Why I finally decided to quit drinking alcohol

About 15 years ago, I did something very dumb.

I was still young and I was completely miserable at work. I knew I had chosen the wrong career despite having just started it. I was good at my job and was something of a star employee for someone in their early 20s, despite my dislike of it. My happiness and job satisfaction plummeted further thanks in large part to one boss who bullied his staff on an almost daily basis.

I teetered a bit, then moved into a position where I was happier, but I was still very depressed and unsatisfied.

So one night after work (I was on evening hours at the time), I decided to try what I’d seen on TV and in movies a million times.

In university, I’d drink alcohol once a week with my friends at the bar or whatever. When I wasn’t in that situation, I didn’t give alcohol a second thought. And it stayed that way until that one night, when I did that one dumb thing.

Sitting on top of our fridge was a bottle of whiskey that had been left over from some previous party or visit and that had sat dormant for some time. I went over, put a couple of ice cubes in a glass, and poured myself just one drink.

I sat back on the couch, picked up by book, and sipped on the dark liquid. Oh so sophisticated! I felt relaxed and happy, and I thought that if I could end every day like this, it would solve all my problems.

I had only one drink that night.

And that one drink set me on a 14-year course of excessive drinking that I’ve only recently come out of.

I was so excited to tell my wife about my great idea the next day, though. Just one drink! What a way to de-stress from the day!

My wife smiled and said, “be careful with that.”

Oh yes, of course, I assured her. It was only one harmless drink after all!

After a few more nights of just one drink, the whiskey was gone. I didn’t have a lot of booze in our apartment. At the time, I was still only drinking maybe once a week with friends, and sometimes not for a couple of weeks.

We had one bottle left, though: some Finnish vodka a friend had brought back as a gift from his trip to Europe. I had an iron stomach at the time, and the fact that the taste of vodka, if you really think about it, isn’t all that far from that of nail polish remover, didn’t dissuade me. That bottle was full when I opened it, and by the end of that bottle, my “just one drink” sessions had evolved into a “just 1.5 or two drinks” sessions.

If you’ve found this story and the new publication I’ve started here, you probably know what happened next. Alcohol became a convenient solution to every stressor and emotion in my life. Had a crappy day at work? Get kinda drunk. Feel sad? Get kinda drunk. Feel happy? Hey, could be happier, right? Drink. Feeling just bored? Drinking would be more fun than being bored. And by the way, you know what’s more fun than two drinks? Four!

Did I destroy my life? Get cancer? Lose my wife and kids? Did I drive drunk? Did I kill someone?

No. I certainly knew my health was deteriorating because of alcohol — and that was a driving factor toward me wanting to quit — as I moved into my late 30s, but I didn’t have any one big, acute health scare to speak of. If you have a drinking problem that intense you should be speaking to a doctor before any attempt to quit.

In my case, I was quite successful in my career, happily married and an exceptional father. I also wasn’t drinking more than several people I knew personally who were totally unperturbed about their alcohol intake, nor was I drinking an amount that would shock current societal standards.

But I was tired. I was tired of feeling tired. I was tired of not sleeping well enough. I was tired of having low energy all the time. I was tired of cycling from caffeine to alcohol to bad sleep and back to caffeine and alcohol the next day and over and over again, just to get through the day on my feet.

I was also tired of disappointing myself.

I’d always wanted to accomplish something outside of the typical commuter life. I wanted to write on my own terms, to build a business. But when you’re approaching middle age and have work responsibilities and family responsibilities and home maintenance responsibilities and financial responsibilities, who has the energy for that?

Listen … YOU have the energy for that. I know because I have it now, and this very article is a testament to that.

Looking back now, I can’t help but regret just how many hours I pissed away. I can’t help but think of what I could have accomplished had I not felt so sluggish on so many days. How much better my fitness and energy and mood could have been.

No, I didn’t destroy my life. I was the type of problem drinker that isn’t really seen as a problem anymore. Not only has drinking almost every day been completely normalized and seen as a reasonable solution to dealing with the mundane problems of everyday life, it’s actually celebrated!

“Uhg, my boss is such an idiot,” you write on Facebook. “Thank God it’s Wine O’Clock!”

“I have never heard so much whining as I did from my kids today :/ … pass me a beer (or 10 lol).”

Post that type of stuff and watch the Likes and the encouraging comments pile up.

After I finally hit the wall, I listened to some audiobooks about quitting drinking. They helped me enormously in motivating me to quit, but I knew I’d need to do more to really kick the habit.

I decided to come at my hurdle in a smart, pragmatic way, and from several directions. I’ve studied it, tracked it, identified its weaknesses and attacked them every way I know how. My goal, as a former journalist, was to compile facts and use information and common sense, along with some great tools I’d found, to build a strategy that would kill my bad habit with a million little cuts.

I’m doing this in a completely drama-free way. The content I plan to write here is for the many people who aren’t necessarily struggling with hereditary, genetic factors that compel them to drink in a truly destructive way, but who are definitely doing damage to their goals, health and self-esteem. I approach this as a behavioural tick rather than a “disease.”

One of the reasons I think people are ashamed to admit that they’re drinking too much is that it’s been built up to be something binary and terrible. Either you’re an “alcoholic” or you’re not.

Ergo, if you’re drinking heavily all the time and you’re fine with it (or even proud of it), you’re the fun party guy. If you suggest that you’re unhappy and want to make a change, but don’t know how to do it yet, you’re an “alcoholic.”

I think I’ve built a method for getting my drinking under control that appeals to and works for me. I’m an active-minded (restless?) person who likes to come at problems analytically, so that’s what I’ve done. Over the coming days and weeks I’ll post some of my tricks and findings here. If you’re interested, please do give me a follow!

Even if you aren’t exactly the same as me and you find some of these ideas less valuable, my hope is that you will at least take something away from these articles that you can integrate into your own strategy for success. You may find that some of the tactics here translate well to other areas of your life, as they are for me.

At the end of the day, it’s about knowing yourself. You have to learn how to recognize and track your behaviours, turn weaknesses into the strengths, and ultimately build the life you want.

I hope you enjoy reading about this journey, and I hope it inspires you to start yours!

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