At what point in life did you tone down your drinking habits (if ever) and how did your life change as a result?

14 comments

1. 2016. I quit drinking and I haven’t had a drop since.

2. After I turned 20 and could buy it legally, fun of it was gone then

3. 1999 – no alcohol at all.

4. I stopped spending tons of money in bars when I got married.

   Then in my later 30s the hangovers started to be harder to recover from.

   So yeah in my teens and 20s I drank a lot. After that it tapered off. Now it’s a few beers at a nice restaurant about once a month. And maybe get shit faced a few times a year for some special occasion.

5. Stopped casual drinking at the beginning of 2021. I drink 0% alcohol if I pop to the pub.

   Mocktails are a nice alternative.

   Saved a fortune with my shopping.
   No hangovers
   Skin is better
   Mental health is better
   Overall health was better

   For context I would regularly drink 1-2 glasses of white wine of an evening 5 days a week. Binge drink on occasion.

   I don’t miss it.. watching other people drunk reinforces why I’m happy without

6. Somewhere around 38, I realised that even if sometimes I could still drink gallons and wake up the next day a 6 to fight dragons, most of the time the fourth glass was already one too many and I’d be hungover till 4pm.

   So as from then, i drank moderately.

7. Probably different from others but I toned down mine specifically for getting healthier and losing weight not because of an addiction thing.

   Started about a year ago. I actually really enjoy alcohol and have a myriad of booze and a not too shabby whiskey collection but I recognized that getting tipsy was the gateway drug for me stuffing my face and eating way too much.

   So now I only drink on the weekends, and really I primarily just do Friday and Saturday night. Keeps me in line with fitness goals but I still get to enjoy alcohol.

8. used to drink heavily then i turned 21 and when it was legal i decided i hate the feeling and haven’t really drank much since. I like socially drinking in moderation but that’s a couple times a year.

9. I never really liked drinking all that much. Didn’t like how alcohol tasted and never really developed a taste for it. I pretty much only drink if friends are drinking to be polite.

10. I toned it down about when my kid was born. Hangovers hit different after 30, and you can’t recover from one with a toddler in the house, it’s torture. I’ve all but stopped drinking entirely now, just because it’s empty calories and I’ve been really focused on my gym goals.

11. I started drinking and going to parties at 13 and I have 4 special nights(which I call them the 4 nights of the apocalipse) from 13 to 23 that had me months without drinking again and at 23 had 16 shots in one night and spent a week feeling ill and I was fucked, barely could stand and I just left without saying a word to my friends, who thought something happened to me. Since then I don’t drink and I cannot be convinced to drink anything alcoholic again and allow myself to loose control again like that. I don’t miss anything that comes from drinking. I’d rather smoke a joint and play videogames with the boys.

    After I stopped drinking I realize I don’t even like partying and I just drank in order to enjoy anything that comes from going to parties. There is a point in the night where everyone there is just taking cocaine, or LSD, or another hard drug or they are heavily alcoholize and most people I know have fond memories of parties and just want to have that feeling of having a good time again and there is a point where one or two drinks isn’t enough for them.

12. About 5 months ago my partner and I decided to tone down drinking. I’ve been trying to lose weight, and she started some new medication that interacts poorly with alcohol. Before I would have maybe 3-6 drinks a week, and she’d maybe have 1-2. Now we each have maybe one or two drinks every month. The biggest change is now we have to actively look for things to do that aren’t going to a bar, and also we both get drunker on less alcohol which is cost-effective.

    The last time we went to a bar was about a month ago and it felt a lot more special. We chose to go to a classy cocktail bar and just sip on our drinks for 2 hours. It was really nice to get tipsy as a rare thing together.

    Overall, it’s just been part of a life change we’re going through as we transition from being in our mid/late 20s to being a stable family unit.

13. A few years ago (late 20s), my stomach started acting up. It was pretty painful. Hard to pin to a specific cause, but think it was a combination of stress, caffeine, NSAIDS, diet and (considerable) drinking, but at the end of the day I needed to make changes in all of those areas. For the alcohol, after going back and forth for a few years, with my body clearly telling me to stop several times, I’m down to one drink on rare occasions. My stomach feels better, and I don’t have to deal with hangovers anymore. But a lot of the most important changes are down the road. My uncle died relatively young of an alcohol-related cancer. Hopefully I won’t follow in his footsteps.

14. I stopped around 24 because it made my anxiety worse. I would still go out and just have soda water & lime so I save money, skin looks great, no hangovers, and it forced me to adjust to socializing without alcohol in those situations. 10/10 would recommend.