Quitting Alcohol

10min • 24 September 2024

Alcohol kills about 75.000 people every year in Germany alone, yet it's still widely available and relatively cheap. Drinking is so deeply rooted in our culture, you often have to justify yourself for not doing it rather than the other way around.

On average, every German drinks a staggering 450 bottles of beer per year. That's 225 liters or 11 liters of pure alcohol! And most of my life, I have been one of them. Ever since I was 15 up until exactly one year ago, to be precise.

Today is my 31st birthday marking a huge milestone: I've been sober for a full year.
Over the last months I reflected my view on alcohol a lot and eventually completely changed my mind.

In this article I want to share my journey and the experience of quitting alcohol, talk about the impact of alcohol and alcohol abuse and share some tips on how to reduce or stop drinking altogether.

Growing Up with Alcohol

As I already mentioned, I grew up in a social environment where people drink at literally every occasion. I was actually quite late when I started drinking beer at the age of 15. Living in a small village on the country side, kids usually start drinking way earlier. In some way, society even encourages it.

We often spent our free time outside in nature and at some point, we simply brought beer as well. Out of curiosity, we soon tried everything, eventually getting used to the initially unpalatable taste of beer. Soon after, we'd spend every weekend hanging around and getting drunk.
There was a lot of indirect peer pressure. You wouldn't necessarily be called out for not drinking, but you also wouldn't be part of the group and considered uncool. This more or less went on for the rest of life, with the addition of smoking cigarettes when getting drunk.

Since everyone was doing it, I never even questioned my consumption or behaviour.
I didn't even notice, that I gradually enjoyed activities without alcohol less and less, unconsciously opting for events that would serve beer.

I was more of a silent drinker. I rarely got aggressive and only showed signs of intoxication when I drank way too much. People often didn't even notice that I was drunk. Additionally, I would always have my life under control and be quite successful despite drinking frequently.
But the biggest problem is yet another one: I really enjoyed it. I have a hedonistic side that thrives for pleasure and while I'm a very rational person when sober, I couldn't stop drinking once I exceeded a certain threshold. It also helped me suppress my anxiety and ADD in moments of acute panic and sensory overload. After all, alcohol is also a sedative.

I tried to quit occasionally, but since I never really wanted to, I always leaped back. That is, up until the point where I finally realised what alcohol is doing to my body, mental health and social life. This “nice” feeling, that so many people get addicted to, is nothing more but our body's reaction to the poison. The english word intoxication quite accurately describes that.

That was just before my 30st birthday. The plan was simple: Celebrate one last time for 2 days straight and then quit for at least the rest of the year. Long story short, I had a great party and never touched a glas ever since and also do not plan to do so ever again. In addition to that, I also completely quit smoking, since I was only doing that while being drunk anyways.

One Year Sober

That sums up my journey, but what happened since then?
Well, where do I start? I feel much better both physically and mentally. While the day-to-day difference isn't always noticeable, my health metrics and journal entries paint a clear picture of improvement.
I lost a couple of kilos and increased my VO2max quite a bit, going for long runs way more frequently. My energy levels are usually way higher and I have less mood swings than I did before. Looking at my journal, my average daily rating went up from 3.75 to 4.15 out of 5 and my daily happiness score went by up 0.5 points.

While all of that feels nice and I'm certainly proud of myself, the best part is that I enjoy life much more than ever before. Oh, and I don't spend my Sundays completely wasted on the couch. That's 52 more days a year with meaningful activities.

The Impact of Alcohol

While some people, especially in Germany, might relate to my story, most of you probably do not quite share the same background. So instead of sharing anecdotal evidence, let's look at scientific research and explore some facts about alcohol and the impact it has on our health and society.
I only mentioned a few things here that stuck out for me, but there are of course many more consequences.

Health Consequences

Alcohol is a neurotoxin. A type of poison that specifically targets the nervous system, causing damage to or outright killing nerve cells. This leads to various neurological symptoms, ranging from lightheadedness to impaired coordination and reduced motor skills to speech difficulties, nausea and ultimately to blackouts and hospitalisation.

Contrary to popular belief, there is no healthy or safe amount of alcohol. Recent studies have repeatedly shown this, but the idea of moderate drinking is still widely spread.

If we exclude nicotine, alcohol kills more people than all other drugs combined.
It's linked to a plethora of health issues including several cancers, liver and heart disease, dementia, sleep and mental health disorders. It's in the same group as asbestos when it comes to how certain it is to cause cancer.

Apart from the direct health consequences, there's also secondary causes such as drunk driving and alcohol consumption during pregnancy. Look up fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) if you're interested.

Societal Consequences

At this point, I think it's pretty clear how detrimental alcohol is for our health. So let's talk about the effects on our society, shall we?
In Germany alone, alcohol consumption causes roughly 57 billion euro yearly costs, primarily in healthcare, but also due to accidents and lack of work. For comparison, that's about 1/3 of what we spent on education. In contrast, we only earn 3-4 billion on taxes.

In addition to immense cost, alcohol is also linked to crime and violence. Every tenth crime is committed under the influence of alcohol and up to 50% of all domestic violence cases involve alcohol with drunk men being 4-7 times more likely to perpetrate domestic violence.

Last but not least, addicted people, no matter which drug they're addicted to, are being pushed out of society and do not receive appropriate help to get out of their misery. On one hand, we celebrate alcohol everywhere, on the other hand, we stigmatise addicted people as failures and believe it's their own fault.

Reducing Alcohol Consumption

Alright. Now that we know how detrimental alcohol is to us, what can we really do about it? Since you've been reading this article up until now, you're already educating yourself, which in my opinion is the most important step to even get started. But if you are anything like me, the facts alone won't really cut it for you.
That's why I want to share my top 5 tips to reduce or even quit alcohol altogether:

1. Track your drinking: Without knowing how much you're drinking, how do you even know if you're improving or not? You don't have to do it all the time, but maybe track your drinking for a couple of months to get a good estimate of your average. There are several apps to do so, but you can also just use a notebook or a note-keeping app on your phone.
2. Set clear goals: Now that you track your numbers, it can be helpful to set goals in order to manage your alcohol consumption. For example, you might want to limit your intake to a specific number of drinks or a specific set of days.
3. Identify triggers: Addiction is gradual, not binary. You do not have to grave alcohol all day to be addicted. But, for most of us, there are triggers such as specific situations, emotions or places that make you want to drink. Identifying those and coming up with strategies to avoid or cope with them, can help to reduce impulsive drinking.
4. Find alternatives: One of my biggest issues was that I really liked the taste of beer and I always missed that when I was not drinking. That only stopped once I found proper alternatives. These days, we have a ton of non-alcoholic beer, wine and even some spirits that taste great and are much more healthy. Maybe have some fancy mocktails?
5. Seek help: Last but not least, you should always seek help if you can't do it yourself. Talk to your friends and family and get them to support you or find professional help. There're many doctors, therapists and self-help groups such as the Alcoholics Anonymous. It's okay to seek help and you deserve it!

Following any of those tips should already have a huge impact on your success. If you want to reduce your consumption, you can definitely do it!

Culture and Societal Challenges

Finally, I also want briefly mention our culture and societal challenges.
Growing up in a country where alcohol is the norm, it's been extremely difficult to break out of it. We need to get better as a society and be way more critical when it comes to our relationship with alcohol.
We have to stop justifying extreme alcohol consumption with tradition and culture. Saying that it's one of our most important traditions is a disservice to our great cultural heritage and achievements as a society and humanity alike.
We need more countries like Sweden that restrict and limit the selling of alcohol, have high taxes on it and prohibit any advertisement whatsoever.

Final Advice

I wrote this article primarily to educate people and share my story.
While I'm not advocating for everyone to quit drinking, I hope my story encourages reflection on personal alcohol consumption.

After all, it's up to you to decide whether you have a problem or not. Chances are you're just fine and the occasional glass doesn't have a huge impact.

Conclusion

Alcohol is the one of the most deadliest drugs on the planet and costs our society a fortune due to its severe side effects. Yet it's still widely available and socially accepted for a reason. There's a lot that we'd have to do as a society, but also a lot we can do ourselves.

If this article changed your perspective or you consider reducing or quitting alcohol, feel free to reach out and share your story - I'm happy to hear it!