joy of getting to know someone that you just fit with, no lubrication required, is sweet. Like being a child again, you know that you’re bonding over things that really matter, like personality, values, hobbies and interests rather than just the capacity to get pissed together. 

Once I was sober, it was also quite astonishing to me how many people there are out there who don’t habitually use alcohol in a chaotic way. When you drink a lot, and your friends drink a lot, and you spend a lot of time together drinking, you don't notice all the other people who aren’t drinking. The people in coffee bars, or happily having juice in the pub, or water with their meal even though they aren’t driving. Making cups of tea when they get home from the school run, and not opening cold bottles of Pinot Grigio to cook fish fingers with. Those sort of people. And when you make friends with them (or fall in love with one), it’s like finding another world through the back of your wardrobe, Narnia-style. Something previously familiar, yet totally new, you really see how central alcohol used to be to your life, how insidiously it rooted its rhizomes through every social fibre, sloshing through your mind, making you think your world would sink without booze keeping it afloat. 

I’ve even noticed this with old friends too – it makes me chuckle… WE didn't used to get paralytically drunk together, WE didn’t go out on the lash, I did, and my friends went along with me! Now they're relieved that we don't have to do that any more – in fact some friends used to ignore my midweek calls to avoid meeting up because they knew exactly how it would end – head down the toilet and a sickie off work the next day. Once I stayed with a friend who I was organising a conference with. The night before our ‘work day’ we shared a bottle of fizz I’d brought. She probably only had two glasses but the poor woman was so horribly hungover in the morning, I couldn't believe it! Not least because drinking the rest of the bottle had been me being exceptionally restrained. 

I know there’s no such thing as MAKING someone get drunk (unless you force feed them alcohol), but its very hard to stay sober around an infectious, enthusiastic piss head who’s buying the drinks! I don't think my new non-alcoholic friends appreciate quite how much their lives and habits mean to me actually, it’s hard to understand if you’ve not had a life with Captain Alcohol at the helm, but this goes out to all of you who’ve helped me grow to love my ‘new normal’ just by being you.

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Other people’s reactions: Anger

This is part 14 of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

One of the things I was most unprepared for when I stopped drinking was other people’s reactions. This is the first of a few posts about these responses because I think my newly sober self would have liked to have been more forewarned and forearmed.

The first time I quit drinking I was almost certainly super-annoying and evangelical. I’d read Allen Carr’s cunningly titled The EasyWay© to control alcohol and, like a leaf-blower in an autumn park, it felt like a pathway had been cleared before me – a big wide path through which I could regally ride my wagon to a sober future. Even though I fell off this particular wagon after about six weeks, I’m still very grateful to  Allen Carr for his no-nonsense leaf-blower approach to blasting away the myths that our society has spun around alcohol, and which invisibly draw us in and trap us. So having hit a low, read the book, and gone a few days without a drink for the first time in a couple of decades, I was ecstatic! Soaring on a thermal of hope and feeling FREEEE! I could do this! And I wanted to tell everyone about it. This amazing cure I'd found, this secret passage to a sober, fulfilling life.

From my giddy heights, I’d been ready to hear disbelief and ready to defend against the jibes of “yeah, right, like THAT’s ever gonna happen” from anyone who knew me. Bring it on. But I was ill-prepared, no… absolutely floored by the responses I got from my friends who I thought would be happy for me… The most crushing ones were dismissiveness and resentment. In fact after writing this story I don't think it’s exaggerating to retitle that as anger. Because that’s what it was. 

One of my oldest friends went so far as to not even want to hear about my new-found sobriety, vehemently defending their right to drink, angrily disputing any of my new-found wisdom from the ‘Book of Carr’ and telling me I “didn't need to quit drinking…” just bloody well learn moderation! As I will further explain in a later chapter, a big reason I think I started drinking and continued to drink long after I ‘grew up’ was to fit in, to be normal and show off my devil-may-care, don’t-give-a-fuck, wild abandon in order to win and keep friends. The sting of being cut down mid-sentence at a dinner gathering with a “Yes, well we don't want to hear any more about your ridiculous things, thank-you” as if I were a child will stay with me forever. And at the time, my fragile, solitary, sobriety just couldn’t withstand the slap. When I stopped for good some years later, I had moved to a new town and so it was easy not to tell them until I felt strong enough. But they’d heard my news from another friend in the meantime, and were hurt to hear that their previous reaction had caused me to hide my sobriety from them this time around. 

Looking back, it’s clear they felt very frightened that our friendship wouldn't continue without the piss-ups that characterised most of our time together… they were losing their friend! I was dumping them! After all we’d lived through together! I also think they felt at least a little anxious that if I felt my drinking was so much of a problem I had to stop, then their’s (by association) must be too. They didn't want to hear the wisdom of Carr, or my reasons, because it caused them to reflect on their own habits. It was disrupting normal service, and carrying on as normal, with no boring sober friends in tow was very much what they’d like to do. THANK YOU VERY MUCH.

You’d think it would be enough to be dealing with your own issues when you’re recovering from alcohol addiction, but as it turns out, a lot of those issues are ones that arise from your relationships with others. For me, knowing how to respond to other people’s issues that my non-drinking hooked in them was more of a challenge, and one that I wasn’t expecting at all.

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Don’t lose the fun of the habit

We’re up to Chapter 13 of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

When I first contemplated living without alcohol I was convinced I wouldn’t be able to do anything from my old boozy life ever again. This fear was enough to make sure I kept on drinking for years past the point I knew I needed to quit, because alcohol was woven into the very fabric of my life and without it, everything would just unravel. But after the first few wobbly, fragile months were passed, I started doing all the things I used to do – just without the drink. Things start to feel slightly less awful, less weird, and more normal – well, they felt OK at least.

All the glitz and magic of Christmas with none of the alcohol

You’ll know when you’ve got to this point. It’s when you no longer have an urge to hide from the world with your embarrassing secret, or gush your sobriety over everyone you meet when you do venture out. When I felt strong enough, I started going to the pub again, having fruit cordial in a big beautiful wine glass after work, and ordering virgin mojitos on fancy nights out with the girls (just ignore the prices!) It felt safe to celebrating nice happenings with a bottle of sparkling grape juice, and more recently no-alcohol Prosecco has gaily bubbled onto the scene. And far from making me wistful for the buzz, or mourn for alcohol, I felt wonderful… I felt normal. I blended in, I still had life’s lovely drinky rituals, and very quickly I worked out which of these activities were still fun sober, and which ones weren’t.

Mocktails with dinner and a friend? Definitely fun...

Where I come from, drinking is not just about the drink, or even getting drunk. It’s also about the social rituals that fizz around the act of planning, buying, consuming, and recovering from alcohol too. Deciding how many bottles is enough to get in for a party, perusing the hundreds and hundreds of near-identical brands of gin in the supermarket, selecting just the right glass, swizzle stick and fruit garnish for cocktails, and then posting slightly proud comments on social media the next day: ‘Ugh. Hanging, but worth it: great night out!’ And then there’s the endless talking about alcohol – ‘expert’ sommelier tastings that make up a whole industry from tiny little sips, chunky courses on craft brewing, TED talks on viticulture and of course the tall stories between friends after a boozy escapade that are retold as high as skyscrapers for years after. Yes, alcohol is probably more a social substance than a chemical one, so when you quit you need to make sure you don’t overlook this important side to things. It’s only the addictive poison you want to be rid of (well, and the chaos and hideous hangovers, but they’re two sides of the same coin for us drunks). So make a clear distinction in your mind. 

It's the stuff in the glass that’s dangerous, not the glass!

Many drinking support groups caution against keeping up the same rituals after you’ve quit drinking – you know, don’t put elderflower fizz in a champagne glass, don’t drink no-alcohol beer, don’t go to pubs, don’t go on bar crawls… which is shorthand for basically amputate parts of your social self and never leave the house. Wear dark colours and flog yourself too while you’re at it. What a sacrifice! You’re already getting divorced from your toxic lover, do you have to lose contact with all their nice friends too? Really? And of course, once something feels like a sacrifice and not an escape, you will feel deprived, hard done by and like you’re missing out – and we all know what happens then. 

I prefer to reframe it completely the other way. With the beer goggles gone, you can see what you truly enjoy doing, and what you only enjoyed because it was an opportunity to get drunk. Having two bottles of Becks Blue in a pint glass after a summer country walk is sheer bliss. Sitting in a pub garden, quaffing like everyone else is a priceless feeling. Which is just as well seeing as that can set you back at least £7 at the time I’m writing this!

Spot the Difference?

However (for me), sitting in a Wetherspoons on a Saturday afternoon watching football is not. Neither is trawling around ten fancy bars in one evening spending money on expensive sugary potions. But having long liquid lunches of lime and soda with friends is just as brilliant as ever.

These are just my preferences of course and they’ve changed quite a bit during my sober journey. It will be different for you, and will change for all of us depending on who we are with, and at different times of our lives. But the process of distilling the ritual from the alcohol is the same, and it's a really nice process of discovering what you really like to do, and with whom. 

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Just for Today (no emotional time travellers please)

This is the 12th post for ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

One of AA’s mantras is that you only need to not pick up a drink today. You don’t need to worry about tomorrow. You don’t need to worry about Saturday night, Angela’s party next month, Christmas, or the rest of your life. You are just not having a drink today. Dear sweet Mary Mother of God, what nonsense!? When I was a drinker I use to think this was the most ridiculous idea – what the hell is the point of kidding yourself? If you believe you need to stop drinking (and I mean really be free of it) then of course it’s not ‘just for today’. Why pretend? Surely it’s better to come to terms with a sober life than play mind games?

Image credit: Chiltern & Thames Intergroup of Alcoholics Anonymous

Now I have stopped drinking, I can see how wrong I was. ‘Just for today’ doesn't mean kidding yourself that at the stroke of midnight everything will miraculously be OK again and you can crack open the bubbly to celebrate. ‘Just for today’ means

‘Worry about now. Right now. Just now and no further’

Not tea time, not even an hour from now. Concern yourself with this moment because this moment is all there actually is! The ‘Just for today’ card you’re given at your first AA meeting contains many excellent practices, but within them, there is one important idea that has stayed with me all these years. And that’s the practice of not loading yourself up now with the anxieties of some future state, so that you feel overwhelmed, plummet into the pit of despair and be far more likely to have a drink than if you stay in the present. 

No-one can know the future, so our hopes and fears about what will (might!?) happen are just that – hopes and fears. So beaming them into the here and now, effectively making them real, is a huge source of anxiety which is completely avoidable, if you learn how. It’s an excellent trick to learn for all sorts of things in life actually, and is at the heart of all sorts of ancient ‘eastern’ inspired meditative practices. Shut down your nervous, chattering ‘future brain’ and stay in the present. Mind-full, body-full, and soul-fully right where you are. Because that’s all you have to deal with right now. As I write those words I am wrapping you in this super-soft velvet backed teddy-bear throw, because that’s how soothing ‘just for today’ feels. 

In fact I might just join you in the blankie if that’s OK, as I’m in a pretty anxious place myself as I’m writing this – which is why I decided to tackle this particular chapter today.  I have a Really Important Job Interview coming up in a few weeks (which is in itself a projection… take away the Really Important, and I might not be feeling so nervous), an uncertain application for a mortgage in progress, travel plans to finalise, a potential home-move to organise (oh my LORD I have to rent my apartment out?! I have no idea about such things!) and so on, and so on. And there will be a whole new set of things to replace these when I’m done getting through this lot. My son calls these matters for “Future Mum”, not “Now Mum”. I like that. It’s really helpful – it means I can pop them in a parcel and post them off to someone else*.

Now it’s one of the great joys of imagination and day dreams that we can conjure up future states at will, just by thinking about something or someone. But it’s also dangerous if we use it to imagine future strife or sorrow. Of course, there are tasks I need to do today in respect of things like job interviews, mortgage applications, and travel plans, and of course there are wider future issues that demand we think about, and act on them, now – like climate change – but the important point is that I don’t need to think (and therefore WORRY) about all of them, all at once, right now. Because as soon as I do, the emotions associated with the ‘worst things that could happen’, flood through my body as if they were already happening. 

If drink has traditionally been your go-to support in times of stress, anxiety, or panic, then worrying about tomorrow just heaps on pressure to drink, feel crap about being sober, or hopeless that you’ll never stop craving, etc etc etc… so even if you don’t pick up a glass, you still end up miserable and wallowy. And as being sober seems extra shit under such conditions, you imagine bleaker futures, with more terrifying emotional ‘presidues’. This is my word for residual emotions from something imagined that you feel in the present moment.

Image credit: Complete Health News

Because emotions are chemicals that your mind makes real. To your brain (well, your endocrine system to be precise) your imagination is real. Seratonin and dopamine manifest to us as ‘happiness’, Cortisone becomes ‘stress’, Adrenalin converts to stress too, but also excitement. Yep, it's a bitch that one, even exciting things can stress you out – I still get all weird before a big night out like a five year old waiting for their birthday party to start. My friend Donna and I call it ‘pre-rave anxiety syndrome’. Finally, there’s the mother of them all – Oxytocin, which we experience as desire/ pleasure. This one is also a tad confusing: it is released during orgasm, breastfeeding and when stroking cats. But probably not all at the same time.

So remember folks, that all we really have is now, corny as it sounds. And if we can live ‘just for today’ it’s truly a gift that frees us from living in fear and worry of ‘what might be’. I guess that’s why it’s called ‘the present’.

*I wrote the original text for this piece in early 2018, and I can report from the future that all of those things worked out just fine, in fact better than I could have imagined.

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Was I bad enough?

This is the 11th chapter of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

Last week I introduced the idea that we like to think of alcoholics as bad-smelling, stubbly, broken people who shamble and stagger about. Tragic figures, wearing stained raincoats, either sitting quietly up at the corner tables in low-cost pub chains at 9am, or swigging 50p plastic bottle cider on park benches. On the other hand, we also glamorise drinking as the highest form of entertainment. We recall hilarious tales of drunken ‘adventures’ as if they are our proudest achievements even though we almost died or caused catastrophes. 

Me c.2004 partying on my coffee table, with trusty wooden spoon microphone, after the pub. The tequila hangover the next day was not quite so much fun...

We need to construct alcoholics the way we do, and make heavy drinking seem like the most exciting thing ever, in order to insulate ourselves from the possibility that our drinking might be escalating to problem levels. Of course this is all the easier to do if you are in a group of people with similar drinking patterns because no-one will call you out. Calling others out would be calling ourselves out at the same time so no-one would dare. We tell ourselves we’re JUST FINE because this is what everyone does! We have to think like this because we need to place ‘problem drinker’ as far away as possible from our own habits. So, don’t be surprised if you hear people ask “Oh, so how bad were you?” when you explain that you no longer drink:

“Did you drink in the mornings?’

“Couldn't you even go a day without drinking?”

“Could you not just have one or two glasses?”

“What, you don’t even drink at Christmas?”

You can be sure that they are just checking the behaviours you deemed to be alcoholic against their own habits, but this is cold comfort when you are in the early stages of sobriety. The last thing you need is someone shaking your resolve, by questioning if you were really that bad. Especially if – in their eyes – you didn’t really fit their expectations of what truly alcoholic behaviour would be.

In the early weeks and months, the painfully freighted memories that culminated in your last ever drink will fade, as time washes them away. But until you are free of the desire to drink (e.g., you’ve realised life can be pretty OK without booze), any cracks in your fragile foundations can feel like a tractor beam pulling you through the pub door like Sigourney Weaver on her armchair in Ghostbusters being dragged into Zuul. You do not need even a glimmer of hope that maybe things weren’t that bad. You need to remember that no matter what their opinion, yes, yes it was bad – because you decided to quit drinking.

Image credit: Colombia Pictures retrieved from Multiverse Omnipedia

Imagine this another way. Imagine meeting someone who is in an abusive relationship. You can see the bruises and scars and the trail of devastation after an attack. Imagine saying to that person “was it really bad enough to leave?” Would you laugh it off with them? Chortling at their stories with an “OMG, that's mental!! Still, we never learn do we, eh?” I doubt it very much. If you feel unsafe in a relationship, that’s plenty enough reason to get out early, for others to respect your need to do so, and to support you, not question if you should maybe go back and have another go!? But there it is – and you’ll face this question time and time again, because your abusive relationship was with a liquid drug and not a violent spouse. 

BUT… and here comes the best part… when the well meaning (but oh-so-irritating) stranger asks, it is SO much fun to pretend you were much worse than you ever were. Go ahead! They’re expecting it! Gleefully tell stories of downing a bottle of vodka, while hiding from your kids in a wardrobe at your parents’ house at Christmas. Recount the hilarious time you tried to sleep in a churchyard flowerbed after a pissed-up fight with your partner, got mistaken for a tramp and found you had laid down in dog poo. Shock them with the story of falling out of a train door, lost and drunk and not being able to stand up by yourself – go on, fill your boots!* It sounds so much better than “I was sick of drinking two huge glasses of wine every night and never having an evening with a clear head”, and will protect you from any insinuations that you might not needed to have quit.  

Because the important point is that however much you did drink, and whatever your own answers to those questions are, you don’t want to be drinking now. You don't want to do what you were doing, and you have realised that its futile pretending that you can ever drink “normally” – e.g., in so-called ‘moderation’, or perhaps are forming a dependency that you’d rather not have. And that, my friend is all the reason you need.

*At least one of those stories is true. I’ll leave you to wonder which one(s)

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Couldn’t you have just one glass? Stupid questions (2)

Part 10 of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

A few weeks back, I started explaining how well-meaning folk still can ask an ex-drinker the daftest of questions. Back then it was, ‘Do you miss it?’ and here, I’ll introduce you to its slightly more inquisitive cousin: ‘What, couldn’t you have just one glass?’

Photo credit: ‘Cinen Miniatures’ Etsy shop

The ‘one or two glass’ indicator is an unwritten test for alcoholism set by that best of experts, Joe and Joanne Public. Other items on the test include: not drinking hard liquor, not drinking during the week, not drinking before lunchtime. These are stakes in the flimsy barricade that heavy drinkers erect to distance their habits from those of ‘real’ alcoholics. If you can drink one pint, one glass of wine, one G&T, and stop of your own volition, then you’re A-OK. You’re in control. You’re the boss of booze. Nothing to see here, move along! 

And yes, I could just have one (ok, maybe two). And yes I did sometimes only have one or two. Such behaviour was robustly planned. I would buy miniature bottles of wine in the supermarket specifically so I could only have ‘just one’. I poured them into a small wine glass so it felt like I was having two. Ha! Such trickery! My brain didn’t stand a chance! And all the while I was having these two small glasses of wine, I would feel smug and in total control. Totally in control because while ‘enjoying just one’, there was no room for any other thoughts apart from alcohol and how GROWN UP I was being:

Look! Look at me! The moderate drinker! Look how modern and respectful of her health she is! See her restraint SHINE! 

I even downloaded a drinks tracker app on my phone so I could revel in my moderation. I decided I would measure and record my ability to ‘enjoy responsibly’, so HA! What do you think about that? Fuck you alcohol!

So yes. Yes I could have just one or two. But I didn’t want just one or two – and therein lies the crucial point. Why the hell would I want just one glass? This is only a question someone without drink problems could ever ask. And that’s my answer to this kindly but stupid question – why would I only want one glass? The people I know who voluntarily have only one or two drinks (e.g., they’re not driving, they don’t have to get up for work in the morning, yet they still abstain), those people don’t really like alcohol if they’re honest. They’re drinking to fit in. Drinking because it’s what you do, and not liking alcohol is a bit weird. I genuinely don’t believe that people who like alcohol ever enjoy ‘just one glass’.  They may be able to stop after one glass, but that’s because they have reasons that are stronger than the desire to drink. So restraining yourself to ‘just one or two’ means parties, events, meals out, basically all of social life, and perhaps even in private too, is tainted by some degree of deprivation. And deprivation is a dangerous feeling, because if at some point, your reasons not to drink become less important than your desire to have that third drink, then drinking more is inevitable. Because, as I repeatedly say on these pages, alcohol is a highly addictive substance you build tolerance to.  

But there is another problem I discovered with the ‘just one glass’ strategy too. Did you know two x 125ml glasses of 12.5% red wine registers a massive red DANGER blob on the shitty drinks tracker app? 250ml of strong wine is well over current ‘safe’ daily drinking limits for an adult woman. In 2010 that was one measly supermarket mini bottle, and within, ooh, I don’t know, 0.5126 seconds of seeing that red alert flash up, my pride, good mood, resolve and fragile sense of responsibility dissolved, because even my best wasn’t good enough so why the hell bother?

Let me be very clear here - I am not suggesting that these apps are not useful. In fact, one of my friends has recently stopped drinking as a result of using one of them. But my reaction was to go straight back to the kitchen and quaff the other three mini bottles in the cupboard. Of course I’d bought four mini bottles of wine when I went shopping because they were a multi-buy deal for a fiver. So now I’m a litre in, and full of self-loathing at my failed restraint. The really big FUCK IT is about to be unleashed. I get in the car, drive to Tesco because it’s more anonymous than the off licence, and buy a proper sensible sized bottle of red. I drink that as well. Normal service resumed. Relying on your willpower to have ‘just one’ is a dangerous game that over time you lose the rules for.

The amusing end to this story happened in the murk of paranoia I swam through the next morning when I realised that the Drinks Tracker App knew I was over the limit. It knew my name and where I lived, because the sanctimonious ‘enjoy responsibly’ me of yesterday told it. My phone had GPS. I’d taken my phone to Tesco’s with me in the car. Anyone following my GPS signal would know I was travelling too fast to be on foot. I’ve seen Spooks, I know these things! FUCK. Any minute now the police were going to rock up and nick me for drink driving. Oh GOD! App deleted.

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In praise of blow outs

The ninth post from ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

I loved being drunk. I loved the frisson as the first mouthfuls melted my veins, the buzz, the shimmer, the silky slide out of myself and into oblivion. I didn’t care that I would probably end up crying, start a fight, or be sick with migraine the next day. I didn’t care that I was hurting and lying to the people I loved, and slowly killing myself. I loved being drunk. And I loved that release – the feeling that you’ve stepped outside yourself and just popped up the road for a while. A few precious hours off from the world with no cares or responsibilities. Just because you’ve binned the booze doesn't mean the urge to get wasted will dissolve with it, and the sooner you make peace with this, the sooner you’ll feel free.

For me, accepting I have a switch marked ‘FUCK IT’ that still needs to be flicked is my way of making sure I never pick up a drink again, along with all the other strategies I’m sharing in these posts. But it is also one that I don’t read about in recovery manuals or self-help forums. It’s somehow taboo even among recovering booze-hounds. But having a need for buzz and excitement and blow-outs does not make you weak and it’s nothing to be afraid of. Own that shit! Enjoy it! It’s part of you and it’s probably why you were seduced by alcohol in the first place. Alcoholics spend all their lives drunk, or thinking about drink. For me, there was never a day when alcohol wasn’t involved somehow, and I’ve said before, even thinking about not drinking meant booze was King. You stopped drinking because of this, and you are amazing. BUT. Ignore that jaunty little devil with “Blow Out’ on her t-shirt at your peril. I don't care what you do, but whatever it is, feed that little critter or your life will be miserable and resemble that of a reluctant monk – either that, or you’ll crawl back to the drink. It’s as simple as that.

One of my vices is caffeine. A big rich jug of coffee at 6am in the morning is what’s fuelling this writing right now. And a mug at a party in the evening is what I need to keep me awake and feeling sociable until the wee small hours if that's what I want to do. (I have even been known to neck a couple of Sudafed at 3am in a club for an energy boost as I am frankly a bit grubby at times). At the moment I also do HIIT training after work – 20 minute workouts of high intensity intervals which are quick and effective buzz generators. I have also been known to eat entire boxes of chocolate eclairs to get a similar effect but this is clearly not sustainable if you want to fit into your clothes after a couple of weeks.

Take up long distance running, bungee jump, join a climbing club, learn to tango, I don’t care what it is, just make sure it gives you a thrill, sets your adrenaline and serotonin/ dopamine flooding, and replaces the RUSSSSHHH. You could even try meditation - ok, so that's more of a ‘blow in’ but I hear it’s pretty cool. I even have a friend who takes recreational drugs from time to time. People don’t understand this at all. How can you refuse alcohol, but pop ecstasy or acid in a field at a festival? But it does make sense to me… because they’re not doing it every day. Unlike alcohol which is a constant, daily necessity of life for an alcoholic, they’re not even doing it every week, or even every month. It’s their guilty pleasure, their blow out. And it leaves them free and rejuvenated to enjoy a calm and happy sober life for the other 355 odd days a year.

A lot of substance misuse counsellors would disagree with what I am saying here – call me irresponsible even – because there will always be the possibility that one day you’ll pick up a drink instead of your running shoes if you’re having a shitty time. But that’s always going to be the case. And I argue that ignoring the need to blow out can actually make that more likely to happen. I think it’s an unreasonable ask of ourselves that as well as kicking the booze (with which we are deeply and destructively in love), we also have to control our urge to blow-out too. And frankly I don't want to. I have not had an alcoholic drink since 6th March 2011. I am no longer in that abusive relationship. I have a clear head every day, my teeth are no longer stained with Merlot and I don’t live with constant heartburn. I’m in tune with my moods – more about that in a later post - and am loving being able to drive for days out in the country. I have relished discovering all sorts of places a short drive from my home town – places I had no idea existed because there was no way I’d waste a perfectly good drinking day by having to drive the car! And that's enough for me. The blow outs stay. Now, someone please pass me the eclairs…

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Convalescence

Part 8 of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

It probably goes without saying that to stop feeding your body a powerful toxin on a regular basis is a very positive thing to do. Most people know that alcohol damages the liver because it has to work extra hard to break down the poison so the body can excrete it. But alcohol also inhibits absorption of vital vitamins and minerals in the stomach, stops white blood cells from fighting infection, weakening the immune system, and on its way out the door, our beloved poison inflames the bladder walls eventually leading to disintegration. Nice. Your body takes time to heal from this onslaught but when you quit drinking, this is likely to be the last thing on your mind as you battle with the psychological highs and lows and cope with the social weirdness. 

There’s a song by OceanLab that perfectly encapsulates the starburst of excitement I felt when I was coming up to a year without alcohol. The feelings I had were nothing short of a revelation. It’s a bit of a big cheesy trance tune to be honest, called On a Good Day. I remember sitting in my car waiting for it to finish playing, before I went to my office. I felt so supremely happy and excited about my future. I was truly free. I was well. I was happy, finally. I was 41 years old and my life was just beginning!  But it took a while to get to there.

Cover for the OceanLab album which features ‘On a Good Day’

To tell you the truth, it came as a disappointment that I didn't feel bursting with health and vitality the minute I was sober. No drink = no hangovers, and your body is now a temple, so it should feel as cool and clean as one, right? Well I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news if you’ve not worked this one out for yourself yet, but it’s quite disheartening when you realise you still feel pretty crappy several weeks or even months after you stop being drunk. Of course, the shape you’re in mentally has a lot to do with this as it’s a crazy myth that our mind and body are separate somehow, but the fact remains that your body might need some help to get well again after years of daily poisoning, with all the violent migraines, anxiety and self-induced vomiting, that entails (if your experiences are anything like mine).

In the first few months, my response to being sober was overwhelming exhaustion. I’d wake up in the morning still feeling mildly hungover and ‘fuggy’ and by early afternoon I’d fall asleep at my desk, like someone had pulled the plug on me. On the advice of a friend, I went to see a homeopath and herbalist who told me that the liver takes two years to completely regenerate after being battered by booze, and that’s not taking into account its normal everyday payload of toxins from food, environment, stress chemicals and, in my case, the eight tons of sugar that had taken the place of alcohol in order to deal with the “I deserve it” treat function that drink had for me.

During our conversation I realised I'd been so caught up with being a non-drinker that I didn't have time for the gym, going for walks or much exercise at all. Only an ex-drinker will understand how much time ‘not drinking’ takes up in the early weeks, plus I was sober, I could drive everywhere, any time of day, so why would I want to walk?! So as well as little brown bottles of witch doctor potions, the herbalist prescribed me some convalescence too. I was to drop sugar and avoid wheat in my diet for one month, starting with a 9-day “liver detox” all accompanied by gentle aerobic exercise every day. The randomness of a nine day anything rather appealed to me.

After six months of not drinking, I was desperate to feel amazing… and a month without bread and sugar would be a walk in the park compared to kicking alcohol out of my life. And it was! Within two weeks of being sugar and wheat free I cannot tell you how much difference it made. I no longer slumped in the afternoons, I woke feeling refreshed – even cheerful – and by the end of the month I’d lost 8lbs and felt like a new woman. I felt strong enough to finally end the stuttering marriage I’d been desperately trying to re-kindle for months, and I had new, enjoyable eating habits, some of which have even stayed with me over the years. 

Of course I didn't stay sugar free or even wheat free, but I’d learned an important lesson – that the commonplace, over-refined foods we eat every day can be pretty poisonous too, so we need to eat them knowingly. I’ve learned that I can get mild ‘hangovers’ from any over indulgence, and that never goes away. Even now, ten years later, I still know about it the next day if I’ve binged on chocolate, or rounds of toast. But, sadly, just like when I was drinker, feeling crappy afterwards doesn’t seem to stop me doing it. Perhaps it’s true, some things really do never change!

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Remember the ‘yet’...

This is Part 7 of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

It’s tempting to distance yourself from someone who tells you they had to go out on a frozen winter’s night, knee deep in snow, with a broken leg in plaster to buy a bottle of vodka. Motivated by fear, they only had one bottle left in the cupboard, and were terrified of not having at least 2 litres safely stashed under the sink in case they needed to go on a bender. That was just one of the stories I heard during my time at AA meetings.

“Phew, I’m not that bad” you think, and it’s true, I was never in that deep with booze. We have a classic image of an alcoholic as someone who drinks all day and night, and in quantities that would send a regular drinker into a coma. But it’s this caricature that prevents many of us from admitting we have a problem. When I did stop drinking I’d never struggled out in a blizzard with a broken leg to buy a litre of vodka ‘just for spares’, even though I’d had my fair share of horrible consequences. I’d not lost a job through drinking…. Yet. I’d not crashed my car while under the influence, or lost my driving licence… Yet. I’d not been diagnosed with liver disease… Yet....Yet. 

‘Yet’ was one of the earliest and most lasting impressions I had from AA meetings – recognising shades of my own behaviour in the desperate and shocking tales I told, like my friend here, with the broken leg and vodka. That scenario didn't resonate with me when we’re talking those sort of quantities, or even that kind of alcohol - much as I loved vodka, my drink of choice for benders was always beer or wine, and that’s another myth about alcoholics, that they’re always addicted to hard liquor. 

But this guy’s story did resonate with me. I’d felt the same terror propelling me into action. I’d been soaked through with that absolute compulsion to drink, and to keep a ready supply of drink to hand at all times. It was exactly the same albeit on a lesser scale, perhaps. If it resonates with you too, take it as an alarm bell. Because it’s not the quantity consumed, but the habits and rituals that slowly, but surely take root, and soon enough the amounts will get larger. How can they not? Alcohol is an addictive substance that your body builds up tolerance to. You need more and more to feel the same effects, and in my culture being able to ‘drink someone under the table’ is often worn as a badge of honour.

I couldn't let my wine glass be drained without knowing it would be refilled. I never let it get below two-thirds gone. Amazingly I still do this with soft drinks, especially if I’m drinking from a wine glass. The panic of “keep it topped up!” is still there. It makes me shudder. A faint alcoholic reverb buzzing in the background. The thought of being empty was so horrible I’d always do the mental calculation of drinkers to bottles-on-the-table ratio, and order another in anticipation. “Better to have just-in-case than just-enough!” I would trill.

Once, I had to examine a PhD thesis at a university campus that was hard to reach by train from my home. I had no choice but to drive up the evening before the exam, and as I’d left in a rush after work, I’d not had a chance to put a bottle of white in the car for my late arrival at the hotel. I figured I’d stop en route and pick one up. So just imagine my horror at the motorway services when the supermarket assistant told me they didn't stock alcohol. As I walked back to my car, the panic set in as I realised there were no superstores with extended opening hours on my route now. I was peeling off the motorway and burrowing to my destination through dark and tiny country lanes. It was late and I was terrified I’d miss last orders at the bar. I would certainly be too late to get two or three glasses in without drawing attention to myself. I drove too fast, screeched into the car park and headed straight for reception before I’d even taken my bag out of the car. Two large glasses of Pinot Grigio with a sandwich to be delivered to my room with a side of check-in. 

I was so relieved. I remember the delicious civility of them turning up on a silver tray, charged to my room. I didn’t even have to go to the bar, and if I remember right, the university even picked up the tab. I also remember the despair I saw in the dressing table mirror, as I placed the tray down, my face framed by two tall glasses of twinkling liquid. Pale straw. Sharp and cold. I knew I had a problem. I knew it had to stop but, it wasn’t time yet, was it? It’s that “yet” that’s the important word, because it really is only a matter of time before you are out in a blizzard with a broken leg, hobbling to the offie, fuelling up for a bender. No, it wasn’t time yet, but it was coming. 

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You’re not alone

The sixth part of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

My deep breath plunge into the deep end of sobriety, was partly because I’d seen someone leap before me. I’d always considered a close friend of mine to be a heavier drinker than me, and she’d just quit. A therapist she was seeing for chronic anxiety refused to treat her until she got help for her drinking, referring her to Alcoholics Anonymous. Yes, AA. When she’d told me a couple of months before, all I could think was that my funky, cool, intelligent, wonderful, gorgeous friend had been forced to join the glum circle of broken old drunks on uncomfortable chairs in a depressing community centre hall. How awful! But if she could do it, could I?

Image credit: Amita.K.Patel, Pinterest

Of course AA turned out to be nothing like that. She’d spoken to me of how incredible the meetings were, and how much inspiration she was getting from even the ‘broken old drunks’ - and especially them in fact. On that last hungover Monday morning, with fear-soaked fingers and blurred eyes from crying, I texted her. “I can’t do this any more. Tell me about AA” I mean, if she could stop drinking, then surely there was hope for me? She told me to get online, find a meeting happening near me that night and just go. Then call her directly after. “Honestly babe, they’re just like us” was her parting advice. Google ‘AA meetings’ and see what you get. I was stunned. There are gatherings of people who want to quit drinking literally everywhere in the country, every day of the week, and sometimes more than once a day. Rather like rats, you are probably never more than 12 steps away from one.

I will never forget my first AA meeting. I was terrified of going, but the thought I might never drink alcohol again was almost paralysing. How the HELL was that even possible? I’d rather die than live as a boring, dull, shameful sober person. Putting on my coat to leave my flat on that dark rainy night in March felt like walking to my own execution. But I kept on walking because I’d told my friend I would. It wasn’t too far away, and in a familiar area of town, but when I got there, I couldn’t find the place. FFS, I needed this to be easy!  The address I had seemed to be for a PUB!? Surely they didn’t hold AA meetings in a room above a pub? 

Image credit: Lars Ploughmann, Flickr 

This tickled me immensely, and I think it was the amusement of that ludicrous thought that stopped me from turning round and walking very quickly home again (via the off licence). Eventually, in the drizzly gloom, I noticed an alleyway tucked to one side that led to a brightly lit, low brick building in the car park behind the pub. I must have looked lost as a man asked me if I was, “here for the meeting?” and showed me in. I forget his name, but I won’t forget his smile.

Entering that bright bustling room from the dark outside felt like a giant step into sunshine. The windows were steamed up from damp coats and hot coffee. Everyone was milling about chatting and laughing, folks from all walks of life. There were all ages - some much younger than me too, which I didn’t expect. So. Many. People. I didn’t know if this was wonderful (I’m not alone!!) or awful (Jeez, it’s an epidemic!). It’s the smiles and the laughter that I recall most from my time with AA. I didn’t complete the 12 steps, I only stayed 4 months in fact. I could see how attending a meeting every day (or more) could turn into another addiction. I’m absolutely not knocking anyone who has made AA a way of life or who is wonderful enough to volunteer and help run the incredible organization that it is, just that for me, I wanted alcohol out of my life, which included sitting around talking about not drinking as much as the actual drinking part. I might not be drunk, but alcohol would be there with me all the same.

But in those early days and weeks of sobriety, you need to feel part of something bigger, to trust that others’ have your back – even strangers – and that you’ll be caught if you fall. It’s estimated that half a million people in England alone are dependent drinkers, but 82% of those are not in treatment. You are most definitely not alone. You probably didn’t start drinking by yourself, and you don’t have to stop on your own either. You only need to reach out. I’d wholeheartedly recommend you at least start your separation from alcohol with the support of others – whether that’s an organised meeting, an online forum, or just reading these posts. 

That room held the strangest gathering of human beings I’d ever encountered. It was wonderfully affirming. People brought together by a desire to get well, regardless of age, colour, race, class. Some were visibly damaged by their addictions, standing beside others you’d never guess were alcoholics in a million years. I was offered a mug of hot coffee from a big silver urn by people just like me – young professional women. My contribution to the kitty was refused on account of it being my first meeting. People welcomed and congratulated me with such genuine warmth. I felt at home, despite obviously looking perplexed at holding a hot mug at 8pm instead of a cool glass. A smart woman in a suit, kicked off her high heels to tug on some trainers. She smiled at me reassuringly. “It’s OK” she said, “we drink a lot of tea here!”

Image credit: Zepbrook refreshments, zepbrook.co.uk

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So much time

Part Five of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

Image credit: ‘Njoyart’ https://society6.com/njoyart

The first thing I noticed when I stopped drinking was my how long my evenings were. Acres of clear headed, sober hours stretching out endlessly before bed. What the hell was I supposed to do with it? In the early days I tiptoed around my new time gingerly, prodding it for signs of life like a washed up jellyfish on the beach – it looked like something but I wasn't sure what. Would it sting me?

Apparently, the average person spends a third of their day at work, or occupied with domestic chores, and another third asleep. The average drunk spends (at least) the final third pissed, which, including the hangovers, means around half their life is spent under the influence of alcohol. But as if that isn't bad enough, they also spend the remaining half of their life under the influence of alcohol, because an alcoholic is always thinking about drink. Where shall I go after work for a couple? Can I get away with another one at lunchtime? And even on ‘good days’, there is willpower to be marshalled – doing the self-talk and revelling in the smugness of not having a drink (see? I can do it, pah! What drink problem?). In short, alcohol takes up so much TIME!  

Image credit: MemorEase (Etsy store)

When I quit drinking, I was living by myself, between relationships, a year into a new job in a new town, with new places and new people. Everything was vivid, and out of my comfort zone, sharp at the edges and requiring effort. I was out on a limb without my old best friend. Eek. But it was also this newness, and the fact that I could now be anyone, that helped me kick the booze. Anyone new I met wasn’t weighed down with the baggage of ‘old me’ and every time I went out, I wasn’t dragged down well worn ruts to places that would forever be associated with being out on the lash. But I was bored. And boredom and isolation are a recovering alcoholic’s twin nemeses. Being left alone with yourself and nothing you fancy doing tests your resolve to the limit as the cravings advance like five o’clock shadows. The point at which I came home from work and brewed a cup of tea instead of pouring wine, marked the start of the day’s ‘terrible void’.

For a while I dealt with The Void by staying late at the office and had a really poor work-life balance. For so long alcohol was my life - I’d been having a work-drink balance, not a work-life balance really - so it’s not surprising that when I took alcohol out of that equation, the scales thumped down on the side of work. Sure, I was in danger of replacing alcoholism with workaholism, but that phase passed as I broke my sobriety in until it no longer gave me blisters, and I did some good work during that time too. I felt more thorough, and grew in my sense of self as a capable professional. So if you’re currently thinking “yeah, that's me right now”, then that’s fine, because it’s probably necessary and helpful and if you want it to, it can end when you’re ready. You quit drinking, right? You can quit anything.

And sure enough, it wasn’t long before the tea felt more normal and for the first few weeks of my sobriety I also had AA meetings to occupy my time and look forward to. I started to read again. I slept a lot. I joined a gym, re-started running and found a book club. I took long baths and watched trashy TV that I actually remembered in the morning. I ate a lot of cake – a fact I shall return to in a later chapter. And like the warm glow of feeling a squashed limb come back to life after pins and needles have subsided, The Void got easier to bear and and I took delight in remembering some of the things I liked to do before I spent all my evenings drinking.

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Stupid questions (1): Do you miss it?

Part Four of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

Alcohol is a central part of social life in the culture I come from. We see the legal age for drinking as a huge rite of passage. Coming of age cards, at 18, are covered in references to drinking, being drunk and hungover, and we often allow our children to have a sip or a small glass way before then. The question “why do you drink?” is never asked when someone orders alcohol, yet to ask “why don’t you drink?” is perfectly acceptable. In fact the question is usually an incredulous statement: 

Them: “You don’t drink? What, not at all? Not even with dinner/ the odd glass/ not even at Christmas?” 

<<sighs>>

Me: “No. Yes, that’s right. Not at all.”

<<forces smile>>

So here’s my two-penneth to all those idiotic questioners out there: Do you honestly think that if I could manage such meagre appetites and exercise such sparkling restraint around booze I would have quit drinking for good??

Perhaps the most ludicrous question I have had, was while sitting down to dinner at a function, on a table of people I didn’t know. Several bottles of red wine were open on the table and it was a warm night. I still remember how the air was filled with its dark rich scent, as one by one, guests eagerly accepted the waiter’s offer to pour a couple of inches into their fish bowl sized, fine rimmed glasses. They chinked and glinted in the sunset. There was no getting away from the fact it would be my turn next – the only person to say “Oh, no thanks, not for me”, inviting the usual surprised faces and exhortations to change my mind, often accompanied by demands that I explain myself. 

On this occasion, it came from a really very nice and genuinely interested lady sitting opposite. “Do you miss it?” she asked, “Do you miss alcohol?” 

What. The. Actual. Fuck. 

Do I miss it. Do I miss it? At the time I thought this question was quite possibly akin to asking an amputee if they miss their leg.  OF COURSE I MISSED IT!! I missed the ice-sharp slice of Chablis with seafood by the ocean. I missed port’s warm spice rolling round my mouth and burning my throat with rich cheese and Christmas carols. I missed delicate pink bubbles with birthday cake, fizzing ever so slightly against my face as I tip my glass, and I missed creamy poolside piña coladas mingled with suncream and salty lips. I missed quaffing local beers with unpronounceable names on my travels, I missed chucking back tequila, and standing on chairs. I stopped eating stilton and crackers because frankly they’re a bit shit without the red wine, and the idea of going round fancy bars as a night out watching everyone else get drunk? Mmm. No longer appealing. 

So yeah lady, I miss it. Sometimes I missed it so much it hurt. Hard. Right in my chest, and I’d take a sleeping pill and go to bed to get through the evening without wine. Luckily my well-meaning questioner realised the stupidity of her question by the look on my face and I didn't have to treat the poor woman to the answer you’ve just read. I doubt I could have said it anyway, or even written it down in the early weeks of my sobriety without howling great sobs of grief. If memory serves me correctly I think she actually answered her own question with “...yeah, of course you miss it, what a stupid question,” but that’s rare. Most people don’t stop to think about the utterly ridiculousness of what they are asking you.

I once heard a counsellor explain how a client expressed his recovery through the medium of supermarkets. In the first few months he couldn't even walk down the alcohol aisle, terrified of picking a bottle up and bolting for the self-scan, the pain of mourning so bad that he avoided it. Sensible if you ask me. Fast forward a bit longer and he felt proud of being able to walk along the rows of bottles and even buy some to take to a friend’s house for dinner! Such progress! But ultimately he knew he was free only when he felt nothing but puzzlement when walking down that exotic aisle, thinking “what on earth would I even use this stuff for?” And that’s where I’ve got to now and if you have too you’ll know how wonderful it feels. But it not you will get there, I promise, and it will feel ACE.

And writing it out now, several years later, it’s like I’m talking about a different person. I’ve 95% forgotten all that painful grief and loss, that feeling of being deprived and a half-citizen, with a social handicap. The new habits – like  not going on bar crawls - have become my new normal and other ways to spend my time with friends that have settled in. Rather like how you let go of an ex-partner. No matter how much you loved them or wanted the relationship to work, eventually, the pain fades and the details blur and it becomes past-life, not missed life.

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Sober moments

Part three of ‘How to stop drinking: A guide for normal people’. A series in which I am sharing my reflections on living, and staying sober, in a fun, honest, down-to-earth way to show that an alcohol-free life is possible. Previous chapters can be found below on www.samwarren.net

I learned the term ‘sober moments’ from my brief spell at AA meetings. They are the flashes of joy that fizz through you when something amazing happens because you are sober - something that just wouldn’t have been possible when you were drunk. Sober moments are truly magical because when you stop drinking, no matter how brave you feel (or act), there is still a small broken person chained to a chair in a dripping dungeon deep down inside you. This person is absolutely positive they will never be released from their life sentence, and will never know true fun again. The idea that extra happiness might be ahead because you’re not drinking never occurs to this sad little figure, so the first time it happens it feels extra magical. Here are two of my earliest sober moments. They still bring me joy, in fact I’m grinning right now, while I tell you about them.

I was sitting with work friends at dinner after a Saturday meeting in Amsterdam. I’m fortunate enough to have a job that means I get to spend time with interesting people in cool places, but this world is also awash with alcohol. This night was no different, and wine was flowing as freely as the conversation. 

We were seated at a circular table, so I could literally see the alcohol taking its effects on my companions, one by one, shoulders leaning, voices louder, gestures wilder, slight slurs, and a few anxious glances to see if the waiter was coming with the next bottle. I doubt anyone would have said they ‘got drunk’ that night, but it’s amazing how you notice these tiny things when you’re a new non-drinker.  I had prepared myself to feel uncomfortable, envious and deprived. I’d been nervous about the evening, about how I would get through it without wine – feeling weird, different, lonely and left out. So imagine how I felt when instead, while chatting with my friend, I felt a rush of pure joy! It was 10:30pm, my head was clear, my tummy was full and I wasn't even pretending to have a good time. I was actually ENJOYING myself! Not just tolerating the situation, not just ‘coping’ with it, but having a lovely, lovely time. What that sober moment showed me was that perhaps it might not have been the alcohol causing the fun times in the past, but the situation and the company. Who knew, eh?

Another time was my first sober Christmas (officially the shittiest time ever for recovering alcoholics). I’m not going to lie to you, I found that whole holiday period downright miserable, but given that I was also about to leave a long-term relationship (for the second time), I was feeling the lack of drink even more acutely because my ‘hiding place’ had gone and it all felt too stark, and raw to have much hope of feeling pleasure. But even in the midst of this, a sober moment sparkled through. After a Christmas night party, around 2am, I was able to offer rides home to very drunk people on a night when taxis were at a premium. They didn't believe me of course.  “What?? You’re gonna drive? But you’ve been drinking! I’ve seen you!” What they’d actually seen was me swigging bottles of no-alcohol lager and sipping fizzy pop from a wine glass all night. 

The gratitude and joy on those faces was wonderful and warmed me through more than mulled wine. A simple act, but one that put me back at the centre of attention as surely as half a bottle of vodka and a karaoke machine would have. They hadn’t even noticed I wasn’t drunk. I was convinced that being a non-drinker would change my whole personality, condemning me to bearing a neon sign “BORING SOBER PERSON” at every social gathering for the rest of my life. But do you know what? Most of the time, people don't even notice – or as happened this Christmas night, they’ll insist they’ve seen you drinking and you’re making it all up. 

Realising that you have the capacity to enjoy yourself, all by yourself, ‘un-enhanced’, so much that nobody can tell if you’re drunk or not is an incredibly liberating feeling. It’s just the best… because you know there’s no hangover tomorrow. Sometimes when I’m with people whose company I really love I even feel like I am getting drunk – kind of by osmosis. I used to think that “getting drunk on the atmosphere” was such crap... er, no, you get drunk on booze, idiot. But just look at kids… They're giddy and high on life (even when they haven’t consumed their whole family’s weight in sugar) and believe it or not, you can be too. If you’re with the right folks, doing something you love, being around drunk people gives you the permission to stop adulting for a while and play, without anyone noticing.