Week 3: Three Weeks Without Wine (And the Audacity of My Garmin)

Tomorrow marks three weeks without wine. In that short time, I’ve returned to work, relearned how to walk, survived a family trip, and endured the school holidays. If that isn’t a comprehensive, trial-by-fire test of my commitment, I don’t know what is.

I haven’t tested myself at a proper party yet, but with a dual exit strategy prepped and a couple of other secret weapons up my sleeve, I feel ready to face the music. I might even enjoy myself.

Before I dive into the data, I must formally acknowledge the village that kept my sanity intact over the last fortnight. My parents have been absolute saints, taking one or both or all the kids almost every day to walk, bike, play mini-golf, eat donuts, and burn off holiday energy. Meanwhile, Poppa—the kids’ paternal grandad—bravely took the twins for three whole nights. They returned on Friday bursting with stories, and Poppa miraculously still has all his hair. Because of them, these school holidays were arguably easier than the actual school term. But we shall see on Monday.

With the holidays wrapping up, it’s time for the official three-week sober review.

🏆 The Wins: Shiny New Patience (and Mild Self-Righteousness)

I am officially a more patient, tolerant human being. I’m staying up later, getting more done, and feeling a genuine sense of pride for finally making the change I’ve wanted to make for ages.

📉 The Losses: My Body is a construction site

As you’ll see in the numbers below, my HRV and sleep recovery scores have absolutely plummeted. I’ve been waking up with a raw throat, clearly fighting off a cold. I am currently slamming Armaforce to keep the virus at bay, but it’s wrecking my stats. Combine that with a body trying to knit a major bone injury back together while I force it to walk daily, and my internal battery is struggling.

The lack of sleep improvement is the most annoying part. Better sleep was my main carrot for quitting. Waking up bloody tired and unrefreshed is exactly what caused me to rationalise returning to the booze last time (“If I’m going to feel like shit anyway, why am I denying myself a drink?”). This time, I’m refusing to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I’m going to find the real culprit and fix it.

🛒 The Plot Twists: “Booze Maths” and Morning Meltdowns

Yesterday at the supermarket, I had an aggressive argument with myself over an $11.99 bottle of Barker’s Immunity cordial. Too expensive, I thought, walking away. Then I did the math. A 710ml bottle makes 25 drinks. Meanwhile, I wouldn’t hesitate to drop $15 on a bottle of wine that yields maybe three generous, non-standard pours and lasts one night if I’m lucky. Why will I happily spend $30 a weekend on grape juice that destroys my liver, but agonise over $12 on a cordial that lasts a fortnight? As the ad on telly says: booze maths doesn’t add up! I bought the cordial.

While this didn’t surprise me, it was a strong reminder that parenting is hard. My logical brain knows wine isn’t the answer, but my overwhelmed “crap-parent” brain strongly disagrees. Case in point: the grandparents watched the kids for most of the holidays. Yet, within minutes of returning home, the screaming and fighting commenced. One reverted to a sassy know-it-all, one lived to antagonize, and the third just picked holes in everything the others did. Despite my recent days of respite, I maxed out. I yelled, ran to my room, hid under the covers, and questioned every life choice I’ve ever made.

I love my kids, but sometimes I really don’t like them. Once I finally put my toys back in the cot, I crept back out. There they were—happily playing together outside, completely oblivious to their mother’s brief mental breakdown.

🔮 The Verdict: I am an abstainer

This is a keeper. One of the things I’ve realised is that I am an all-or-nothing person. Moderation is a massive mental burden when my cognitive bandwidth is already at max capacity. Deciding if I’ll drink, how much I’ll drink, and trying to stop once the alcohol hits the brain is exhausting. I like clean rules. Drinking alcohol is just not something I do anymore.

📊 The Final Scorecard

• Difficulty: 3/10 – Easier than imagined. Once I made the call, the mental loop closed. There’s no Sav in the house, but even if there were, I think I would be ok. That said, the urge to use alcohol to escape the reality of parenting still pops up—but just like the chaos, it passes.
• Sleep: 4/10 – Still total shite. Watch this space—there is only so much creatine a person can ingest to compensate for this level of brain fog.
• Mood: 7/10 – I feel like someone finally tightened the legs on an unstable Ikea coffee table. I haven’t lost my mind or spontaneously sobbed (excluding yesterday) in almost two weeks. Wonders never cease.
• Energy: 6/10 – Heavily chained to the sleep stats. I wake up acceptable, but by 3pm, if I remain seated for more than four seconds, I will micro-nap.
• Money saved: 9/10 – Docked one point because of the Barker’s Cordial investment.
• Likelihood of continuing: 10/10 – This is my identity now.

📱 This Week’s Numbers

• HRV: Absolute trash. Friday night it plummeted to 25ms, pulling my 7-day average down to a miserable 29ms. I had a wee chat with an AI assistant who gently informed me that because I’m walking unaided on pinned bones, my cardiovascular system is running a nightly marathon to process inflammation and rebuild bone. It also suggested this will last another 2–3 weeks. NOT FAIR.
• Sleep: Averaging an 80 score but often lacking deep restoration, likely due to the bone works underway.
• Steps: My daily average is up to 5,000! However, my iPhone sent me an automated alert stating my “steadiness is low,” I am a “potential fall risk,” and my “walking asymmetry is poor.” Well, Apple, you can just shut up. I’ll take my limping steps however they come right now, thank you very much.

🗺️ Where to from here?

Overall, this has been a success and a positive shift for both me and the family. I’m stoked that the co-pilot managed to stay on the plane for the bulk of the journey—ignoring the stadium experiment and a couple of shed beers this week, of course.

I will admit it’s frustrating to still feel absolutely exhausted every damn day. But I need to remember that behind the scenes, my body is basically a major construction site right now. It’s busy getting these bones back to full strength, and alcohol would only halt production and delay the final handover.

So now, I’m looking toward the next micro-experiment. Next week will be an official “week off” from structured testing just to breathe, but I’m already plotting what to tackle next.

Because my pinned ankle is still healing, a full-throttle HYROX gym return is completely off the cards (unless I want my HRV to drop into single digits). Instead, I’m pondering taking on one of these three paths:

1. The Sleep Master: Consistently in bed by 8:30 pm and up at 5:00 am. Absolute ban on phones and audiobooks in the bedroom. After-dinner snacks strictly limited to dark chocolate and chamomile tea.
2. The Gym Junkie (Lite): Creeping back into the gym environment to try out that “sitting passively on a stationary bike reading a magazine” thing. Sigh.
3. The Socialite: Actively increasing my social interactions, actually leaving the house, and trying to be a better friend entirely on mocktails.

I am open to suggestions if anyone wants to use me as a guinea pig—or if those who know me think there is an area of my life that needs a dramatic overhaul (immediate family, keep your comments to yourself).

BRING ON MONDAY AND THE RETURN TO SCHOOL!