It is challenging to resist the urge to keep pouring alcohol into your glass when you’re used to drinking excessively. But you have to try nonetheless because drinking too much raises your risk of getting into accidents and developing serious medical conditions and other problems.
If you stumbled upon this article, chances are you are aware of your drinking problems and want to know how to stop drinking too much.
6 Strategies to Drink Less
Reducing your alcohol consumption (or eliminating it) is difficult but not impossible. The next time you feel like drinking, try the following strategies:
Measure Your Drinks
The first step is to determine the amount of alcohol you are drinking. The alcohol content of wine, beer, vodka, and other shots of distilled spirits varies. For example, a standard 5-ounce glass of wine contains around 12% alcohol. Meanwhile, a 12-ounce can of beer has around 5% alcohol, and a 1.5-ounce shot of vodka has 40% alcohol content.
Although no amount of alcohol is completely safe, having no more than the standard drink reduces your risk of harm from alcohol-induced disease or injury. In Australia, one standard drink contains 10g of pure alcohol. If you are a healthy adult, experts recommend drinking no more than four standard drinks in one day.
Your cup or beverage label will not normally tell you how much standard drink it holds. But you can learn more about it using the NIAAA drink size calculator.
Make Plans and Track Your Intake
There’s an application called Sunnyside designed to help heavy drinkers reduce their alcohol consumption. According to data from 10,000 app users, those who set drink limits daily consumed 10% fewer drinks every week than those who did not. So try doing the same thing. Decide how much drink you plan to have daily, and track your intake using a journal, calendar, or any tracking app.
You could also schedule one or more alcohol-free days every week. You could choose any day, but scheduling your sober days at the beginning of the week is best. Try sober Mondays or Tuesdays. While aiming to drink once a week or not at all is better, it will be challenging. So start easy by aiming to drink less in a week.
Identify and Manage Your Triggers
Knowing your alcohol triggers is critical to determining how to stop drinking excessively. It can help you plan ways to manage your urge to drink. Identify specific scenarios, experiences, places, or feelings that make you want to reach for a drink. If you don’t know your triggers yet, you can track instances when you feel the urge to consume alcohol. Note the place, time, people you are with, and the scenarios, and try to see patterns.
Experts suggest using an informal mindfulness practice every time you feel triggered. Stop to take stock of what is happening and then decide how you want to respond. For example, if you often drink excessively at happy hour events and your friends invite you to one, suggest doing it at lunch instead.
If you really cannot get away from your alcohol triggers, consider staying in a rehabilitation facility. Aside from offering an alcohol-free environment, these facilities have experts who can help you understand your triggers and determine effective ways to deal with them.
Connect With Others
Many people drink to escape loneliness. If you wonder how to stop drinking when dealing with loneliness, make a conscious effort to connect with people. If you cannot think of anyone, consider joining support groups like Alcoholics Anonymous to meet new people. People in such groups would understand your struggle.
Join community events, hobby groups, sports teams, and the like, where you can meet individuals with the same interests. Try to open up with the people you meet, and every time you feel lonely, engage in mentally and emotionally nourishing activities that could distract and prevent you from grabbing a drink. Alcohol can be a great companion when it feels like no one else is there for you, but all it offers is temporary relief and long-term harm.
Practice Healthy Lifestyle: Drink Enough Water, Exercise Regularly, and Eat Properly
You may have the urge to drink alcohol when you’re just parched. So, quench your thirst first with a tall glass of water or a cup of soothing tea before you imbibe. If you turn to alcohol whenever you’re in a bad mood, try exercise as an alternative. Physical activities, especially in nature, can be very helpful in coping with negative moods, such as anxiety.
Eat regular, healthy meals, too, if you want to stop drinking excessively. You may have become less interested in eating after drinking too much for a long time. Unfortunately, poor dietary habits can contribute to increased alcohol cravings.
Therefore, consider improving your nutrition. Avoid eating foods high in salt, sugar, and fatty acids. Instead, eat more foods rich in proteins, complex carbohydrates, and amino acids. Don’t forget foods with folic acid and B-complex vitamins.
Some rehabilitation centres promote healthy lifestyles in addition to providing alcohol recovery assistance. For example, HARP offers fine dining with private chefs to ensure patients eat healthy and nutritious meals. Patients can engage in equine therapy outdoors and enjoy nature. There are also tons of alcohol-free activities, like yoga and meditation.
Control Cravings With Medication
Several medications are effective at helping people reduce alcohol consumption. The most commonly taken medications are naltrexone, acamprosate, disulfiram, triapride, and gabapentin. Some are FDA-approved, while others are not. While effective, these medicines can cause an array of side effects, including nausea, vomiting, and restlessness.
Talk to your healthcare provider if you are planning to try these medications to reduce your alcohol consumption.
Reach Out for Support
Reducing alcohol consumption or quitting altogether is harder for some than others, but you don’t need to go through it alone. If you cannot cut back on your own despite trying everything on this list and more, reach out to a professional for support. They’re just waiting for you.
Do You Need to Cut Back on Alcohol? Take Our Quiz!
Too much alcohol is bad for your overall health and life. But how much alcohol is too much? Experts suggest having only 10 standard drinks in a week. So, if you’re drinking more than that quite often and your habit is already causing you trouble, then you may have an alcohol use disorder, and it is time to reduce your consumption.
Take this
“On a scale of 0 to alcoholic, where am I?”
to know whether – and where – you fall into alcohol use disorder.
