How did you stop drinking?

I used to put away a liter of vodka a night. I kept it up for years, accumulating a solid decade of heavy drinking. I was miserable. It was souring my relationship. The stress from work, personal life, and declining mental state of course made me feel even more compelled to drink. I was becoming a shell of my former self, and my dreams were becoming strictly that.

I had a confluence of events that changed my course:

1. I attended a tech conference where someone I personally knew who had went through rehab was hosting and speaking, and he was filled with a vivacity I hadn’t seen from him before.

2. My spouse gave me an ultimatum to quit or he’d be out the door. It wasn’t the first time he had said this, but I had a feeling it was probably going to be the last.

3. My progression in life was stalling. I couldn’t keep up commitments anymore, and I was starting to feel like I had already passed my peak.

So I quit. Cold Turkey. It was a dangerous, stupid thing to do, but I knew if I tried to taper off, I’d just slide back. The withdrawals were nightmarish, and I was lucky I didn’t die from it. But I pulled through, and then started to do some heavy soul searching for why I ever picked up the bottle — what was I escaping from? And I found those answers, and got to work — A real kind of personal work that most people will never have to put into themselves.

Since then, I have been a cofounder, jumped multiple levels in my career, and have been working towards several academic publications, on top of drastically improving my personal life. It’s been nearly five years since I put down the bottle. And every day I choose to never pick it up again.

I haven't had a drink in 27 days, which is the longest I've gone in a while. Left to my own devices, I tend to settle into a pattern of 2-4 drinks per night, 5-6 nights a week (I actually tracked this for a while with a spreadsheet).

It's not like, ruin my life, wake up in a gutter type situation, but it leads to just feeling somewhat crappy all the time, and I didn't like it, so I wanted to stop.

Some things that helped / are helping:

I have an app Habit Tracker. It's a pretty simple app with a list of habits you want do do, you can set on some schedule. When you do them, you tick them off and it keeps track of how many times, so you build up a streak. I made a "don't drink" habit, and check it off in the morning if I didn't drink the day before. It also shows a notification bubble on the app if you don't check it off and I hate that. It's like this little negative reinforcement that I have to live with that bubble all day if I drank the day before. It's silly, but it helped.

Reading the book This Naked Mind and listening to The Huberman Lab podcast episode about alcohol (#86) also helped. Alcohol messes up your body in a lot of ways, even at what's considered "moderate" or "normal" levels of drinking.

/r/stopdrinking on Reddit

Alcohol is an addictive drug and when you stop after using it regularly, you're going to feel cravings. It's not a moral failing, it's physiology. They do get less intense and less frequent after the first two weeks or so.

I was drinking heavily and knew that it would be the quickest and most effective hack towards being a better father and husband. I first stepped into an AA meeting and as the opportunity to speak was going around the room I started seeing many similarities between the people sharing their stories and myself. I thought to myself 'If I were perhaps an alcoholic, what could I share about it and how it may hurt me and those that love me?' When the opportunity for me to share came up, I said 'screw it!' to myself and spilled the beans. "I am an alcoholic..."

The meetings made me feel good at first as I kept telling myself that my stories could potentially help someone else. I did not end up sticking with the AA program but the meetings really launched me into the right direction and finding my own path. I do drink NA beer and as many others in the comments have pointed out, there is a lot offered in that arena as of lately.

I am a very social person and navigating that lifestyle for the first time without alcoholic beverages was the biggest challenge for me. But I learned to like the challenge and found that sparked a lot of conversations with friends that were interested in quitting or dialing it back. It also identified and strengthened a lot of friendships where people normally wouldn't drink while doing whatever it was we are doing, but they did because I was 'the drinker.'

Next week marks my first year of sobriety, so I am certainly no expert, but feel free to reach out if you ever need to hash some things out.

I've cut back by switching to non-alcohol beer.

I've found that I enjoy the taste of beer, but I don't enjoy how shitty alcohol makes me feel. NA beer tends to solve that for me. Lots of good options coming out.

* Just the Hazy by Sam Adams is top tier.

* Athletic brewing is solely NA beer - lots of different varieties.

* Heineken 0.0 is great

* O'Douls amber is surprisingly passable as well

I suspect the options will get even better over time. It sounds like Gen Z aren't big drinkers and alcohol companies are responding to that with better NA options.

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Lastly, I've discovered that I have an issue with wheat and/or gluten. Impact varies across beers (based on their mash), but it became really obvious that some beers would make me feel absolutely terrible.

I don’t have any good advice on stopping drinking, but what I will say is that some people have a physiological addiction response to alcohol that others do not and those who do not usually don’t realize this, so they can blithely say things like, “just don’t drink” without realizing that this is a genuinely difficult thing for others.

I, fortunately, am not among those who have the addictive response and when, as an undergraduate, I realized that my drinking was getting very problematic, it was easy enough for me to cut out the worst aspects of my drinking (straight vodka in a 20oz tumbler—definitely not recommended) and restrict myself to beer and wine and these days I almost never drink that either.

But I know people for whom doing things like making it through a month without a drink is a serious challenge.

I think your best bet is to find some form of support, whether that’s AA¹ or just a trusted friend who can help you stick to your choices.

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1. The literature on AA points to mixed efficacy, if I recall correctly, but I think the whole concept of having a network of trusted peers you can turn to for support whether you succeed or fail is probably the key aspect of what makes it work and since it’s so widespread, if you’re in any decently populated area, it’s likely you can find a meeting any day of the week and can drop into one whenever you need it.

I've been sober for 4.5 years now - totally free from alcohol and cannabis (my first and biggest problem). I've also quit smoking.

First off, let me say that it took many tries for these abstentions to stick - that is normal, and you should remember that. Be kind to yourself. It's a skill and a habit you are building, and those things will take time. It took me years to finally gain real duration in my abstention.

Second, the fact that you are considering abstaining should be enough of a signal to you that something in you wants to stop - and this is enough to base the new behavior on. You don't need anyone's permission to stop. When I stopped I always heard about how "I wasn't enough of a drinker" to worry about it, etc. Many comments of this nature came my way. Just know that you know yourself best, and if these thoughts are arising, you should explore them.

And third, remember that if you are feeling unfulfilled in some aspect of life, substance abuse (of most types) will cloud this bad feeling, and give you an instant uplift. What happens then is up to you, but for me it led to a persistent drain on my ambitions. Thus I wasn't doing what I wanted, but at the end of the day, comfort awaited in the form of my drug of choice. This was my revelation that I eventually used as motivation.

Alcohol is a slow killer. Physical addiction takes about 10 years to form. First, it's barely noticeable. People think it's age, and "after 30 hangover lasts for 2 days". But that is not actually being hang over. It is the symptom of alcohol withdrawal. Mild one at first, but more severe as physical addiction settles in.

Drinking 3-4 days a week seems like "okay". However, it basically means drinking whenever withdrawal symptoms kick in. This is creating a feedback loop, that is very hard to notice, because it is mild, and also socially accepted.

If you really want to know how addicted you are, stop drinking completely for a week.

If you find yourself unable to sleep, or sweating all over the place, or having weird stomach or muscle pain, or have unexpected mood swings: you already have a physical addiction to alcohol.

Spaniard here.

Social drinking is very much a thing in Spain. However, most social drinking is light or moderate: walk to a nearby bar, have two beers with the family or with close friends (with free tapas, which accounts for dinner), then walk back home. In rare occasions (at least in my personal experience) things degenerate and one goes out for "just one beer" and gets back home at 5am with a vague recollection of chanting down the street.

My point is: every time that things get past the two-three beers limit in an evening, I am very conscious that I'm deviating from "social drinking" and "this is a meal" and entering "getting drunk" realm.

My personal point of view: having a responsible drink every now and then is a lot easier than cutting out completely. Here's what I do:

* If I want to enjoy a drink, I have a healthy meal with it. Can't open a second bottle of beer if the meal isn't finished, and by that point I'm full and happy.

* If I'm in a social situation where drinking is expected, I have a first drink, then switch to tap water (or sparkling water when plain water just won't do).

* More irresponsible drinking is an option. It's not verboten. However, it's reserved to very special occasions (New Year's Eve, my birthday party, a good time with friends not seen in years, …), and by the fourth beer I'm already sleepy enough to need a rest.

* On a tangent: Real tapas are *free, never paid*, and come with every drink ordered in a bar (including non-alcoholic drinks). I am certain this helps curb alcoholism to a significant degree in my hometown.

This is just me. YMMV.

I haven't had a drink in almost 5 years. I still consume cannabis and psychedelics.

I talk to a LOT of people about this. But I am not a professional.

Tip #1: You have to stop beating yourself up over it. It's brutal. I get it. At my lowest I woke up for months wanting to eat a bullet. If I had better tools and coping skills I wouldn't have as close as I did.

Tip #2: Know you want to quit. Know that you CAN quit. It doesn't have to be today. But there will be a day.

Tip #3: Acknowledge that it's difficult and that you're doing the best you can.

Tip #4: I hate AA. I still think it's incredibly helpful for a non-insignificant number of people out there. I'm an atheist. I never bought into the steps. But the stories... hearing people say things that I'd never been able to put into words... was life changing. I wasn't the only one that couldn't put it down. It helped to hear that in words that I can relate to.

Tip #5: Get a mindfulness practice. I think a blend of meditation and stoicism (per William B. Irvine's book) is a great start. Skip the meditation if you have any trauma unless you're guided by a professional.

Tip #6: Make new friends, cut back on the old ones

Tip #7: Hobbies. Find some.

Tip #8: Keep doing what you're doing: asking for help.

Good luck. I hope you find your groove. My life is so much better today because I don't drink.

The thing that I find holds me most accountable is exercise. If I'm preparing for something (a race or a bout) then drinking undoes all the hard training and it's evident in my performance.

The longest I went was about a year. I still enjoy the odd drink and very occasionally might have a bigger night but I feel fairly well moderated.

If you're really going for zero (or close to zero) then it's going to need a bigger habit change (which could be assisted by something like forming a new complementary habit).

As for social settings, it takes a lot of personal discipline but I find most people are quite respectful and encouraging if you assert that you have kicked a habit for good.

I had to let(make) it become part of my identity.

“I’m a person who doesn’t drink alcohol.”

“People will know and perceive me as a person who doesn’t drink alcohol. This is fine because it’s true.”

It’s the same as being a person who doesn’t do a thing that you already don’t do.

You can tell people you feel healthier without it and it’s just your preference. Most people won’t pry further. For some reason, Europeans tend to be more confrontational with me about it. You don’t need to share details about binging and lack of self control with anyone unless you want to.

It is not the same, but I quit smoking recently. Some things that worked for me:

* Find the reasons why you started this bad habit: I was a lockdown smoker: the best part of the day during the lockdowns for me was when I went out to our balcony with my wife and we had a coke and cigarette. What is the reason why you enjoy drinking? Can you get similar results without drinking? My wife and I started going for a walk whenever we wanted to smoke, this helped us relax, spend time with each other without the negative effects of smoking.

* Recognize the circumstances under which it is extremely difficult to stop: For me, it was hard to stop after an extremely frustrating and unproductive meeting, before and after job interviews, etc... in short, under stress. When do you tend to "fall off the wagon"? Once you recognized this, you can attempt to mitigate. I attended meetings with my running clothes on, and if I felt frustrated after the call, I went for a run.

* Be honest with your loved ones about your struggles. I told my wife and sister that I enjoy smoking, but it makes me feel physically sick and it destroys all my ambitions for the day. They could help you in many ways.

* Do not make the bad habit easy for you: I don't have cigarettes or beer at home, this way when I get the urge, my laziness might save me (who wants to go to buy cigarettes when it is cold outside?)

* Don't beat yourself up over small setbacks: guilt is a negative emotion that usually just triggers more of the bad habit. Recognize that you are human, forgive yourself and move on, feeling guilty will only work against you.

* If you had a small setback, do not make it big: if I badly desired a cigarette and I bought a pack, I smoked one or two, but after my "uncontrollable" desire was satisfied, I threw the other 17 out.

This list worked for me, but it might not work for you. I came up with it, there is no research behind it.

Just FYI: I had 42 years, last month. Got clean at 18. I'd used up my quota, by then.

I can't go into detail, in public, but I didn't do it, myself, and I didn't "moderate."

I stopped completely. That includes all mind-altering drugs (pot is a drug, and alcohol is a powerful sedative/hypnotic). To this day, I am extremely cautious about prescriptions, and there are many drugs that have been introduced, since I got clean. I avoid them, as well.

I hang out regularly, with many others, that have done likewise. Hanging out, together, is a big part of things. We do it One Day At A Time.

WFM. YMMV.

Check out the Sinclair Method, which is basically taking Naltrexone before you drink. Also check out the book "The Cure for Alcoholism: The Medically Proven Way to Eliminate Alcohol Addiction" by Eskapa.

I used this method, along with keeping a log of drinks consumed, to eventually quite drinking over the course of a year. I went from having anywhere from 3-8 drinks a night, every night, to eventually stopping completely. In turn I've been sober 6 years now.

I found keeping the drink log useful both for charting my progress, and also just forcing me to be honest with myself about what I did and did not drink. It's too easy to skew ones memory in favor of having less of a problem if you feel like it.

I go through spans of a few months where I ramp up to drinking heavily punctuated by years where I don't drink at all. The most difficult part of alcoholism is recognizing when I've become an alcoholic.

As soon as I do, I quit. I already recognize that drinking just makes everyone a sloppier, worse version of themselves, so I harbor no illusions that I am doing anyone a disservice denying them an opportunity to test their tolerance of me.

I'm also a mostly private drinker. I don't do bars or drinking culture, so there's little social pressure. I also make sure I'm never the only person to have had a drink. It's not a secret, just nothing to celebrate.

I've been on a dry spell for the past two years, and, as always, I don't miss it. I'll probably go another five years before I have more than a beer in a week, largely because my SO and I have a poor dynamic when alcohol is involved. We still keep alcohol around- we just end up cooking with it, instead.

My high level advice is to spend enough time not drinking that you really appreciate your health and clarity when you're sober. You're not alive for long, and alcohol really doesn't add anything of value to it.

Everyone has different experiences, my path was admittedly much easier than many other people.

I haven't had any alcohol in about 2 months. Prior I was consuming 1-3 drinks per week, almost exclusively beer, and almost never 3 drinks in a day. I got sick with COVID, found a podcast episode talking about the effects of alcohol and thought I'd give it a listen. [1]

The long and short of it is that alcohol is harmful to a laundry list of biological processes, and any minor benefits that might exist are absolutely dwarfed by the negatives. I wanted to feel as good as I could as fast as I could, so I haven't had alcohol since. Even my minimal consumption was affecting my sleep quality more than I realized.

I found the podcast to appeal to the logical side of me. If you made an honest list of pros and cons to consuming alcohol and were given the choice to have a drink after being raised without any exposure, you would say "why would anyone drink that stuff?", yet regular consumption of alcohol is deeply engrained in our society.

Right now I'm not drinking at all. I've been offered many times and heavily pressured a few. Alcohol hasn't been an issue for me, but it makes me feel awful for people who are battling alcoholism.

[1] https://hubermanlab.com/what-alcohol-does-to-your-body-brain...

Where I moved five years ago, drinking is the social activity by default. I had a lot of fun the first years in pubs and parties in general and it helped a lot for improving my language skills and social network (and gave me some embarrasing memories too. Cé la vie). At some point, I started to feel simply tired of the sensation of being drunk and the health problems it produces in all terms but I kept going. I stopped drinking that much naturally after finding a sport activity (climbing which I am devoted to now) that kept me grounded and motivated for taking care of my health in order to perform better. So, my advice is: Find some physical activity that motivates you and use as the reason for avoid drinking. If temptation arises, just think on the aweful training session you are gonna have due to the hungover and all that.

(My advice comes from the assumption that you don't have a serious pathologic adiction to alcohol. If that was the case, seek help from a profesional)

Probably aimed more at the heavy drinkers on here and not so much the OP, but adding my voice to the "replace it with exercise" camp.

Once exercise has become a critical routine you start feeling terrible for killing your performance because you were too sluggish from drinking the night before. You begin questioning your life choices. At some point you get over the mental hump and can start dialing things back. Maybe even outright quit depending on your goals.

I started weight training 3 years ago and as of this year hit that sincere performance stride where I'm seeing genuine gains. I haven't outright quit drinking yet, however, these days I'm only downing a limited amount about once every 1-2 weeks as opposed to getting shitfaced 3-4 days per week.

The moral of the story is to engage in something that has its positivity stolen by alcohol and gets you angry enough about it to quit.

It may not work for everyone. It takes a lot of personal discipline to get started with exercise, let alone consider quitting alcohol. It could be a mental hole too deep for some people suffering from alcoholism to get out of, at which point I'd say try the numerous other options mentioned in this thread.

As part of the alcopop generation I’d always been a pretty enthusiastic drinker. It was never a _problem_ for me, it never got in the way of family or work life (apart from semi regular hangovers), but I did like a drink, and I wasn’t averse to an all-day’er.

4 years ago, I was having a pretty boozy run up to Christmas one year. Out pretty much every night in December with different groups and sub-groups of friends, different events and whatnot. Some night might just be a couple of steady pints, some might be a full on sesh.

In the break between Xmas and nee year my GF and I decided we needed a break. She’d read about a book “This Naked Mind” which she understood to “help you take control of your drinking”.

As January rolled round with the festive season behind us we both read that book. You’re supposed to take your time reading it, over the course of a couple of weeks. We started drinking alcohol free beer tad a stop gap.

For me, the format of that book worked perfectly and I’m coming up on 4 years sober in January.

I still drink plenty of AF. There’s some really tasty ones on the market these days. I reckon I get about 80% the enjoyment from drinking alcohol free. It fulfils that desire to drink.

I’ll happily go to the pub and have a few AF while those around me drink, and then when the conversation takes a dip as the evening wares on, I say my goodbyes and leave them to it. The next morning I’m never not happy that I’ve got a clear head.

Good luck! I hope you find something that works for you.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/This-Naked-Mind-Annie-Grace-ebook/d...

I did not entirely quit drinking, but I reduced quite a lot.

It is important to note age when describing alcohol consumption. I am 50. What worked for me at 20 does not work at all at 50. This is generally true for most.

I have been regularly drinking alcohol for over 30 years. I found that in my 40s my drinking was gradually increasing. I was at 4-5 beers every evening. I was using too much caffeine to get moving in the morning, caffeine and sugar during the day to work, and then alcohol to relax and go to sleep.

I fasted from caffeine, alcohol, and sugar and found my mood and energy overall improved. I simply have more capacity now without these things dragging me down.

I still have 0-3 drinks per week in social settings. The important thing to me is that I have a budget that is realistic for my age, just as I do for sugar and calories. I could get away with consuming more when I was young. Now, I easily gain weight and suffer long hangovers.

Total abstinence might not be ideal for everyone. Thinking about consumption in terms of a budget is useful for everyone.

What worked for me was Allen Carr's book Easy Way to Control Alcohol https://amzn.eu/d/89NkrKR

I tried several times to stop drinking previously, the longest I managed was for about 3 months. I think the hardest part is really deciding that you want to stop drinking. Once I did that, I read the book and it was easy. I haven't had a drink in about 6 years since.

What I like about this book is it doesn't make it into such a big thing like AA does. I don't think I was an alcoholic, though I did have some problem drinking types of patterns, and maybe the AA approach is necessary for full on alcoholics but I don't have to avoid going to bars or social situations where others drink for fear of relapsing, I just don't drink anymore.

I know this book has worked for a lot of people but no doubt it doesn't work for everybody. It made something that at times seemed impossible for me seem easy though.

We sound similar, except for the 12 pack in a weekend thing. I don't drink much, but I enjoy it when I do. When I drink, it's one drink. Maybe two if I'm feeling extra spicy that day. I enjoy the ritual of the drink. I enjoy the little buzz I get. I enjoy socializing with my fellow drinkers. I DO NOT enjoy how it makes me feel an hour later... that night... the next day. I can tell that something isn't right almost immediately and that steals the joy from the ritual.

So, I just remember that when I want to have a drink. It's going to make me groggy. It's going to make me snore... which annoys my partner. It's going to make me wake up "foggy". Sometimes, particularly when I don't have any responsibilities the next day, or I'm away from my partner, I decide that it's okay, and I'll have a drink. Most times, I won't. I'll have something else instead. Try a virgin drink or a non-alcoholic beer. There's lots of tasty options that don't come with the negative side effects. My go-to is just tonic water with lemon/lime. I don't even miss the vodka/gin that's supposed to be in there. Have them add a splash of dry vermouth or bitters for a little extra special something.

I have found, in the situations where I took control of my desire and rejected the "need" for a drink, I have felt an even better "buzz" from that decision than I would the drink!

I had this exact same feeling for years. There’s a ton of pressure to drink through society and marketing. Drink to celebrate. Drink when you’re commiserating. When you step back you realise that actually it isn’t needed. When you stop a couple of things happen. The first is that you have a bunch more time from not drinking itself but also not having to recover. The second thing is realising quite how dependent society is on alcohol. Can you imagine any event without it? So you go through a phase of adjusting to a society that is dependent. Like you I tried and failed to give up when that was my goal. What worked in the end was taking a break from it with no end and so removing the pressure of giving up. The break in itself is better than no break só celebrate that. If it lasts even better. It’s been more than 10 years since I drank and I can’t imagine going back. I don’t see any of the benefits. It just feels like something we’re indoctrinated into and when you look in from outside you realise how bizarre it is that so much of society is based around it. People are so indoctrinated that they get upset when you don’t drink with them, or think you’re strange because you don’t. Never trust a man that doesn’t drink is something you’ve probably heard. The alcohol industry has a very strong interest in you and everyone else drinking and coercing each other. That’s what all the adverts of happiness around alcohol are about. Reinforcement. Life is so much better without. Dancing when you’re sober is quite hard though.

Everyone else here will hit you with the "ritual" and "learn to enjoy without" I am the same as you - and I will tell you what worked for me. I tend not to drink on weekdays, but when I do drink, I drink to get drunk. The holistic stuff didn't work for me, I love drinking, I enjoy the social aspect of it. I have terrible willpower and a very hedonistic attitude.

Naltrexone works for me

I take a tablet on Wednesday to Saturday before bed.

I don't get any side effects (YMMV) but what it DOES do is basically take away the majority of the buzz from drinking, I lose interest after 2 or 3 drinks

Those weekends I want to go out and get smashed with friends, I just don't take the tablets.

Talk to your doctor, its cheap, low level side effects if you do have them - but its the one thing that works for me, I now have a couple of social drinks on weekends and I never thought I would be that person

Magic Mushrooms during an Amsterdam visit. I was drinking heavily, half a liter whiskey per evening every day for a few years. I also didnt think couldnt stop, the urge to drink, and the inability to stop once i started seemed to be just too strong. And that despite me despising how stupid i got while drunk. It really wasnt a fun addiction and realistically i was on my way to drink myself to death. After the trip the urge was gone and has remained this way for 4 years now. I even tried a sip of my back then favorite whiskey a few times on special occasions but never finished the glass. I can honestly say i am truly over it.

I also dont seem to be the only one having this experience, a cofounder of AA (Bill Wilson) had a similar experience with LSD.

Obviously, read up on psychedelics safe use first.

Your story illustrates one of the difficult things about alcohol, which is that people who drink don't belong in one category. It's unhelpful to think of people with a "problem" as alcoholic, IMO.

All of these situations are tricky in their own ways. Yours is tricky in that you can go for a while without a drink and it seems you can stop in one night long enough to feel horrible (as opposed to continuing to drink until you pass out and push off the horrible feeling until the morning.)

I skimmed through the comments and noticed a few which perked my interest.

One is identifying with a drinking culture. We're bombarded by references to drinking in all forms of culture. People who drink, may do so in part because they identify with that culture. Drinking culture becomes part of them. In that case, I think just being aware of this and picking it apart in your own life can help move away from it. Then actively manage it within your personal relationships.

Another is being aware of the urges which arrive, and then simply observing them without acting on them. When you have an addiction, part of the difficulty of moving away from it is that voice which tells you that you should get that thing. It can be a convincing and creative voice. As with the above item, just being aware of it and picking it apart can help.

Some do like that "warm glow" feeling of a few drinks at times. That's fine for those people, but the time to stop is when you feel like you want or need to stop. The trouble is that a small drinking habit can spiral into a big drinking habit if the conditions are right. If you're already concerned, then it's good to cut it out completely.

The big change for me was to stop thinking of quitting as something you should succeed at on the first try and start treating attempts as trial runs for gathering data and improving your approach.

The other piece was combining many different levers: social support, replacement activities, rewards, motivation statements etc. You need as many tools as possible because addiction is tough.

For more on this type of approach check out the book Change Anything... Helped me more than any other source.

A key idea they discuss are "critical moments" - ie that time when you're buying the 12 pack. You need to figure out when and why that happens and design a plan to address it.

> I have a hard time saying no to a drink if everyone else is having a drink

I also find it hard to say no a drink. I ended up needing to avoid a group of friends that I regularly drank too much with. Basically if there’s a regular time that you get together and drink, just make sure to plan something else instead. Ideally something constructive.

It’s a little sad to avoid your friends like that. But on the other hand I have made new friends, improved my health, and spent more quality time with my family because of it.

I know you said you want to cut it out completely, but this past weekend I met up with the old group of friends for the first time in a while. We had a lot of fun, drank way too much, and I felt like crap afterwards. It was good to catch up, but now I feel like I’ve gotten it out of my system and can get back to healthier pursuits. No regrets.

I hated that feeling too. In college in particular I had a handful of really bad nights, including a night where I blacked out my arrival back to the dorm, including apparently me showing my id to the security guy in the lobby, a morning in which I woke up to find puke all over my computer and a plate of food I had apparently prepared next to it, and a time I was at a frat party so drunk that they eventually threw me out, my friends having to carry me over their shoulders.

Got easier and easier as I got older and stopped hanging out with people who drank heavily.

I eventually made it a rule to only drink when I'm in a social engagement (and don't make a habit of going to events where alcohol is served more often than not), and limit myself to two drinks max, and that seemed to do the trick for me. I've gone as much as six months without having or even thinking about having a single drink.

I don't even desire it anymore. I enjoy when I have it, but I can't even remember the last time I went "man, I could really use a drink". For me a drink pretty much always just means diet soda or coffee now.

I actually have beer in my fridge and wine from before the pandemic that I still haven't drunk, and some leftover alcohol I brought to an event three months ago I haven't even touched since, so I'm pretty sure I don't have a problem anymore.

Two things that worked for me. (Not a doctor, not a psychologist, do your own research, etc etc.)

1) Dihydromyricetin - This is a supplement which helps your body digest alcohol that which can lead to less hangovers. For me specifically? It completely removed any craving I had for a drink within a week. Without hangovers the next day, I was left feeling just tired and crappy but without feeling horrible. This was a full game changer for me.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00CX60CMA/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b...

2) After you actually stop drinking, there's another hurdle of dealing with the social setting where everyone else is drinking and you are not. Unfortunately most non-alcoholic options out at a bar are pretty limited -- selzer w/ lime, cranberry juice, just a soda. However, at home, a ton of options for mocktails are popping up. For me, these fully fix any remaining craving to sit down and enjoy a beverage. Would recommend Seedlip or Three Spirit

https://www.seedlipdrinks.com/

https://us.threespiritdrinks.com/

Definitely don't hate yourself when you fail. There's a huge industry interested in getting you to drink alcohol and its the only drug you have to explain why you're not using. It has an odd hold on us.

Good luck!

The only reason you continue to do it despite the inevitable price you have to pay is because it alters your mood positively in the short term.

You have two problems: 1. Desire for instant gratification 2. Lack of other things that alter your mood positively

You can work on both in parallel. Exercise solves both at the same time.

The last meta thing to keep you focused on longer term healthy routes of solving this problem is to realize that:

1. You’re weak minded if you keep giving into instant gratification and should strive to be a stronger person 2. You have a deficit of things that give you positive emotion which is decreasing your quality of life

There are a lot of good ideas in this thread on what could replace drinking for you but you need to seek what works for you.

I starting dating someone who was sober. For the first two years, I never drank around her - only if we were traveling apart. Then I just decided to quit altogether so that she wasn’t cast as the party pooper. It’s been three years since then and the first two were really hard. But in the last year, my addictive attraction has transitioned in to revulsion. I now feel pity for people who drink. I never saw this coming. I drank an unhealthy amount but never considered quitting for “recovery” purposes. I just met this girl and it worked. I quit smoking in 2004 and it took me roughly the same 3 year period for that addiction to subside and turn around to revulsion.

Just don't drink alone. Where 'alone' includes 'with the people you live with' if there are any.

Unless it's too easy for you to meet friends at the pub every day, it should suffice.

What helped me eliminate almost entirely was understanding the impact it has on the body and the brain. More than "it's bad for your health", it helped me understand why it's bad. Even the allegedly harmless "a glass of red wine a day is good for your health" (spoiler: no).

There are many sources, but I recently saw this one from Dr. Andrew Huberman, which seemed more comprehensive than a lot of what I've read before.

[1] What Alcohol Does to Your Body, Brain & Health - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkS1pkKpILY

A couple things:

1.) I realized that drinking was a symptom of bigger issues in my life, and I was self medicating. Resolving those issues wound up with me giving up my excessive drinking with almost no effort.

2.) When I do recreationally drink, I limit myself to evenings only, I give myself extra time to sleep it off, and I force myself to consume single tall drinks only.

3.) I maintain awareness that I tend to self medicate, and reflect on the problems in my life that I can control.

Cutting drinking out completely is likely going to require a person to hold you accountable, and swapping in a different hobby to divert your focus. I find that when I'm idle, I tend to wander in the kitchen.

Good luck!

Just a bit of practical advice. If you want to go to a party but you are worried about your own behavior because there will be drinking, just show up at least an hour late. By then most people are inebriated, and they won't notice/care that your glass contains something alcohol-free, and you will get cheap entertainment re. how people really act when they are inebriated.

I love beer and always drink fairly responsibly. The hangover from >2 beers is enough to keep me from having more than that. I used to average 2 on Friday, 2 on Saturday, maybe 1 on Sunday, and a couple of weekdays I might have 1 or 2. I always told myself that was perfectly fine because it's not excessive on a given night, but recent review of the literature convinced me otherwise.

It was pretty hard to change my habit at first. What made the biggest difference was working out. I have a long history of fitness, and could recall that in my most fit era, I rarely drank. Like maybe once a month I'd have a beer.

It's really hard to be in great shape and average 10 beers a week, even if it's limited to 2 per event. Knowing that it's a limitation to my goals is very powerful in reducing my intake. I really just love beer and all its variety, so I miss it, but it also makes it much nicer to enjoy when I have it.

If you don't need to detox then it's a one day at a time thing. If you can't do one day then start with one hour.

You can find a therapist who specializes in addiction recovery to help keep you accountable. You can go to an AA meeting. Find a group of friends who don't drink and do things with them.

Actively remember life and having fun before you drank. For me that was high school.

Throw out all of your booze and don't buy any. If you like beer buy non-alcoholic beer. That will short circuit the pleasure response circuit that is responding to the alcohol. So you will find after your first NA beer that the pleasurable feeling doesn't hit so your body learns that the beer isn't the thing anymore.

I am 3 months sober and it really took two weeks to settle in, the first day was the hardest.

Tried psilocybin mushrooms once. It was not a pleasant experience, but for some reason afterwards the need for social validation through alcohol usage completely evaporated. The effects of alcohol became almost boring. I literally started drinking milk at those kind of social gatherings. Very strange.

A couple of years passed since then. I'm now in an environment where alcohol usage is increasingly encouraged, and not drinking makes other people uncomfortable. So what I'm doing now is just buying small amounts of alcohol, usually better quality.. but I still don't feel any internal drive to drink.

So.. perhaps trying out one of these psychedelic substances once could help.. there is also some research suggesting that they have anti-addiction effects.

I bought a motorcycle.

It's almost impossible to stay sober with all the social pressure. In our culture, every event has to have alcohol in it. Every occasion is a drinking occasion. Which is fine, except that I already drank my share for life and now just prefer enjoying life in other ways. So now I show up in full gear, put my helmet on display and have a nice evening without any nudging and questioning.

I took Ayahuasca, and it told me to stop taking drugs. Ayahuasca is an insane plant.

Drinking is a bit special in the addiction category. I've listened to my partner explain to me her struggles with drinking. I'll do my best to recount what she's said, with some paraphrasing.

Drinking is a cyclical activity, chemical wise. You get anxiety so to escape the anxiety you drink, the first few drinks you feel great - because the anxiety is gone! As you drink, though, the anxiety comes back so you drink more. The next day your anxiety is raging due to a hangover + your normal anxiety + whatever happened the night before. Shame and guilt set in, if you're trying to quit, and then rinse and repeat.

Alcohol is also a dangerously addictive substance for reasons most people don't realize. Withdrawals are lethal, which makes them special on their own, but alcohol is also available, advertised, and accepted everywhere. There's seductive ads on TV and in your grocery store; it's marketed as a lifestyle choice and a luxurious one at that. It's available in gas stations, grocery stores, and convenience stores. At any given party there is a high likelihood of alcohol presence.

I don't have any answers for you; my partner keeps herself busy with hobbies and work. She's got some totems around that remind her why she quit (or that she quit, in general). It's every day work.

My story with alcohol was far more simple. I was depressed and when my depression hit a high I would start to drink. There was no such thing as, "I'll have one beer" in my house. I hit rock bottom and I had one of two choices to make. The path I chose involved eating better, doing physical activity, and studying. My hobbies eventually ate over all the opportunities I had to go out with friends and booze casually. At some point it occurred to me that I hadn't drank in years; these days I can have as many beers as I want and stop when I want, but more generally I just don't drink. It's just not that fun to me anymore now that I know a life without alcohol.

I tell my story separately because I don't really fit the mold of an addict, yet I certainly destroyed a period of my life with alcohol.

After years of heavy drinking (rock'n'roll and stuff) I woke up in one morning, found out what I have done yesterday (again) and decided that I don't want to see this face in the mirror again. It was 20+ years ago and I haven't touched alcohol since then. I can visit any party, can take part of conversations even with quite drunk people, but can leave any time I want and not to have any problems in the next morning.

Yes, there are questions and "But wine?", "But a good beer?" social pressure, but being in my fifties probably helps a lot to preserve my "I don't care" attitude towards this.

All or nothing approach to quitting leads to quitting completely or going back to the same state, When I quit smoking I used to quit for a week then a month, later I quit for a long time and I did smoke once after a year, I did not treat it as a failure and just a break in my quitting, have not smoked since, I may some time if there is a special occasion ,but I don't think that would get me back to regular smoking. I have seen some quit and then once they smoke or have a drink resign thinking their attempt to quit has failed and then going back to the habit.

You may have breaks in your quitting , but that's ok get back to the quitting state as soon as possible.

Have some kids. It'll be torture when you have a headache and they're up before the sun rises.

Some ideas: 1)Before you start drinking try to think about how you will feel after 2)Make a calendar and everyday you don't drink mark an X on the day - you won't want to break the streak 3)Drink way more seltzer water 4)Consider fasting - when I started fasting I had ZERO interest in eating or drinking garbage 5)Seek therapy

My Brother has had traumatic events with alcohol in the past. He said he quit (over a year now) by reading Allen Carr's Easy Way to Quit Drinking. Specifically the self-hypnosis audio at the end, he said he did it once while going to sleep. He'll have a non-alcoholic beer rarely but I don't pry.

I just flat out quit - no drinking, period. I think 6-8 months for me was enough to normalize and remove it as a habit and now I'm able to drink without making it unhealthy. Luckily I wasn't anywhere near alcoholic - just casual habitual drinker, but a nasty hangover really pushed me over the edge to stop.

I've found it easy to stop a great deal of such behaviors by examining not what they promise to deliver, but what they actually brought. I.e. don't look forward, look backward when making decisions.

Alcohol promises a great time. Alcohol delivers a hangover and regrets.

Junk food promises a great time. Junk food delivers poor health and regrets.

Going to the gym promises hardship and struggle. It delivers health. I've never once regretted it.

Reading a book promises struggling and boredom. It delivers wisdom and inspiration. I've never once regretted it.

If you compare what you think you will happen with what you know will happen from experience, it's very easy to see how often you are misjudging these things.

I stopped drinking around 6 weeks ago. Due to my indolent WFH lifestyle and drinking heavily after work to "relax", I gradually developed back pain which eventually made it impossible to get to sleep.

Drinking myself into a stupor made it all to easy to sit, for hours on end, in front of a tv or computer, endlessly consuming while shirking my responsibilities to myself, not least of all exercise. I always knew that it was leading to a bad place, but it got to the point where I could not physically continue. That, and reducing inflammation were my primary motivators.

Being continuously sober for an extended period of time has revealed to me that there are likely other reasons for my misuse of alcohol, I think I've been dealing with low-level anxiety and procrastination, making it difficult to quiet my mind, go to bed on time, etc. Part of this is probably due to the effects of abruptly quitting a crutch I've leaned on for a long time, but my conscience is telling me that there's more beneath the surface which needs to be addressed.

I would say that the single biggest factor in keeping my roll going is this: I have admitted to myself that I do have a problem with alcohol, and that some people are just not capable of enjoying alcohol responsibly, and I am probably one of them.

The inner voice telling me "go on, it's normal to have one or two at the weekend, everyone does it" has been quieted, because I know that I am not one of those people who stop at one or two. And that is fine by me.

Firstly, you mustn't ever hate yourself when you feel you've failed. Alcohol is a crazy powerful mind altering drug. Be kind to yourself. It's seriously hard to quit for some people.

It's really positive that you seem to have recognised some patterns and that you have a desire to quit for good. It's also good that you don't seem to be physically dependant on it after your weekend 12 packs.

What worked for me after ~8 years of increasingly deep alcoholism that started with weekend bingeing, ~2 years of trying to get sober, and now 18 months clean was two simple things:

1. Accountability of some sort. For me it was to my mother, but it could be to anyone or anything. Just someone or something you respect or that you hold dear.

2. A simple therapist. My therapist is a general therapist, not a specialised addiction counsellor. I'd tried AA, SMART, and 2 stints in rehab...nothing stuck until I just started talking to a therapist. Just talking, and slowly but surely breaking down my thought processes around life/love/relationships/work etc and I started to truly and fundamentally understand myself better and why I was drinking. Then is was so much easier to not pick up a drink. It's the best £50/week I've ever spent and I still go weekly.

Anyways, every one is different and that's just what worked for me, I wish you the absolute best. You've got this!

I listened to Annie Graces This Naked Mind and it helped me make a rational argument for why I shouldnt drink. I wanted to stop when I started the book mostly because hangovers started getting bad and I was spending too much on booze.

I told myself I was going to quit for 90 days. That turned into 6 months. Which turned into about 2 years now. At this point I dont get urges anymore. The first 90 days were the worst. The following 6 months were kinda bad. After a year it got a lot easier.

A HUGE help is having supportive people in your life. My wife still drinks but she was never a big drinker. My friends still drink but they are also really into doing things that drinking doesnt help, like sports where drinking doesnt really fly, or outdoor activities where drinking doesnt need to be involved.

I was pretty much drinking every night when I quit and it was my main social outing. The hardest part was retraining my brain to do things I liked without drinking. A big one for me was drinking while watching movies or tv. I could get drunk and watch shitty lifetime movies because when youre hammered enough those shits are fun. But without booze even great movies were boring for a while. It just takes time. It does get easier.

Check that book out. It helped a lot with building up enough arguments that I couldnt easily break them down when I wanted a drink.

What worked for me was convincing myself, deep deep down, that I don't want any alcohol to drink. It's just poison, addictive poison, that's provably bad for you with like no real upsides that aren't just shaky arguments propped up by billions upon billions (upon billions) of dollars in marketing spend. It's a shit, over priced drug. If you really want/need a recreational drug in your life, there are better options, it's a stupid sad shame that alcohol has taken hold as the main social drug, it belongs under the sink with the rest of the household cleaners.

So how do you quit drinking if you want to? Figure out why you still seem to want to drink at all. If you're going literal weeks at a time without drinking, that's great, you're probably not fighting the chemical addiction part. Most people that give in to daily cravings are just very addicted to the chemical alchohol and are constantly feeding their addiction.

After some weeks, if you're still going back to alcohol, it's because you still see it in some good/positive light. That's understandable, remember, billions and billions of dollars are spent every year trying to convince you that alchohol is THE way to have fun, relax, meet new people, and live that amazing life that only seems to exist on billboards and in commercials.

Once you just see alcohol as a poison you don't want to drink, not drinking alchohol is as easy as not drinking bleach or windex. For two years now I've had exactly as much to drink as I wanted to (zero), it's quite freeing really.

I too love drinking. I used to close bars every day of the week. I had changes of clothes at work so that I could go straight from the bar to work the next day.

Eventually I had to want something else more than I wanted to drink. I started adding up the financial toll of my drinking and looked at how much that set me back from other goals. Then later it was my health.

But finances was the biggest thing. Social drinking was like buying a brand new car every year. It kept me from going anywhere in life.

Making that connection is what worked for me.

Sometimes alcohol overuse is indicative of metabolic problems. Their brain say 'starving, please feed me', but because of insulin resistance sugar can't get into the brain cells. Ethanol has 7 calories/gram. It gets converted into acetate, which is easily used by the brain as fuel. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14085230

There was a link I found interesting, on student athletes and the '4 day hangover'... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21255738

Naloxone and naltrexone can be really helpful at reducing the amount of alcohol that you can consume. Naltrexone is FDA-approved for alcohol abuse. My friend's alcohol use was under control for about 2 weeks after her treatment with naloxone. Low dose naltrexone is probably more beneficial than full-dose...

Another friend told me of how, while on naltrexone, she could have a beer, then half of a second beer, but couldn't finish the second beer. She drank to make her emotional problems go away - it was easier to stop the naltrexone than the alcohol.

I slept poorly one night and decided that nothing was worth that effect on my wellbeing. I also read that there alcohol is neurotoxic at any dose, and I value my lucidity: https://www.ndph.ox.ac.uk/news/new-study-finds-even-moderate...

I feel like the advice here is a little weirdly targeted given:

> I don’t buy it for weeks at a time, then cave and have a 12 pack in a weekend and feel like garbage most of the time.

Doesn't sound like you're at all dependent on alcohol, you just need something to get you over the "well, why not?" urge. Make a bet with a friend and agree you'll donate a meaningful/painful amount of money to a cause you absolutely hate if you drink.

If you need help for drug addiction please consider visiting:

Alcoholics Anonymous, https://aa.org/

Alcohol Detox Resource, https://addictionrehabtreatment.com/alcohol/alcohol-detox/

American Addiction Centers, https://americanaddictioncenters.org/

Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, https://www.hazeldenbettyford.org/

Lily’s Place, https://www.lilysplace.org/

Self-Management And Recovery Training, https://www.smartrecovery.org/

or call the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration helpline:https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/

1-800-662-HELP (4357).

How did I stop drinking?

Well, I let it get so far out of hand that my only solution appeared to be suicide. Luckily that attempt failed and I received the help I long since needed. That, together with knowing the next drink will probably kill me, is a great motivator to stay sober!

This is not a joke or an exaggeration, but I also realize its of not much help to most people. What I can say is that in every self-help group I've been to there is a history of family instability found in every single one of the participants. It affects people more than they think and it's a good idea to read up on it. Even if you think your childhood was stellar - when you're faced with irrational behavior you can't seem to stop, there is a reason for that. And that reason is usually found in the formative years of your life.

Especially western middle-class 'perfect childhoods' are plagued with invisible emotional neglect and unhealthy boundaries between children and parents. We just don't see it as such because it's the norm.

It might sound terribly old-fashioned, but I think there is something to be said about "moderation". Why does it have to be either binge-drinking and having a hangover the next day or abstaining from alcohol completely? I drink on average about 3-4 bottles of beer and the occasional glass of wine over a week, and I was never "really" drunk (to the point of losing control or forgetting what happened) my whole life. Yes, maybe the alcohol has a negative effect even at relatively small doses, but so do other things that are far less enjoyable (e.g. the fumes from the cars passing by my office window).

EDIT: I realize that when you have a drinking problem where drinking one beer inevitably leads to drinking x more, it's probably easier to stop completely. I guess I was just reacting to the feeling of guilt - I'm not sure hating yourself for not being "strong" enough is helpful in this situation. Of course getting comfortable with what you are currently doing isn't good advice either...

The 12-pack-in-a-weekend part makes me think you’ve got a problematic relationship with alcohol. You might start with an examination of why you’d choose to do that on a particular weekend instead of something else. I spent a decade ramping up to about 5 beers a day, and it initially had a lot to do with anxiety and feeling trapped in a life that wasn’t fulfilling to me. Even after I addressed those things aggressively, the drinking remained. I failed to control it every day. Only until I could visibly see the effects it was having on my body was I able to quit. I quit because of vanity!

It is hard to offer universally good advice on this, but because I personally can’t drink moderately, maintaining an intentional and holistic relationship with myself is the way I’m able to stay off it. I try to remember that regular life as a goldmine far more rewarding than alcohol.

Last thing: self-hatred and alcoholism go hand-in-hand, so find ways to treat yourself well, whether you drank too much or not.

Good luck :)

I kicked alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis. Not all at the same time, and not all on my first try. Everyone's usage is different so you have to figure out what works and doesn't work for you.

First thing is you have to really want to quit. If you don't want to do it, it will be a lot harder. Try to really think through the ways your substance use is harming you in the short term or long term, be it physically or mentally or whatever. People get really really strong cigarette cravings when they quit, but if you've started to feel lung pain in your daily life and actively realize the damage you are doing to your body, it's a lot easier to hold off on those cravings.

If your pattern is to go long periods without drinking and then binge a bunch in one weekend, maybe you just need a strategy to get you through the one weekend that you do feel like it. Anything that can delay it- eg say I won't drink until I clean the whole house and go to the gym. and maybe when you do finish cleaning and exercising a few hours later you won't feel like you want it as badly or can say no to your urge.

If going to bars is what tempts you into a drink, and you go to bars more to socialize than anything, try to find some socialization somewhere that people don't drink or where drinking is a detriment, like hiking or sports or Magic the Gathering or what ever floats your boat.

Rather than wallow in self pity, forgive yourself for your mistake and then try again. Don't excuse yourself like well I already had one so I guess I failed... you had one, but one is better than two or ten, so don't give up, start again and keep at it! If you were doing a programming project and your first prototype went a bit poorly you wouldn't give up (hopefully), if you knew you could do it, you'd take what you learned and try again with a new prototype.

I had a daughter. My dad was a smoker and when he gave up smoking he took up drinking. Between him and My mum They drank a cask of wine every 2 days. One day my dad got drunk and threw a glass at my mum, then fell down the stairs cutting his leg open and stumbled to bed. The next morning he woke up with blood everywhere and went up stairs, asked my mum what happened to her face. He had no recollection of what happened. (He gave up drinking for a long time, now he might have a beer on the weekend after mowing the lawn but he doesn’t drink anymore)

I enjoyed drinking especially when I lived in australia. Start drinking at Friday noon, end up at the pub and casino.

When my wife got pregnant I more or less gave up drinking. I didn’t want to end up like my dad. After not drinking for the duration of the pregnancy I kinda lost the desire to drink.

I some times have a cider or beer. Only 1 and that’s it. I just drink soda or water. And don’t cave to any peer pressure because my daughters are more important to me than what someone else thinks.

I was (am?) an alcoholic though I was probably on the lighter side of the spectrum, similar in amounts to what you describe. It took me a long time to recognize I had a problem, even with many binge drinking events turning into soured weekends and broken promises.

My hack for stopping (after yet another bender) was turning it into an identity for myself: I am now a person who doesn't drink alcohol. I think creating identities for yourself in this way is effective for many habits.

I wrote about why I chose to quit in 2020: https://whatshouldyoueat.com/2020/03/15/quit-alcohol/

and how it felt after a year of no drinking in 2021: https://whatshouldyoueat.com/2021/02/28/a-year-sans-alcohol/

good luck

I just have a rule that I only drink in social situations. Since I only have enough real friends to count on a couple of hands that doesn't happen very often at my age, so it works for me. I never drink at home, I think that too easily leads to what I call "casual alcoholism" . You are not technically an alcoholic but you do it instead of more productive things like coding, playing video games, or (my) wood working hobby. Just sitting around drinking kills your liver and the rest of your health. Some few people seem to not really effected by it, but I have seen two early somethings get cirrhosis and that's kind of scarey. My papa pickled his liver for decades and it never happened and he died when he fell and hit his head at 89. I always felt science should study elderly like that to see why they don't get cirrhosis/lung cancer/kidney failure from 50-60 years of drinking/sugar abuse/etc.

Maybe not exactly what you are looking for, but I can share my experience doing the opposite: I wanted to cut out drinking sugary drinks (soda, sugary coffee, fruit juice, etc) and had always struggled until I switched to beer instead (and sugar-free coffee in the morning). When I would have reached for a soda, now I reach for a beer. Haven't really wanted a soda in ages, the big brands all taste sickeningly chemicall-y to me now.

Drinking a beer carries (to me at least) much more weight than drinking a soda. It has alcohol so I can't drink more than ~2 in a night (or if affects my sleep), and to be honest my body just doesn't want to drink more than one or two a day anyways. A big part of it was only buying half decent beer that has a lot more flavor than a miller or bud so it encourages you to sip it more like a nice coffee or cocktail then just chugging it down.

Similar story with coffee - it is caffeinated so I can't drink more than 1 or 2 a day (again, with the sleep...) but it just brings me so much joy to make a nice cappuccino with breakfast. Overall it tastes infinitely better than drowning a crap drip coffee with sugar, and with the milk based coffees there is just so much more flavor in the cup to experience with and explore (different coffees, roasts, grinds...).

Long story short, if you are dead set on cutting out drinking from your life I suggest that you pick up something similarly rewarding to replace drinking with. The obvious choice would be some other sort of stimulant -- Sugar? caffeine? THC? Your cravings could just be that your body is looking for carbs and knows that beer is an easy way to get them.

Best of luck

PS - if you want to experiment with non-alcoholic beers, Athletic has a line that is a significant cut above the rest which you can get in most grocery stores now. I personally prefer the "run wild" but the "upside dawn" is also decent if you are more into ales.

As I have gotten older, simply observing what you're observing has led me to massively cut back on drinking. So you're more or less doing the thing.

One thing I will say-- the "hating yourself for drinking" is probably more of a significant issue than occasionally drinking.

Like, we all do dumb stuff, ranging from leaving something on the stove too long to taking a shitty job. The ability to be compassionate towards ourselves when we do dumb stuff.

I've found that what the Buddhists call "loving kindness meditation", in which you first target other folks (who you agree deserve it) with your empathy, and then gradually learn to apply that same kindness to yourself has been very helpful in my own struggles with being a horrible fuckup (or, if you prefer, a normal human being).

It's okay to fail sometimes. You're human. Just keep trying to do your best and think about why you might have made choices contrary to how you generally understand yourself.

After reading "Why we sleep" (Matthew Walker) and "Spark" (John Ratey) I went from drinking a couple of times a week (some beers, sometimes a cocktail) to zero.

Knowing the damage I was doing to myself, all the side effects and bad impact on my health (sleep, hearth, overall physical performance) literally stopped me from continuing with this. Moreover, in the same period the report the article "THE IMPACT OF ALCOHOL CONSUMPTION ON CARDIOVASCULAR HEALTH: MYTHS AND MEASURES"[1] from World Health Federation came out. TL; DR: the right amount of alcohol for anyone is precisely zero.

In short, a better knowledge of what I was doing to my body helped my in stopping a bad habit.

[1]: https://world-heart-federation.org/wp-content/uploads/WHF-Po...

I started following the Greek Orthodox Lenten fasting schedule[0] even though I am not Greek Orthodox. In this context, fasting means refraining from the consumption of specific things. It basically boils down to a vegan diet with no alcohol and minimum oils (e.g. olive oil) during various periods of the year. I found following this schedule really helped keep me in check even without the religious component.

After my first observance of the fast, many new habits stuck with me:

• I only drink on weekends socially with others (save for occasional exceptions such as a birthday during the week)

• I never drink alone

• When I drink, I follow each drink with a glass of water and completely stop myself if I start feeling tipsy

• I gave up meat and eventually dairy, eggs, and fish (in that order) because I felt so good during the fast

Now, elements of the fast has become a bit more permanent in my life apart from the strict periods of no alcohol and no oil. Although, I do not have to battle alcohol addiction, I found periods of fasting really helped me gain a greater control of myself and what I regularly consume. It may seem odd for a non-religious person to follow, but I think there were good reasons the Greeks have historically followed this schedule that have led to a healthy lifestyle. Regardless of possible health benefits[1], following a fasting schedule really helps keep me in check and prevent my past behaviors of over-indulging in pleasurable things (for me that was primarily an over consumption of meat without consideration of the negative side effects from that behavior).

[0] https://www.goarch.org/-/when-you-fast

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC156653/

If you're at a bar, get sodas or seltzers and don't tell anybody they're dry. nobody can tell and nobody asks. if they do, say they're boring drinks like well rum and coke or well vodka tonics. Tip the bartender.

If you're at a BYO party, bring some silly drink you never had before. Never had orangina? bring some to the party. try that CBD seltzer, etc. there's dozens of kitch drinks in every corner store.

At home, stop restocking. work thru your liquor cabinet, even the stuff you don't normally drink.

lastly, find other substitutes. night on the couch, you want a beer? get into herbal teas. make a bag of popcorn. there's so many fun treats out there.

If you are offered a shot or other social situation, don't beat yourself up for saying yes. the goal isn't to be perfect it's to replace most situations with an alternative.

After twenty years of daily wine drinking, I woke up feeling terrible and looking worse, and just--quit. I was curious how things would proceed if I just didn't drink alcohol. I put a hash mark on my office whiteboard, and wondered how many I could accumulate.

It's been five years of complete abstinence. I didn't join any programs or make any noise about quitting; I just quit. I don't miss a thing about drinking.

I think I was successful because I made it simple. I didn't try to taper or wrestle with the conflicting formulas for "moderate" drinking. It helps that there's increased awareness of "sober curiosity," and more consideration for those of us not drinking at social occasions.

You've already been able to quit, so next time, just extend the duration--maybe it'll be forever.

We wanted to. That's step 1. Sounds like you're there.

What we did: Read This Naked Mind by Annie Grace [2], listen to Andrew Huberman's "What Alcohol Does to Your Body, Brain & Health" [1] The point is to wade through the material and let it brainwash you.

It's all about how it's bad and a tiny bit neuroscience on why you struggle. Also pointing out over and over how going sober is actually more relaxing, less stressful and how attractive the new habits in the same situations are. Alcohol just wasn't doing me any favours.

[1]: https://hubermanlab.com/what-alcohol-does-to-your-body-brain...

[2]: https://thisnakedmind.com/

Something practical that helped me – I'm taking a year off drinking, and am 328 days through – was getting my friends and family to take bets heavily skewed against me. If I don't drink for a year, for instance, my friend is giving me $50; if I fail, I am giving her $150.

When I've really wanted a drink, I have to ask myself: is this drink worth ~$3,000? It never is.

I've also been doing lots of gym workouts and going for runs. Seeing my progress after a few months of sobriety has been extremely helpful. I didn't realise I could be athletic – and it was always _much_ harder with a hangover.

Finally, there are now lots of decent alcohol-free drinks available that make sobriety less boring. Athletic Brewery and Lucky Saint are particularly good facsimiles. And a tonic water with a splash of cocktail bitters is delicious!

Try to find a good alcohol-free beer.

I like drinking beer but alcohol-free beer is like 90% of the experience, so I go for that.

I have cut back, not eliminated completely, although the trend is in that direction.

Whenever tempted I focus completely on the fact I never regret not having drunk anything. That I will feel great having clear head.

It’s the opposite from imagining a certainty of lost sleep, fuzzy head, and feeling the subconscious worry I will hedonistically miss out on anything.

The key is two things:

1. to realize how certain you can be, 100% for practical purposes. Absolute.

2. And that not drinking is the hedonistically best choice. It’s not about withholding some pleasure from myself, it’s about not letting anything get in the way of my all day clear headed pleasure.

3. So I absolutely, with complete certainty, know I will not regret, not having the drink in front of me.

My interest in alcohol keeps instantiating further below where I think any discipline I have is.

I hope that makes some sense and helps someone.

From your description, it doesn't sound like you're all that bad. It isn't wrong to enjoy having an occasional drink. It's important to recognize and embrace the feelings you described after drinking. Moreover, the fact you've made this post and describe yourself as wanting to stop, I think that's a huge part of the battle.

It sounds like the most crucial thing for you would be to identify what it is that makes you crack after weeks of not buying it (not sure if that's the same as not drinking). Address and work through that, see how it goes. Your mind and body are clearly recognizing the negative affects and trying to steer you in one direction... but there's still something that brings you back and you need to figure out what that is.

Godspeed, my friend.

Hello. Long time lurker, first-time poster (because this question resonates with me).

I accidentally stopped drinking after 30+ years. Three factors helped get me there.

1. I have been practicing mindfulness for 20+ years. Alcohol disrupted my practice.

2. To prioritize my health, I modified my diet (keto), and drinking no longer fit into my food-related health goals.

3. I started exercising, and drinking didn't support this habit.

Takeaways: if possible, add important things (i.e., habits) to your life. Sometimes these habits force alcohol out of your life. So, instead of "Stop drinking," start "something(s)" and let them force alcohol out.

Of course, this may not work for you, but I wanted to share what worked for me.

I switched to weed completely and minimized that. It helped that weed does not work with me when I had even a little alcohol.

I don't have the urge to drink at all anymore and avoid it completely. I also hate the feeling of an alcohol buzz, even after a beer. Completely deprogrammed :)

Guided introspection.

Despite not considering myself alcoholic, my wife nagged me into going to local Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) meetings. I came to realise that I had somehow slipped into alcoholism without being the classic street-drunk, shop-doorway kind. I had the mental obsession with alcohol in spades... every day I'd count the hours until, after work, I could start drinking.

Once I'd accepted I was alcoholic it was relatively easy. The simple fact is I don't want to be an alcoholic, or any kind of -holic, so I was suddenly highly motivated to stop.

The AA way gets you thinking deeply about why you started drinking heavily in the first place: What are the exact feelings you want to drown in alcohol, and why do you have them?

I quit drinking over four years ago and it's sincerely been one of the best things I've done for myself. The book, "This Naked Mind" helped me a lot.

https://thisnakedmind.com/this-naked-mind/

The author does a very analytical, scientific breakdown of the physiological and psychological factors at play with alcohol. For me, it helped a ton to understand that there were very real forces at play that were compelling me to drink, it wasn't necessarily a personal failing or weakness.

Best of luck to you! I am brutally aware of how tough it can be, but I can tell you the other side is pretty great.

All drinkers on HN - I recommend you do dry Jan or Octsober each year. I think it’s an easy way to check in with yourself and examine your relationship with alcohol.

If you find yourself counting the days to Feb 1st, you might want to do something about your drinking.

It’s a good question, and I’m glad that you posted it. I am in a similar situation.

For me, I am becoming wearier and wearier of drinking - but having the access to an external and accessible release is appealing. I don’t have advice but I do have a personal target: I smoked cigarettes starting 20+ years ago. And over the years I got distance from it little by little. Now I have, what I like to think of as, a good relationships with tobacco. I enjoy a cigarette once every 6-8 weeks. Sometimes it’s good and tasty and I enjoy the experience, other times it tastes like crap and I know I’ll feel even worse later so I cut it 1/4 in.

That’s where I want to get with alcohol (and I’m certainly getting closer).

I quit cold turkey for a whole year - 1st of January till 1st of January next year. I drank non-alcoholic beer when going out for beers with friends during that year, that stuff is so horrible you can't really drink more than three or four.

Youre asking a great thing!

I think you have to add up all the reasons alcohol is bad. Really, genuinely count all the mess ups it causes:

1. More fights 2. More reckless talking. 3. More infidelity or need for sexual release 3. DUIs and car accidents 4. Stupid you comes out - not smart you. Not learning or wise you. 5. Once you are tipsy or drunk, its wasted time its time wasted on earth. Nothing really progressive will happen while in that state. 6. Takes toll on your health. Can damage liver. Makes you prime real estate for many other health problems. 7. Destroys relationships. 8. Destroys your trust in yourself and your discipline. 9. Redefines what a ‘fun time’ means. Suddenly a little drink must be involved for you to have fun or feel good? 10. Costs money. Alcohol is not cheap. 11. A lot if life-regrettable acts are done when we wre tipsy or drunk.

Add up these reasons, and you’ll really start to see that alcohol is really something you want to stay away from for good and permanently. It was never good to have a little bad. Bad is bad.

I’m also a Christian so I prayed when I wanted to quit. I prayed to Jesus also when I wanted to quit cigarettes and pot. And by His grace, I am free from pot, cigarettes, alcohol. I thank God for helping me be substance free.

For me it is the memory of my 5 year old daughter crying and trying to get me away from her mother who I was hurting. Plus realization and memory of a wealth of other fuckups I've been guilty of because of being drunk. But the child's terrified face was the tipping point. I can still see it in my mind. Been sober for 2 years.

I think you have to add up all the reasons alcohol is bad. Really genuinely count all the mess ups it causes:

1. More fights 2. More reckless talking. 3. More infidelity or need for sexual release 3. DUIs and car accidents 4. Stupid you comes out - not smart you. Not learning or wise you. 5. Once you are tipsy or drunk, its wasted time its time wasted on earth. Nothing really progressive will happen while in that state. 6. Takes toll on your health. Can damage liver. Makes you prime real estate for many other health problems. 7. Destroys relationships. 8. Destroys your trust in yourself and your discipline. 9. Redefines what a ‘fun time’ means. Suddenly a little drink must be involved for you to have fun or feel good? 10. Costs money. Alcohol is not cheap. 11. A lot if life-regrettable acts are done when we wre tipsy or drunk.

Add up these reasons, and you’ll really start to see that alcohol is really something you want to stay away from for good and permanently. It was never good to have a little bad. Bad is bad.

I’m also a Christian so I prayed when I wanted to quit. I prayed to Jesus also when I wanted to quit cigarettes and pot. And by His grace, I am free from pot, cigarettes, alcohol. I thank God for helping me be substance free.

>Any tips on cutting out something completely and how to get out of just hating yourself when you fail?

Hating yourself doesn't help. I find quitting an addiction requires a good self image. Bad days are on the path to getting free. Remember you can pick yourself up when you fall over. It's all part of the process.

"For though a righteous man falls seven times, he rises again."

You are doing it. You are on the path to getting free of this. You can do this. Keep going, don't get discouraged.

If you can get help I advise going after it. Someone in your corner will really help. You might not consider yourself an alcoholic, but an alcoholic support group has the tools to help.

If there are other people in your family with drinking problems, or you have a mental illness, you should probably get professional help with quitting, because the chance of alcohol eventually ruining your life is significantly higher.

Andrew Huberman has a great podcast episode on the effects of alcohol on the body and brain[1]. Huberman is a professor of neurobiology at Stanford and he does a great job of explaining things in layman’s terms.

I recently cut back on my drinking significantly after listening to this podcast. Give it a listen and maybe you’ll find something that resonates with you as well.

[1] https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/what-alcohol-does-to-y...

I quit drinking after more than 25 years of problematic drinking by taking naltrexone just before drinking for 3-4 weeks. Given my prior experience with alcohol and trying to quit, it was the easiest thing I've ever done.

I urge people who have a problem with drinking and wish to quit, who for whatever reason do not feel that 12 step programs like Alcoholics Anonymous are right for them to find a doctor who is willing and able to prescribe naltrexone and have a serious discussion with them. Had I had access to it and known it was effective as it is I probably would have been able to stop drinking 20 years sooner than I did.

Long abstinence is the key. I have been able to re-frame my relationship with alcohol successfully---but this is often not the case for long time habitual users. I cut out alcohol, but substituted in non-alcoholic beer (they are VERY good now) and high CBD / low THC cannabis. I felt nearly no "high", but found that it hit the spot that the first beer would. Eventually once the habit was broken I kept drinking the near-beer and stopped the cannabis except for occasionally, and it worked! This may not be an option for you, but it worked for me.

For me, I focus on the concept of temperance. Temperance is a long-venerated cardinal virtue that speaks to the vice of over-indulgence, but it's special in that it doesn't insist that you never indulge, only that you assert yourself and pull yourself back from that indulgence. You temper your urges, and drink perhaps one drink less than you otherwise would, pass on one opportunity that presents itself. This act of will empower you by giving yourself the agency to limit your indulgence and choose between engaging or holding back.

When you can't smoke, if you stand and stare out of the window on your own, you're an antisocial, friendless idiot. If you stand and stare out of the window on your own with a cigarette, you're a philosopher. - RORY SUTHERLAND

So I think addiction is about meaning. Addiction activities are always meaningful activities. May not be pleasurable activities but always meaningful. To quit a meaningful activity, you need to replace with another meaningful activity. like exercise, help someone, do something good..whatever is meaningful to you.

As I get older the hangovers get even worse to the point of affecting the entire next day, sometimes two days, from drinking heavily.

So I listen to my body and never have more than two drinks a night.

This means a glass of wine or one martini at dinner, or a beer at a concert is fine. A bottle of wine or rounds of cocktails is not.

Replace the extra drinks with:

- water or soda water - coffee (decaf at night) - non alcoholic drinks. This is the future of social drinking imho - chocolate, ice cream or other dessert - cannabis

All make me feel good and are fun socially and none have the hangover.

> I have a hard time saying no to a drink if everyone else is having a drink

Dig in deeper on this and then make yourself do it. It’s a good initial skill to hone.

The first thing is just saying no thanks when offered. This will be easier/harder depending on your friends. Ordering something nonalcoholic is a good. But next problem is being sober around your drunk friends isn’t usually such a fun thing. So you’ll ultimately need to just stay out of the bars, make friends that don’t drink that much, or alter your friend group nights.

I never much enjoyed the act of drinking itself, but my social life was pretty much nonexistent without it. It was predictable and I started hating it - go out, drink, have pissing matches about who drank more, talk about inane things (with exceptions, but I also always hated the drunk honesty, which is a minor contributing factor here) and then regret losing an entire day to your hangover.

Do you have history of alcohol abuse in your family? I was “fortunate” to witness it firsthand and, over time, I got afraid of losing control over myself, because I noticed some… familiar personality _quirks_ that would warrant it.

Neither of those issues really pushed me to stop, but it all became a perfect storm when I took up running and found out that a friend is a runner. It spawned a positive feedback loop - I wanted to improve and we celebrated each other’s victories, no matter how small (with pats on back, not bottles). It is a hobby that is not conducive to hangovers, so I began the process of weaning myself off.

On the other hand, I have certain intolerances/allergies that also conflict with indulging.

I guess my point is… death by a thousand papercuts. Any and every reason to abstain helps with losing bad habits.

And _never_ hate yourself for slipping up. Look into eating disorders - the compensatory behaviors following that are what cause you to spiral down.

For me what worked was to try and understand why I was drinking. I used to drink (a lot) at night to help me fall asleep (pretty much black out).

Why was I having difficulties falling asleep? Work stress? Diet? Something else? I decided to change two of the simplest things and the ones I had direct control, it was time to go to a gym and start diet. So I just radically changed my lifestyle.

From one day to the other I stopped eating crap and became a lot more mindful of quantities I've been eating and started tracking my macros. Because of that I removed alcohol entirely from the equation as those empty calories didn't fit in my macros. I started going to the gym every morning before work, and been consistently going 6 days a week. Since I'm waking up earlier to go the gym, by the time its evening I'm a lot more tired and don't really need the help to fall asleep.

Been losing weight, gaining muscle, my sleep patterns have never been better. It's been 3 months since I started, and since then I've had 2 glasses of wine on my birthday, and 1 pint of beer when I met a friend I haven't seen in 5 years.

I still enjoy the act of drinking, I like that buzz feeling, I like the taste and the smell, it's all great. But I don't want to ruin the progress I've had since I started exercising and eating better. I've never been in a better physical shape in my life and I like that a lot more than I like drinking. Of course I'll still get drunk on NYE, but at least I won't get drunk the whatever remaining days till then we have.

I’ve stopped drinking for periods in my life before. (I was a moderate drinker at 7-14 drinks per week.) What I’ve found is that for me, it’s primarily just a habit that needs to be broken. That’s the main reason for the regularity of my drinking. During the first week or two I continue to crave a drink, but after a long enough period the cravings stop. During my longest stretch I had my favorite beer after about six months and was surprised at how lackluster it tasted.

Develop an exercise routine.

I hated the feeling of running or working out hung over and used that as motivation to not drink. Would rather feel good working out and feel good after the work out.

Probably not any one thing - but a combination of things:

1. In a work situation once, I was embarrassed while out drinking with the 'team' at my behaviour - not because I made an ass of myself, but I 'went along' with a mean characterization of someone in my group that I never would have done when sober. I decided that wasn't me - and I vowed to NEVER drink with people I didn't respect, or make myself 'vulnerable' to that kind of behaviour.

2. Not drinking 'about something' - like a country song 'drinking because my gal left me' but usually if I drank it was because of stress, it was an escape, a response to painful stimuli, and not a 'joyful enhancement of activity' that it can be in moderation. And finding what I was 'drinking about' (hate your job, feel trapped, an excuse to 'get drunk' etc.) and work on THAT instead.

3. Feeling fat and bloated, and hungover is not something I want to put up with as I get older.

4. Adopting a 'gourmand' vs. 'glutton' mindset - consciously choosing a good experience, vs. the 'mass of experience' - i.e. a shot of a new whiskey enjoyed, vs. a case of Labatt's, etc.

5. Worrying about the cumulative effects of drinking over time - how will you 'know' that you're damaged your liver, brain, memory irreparably? Scary.

So the end result is - in a social (especially work situation) I'll have a drink, but find I rarely finish it - everyone else is on their third or fourth and I'm still enjoying my first. I have a clear head, can enjoy things, etc.

Don't hate yourself. If you can go a few weeks at a time that's good. Better than me. You are certainly better off for that. Blowing off is not all bad. Maybe feeling shit for a couple of days is a price worth paying for decompressing once a month? I'm not advocating that I would love to stop but at the same time... I also like it and it's part of my culture. Do your best, limit yourself, feel good for your achievements not bad about the failures

I'm a German living in one of the heaviest wine regions of Europe. Social drinking is a way of life here, there are constant festivals, and it's normal to drink moderately when with friends. Honestly, as horrifying as that may sound to other cultures, it works quite well. However, there are some mostly unspoken rules that must be met for drinking to 'work' well, from my experience:

Not having a drink when together with drinking friends must be fine and accepted by everyone. You must be able to NOT drink when you don't want to. Your consumption must not unacceptably interfere with your life or the life of others. You must be able to enjoy a drink in moderation without escalating further. If you drink excessively, make sure it's only once in a while and in a safe environment.

In your case, there is apparently a fine line between using alcohol to slightly enrich your experience on the one end and feeling "like garbage" on the other. If you can't ride that line because your consumption always escalates, it may be best to cut out alcohol completely - at least for a while - by reasoning about the inevitable outcome when you're still sober. I have two friends who never drink, for that exact reason.

I never was a drinker, hadn't really had the time for it, instead devoting myself to work. In my mid 20's, I decided I had enough and decided to lose weight and get fit. It went well, I lost >240 pounds. This was a few years ago.

I ended up on a dating site (go figure, newly fit guy) and ended up finding someone I meshed with. She's an absolute legend. She also introduced me to drinking ("social"). It ended up getting a bit of out hand, especially with the pandemic.

I then started "hiding" the alcohol, and binge drinking 2-3 bottles a few nights a week. Crazy stuff thinking back on it. I'm so glad she stuck with me through this.

So yeah, we tried a lot of things (therapy, a drug that didn't work and gave me incredibly bad side effects), but I never had the urge to drink, until it hit me and I couldn't stop until I did. I can't believe I managed to hold onto my job, and actually perform well.

Anyway, I ended up getting diagnosed with ADHD (or at the very least, ADHD traits, it's a giant spectrum, i guess). This was 18 months ago. Since then, I haven't had the urge to drink, I'm on new medication which helps SO MUCH, and therapy where it actually makes sense. I might not have ADHD, but damn close to it.

Not drinking but smoking, I quit when covid started and I was afraid that my damaged lungs would make vulnerable to it.

Earlier this year I was reading 'The Gracie Diet' which is a book about nutrition written by the Gracie family, a the people who pretty much made brazillian jiu jitsu and the key take-away to avoid bad food is to think of it like a fight with a nemesis.

There's someone that is trying to kill you, he will try to use any means, what if he would try to poison you? How easy would that be? What if this enemy were to add poison to your ice cream? How easy would that be for you notice that? News flash, icecream is already poison and the enemy is yourself.

Replicate the same thinking to alcohol, it is poisoned because someone is trying to kill you.

Can't have tilted paintings. Ice-cream is poisonous. Alcohol is poisonous. The floor is lava.

Make it a game or leverage your existing OCD for good things.

> Any tips on cutting out something completely and how to get out of just hating yourself when you fail?

I'd imagine it's the same as say running every day. I'd you miss a day then well that happens sometimes so just pick yourself up and get going again.

Specific to wanting to not do something, nature abhors a vacuum. Don't just cut the thing out, but find something to replace it with. Like I tend to snack less if I have a giant glass of water ready to hand.

I quit smoking after 18 years and think the same advice is applicable: remove yourself from the triggers.

Right before I got married I quit smoking and started using the patch. Once we got to our honeymoon spot the urge to smoke dropped off because I was in a new location. I didn’t use the patch at all and am still smoke free to this day.

If you can afford it, take a 5 day vacation and don’t drink. That may give you the mental distance to break the cycle and give up drink.

I've never been an "alcoholic" but I have occasionally drunk too much and made an ass of myself (like once every through years.) I've had times when I drank very little, others when I regularly drank 2-3 drinks a day.

One fall we made about 30 gallons of applejack from our own apples and I drank enough of it that December that I thought I was starting to become dependent because I'd feel uncomfortably warm if I went a day without drinking any. I didn't have a hard time kicking it though. (I live on a farm and have acres of seedling "cow apples" that are not sweet at all and not pleasant to eat out of hand but horses like them and they make good cider. I've got some good clonal apples in the hedgerows that seeded in the cow apples.)

More recently though I had a doctor tell me that I should stop drinking alcohol entirely and that doctor and another doctor told me to stop drinking caffeine. I found quitting alcohol easy, quitting caffeine much harder. I've had maybe 1 alcoholic drink once a month since, I still occasionally drink maybe 2 fluid ounces of coffee in 6 fluid ounces of milk.

I am a big fan these days of going to happy hour and having a Heineken NA.

Here are two considerations:

- Try to drink for the taste, not to became wasted. Try to sense the flavour of what you're drinking. I don't think that 12 cans of whatever you drank was so fantastic that you enjoyed all of them. I have plenty of bottles of wine and beers at home, but I rarely drink more than a glass. Also, when you start looking for the taste, you'll discover that good bottles are way more expensive and you want to enjoy drinking them.

- I've only quit smoking, so I can tell what worked for me. I read a book ("it's easy to stop smoking if you know how to do that"), that convinced me that the cigarettes were giving me nothing. We all have excuses to smoke, but in reality they're just excuses. We don't even like that, we only have to think our first cigarette to remind how bad it was. The book goes deep into this topic and actually convinces you that it's better to not smoke, but you must NEVER smoke a cigarette ever again, so that's what I did, and I am happily non-smoking since 15 years. I reccomend you to go this path if you don't want to drink, ever, again. But it doesn't seem the case because you want to continue drinking socially.

I spent about 25 years in the bar business and the metric is pretty simple. If you and/or others think you have a problem with alcohol, you probably have a problem with alcohol. So best not to drink if you can manage it. Not everyone is born with a compatible chemistry or a hollow leg. Some signs are blackouts, frequent hangovers, significant changes to personality when drinking and the word "enough" ceasing to have any meaning...

alan carr's how to stop drinking, that should exist, no?

https://www.amazon.com/Allen-Carrs-Drinking-Without-Willpowe...

Hello Chris! I had stop drinking 8 years ago with help my special methodology. Below I am talking about it: 1. Firmly decide that you need to stop drinking. If this decision is in doubt, nothing will work. 2. Plan which day and time you will stop drinking = Trite to set the date and time. For example - April 17 at 18.30 p.m. Do not select a date close to or too far from the current one. No more than 3 months. This will give you time to mentally prepare yourself and will not reduce your motivation. 3. Every day repeat this date and time and speak" I will stop drinking on December, 13 at 14:15 p.m. Repeat this date when you drink or before will drink 4. When the date you have chosen comes, tell yourself - I'm thirsty, but I'll do it later. It is important that you repeat this every time you feel like drinking and put off drinking until a later time each time. 5. If you can stop drinking alcohol for more than six months, according to this method. It is imperative to change both your own understanding of the situation and the phrase - then you should say "I don't drink today." It is also important not to allow yourself any amount of alcohol, convincing yourself that it is better to endure = give up drinking today. In the future, the previously chosen phrase for persuasion - "I am thirsty, but I will do it later" should turn into a persistent belief "I have a desire to drink, but I will not do it today."

Also, do not leave yourself alone and in idleness. Try to keep yourself busy, and during periods of an acute desire to drink alcohol - use high-calorie foods or drinks, cakes, soda. This is of course a little dangerous in terms of gaining weight, but will allow you to quickly remove the desire to drink anything alcoholic. It is important that you find like-minded people and communicate with them about your problems and just about life. A.A. can be such a circle of contacts.

3 things stand out to me in your description, based on similar experiences of my own (though not with drinking):

- It does not seem entirely clear to me why you want to stop, other than a vague idea that you might be better off that way. Figure out why first. How does not drinking make you a better person, concretely? Write that down. Share it with other people. Live your life around those important ideas. Make them a part of who you are.

- Stop being hard on yourself. It will only make the problem worse. We all make mistakes. Acknowledge it, try to figure out what caused it, fix the causes as close to the root as possible, and move on. Not drinking isn't a goal you fulfill and then you've done it. Not drinking is a process that you partake in every day. Just because you didn't one day does not diminish the value of doing so in the next 1, 2, 7, 30 days.

- Get external support with the two things above. Talk to a therapist or other people in your situation. When you're going in your old ruts, it's very hard to create change. It takes a lot of persistent work. It's helpful to have someone else sometimes remind you of why you are doing it, when you forget yourself.

I have been diagnosed with epilepsy (though I am 31 with no priori signs of this disease) and the main factor identified was fatigue. I used to drink a lot, as I used to consider this the only way for me to relax, evade and have fun with friends. Wrong news though is alcohol lower your epileptogen threshold and added to the level of exhaustion I had at this time, it was decisive in triggering my crisis. So I decided to quit, not for me really, but mainly because I did not want to fall on the streets while carrying my daughter. What missed much was the taste of beer and wine, but for the former, non alcoholic beers have made tremendous progress and Brooklyn lagers offers a 0.4% alcohol beer that could trap any beer lover into thinking this is a real IPA. I wish you to find what works for you, for me it was all a matter of finding something more important than those destructive habits. And go easy on you, it's not failing, just making progress and experimenting. I occasionally allow me a glass of good wine with my wife when the bottle is worth the degustation.

I started doing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. As a result, I drink way less, I'm in a better shape, and can defend myself. I know that drinking will have a negative impact on my performance and that is enough to keep me away from booze. I've also noticed that refusing to drink in a social setting is way easier, both for me and the social group I'm in.

It doesn't have to be Jiu Jitsu, it can be exercising in general.

Hope it works!

I was the typical teen/early 20's for the UK at the time (~2000) and while I didn't drink during the week I drank to *oblivion* at the weekend - every weekend.

I went out one weekend (6pm saturday) when I was 27 and got so drunk that I didn't remember anything from 9:30pm til ~5PM on the Sunday - Scared the shit out of myself and resolved to never get drunk again - everyone who knew me said "yeah right, see you in the pub on Saturday" but I stuck to it.

I didn't have a drink at all for the next decade and these days I have 1 or 2 a handful of times a year (and raise a glass of scotch to my grandfathers every Christmas) - haven't been drunk or had a hangover in 15 years.

> Any tips on cutting out something completely and how to get out of just hating yourself when you fail?

Failing is part of life, the trick is to accept your failure and then move on to not repeating it - otherwise you get into a loop of "try, fail, be dispirited, continue to fail, try " - basically be kind to yourself and remember that everyone struggles with something.

This is a dear question for me and it took me many years to figure out. For many people, occasional drinking is fine, but for me, small amounts of alcohol will mess with my sleep and health. So I would fix it for a while, but because alcohol is socially acceptable, I would occasionally have a drink and then a few weeks later I was back in the habit of a few drinks a week, which meant poor health. The answer for me eventually was to write a blog post to myself: https://blog.jtoy.net/stop-drinking-all-alcohol/ After writing that and occasionally going back to reread it, I don't drink at all :) I hope it helps.

I love alcohol. It gives me nice feelings, I relax and gradually become a brainless idiot thinking I'm all smart. Social drinking is also nice, because you get drunk with others on a very similar pace. What's not nice is all the lost days spending in bed with hangover.

I simply woke up one day and said it's enough. I get superb sleep, don't feel like shit,etc. Life does get more boring though.

Having kids for the most part has sucked the joy out of getting drunk. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy having 2 or 3 pints with a meal as long as its providing a lubricant to socialisation. Time constraints mean it's something I only get to do once every couple of months though.

Beyond that though means feeling like shit the next day and not being able to give the kids the attention they deserve.

Over the years I've found I'm an emotional drinker. If I'm tired or having a bad day getting drunk will make my forget about it. If I've had a wonderful day getting drunk will carry that enthusiasm into the night. I haven't permanently quit but told myself I'd take a year off to see if I could do it, I liked this approach because thinking about _never_ drinking again seemed unachievable. 3 weeks left and no desire to start drinking again.

Something that I found really effective was quitting caffeine the same day I stopped drinking. I went from drinking 6+ drinks most nights and 6-7 cups of coffee a day to nothing. First three weeks were terrible, drank 6-8 cups of strong chamomile tea throughout the day to help curb anxiety, kept candy around to deal with the sugar cravings. Throughout the year when I would get a craving to drink I'd have a coffee or energy drink and that usually altered my mood enough to satisfy the craving for a drink. Hard part there is not to allow caffeine to become a daily habit and keep it as a break glass. Around 5-6 months I found there was a big jump in mental clarity, after 10 months I hardly think about drinking.

Around the same time I quit I started getting up at 5am instead of 9am, I'm not very productive in the morning, some days I get some exercise or chores in but most days I just sit around on my phone until I start working around 8 or 9(phone addiction is my next vice to work on). This allows me to fall asleep by 10 and prevent the late night boredom which often lead to drinking. Having a fitness goal will help and you'll see how much easier it is to achieve without being hungover most of the week.

For social events I show up an hour or two late. By this point people have a few drinks in them and there's less pressure to drink to get conversation going since the work is done for you. Not perfect but it helps.

What worked for me was:

* Find new hobbies and things you enjoy, even if it is just being better at video games because you aren't drinking when you play. You can't 'stop' something without replacing it with something else.

* Understand that quitting isn't going fix all your problems, your life might seem worse/more boring afterwards. Accept it and see #1

* The decision to drink or not is the most stressful part. Things like dry Jan and sober Oct really helped me avoid making the decision and especially the long term decision at first. Deciding in the store if you're going to drink or not doesn't work, you have to make that decision one time and rely on the fact that you already decided for that month and it isn't a big deal.

* Exercise. People who quit drinking get healthy, it is such a stereotype but you will love it. Get jacked with your new extra time.

* CBD + todo lists, taking care of the little things in your life will keep your anxiety down and eliminate the need for the forced break from your life that drinking provides.

It will be 2 years next month for me.

I did a lot of personal development and spiritual work that taught me very practical tools for 'being with' the uncomfortable sensations that arise around choosing not to drink. Armed with the confidence that brought me, I simply lost interest. Surrounding myself with other people doing the same thing also helps a lot I'm sure. I didn't keep alcohol in the house until someone was moving and gifted me some.

Occasionally I'll have a drink, but I have higher sensory clarity now from meditating and I typically find it neutral to unpleasant, unless it's just the right situation.

What also helps is taking other lightweight mind altering substances for evenings when I want to have social fun. I recommend going down the research chemical rabbit hole and looking at the dissociatives especially.

At the end of the day though, it took a lot of time and drastic lifestyle shifts over years. For what it's worth, I don't think self discipline is the right approach, for the same reason it's not an effective way to treat any other addiction.

I found pretty quickly in was enjoying the ritual of drinking, not the alcohol itself. Once I figured that out I would have a cold seltzer water after a day of work, or when hanging out with friends, and get the exact same ‘unwinding’ feeling.

Pretty soon after that I could have water with ice - turns out my body just wanted something cold at a certain time as a cue to relax.

Still going strong 6 years later!

>get out of just hating yourself when you fail

This part is a choice. Choose to stop beating yourself up over it. You’re not perfect and neither is anyone else.

Ultimately quitting is a continuous series of small decisions. You can make a decision at this instant, but you don’t control your future self, and you need to be ok with that. Come to the table with the understanding of the long term goal. If you slip up, the most important thing is to get back on track, which means letting go of transient mistakes and focusing on the long term path you’re on.

A corollary to the above, if and when you slip up and buy a 12 pack, don’t keep it around, throw whatever you have leftover away.

“But that’s such a waste!”

Buying it in the first place was a waste. once your craving is satisfied, how does drinking a bunch of extra beer you don’t even want productive?

If that means you’ve bought 12 beers and drank one, and you’ve searched the itch: throw 11 away, far away from you. The prime directive is to reset yourself back on the path as soon as possible.

There is something called CORE which may or may not work for you. It worked for me. It applies to a bunch of addictive things.

C = Commit. You make a mental commitment that you want to change something - it really matters. It’s a big deal, worth your effort and, well, commitment. O = Objectify. You notice the inner voice that says, let’s have a drink/donut/videogame etc. And you separate it from the “core you.” It’s just one more voice at the table. R = Respond. Now that you’ve isolated that “addiction voice,” you come up with an answer to it. Oh, we NEVER do midnight snacks! No, we NEVER drink alone. And you use these answers when the “voice” makes itself heard. It’s outvoted. E = Enjoy. Learn to breathe and take in your improved life. Let yourself feel great. This helps the addiction voice dwindle away until it’s inaudible.

Again, your mileage may vary, but especially for people turned off by the cult aspects of some of the other programs, CORE may be worth a try. Best of luck to you.

Sometimes you just need to impose your point of view. It will feel wrong the first time but thence, people will let you do as you please. Just try. If they do not accept you, they are not worth the company.

"No, I am not drinking any more tonight. Really, no. I am leaving, because I want to feel OK tomorrow."

Sad, angry faces, whatever. If they do not respect you, they are not worth it.

I had an insight about myself. Things that require me to actively do something to achieve a desirable result are easier. Things that require me to quit are harder.

Working out is easier for me than quitting smoking. I was able to achieve both, but the latter felt exponentially more difficult.

This repeats to other things I want to change, big and small. Stopping a behavior is more difficult than starting one.

Recently, I thought about how to come out ahead of this. I am now trying to rephrase "stopping" as "starting the inverse." It's a mind trick, but I am hopeful it will work. Instead of "don't eat as much", I am reframing it as "start having good-diet days" or "build a habit of intermittent fasting".

Could this work for reducing or eliminating drinking? Instead of "quit drinking" maybe it could be framed as "start abstaining." Materially it's exactly the same, but mentally it may be more actionable and sustainable.

Health reasons (I work in the medical field). After seeing far, far too many patients ravage their bodies and their minds with excessive alcohol consumption I (belatedly) decided I should not end up like that. I also recognized the insidious changes in mood that regular alcohol use can cause. It may be hard to notice but after a few weeks of not drinking you might find yourself at least slightly happier more often.

Mostly I was just afraid of damaging my brain and my liver. Being healthy when I am older is much more important to me than being drunk now. I just tell people no thanks when they offer a drink. At restaurants and bars I'll go for a zero proof cocktail if they have them or a soda or water. No one seems to care. As a general rule, you think about yourself much more often and critically than other people think about you. If someone insists I laugh and tell them I did enough drinking in 20 years to last several lifetimes, I'm good.

I blacked out at a party when I was 18. The morning after, I had no recollection whatsoever about half of the evening despite my friends telling me how funny I had been and all. That momentary loss of time and control scared the shit out of me, enough to make me stop right there and then. That was thirty years ago. Thirty years without a lapse.

I'm currently drinking moderately but I've had periods where I haven't drank for a long time (years to months) and also periods where I've drank way too much and would say had an addiction. I drank something almost every night of the week and at least once or twice a week was drunk. Every time I had hangover I promised myself I would quite but in a couple of days I was drinking away. What helped me quit in the end was a combination of counselling, disulfiram and an LSD trip. Not sure if any of those alone would have helped to quit the binge but together they helped me quit the destructive habits and form new ones.

Nowadays (after many many years) I'm again drinking alcohol (I try to keep it on weekends) but the urge to get drunk is gone luckily. Still there have been slippery slopes where I have accidentally drink couple too many but still it never leads to excessive drinking, I rather go to sleep then.

I have not drank for more than a 1000 days. This was the second attempt to completely stop drinking. For the first attempt, I didn't get past 100 days.

I have someone who holds me accountable. That individual started messaging me daily the count: 1 day without drinking, 2 days without drinking, 3 days ... Once we hit 100 days, it became 110 days without drink, 120 days without drink ...

What has helped keep the discipline:

1. Non-alcoholic beer. I second the recommendations of SkyPuncher. 2. I avoid situations where alcohol is present. 3. Friends and colleagues who don't pressure me to just have 'one drink'.

I perform stand-up comedy at clubs and bars. There's a culture of getting a free drink if you are not the head-liner and it isn't an open-mic. One way I maintain the discipline is to treat stand-up comedy like work - I need to have a clear mind to do the job and alcohol diminishes my capacity to perform.

All the best in your journey!

I don't have an answer to this question because I've never experienced the issue, but I have a related comment.

I find it interesting that whenever Anglos speak of "drinking" (alcohol), what they really mean is "consuming alcohol in excess as a means of getting high". To an Anglo, beer and wine are not food, they are drugs intended for pleasure. To an Anglo, there seems to be no healthy middle. It's either "a twelve pack in two days" or "I'm completely sober these days". It's never "I had a mug of ale as a part of my dinner because that's what ale is - a traditional foodstuff". That's what beer and wine are to me - food. Nothing more.

I say this as an American, and I realize my cultural values toward "drinking" are very unusual to other Americans, and Anglos in general.

Hello everyone. I was heavy drinker for approximately 22 years, alcohol caused some real problems in my personal life. I drank from 18 until 39 years old. Let me tell my story how I quit drinking. One day during hangover (and my hangovers were hard as hell) I realised that my son is going to kindergarten and I badly want to see how he is graduating from school, university. On that day I made my temporary decision - to live 30 days without any alcohol. 30 days are not very much and are manageable for every person. After 30 days I didn't feel any urge to drink immediately so I'm still counting my "30 days". Since July of 2014. The best decision I made ever. I hope that my story could became inspiration and support for other fellas here in our sober journey.

I grew tired of feeling sick. I was curious if I could just decide to stop, and follow through. It has been about 1.4 years now, and I still tell myself I am allowed to get a drink if I want one.

I just love how I feel now that I have decided I don't want alcoholic drinks. - I feel great. - I have more money. - I lost 35 lbs. - I can go to stores late at night without drinking and driving. I used to stay home instead. And this one is a safety issue, because I am a father. What if I needed to drive family to the hospital suddenly? - I can change my mind if I want to, so no pressure.

We used to go with colleagues for early lunch, then drink about 500ml bottle of 38-40% baijiu (Chinese distilled liquor) among 2-3 of us during 1-1.5 hour lunch break, didn't do much productve work in the afternoon and then went for dinner when we drunk again.

What I wanna say, it was just social ocassion, so if we were not together I didn't drink, but on workdays I drank basically every lunch (150-200ml of 38-40% liquor) and often also during dinner, surprisingly didn't build up any addiction. Then I've got GF, so less time after work and in weekends for drinking.

Maybe find GF or some (physical) outdoor hobby (exercise, hiking, biking, etc)so you will have something better to do than use alcohol to feel better? But maybe it's different with beer since it is much weaker and you can drink huge amounts before it will really affect your mood.

So I ended up on a combo of meds that had a “No alcohol” provision. One was your standard mental health medication; but the other was terbinafine for a toenail fungus that wouldn’t die. The latter pretty much got me to stop drinking. Whenever I would have a drink anyway (thinking, how bad could it be anyway) the hangover the next morning was brutal - and way out of proportion to the amount drunk.

A single 12oz beer with moderate (6%) ABV would leave me with a hangover that felt like I’d tried to keep up with a bunch of 26 year olds with a death wish.

Anything more would make me actually wake up with a death wish.

This amount of negative reinforcement made it pretty unbearable to drink for the year plus I was taking the medication, and it just sort of stuck after.

To make this useful advice - maybe try doing something terrible the morning after; perhaps posting a bad programming opinion on the forum of your choice.

I wanted to undergo a medical treatment but it required me to stay off alcohol for the treatment duration. I wasn't sure if I could do it so I deferred it for a long time. Eventually I worked up the courage and did it for ~10 months.

I started buying 0 calorie fizzy water (Bubly) as my go-to replacement for alcohol. Opening up a can fulfilled part of my prior habit. Swapping one habit for a more healthy variant is one tip.

I was also held accountable by my doctor reviewing my monthly blood test. If I drank alcohol I assumed they would catch it. There are other people that you can ask to hold you accountable like this.

I'm not sure how to get over the self-hatred after a binge. In one respect I think it's healthy in a small dose. But if it's so large that you don't want to restart your sobriety then it's a problem.

I suffer from epilepsy and I've often gotten epileptic attacks after drinking alcohol.

Due to local laws each time you have an epileptic attack you're not allowed to drive for six months.

So for me quitting alcohol came very easy. It was a choice between being able to drink or not being able drive, so I obviously choose driving.

Given the prevalence of alcohol in many cultures, it really seems that developing a substitute drug from which one can immediately and completely sober up on-demand (with no hangover), and which can plausibly be legalized, is going to be a major medical/social/lifestyle advance (and possibly make a lot of money for some people). (I think I read that David Nutt in the UK was leading a team claiming to be developing substances along those lines?)

Adding my personal data point to the discussion:

- I like drinking alcohol. I do it socially.

- When I drink socially I often am doing good for my relationships with other people; if I were staying sober I would not be being so social. I find it very hard to not drink at social occasions.

- However, like others commenting here I hate the way that I cannot think effectively about my work the morning / day after drinking. I also dislike feeling physically ropey in the other ways of course.

- So, personally, I've felt very conflicted about this for years. In some ways I'm jealous of people who seem to be able to integrate it into their working lives much more easily than I do.

- For the above reasons, I don't drink at all most days, and often go a week or two without a drink. However I vaguely suspect that that makes tolerance worse when I do drink; certainly I whine much more about the after-effects than other people I know.

- Maybe I should try tricking myself a bit with alcohol-free beers etc and testing to what extent I can enjoy socializing like that.

- So, this is a topic that has been around for ever and that I care about quite a lot. Admittedly it's a bit of a first-world problem, but somebody solve it please! Surely it's not beyond humanity's abilities to come up with a substance that is fun and mind-altering in the desired ways, could plausibly be legalized by the (increasingly open-minded on these topics?) governments concerned, and which we can purge from our bloodstream / cancel the effects on-demand?

Get a child. It will make you value good sleep so much more that you will drink a lot less automatically. Also it disrupts your usual social life quite effectively so you won't meet your drinking pals anymore.

In case that is not enough simply get another child. And another one, until you are sober.

Liver function check and then a DNA test for me.

Drinking was always beneficial to me, I guess. I suffer from depression and drinking has always good a good way to clear my head. Knowing that I could get drunk at the weekend and feel okay would help me get through the week...

I found I had raised liver enzymes then a DNA test showed I have a fairly uncommon polymorphism that means alcohol does 7x more damage to my liver. Basically, if you have this polymorphism and you drink long-term you'll almost certainly blow out your liver. And when I say long-term, I mean like ~10 years of moderate to heavy drinking is often plenty.

So it might not help you stop drinking, but if you're a heavy drinker I'd highly recommend you get tested to understand how at risk you are. You might even find something worrying enough to make you stop.

I would recommend getting professional help: find a counselor/therapist. It's not that they have any magic for you, but they can help you analyze your own behavior and feelings about it and give you a lot of guidance and personalized advice. They've seen it all! Look for "harm reduction".

I've been about 3 weeks without booze after about ~6 years of completely functional but pretty over the top drinking (I counted recently a sustained ~7 drinks every second night kind of thing for a month). I never realized how much it was affecting me: I'm now much more energetic, upbeat, and just feel better.

Many of us are completely functional yet at least borderline alcoholics, it's worth taking it seriously and thinking carefully about your relationship with alcohol!

Switch to light beer, and then start alternating light beer with non-alcoholic beer, then have two non-alcoholic beers for every one light beer, and then just drink only non-alcoholic beer. Then drink sparkling water from a can. Then drink sparkling water from a bottle. Then just drink water.

Went from 1 beer to 2, then 3. Then hard liquor. Passing out on the couch for months on end. Waking up with hangover.

Eventually went to the doctor to discuss my issue that I can’t stop. Yet I have no problem not to drink.

So I stopped drinking. Naltrexone for the cravings the first couple of weeks. Now sober. Don’t even miss it.

Definitely look up the Sinclair Method. The idea is to always take naltrexone an hour before you drink. Also you only take naltrexone when you drink (this is key). Then just drink as normal. The naltrexone blocks the alcohol buzz, and you learn to not love it anymore over a period of months.

You have to find something you love more than drinking. Something to choose over drinking.

I used to love drinking. I still do, and probably always will. It may break your heart and drive you crazy to kill something you love. But reconciling the cognitive dissonance is worth it. Have honest conversations with yourself, for however long it takes..

For me, I love my kids my wife and physical training more than drinking. So I don't buy alcohol anymore when grocery shopping and I recognize and avoid social situations that are primarily centered around drinking--there are plenty of other opportunities to connect with people that do not involve drinking. I am also OK with knowing that some people simply do not understand this--it's all good, and I don't care.

I stopped a couple years ago and really didn't intend to. The idea was to hit the pause button for a while, as my wine intake was becoming too regular. I had quit cigarettes long ago w/ a packaged plan. What I remember about it was that it came w/ a card on which you were told to list the things you'd gain, the benefits you'd reap, by quitting smoking.

So I made the same list for stopping drinking and it worked better than I expected. I won't tell you what was on my list, as it would sound preachy. I would recommend making your own list. Spend a few minutes on it & try to be exhaustive. If you frame your goal not as removing a negative but as gaining a set of positives, it may reorient your thinking & get you to your goal. It did in my case.

There are medications you can take before drinking that inhibit the reward circuitry of the brain so you learn to stop the habits that make you drink when you'd rather not in hindsight.

This article from The Atlantic from a few years ago describes some of them while comparing them to the effectiveness of Alcoholics Anonymous: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/04/the-irr...

If this sounds interesting to you, I'd talk to your doctor about exploring the use of these or similar compounds.

>I enjoy the act of drinking - literally having a drink, or the feeling right after a drink. I hate how I feel an hour later, the foggy head feeling.

Hydrate the same time you consume alcohol and after. One 500 ml of beer takes around 300 Alcohol metabolism incurs body dehydration, may as well be that you're mildly dehydrated on top of being poisoned by toxins.

>I don’t buy it for weeks at a time, then cave and have a 12 pack in a weekend and feel like garbage most of the time.

You must evaluate your stress factors. It's not easy because most likely you use alcohol as a sedative tool to hotfix some issues.

>Any tips on cutting out something completely and how to get out of just hating yourself when you fail?

Not really, unless you identify the stress factor and deal with it/your attitude to it.

I had been drinking almost every evening for the past year. It was only a few bottles of beer or a bottle of wine but it was enough to make me groggy in the morning.

I found it real hard going to a supermarket without going down the alcohol aisle - there are always deals going on.

Just recently, I realized I was gaining weight, so started watching what I eat. As alcohol always made me binge eat I 'simply' did not go down the alcohol aisle on the next shopping trip. I put simply in quotes because it took me real effort to avoid it. Without alcohol in the house, the choice to drink has been taken away from me.

I have basically gone cold turkey and drink tea/water instead.

Honestly, I thought I would have had a more difficult time but it hasn't fazed me in the slightest.

I still drink on occasion but now I can go months without when I used to drink 3-4 nights a week. Sometimes I'd put down a 6 pack on those nights.

Honestly, I got tired of being tired. LFPs were normal but my cholesterol and stuff was off indicating that I was doing some kind of metabolic damage. I decided to say "fuck it" and told myself I'd do exactly one week of not drinking. The first weekend I woke up sober I was bored but I noticed that I wasn't tired, or extremely hungry, or anything. I just felt right.

Then I kept that feeling up, setting challenges along the way. "Use my sober time to my advantage". Improved blood work dramatically (back to normal), lost weight, and kept a bunch of good habits. Now, occasionally I'll indulge if I'm out or being social, but I've basically all but stopped drinking on anything remotely near as often as I did. I discovered a lot about myself by reflecting on what made me drink so much (I was much more social drunk) and how I can remedy that.

What works for me may not work for you. AA doesn't work for people, a lot of techniques don't work for people. There's no magic pill. You need to have a reason to do it, and a reason to stick with it. Something you can wake up every morning and remind yourself. Moreover, accept you will slip. It's not an end to your sobriety despite how AA treats it. You are human, what matters is that you learned from your slip and try your best not to do it again. To get to the point I am at I had go cold turkey for a year, and then slowly introduce it back and test myself. If I ever even come close to even two days a week now I'm back on the sober train for another year.

As for the experience of getting sober I never had to do DTs or anything. Though I did drink a lot. I found the first two weeks to be hardest, then the first two months, and then it got to be easy after that. In the first 2 weeks to 2 months you will face all sorts of challenges like having to cope with going to places you usually drink and not drinking, etc. If you can make it two months you have a good chance of sticking to it.

Sorry you are struggling, here's my experience, dumb but want to share: I love cocktails, but like you I hated how I felt afterwards even if I had only 1 or 2. The energy drain, if it's too late at night have trouble falling asleep, etc.

I started asking for mocktails, sometimes they are listed on the menu but many times you can ask the waiter/bartender and they can make you some amazing non-alcoholic drinks even if not listed.

I realized I didn't like cocktails, I liked the sugary drink part of cocktails.

I still limit to 1-2 mocktails when I go out, and fucking love it.

I said cocktails and I know you said beer, but if you also like cocktails maybe that's a way to cut down by tricking your brain into thinking it's having alcohol.

What kicked off my now nearly four years without drinking was an initial four months of intensive breathing mindfulness exercises from thich nhat hanh's book and at least one hour a day on an encompassing project, in my case really learning some 555 timer circuits.

Finding something else pleasurable to do instead helps me avoid my vices. A lot of the time wanting to get intoxicated is an excuse for taking a break or spoiling myself. Instead of buying alcohol, buy some other delicious drink or food - maybe cook something yourself or make some nice lemonade. Read a good book, watch a movie, go on a trip, catch up with a friend. Put in the effort to have more wholesome, meaningful fun instead of being lazy and going for what seems like the easy, low-effort pleasure you get from taking substances, eating junk food or doomscrolling. Make relaxation and fun times a priority and resolve to do them right. This works much better for me than grit and stoicism.

LSD helps to treat alcoholism: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2012.10200

Studies in the 60's had some remarkable results - single LSD administration helped many individuals (participants in trial) break their alcoholism. I'm not stating % because it varies depending on definition of success.

No idea if following would be of use to you. Just thoughts based on my own experience.

If you do not have strong dependence - be aware of not liking side effects of alcohol, and disassociate good time with friends from consuming alcohol.

If you have bad memories about yourself being drunk - maybe idea of disliking yourself that is drunk would be of use (and being aware of that dislike at the moment when you decide if you are going to drink that first bottle of beer that evening or not.

If you are ok with just rarely drinking some small amount of alcohol - do not obsess/fixate on idea of not drinking ever. It will likely be easier to not drink alcohol if this topic is not tangled with internal conflicts and bunch of feelings/emotions.

I have used alcohol heavily, now I use it irregularly if at all. I just try not to take it too seriously since life is pretty short as is, I don't start hating myself the next day after a drinking session. Regardless what has made my consumption lower is my experience with alcohol, I just think about it's effects and often decide it's not worth it for me. I spend my free time on my PC and drinking just makes it harder for me to think leaving me with very little to do besides watching movies, tv shows, youtube, playing games, etc. I often rather just learn something about linux or computers in general, feels more rewarding doing that.

Basically I kept trying; IMO several “failures” were necessary. What really got me over the hump was taking up new hobbies that I couldn’t do hungover, and resetting my social life (meet friends for lunch, not drinks, etc). After a year or so of not drinking I now do have drinks every so often, maybe once a month, but my relationship to drinking is totally different now. I’ve become one of those people who feels sleepy and kind of gross after two drinks.

Psychotherapy helped with the hating myself when I failed (which was almost worse than the drinking itself). That was a major issue.

I recommend the book The Easy Way to Stop Drinking by Allen Carr https://www.amazon.com/Allen-Carrs-Drinking-Without-Willpowe...

Recommended by Nikki Glaser: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mZrA67ohY0I

I hate to be that person, but just don't buy it. When you want to, focus on the post drink feeling and go workout or something. A failing is normal. Look at what led you to fail and try and address that and get going again.

I'll also add that a 12 pack over a weekend is a lot. A 12 pack would last me a month or more.

Something that personally annoys me is the constant push to put more and more alcohol in beer. I want to enjoy a good beer, but don't need 12 ounces with 8%+ alcohol. Because of that I mostly drink wine now because I can more easily control the pour. A 1/4 to 1/3 glass at dinner is enjoyable with few side effects, and a bottle can last ~week.

I stopped drinking entirely for about 4 years due to stomach pain caused by acid. Pain is a fantastic motivator for stopping doing something - physical pain is of course the most obvious. It eventually cleared up and I've started to enjoy the occasional drink.

I didn't notice a single benefit to not drinking, but I only have one and done. An arguable upside is it stops me snacking. I imagine the problem isn't alcohol as such, but going over the top. Someone at work says it's impossible for them to just have "one drink" because it leads to more, and if that's the case, I imagine going teetotal will yield bigger benefits.

I've been through this. Took ages to turn it around. I still have activities that i used to drink with that i have that compulsion to have 'a couple' which in the past would inevitably turn into lots. Like playing pool, watching football, bbq's and such. I used to wonder what the point of alcohol free booze was, but its really filling that gap for me. Where by habit (or long term addiction i guess) i want to be drinking whilst doing some activities, now i have alcohol free...have a couple and that ticks that box. Around others who are mega drinking is a bit of an issue, but i try and just escape those situations. best of luck

The technique that worked for me was replacement.

The idea with replacement is that it's hard to say no to something, but easier to say yes to something slightly different (a nonalcoholic alternative).

Don't have any booze around, but do have lots of seltzer and tea.

I started working out really hard everyday in the early morning. When you know you have to get up at 5AM to workout the last thing you want is a drink. I went from having a few every night to not having anything for months at a time.

AA. it's the only thing that worked for me. i needed to be around people that supported me , not influenced or pressured me. i was lucky to find the right home group and the right people in the program. they tell you not to judge people when you come in, but i'm sorry, do that. there are good people in the program but they are hard to find. find them and your chances of success increase. i did that by going to _alot_ of different meetings at different places and meeting a ton of people. in the end, i don't even think about drinking and i find i can handle things alot better in my life.

I am extremely lacking in willpower, but I was able to greatly reduce my drinking thanks to health issues and having a young child.

I was diagnosed with atrial fibrillation. Turns out that for me (and, my cardiologist said, for most people) alcohol is a big aggravator for AF.

I have a young son, and not having my AF under control would mean seeing less of how his life turns out.

For my brain, that is enough to flip the switch, and I was able to use it to greatly dial back my drinking.

I think of AF as a gift. Getting on top of it means getting good cardio exercise, eating sensible and avoiding alcohol. All things we should want to do anyway - but AF forces one to actually do it.

Moved to Bali, big health and fitness scene there, trained BJJ for 2 years. Quit drinking for 3 months for first time in my life and it flicked a switch in my brain, I don't binge drink anymore. Granted I do drink alcohol but I don't have the need to binge, also hangovers are too rough now, had a couple of pints the other day and had a headache next day.

I get awful hangovers so that's what prevents me mainly. Can't imagine what it would be like if you were one of these people that just don't really get them. I have friends that can have 10 drinks and be fine the next day. Crazy.

Tapered down and began treating for type-2 diabetes instead. Strict intermittent fasting and a fully PBD for 13 weeks with NAD supplementation on top of basic (senior citizen) multi vitamins and extra b complex.

After the 13 weeks I allowed myself meat again and I will drink root beer or creme soda when I feel "off".

It's a sugar problem. It's hypo. It's a metabolic disorder.

It's been 2.8 years sober after 15 years daily drinking.

Getting sober unmasked my OCD. I take a gaba-b agonist now to treat that and I will never ever drink again.

I didn't stop drinking until it felt like a hot knife was stuck in my liver. My peers didn't understand. So I ended up on /r/cripplingalcoholism, the happiest place on earth.

Between the pain and the um... high turnover on the subreddit, it just kind of ruined it for me. I stopped going to the liquor store. If I didn't buy it, I didn't have a problem.

I guess the only tip I have is you'd be surprised the amount of extra time you'll have by squeezing out an extra day or two of sobriety.

Burnout.

I would usually (for years) have a glass or two of wine with dinner. I would tell myself it helped me relax and let go of the day; perhaps that was even the truth.

I was working my main job and 2 side projects. This ended up with me never having downtime. I ended up mentally exhausted.

Exhausted to the point where I felt empty and drained even before I had the drink. The wine just made it feel worse, robbed me of what little recovery I might have been able to glean from the evening.

After 4-5 months (dropped the side gigs) I'm starting to feel rested again, and sometimes have wine with dinner. But I'm also just as happy to give it a miss.

Bro, I feel you. I used to be in the same space.

For me it was about lifestyle changes, and displacing “fun” and cravings, with things that were more fun and more rewarding. And some hard reflection, and planning.

I think in my path to recovery there were a whole load of little steps and changes.

I found - and meticulously nurtured - passions outside of drinking. This led me to get healthier and fitter, and then I started to take pride in my health - I displaced chippies with vegetables, and guess what, my cravings naturally changed with time. The food tangent is related, I knew alcohol was high in calorific value, but the extent this played on me physically was noticeable. So, health suddenly became a hugely attainable goal for me.

I bought a smart watch and this tracked my heart rate. I saw a significant difference in my rate when drinking, and especially while sleeping with alcohol in my system.

I was partially drawn to alcohol due to stress relief, however seeing the impact this had on me mentally and physically I realised that my net anxiety was actually increased as a result.

Now, on to you. Forgive yourself when you do stuff up. Easier said than done. What you are doing is not easy, but please don’t be hard on yourself. You are self-aware, and you are trying.. that is amazing!

Maybe do schedule a few drinks sometimes. Maybe instead of 12 shit beers that are cheap, treat yourself to two expensive beers that are exquisite. Make this a positive experience, planned and controlled.

Try planning ahead. When do you crack in to 12 beers. Have a week plan. Book stuff in in advance. My approach became booking in to gym classes (because then I have to go - and guess what, after 6 weeks I wanted to go more than anything else… thank the dopamine and fitness level achievements)

Identify your triggers. You are looking at your transgressions after the train wreck of a binge sesh. But triggers that lead you to this moment arise before you even decide to buy a twelve pack of beer. Work out what these triggers are, why they are happening, and how you can improve.

Best of luck on your journey. Please post a couple of updates so we can all know how you are getting along :)

I decided not to drink for a year and stuck to that commitment. Simple as. If I can't attend an event without drinking I didn't go.

I'm hopeless for quitting my compulsive browsing habit though. I keep trying and relapsing.

I'm not sure what you want to quit. You kind of seem to imply that drinking as a social thing is what you enjoy, but not being intoxicated by alcohol. If that is what you meant, I'd recommend giving a shot to non-alcoholic drinks. There is nowadays a wide range of alcohol-free wines, beers, mocktails and even a ginger shot is nice.

If you mean that the first kick of alcohol intoxication is what you enjoy, but not further, then it is more difficult. In that case it sounds like you are (slowly) on your way towards alcoholism, and I would seek some professional help there.

You're literally addicted to alcohol. Perhaps that realisation is enough to cause your brain to take it more seriously?

I was never really addicted but I used to drink a lot and have been teetotal now for 3 years. The best thing for me was to find alternatives. You have to consider it a lifestyle change. What can you do differently in the evening that won't make you want to drink? Consider non-alcoholic alternatives like tea/coffee (decaffeinated) or rooibos/infusions etc. and when you are out non-alcoholic drinks like mocktails, lime soda etc.

I just smoke weed. Feels better with less hangover.

However it does have a more pernicious effect on ambition and maybe cognition if you do it all the time. Feels money though, and doesn’t prevent fitness or waking up spry

Thanks for asking this question, I've found the discussion interesting. I have also noticed the negative long terms affects of alcohol and much like you I find it difficult not to drink in certain social situations (am in the UK). I agree giving up completely is probably the best strategy (for physical and mental health) - but having failed to do that myself I moved to low alcohol beers (these guys are good: https://theoriginalsmallbeer.com)

I turned out to be treating ADHD with alcohol, so when I started prescription medication for ADHD my interest in alcohol plummeted to zero. I was drinking to feel the buzz of reward/accomplishment.

There's a difference between not drinking and not being a drinker. If you are able to create an association in your mind between "me" and "not a drinker" it will make it easier over time to reject a drink, either when your friends or colleagues offer one or when you yourself offer one to you.

Do you want a drink? No, I'm not someone who drinks.

This technique is not specific to alcohol, I used it to stop smoking many years ago. I believe it has roots in Buddhism. The idea is to dissociate the "I" with the habit that you want to get rid of.

Find the right intent that you can always mentally justify. Sounds like you are on the right route though!

Personally all the stuff about how it feels is useful but ultimately never stopped me. What stopped me was the awareness of how it effects EVERYTHING and most importantly my role as a father and husband. Once I worked it out (aka a terrible hangover and not having dealt well with kids, wife and taking some time out just before xmas) I realized it was the way. Once you remove the excuse of alcohol then you can see the other problems more clearly.

i got covid - and then murderous acid reflux which i'm on medication for. I used to have a beer after work (just one) nearly every day. Since June - i've not drank once until i got over covid (2 months later). Here we are nearly 4 months later and a single drink just feels aweful to me now. The liquid just sits in my stomach taking up room like it's not supposed to be there, and i'm getting no joy from it whatsoever. My night is pretty much ruined now if I do have a single drink, and reflux gets worse too.

If you like the smell, taste and mouth feel of beer, there are some excellent non-alcoholic beers available now. An extended family member is on some meds that contra-indicate alcohol so we get some of that and have since mostly switched to that.

That works well at home and for pre-planned private events; not as many public places have NA beer.

After about 23, I don’t think anyone gives half a crap whether you’re drinking an alcohol drink or not. If you’re self-conscious, get a seltzer with lime wedge. No one will check (or care).

I wish you luck. One data point: my story. Not a recipe, but maybe something helpful.

I drank hard from high school through grad school and into mid life. I was high-performing and functional, and I am told that I was nicer when drunk than sober. I could never stop at 2 drinks. I tried and swore to stop many times. Never held.

One day 12 years ago, I had my last drink. It was a bender. The next morning I swore I'd stop, similar to many times before. I cannot explain why I stopped that time and not earlier. Day 1 sober was easy. Day 14 was hard, but I didn't go back. But I did count the days, and had pride in collecting sober days. It was an internal counter I had early on. I also knew that 1/2 measures wouldn't work. I would need to reset back to day 0 if I had even a sip or just one. I really didn't want to reset my counter. At some point I stopped counting days, and was counting weeks, and then months. Now I count years, and expect to count decades.

Slipping is not a character flaw, and it's not helpful to beat yourself up. Acknowledge it, sleep it off and move on. Quitting was not a matter of willpower. I did go cold turkey, but I cannot claim it's because I'm strong or anything special. I'm lucky. I believe my wiring changed that night, the balance never tilted back to where it was for me. Maybe the right combo of neurons got pruned. I don't know. I don't really know what was so different about that night for me, but that was it. And it absolutely was not willpower or mind over matter or anything like that. I just changed. And because of my experience, I believe the "willpower" argument is destructive and insulting. People who offer such advice don't understand. I'm lucky. I changed. That's it. My willpower had nothing to do with it.

Over time I discovered that habits matter a great deal. I discovered I needed to develop new ways to fill time since large blocks of weekends were no longer booked with me rendered mentally useless. I also had to develop new social skills, since I could no longer rely on the "nice" me. I also eventually realized how lucky I was that nothing really bad ever happened to me.

This is an issue with both mental and physical health implications. Asking for help is a good start.

Again, I wish you luck.

One thing that can help is to understand that no one is going to save you. You have to decide not to drink on your own. Once you see that, you can work on setting your life up in a way that makes it easier to make healthier decisions. Also don’t feel guilty when you drink. Just decide you want to be healthy, and that drinking leads you away from that goal. It’s not about quitting drinking. It’s about deciding that health is your priority, and drinking simply isn’t helpful is supporting your priority.

Don't think about it as quitting anything. The default is to not partake. Do some introspection to figure out what it's providing for you, and look elsewhere for whatever that is.

I'm sorry that may not be helpful, but I simply did. Alcohol tastes terrible and I never felt the urge to not be able to think properly. I like being in control. It felt pointless to spend money to damage my cognition, inhibit my risk-taking mechanisms, and feel awful the next day.

For me not to even get started, however, it was helpful to get into exercising as I was growing up. It was one extra motivator not to drink. I enjoyed exercising more than I enjoyed any possible "social benefit" of drinking.

Find the motivation. Probably already stated here. You have to WANT to do it, be doing it for yourself in addition to whatever else the big motivating factor is.

For me, it was not losing my family and wanting to not feel like shit both physically and mentally all of the time. I wanted it though. I’ve seen a lot if people fail and the one thing in common is that they are always doing it because someone told them to.

I learned to treat 'feeling like a drink' as a sign that I shouldn't be drinking at that point. Because I wanted to, and as a process over a relatively long period of time. A process something like mindfulness/CBT, I guess. Thinking critically about feelings/urges.

> how to get out of just hating yourself when you fail?

Realise that failure is part of a process, completely normal, to be expected, and is not a character trait or a state of being (let alone an unrecoverable state).

About 4 years ago I was drinking a bit too much. I was 38 and had been drinking heavily and happily for about two decades. There wasn’t a problem per se but I knew I was overdoing it. My wife and I had our second son showing up soon and I knew the drinking was going to be hard to maintain with a new baby in the mix. I decided to use my critical/dev brain to take an honest look at all the arguments out there against drinking. I loved alcohol and never really allowed myself to take a hard look at all the real negative effects before. So I opened myself up to some resources. There are a ton out there of varying quality. I continued to drink regularly while reading these.

Some of the most helpful I found were: Stop Drinking Sub-Reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/stopdrinking/top/?t=all I made myself read a lot of the top posts. It was real helpful reading real-world stories of lives improved by removing alcohol.

Allen Carr's Easyway to Control Alcohol https://www.amazon.com/Allen-Carrs-Easyway-Control-Alcohol/d... This book appears gimmicky and generic but it was very helpful in changing some of my thinking. It is not flawless but it does a great job of going through all your excuses for drinking and why they are all bullshit. I read it twice, print and audio.

This Naked Mind by Annie Grace https://www.amazon.com/This-Naked-Mind-Discover-Happiness/dp... A great follow up to the first book. A more modern perspective from a female author.

I had the advantage of a looming deadline with our new baby coming. This made it easier to pick a date to give not drinking a try. Our son turns 4 in two weeks. I haven't had a drink since he's been born. My life is much improved.

A caveat to these things is you have to actually want to stop drinking for any of this to work. It does not work if you do not open yourself up to the possibility. Finding your reasons is a personal journey you have to make yourself. These resources can help you find those reasons.

I stopped drinking at 19, basically as a test for myself. I never liked most alcoholic beverages and absolutely hated the feeling of loss of control that came with alcohol. Saying no consistently can be annoying, depending on the people around you and how they view that decision, but over time people seemed to become more accepting. Which they absolutely should be. No one questions when you say you don't smoke, but not drinking is somehow seen as weird.

Sounds like you don’t drink much at all already and you dislike being a little drunk. That shouldn’t be too hard to stop altogether.

Mostly it’s about having other options. On the weekends when you crave for drinks, try mixing complex virgin cocktails. They’ll probably bring the same kind of guilty pleasure you’re after, without the drunkenness. You can also get into tea or herbal stuff. Just get into something else that requires you to pay attention to what you’re drinking.

The habit of drinking may be harder the break than the need for the buzz of alcohol. Try weaning yourself off the drink first and the act of drinking second. Meaning try to not have an alcoholic beverage, while still having A beverage at the same places, with the same people. Leave out the last ones first then only take every second one with alcohol, then only drink non-alcoholic. You can break the habit of needing a drink in hand later.

This is one of the best articles I have read about the irrationality of AA and the superiority of the Sinclair Method(naltrexone) ..it’s slightly dated but still informative: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/04/the-irr...

Establish a habit that trumps drinking.

I started playing the piano a few years ago - generally practise in the evening. I read somewhere that recall is affected by alcohol, so have to avoid alcohol until later.

This keeps me from having a glass of wine or a gin and tonic in the early evening. By the time I've finished playing it's often a bit too late to bother.

I've never been an alcoholic, but without this mild deterrent I would probably have at least one drink most nights.

Dude, first of all congratulate yourself for making the choice to pick the better version of yourself. Your choices are between what feels good right now and what is most important. This is a journey and you must allow yourself the time to transition to the better self. Stop beating up yourself you can do and realize that this is a new set of skills you much acquire, that you are going to learn a brand new behavior and transform to this new state. I share what worked for me.

1. Do not drink alone. Just make this rule. No sitting at home and putting away a 12-pack. You seem to be ok for weeks. So challenge yourself to a 3-week limit, put it on your calendar. Pick a nice, upscale bar, dress up and treat yourself.

2. Start waking up early. For extra credit before sunrise. Get out of bed. Go for a walk in the chill of the morning. Feel that air in your lungs. Just do this.

3. Loose the friends. This is the hard one. They are not your friends. You help them feel secure in their lack of agency over their lives. Just very very slowly start being less available. And here is the opportunity to gauge who is a good friend - "I am making a change, lets meet for a walk/movie/museum instead of the bar". The ones who berate this path, loose them.

4. Of the few people remaining from step #3. Appoint someone as overwatch. There will be a time you will be like "fuck it" and get yourself a bottle of wine, 12-pack or whatever. Call or text this person for overwatch request. Take a video of you pouring the booze down the sink. And send it.

5. Finally, remember what Tony Stark said to Peter Parker -- if you are nothing without the suit, then you shouldn't have it.

Epilogue: Guilt. This is the worst thing. All our learning is based on institutional guilt. Tests. Grades. Evaluations. Re-imagine yourself as in third person. Your body is a resource. And you are equipping it. Guilt is rear view mirror stuff and a poor motivator.

What will happen with you is this. You will fall in love with early mornings. You will have time in the morning to do something you truly endear. You will trust yourself with this block of time and this capacity will overflow into all aspects of your life. And in about 6 months' time, you will dress up, you will go to the nice bar, order that drink and very very likely just walk away from it.

Good luck and godspeed.

I'm an alcoholic and I just celebrated 21 years sober. I went to AA and I'm a big advocate for the 12 Steps. AA offers fellowship, direction, accountability, and real tried-and-true solutions on stopping drinking. It's not for everyone but it's worked for me and many others.

I feel like you just want to avoid the foggy head feeling and not necessarily drinking. I'd recommend drinking a 6-pack (or less) over a weekend and not a 12-pack or decrease the ABV of w/e pack you're getting.

w.r.t. going cold turkey, if you're only drinking outside of a bar you can try just buying packs of soda. If you're drinking inside a bar, a lot more of them can make mock-tails which don't have alcohol.

Cutting out drinking completely is easier than trying to drink "moderately." One thing that helps is to view what you're doing now as practice, not failure. When you're learning something, you make mistakes (because you're still learning, not because the lesson is a failure), and you are learning not to drink.

Not having alcohol in the house is a good step. Having an alternative at hand — I make tea, a mix of shredded hibiscus and green tea and drink that — is helpful. I strongly recommend the book Changing for Good, by Prochaska et al. (https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?sts=t&an=Proc...) They found that changes of this sort (quitting smoking is another example) is a 6-stage process, and at each stage certain tasks must be completed to move on successfully to the next stage. If some tasks are skipped, the result is that the change doesn't take.

One thing to keep in mind: any amount of alcohol is harmful to health. Some studies found that those who drank a small amount (say, a glass of wine a day) had better health outcomes (e.g., lower all-cause mortality) than those who did not drink at all, and that gave rise to the idea that a little alcohol is more healthy than no alcohol.

However, this finding was due to bad study design: the "no-alcohol" group in those studies included both people who never had used alcohol and also people who had to quit because of health reasons. (This became evident when, for example, some in the "no-alcohol" group died of cirrhosis of the liver.) Once the studies were rerun, restricting the "no-alcohol" group to those who never drank, the illusory benefits of a little alcohol vanished, and the relationship between alcohol and bad health outcomes was clearly a direct relation: the more, the worse; the less, the better. Period.

AA has now been found to be effective, and you might try that. The benefit is that you have someone to talk to when you get the impulse to drink (and it's free). My own abstinence from alcohol came about gradually and indirectly as I worked on getting control of my budget (in part by focusing intensely on staying within my weekly budget after setting aside the money I'd eventually need for periodic expenses — alcohol is relatively expensive, so I stopped buying it, and after a while I didn't miss it, and then I realized I really didn't like its effects).

I quit a daily gaming habit by admitting that it was addicting and I did not have enough self control to not switch it on. Admit that I needed hard controls so I couldn't easily start up a game.

So I deleted the game and that was that.

First step is admitting you have a problem, and then figure out how not to put yourself in position to do it. After awhile the itch went away, and now I even forgot why it was so fun.

I quit drinking a year ago because I was experiencing severe anxiety and depression and that was a part of my regiment to help myself out of the hole. I think what helps is having a goal other than just quitting. For me, that was trying to feel good again. I had some alcohol a few days ago for the first time in a year and noticed anxiety a few hours later, so now I have no desire to return to drinking.

One thing that worked for me for other addicting behaviors was to properly and deliberately harness regret. If you call upon it in advance of making a regrettable decision, it can be a tool instead of a cudgel.

This book goes over this philosophy well: https://www.danpink.com/the-power-of-regret/

I stopped drinking from 03/2013. I found the process has very few to do with alcohol itself. It'll a lot of communication with yourself.

1. Since you already asked for the approach, it's relative easy to persuade yourself that you want to cut it out altogether. Either because of you don't enjoy the foggy head or like me, stomach bugs. There could be no real reason at all. For the substance of alcohol, you might want to cut it out completely not because it's unhealthy, on the contrary, it might even be healthy. so what. the most important is your decision and determination to take back control.

2. get rid off all the alcohols at home but keep a couple of cans of beer in the refrigerator. make a sticker annotating the date and write down firmly and warmly that 'I don't need it. I quit drinking from 11/10/2022'. Look at them and tell yourself that 'I don't need it. bye beer.' close the refrigerator and tell yourself you're amazing. Do this every once a while.

there's a lot of time of weakness. It's hard mostly because people forget their decision, or not taking the decision seriously enough. sometimes, I need to sit down and tell myself that alcohol is a substance same as butter, good or bad, it doesn't matter any more since i don't need it. i decided to get rid of it from my life. if this worked for me, i will add another sticker telling myself that i success on 04/2013, 05/2013 .. how amazing i was! especially when the stickers piled up thick. the stickers also had some crazy things like 'damn you', 'bye dear bear' .. etc. i bet someone could write a app for it. but stickers on the can works perfectly.

The mind game worked for me. Eventually after a few years, I get rid off those old cans and stickers as well. during the time i can sit with my friends and watching them drinking beer. IF someone asked me to drink, I would tell them the same simple decision. I was a social drinker, quit drinking also endorsed me strong confidence to tell them my true thought - I am same good or even better without the cold beer. I will usually have iced water and chew the ice cubes if i have to drink something.

Honestly all my friends support me quite well. and didn't challenge me too often :D I would suggest that except for those two cans of cues, never get too close to cold beer before your mind wired with the unnecessary of booze.

Good luck!

Having an accountability partner helps, maybe your spouse or somebody that you drink with regularly.

Also reaffirm this by telling your friends and family your intention to stop drinking. It helps if they don't keep getting you to drink.

Lastly, what works for me is also realising that I don't need to drink to have a good time out. I can meet friends who drink at bars but they can drink while I sip my fruit juice.

I drink but when I don't want to drink I just dont... I guess this is useless advice if you have an even moderately addictive personality though.

One drink; one water is also a great way to drink. It'll slow your consumption and keep you hydrated.

All else fails, my grandfather's advice: pick two liquors you dislike the taste of and drink those, you'll never get drunk (because you dislike them).

Couple of things which worked for me: - Start with realistic goals an go incremental, eg not drinking for a week, a month, 2 months, ... and in between it's ok to drink. - Have something to replace it with, which is widely available. In my case that's soda water - Share it with everyone that your not drinking for x days, week, ... to make social pressure keep you accountable

I was never a big drinker but moving to a city where alcohol is incredibly expensive and taxed heavily definitely helped. A single round of drinks at happy hour for 5 co-workers and I costs over $100? Yeah, fuck that.

Oh, I also have cealiacs disease so beer has always been a no-go for me. Easier to refrain when your only options are liquor and wine, neither of which I particularly like.

I’ve found having a sodastream on hand is helpful. ie having something else pleasant to drink on hand. Ideally something not sugar loaded.

I find it's easier to take action than to resist temptation. So a partial solution might be to look out for goals that make drinking less attractive. Train for a marathon. That might not be great general advice but you're on HN so good chance you'd enjoy the optimization problem and have something (dopamine releasing) to do instead of drink.

For me, it took internal alignment. A break through for me was understanding how vegans manage their diets. For vegans, their identity is they are vegan. They don't eat meat because that is who they are as a person.

When I decided to stop drinking, I decided my new identity was someone that does not drink. It took about 6mo to fully get ok with not drinking, but I am happy I did it :)

> Any tips on cutting out something completely and how to get out of just hating yourself when you fail?

Honestly, cutting something cold turkey is the hardest thing and requires hard willpower.

It might work better if you wean yourself off, don't turn down the drink but just zip a bit and leave it. If the foggy head feeling still happens with a zip your body will eventually just reject that idea.

The 2 reasons I drink:

1. I'm bored.

2. I drink when I go to bars to meet people and have interesting conversations. While I can make conversation with anyone, many people aren't that interested and it's boring to sit around waiting for something to happen.

I have hobbies but they aren't something I want to do at 8PM on a Friday or Saturday.

I only drink on Friday and Saturday and I rarely get hungover.

I started getting heart palpitations when I had a drink, so I knocked it on the head. It was already barely worth the headache, it certainly wasn't worth feeling like rubbish during too. Not had a proper drink in nearly four years now, recently had a few of the non-alcoholic or 0.5% type beers that are ok and haven't caused me any issue.

You don't sound like you are addicted, based on which you might get something from this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUck-umj2WI. Basically other things will have to move out the way for you to do this, and you may burn a bridge or too, which is fine.

It's all about self control. My dad was an alcoholic and my sister is an alcoholic. I'm about to uncork a fresh bottle of cabernet, but I'm only going to have half a glass with my dinner. I never touch anything stronger than wine, and I rarely have more than one glass. I probably drink on average one glass every two days and sometimes less.

Stay away from bars.

Stay away from friends who drink.

Turn off any and every advertisement about drinking.

Drink lots of water, juice, and coconut water. Edit: I would avoid soda, but seltzer water and flavor is fine.

Donate the equivalent amount of drinking money to charities.

Remember this: your life is cursed once if you drink. It's cursed twice if you pass it to others. And three times if you make drinks. Keep your life uncursed.

I don’t think I can give any answer to you actual question, but 12 packs over one weekend can easily be reduced. Next time don’t buy a 12 pack, maybe buy a 6 pack or a single larger bottle/can. For myself having more then 2 beers make me feel bad the same way you described, but if I have just 1 beer, it doesn’t feel too bad afterwards

Just gave up. It wasn't feeling nice anymore. It's been 8 years or so.

I guess sports help. I'm been training jiu jitsu for 16 years now and I felt drinking in the weekends would fuck my performance up

The mild sedative effect of beer is partly due to the hops. You can get a similar effect from alcohol free beer ... or hop tea. I've had some fuggle hops left over from home brewing and turned them into tea, with a bit of lemon and honey it makes a delicious "downer" with a similar drowsy feeling like after a beer.

Best thing that happened to my life. I was reborn again after alcohol had left my system completely. All the years before that were a complete waste, an illusion.

My anecdote, I've come to believe that alcohol, besides its short term and well known effects, also has some sort of mid-to-long term low-level psychedelic effects where it distorts your sense of reality as to think everything in a slightly more negative way, increasingly so the further you are from your last dosage, so that it makes itself relevant again as a relief from those symptoms.

I realized this after quitting for a long time, where my mood had significantly improved and i had a very beautiful daily routine, some days i would slip and have one beer or one wine when hanging out with friends (even though i didn't need it, mainly because my feelings of social anxiety had disappeared along with quitting alcohol and honestly i was having so much more fun being sober) thinking that it's fine and it won't do anything to me. Besides not enjoying its flavor at all anymore and getting annoyingly dizzy, the next days something had happened. I didn't experience the very same routine the same way. As if something bleak and dark was lurking in my psyche. I can't explain it but it was completely foreign to me at that point to feel like that so i noticed. Then i realized, oh this is how i used to feel all the time when i was consuming alcohol. Those feelings disappeared after 3 days of consuming a single beer and i was back to normal again, happy. Months later i would slip again, and the same process would repeat. 2-3 days of bleak gloom, then back to normal. That would happen a few times more as i don't really put too much pressure on myself, but now honestly i can't even smell it. A sip of wine or beer brings me disgust so there's nothing to it. I enjoy my nights out more, i dance more, i have more energy, i'm more social, people think i'm on cocaine or ecstasy and they're surprised when i tell them I've been only drinking club mate. Caffeine is a fantastic alternative. No weird paranoias, no weird drunk behavior, aware, not stupid, no dark days, no hangovers. Next day, feeling better than the night before.

Really, my opinion is that alcohol is the biggest scam that exists. It eats your life for nothing. No benefits. Only detriments. I have zero contacts left from the days i used to drink. Noone was my friend, they were addiction buddies with mostly bad behavior. The amount of experience that i'm able to digest with a bright head is so much more fulfilling and lasting that it's like i was a zombie back then and now i am alive. I can't express how lucky i am to have left that era and that self behind. It was trash compared to how i feel now. I strongly suggest that you get rid of it completely and forever.

I recommend start using “don’t break the chain” app. For example “i am sober”.

during my battle against alcohol i have found out these apps useful.

it’s very easy to sell/justify drinking to yourself but do you really want to break the chain?

1. Commit to a year off, for your health. The idea of drinking at the end of the year will sound about as appealing as drinking nail polish.

2. Start a new social circle that doesn't involve alcohol

3. Accept that drinking sucks and don't let people make you feel like you're missing out on something. Misery loves company.

I recently took a month or so off drinking for health reasons, and found that the latest generation of alcohol free beers really helped.

Most of the time I reach for a drink, I realized it was more about habit than any need to be drunk, so simply replacing real beer with Heineken 0.0 helped me “scratch the itch” without the alcohol.

Rather than aiming to cut down completely on alcoholic drinks, I have swapped it for non-alcohol alternatives. I was surprised to see a whole range of non alcoholic beers, dealcoholized wines and even whisky/gin/vodka alternatives that taste similar without the negatives of the alcohol.

There's a great selection of craft non-alcoholic beers on the market these days.

My personal favorite is this one: https://athleticbrewing.com/products/downwinder-gose-non-alc...

I started specifying what I want.

Because booze gives 2 types of stimulation: the drinking and the alcohol.

Sometimes I want to drink some beer, but not the alcohol. So I started buying non alcoholic beers. I get a six pack into my system. I love every moment of it. But I'm not drunk.

Other times I want to get drunk. So I drink alcoholic beers.

I cut alcohol completely 4 years ago. One day I released that it is too harmful for me and to people around. It was not about having fun anymore, it was about drinking, having little please from it and then regretting that. That was a breaking point for me.

PROS:

- less headaches

- less problems with digestion/stomach pain

- more money left for other things

CONS:

- no social life

- no "friends" left

- working too much

Failing is human--please never hate yourself for that.

You don't seem to be in a bad place, but you should talk to your doctor about some mental health counseling.

Specifically, you should try to get down to the bottom of what causes you to feel a need to binge on a 12 pack in a weekend when you can live without alcohol for weeks otherwise.

Good luck.

Download an alcohol tracking app and log every drink. I drank what I would call an average amount so I just did it out of interest. After seeing how much and how often I drank I just decided to stop almost completely. Having a log and a graph and being forced to log every drink made it obvious.

Be aware that this behave already qualifies to alcoholism according to health professionals. Even if the downsides are not as devastating as some of the stereotypical pictures we all know perhaps you should take into consideration taking an affirmative drastic action or even consult a physician.

Substitute with something productive that makes you feel good.

A side project? Photography? Reading blogs while on the go? Podcasts? Playing an instrument? Doesn't matter, anything would work.

I know it's much easier said than done but it's also probably easier than you think once you break the habit for a few days.

Spindrift!

I've, luckily, never been a heavy drinker (avg 1 drink per day at my peaks), but I wanted to get some abs and found that if I reached for seltzer water or three instead of a beer I was just about equally satisfied. Some of that new non-alcoholic beer looks alright too, keep meaning to try some.

For me active life helps a lot, especially when I've set goals. When I want to crush it in a bike ride or in the gym, the day(s) before I am not drinking because I know it negatively affects my form.

I think having a reason to wake up and have a clear head or a body ready for action can help a lot.

I recently read a great book on how to change your own behaviors. The title is unceremonious "How to Change", but the book is well written, backed by research, and I found it inspiring. There may be some insights or tips in there that will help you on your journey.

Try drinking something that isn't alcohol to enjoy the social/refreshment/habit aspects of drinking.

I haven't given up all alcohol, but I've largely switched to non-alcoholic gin spirits for mocktails, and I've been drinking bottled kombucha in place of beer.

I started consuming a lot of non-alcoholic drinks. When I went out for dinner, at home, whenever.

I've also been a cyclist for some time, but since I started doing regular bunch rides, I decided it wasn't worth having a drink if I had to be up and cycling at 5:30 the next morning.

Stopping social drinking was tougher than stopping binge drinking for me. What helped was deciding to go 100% cold turkey for a year. It forced me to learn how to socialise sober. Before that it was too easy to opt out of sobriety "just for this occasion".

I highly recommend Alcohol Explained by William Porter: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25374689-alcohol-explain...

It helped me a lot.

My wife doesn’t drink, very few of my friends drink, so it was easy for me to quit day to day.

When I find myself in a situation where everyone is drinking, like at a meet up or a conference or something, it’s still hard to say no though.

For me the social pull to drink has always been pretty strong.

Everyone that is giving advice and feedback should also state their age or atleast age range. My perspective on this topic in my 20s was wildly different than my perspective in my 30s. Experience, much like hard work, is superior to youthful ingenuity.

Have you thought about substituting “mocktails”, cocktails with alcohol substitutes that taste sort of like alcohol but without any real alcohol?

Personally I think they taste even better, they look interesting just like a cocktail, and can be part of the same social ritual.

By being anti-social enough to be basically immune to peer pressure, and then eventually just finding drunk people very boring to be around with so I never got into it. I've drank like twice in three decades.

Hmm, I guess I never started it now that I think of it, lol.

Probably a bad answer but I was drinking every night starting at the end of the work day then falling asleep drunk.

One day, for a reason I don't know, I just stopped. I don't even cheat because I know how weak I am, I'll go right back into it.

I saw a friend of mine (who’d done AA and had been sober for 10 years) be the life of the party all the time.

This allowed me to disconnect the idea that alcohol is needed to have fun in highly social contexts.

I then just quit cold turkey and that was 4 years ago.

I am the exact same but in regards to coffee

Don't just stop, substitute it with something else that gives you a good feeling.

I choose Yoga.

Some others I knew choose sauna, running, fitnessstudio, sex, painting, ...

Substitute one habit with another one. Dont hit yourself to hard if you fail from time to time. But keep on it.

I quit cold turkey a couple of years ago. I don't miss it, it takes zero willpower, and I am not tempted to ever drink again. And yet my drinking was out of control.

The secret is Allen Carr's Easy Way. I needed a simple perspective shift.

There's no magic, don't buy alcohol. When you give in and buy some, forgive yourself, think about how you made the decision and how you can make a better decision next time. Don't allow alcohol to be kept where you live .

It was a habit of mine for many years. I changed my environment and weened myself off over a period of 6 months. My health has improved and my life is overall better. Failure is apart of the process, so don't beat yourself up.

I've found that people you hang out with understand, if they are good people they will go out of their way to accommodate you; la croix or other carbonated drinks helps with the appearance of 'not drinking' but still holding a beverage in your hand. And a few times recently it actually felt good to say 'thanks, but I don't drink' or telling the doctor or insurance person you don't drink which ends the follow up questions regarding booze, feels great.

And don't hate yourself, try to think about what someone who loves you would say or think instead of yourself since you are your own worst critic, life is about the process not the goal, when you 'fail' try to be open and honest about the things that triggered you and actively try to avoid or replace those things in your life when you are not tempted.

To a degree you might be able to substitute one addiction for a healthier one. Try espresso drinking and making. A powerful shot of ristresso or espresso can give a whiskey like beverage experience (but it doesn't have to)

Are you drinking that 12 pack alone or with friends?

I made hard rules about drinking and generally I drink only a few times a year at this point:

1. Drink only with friends or trusted people. This can be at home or at a bar.

2. Do not drink alone inside the house, ever.

Here is the essay I wrote when I decided to stop drinking “forever”: https://taylor.town/essays/1000-weekends

Not really an answer but I have to recommend Marc Maron's WTF podcast. The guy battled alcohol abuse and while it's not what his podcast is about he regularly brings the topic up in a very frank way.

I never really did stop completely, I just reduced my beer consumption a lot. My replacement is glass of 50% water / 50% apple juice, re-filled several times during the hours, which I have found works great

If you think you may have an addiction, then hit up an AA meeting. I am in a different 12 step program for something that impacted my life far worse than alcohol ever did and basically, it works if you work it.

I still enjoy a tipple every so often, but I found going to the gym really helped me cut my alcohol consumption down to nearly zero. Knowing that my weightlifting will be impacted if I drink is a very strong deterrent.

For everyone that wants to quit drinking/substances and doesn't agree with 12 step programs:

https://www.orange-papers.info/

I used to ddink a lot in social occasions but would always feel sici after so I just decided to stop. I still have a glass of wine or a small beer ecery now and then and the key is to not beat yourself about it

Probably more specific to me, but I took bupropion for a month and the urge to drink completely disappeared. Serotonin replacement drugs in general seem to help kick the neurological chemical dependence.

Becks zero alcohol beer. It costs as much as real beer and has passable taste. There might be better zero beers but I haven't found it and Becks is just good enough to forget it's zero alcohol.

Fairly sure alcohol takes longer than that to kick in, so perhaps it's not the actual alcohol you crave, more the situation?

Best to work out why you drink on those occasion, and try and figure out how to subsitute

1. Just found my own specific meaningful "why"s

2. Changed the environment and social circle to more sober one

The same did with weed.

It wasn't particularly hard for me, I guess I didn't have a "chemical" addiction.

I've seen enough of my friends die to know that recreational drug abuse doesn't end well. That normally does a great job of keeping me from drinking. I do it once a year to recalibrate myself.

I do as Kant: do only as you would if you had to do it continuously and perpetually.

Would you drink water continuously and perpetually? Would you drink whiskey continuously and perpetually? There’s your answer.

I stopped drinking because when I was a teen, I was into hardcore music a lot. And one of my favorite bands was Earth Crisis that preached straight edge lifestyle. That was how I quit drinking.

> or the feeling right after a drink.

Does alcohol really act this quickly? If not, then this would be good news for you, since it’s then only the feeling you crave, not the alcohol itself.

I never did. I heard it's dangerous to fail to drink enough water.

I got a personal trainer and started weightlifting. I got into those goals and cutting out some bad parts of my diet and drinking were easy wins.

Moving cities and not having drinking buddies helped too.

"It gets easier, but it never gets easy." :-(

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CagbTwPxXw

The Sinclair Method (TSM), 78% success rate.

https://cthreefoundation.org/the-sinclair-method

I had kids and my health became more important than having a drink.

You're a binge drinker already. The next thing is a slow slide into everyday drinking, then you'll "discover" vodka and eventually die a slow miserable death.

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol — that our lives had become unmanageable.

2. Some dude said "no don't worry about any of that higher power shit, your higher power can just be a doorknob"

3. ???

4. Profit

I stayed sober during hard drinking party. What I saw was just ridiculous - I never want to be that guy. Haven't gotten drunk since.

> Any tips on cutting out something completely and how to get out of just hating yourself when you fail?

Be careful with cutting alcohol cold-turkey. Beyond a certain point it is very much a physical dependency, and as it affects the full nervous system (it passes through the blood/brain barrier quite easily) cutting it off directly can cause physical withdrawal symptoms starting with shakes and in extreme cases possibly even stroke. This is one of the reasons the rich check themselves into clinics for rehab: having medical staff around to monitor and manage any such reactions makes the process significantly safer.

At times I drank a lot. Vodka most nights, sometimes at least 250ml each night and often litres of the stuff over Fri/Sat/Sun. This was at its worse in the year or so before being diagnosed bipolar (turns out that I was self-medicating, which had worked for a while but hit a spiral that make things much worse). I cut down a fair amount after that, but was still a fairly heavy drinker.

Cut to a decade or so later, there were a number of close calls with regard to health (including a couple of heart issues) amongst friends and family, and with a history of heart issues in both sides of my family tree I decided to do something about my condition (knocking on for 18 stone, and hellish unfit). It helps that my social life had taken a turn for the better around then, and I'd decided this Dave fellow wasn't someone I didn't mind letting rot (my main pension plan to that point was to not live long enough to need a pension, hence my significant “investments” in alcohol).

As I started losing weight I deliberately cut back as alcohol==calories and sometimes it was a choice between drink and chocolate/icecream/ete, and part way through that process I started exercising partly to burn more calories (so I didn't need to cut back on consuming them as much) and partly to get what was left of me into a better shape. I discovered I enjoyed running (I'd have never guessed!) and set myself some goals. This was the point I really cut back as it sometimes became a choice of keeping to those goals or having more to drink. The fact I've reverted to eating and drinking more while recuperating over recent months (long covid, grumble grumble moan moan) might support the suggestion that I reduced those additions in favour of another!

I never cut it out completely, which might not work if what you have is a true addition rather than a dependency, or might if cutting out completely doesn't work for your social circumstances. I just don't drink often, though I can and do occasionally drink a lot in one day/night.

There is this lesson that keeps coming up in my life again and again that I believe is true, applies effortlessly to matters of substance consumption, and generalizes out to life in general: think in reverse.

What you want to do is have a clear vision of what the life you want looks like and then work backward to where you are right now, then walk that path.

When you think forward incrementally with thoughts like "I should drink less" or "Do not drink beer" you are prescribing a behavior that is detached from an identity. Who is the person you will be that behaves this way because these behaviors are aligned with who you are?

Consider the difference between eating less meat versus becoming a vegan. One is a forward looking behavior, the other is a backward looking identity. If you are a vegan, you cannot consume animal products because that is who you are and to be a vegan means that you cannot consume animal products. The behaviors and identity are intertwined in a self-reinforcing system. This is strategy versus tactics.

Veganism and other extremely well defined identities are useful for making my point but it need not be so extreme. You can create a custom identity built around a set of ideals, policies, and rules that you define. I am: "a vegan" is equally valid to "a guy who has 3 beers on Wednesday nights watching the game with his boys". Define your values, describe who you want to be, then figure out the delta from where you are at right now to where you want to be. Then do it or admit that it's not what you really want and who you intend to become.

Setbacks and fuck-ups are inherent to the human condition. They do not matter. If we are still on the path we can take two steps forward, one step back and still finish the race. Black and white thinking leads to shame and guilt, which undermines and destroys everything. Life is messy and happens in the grey. Yesterday might have gotten fucked up, tomorrow might be dope, more than likely it will be aight.

I hate to tell you this but you can swear off booze or smokes or bread or sugar or bowties or whatever now and forever but it is gonna come up again. You might get involved. That is not failure. That is life. Hating yourself is counter-productive. Notice when you get yourself off the path and course correct, keep rolling.

You cannot and should not ever expect that you can execute flawlessly and white knuckle your way through this mess we call life. Do not give up your power and agency by believing that some bullshit molecule has hegemony over you.

Be who you are. Do as you wish. Become what you want. Live the dream.

Started training for boxing. Knowing there are direct painful consequences for diminishing my physical capabilities naturally made me severely cut down on drinking.

It's funny how it's easy to identify how terrible you feel either during and or after drinking, but rarely leading up to buying and just before deciding to have the drink.

I've tried various tricks to help myself get off alcohol, but recently i've really instilled in myself the notion of 'this is not a solution to my problem'. My problem is namely a quick out of anxiety. After a long day at work, the tension in my mind is always relieved by alcohol, but it always exacerbated the anxiety the following day. This is compounded by the shame of not having control over myself, therefore lying blah blah. It's such a stupid cycle and it's embarrassing not to 'know thy self' enough to just flick the switch.

Anyhow, the method that worked for me:

- Giving myself a head start by seeing no friends (zero friends) for about a 2 months who are drinking - Gym/exercise everyday (no rest days, only a day of treadmill or a brisk walk) - Lowering my caffeine intake (lower anxiety) - Having full, but healthy meals (for a period, i'd replace the drinking with another anti-anxiety medication... binge eating! But this is fueled by the same pattern, therefore remembering that 'this is not a solution to my problem' really helps) - Practice social times with no drinking ( so for this, I went out into pubs by myself and grab a diet coke, which turned into lemonade, which turned into lemon water since even the large amount of sugar is not a solution to my problem' and just e x i s t e d in those placing, trying to calm myself. About 4 sessions of that over a few months help me to feel comfortable next time I was out with my drinking friends)

One thing i'd add is that I found it really important to properly arrange my hierarchy of wants. This means that I put stopping alcohol above retaining relationships. In practice, this did meant that when groups of friends would go out for a night that would only revolve around drinking.... see ya! I'd just not go. It is easier than to spend the entire night fighting that urge to drinking and being a grouch around ppl feeling bubbly from the bubbles. That means many of my relationships took a hit, but I think if not drinking is a part of how I want to live and the barrier to enter that life means having to lose many friends... it seems like an heavy, but necessary price to pay.

Think back to like, the ancestral days of humans being butt naked and barefoot. If alcohol is destroying you, do what you need to survive. Get out of that environment. Leave your town and get away from all of your triggers, even temporarily if it's causing that much of a problem. Survive!

Good luck

Perhaps alcoholics should be able to get a stamp in their passport/id, so they can't buy any alcohol (and make id checks mandatory for every age).

literally... I just decided and stopped. Mind over matter. The Last drink I had was about 8 months ago.

Same with coffee. I waiting till i got the flu then quit coffee. The idea is if I'm going to feel like shit and need to rest lots i might as well take advantage of it.

I still drink a cup or two of black tea a day but no coffee anymore.

If I'm not in control of my mind then who is? If I cant control what i consume then I'm not in control of my mind...

I saw people a decade older than me still drinking and partying, like ugly wrinkly teenagers. And decided it was time to grow up least I end up like that.

I got my wife pregnant. She stopped and I stopped in support. 9 months is a long time to change a habit.

I left a relationship that was driving me to drink, not realizing it was the cause. I stopped drinking effortlessly literally overnight.

Make not drinking part of your identity. Instead of telling people

> I’m not drinking

say

> I don’t drink

This is a small change in thinking that has a surprisingly large effect for a lot of people. Hope it helps

I avoid shopping for food. I just cut out grocery stores altogether. Then when I get bored, instead of drinking I have a list of options at hand.

What do you drink and how much to feel fogginess??? I don’t even get dizzy after several glasses of wine (I am completely immune to beer).

Have you checked out the "Tiny Habits" framework? It worked wonders for me and my habits. Haven't tried it on drinking though.

I just remember the person I was when drinking, and don't want to be that guy. Use the classic AA trick:

What would your higher/better self do?

Go to AA, do the steps, read Allen carrs easy way

have a bad hangover. titrate/wean down alcohol dosage over days or weeks. cannabis gummies, cans of flavored carbonated water, habanero salsa. psilocybin for clarity to step away from bad habits. perhaps revisit alcohol occasionally and stop at one or two drinks. be around people who care about you. do other things for fun. eat well.

I did it through Dry January - it's socially normalized. Made it through Jan 2019, then just keep going.

tldr; if you have a good excuse for not drinking - it helps a ton with peer pressure...

I've quit twice.

Once when I was 21 for 4 years; Once when I was 27 going on 12 years.

Both times started for health reasons (UC) and stuck because of superstitious/religious reasons that I have largely grown out of. I stay dry now because of vanity reasons and I'm a homebody - I lift,run, and eat really clean and look better than I ever did in my 20s or early 30s. Also inertia helps a ton.

WRT peer pressure I would tell randos at bars I was allergic and might need an epi pen if I drank and could bullshit a conversation which was kind of fun...I don't advise being dishonest but I was young and it was entertaining when I would go to bars to socialize (a lot more fun saying this than I have UC and I am a little scared this might knock me out of remission).

With friends and family, it'll just take a lot of polite "no...I'm good thanks" before they'll stop pestering you. Just know in advance its coming.

For what its worth the same thing is true with eating healthy. I've been eating healthy for 6 years and because of my GI issues tried some diet to help with symptoms. Before everyone and their mother is shovelling burgers and sweets and cheesy things in front of me, "why don't you eat it? Its good". After I dabbled with that diet no one looks twice at me for eating "weird".

I switched to drinking sparkling water.

I use this app to create a to don't list whenever I encountered such situation I look at that app.

Paxil.

Works like a champ. Fills the holes in your head, the longing to jump into the abyss. If you know, you know.

It’s not for everyone, and you’d need a doctor to support you, but consider “The Sinclair Method”.

I have had chronic dizziness for three years. One or two drinks makes me feel hung over for days

By realizing it is a coping mechanism for other problems in my life I need to face head on.

You can find some really nice alcohol -free IPAs nowadays. It helps with the craving

Cold turkey.

Know you want to feel better more than you want the aftermath of the alcohol illusion.

Here are two excellent books on the topic:

1) controlling your drinking

2) how to change your drinking

I highly recommend either.

Check out Smart Recovery : science based, non religious addiction recovery.

Have you tried medically administered Psychedelics?

Psilocybin, LSD, DMT & Mescaline ...

I got married, kids, work on a statup at night => 0 time for drinking

I stopped attending afterwork drinks. Horrible culture here in the UK

I just kept on drinking.

Allen Carr books. First quit smoking, then drinking

A few years ago my friend stayed with me for two weeks and he was doing “no alcohol August” just to see how he felt, and I joined him. I realized that I felt way better most of the time. I wasn’t drinking much before that, but even one IPA with dinner would make me feel super foggy the next day and sometimes anxious.

Otherwise I’m similar to you - I love the taste of beer and cocktails.

So I basically said after that I’d only have a drink if I really, really wanted one. At first, maybe this was once a week. Slowly, as I got better at saying no and listening to my body and realizing I could go without and still have a good time, I started having it less and less. A few years later, I have maybe one drink every three to six months and usually will drink it so slowly that it barely has an effect. If it starts to feel like a downer, I stop drinking it - doesn’t matter that I spent the money on it.

For what it’s worth I’ve found the “only when I really want it” strategy helpful for stopping other habits too - that’s how I slowly became vegetarian, for example.

I think a huge part of this too is that it gets around “hating yourself when you fail”, because there isn’t really failure with this way of thinking. It’s typical to have all or nothing thinking around this kind of thing - “oh, I had one drink, now I’m off the wagon”, or “I had one pastry, might as well give up on my diet”. But there is no wagon! That’s something you make up. There’s just the choice you have in front if you. If you have alcohol one night, it doesn’t mean you failed, or got off the wagon - it just means you had alcohol one night. That has nothing to do with whether you’ll have alcohol again the next night.

On a more practical alcohol specific note, I loved finding out that craft nonalcoholic beers like ones from Athletic Brewing Company, Untitled Arts, and Rescue Club are actually quite good and can hit the spot of having a beer for me! If I’m at a bar, I’ll sometimes order a seltzer with a splash of bitters if I want something that looks and tastes a little like a cocktail to avoid questions but I don’t really care about getting asked questions anymore.

And then again a big aspect is the social piece - hopefully you have supportive friends who don’t care that you don’t drink. It does take some getting used to in social situations to just explain “Yeah, drinking just made me feel shitty so I slowly stopped and now I rarely drink.” Over time I’ve learned to have a lot of fun sober though - even to dance comfortably. But I’ve also learned that what my dad used to tell me back in high school is actually kind of true - that if something is only fun because you’re drinking, it’s probably not worth doing!

Best of luck with your adventures! Let me know if you have any questions.

Three months of intensive rehab.

Eight and a half years sober so far.

I stoppped drinking about 4 years ago. I used to be a heavy (especially party) drinker with my longest streak being 5 days black out drinking in a row.

Here's what helped me

TLDR; For me: 1. Having something more interesting than drinking > Fitness 2. Education & reading about long term impact of alcohol consumption 3. Psychedelics - one mushroom trip rewired me

So the basic gist is instead of going out aimlessly on the weekend I needed something else to look forward to. I went heavy into Fitness & lifting weights, so then I knew if I drink on fridays I can't lift on saturday, which demotivated me to drink. Also a great excuse for social pressure if people say

"Hey, why aren't you drinking?" Me: "I'm going on this fitness challenge and I gotta workout tomorrow morning" Discussion over.

Next: Going in small steps and being good to myself.

First I went to 14 days no drinking. Then I went to 30 days. Started drinking again. Next time again 30 days when I managed that I went to 90 days, started drinking again, started over and next time 180 days.

With each period it became easier to restart the journey again.

I journaled a lot reflected on my feelings and went to therapy (related to other issues).

After I had my system in place going to the gym regularly, educating myself, not wanting to drink, knowing how to deal with social pressure I went on a magic mushroom trip and it completely rewired my feelings and perception of alcohol.

Since then I have no cravings of see alcohol for what it is - a toxic substance that harms me.

A book I can recommend is "Sober Curious" by Ruby Warringtom, but I also went deep into Trauma & Addiction here "In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts" by Gabor Mate (check his talks on Yt) and also read studies e.g. this one https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.05.10.21256931v... and the scientific literature is pretty clear: no amount of alcohol is good for you.

Good luck my friend!

Personally I only do social drinking, that is have a drink around friends. Which always carries a social norm of not be too drunk to not talk.

Don’t drink alone is my golden rule

Did you try non alcoholic beer?

It's interesting that comments on this thread fall into two categories, people who show clear signs of being prone to developing alcohol dependency (or who in the past were alcoholics and have recovered) and people who do not.

It is important to remember that if you have a predisposition to alcohol dependency, alcohol is very dangerous and can destroy your life. If you do not have a predisposition to alcohol dependency, you are unlikely to develop one by drinking a drink once a week. The blanket statements such as "Alcohol is an addictive drug" are not really going to help people who are not predisposed to alcohol dependency stop drinking because they're not going to be able to sympathize with the statement.

On the other hand, "just think of the negative effects you have experienced in the past rather than looking forward to the future imagined good effects" may be a good think for someone who gets peer pressured to drinking too much to hear about as it may be an effective strategy, but it will do nothing for someone predisposed to alcohol dependency.

So, my advice:

Step 1: Figure out if you have a predisposition to alcohol dependency, there are lots of different risk factors but a bit of introspection should let you figure this out. (As a rough shot in the dark, the feeling that OP describes immediately after having a drink sounds like a sign of a predisposition to alcohol dependency.) Chances are if you're dealing with a stressful life situation and have a glass of wine every night to help you fall asleep then you're probably not predisposed to alcohol dependency (also that glass of wine is actually not helping you sleep better so maybe try to find an alternative way of falling asleep such as meditation before sleep).

Note: If you have an alcohol dependency problem stop here and seek help. There are many options here, research them, they vary from requiring a strong support framework to committing yourself to a rehabilitation programme. This is kind of outside the scope of this comment as I have no personal experience with alcohol dependency.

Step 2: Assuming you don't have an alcohol dependency problem, figure out why you are drinking more than you would like to. Social pressure? Anxiety? Insomnia?

Step 3: Work on the problem that is causing you to drink more rather than the short term bandaid you are applying (alcohol). If you have insomnia and you successfully stop relying on alcohol to fall asleep, you're just going to find something else or go insane from insomnia. Insomnia is not fun, figure out how to solve that problem.

If you're young and partying all the time, alcohol can probably be a necessary evil to help lubricate social situations but it's easy to notice that you don't NEED that much of it. Try setting yourself limits and sticking to them, you will notice that you can still have just as much fun, without a lot of the worse side effects. If your problem is social pressure, try to solve that instead. If you're drinking more because of social pressure then it's highly likely that other areas are also impacted by social pressure.

I was a pretty average (by Danish standards) consumer of alcohol (for my age) from ages 14 to 31. I'm 36 now, so I've not consumed any alcoholic beverage at all for 5 years.

Danish drinking culture is a bit on the heavy side, and I enjoyed getting absolutely shitfaced, I generally didn't have blackouts or do anything too silly, but the hangovers started getting really serious.

One day, with "yet again" the worst hangover in my life, I decided the hangovers were not worth it, and that whatever magic I felt in the drunkenness, was ephemeral, it'd never lead me anywhere, it'd never become real, it'd never truly make me feel good.

I stopped drinking the same way I stopped smoking after a 20 pack a day for 8 years. Simply didn't do it again. I didn't throw out all the alcohol in the house, just like I didn't throw out my half-finished pack of cigarettes..

Eventually, visitors drank the rest of my whiskey and beer, and eventually the cigarettes were thrown away eventually, but they were deliberately kept around for a long while first.

I kept them around due to an insight I had from a previously failed _attempt_ at quitting smoking, which was that.. If I had no cigs, my brain would constantly be looking to ways to get me into novel situations where I might act on impulse.. Like, "oh, maybe you should go get your car washed, then you can also refuel" -> "me goes filling up car, goes into store to pay for gas.. bot-mode kicks in and I impulsively buy a pack of cigs..". I figured that, if my temptations are out of reach, I will accumulate activation energy to obtain said temptation, and when that energy is discharged, and temptation acquired, there's too much momentum to stop mid-way, and I will indulge.

If the temptation is constantly around, no energy is built up, so no momentum, and it makes it very easy to simply look at the can of beer, or half-smoked pack of cigs, and go "yeah, I could reach over and do that, and I'm not going to", constant presence, constant control..

I hate to use the term, but maybe it's a form of mindfullness, being absolutely constantly aware of this thing so you never build up any kind of mental momentum towards it.

It's been so long, and I no longer have any desire for alcohol or tobacco, I enjoy the taste of beer, and I often drink non-alcoholic ones, many of which are great, and perfectly acceptable in social settings as well.

I don't have any trouble saying I don't drink, if pressed on the subject, I explain it as it is, that I've been as drunk as I've ever needed to and that the experience has nothing more to offer me, and that I will guarantee that I can be just as (insert politically correct word of the day) without the assistance of alcohol. Sometimes people then mention taste rather than intoxication as an argument and I explain that while I really enjoy the taste of red-wine, I also think cola goes well with just about anything.

Context: I still drink, but significantly less than I used to; I don't think I ever qualified for an alcoholism diagnosis. I'm also very much into coffee, tea, and good food: everything that involves olfactory pleasure, basically. (Caffeine addiction is also something I'm acutely aware of.)

I got into alcohol originally for the taste — the same reason I got into coffee and tea — and realised early on I simply didn't enjoy the hangover/morning after, and since my personality is such that I have expectations of myself in terms of productivity in a day and I usually get my best work done in the morning, I realised that was highly detrimental to my emotional well-being: I would end up disappointed and frustrated the day after firstly because I wasn't processing things as fast as I knew I could, and secondly because a pounding headache tends to make people cranky.

So I started analysing why it is that I often ended up drinking more than I "should" at night and came up with a big reason: boredom. My olfaction needs stimulation. Since I can't sleep after consuming caffeine (my hard cut-off for coffee/tea is 4pm) and I don't know of any drinks that are both non-alcoholic and caffeine-free that have the same complexity of flavour, I go for fermented stuff.

I found supporting evidence for this when I realised that, if I had a project I'd started in the morning that somehow hadn't drained my brain by lunchtime and that I was determined to continue into the evening, I would basically forget to drink, even if there was a glass right in front of me. The same has happened to me with forgetting to drink coffee in the morning or even eat all day on those occasions when I've gotten into The Zone shortly after waking up.

Since I drink alcohol for the flavour first, and don't even like most of the effects of ethanol, I also don't drink when I'm tired, because I don't have the cognitive capacity to process the flavours: it becomes a waste of money, a waste of time, and a needless toll on my body. Being tired enough to forego the evening drink often comes from doing exercise during the day; by contrast, if I go to the gym after dinner, I often end up in a situation where I (can) drink a lot, because I'm so energetic after the exercise that I need something to do.

So for me, reducing the amount of alcohol I consumed came down to: - Making sure I had other things to do (whether projects or obligations) - Getting a suitable amount of physical activity into my day - Constantly reminding myself that olfactory pleasure was the original reason for spending so much money on good wine, and that I can't afford, financially, to get addicted to alcohol.

In your case, it sounds like peer pressure also plays a role; I can't offer much on that because I long ago embraced the grumpy introvert side of me and stopped caring so much about that (which I appreciate isn't going to work for everyone).

Psilocybin!

Now I prefer sipping tea.

Why stop?

Celiac disease

tldr; switch your drink to soda and citrus.

Regarding "hating yourself when you fail" -- a growth mindset helps with this kind of negative thought pattern, generally. You are making incremental, iterative progress not flipping a binary switch.

One thing that was a big help, in my experience, was noticing that I liked carbonization and conversation, not ethanol. I switched to soda and citrus. I've also heard good things about CBD beverages if your jurisdiction allows.

Never started

find a meeting and go there.

My parents used to drink all the time. So I grew up thinking that drinking alcohol was what normal people did. The quantity of drinking depicted on Mad Men was about the right amount for their generation.

I also hung out with people who drank a lot. There's a saying "birds of a feather flock together". Hanging out with drinkers meant that drinking was the social norm. I really only noticed this after getting run over by a car - I had turned into a miserable person who even I didn't want to be around (additionally, many of my social group were not all that fun to be around when both of us were sober). When I stopped hanging around drinkers, I found it easier to cut way down on alcohol consumption. I also didn't realize just how expensive it is until I cut down.

Then I got gall stones and had to have my gall bladder removed. Something else went wrong with/from the surgery and my pancreas got badly infected. This resulted in me having to make massive changes in what I ate, how I ate and when I ate. Completely discontinuing alcohol was one of those changes. No more bacon cheeseburgers was another change. A person with a working gallbladder is capable of eating lots of garbage, but without one, I have to be more picky than a stereotypical vegan (or pick whatever stereotype you want to mock and dial it up to at least 9¾). Some types of fat (like margarine) will have me stuck to the toilet. I hate it. I miss bacon cheeseburgers. And potato chips. I never realized just how many pizzerias use fake cheese (made from vegetable oil), and now I can hardly eat any pizzas. I hate it.

Excessive alcohol consumption is one of the risk factors for getting gall stones. Others include: overweight, too much fatty foods, being female, being sedentary or over 40.

> the foggy head feeling

I grew up thinking this was the entire point of drinking alcohol. Or smoking pot. Or opiates. My sister refuses to take pain killers because she hates the blurry thinking and foggy head feeling.

> I have a hard time saying no to a drink if everyone else is having a drink

This means that you need to change who you socialize with. I'm sorry - there's no way around this. You cannot associate with "users" and stay sober. This also took me a very long time to realize. Humans are social animals. If everyone you associate picks their nose - you will start to pick your nose. It is called "mirroring". It is a bug in the wetware.

Alternative: instead of ordering at the table like others, go up to the bar and order something non-alcoholic. In America, such drinks usually get "virgin" prepended to the name. Or instead of a "rum & coke", just a coke with a wedge of lime. Expensive, but then you're renting space at the bar/restaurant. They need to survive as well.

> how to get out of just hating yourself when you fail

Take each day as it comes. Don't hammer yourself when you stumble and fall. I used to mock AA members - that was wrong of me. It took me a very long time to realize that many of the 12 steps are important and do work.

I come from a place where a lot of men start drinking when life ends up turning into a different direction than they expected as young. They use it as a replacement for a therapist, because therapy is relatively new there and people are generally looked down upon if they require it.

I am recently bereaved of my father, who was an alcoholic of about 20 years. His death wasn't immediately due to the drinking but undoubtedly it was one of the causes. For most of this time he had it under control, and it manifested itself as long evenings of watching TV drinking quietly and going to bed late in the night. I wasn't fully in the picture for most of this, and had cursory glimpses during rare visits.

Over this period I watched him get more and more embittered. He had cancer treatment and multiple strokes - the former I suspect were related to alcohol. His second wife and step-children tricked him out of the house they had bought together and sold his car. I suspect they wanted to distance themselves from the drunk he was, but I can't bring myself to discuss it with them now. Slowly all his friends turned away and in a desperate move he returned to his home town to get in touch with childhood friends. Here he couldn't get a job and his friends (old men with separate lives) didn't have time for drinking with him. He decided to retire early.

I started to support him full time about six or seven years ago when his pension wasn't enough (if it ever was truly) to support his addiction and pay the rent.

At first on his own he looked interested in getting a hobby and trying to learn new things. Due to his previous passion for computers - one of my fondest childhood memories was playing on Amiga like computers at his work in the early nineties - he started learning PHP and built a small course material in our native language. We has proud for a while that people were using his website to learn themselves. I was hopeful for a while and helped him with the computer, internet and answered his questions.

However things got worse. His balance wasn't very good because of the strokes and combined with being drunk most of the time it led to multiple accidents. The cancer had taken his sense of smell and he almost set fire to the apartment he was living in when cooking and falling asleep.

My mom and I visited once in a while, as I couldn't bring myself to see the ruin of my father in the rare times I returned to my country all on my own. She helped tremendously first by convincing him to go into a home and then, when he gave up on being sober and deciding he wanted to be back on his own by finding a person to help him with taking care of the house.

Finally, he died this summer, all alone. I didn't go to his funeral, it was my mom again that had to go across country and take care of everything instead of me.

The reason why I'm writing this is not to give you a cautionary tale. I partly blame myself for being an enabler for my father's addiction over the period when I had the power to force him into rehab. I suspect most people would do that for their family. I couldn't. They say hitting rock bottom can be a trigger for an internal desire to fight the alcoholism, but I always had a pillow there and my father never hit it hard enough to matter. For that I am sorry.

You read like a young man, so you can probably make it work for a long time. However, it will never get better by drinking, the only way it will go is worse and lonelier. If you have dependents, at least make sure they won't regret outliving you.

Ayahuasca

I dont get alcoholics, I never drink to get drunk, I only drink craft beer

I'm not an alcoholic or even close to it. Why would I stop drinking alcohol? This is a you problem, why is this relevant to HN?

firstly, stop drinking sweetened drinks. drink only pure alcohol.

secondly, drink good alcohol. like extra old rum(generic term for well aged rums) or 12y+ scotch.

thirdly, drink high ABV, non-chill filtered or as natural alcohol as you can get. you will not be able to drink more than one, maybe two, glasses of a juice like that. it will fill up your desires. you'll have enough with one glass.

fourth, don't drink socially. drink at home, alone. watching some entertainment or doing some work.

Create a culture of drinking out of a simple, mindless process. Visit the Napa Valley, do whiskey tours in Scotland. Learn how to do proper testing and how to evaluate wine, whiskey, porto, beer or whatever your preferred drink is.

Try to distill alcohol yourself or brew a beer. You can brew make beer the Cantillion style even in your bathtub, if you can withstand the smell.

Be resourceful.