Abstain April

I never considered myself a drinker. I didn’t have my first alcoholic drink until I was twenty.

I would go out drinking with my roommates in college, but I was not drinking nightly. I remember drinking too much and throwing in sinks when I should have been throwing up in the toilets. My worst experience was when I challenged myself to drink the rest of a party punch and spent the night on the couch of two ex-girlfriends. I was never welcomed back.

My wife and I bought a bar from Pottery Barn and loaded it with mixers and liquors. I enjoyed making White Russians and mixed drinks, but it was sold when our youngest was born.

I never tracked my alcohol consumption as I never felt drawn to the drink. I assumed I had a couple of glasses a week. However, I was inspired by this Reddit post to evaluate how much I am drinking.

Dry January

I had already decided to try Dry January since I needed a New Year’s resolution. Still, I wanted to ensure I tracked how many drinks I had once I started drinking, not just my current tracking of whether I was sober that day.

I made it through the month relatively easily. My wife rarely drinks, and I don’t have much social pressure to drink except when we play trivia on Tuesday nights. On Tuesday, January 31st, we had only our second trivia night of the month, and I thought hard about drinking but kept to my goal.

One of my friends said that January was a “bad month” to stop drinking. He is probably the lightest drinker at the table after me. I went with him to a music trivia night earlier in the month, where I also avoided the pitchers of free beer. He has a lot of social obligations in January. My Playstation doesn’t care if I drink or not.

I am now curious to see which months may make better dry months.

February and March

I decided to have two Bud Selects with some pizza on February 2nd and drink on the following trivia Tuesday. Valentine’s Day is a pretty easy way to steer off course in February, but being the shortest month of the year makes it a strong contender. So, I drank eight days in February and only 18 total drinks. I felt good about that number, so I let myself go in March.

In March, I drank nine days but had 28 total drinks. Eleven drinks came from a full day at Buffalo Wild Wings watching the opening of March Madness basketball. I enjoy March Madness, and it could be tough to avoid drinking and watching basketball at some point during the tournament.

Near the end of March, my tingles had reached an extreme. I was trying anything to improve my health. I figured averaging a drink a day in March was too high. I thought April would be a good choice for another dry month. That said, April is my birthday month, Easter, and the start of the baseball season. However, if you offer me a piece of cake versus a beer, I will take the cake ten times out of ten.

I knew I didn’t have to have a drink on my birthday, even if I celebrated with friends.

My Dad rarely drinks, and Easter came and went without issue. The month was full of trips for my wife and my oldest child. I spent most days in our house and hardly even thought about drinking. I didn’t tell anyone I wasn’t drinking for the month; it was just part of my routine.

I have started to understand how much of our society is based around food and drink for celebration and experiencing joy. We want to reward ourselves for surviving a tough day by having a drink instead of spending time doing something we love. I thankfully don’t turn first to a drink, but I still turn to sugar.

Other Months?

I had a giant margarita for Cinco de Mayo, which is also my wife’s birthday month. But May could be an option, as the kids have been in school for almost a month.

June, July, and August are all harder months with vacations and social summer hangouts. But my 2022 sober calendar showed October and November as the other feasible months.