Dry January 2021

Yesterday I really felt like having a glass of wine. It was really the first time since I started the Dry January I genuinely felt I don't want to resist wine anymore. Afterall, it had already been 12 days with no alcohol whatsoever, and to have 1 glass of wine didn't seem such a big deal. I won't lie, it really took immense willpower to not succumb and to grab a non-alcoholic beer from the fridge instead.  Maybe it's something to do with the boredom that is kicking in with the lockdown situation. I've kept myself busy every single day in the beginning of the year. I've gone for my runs, I've done a jigsaw puzzle, I've cleaned the house inside and out, I've planted tulips, I've gone for long walks, I've read 2 books but now for the past couple of days I've started to completely run out of stuff to do.  As I'm nearly half way through this challenge I need to look back to day 1 and remind myself of all the good reasons why I'm doing...

I've realised that for the past 3 days I've thought of having a drink much less than I expected. The Dry January promise even seems to be getting easier, rather than harder.  There was only one time when I genuinely felt like I'd like to have a glass of wine, which was after I'd just cleaned all the house. There's something very comforting in rewarding yourself with a nice glass of wine after hours of decluttering, dusting, hoovering, sanitising and mopping. I pictured myself sitting in my perfectly clean living room with that delicious glass of wine, being proud of myself.  Yet, just moments later I realised that I can still sit in my perfectly clean living room feeling proud of myself even without the wine.  That has just made me realise how often I've turned to Wine for a reward or, equally, for compassion.  When there's something big to celebrate at work, we always open a bottle in the office. Similarly, whenever I've had a stressful day at work (whi...

Another day has passed in my very sober lockdown. I have gotten into a bad habit of sleeping in until late and going to bed very late (I keep wondering, would a glass of red wine help me fall asleep quicker?). I’ve read 2 books a week, run a total of 21.1 km over 3 days, and done a little bit of my jigsaw puzzle with Carla. Not very exciting.   After endless pints of tap water and about 300 cups of tea later I finally had a go with a non-alcoholic beer with dinner this evening.   It was Heineken 0% in a can. It wasn’t too bad to be honest, and surely a welcome change to tea and water.   I’m not a huge fan of non-alcoholic wine (I'm a devoted wine connoisseur, after all!) or cocktails. I read some non-alcoholic cocktail recipes online, but I simply cannot imagine the taste of an Espresso Martini without vodka and Kahlua, or a Negroni without gin, vermouth and Campari (a cocktail of which ingredients are ALL alcoholic). I really, really don’t want to traumatise my cockta...

It's not my first time trying to do Dry January. I've been doing it on and off for several years, some more successful than others. Last year, after kicking off 2020 with some champagne at work, because, as always, I worked on NYE 2019, I savoured those last couple of glasses of bubbly with a GREAT feeling of all good things ahead of me that new year. If only had I known then, what was about to hit all of us.  Nevertheless, the year had started off well. But everywhere I went, someone always offered me a glass of complimentary drink. A perk of the industry suddenly became such a nuisance. I politely declined one, two, three times. Until the fourth time it was hopeless. I gave in. It was a glass of beautiful rosé champagne at the Royal Horseguards Hotel where we had sampled afternoon tea with colleagues. I think my Dry January had lasted for about 12 days.  So it was a good start of the year at work, and then it got even better on 14th of February, when Carla p...

You probably would have guessed by now that my choice of poison is definitely wine. I might opt for a quick cold beer on a holiday in a hot country, or a pint in a pub with colleagues after work. I would also very much enjoy a gin & tonic time by time but most of the time that drink reminds me of my Mum. But wine - wine literally goes down on any occasion, any day or any mood, and be it white, red or sparkling, almost anything goes. Maybe not a rosé that much, but even a rosé will do in case of an emergency. At home, we have 3 bottles of champagne, one of them a Magnum, 13 bottles of white, 3 bottles of rosé and 15 bottles of red (yes, the Brexit panic shopping wine). Aside of that, we have a shelf with Carla’s gin collection. There are 8 different bottles of gin, all of them unopened, most of them very expensive and some of them extremely unique. Time by time she allows herself to open the cheapest, the most boring and the most common bottle, such as a basic Tanqueray or a Gordon...

As I've mentioned before, there have always been a few booze free days per week anyway, so going dry for the first two days has really not been a problem or a burden yet (what a relief!). I discovered that I managed to fit in a lot of activities to my booze free day No1. I went for a 6K run, read a book, did a bit of a jigsaw puzzle and watched a movie without falling asleep 10 minutes into the film.  Nevertheless, there are these thoughts creeping up to my mind and I keep asking myself if a whole month without any alcohol (read: wine) is really that necessary? What if I did it only on weekdays and allowed myself a glass of wine on a Saturday night only? What harm could that do? It's still better to have 5 booze free days rather than 2 booze free days, right?  Even according to some UK health experts one unit of alcohol per day for women (and no more than 7 units per week), and two drinks per day for men, is perfectly normal, legal and even healthy, so what am I on about ...

Part of me knows that the Dry January is over before it can even begin. When I told my friend James that I’m doing dry January he told me why on earth would I suffer from such a self inflicted misery and that he would never put himself through a torture like this. It truly is heartbreaking to think of all the good memories that a decent drink normally brings along. Enjoying a lovely glass of wine whilst reading a good book and cuddling up with my cats on the sofa... Or having a perfectly well matched glass of red with a nice piece of steak for dinner. I love to cook and a lot of food I make contain wine in the cooking process. It’s often the rule that half bottle goes into the cooking sauce while sipping the other half from a glass…  It really does feel like a break up.  It also doesn’t help that we had JUST stocked up our wonderfully stylish wine racks and white wine fridge with a great selection of fine wines. We knew we had to beat the rising prices after Brexit so we m...