Fail to prepare and prepare to fail
DrinkCoach asked Will, Alcohol Advisor from the West Sussex Wellbeing Team to document his new year’s resolution to cut back on alcohol. Read his series of blogs throughout Dry January…
Blog 2/10
PLAN
So what does my plan look like? Where do I start? I could just go for it, jump right in? It might work... but probably not. I know my willpower can let me down; remembering my ill-fated attempt to become a vegetarian, well-meaning and with good intention but essentially futile - succumbing in my second week to a roast dinner.
Well I’m not going to go cold turkey because I just don’t think it will work for me. It’s not worked with other things in the past so there’s no reason to think it will work for this. What I am going to do is to plan on a steady reduction over the month until I am at a drinking level that I am happy with.
Well the first thing I should do is look at what I have been doing, as this will give me a good insight into what I am likely to do in the future.
Ok so let’s look at my last week:
Monday - fun day: start of the week and I’m a bit sad that the weekend’s over. So, maybe I’ll open a bottle of wine for dinner; I’m sharing it with my partner so 1 glass… ok let’s be honest 2 glasses, but they are small glasses 125ml, a couple of units. 3 units.
Tuesday: well the bottle’s open from Monday so I’m likely to finish off Monday night’s bottle. My partner’s preoccupied and got a deadline to finish so I can’t really even pretend to myself that we shared it. 6 units.
Wednesday Hump day: big work planning day, needed a few tinnies just to help me relax for when we finished, I don’t want to be carrying the work stress into the house with me. The tinnies have given me the taste for it though so maybe I’ll open a red. 12 units.
Thursday: I’m cooking and I like to have a drink when I cook. 5 units.
Friday: start of the weekend on a catch up video call with my brother and sister in law . Gin and tonic, yes please. Beers before dinner, wine during, check. 12 units.
Saturday: i’m planning to drink in the evening, I found some interesting craft beers… with a ridiculous high ABV… 8 units.
Sunday: Sunday lunch which means I started drinking early around 3 but spread out into the evening, 5 beers, 2 units a can.. another double digit day!!! 10 units.
So that’s what my week looked like, adding up the numbers… 57 units.
Wow that’s a lot and I only really felt hungover on Thursday and the Saturday morning. I guess that just shows that I have developed a tolerance to the effects of alcohol, not a good sign.
The government recommends that we drink no more than 14 units per week and that we spread these out over the week with some alcohol free days too. I have clearly moved far away from this target so plenty for me to work towards.
Time for me to rewrite my week.
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