Dry February?

Ireland is one of the few countries where we both celebrate and commiserate with alcohol. On a hot day, we might head to a beer garden. When the weather is miserable where better to pass the time than in a cosy pub toasting ourselves by the fire? We overindulge throughout December with parties, nights out and Christmas celebrations. January which is usually a dry month (often because we are financially broke). Lent is an opportunity for us to prove to ourselves that we can remain sober for forty days and forty nights (with a permissible blow-out on St Patrick’s Day!) But what about February? It’s a bit of an enigma.

Alcohol is intertwined in our everyday living, so much so, that when a person doesn’t drink there must be a reason – pregnancy, antibiotics, recovering alcoholic? It may be because he/she simply chooses not to drink.

I have noticed a fairly recent shift in our drinking habits. We now drink more at home before we go out and in general having wine with a meal isn’t really drinking. However, wine is no different to other types of alcohol. To our bodies, alcohol is alcohol.

An unpopular piece of health news is that alcohol is linked with several cancers including mouth, bowel and throat. I often think I do not gain fans sharing this information because we would rather ignore the news that alcohol is a carcinogen.

After a recent talk to a community group someone mentioned that I had introduced the topic of alcohol in an unusual way. I explained that my aim is simply to encourage people to think before they have that extra alcoholic drink (and by making minor changes in our lives we can impact our children’s views of alcohol). We know that cigarettes are bad for us but the notion that alcohol is bad…well, that’s not something we really want to think about. Ignorance is bliss but it is also potentially lethal.

Cutting down the amount we drink, could potentially reduce the risk of alcohol-related cancers. Alcohol is not just connected to cancer – it causes accidents and injuries; leads us to say and do things that we cannot unsay or undo. It causes us to fight, stress, engage in risky sexual behaviours and put ourselves in danger which we would never do when not under the influence. As well as dulling our memory and helping us make dodgy decisions, alcohol is linked with heart and liver-disease, high blood pressure, poor sleep, anxiety, depression (there is a long list).

I am not writing about this because I want to scare, annoy or upset anyone. I am encouraging you to make informed decisions about your alcohol intake. You do not need alcohol to function, to engage with others, to make you interesting or to help you sleep. If you do, perhaps you might re-think your drinking.

Cutting down means you can avoid hangovers, save money, get a great night’s sleep, improve mental and physical health.

How you can cut down your alcohol intake:

Encourage friends/family to support you. Explain that you don’t want to be encouraged to drink (and that there is nothing wrong with not drinking).

Don’t bring alcohol home. If it is not in the house you will be less tempted. This doesn’t mean you have to drink all the alcohol in the house to get rid of it!

Examine your drinking routine so that you can decide on what needs to be changed. When do you drink and where?

Distract yourself. Do something different at the time you usually drink e.g. shower, walk, dance, vacuum, phone someone, read.

Change your scenery. Suggest going to the cinema or for a meal instead of going to the pub.

Set a limit to the number of drinks and stop once your limit is reached. You might consider bringing only enough money for a certain number of drinks if you’re going to the pub.

Finish each drink before ordering/pouring another to help you keep track of how much you are consuming.

Slow down. Drinking is never a race! Alternating with a glass of water helps us slow the pace.

Drink from a smaller glass.

Have a bottle instead of a can, a single instead of a double. Pour one glass of wine then put the bottle away.

Increase your alcohol-free days in the week.