The Origin Story: When Exactly Did the Booze Become the Boss?
Wine and I have a long-standing relationship. It wasn’t my first drink—that honor goes to Midori RTD’s, and a bottle of Kristov vodka so harsh it still makes my stomach turn.
But in my early teens, I started working at a prestigious winery restaurant. After-work drinks were always wine, and I quickly acquired the taste. One or two glasses often morphed into one or two bottles. By my late teens and early twenties, heavy drinking was entirely normalised. Wine accompanied catch-ups, dinners, beach picnics, and road trips. For years, I drank hard most nights, dragged myself to work hungover, and did it all again.
My first real period of sobriety came with pregnancy. Because it wasn’t an option, it was easy. But when my womb was once again vacant, booze returned with vengeance. I surrounded myself with like-minded people, which weren’t hard to find in Australia. My mummy’s group even met at the pub!
The Turning Point: Double Trouble, Lockdowns, and a Mounting Mountain of Glass
The real shift happened after having twins, coinciding with the COVID lockdowns and moving back to New Zealand. Without curbside glass recycling, the empty bottles accumulated in the recycling cupboard—providing irrefutable, visual evidence of my consumption.
The physical toll grew heavier. I was occasionally going to work hungover, recovering by 5 PM, and drinking again that night. Worse, parenting hungover is next-level torture. I actually found myself choosing to drink more on work nights rather than weekends, just to avoid facing my kids while hungover.
At 39, a hangover so brutal it kept my head down the toilet for a day forced my first real break. I managed six months. During that time, I’ll admit I became a bit of a self-righteous, preachy twat, consuming sober-curious content and projecting it onto everyone else. But on a kid-free weekend away, I wanted a glass of wine while bathing beside the river. That single glass derailed me. I tried again after my 40th birthday, made it four months, and relapsed again.
Until now.
We are breaking up – It’s not me, it’s you (wine)
The truth is, I am a bad drunk, especially at home.
Occasionally I get a small energy boost depending on the drink, but mostly I just become tired, impatient, and irritable. I start reacting to the smallest slights like they’re personal declarations of war. I sleep terribly and wake up exhausted most days, never quite sure if it’s because I took myself to bed at 7 PM or because of the toxins in my system. Probably both.
More than anything, I am tired of being a shitty role model. My kids notice. They comment on me “needing a wine” or ask for a taste of what I’m drinking, and I seriously don’t want them ending up where I am now. While there are moments, I could happily rehome them, they are my world and my ultimate motivation for this change. I want the energy to laugh and play with them. If I’m tired, I want it to be because we’ve been busy living, not because I’m drunk or hungover. I want them to know, full stop, that you don’t need alcohol to live.
The Security Blanket and Other Terrifying Things to Lose
But standing on the edge of this change brings a massive layer of fear.
First, there’s the internal anxiety: What if I stop drinking and discover that wine wasn’t actually causing the problems I thought it was? What if the impatience, the irritability, and the exhaustion are just me? And what if I simply can’t cope without my security blanket?
Then, there’s the environmental anxiety. My partner continues to drink, meaning alcohol is always in the house. It’s not just about resisting the temptation; it’s about the message it sends. I have all boys, and the last thing I want them thinking is that “Mums shouldn’t drink, but it’s okay for Dads.” That is a minefield I will navigate another day.
The 21-Day Coup: Human Guinea Pig vs. the wine marketing experts
To face these exact fears—to find out if the fatigue and irritability are truly the alcohol or just my delightful baseline personality—I am treating the next few weeks as a data-gathering experiment, including some vague ‘how it feels’ reflections and some strict metrics.
For the next 3 weeks, the rules are simple:
Zero alcohol: No exceptions (An absolute tragedy for the local bottle-o)
The Data Trackers: Every day, one post per week I will update:
• Sleep & HRV (Heart Rate Variability): To see what my body is doing at night when it isn’t processing alcohol.
• Mood & Energy: To figure out if my impatience is a baseline personality trait or just a perpetual hangover.
• Exercise & Weight: To measure the physical shift of removing thousands of liquid calories.
Accountability is a Bitch: The Journey Begins
But here we are. Day One.
The cast is gone though walking unaided still eludes me.
The wine is gone.
The trackers are set.
And I’ve told enough people about this choice that quietly backing out isn’t an option.
That’s the problem with accountability. It requires accountability.
Let’s see what happens