Mountain Sober

Despite being on lockdown to prevent the spread of COVID-19, my sobriety goals have actually been going pretty well.  I've been drinking less, and minus some slip ups here and there (which I painfully regret the next morning), overall my consumption has been on the lower end. I also signed up with a nutrition coach, and not so shockingly, she suggested that I eliminate alcohol to help with my health and weight loss goals.  Alcohol is empty calories, and is a sure fire way to keep extra weight around. To fully commit to my nutrition goals, I am planning to do another sober week this week.  I've happily been losing about 1-1.5 lbs per week since starting with the coach, and I wonder if cutting out booze will kick that up some. My goal is to drop 35-40 lbs from my heaviest weight.  Every little bit counts! Instead of wine, gin, or whiskey, I plan to drink kombucha, coconut water, or plain water.  Let's see how it goes!

It was over a week ago that I decided to do a sober week.  In short, I feel great.  I didn't stop drinking 100%, but beside one day, I didn't have more than 2 drinks any day, and most days it was 0 or 1.  I have been waking up clear headed, energized, and feeling good.  My workdays have gone well too -- they've been full and busy, but I've felt engaged and ready to tackle them head on. Another thing I've been doing is listening to a meditation/hypnosis program every evening that is focused on quitting alcohol.  I can't say if that's helping as well, but I'm going to believe it is.  So this would technical be week 2, day 2, and I'm planning to keep up my non-drinking habits.  In addition, I signed up with a nutrition coach, and I'm down about 2-3 lbs just this week. Good luck self, you can do it.

Another quick update: on day 7, and going strong! I haven't stopped drinking completely, but I have been stopping after 2.  I've been waking up feeling good, clear headed, and energized.

It's been busy with guests and work, but the sober week is going well!  I did end up drinking (and drinking too much) on saturday night, our first night of guests, but other than that I've been sticking with my sober week goals and have been feeling great.  Even with the daylight savings time change, I am waking up feeling fresh, energized, calm, and happy.  I feel like I have more patience as well. This has to be a quick update since I have a work commitment starting in 5 min, but just wanted to post progress.

During this sober week, I'm planning to write a short entry each day to update my progress.  Here on day 2, I happily report that I didn't drink last night, and overall had a great evening.  I took care of some things around the house, made a delicious dinner, read a couple magazines, and headed to bed around 10pm.  L blessed us by sleeping in until 7:30 this morning, so I got a solid 9+ hours of sleep. I woke up feeling great and well rested.  My early meetings all went well, I felt clear headed and well-spoken, and very able to focus on the tasks at hand. Going into a guest-filled weekend, I think I will have some challenges, but I plan to stick to the plan of a sober week.

Reflecting back on my last post, I'd say things are going mostly the same -- fine, not great.  I do feel like I am drinking less than I used to (yay! go me!), but I do find myself drinking more than I'd like around once a week. Though it might not seem like a big deal, one thing that has happened over the past few months is that I can easily go a night or two without drinking.  Besides the time that I was pregnant (where I didn't drink at all), taking nights off just didn't happen.  Now it's a pretty regular occurrence.  Small steps, but hey I'll take it. While taking one or two nights off is now a pretty regular thing for me, going much longer than that, say a week or even a month, still is not my normal behavior.  Today though I woke up with a bad hangover (my tolerance has gone down, and I now get worse hangovers drinking less than I used to), and honestly I'm just sick of it.  What a waste of time, energy, and happiness.  I am planning to do a ...