Mindful Drinking and Moderation in Midlife: How to Drink Less, On Your Terms
**A Spotify 'Rising Star' show** Practical moderation for the way you want to live.
Why can't I drink like I used to? How do I drink less without quitting completely? Should I go for low, no or light alcohol drinks? Why do alcohol-free drinks cost so much?
If you're in your 30s, 40s, 50s or beyond and asking these questions, this is your podcast.
Welcome to the essential show for midlife adults who want to drink less, on their own terms—without the pressure to quit completely, follow rigid rules, or label themselves as sober.
I'm Denise Hamilton-Mace, your mindful drinking mentor, writer and public speaker on all things low, no and light. Each week, I help stressed parents and busy midlife adults navigate their relationship with alcohol through practical approaches grounded in real-world experience and behaviour change strategy, not willpower or wellness culture
What you'll get:
Mindful Moderation Solo Episodes – Deep-dives answering the questions that matter to sophisticated drinkers who want to moderate smartly:
- How do I cut back when my partner still drinks at home?
- What really works: willpower vs. strategy?
- Why do premium alcohol-free drinks cost the same as full-strength versions?
- How do I navigate social situations when I'm the only one moderating?
This podcast is for you if:
- You're looking for practical advice that fits your demanding life, not another wellness overhaul
- You recognise that coasting with mid-strength drinks, zebra-striping, or bookending your evening with something non-alcoholic are all valid strategies
- You want better mornings without giving up celebrating life's special moments
This isn't about going completely dry or reinventing yourself. It's about keeping energy for what matters most: family, health, career, and living life on your own terms.
Join the moderation revolution happening in midlife – because while Gen Z gets the headlines, you're the one actually doing it.
Mindful Drinking and Moderation in Midlife: How to Drink Less, On Your Terms
#63. What Are Zebra Striping and Bookending (& Do They Work)?
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
In this week's FAQ, we cover:
0:21 Where do the terms come from?
1:05 What is zebra striping?
2:17 What is bookending?
2:59 Is there any data?
3:52 Who zebra striping is good for
4:33 Who zebra striping is bad for
6:59 Honest personal reflection
7:53 Zebra striping as active moderation
9:05 When bookending works well
9:41 When bookending won't work
10:27 Final thoughts
12:14 Free access to Low No Drinker Magazine
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🌱 Ready for real change in the way you drink? - https://www.lownodrinker.com/4weekreset
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🗝️ Become a Vault member to get access to the moderation tools that actually help - https://mindfuldrinking.substack.com/s/the-vault
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✏️ Come hang out with me on Substack - https://mindfuldrinking.substack.com/
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❓ Take the Midlife Drinking Triggers Quiz - https://quiz.tryinteract.com/#/68dd33385bb4a20015996a13
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Hello and welcome to Low no Drinker FAQ , a weekly look at the world of low no light drinks , drinkers and drinking , where , each week , I'll help you to find , understand and enjoy the amazing drinks that allow us all to live a life less intoxicated . I'm Denise Hamilton-Mace and I am the founder , editor and host of all things Low no Drinker
Where do the terms come from?
Speaker 1this week's FAQ . Does zebra striping and bookending actually work ? Okay , so let's start at the beginning and have a look at what these terms actually mean and , indeed , where they even came from . So in 2024 , the research company CAM partnered with alcohol-free beer company Lucky Saint to develop a report in which they unveiled these two terms to describe the way that they see people are drinking and using alcohol-free drinks when they go out . So these are not new concepts . Cam didn't come up with them , lucky Saint didn't create them , but they did sort of coin the term .
What is zebra striping?
Speaker 1Basically , zebra striping refers to the act of drinking one alcohol-free drink for every alcohol-full drink that you consume . So imagine you are off down the pub and you meet up with your friends and you get the first round in and everybody's having a pint or wine or a cocktail , whatever it is that you're having . You have your first drink and your first drink has got alcohol in it . So for your next drink you would drink an alcohol-free drink . Now this doesn't just mean the general advice of having a glass of water in between every drink , which is good advice , but that's not specifically what zebra striping refers to . It refers to the fact that the next drink that you have might be that lucky saint , or it might be a rebel's zero gin and tonic , or it might be a ready to drink alcohol-free mocktail Anything that is in that sort of alcohol-free , non-alcoholic drink space . Then , after that drink , the next drink you would have would be permitted or allowed to have alcohol in it . So you would just be alternating between alcohol full and alcohol free drinks throughout the evening . Okay , so that's zebra striping .
What is bookending?
Speaker 1Bookending is something slightly different but similar . So bookending refers to the act of going out to that same pub with that same group of friends on the same night out . But when you get to the pub , that first drink that you have would be an alcohol free drink Again , not just water , but an alcohol free , adult alternative drink . You would then go about your evening and consume alcohol to your heart's content , and your last drink of the night before you go would again be an alcohol-free drink . So you started and ended the evening with an alcohol-free drink , hence the term bookending . Okay , so pretty straightforward when you break them down
Is there any data?
Speaker 1.
Speaker 1The question then is do these techniques actually work ? Are they effective for people who are looking at reducing their alcohol intake ? Will they help you to drink less on a night out ? It's very difficult to answer this question with any sort of scientific accuracy . There isn't any definitive data that states that this group of people went out and zebra striped and had this result of their drinking experience , and this group of people bookended and they felt like this . This is one of those situations where all the talk you hear about it is very much anecdotal and unfortunately , I know people hate this phrase , but it really does depend . This is going to have to be one of those times when you try the good old-fashioned suck it and see , approach and see if it works for you .
Speaker 1Me personally ,
Who zebra striping is good for
Speaker 1I think that something like zebra striping could be really great for those people who are the type of person who is very organized , has very good self-control , who is quite happy to plan ahead and is very good at knowing what's coming up and being prepared for it and ready to say this is my plan of action for the evening . This is exactly where I'm going to go . These are the drinks that are on offer . First of all , I'm going to have this this is my alcohol full drink and this is my alcohol free option , and this is what I'm going to stick to for the evening . If you're that kind of person , then something like zebra striping could and should , work really , really well for you .
Speaker 1If , however , you're
Who zebra striping is bad for
Speaker 1a little bit more If , however , you're a little bit more like me and you're a little bit more I don't want to call myself scatterbrained , because that would be an insult to myself but if you are a little bit more , let's say , laissez-faire in your approach to your night out or what you're doing , something like zebra striping does possibly present some challenges , because the problem with alcohol is that it impairs your decision-making abilities . As you know , this is not a sobriety podcast . This is not recovery . This is not anti-alcohol . I'm not saying you shouldn't have a drink , by all means . If that's what you decide to do , then good on you . You do things your way .
Speaker 1If you do decide to drink alcohol and you are then following that alcoholic drink with a non-alcoholic drink , that's probably going to work really well for your first couple of drinks . However , once you've had a couple of alcohol-full beverages , your ability to make rational and helpful and forward-plan planning decisions begins to diminish . This is just a statement of fact . It is the way that alcohol affects the brain . It affects your inhibitions , it affects your decision-making processes .
Speaker 1So something like zebra striping is a really , really good thing to do , for the start of the evening perhaps , or if you know you're only going to be out for a little while . However , if you're out for a longer time , if you're out with friends for over a few hours , my guess is that this is going to be slightly harder for you to manage and maintain . Now again , this depends on the type of person you are and how organized you can be and how much self-control you're skilled at exerting . But if you are looking at changing your relationship with alcohol , the likelihood is that once you've had a couple of drinks in you , you are the type of person who might just throw caution to the wind and say , ah , screw it , I'm out anyway , let's have a few more .
Speaker 1So can zebra striping work ? Of course it can work . It absolutely can work . And if you're the kind of person that it works for , then I think that's absolutely fantastic and you should continue to do it and tell your friends about it and share it with the world , because any techniques that we find that help us look at our relationship with alcohol in a positive light are worth talking about and worth sharing .
Honest personal reflection
Speaker 1But I don't necessarily think it's something that's going to work for everyone , and that's why I say it's got to be a suck it and see kind of situation . You have to be prepared to give these things a try . So go on out for your evening , go out for your meal or for whatever it is that you're doing , and give it a go At the end of the night or possibly the next morning , depending on how it's .
Speaker 1I would really encourage you to have a really honest chat with yourself and think about just how effective that routine or that system or that process or that framework has been for you . Did it produce the results that you wanted ? Were you able to stick to your one alcohol for one alcohol free routine or system , or did you find it challenging ? Did you find that after your third drink it all went out the window ? Did you find it a bit stressful ? You know always having to remember what drink you had next and to be restricted to what you can have afterwards .
Zebra striping as active moderation
Speaker 1Zebra striping , for me , falls into what I call an active moderation technique , and active moderation can work for many people . Active moderation I've spoken about it many times before , but that's what I consider to be things like a dry January or sober October , or setting yourself a rule to say that I don't drink Monday to Thursday but I can drink Friday to Saturday , for example . Passive moderation , which is where you've actually gone beyond the need to set yourself rules and you've actually decided to live a lifestyle of moderation , in that your choices around drinking are based on how you feel and what you're trying to achieve with your life , rather than a set of structured rules , is to me , a more successful way of venturing down this mindful drinking path in the long term . But zebra striping could well work for you in the short term . If it helps you to kickstart that passive moderation approach . If it helps you to kickstart your changing of your drinking habits , then it's a really good thing to try . You're going to have to figure this one out for yourself . It's just one of those situations that nobody else can really give you the answer to .
When bookending works well
Speaker 1Now the other side of this is the bookending and whether or not that will work . Again , it's one of those things where I think if you're out for a shorter evening or shorter time , then bookending is probably going to work really , really well . If you're going out , for example , for a lunch or a meal and you're going to have an alcohol-free drink to start the evening , you'll have a nice aperitif to get yourself ready for your meal , and then perhaps you have a glass of wine with your dinner or your lunch , and then you end the evening with an alcohol-free cocktail , that could work really really well , and I can see that being really successful for a lot of people .
When bookending won't work
Speaker 1If , however , you're going on a more exuberant , shall we say , night out and you're likely to be out for a few hours , having one alcohol-free drink at the start of the evening , one alcohol-free drink at the end of the evening , but having seven or eight alcohol-full drinks in between , is going to make something like bookending less effective . In fact , by the time you get to the end of an evening like that , you're probably not going to be making the best decisions for yourself and thinking about something as controlled or regimented as having an alcohol-free drink to end your evening is likely to either not happen at all or to not have very much of an effect on all the alcohol-free drinks you've had beforehand .
Final thoughts
Speaker 1So I definitely see a place for both of these in a moderating lifestyle . I definitely think that they have benefits to them and that they can help people change the way that they drink .
Speaker 1To someone who might be thinking , oh my god , I don't want to have to go out and drink as much as I do when I'm normally with my group of friends , doing something like zebra striping or bookending can give you a sense of positivity about the night , because you know you've got a plan that's going to mean that you're likely to drink a lot less . You have to know yourself to do something like this successfully , though , and you have to be able to be honest with yourself . If you know that you are the type of person that , once you've had one or maybe two alcohol full drinks , that you are unlikely to stick to your plans and that you're going to throw all caution to the wind , then you know that that's not going to work for you . So be honest with yourself , because nobody else can do it for you , and just decide if this is really something that's going to work for you . And if you do go out and give this a try , I'd love to know how it works for you . Please do let me know about your experiences when you are out searching for low , no and light alcohol drinks that you can enjoy with your friends in social situations , good or bad . I'd love to know what experiences you are having and how I can help you with those . So don't forget .
Speaker 1The easiest way to contact me is just to reply to one of my newsletters , which I send out on a weekly basis for you , and the easiest way to get on the mailing list for the newsletter is to head to lonodrinkermagazinecom , forward , slash free gifts and download one of the amazing freebies in there . I highly recommend the Lono Nation New Citizen Quick Start Guide , which is full of really useful guides like what is a unit , what is ABV and where do I find great Lono and light alcohol drinks
Free access to Low No Drinker Magazine
Speaker 1. And for those of you who haven't yet subscribed to Lono Drinker magazine , I have just introduced a we'll call it semi-permanent free trial for the digital version of the magazine . You can now get access to every single Lono Drinker magazine ever published online with a seven-day free trial . When you head to lonodrinkermagazinecom , forward slash subscribe . That's it for now . Cheers to a life less intoxicated .
