Easy enough

No problems so far in having this little break and I can feel already that the physical urges have passed. That's the hardest part for me, when I feel something inside, not quite a craving but an urge, to go and sit somewhere with a pint. There's an almost visible link in my head between that action and a feeling of contentment, which is probably one of the main reasons I find stopping difficult.

It's going fine this time though and I'm making the most of it by pouring my time into a bit of web design. The hours fly by when I'm doing that and it's something I never have the motivation for if I'm tired, so now's a good time while I have a very regular sleep pattern and am waking up alert. The 5-HTP seem to be doing their job too, so all's looking good at the moment.

An attempt to learn from the past

One of the difficulties I've faced in the past is that my character is such that I feel a strong need to blend in to my surroundings. I don't like to stand out and garner attention. This means that when I've made some kind of proclamation or announcement, I feel very uncomfortable about it afterwards because it draws attention to me.

Therefore, rather than make a big announcement this time, I'm just quietly going to have a little break from drinking. Just a couple of weeks after this Friday, while (for once) I'm not committed to being anywhere or doing anything. I'll just take it easy for a bit and see if anyone notices or comments. I imagine someone will since it'll mean I won't be out and about as normal, and I'll probably curse myself halfway through, but it's in order as festivalling has depleted my batteries a bit recently. I did one all-nighter and it killed me the whole day after - how's that for a sign of age! I've found I need stark reminders like that to help modify my habits, and they are, after all, habits of a lifetime.

Something of a setback

I'm feeling pretty low at the moment. To cut a long story short, it seems she doesn't like me much at the moment, because I've been having a few drinks. Even just something moderate, which is what I've been doing. I haven't been drunk even though I've had a couple of things on this week, and it was good getting through crappy wintry days at work knowing I could relax with a pint and a natter with people at the end of it. I've missed that over the last month and I thought everything was going okay with it (because we'd been out together a couple of times and she seemed fine with me, even said she had a good night) but she's since been funny with me all week and it turns out she'd got the idea I'd been secretly drinking, or keeping it quiet, or something - not sure of the specifics of exactly what I'm supposed to have done, but you get the idea. It all stemmed from a misunderstanding over an empty wine bottle - I'd had a glass and as the recycling had just gone out, I put the bottle back in the cupboard rather than start a new pile straight away. Didn't give it a second thought really, it was just one of those things with a simple reason that you do a hundred times a day and forget about. I don't know why she's gone looking in that cupboard at my house to find this bottle and get angry about, and I haven't asked since it would detract from the main issue, but it's just spiralled from there. I asked her last night what was up and when she said "if you'd finished with a bottle would you put it back in the cupboard?" this massive wave of gloom washed over me, it felt like we were back at square one and I'd made precisely no progress with her at all. In addition, I have a very low boredom threshold with absurd arguments and that misunderstanding just left me so exasperated I was almost laughing out of delirium.

I'm trying to be rational about my feelings because I'm very wary of being defensive. But I think I've broken that defensiveness down already, by going on this very mission to change things. It would have been easier to reject her opinions and carry on regardless of the end result, but I like her too much to risk that. I feel really disappointed. I don't know if I've kept so much of this to myself that it hasn't been obvious the effort I've put in because I care about her, but a little bit of compassion from her would have been nice. Instead I find I'm still not acceptable, and I feel very much on my own and thinking I may as well keep it all in my head since people like her have the empathy of a disinterested pebble quite often. It was hard for about four or five days when I first gave up, but that was mostly boredom kicking in and I got over it and did a month sober absolutely no problem, in fact it was a really good way to get through God-awful January and I might try to recruit someone to try it too next year. So yeah, I did that no problem, and have been sensible in the past week and either gone home early or really slowed my drinking when I can feel it. I know I've said I don't have an off switch but I'm not a fucking junkie and I can stop when I want to. So it seems like I was right in what I said a few weeks ago, that she's inevitably formed a comparison between me not drinking at all and me having a drink, and prefers the former. That original problem with drinking too much has become drinking at all, because she prefers the other. I am now in the situation where even moderate social drinking annoys her. I think the root of the problem is that she doesn't like that part of me that I wrote about earlier, that I become a bit more extrovert in a group situation and pay less attention to her. I thought she'd know that's how I am in a group and indeed how all group situations, by very definition, work, that there are more people so you can't pay as much attention to each one. I haven't had enough time yet to develop my thinking beyond that, but from what I've managed to get out of her that area is the real problem and the other things that have come up are extraneous symptoms that have been distracting from the real point.

I am disappointed. It feels shit to try really hard at something, and think you're doing okay, and then still be told you're not good enough. I can't help feeling a bit down about that. I sit questioning myself and what I'm like after I've had a beer, and I know I change - that's the very nature of it! But it changes everyone, so I guess the question is what I'm doing or being that she doesn't like. I am a bit angry too, I must admit. I've known from the start she's not the most tolerant person around and her character is pretty aggressive sometimes, but that's part of the deal in being with her and it doesn't usually bother me much at all. I used to get annoyed at her ranting about work straight after work, but then I realised I'm lucky enough to be able to forget about it straight away whereas she needs to vent it, and I shouldn't stop her doing that. Part of me thinks that she is being intolerant of me and wanting me to change rather than accepting things about me, but there's also the other (dominant) part of my nature that presumes I am in the wrong and tells me I must change to accommodate her. I did it a lot with my last girlfriend, bended and gave in on a lot of things so that we fit together, but in the end of course you can only change so many things in your nature before it makes you serially unhappy with what you're trying to be. I hoped the sober month showed that not drinking wasn't a big deal to me, and the odd bit of social drinking would be fine since it's something I enjoy like most people do, but if even that's a problem... I don't know. I'm not going to bother even telling myself I might lose patience trying to accommodate her because I know I'll assume blame here and set about fixing things, but it does spark a series of thoughts about what my path to inner contentment is and whether my desire for peace and love (maaaan) is inadvertently causing me distress.

A sober month completed

I haven't added anything new for a while because the past couple of weeks blurred together. The impulse to do something at the weekend wasn't there and I was quite content passing the time doing odds and sods, bits of nothing really - I watched a lot of TV, not much else.

I did a month without drinking and had a few drinks at the weekend. I'd been out on Friday for a birthday, but found it really boring by the end. I'd never really thought of it that way before, but I couldn't imagine going round to a mate's house and sitting talking for four hours solid, but that's kind of what I was doing by going to pubs sober. I'm still not the biggest fan of going out and not drinking, although I know it's not that bad really, so in future I think I will be happier just not going out if I am not drinking. I don't enjoy the company of drunks and feel bad for making people awkward and self-conscious by having a sober person sat there with their brains fully switched on while they begin to relax and get silly. I don't like putting people in that situation by my presence, so I'll probably just stay at home more often than not.

I had a few pints of bitter and felt fine - no "going to my head" episodes! I was paying attention to the speed I drank and managed to control things okay. It was a pleasant night and although I went out again on Sunday I was tired and didn't have many. Yesterday was an interesting one. I was curious to compare how I would feel then as opposed to the past month. And I could feel the crooked fingers of gloom trying to paw at me. It is a combination of the depressant effect of alcohol with having to be up too early to go to work, meaning the first part of the day is spent fighting against its effects. I take two things from this - firstly that I am at that age now where my body doesn't recover as quickly as it once did, and that drinking more than a couple of nights in a row is probably the point when I begin to get a bit boo-hoo afterwards. It certainly didn't use to depress me quite so much but that doesn't change the fact that it does now, so to keep that at bay I'll have to give my body all the time it needs to handle things properly.

I think I'll pass this on to my girlfriend now. She's been good for the past month, and any time I've got defensive I've realised after a moment that it was just me being silly. I hope the past month showed her that I take what she says seriously and that I'm not a slave or addict to anything; the thought of that repulses me so I can understand why she wouldn't want it that way either. We come from different backgrounds and trying to adapt to her ways is really difficult sometimes, this being just one of them, so my hope is that the changes I'm making help us meet somewhere in the middle. As I said right at the start, conflict goes against everything in my nature which is probably why I've gone on this masochistic journey in the first place, but to people like me, well, it's better to take the hits yourself if it keeps the peace. The next step is to work on keeping things moderate. Everyone knows that silly voice in your head that says "just another one", and everyone gives in to it sometimes, but it seems to piss her off so much if I slip that we stop liking each other. I know where she's coming from since I don't like her much either when she's had one too many but I've never known it be such a problem to someone before. So, well, the great experiment I started a month ago continues and I keep on trying to re-program myself to be a better man.

Tempus fugit

Good lord, Thursday already? I'd done a good job of writing daily until now, but as always seems to happen with these things, it's proved impossible to keep up the pace. Truth be told, anything in the last few days would have only been filler. I have been busy every evening and by the time I'm home I rarely have the energy to sit and muse.

By Saturday it will have been two weeks. As I said to a mate yesterday, I'd half-hoped I'd be leaping about with excess energy by now, but it seems that all alcohol does is cream off the top 10% so you still end up feeling pretty much the same. I was curious what effect it would have on my other little ailments, namely my chronic heartburn and strange little pain around my hip. So far as the heartburn goes, it has proved helpful in offering a little support to my belief that I'm not so much suffering from persistent heartburn, but rather a burned or damaged oesophagus which is irritated by occasional heartburn. It feels vaguely better but that may just be psychosomatic. As for the hip, well, that's just the same so it's probably unrelated to drinking completely.

My girlfriend wrote a note on the internet last night that causes me to ponder where to go from here. She was full of praise for how over "the last week and a bit" - what a coincidence! - something "has clicked". In these situations, I become WOPR and fly into the future to predict as many scenarios as possible. Invariably, pessimism wins and I then have to conjure ways of defeating what has not yet happened. The future with the highest likelihood seems to be one where she associates me not drinking at all with things being great. I do not want this association to form as I'm tired already of even thinking about the long, dull conversations about moderation, temperance, a little bit of everything, etc etc etc...

Undeniably, things have been mellow over the past fortnight. But then again, things are smooth 99% of the time anyway so it's not much of a change, really. All it's done is stop those times when I've had a drink (not anything excessive, just a normal few drinks) and it sets my mind free from the normal routine of how my head works, I lose myself and begin to think extrovertly rather than introvertly; a consequence of this is that I want to do and feel things I normally can't so I lose interest in the touchy-feely stuff and pay her less attention because I want to communicate with other people. I guess that's not just down to drink but also my attitude to a group situation, that I don't want someone next to me niggling away all the time while I've got the group to think about. She doesn't seem to think that way and in the past has probably blamed it on drink but perhaps Saturday night may have shown her that it is how I need to be in a group.

A full day out

Something of a victory, yesterday. To follow the analogy of the speech at school, the second time was by no means perfect but it was certainly easier. I will not look back with the advantage of hindsight as in these cases it is tainted and useless; the temptation is there to break yesterday down into small chunks and look back on them thinking hah, what on Earth was I worried about? Yet that would be to ignore the very real fears I had at the time. I would suggest that an important part of this process of changing my feelings toward drink is not to forget completely what my old compulsions were like, but to remember and understand them as a warning for the future.

I had to field a few questions about why I wasn't drinking. The stock answers worked well enough - I'd had enough after Christmas, I was saving a bit of money (and Christ, have I saved some money), I usually try to have a bit of a break in January. It worked well enough in the whole. I think it depends a lot on who's asking the questions. With people I know well - and yesterday I was lucky enough to spend the whole day with people I know well - I can laugh off any silly answers I get back without feeling I need to explain myself. For some reason, with people I'm not too confident around I get an urge to explain every last detail of why I'm doing this, as if I'm an innocent terrorist suspect having to justify my every last action.

It was good to spend the night with people knowing I could do it without a drink. At times, I felt a little tired by the effort it takes to be outgoing while sober, and had to have a quiet moment. I felt like I would have had a better time with a few drinks, but probably only because it would have taken that edge off, that constant awareness that I had to make an effort to stay on the same level as everyone else. I was with a good bunch, though. Wit is the order of the day rather than drunken outrageousness, so it wasn't too hard to fit in; indeed, my mind is sharper while sober so I caught more of what went on. If only the headaches would go! Sugar pounding through my head from the lemonades and fruit juices... only at the end can I muster the will to get a glass of water, a moral point deeply rooted in my head from years of the stance: pubs are for drinking!

This weekend has given me some confidence. It would be easy for this to become a depressing chronicle of my fears and woes, but it's important to mark the high points too, and I'm pleased that a week into my attempt to rid myself of the old habits, I've broken through one of my main fears: being incapable of seeing people socially without a drink to help me through.

A sober night out

I managed it without too much incident. Constructing the night as a bit of fun, a "first date", distracted from the overhanging knowledge this was the first time I'd been out for the night not planning to have a drink. We met in an old favourite, a pub which has just reopened but is full of memories, the vast majority based around drinking, naturally. The half of lemonade was sickly sweet, but it passed okay.

Three games of bowling down and the three glasses of wine are visible in her nature. I hate this bit. Not in her, but in me. I seem to become hypersensitive to all the signs of drunkenness in others when I'm out sober. It's probably why I've always felt too uncomfortable to do it; drunks irritate me in a million ways. My English sensibilities make me shy away from their exuberance and beg for a little dignity, but it's not forthcoming so I'm forced in the company of the sort of person I am not.

We ran into four of her friends in a quiet pub and a flash of panic kicked in - would this be the first time I'm fully exposed to a group of drunks? I'm not looking forward to it at all. Shouts and laughs from every direction and none of them making sense; I really want a drink to help me make sense of the noise, or at least just cut out the noise and help me focus on one. As it was, they were pretty sedate themselves, to the point where I was carrying the conversation - so much for sober reserve. If only the pounding headache would go, most likely a reaction to the awful sugariness of the lemonade. What else is there to drink? I feel like I have a hangover and all I've had is four lemonades.

We finished the night in a loud pub - a bad choice on my part. It's past midnight and the noise and the lights are feeling quite enough, and I feel my concentration drifting. Fewer and fewer thoughts are popping into my head and I begin to feel the first pangs of self-consciousness in a pub, as if I've a sign on my head making it clear I don't belong there. Time to go, I think. I'm sure the significance of the night hung in the air as we went our separate ways, but it went unmentioned and I'm happy about that. There are no words to really say about it all that don't just seem to attract unwanted attention.

It's only one night, but at least I've an idea what it's like being the designated driver now.