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Ask HN: How did you stop drinking?

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Re: Ask HN: How did you stop drinking?

#151

Post by codespin »

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.

Re: Ask HN: How did you stop drinking?

#152

Post by randomsearch »

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.

Re: Ask HN: How did you stop drinking?

#153

Post by hardware2win »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #149

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'v…

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

One beer?

Also

Alco often delivers crazy social interactions that may be very desired

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

I wish, a lot of books that ive read were mostly waste of time e.g dragon book

Re: Ask HN: How did you stop drinking?

#155

Post by Markoff »

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.

Re: Ask HN: How did you stop drinking?

#156

Post by Jaeon1 »

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!

Re: Ask HN: How did you stop drinking?

#157

Post by blablablerg »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #149

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'v…

Look backwards.. good advice!

Re: Ask HN: How did you stop drinking?

#158

Post by BenGosub »

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.

Re: Ask HN: How did you stop drinking?

#160

Post by jcims »

imgabe wrote: post #26

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 he…

>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).

This is where I would settle as well, except some Saturdays when I'd have a bloody mary in the morning then just nurse gin and sodas from noon until 2am Sunday. Just enough to keep a little happy buzz going, I really don't like getting drunk at all.

My daughter started a practice of not buying alcohol for her home. I started doing that and it's actually working quite well. Still will get a beer or glass of wine with dinner when we're out but I don't burn down handles of rye or gin over the course of a week.

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