drinking too much

LegacyUser

I guess Im asking for some advice, I am definately turning into a cliche.

female & in my forties, I find that I am drinking too much, at home, alone.
I don't drink every night, I work shifts, so when I am home in the evenings I just see having a glass of wine as a treat for myself.
but a glass of wine turns into a bottle of wine.
It hasn't affected my life or my career, I don't miss work due to drink, ever.
But I say to myself every day that I won't drink that evening, but when the evening comes, I just think why not?

I'm not an alcoholic, but I don't want to become one. any advise?

Princess Calla

The obvious one is not to buy the wine in the first place.

If you want it as a treat just buy one bottle to have with a nice dinner once a week.

Sounds like you might be abit bored, maybe look at a new hobby, evening class etc that will get you out of the house and break the cycle.

Weather "should" be getting nicer so even get into the habit of evening walks... I have never worked shifts but heard they can be tough to maintain out of work routines, so evening stroll would work.

zoobizoo

Practical and non emotionally intelligent advice and if you're not an alcoholic: buy 1/4 bottles one at a time.

You have one glass, it costs you more and there's a psychological aspect of opening another bottle.

Or don't keep alcohol in the house - you don't have the temptation. So you make that practical decision prior to going to the shops.


If that is difficult for you, then you might need to ask yourself if you have some form of dependency on alcohol.

I know alcoholics who don't miss work, who don't let it affect their career and who don't drink every night.

LegacyUser

This reply may be a little unorthodox, but how about purchasing non alcoholic wine? It would be difficult to give up your treat of a glass/bottle of wine, if you were to go cold turkey you might yearn for it more. If it's just a treat after a long day keep treating yourself, just with an alternative

HelgaWard

I agree with the other posters, don't have it in the house. I also think you need a hobby/exercise to keep you busy.

It might be a good idea to visit your GP & get a full check up. If results showed your liver is being effected by your alcohol consumption it might act as a deterrent.

Best of luck.

LegacyUser

Well done on facing up to things

You may well not have a problem let's hope you've solved it on time.

Definitely a hobby and trying drinking less. If that doesn't work for you, you might have a problem. I'd say you don't as you seem so self aware.

take one of those quizzes on the internet And see what they say.

I drank a lot at home and pretty much stopped bar a glass of wine at Christmas. I still have maybe 2 heavy nights a year and I used to drink waaay too much. I'm very lucky I caught it on time. I just got fed up of feeling crappy a lot of the time

Thelonious Monk

I have found myself going through similar habitual stages in life from time to time. I always find that I just have to say "NO" to myself, and after a night or two it is easy and you don't miss it. Now I just allow myself a few drinks one or two nights a week without going nuts. You'll find you'll probably sleep better without it too, even a small amount can throw a spanner in the works of your sleep patterns.

skallywag

I would not be so concerned with the drinking at home alone aspect. I know that this has long been looked on negatively, but I have never bought into it.

For me it really depends on how often this happening OP, (e.g. is it 2-3 times a week or 6) and whether the trend has been increasing or not over the years.

Drinking a 'full bottle of wine' also has a stigma attached to it, whereas you do not tend to see that same if someone says they went out and had 4 pints of beer (which is roughly the equivalent in alcohol content). As for the glass becoming a bottle, I do not think that this is so uncommon either, e.g. if I am going to have a drink in the evening I will either have 3-4 or will have none at all. E.g. I am never going to say, hmmm, I hancy a beer tonight, I am just going to have one.

I think the litmus test for you could be to pack it in for a week, and see how you feel after. If you find that difficult then it could be the sign on dependency.

05eaftqbrs9jlh

Well done on enquiring here. It shows that you know this isn't the norm.

There's a documentary on Netflix where a doctor examines many myths about alcohol. One finding which amazed me was that your body starts gearing up for alcohol if you're a regular drinker, because it expects it. That's part of the addictive quality of the substance.

As a smoker who has quit many times (off them now for four months with only two lapses, so hopefully forever...), I can tell you that it won't be easy to break the routine you've built up. Physically and psychologically, your dependence exists. That's the first step of AA, I believe - admitting that you have a problem.

But it sounds like you have a fortuitously manageable problem. If you start cutting down, for example, only buying quarter bottles at a time or getting a quantity of non-alcoholic wine, as posters above suggested, you will find yourself "need"ing it less. Chances are, after a time, you'll feel so much better and your overall health will improve dramatically so you'll put it aside in favour of other, healthier pastimes.

This article might help to spur you on.

My personal experience was that I went out a lot from my late teens to my mid-twenties. I was thirteen stone. Now I only go out when I'm performing, for a special occasion or just the odd weekend I think there'll be a bit of craic. I seldom drink excessively, except if it's a very late one.

My weight has dropped to eleven stone with much more muscle mass. Someone who hasn't seen me in a while described me the other day as looking like I'd "lost loads of weight doing outdoor activities". I thought it was hilarious because I only leave the house in emergencies. I do a lot of yoga though, and walk and cycle everywhere except work, so that coupled with the huge reduction in alcohol intake, would probably do it.

The impact it will have on your brain is huge as well. Alcohol is linked to earlier symptoms of the worst of the neurodegenerative illnesses. A few of my friends in their thirties who are heavy drinkers are already showing symptoms so the sooner you stop regularly drinking too much, the more your brain will be able to recover before it gets to those more challenging years.

I wish you the best OP - change your routine and you'll change your life.

pwurple

Well, we can get mathsy about the limits / guidelines.

14 units per week is the recommended maximum for women, to be spread over a minimum of 3 days.
A bottle of wine is 10 units.

I do like a glass of wine with dinner sometimes at home, or by the fire sometimes. With bog standard supermarket white wine, I will kinda make it into a spritzer with fizzy water to make it go a bit further without the booze. Half wine half fizz.
Any fancy wine, I just stick to the rule that I won't open it on my own.

A decent stopper is good too, so the wine can hold and not go to vinegar if you have one glass on a tuesday and the second one on a Friday.

skallywag

HelgaWard wrote: »

It might be a good idea to visit your GP & get a full check up. If results showed your liver is being effected by your alcohol consumption it might act as a deterrent.

This is very good advice, and I have experienced the same myself.

I had a blood test done some time back for some non-drink related reason, and the doctor casually mentioned something along the lines of 'I see you have had a heavy night on the booze within the last few weeks', which threw me a bit. One enzyme was elevated (Gamma GT I believe), not too a dangerous level, but elevated nonetheless. He told me that it was normal to see this after even just one night out where you overdid it, and that it will then slowly drop back down to normal within a few weeks (assuming no underlying damage). Although it was not a sign of any real damage etc, it did really get me thinking. Seeing the facts there in front of you on paper is an eye opener.

He could see I was concerned and suggested that I stay off the beer for 2-3 weeks and come back and test again, and that then he was pretty sure it would be back within the normal levels. I did so, and he was completely right.

So could be worth thinking about OP.

LegacyUser

thanks to everyone for your responses.
I think just knowing other people have had issues like this helps lot.
I broke up with someone a few months ago, & I hate feeling down, everytime I drink , I know it will make me a little bit down the next day.....so that is the big reason I should cut back, also I want to loose some weight & the calories are very high, so will also keep that in mind!!

I won't have any chance to drink for the next week, with night shifts & early mornings, I cant drink the night before, so that's a good time to start!!
I want to be able to have a drink, so that is another reason to take control now, there are alcoholics in my family & I refuse to become like them.

Thanks everyone again, I may post here again, just for updates, maybe just for me!

MartyMcFly84

I don't have the best self control. But i find if I dont have beer in the house I dont drink it.

If wine is in the house there will always be a temptation to drink it. Once a bottle is open, its very easy to finish it.

I only buy beer/wine now if going to a social occasion or if someone is coming over for dinner or something. It has cut down the amount I am consuming massively to perhaps once a month, rather than a few times a week.

05eaftqbrs9jlh

cliche drinker wrote: »

thanks to everyone for your responses.
I think just knowing other people have had issues like this helps lot.
I broke up with someone a few months ago, & I hate feeling down, everytime I drink , I know it will make me a little bit down the next day.....so that is the big reason I should cut back, also I want to loose some weight & the calories are very high, so will also keep that in mind!!

I won't have any chance to drink for the next week, with night shifts & early mornings, I cant drink the night before, so that's a good time to start!!
I want to be able to have a drink, so that is another reason to take control now, there are alcoholics in my family & I refuse to become like them.

Thanks everyone again, I may post here again, just for updates, maybe just for me!

I'd love to hear how it goes for you. I'm in a bit of a pattern myself and I'm finding resisting the usual binges tricky when things get tough. It's not a great way of coping with my issues but it's much easier than just addressing them. Best of luck with your attempts.

I also like the Alan Carr strategy - if you can resist something for one minute... then just do that again and again and eventually you'll stop thinking about it. That's the idea anyway!

Andrew33

cliche drinker wrote: »

I'm not an alcoholic, but I don't want to become one. any advise?

You don’t “become” an alcoholic.
You’ve said it’s in the family.
It is genetic.
Ask yourself the question (and only you can honestly answer it).
Can you have 1 or 2 glasses and leave the rest of the bottle there or do you find yourself making excuses to yourself to finish it like,
“I’ll just watch another half hour of tv”
etc.
In other words, does your OFF button work?
best thing to do is give it a miss for a couple of weeks until you are back in control.

LegacyUser

Hello. I thought I'd reply to this post because I used to be like you. I'm a woman in her 40s who lives alone and likes a drink. I never drank a full bottle in one sitting but I'm sure I would have got there eventually. I ever drank so much that I'd miss work or be very drunk. But still, I was putting away more than I wanted to admit over the course of a week. I knew I had to stop when I got up one Saturday morning and counted what I had put away the night before. I should have gone to bed feeling quite drunk (I wasn't) and woken up with a hangover (I didn't).

I don't think I ever craved alcohol but I loved the ritual of my evening "treat". I think it was more of a bad habit than alcoholism, though I acknowledge that I was a problem drinker. There's no point in telling me that a cup of tea or a fruit juice at 9:00 at night is a suitable replacement. When you've got used to having a nice drink that has a bit of bite to it, tea just doesn't cut it. I found non-alcoholic drinks to be a passable replacement. Many of them lack that extra something that a proper drink has but I found a few that will do when I feel like a treat. They're not as moreish as drinks with alcohol in them so I don't get through the bottles as quickly. I sometimes enjoy a cold bottle of fizzy mineral water too, crazy and all as that may seem. For me, the habit seems to have been to have something to hand to drink and it didn't really matter whether it was boozy or not. I still like trying different soft drinks (not the usual very sweet ones) and they sometimes hit the spot too.

The other change I made was to mix up my evening routine. They can be simple things like cooking dinner later than usual, going to cinema, having a bath, making a better effort to see friends etc. I'd get to a time of the evening when having a drink or two or three felt like the logical next step. Breaking that habit and trying to distract myself until I got to the time of night when I felt it was too late to bother was a breakthrough. I knew I'd made progress when I drove home from work one evening and instead of wondering which shop to buy drink from, I wasn't all that pushed. I still like a drink and wouldn't like to become a teetotaler. I'm pleased that I seem to have broken the bad habit I had slipped into. Maybe some of what I have written about here might give you some ideas?

Bobtheman

Look up a book the naked mind by Annie Grace.Basically alcohol is an addictive substance to all drinkers.
The more you drink the stronger the addiction.
The venue fly trap is often used an analogy

JustAThought

Set yourself a challenge OP-its Lent -go off it for Lent ( you can have it on St Patricks Day if you want!) .Everyone will get that so it will be easy to explain -theres still 35 or so days left- set that as a goal and make it happen. Like for everyone it will be hard but if you give in or cannot,then you know you have a real problem.