Make It Tea

Fri 2026-02-20

My journey towards Teetotal

I first tried a break from alcohol in 2016. For various reasons. I just wanted to stop drinking.

I'd read a few "sober blogs" and had been increasingly unhappy about how much I was drinking and how much mental energy I was expending on thinking about how to moderate it.

So I stopped. Just like that. It was easy, really.

Other people were the problem. Not the not drinking. People. It became obvious that drinkers just don't like a non-drinker - it makes them feel as though they're being judged, or makes them question their own relationship with alcohol. And they get uncomfortable.

I blogged about it for a while at https://makeittea.wordpress.com/ and I enjoyed the writing of the blog posts. And I enjoyed the positive feedback I got from the few people who read my posts.

The make it tea name has stuck with me and is now resurrected as the name of this new blog in 2026.

I started drinking again in early 2017 - but regretted it. Regretted giving in.

After a heart-attack in 2018. After developing Rheumatoid Arthritis in 2019. Being on a bucket-load of medications. After the 2020 Covid-lockdown-shielding-wine-o'clock adventure.

After all that....

Enough was enough, and I stopped again in April 2021. Although I didn't do it in any ceremonial way. There was no "Today I stop drinking" watershed moment.

I decided to not drink one day, and then the next day I did the same... until after a few days I thought "I'm just going to keep this going....". It took a few more days to realize that this was my chance to do it "properly". I had sympathy and support this time. There wouldn't be the silent (and not-so-silent) peer-pressure.

This time, unlike the first time in 2016 (when I was doing it for no obvious reason and thus I was an annoyance to everyone around me) I was doing it with good, medical reasons.

And everyone forgave me now for being a teetotaler. I wasn't judging them after all, and I wasn't just being a martyr, wasn't being holier-than-thou....

If anything I was a poor victim.

Health Reasons?

Can't drink because of your medications?

You poor thing!

But if I'm honest, I gave up this time, in 2021, for the same reasons as my first try, 5 years earlier. I wanted to stop, I enjoyed the peace and freedom of not drinking¹.

This time I just hid it behind "Medical Reasons".

The new "Day One" was April 23++rd++ 2021. I only know because I've just checked back in my diary. I calculate today to be day 1765. I've had 5 sober Christmases, 4 sober Birthdays, 5 sober Wedding Anniversaries. 5 sober New Year's Eves.

Anyway.... back to blogging....

I found on the Wayback Machine one archived capture from my makeittea.wordpress.com blog which has several of my posts.

I've made new posts out the the recovered material from Wayback Machine and published them here - and made them appear dated correctly so they show in the timeline as if they actually are from 2016!