Mindful Drinking & Moderation in Midlife: Low No Drinker Podcast

#103. No One Tells You This About Drinking Less in Midlife

• Denise Hamilton-Mace • Episode 103

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Let’s dive into some little-discussed truths about changing your relationship with alcohol that nobody talks about. From disrupted sleep and mood swings in those first crucial weeks, to navigating shifting friendships and social dynamics, I'm not sugarcoating anything. 

I explore how your taste buds will literally change, why you'll discover more about yourself than ever before, and how this journey impacts everyone around you - not just you. 

Most importantly, I address why midlife drinkers need different support and advice than the twenty-something wellness influencers dominating social media.

0:00 Truths About Life Less Intoxicated
1:29 It's not about the booze
3:22 It takes time
8:27 The impact on your friends and family
17:04 You're Not the Only One Drinking Less
22:03 You will get to know yourself like never before
28:29 It Doesn't Have to Be All or Nothing
32:37 How you feel about alcohol will change
37:47 You need a different type of support in midlife

Best episode to listen to next:
#66 Active vs Passive Moderation
#78 How Your Tastes Change When You Start Drinking Low/No

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Speaker 1:

Everyone talks about the clear skin, the great night's sleep, the blissful weekend mornings, being an amazing parent and a perfect spouse, but I have never been one to sugarcoat the truth, so today I want to talk to you about some of the other truths that accompany choosing a life less intoxicated. Now, some of the things I'm gonna cover today might surprise you. Some might seem obvious but have more nuance than you realize, and some might be a complete revelation. But all the points that I'm about to share with you today, once you understand them better, will help to prepare and support you, whether you're just entering into low-knowing life for the first time or you've been a mindful drinker for a while. But you still have some questions. So let's jump to it.

Speaker 1:

Hello, hello and welcome to the Mindful Drinking and Midlife Moderation podcast from Low no Drinker, the leading global magazine for mindful and sober curious drinkers. My name, as you'll know by now, is Denise Hamilton-Mace, and I'm the founder, editor and host of all things Low no Drinker. And I'm the founder, editor and host of all things low-no drinker, and I'm here to help you find, understand and enjoy the world of low-no and light alcohol drinks, drinkers and drinking, so that you can build a life less intoxicated, on your own terms. So I've got seven points for you today, plus a bonus one that we're going to take a look at and we're going to just jump straight at. And we're going to just jump straight into it, because there's no time for messing about here. The first thing that I want you to be aware of when it comes to jumping into choices to change your relationship with alcohol is that it is not just about the alcohol. Okay, there's a lot of talk about you know. Let's talk about alcohol-free drinks, non-alcoholic drinks, and I do a lot of talk about you know. Let's talk about alcohol-free drinks, non-alcoholic drinks, and I do a lot of that myself.

Speaker 1:

But making this choice isn't actually about the booze itself. Yes, we have the medical concerns that alcohol can bring along, we have the psychological concerns that alcohol can bring along, but actually making this choice is a mental decision. This is not just about the booze itself. This is about questioning why you want to make a choice to change the way you drink. What are you trying to achieve that what you're currently doing is stopping you from achieving? It's about questioning why we drink, what we want from our social lives and what adult drinking occasions actually mean beyond just holding a pint or a glass of wine or a gin and tonic in your hand. Your relationships with social situations are going to shift. It is there's no two ways about it, but it can shift in a really positive way.

Speaker 1:

You're actually going to get the opportunity to figure out what it is that you like about going for drinks. You're going to get a chance to recognize who you enjoy spending time with. You're going to discover a lot about yourself and I'm going to talk on that more a little bit later on. You're going to start to figure out whether you're doing things just out of habit or whether it's out of desire. Now, whatever those revelations are, it's entirely up to you how you manifest those going forward. But this is a mental journey, this is a psychological journey. This isn't just about the physical act of holding a drink. It's about what it represents and how you want that representation to change for you as you move forward in your life to whatever goals that you set for yourself, that you set for yourself.

Speaker 1:

The second thing that I think that we need to look at, that people aren't talking about and this is a big one is that it takes time, whether you are coming at this from a sober month challenge, like a sober October or a dry July or obviously dry January, whether you've just set yourself a challenge, whether you've just recognized that you want to start making a change, whether you've just set yourself a challenge, whether you've just recognized that you want to start making a change. It's really important that you are aware that just because you've made a decision on Tuesday to make a change, it doesn't mean that by Wednesday everything's going to be hunky dory and super duper fantastic. These things take time. Ok, you are listening to the midlife moderation podcast, so you are not a kid anymore. You have spent years building up these habits and these ways of doing things and it's going to take time to undo some of those habits so that you can let space in for new things. And whilst these changes take time, it might not necessarily always be as comfortable as you might like it to be, and I think it's important that you know that, and I think it's important that you know that. I think it's important that you are prepared for that, so that you know that it's also normal that it's not necessarily the easiest journey as you would like it to be.

Speaker 1:

So some things to be aware of when you start changing your relationship with alcohol. Now, obviously, the more drastically you make a change, the more acutely you're going to feel some of these things. If you're doing a dry month challenge or you're going cold turkey or whatever it is that you're doing, you know if you're completely wiping out alcohol altogether, you're going to feel these changes far more intensely than if, say, you were just cutting down. But if you're wiping out alcohol altogether, you'll also get over these changes a lot quicker than if you're just cutting down. So there are swings and roundabouts for both approaches and it's about what works best for you and what you're trying to achieve. So some of the things that you're going to feel that you're going to need to give yourself time to get over, I suppose in the simplest terms, and the first and foremost is sleep. Your sleep is definitely going to be interrupted. Now.

Speaker 1:

A lot of people might rely on alcohol to get you to sleep, and whilst alcohol might help you fall asleep quicker, it actually impacts the quality of your sleep, that deep REM sleep that we need for restoration and for your brain to put everything back together and for your body to repair itself. You don't actually get that whilst you have a lot of alcohol in your system. But what happens once you decide to start reducing the alcohol intake is that your body has to adjust, and one of those times that it makes those adjustments are while you're sleeping. So your sleep may be affected for some time, which means that you may end up feeling a bit more tired. And if you're a little bit more tired during the day, you might feel a little bit more cranky or you might feel a bit more anxious about things. We know that not getting great sleep affects the way that we feel the next day. So note that all of these things come together as kind of like a bundle, and if you notice that you're feeling effects from one area, then it's likely that it's going to impact other areas.

Speaker 1:

But, like I say, this doesn't last. So in that same vein, you know, your energy levels might be a little bit lower for a little while. You might have mood swings for a bit. You know your brain chemistry is rewiring itself. That takes a lot of energy. That takes a lot of effort and input. So you might not necessarily have that much energy left over for pleasantries and niceties. You might feel headaches and fatigue.

Speaker 1:

There's a lot of talk of this thing called the pink cloud effect, which is supposed to be kind of like a runner's high, but for changing your relationship with alcohol, where suddenly everything feels wonderful and that everybody's beautiful and the world is a fabulous place to be. Now I've run quite a few times in my life. I've never had a run as high and I've not been drinking the way I used to for a few years now and I've never had a pink cloud. So you know they're not necessary. It's not something that means that if you haven't achieved these or you haven't felt these and you haven't achieved anything, but just know that your journey is going to look different for everybody else. Now these negative impacts that you might feel will only last for a little while. We're talking like a few weeks, two to four weeks, like I said, depending on whether you're going cold turkey, for want of a better phrase or you're just moderating.

Speaker 1:

But what I really want you to remember is that you can't judge your entire alcohol-free drinking experience on the first part of making this change. So you know, if you do feel a bit crappy for the first couple of weeks, know that it will get better. There's a phrase that I like. That says this too shall pass. So you know it will pass in time and you will start to feel the positive benefits of making this change. But you might have to go through a little bit of roughness on the way to get there and, like I said, I'm not here to sugarcoat it for you. You know you need to know that this is what's happened because that way you'll know that it's normal and that you should expect it, and that you'll get over it and that you can move past it and you won't let it derail your efforts and your intentions along the way.

Speaker 1:

Okay, the third thing that I want you to be aware of when it comes to making changes in the way that you drink is the impact it's going to have on your relationship with your friends and your family and social situations. And the stranger down the pub who thinks he needs to make a comment on what you're choosing to drink when you place your order over the bar. Yes, that has happened to me. No, I'm not interested in your opinion. I didn't ask you for one. I have no comment on what you're drinking. So why you feel the need to comment on what I'm drinking, I will never know, but focusing on the people that you do actually like, you do want to talk to and whose opinions do matter to you. Your choice to change the way you drink does impact other people and quite often you'll hear people say you know it doesn't matter what other people say, or you know you shouldn't pay any attention to other people's responses. And whilst that is true to a certain extent, if there are people in your life that you care about, who care about you, it is understandable that they are going to have questions. They're going to want to talk to you about the choices that you have made, because your choices will impact them as well.

Speaker 1:

There was a great article in the last but one issue of lono drinker magazine written by the lovely neil hudson basing, a friend of mine, and he talked about how his relationship with his husband has been impacted greatly by his choice to stop drinking. Now he's gone completely sober. Um, he and his husband met at a time when he was drinking regularly and it was a huge part of their relationship going out, socialising, having wine at home with dinner, having friends around and his husband has decided to keep drinking, whilst Neil has decided to go teetotal. Of course that is going to impact the dynamic of their relationship, and it is perfectly okay for Neil's husband to want to question that, to want to talk about it. Of course you as a couple need to support each other and of course you need to be there for each other, but that doesn't mean that you get to just make this choice and not discuss it with anybody else.

Speaker 1:

Now I'm not suggesting that you have to justify yourself to your partner or to your friends or to your it with anybody else. Now I'm not suggesting that you have to justify yourself to your partner or to your friends or to your parents or whoever else. But what I am saying is that to have them on side, to have them support you, to understand why you're making these decisions, to make sure that they treat your decision with the respect that it deserves, that they honor your choices, that they don't try to encourage you to have a drink the way that they treat your decision with the respect that it deserves, that they honour your choices, that they don't try to encourage you to have a drink the way that they used to before. They need to understand A that you actually made this choice. You can't just do it quietly and hope that nobody notices. So they need to understand, a, that you've made this choice and, b, why you've made this choice.

Speaker 1:

Now, like I said, it doesn't mean you have to justify yourself to them, but it does mean you need to communicate. Listen, I've been feeling really crappy and I want to feel better, and this is the way that I'm choosing to do it. Please respect that decision. Please help me along the way with that choice, and if you want to come on this journey with me, then that would be wonderful. I'd love for you to join me. If you're not ready to make those choices, then that's absolutely fine. Love for you to join me. If you're not ready to make those choices, then that's absolutely fine. Let's find a way that we can both do the things that make us feel better in a way that respects each other and doesn't take away from the other person. Now that's your romantic relationship with your partner.

Speaker 1:

Your friends. Again, it's going to impact them. You might have been the social glue that holds your friend group together. You might have been the the, the social glue that hold your friend group together. You might have been the person that always got the shots in at the bar. You might have been the one that always came up with the crazy ideas. Now, you're still the same person that you've always been, but the way that you're going to be presenting the side of yourself that you are trying to support through your choices to drink less is going to come across differently, and so this is going to be one of those times when your friend group are going to reassess how that all fits together, and how they fit into your new way of socializing just as much as how you fit into their old way of socializing. There are adjustments that are going to be made on both sides.

Speaker 1:

Now, if you're one of the lucky ones, you would have by now found yourself some real, good and true friends, and, in the long run, your relationship won't be impacted by the fact that you choose to drink less or to not drink at all, and they still consume alcohol and they still consume alcohol. You might, however, find that there are a few people in your friend group with whom your relationship is purely based on the booze. You'll hear lots of story of people who have, unfortunately, lost friendships because, when you took the booze element away from it, you found that actually, you perhaps didn't have that much in common, or you didn't have that much to say to each other, or everything that you did was based around the alcohol. It's going to happen. It's going to be uncomfortable. You will get through it and you will get over it, and so will they. You will create new friends. You will create new social circles.

Speaker 1:

That doesn't mean that you leave your old ones completely behind. It just means that the way you socialize is going to look different. Some of your friends will come with you on this journey. Some of your friends will be quite happy to join you on this journey and I'll speak a lot more about that in a moment. But some of them might think that you know what this is, holding up too much of a mirror to my own life and I'm not ready to reassess the way that I'm drinking, so I'm going to separate myself from that Now. I don't have all the answers because I can't talk to your specific situation, because you are different to me. Your friends are different to my friends. Only you're going to be able to figure out the best way to handle these situations and what's important to you in those relationships and what you want to keep hold of. But what I will say is that, whilst it might be difficult for the beginning parts of this transition, real friends. They'll stick with you and they will find ways to support you in your choices and to go on this journey with you.

Speaker 1:

My best friends, you know our relationship my relationship with my husband, my relationship with my best friend are all based on alcohol. My relationship with my best friend are all based in alcohol. My husband and I started dating having late night runs in the basement of the bar that I used to manage. My best friend and I were doing ninja rolls across central London. That is a story for a completely other time, but suffice it to say we were definitely not sober at the time. But these relationships and friendships have grown and they've evolved and whilst I'm, uh, the only one who said, look, I don't really want alcohol to be very much a part of my life, uh, going forward, uh, they've all decided to look at their own relationship with with booze. They've cut down, or they, perhaps, when we do something together, they don't drink as much as they would otherwise. You know, it looks different every time we we go out.

Speaker 1:

If I do decide that I want to taste what they're drinking, there is no ongoing pressure to say oh, you've had a sip, go on, have some more, because I've got some good people around me and I'm very grateful for them and if you've got those good people around you, it will be the same. And if you haven't got those good people around you, then this is your opportunity to go and find some fabulous new people to spend time with. Okay, in that vein, sticking with that sort of social circle the fourth thing that you need to be aware of is that, whilst it might be difficult, you are most definitely not the only one who's feeling this way. Like I just said, you know, my social circles, the people closest to me, have opened up to me to say that actually they aren't entirely happy with their relationship with alcohol anymore either. Now, I've never once asked my husband, my best friend or anyone around me to give up drinking or to stop drinking or to not drink when I'm around. They are grown adults. What they want to do is their choice, just like what I want to do is my choice.

Speaker 1:

But what I did find is that, speaking to them, speaking to other friends that I have, speaking to parents that I know at the school drop off, you know those acquaintances that you kind of know each other, but not so well. Whenever it has come up and I've said, actually I'm not, I'm not that keen on drinking that much at the moment, the resounding response from most people has been oh my God, denise, yeah, me too, because what happens is a lot of us. We've reached this midlife stage. We've got the kids, we've got the job, we've got all the things that we got to deal with. Actually, we're all feeling a lot of the same things, which is, you know we can't be dealing with the three day hangovers. It's costing so much money to go out and I've got to spend all my money on fish fingers. You know there's a lot of similarities between you and the person next to you in the queue at school time. You know you are not so unique as that. You are the only person on this planet who is feeling this way.

Speaker 1:

The low-no market is growing at a rate of knots. It is worth billions and, depending on which set of numbers you speak to, over the next sort of six to seven years it's going to be worth anything from $6 billion to $30 billion. I know people need to get the numbers in order and I'll do an episode on the actual stats as I find them for you in the future. But the point is, whichever of those numbers you choose, it's worth a hell of a lot of money. That means that a hell of a lot of people are drinking this way. You can't have an industry grow to be a multi-billion pound or dollar industry if lots of people aren't buying into it.

Speaker 1:

So you know your friends, your social groups, your peers, your colleagues. Within all of these groups there will be other people who are also looking at changing the way that they drink. And even if you don't identify those people in your social group, all you have to do is look online. Look at the world around you. We've got celebrities. We've got film stars, music stars the world around you We've got celebrities. We've got film stars, music stars, sports stars, who are all being extremely vocal about their choices to drink less.

Speaker 1:

Now, if you're watching on video, you'll see behind me there is a stack of shelves with lots and lots of alcohol-free drinks, and behind me there's Biro, which is Tom Holland's brand. Tom Holland, for anyone who doesn't know, is Spider-Man, so you know even the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man has decided to change the way he's looking at alcohol. You've got big stars like your Brad Pitt, who are vocal about not drinking, eminem, who doesn't drink, and 50 Cent. So even your cool rappers you're like really trendy. I shouldn't say cool and trendy in the same sentence. That just shows that I'm neither cool nor trendy. But that's neither by the by. But my point is that this is very widespread.

Speaker 1:

Restaurants and bars are investing heavily in consultants for alcohol-free drinks menus. They are getting brands in to come and help train their staffs and yes, I know they've got a long way to go, but the point is that they've recognized that this needs to change if they want to be able to keep custom. Workplace culture is changing. The health conscious approach of the younger generation is having a huge impact on workplaces in that now companies are recognizing that to thank their staff for the work they do, that just throwing a credit card behind a bar and letting everybody get as lashed up as they like is not the only way to show your appreciation to your team.

Speaker 1:

So all of this is to say remember that you are not the only one. You might feel. If you're the only one in your family or in your immediate friend group that says that they want to change the way they drink. You might feel like you're the only one, but I promise you jump online, find some communities, find some groups you know, read some articles. You are not the only person who is feeling this way. So whilst you might feel lonely to begin with and it's important that you're aware that that is a real side effect you know that some people do contend with that. You're not alone in this, and finding podcasts like this one with voices of people that you can trust and spend time with, and other podcasts and Instagram groups and Facebook groups, you know you'll soon recognize that you're not the only one who's feeling this way. The fifth thing that I think we people need to be aware of and this is something I alluded to before is that removing or reducing your alcohol intake is going to give you a lot of time and a lot of space to do a lot of self-reflection.

Speaker 1:

I have known myself better in these last few years of removing my alcohol consumption down to a minimal or zero level than I have ever known myself before. My life in my 40s now has more clarity than at any point in my life beforehand, and it is no coincidence that I'm drinking less now than at any point in my life beforehand, and it is no coincidence that I'm drinking less now than at any point in my life beforehand. From the age of about 14, alcohol has been a regular part of my life, as it has, I'm sure, for lots of people who are listening or watching right now, you know, down the park with a can of white lightning and a cigarette, trying to be older than my years, for absolutely no benefit whatsoever a rite of passage, as we often called it. From that moment on, daily drinking has been a regular part of my life, and then, working in hospitality for 24 years, it was part and parcel. It was almost a given that you had to consume alcohol in some way, shape or form every single day. And whilst I had some wonderful times, you know I'm not one to denigrate the past just because I want to make changes for my future in my present.

Speaker 1:

I also recognize now that I never had the clarity that I have now. I've never understood myself as well as I do now. I've never known what I wanted as much as I do now, and I've never had the capacity to achieve what I wanted to the extent that I do now. There are downsides to this as well, don't get me wrong. There is a lot more clarity on actions I've taken in the past. Whilst I don't believe in living in regret, I am definitely more aware of things that I could have done better in lots of different situations, and I'm sure we've all got some of those skeletons in our closet. But I now have the capacity and the ability and the desire and the energy and the impetus to actively create a better life for myself and therefore, by extension, for the people that I love. So you're going to get to know yourself a hell of a lot better and once you've dealt with some of the things that you might not be as proud of as you would would like to be, it then opens up this space for you to start really serving yourself in such a better way and I know that might sound a little bit woo-woo, and I'm not really a woo-woo person, but we all need a little bit of woo-woo in our lives from time to time If it means that we can get ourselves to a place that leaves us feeling stronger and happier and more connected with the people that we love.

Speaker 1:

In practical terms, there will be some things that you'll recognize. You know, I remember the first time I went out with my husband and my friends when I wasn't drinking and the three of them were and I realized how quickly they started to get drunk. We all consider ourselves to have a really high tolerance. We're like, yeah, no, I can have loads of drinks, it doesn't touch the sides, I'm fine. Uh, two drinks in and I could see, um, my very ginger husband getting all flushed in the face. I hear my mate starting to slightly slur their words. You could notice that the the coherence of their stories wasn't quite there. Um, I wasn't judging at all. I found it quite humorous. Actually, you know, we're all having a great time, but I definitely felt the desire to finish a night earlier than they did. Um, but that's, that's part and parcel.

Speaker 1:

You know that that that happens, you will recognize who you enjoy spending time with more. Uh, the friends that you can be around whilst they are slightly inebriated, whilst you're fully sober, other people that you really love. But on the flip side, there might be in the beginning, a bit more anxiety about social situations. A lot of us hold a drink in our hand as a way to give ourselves some of that Dutch courage. My suggestion for those people is that you still hold a drink in your hands, just the contents of that drink might be different. A lot of the habit of drinking is the ritual, it's the feeling, it's a secure feeling that we get from having a pint or a glass of wine or a vodka and coke or whatever in our hand. So you can still get that security just by having a drink in your hand that perhaps doesn't have any alcohol or as much alcohol in it. But, interestingly, you know your energy levels throughout. Social events might surprise you as well, because, whilst you might decide to go home sooner, if you find that everyone around you is getting drunk and you're not quite in the frame of mind to deal with listening to the same story for the 15th time.

Speaker 1:

One of the things I discovered is sober dancing is a great thing. So actually I love on a night out when I get to just dance and feel the music and enjoy myself and let my body move and my energy levels to do that are actually a lot higher. I'm not gasping for breath, you know, after every other song because I've got all this alcohol in my body that's trying to deal with. So there's a lot of social change that happens. You'll become more intentional, like I said, with who you spend your time with. You'll become more intentional with what you do with that time and the social anxiety that I mentioned will pass, as with everything else that we've talked that I mentioned, will pass, as as with everything else that we've talked about. It will pass eventually as you become to realize that actually going out sober, going to a work event with, uh, only having a low alcohol drink instead of a full strength one, um that you are actually as funny as you think you are. You are witty and sharp and clever and caring, and you are just as much of a social butterfly when you give yourself the space to actually know your thoughts, form a sentence, carry on a conversation, add value to the people that you're around. So that social anxiety, whilst it is real and you will feel it to begin with, that too will pass.

Speaker 1:

The sixth thing on my list that I think that is important that you know is something I kind of mentioned before when I talked about having an alcohol-free or perhaps a low-alcohol drink is that when you decide to start taking a look at your relationship with alcohol, this does not have to be an all or nothing decision, despite what many of the Instagram social media gurus might tell you and that you might see, my position is very much that you do not have to make a lifelong decision to never touch a drop of alcohol again just because, for the time being, you might be considering taking a sober, curious or flexible drinking or mindful drinking path. I have never said that I'm never going to drink alcohol again. I have never described myself as teetotal or sober. My personal goal was to never, ever, ever, have a hangover again. So that is something that I've said never to, because small children and hangovers just don't mix and I get really bad hangovers as well, and they can last for hours and hours and hours, obviously, but then for days, and days and days, and that just isn't good for anybody. But it doesn't have to be all or nothing.

Speaker 1:

You don't have to commit to a life of sobriety to want to change your relationship with alcohol. Perhaps you decide to moderate and I've spoken before about active moderation and passive moderation. I'll link to that episode below if you want to know a bit more about the difference between those two. Perhaps you want to decide to drink more mindfully. Perhaps you want to coast and just have mid-strength drinks throughout the evening, so that you can go for two instead of going for one. Perhaps you want to bookend your evenings with an alcohol-free drink to start, an alcohol-free drink to finish, but you might have one or two alcohol-full drinks in the middle.

Speaker 1:

It's entirely up to you to figure out what works best for you. For some people, moderating actively moderating requires too much brain power. There's too many thoughts and considerations that have to be taken into account, and for some people, having an alcohol full drink works perfectly well if they can have some alcohol-free drinks around it. You don't need to announce your decision to anyone. You don't need to go and put a post on your Instagram and say I am now mindful drinking for the next three weeks. This can be a case-by-case decision for you. You have to figure out what works best for you.

Speaker 1:

Mostly, alcohol-free might be the way that works best for you. You have to figure out what works best for you. Mostly, alcohol-free might be the way that works best for you. Only, you're going to know that when you consider your reasons, consider what you want to achieve. Consider how alcohol is going to impact your ability to make those goals come true. Know that progress isn't always linear. You might decide that you want to change the way that you drink and for the next week you decide that you're not having any alcohol, and then on Tuesday you go to a work lunch and you end up having a glass of wine. Does that mean that you failed? No, of course not. It's progress over perfection.

Speaker 1:

It's about taking time to make conscious choices and recognize when you think that having alcohol might serve you and making a decision to have an amount that you feel that you can still remain in control of and you can change your mind over how this looks for you. You might have that glass of wine at this Tuesday lunch meeting and go. Actually, I didn't enjoy that. I didn't enjoy having alcohol in the middle of my day. It's not something that I want to do anymore Now. I'm only going to have a glass of wine if I'm going to an event in the evening, or perhaps I don't want to have one at all until the weekend or whatever that looks like for you. You're allowed to make your own rules and your own choices about how this looks, and you're allowed to change your mind in either direction whenever you feel is going to serve you best, and only you know what's going to serve you best.

Speaker 1:

The last thing that I think people don't talk about enough and this one, I think, is an area that might come as a surprise to a lot of people and that is that your relationship with full strength alcohol is going to change once you start exploring more low, low and light alcohol options. And when I say relationship with alcohol, I'm not talking about, you know, choosing to drink more, choosing to drink less. I'm talking about your perceptions of what you actually enjoy and how you physically drink. It's going to change. The more you remove alcohol from your drinking repertoire, the more your palate is going to change repertoire, the more your palate is going to change. Your taste buds are going to change. Your perceptions of what tastes nice is going to change. What you enjoy is going to change. I've done an episode for you previously and again I'll link to that in the show notes for you if you want to go and find it about how your tastes change when you start drinking less alcohol.

Speaker 1:

In brief, alcohol in itself acts as a numbing agent in the mouth. It impacts your taste buds and it makes them less receptive, just like smoking and just like smokers. When smokers stop smoking or when people stop drinking full strength alcohol, your taste receptors regenerate. As you know, the cells in your body regenerate on a cycle and within a few weeks, your taste receptors start to regenerate and become more sensitive to flavors and the tastes that you are consuming. So, actually, what's happened for me, for example, now my favorite drink used to be my favorite cocktail. Used to be an old fashioned. Absolutely love old fashioned. It was the depth of flavor, it was the warmth, it was the strength of the drink. For anyone who is a cocktail fan, you'll know that an old fashioned is pretty much just bourbon in a glass, stirred gently. There's one or two other things in there, but it's a very full-flavoured, full-bodied cocktail. I tasted one a few months ago and it kicked my arse, to be honest with you. It blew me off my chair because it was just so intense and I was able to knock back three or four of those of an evening before. So your taste buds become more sensitive. You will start to pick up the nuances in different flavors that you're drinking and eating.

Speaker 1:

As you reduce the amount of alcohol that you regularly take in, you'll notice that when you do have full strength drinks, that the alcohol in them will start to taste more boozy, like I was saying, than they had done before. You'll find that alcohol burns more intently, which is what I find really funny. When people say that alcohol free drinks, they're missing that burn of alcohol. But actually if you have it on its own, it's not a very nice experience. I mean, who's ever gone? Oh yeah, I really like tequila because it burns my throat. It's not a nice sensation.

Speaker 1:

So you know, the other thing that will change is your appreciation of the impact of alcohol. You'll notice that the less alcohol you drink, the quicker the booze that you do drink impacts you and you'll notice that you need fewer drinks to start feeling noticeably tipsy. So you might nurse a full strength drink for a lot longer than you would have done before, which is, in my opinion, a good thing. But you know that just depends on what you're, what you're going for. You'll notice that the appeal of getting drunk starts to to diminish. You know, when you've had a few nights out where you've enjoyed yourself and you've had a really good time on low or no alcohol for the evening, and you've woken up the next day and you're having a productive day, you'll recognize actually the idea of having that same night out, but being more drunk throughout it, not remembering as much of it and then feeling crappy the next day. You're like well, actually I don't need to do that. That doesn't sound as appealing to me. The ritual becomes more important, as I was saying before. You know, opening the bottle, hearing the pop of the cork, holding a pint in your hand, that in itself becomes more important than how much alcohol is within each one of those drinks.

Speaker 1:

Those are the seven most important things that I think people don't talk about when it comes to changing your relationship with alcohol in the beginning, and that really will impact you. And, like I said, some of this might be surprising to you and that really will impact you. And, like I said, some of this might be surprising to you. Some of it you might be aware of, but with more nuances. Some of it is negative and it is a bit daunting and it is a bit worrying to think that you might feel socially anxious, that you might not sleep as well, that you're going to have to have these conversations with your friends and family. But, like I've said throughout, these things will pass and they will move on, and you will move forward for them. There's one more thing, though, that I think is really important, particularly to you listening or watching this podcast, and that is to be careful of who you listen to when it comes to finding motivation and support in your choice to drink differently.

Speaker 1:

The triggers that impact you, the choices that lead you, are different for people in midlife than they are for a lot of the people that you will see on social media. Your social media influences are usually younger not always Sweeping statement, I know but generally younger. It's a younger person's game. Us mid-40-year-olds aren't as prevalent on these platforms, very, very different to the things that impact a, for example, me, a 46-year-old mum of two with a mortgage and a school run to do and a business to hold down.

Speaker 1:

Wellness influencers if that's the right term in their 20s don't necessarily understand the specific stresses and strains of people in their midlife. Now, that's not to take anything away or denigrate those in their 20s in any way, shape or form. They just haven't lived the same life as you yet, and that's perfectly understandable. But the things that might stress somebody or be a trigger to somebody in their 20s is going to be very different to the things that might stress or be a trigger to somebody in their 40s, for example, when you're younger, your stresses are more, perhaps, around things like peer pressure and dating anxiety and finding a job and figuring out what you want to do for the rest of your life and who you want to be, whereas in your midlife your pressures might be the job that you already have, the career that you have. Perhaps you've moved up in your career and you're in a position where that has a lot of stress to it.

Speaker 1:

It might be parenting overwhelm and trying to get your kids to school every morning and then trying to get them to eat the vegetables in the evening. It might be relationships rather than dating. You know, maintaining a healthy and joyful marriage or long term partnership comes with a completely different set of stresses than dating and finding somebody to settle down with. It might be looking after aging parents at the same time as looking after kids, you know so it just looks different, and so it's important that you find people to relate to and to speak to and to learn from, whose lives look similar to yours, so that you know that you're being seen and understood as you get older. You're not drinking or socializing to find yourself. You know you've already found yourself and you've got to deal with that self that you've found and that life that you have created as we age.

Speaker 1:

And this is going to sound really depressing, but you know, time is precious. Time with our kids is precious. Time with our parents is precious. You know, we actually want to spend time with our parents. You know, I was at my mom's the other day with the kids and I was asking you know, tell us some stories. And my mom's from Jamaica and I said tell us some stories. Tell me and the kids some stories about growing up in Jamaica and growing up on a farm and what it was like having chickens running around, because as you get older you want to hear those stories. They mean more to you than when you were maybe 20. I know that when I was 25 or so I didn't really care. I was far more interested in going out and enjoying myself and hearing stories about my friends' wild nights than stories about my mum's very interesting past.

Speaker 1:

Health concerns are another big thing. You know, as we get older, health concerns become far more real than theoretical. When I was young, I was invincible. I could go out for days and days and days and nights and nights and nights on end, and I knew that eventually I would bounce back. I didn't think about, you know, my health and my well-being the way that I do now. I didn't make strange noises when I got out the chair. You know, my back didn't hurt as much when I did a workout. So all of these things, you know, I'm trying to bring some levity to it because I don't want to sound like a miserable old doomsayer, you know, and I'm not about to shuffle off this mortal coil but we do have to think about these things as we get older because we have to make sure that the people we're leaving behind are going to be well looked after. So you know, there's just a lot of differences.

Speaker 1:

And then, when it comes to the actual drinks themselves, you know there's all this talk about Gen Z not drinking alcohol the way that we used to. You know the percentage of people in their 20s who have never tasted alcohol. So what they're looking for on a night out, when they are having a drink to go with their meal or in the pub, it's going to be very different to what we're looking for. A lot of people in their 40s and 50s have decades of drinking experience behind them, so are more likely to be looking for drinks that replicate things that they used to like. You know you'm more likely to be looking for drinks that replicate things that they used to like. You know you're more likely to be looking for a beer that tastes like a beer for a wine that tastes like a wine for a spirit that you can put in a cocktail that's going to taste like the ones that you've already turned into your favorites.

Speaker 1:

So what we're looking for from our drinking experience is going to have changed as well, because we've developed these patterns and these habits over decades and let's not forget that these were decades where heavy drinking was a really big thing. You know the 90s, the noughties, even the 10s, the lads and ladette culture. You know it was full on, it was intense, and so it's a very different journey to those who are coming into themselves as young adults Perhaps, some might say, in a wiser way than we did, but for whatever reasons, it looks different, it hits differently. It hits differently. The things that impact those of us in midlife who are looking at moderating our alcohol intake or going sober, curious or whatever it is, are just going to be different to when you are looking for help and support and you're reaching out to people and you're playing that awful comparison game which I'm telling in at the moment, because you are doing something wonderful for yourself, for your partner, for your family, for your friends, and you deserve to have the best support whilst you're making that decision and you're going on this journey. There you have it no more bonus extra ones.

Speaker 1:

I hope that you have found these points, these seven points and the bonus one, to be insightful and that they've given you some food for thought. That's really my goal with every episode is to give you something to think about. If it has, then I would love for you to do me one solid, and that is to share this episode with a friend Relaunched the podcast a couple of weeks ago. The numbers have been fantastic. The amount of people that the show is now reaching is fabulous, and thank you all for being here, particularly if you're new. Welcome, welcome. I'm so glad to have you here as part of Lono Nation. So if you found this episode, please spread the word and share it with a friend who is also on their journey, and together we can help them say cheers to a life less intoxicated. That's it for me. I'll see you next time.

People on this episode

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Denise Hamilton-Mace

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