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Reasons young people are choosing sobriety

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Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety

#61

Post by MichaelCollins »

vouaobrasil wrote: post #5

I'll say why I am. I don't even know what it's like to be under the influence of alcohol...and I love it. The type of social situations with a bunch of people laughing and tipsy is repulsive to me. I have been to a few such situations and it is universally a waste of time.

If you've never been drunk, then I think it's hard for you to have any personal insight into the reasons other people used to get drunk but now choose not to.

I'm not saying you should get that experience. Better for you if you continue your abstinence. But you should probably check your attitude when discussing things you have no experience with.

Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety

#62

Post by GekkePrutser »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #57
GekkePrutser wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also have had depression and it's very important to note that Alcohol while temporarily lifting it, will cause an even worse depression the next day. At least it does for me, like clockwork. I've always coped with this by realising that it is purely chemical and ignoring it because it goes away by the next evening, but sometimes it was tough. Still, it helped me fix the 'root cause' of being depressed which was bei…

>Alcohol while temporarily lifting it, will cause an even worse depression the next day. At least it does for me, like clockwork. Not for me. As long as I keep my empirically determined 2 pints of beer limit, I'm at that perfect sweet spot between my anxiety and inhibitions going away, while still staying mentally sharp and avoiding any negative side effects of alcohol. The best code and most successful solutions I e…

Yeah for me that doesn't work because if I stop drinking I get a splitting headache and that instantly ruins my social skills. Even when hydrating with other stuff, strange enough. With very moderate drinking I can hold it off for a while but it will still come. I also get this restless/irritable mood when I stop drinking which is also a moodkiller. Once I start I'm committed till the end :) At the bar I just used to stop a while once I started dropping things and that was ok.

I used to say: "I'm intolerant to small amounts of beer" :)

Of course after drinking a lot I get it too but by that time I tend to be asleep and don't really notice if I can sleep in the next morning.

Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety

#63

Post by roland35 »

daniel-thompson wrote: post #30

When I was in my 20s, I drank socially from time to time and even occasionally by myself. As I've grown older, I pretty much stopped: - I've found that the pressures of "adult" responsibilities (kids, real career, etc) leave little time for it - I want to model good behavior for my kids, and in particular, I don't want my kids to see me drinking or drunk - I'm in the back half of my 30s now - I've realized that the t…

All good reasons! As a parent too I also feel like I need to be available and responsible in case of any emergency with my young children. I was never really a big drinker though so it isn't much of a sacrifice.

Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety

#64

Post by peregrine »

nawgz wrote: post #52
peregrine wrote: post #40

Once you stop drinking the hangovers get worse and worse. The pandemic removed the pressure to drink (for some) and now it’s really hard to lose an entire day to feeling like garbage in exchange for a couple hours of partying. I still drink one or two socially but anymore and my next day is a mess.

Sounds to me more like you don't eat and hydrate enough when you drink. If I simply have alcohol for a night and nothing else, of course I'm hungover; but if I stay hydrated and eat AND drink, I can get pretty intoxicated without much ill effect the next day.

Sounds like you drink more often than once or twice a quarter.

Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety

#67

Post by MichaelCollins »

nawgz wrote: post #52
peregrine wrote: post #40

Once you stop drinking the hangovers get worse and worse. The pandemic removed the pressure to drink (for some) and now it’s really hard to lose an entire day to feeling like garbage in exchange for a couple hours of partying. I still drink one or two socially but anymore and my next day is a mess.

Sounds to me more like you don't eat and hydrate enough when you drink. If I simply have alcohol for a night and nothing else, of course I'm hungover; but if I stay hydrated and eat AND drink, I can get pretty intoxicated without much ill effect the next day.

> Sounds to me more like you don't eat and hydrate enough when you drink.

If he's like me, that's not the case. I've always drank tons of water after drinking booze. I used to not get hangovers, but as I got older the hangovers got worse. I took a few years break from drinking, and now when I try drinking a little the hangovers are worse than ever before, no matter how much I hydrate. Two drinks at dinner is my limit now. And no earlier than dinner, because it makes me very lethargic for the rest of the day. Three drinks and I'll be miserable for the next day too.

Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety

#68

Post by drclau »

andai wrote: post #59

This one time I woke up in Belgium without my wallet. The disturbing part though was that I had actually been awake the whole time, but had blacked out completely for 8 hours. The last thing I remember was looking at a line of shots around 9pm. Between 9pm and 5am I have no memory. My body was just doing its own thing. When I "woke up" I was already awake, walking down a dark country road. All my stuff was gone. Had…

Have you considered that you may have been drugged?

Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety

#69

Post by nawgz »

peregrine wrote: post #64
nawgz wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds to me more like you don't eat and hydrate enough when you drink. If I simply have alcohol for a night and nothing else, of course I'm hungover; but if I stay hydrated and eat AND drink, I can get pretty intoxicated without much ill effect the next day.

Sounds like you drink more often than once or twice a quarter.

Oh yeah, I am a regular consumer, but the nature of hangovers seems entirely divorced to the frequency of drinking to me.

Re: Reasons young people are choosing sobriety

#70

Post by diogenescynic »

yuan43 wrote: post #26

The bigger question is why isn't sobriety viewed as the default position rather than the exception? I mean, nobody would ask why young people are saying "no" to crack cocaine.

I'm not a big drinker at all (probably less than 4 alcoholic drinks a year), but I don't think sobriety is the default or even really the norm for most civilizations/societies. Alcohol especially is a social lubricant which is useful for meeting new people when you're younger and other countries drink beer and wine as a bigger part of their culture/tradition/socialization--but they also tend to drink less excessively than Americans. It's also a way for people to celebrate and blow off steam at the end of the week. I think alcohol has always had a huge place in society and I don't think sobriety is the default for most people--even if I don't personally enjoy it that much.
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