A month of not drinking

10 February 2019

A post about not drinking on a beer blog! I decided I wanted to cut back on drinking alcohol for January, so I created a ‘No Pints’ rule for myself. The goal was to thoughtfully consider how and why I was consuming alcohol. Tasters of beer & wine meant that I wasn’t abstaining from alcohol for the month, just reducing what I had!

Upsides

  • ‘No Pints’ meant that I could still enjoy the taste of beer, just that I was limiting myself to a small sample. It meant that I slowed down and focused on the beer that I was having, not just sipping away because something happened to be in front of me
  • Explored new restaurants- Turns out my husband and I were going to many of the same places for our date nights because they had a great beer menu. This month we went to lots of new places with great food menus. It had us thinking of new places
  • Lost 6 pounds. It was combined with being more active (I cycled 230 km this month) and eating better (buying veggies at Costco), but the fact is, regular beer is a lot of calories. The biggest downside of homebrewing has been my expanding waistline. Hopefully, this month has helped reverse that trend.
  • Learning about all the fancy sodas out there- the craft soda market has really upped their game. Cane-sugar sodas, ginger beer, authentic root beer, shrub syrups- there is a wonderful world of non-alcoholic carbonated beverages to discover. A couple local taprooms are starting to offer sodas, I love the idea- so inclusive!

Downsides

  • Pregnancy Questions- a gal in her early 30s not drinking? Answer must be pregnancy. Minor, but annoying. We aren’t trying yet, but we now know enough couples that struggled with infertility or early term losses that I don’t like assumptions about anyone’s reproductive choices being thrown around.
  • Planning- I found myself inviting people over more often (and having to clean, cook etc.) so that there were pre-emptive plans not focused on the pub. I got to play a lot more of my boardgames, so maybe this was a pro?
  • Timing- this wouldn’t work any month of the year. The fact that it was January helped with the planning aspect as others were looking to not go out. There were a couple of social events (weekend away, Pints&Poses Yoga etc.) that I pushed to February to make this work.
  • Less homebrewing- those kegs aren’t going to drink themselves! Seriously, even with brewing 2.5 gallon batches I have a backlog of beer.

Conclusions

I can see this as something I’d do once or twice a year. Its good to recalibrate how and why I ‘treat myself’ with beer.
The truth is, I like the taste of excellent beer and the camaraderie in the homebrewing community. I can have both of those without having a ton of beer if I’m mindful of how much I’m consuming.