How I changed my life by quitting alcohol 💭

In under a year, sobriety became so much easier than drinking

It’s been 250 days since I completely stopped drinking alcohol, and from where I sit (it’s comfy here 🛋️✨), I’m never looking back.

I’ve been quite open about my alcohol journey on Instagram stories, and enjoy talking about it because to me it feels like an incredible way to use my platform. I’ve posted about it to the feed just once (below), because lots of you wanted to know more about why I wasn’t drinking anymore, and it’s one of my most liked posts ever. I wanted to go more in depth about this with you guys, because how I felt clearly resonated with a lot of you, so here it is.

intothesauce

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I’ve never had the sort of relationship with alcohol where I’ve been dying for a drink once it hits 5pm, more so I had always used it for a fun time. From the age of 18-29, I’d say 80% of my alcohol consumption involved weekend binge drinking, using it to help me be confident and hilarious and pull more all nighters than I’d like to recall (IYKYK). Since learning about, well, how negative even two drinks a week is for your health, I’ve also realised I was pretty flippant about a wine on the couch or at dinner, but to be honest I just never had any idea it was that bad for you - something I’ve now realised is really common (the alcohol industry is powerful, and also, no one who enjoys drinking wants to read up on the negative health impacts. For now, let’s just say I was shocked when I learned from my doctor that alcohol is a Class A carcinogen). Often a Saturday night out drinking would leave me not feeling myself until the Wednesday or Thursday of the following week. I’d exclusively spend the Sunday on the couch ordering or eating a lot of pasta and chocolate, taking soo many painkillers, nursing a headache or migraine, feeling anxious. I’ve always been very prone to headaches but over the last few years of drinking, I realised that even a glass of wine with dinner could lead to the poorest sleep and the next day, a terrible mood, lethargy, anxiety (or at least, more anxiety, lol), and a bad headache. I had stopped drinking heavy reds after one Thursday night when I’d had literally half a glass of cab sav and wound up with a migraine the next day at work - (side note; how bad are headaches at work? No one can see them so you feel like if you say you’re sick you seem like you’re lying. I’ve endured so many at work to avoid looking like I’m pretending to be sick when I’m not, eek). That was one of the last times I drank heavy red but it made me much more aware that I couldn’t handle my drink the next day, and it’s kind of crazy for me writing this now to think that out of peer pressure that I had instilled upon myself, I continued to drink any wine on weeknights even though I knew the reaction I would have.

I was really excited to become pregnant with Winnie because it meant I could have a break from drinking without making excuses. I have spoken to so many of my girlfriends about this who have felt the same and it honestly blows my mind that for most girls, it literally takes getting pregnant to feel you have the ability to say no to drinking without feeling like you are disappointing someone or not being ‘cool’. How messed up is that?

So I had my daughter Winnie, and obviously love her more than anything on this planet. The crazy thing that happened was immediately after having her, I realised I was now a mum. A parent. Not invincible. Not going to be in my 20s forever. A person who’s good or bad health directly impacted another human being and the way their life would unfold. Obviously having a baby means giving up every Saturday night out drinking, but there’s still lots of events and dinner parties (of course) with babysitters at home, which means an opportunity to unleash on a night, which I did a bit of. But the next day I couldn’t handle it. I was sleep deprived, I had to parent, I was in a horrible mood (and even though Matt would wait on me when I’m hungover, I was not a nice person to be around), and the parenting with a hangover was made even worse by the guilt that came from wasting a precious, finite day with my daughter. I just couldn’t understand in what way it was worth it anymore. I didn’t have Sundays to spend doing absolutely nothing, binge-watching Netflix. It meant a bad Sunday for Winnie and that just didn’t make sense to me. So I cut down massively, stopped drinking at home or out to dinner with Matt, but around friends and family I often still felt like I had to drink to maintain my ‘cool’, ‘fun’ persona. I thought that being the girl who is keen to have drinks was part of my identity, my brand even (eeek), and if I didn’t drink, people would look at me as lame, not cool, not fun.

I stopped drinking completely at the start of this year, but not on January 1st. I had spoken at the end of last year about cutting it out, ‘picking my moments’ (and secretly hoping I wouldn’t have to), and I thought that would be enough. But the thing is, if you’re ‘picking your moments’ and at an event like a birthday, hens or wedding, you then constantly feel like there is an expectation for that to be a moment, and that by not drinking, you’re saying ‘this isn’t important enough’. I found I was pretending to drink or drinking small amounts to avoid offending anyone which was just a terrible experience… I didn’t want to drink, but I was a bit, which made me feel like shit physically, and I didn’t want to pretend to be someone I wasn’t, but I kinda was, which made me feel like shit about myself personally. So the blanket rule came about, and I told everyone ‘I just don’t drink at all anymore’. It was the best thing I could have done.

I haven’t had a single friend be anything but supportive of it. But I have had followers of mine, who told me about their experience of stopping drinking, tell me that they have friends who are unsupportive and have made mean or rude comments about it. That is honestly so sad and says a lot more about the people making the comments than the person trying to better themself by stopping drinking. I believe some of the reasons why people would feel it’s okay to do this come down to lack of understanding and ignorance on the subject, insecurity/low self-esteem (maybe they resent that they feel they need to drink, or that they need you to drink when they are), a belief that it’s compromised their own enjoyment of social drinking, and fear of change.

Quickly on fear of change, something I came across during my recent self-improvement era was the idea that we as people do not stand still. You're not in a state of stasis; you're either making progress or experiencing decline, whether it be personal growth, relationships, health, etc. This served as a reminder to me of the importance of ongoing effort, learning and self-reflection to avoid complacency and strive to get better in any way I can, and it encouraged me to be proactive and make meaningful changes rather than passively letting circumstances unfold. Consciously embracing change, this time in my relationship with alcohol, is one of the most positive things I’ve ever done.

Alcohol free in NY babes, best trip of my life

I’m the type of girl who makes lists, so here is what the pros and cons of quitting drinking has looked like for me:

Pros of quitting:

• I never have a hangover anymore, meaning, I don’t have days where I:

  • Have alcohol induced headaches/migraines

  • Am in such a bad mood I have no patience for those around me

  • Can’t handle the thought of leaving the house

  • Don’t exercise

  • Am severely dehydrated

  • Am severely tired

  • Have anxiety thinking about what happened the night before

  • Gorge myself on unhealthy food in a futile attempt to make myself feel better

  • Waste precious time spent with my family

  • Cancel plans or call in sick to work

  • Dread the week ahead because I know the hangover will roll over to Monday-Wednesday

• Not having hangovers has allowed me to identify patterns in, and be more in-tune with, my health, where previously a headache or feeling bad could simply be attributed to alcohol (for example, I've just recently discovered I may have PMDD, a condition that would have previously been overshadowed by the effects of a hangover)

• My skin is better

• I sleep amazingly and am alert throughout the day (I know this because I have an Oura ring which tracks my sleep - 10/10 would recommend btw)

• I’ve become a runner, because quitting alcohol has freed me up to have more productive time and hobbies like exercise

• My relationships with my family have improved because my mood is so much better and more stable than when I used to drink

• I’ve learned so much about health (particularly from the Huberman Lab podcast), because the payoffs of not drinking have made me want to chase more of that good feeling

• I’ve gained confidence in myself for being the person I want to be, even if it has put me at risk of not being ‘cool’ to some people anymore (literally who cares)

• I think I’ve been on an overseas holiday almost once a year since I finished school, and I can honestly say I’ve never had a better time than on the ones I’ve been on that I didn’t drink. No horrible travel days, just energy, clarity and pure happiness to enjoy what so much time, planning and money goes into (side note, whether you drink on your holiday or not, I have always thought drinking on a plane is a terrible call - you’re already putting your body under stress by being on that plane, why make yourself feel worse)

• I’ve had now countless people DM me on Instagram and tell me that my journey has inspired them to quit or cut down on alcohol, and I cannot tell you how much it means to be a role model for something so positive

• Having late night showers and getting ready after a night out and not feeling (like I’m used to) drunk, tired and gross before going to bed HITS DIFFERENT

Cons of quitting:

• Not being able to, or wanting to, last as long at a party because quitting alcohol has also showed me the importance of sleep.

• Sometimes I don’t feel on the same level as my friends but to be honest it’s only for a 1-2 hour window before everyone goes to the next level and I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything anymore but am relieved I won’t have the hangover. Over time, as all of my friends and family have learned that I don’t drink, I’ve gained the confidence to very easily hang out at any event without the need to drink. When I first started, I definitely missed nursing a drink or guzzling one at the start or something where I didn’t feel that comfortable (it’s a habit, of course it was going to take time to kick). I can honestly say that that tipsy feeling is not something I need at all anymore. When my friends are feeling silly, I feel silly too. It’s been more than possible to laugh just as much as I did before.

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Do you know the impact alcohol has on your health?

One of my followers actually recommended this podcast (Apple here, Spotify here) to me when I first started posting about not drinking. Andrew Huberman is a neuroscientist and an associate professor of neurobiology at Stanford University, and now my favourite podcaster everrr 🫶. The episode was absolutely life changing, I cannot recommend it more, and I’ve been in my Huberman era ever since, slowly working my way through. Below is some information from the podcast that blew my mind:

• Alcohol is a water and fat soluble toxin, meaning it can pass into every single cell and tissue of your body. The fact it can pass into so many organs and cells so easily is what explains its damaging effects (this is something I believe should be emphasised more to pregnant and breastfeeding mothers, because I didn’t know it at the time and was actually told ‘not much filters through’ when breastfeeding which doesn’t make much sense to me now).

• Alcohol damages the gut microbiome. Your gut microbiome, which is the collection of trillions of microbacteria living in our bodies, is like your second brain, and plays a crucial role in our overall health, regulating mood, immune function, hormone function, brain function and reduction of inflammation. Alcohol kills bacteria (good or bad), and when it is ingested and reaches out gut, it kills a lot of the healthy gut microbiota, the ones so many of us are working so hard (and spending so much money on probiotics, kombucha, kimchi, yoghurt, etc.) to improve. As a consequence, the gut lining is disrupted, and you develop, at least transiently, leaky gut (ie. bad bacteria that exist in the gut can now pass form the gut to the bloodstream).

• Alcohol significantly increases the risk of cancer. On average, 1 in 3 people will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime, and 1 in 6 will die from cancer. (That stat ruined me). Consuming alcohol, even in moderate amounts, can significantly increase the risk of cancer, especially breast cancer. Every 10g of alcohol consumed per day (on average, this can all be consumed on one day of the week alone, ie. 7 drinks on a Saturday), leads to a 4 to 13% increase in cancer risk. The cancer risk of every 10g of alcohol consumed is the equivalent of smoking 10 cigarettes a day. Alcohol alters DNA methylation, gene expression and cell cycles in ways that promote tumour growth and impair the immune systems ability to fight it. Consuming folate and B12 vitamins has been shown to partially offset the negative effects of alcohol on cancer risk, which is why I’ve got Matt onto these supplements.

• Light to moderate alcohol consumption leads to loss of neurons in the brain neocortex and other regions. It scales with the amount of alcohol that people drink, with a study showing there is almost a dose-dependent increase in shrinkage of gray matter volume. Even just 7 glasses of wine across the week will lead to some degeneration of your brain in response to that alcohol intake.

• Alcohol makes people less resilient to stress, causes higher levels of baseline stress, and leads to lower mood overall. It changes the activity of the neural circuits that are involved in mood and feelings of well-being. People start to feel really good after a few sips of alcohol, making them hyperactive. As it wears off, or as more is ingested, serotonin levels start to drop, which leads to people feeling less good and often getting another drink to restore that feeling (very relatable).

• Alcohol impacts the amount of stress hormone when not drinking. People who drink regularly (1-2 drinks per night, or 7+ one night a week), experience changes that result in more cortisol (stress hormone) being released at baseline when they are not even drinking. As a consequence, they feel more stressed and more anxiety even when they aren’t drinking. This information made me really sad for those stressed people and parents who get to the end of a day and ‘need’ a drink to calm down or unwind. I don’t believe many people realise it can actually contribute to their stress levels in the first place.

• Alcohol disrupts the architecture of sleep, leading to what is often considered pseudosleep. Even after one glass of wine or a beer, your slow-wave sleep, deep sleep, and REM sleep, are all disturbed, leading to a low-level, hypnotic kind of trance that is not really considered real sleep, consisting of multiple bouts of waking up that you likely aren’t aware of. I bought Matt an Oura ring so we could both track our sleep together and he has been absolutely shocked seeing his sleep stats after just one drink (heart rate doesn’t drop overnight, REM sleep reduces), never having thought that little could actually have an impact.

• Alcohol causes dehydration, one of the many reasons behind a hangover. It acts as a diuretic, causing people to excrete not only water but also sodium, an electrolyte critical for the function of neurons. This can disrupt your electrolyte and fluid balance, even if you've only had one or two drinks. If I was still drinking, I could be absolutely smashing electrolytes whilst drinking, before bed and the next day - my favourite brand that I take each morning is LMNT (raspberry and watermelon are my top flavours).

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My favourite non-alcoholic drinks

I get lots of questions about my favourite non-alcoholic drinks, so here they are (I have no affiliation with any of the below, I just enjoy drinking them)!

• Monceau. These are really nice and only around $16 a bottle. I tried all the flavours two weekends ago and chef’s kiss.

• NON Wine. Good for a special dinner party because it has a higher price point, but I have also been known to smash this from the bottle.

• Remedy Komucha. Good for your gut! I looove the apple flavours, followed by the raspberry lemonade.

• Flavoured sparkling waters. My favs are Santa Vittoria (pomegranate and lemon are delicious), Mount Franklin (watermelon go off), and Bubly (lime and raspberry my top two)

• If you’re in the US, make sure you try Ghia!

Lastly on this, I have to say, I am absolutely loving ordering non-alcoholic cocktails at restaurants these days and have some seriously amazing ones. The kombucha at Summertown Aristologist, stoppp. I totally judge a restaurant now on how much care and consideration they are putting into this (it’s just not a vibe when you get a sickly sweet mocktail mojito), and I’m seeing more and more restaurants put in the effort which is cool.

Happiness is spending quality, clear-minded time with your family and friends (that doesn’t render you ill the next day and that you can remember), you can’t convince me otherwise.

I’ve wanted to write this newsletter for a long time now. It’s important to me that I share my experience because I’ve actually wound up liking myself more than I did before, because I’m no longer being a sheep and doing what the majority of society expects of me. If I can be a role model for being true to yourself while also making an extremely positive health choice that is going to make you live better and longer, well, I’m gonna.

Tori x