The benefits of cutting down on booze can last way beyond the new year. LAUREN TAYLOR finds out more about strategies to make the change stick
MANY of us entered 2020 promising to give up alcohol for a month and, if you’ve stuck with it, steering clear of booze for that long can feel like a huge achievement. But will you be breathing a sigh of relief and hitting the bar hard in February? Or has a month off given you a slightly different outlook?
Millions may drink far above the recommended limits, but the ‘sober curious’ and ‘mindful drinking’ movements are growing in popularity. A YouGov study, commissioned by One Year No Beer (OYNB), found that 54% of millennials and 25% of baby boomers are going beyond Dry January and instead planned to give up booze for more than a month. A fifth say their reason for doing so is to improve their mental health, and 17% because they don’t want hangovers to mean they miss out on exercise.
It’s common to hear people say they slept better, lost weight, saved money, had more energy, or were more productive during Dry January, and it’s not surprising you might want to continue feeling these benefits – so it could be the perfect time to reconsider your longer term relationship with alcohol.
“February is the perfect time to reflect the new experience of feeling great without alcohol,” says
OYNB’s Andy Ramage, co-author, along with Ruari Fairbairns, of The 28 Day Alcohol-Free Challenge (£12.99, Bluebird). “Once you have experienced a bit of the alcohol-free magic, you’re much more likely to reduce or even stay alcohol-free in February. My plan was to do a month, and that was six years ago!”
ALCOHOL AND SOCIALISING
THERE’S no getting past it, drinking is completely interwoven into the fabric of our social lives – from going