The occasional drink
Throughout Alcohol Awareness week we've invited guest bloggers to contribute their thoughts and experiences on this subject.
In this post, Bromford colleague, Gav Chahal talks about how giving up 'the occasional drink' has helped him to lose almost two stone in weight.
In late September I decided that I needed a lifestyle change, so I set myself a personal goal to follow a healthy eating plan, but I knew I needed that extra oomph to keep the motivation up. Basically, you know how it goes with any type of calorie counting or dieting plan, its great to start with and then it tends to fizzle out and by the second or third week and you fall into the same old habits.
During a conversation with my colleague Clare Parslow, she told me she was taking part in Sober October. I literally laughed at her, but unfortunately she wasn't joking The conversation made me think that maybe this was the oomph that I needed to keep the motivation going, so I accepted the challenge.
I like the “occasional drink”, usually in a social setting, so I saw this as the perfect motivation to help me to kick start my healthy lifestyle challenge. Once committed, I knew that I wouldn't want to let my colleague down and when I checked out the calories in a pint of lager I knew that I was on the right track. I never knew that there was 187 calories in a pint! I did a quick equation and was I shocked (187 Calories x 5 Pints x 2 a week) now that’s worrying 7480 calories in a month! Wow!
The daily banter on Facebook with both Clare Parslow and Rachel Finlayson (Clare’s Friend), who took part in the challenge too, was quite hilarious. We kind of naturally kept each other going by posting pictures of alcohol-free beverages that we had brought to fill the gap.
I know that this sounds bad but a month is probably the longest I have gone without an 
alcoholic drink. Even in the final week I was sending Clare and Fin pictures whilst I was eating out, asking for their permission to eat a particular meal. I know that alcohol evaporates in the cooking process, but it's always good to check!
So how did Sober for October help me?
Well I lost 1 Stone and 3 pounds in that month, I’m sure that those 7480 calories I saved helped me along the way. As I’m typing now in week two of November I’ve lost 1 stone and 13 pounds. Or the way I like to put it – the weight of 13 ½ bags of sugar in seven weeks!
In truth I probably exaggerated the word “occasional” earlier, but it really is occasional now and a big thank you to everyone for the support, especially the fab pair Clare & Fin.
This is one a series of blogs being posted during Alcohol Awareness Week. Please click on the titles below to read the others:
Do small things with great love
Does everybody have an off switch?
It's not big, and it's not clever
Come and have a look at how we help and if you feel that you could make a difference, you could even come and join us.
(Image courtesy of aJ GAZMEN)