Alcohol and Driving

So, the mayor of London has put Uber on the naughty step. 

I imagine that they will stay there for a couple of months, thinking about what they've done, then they'll proffer an apology and promise to start treating their drivers properly, report serious incidents in their cabs to the police and, you never know, maybe even pay some tax.

Then they'll be given their license back (thereby saving the jobs of 40,000 drivers - hurrah!) and told that they'd better keep getting smiley faces on the reward chart, or else.

A while back, the thought of living in the capital with no Uber would have been rather terrifying, but not now, because I am my own mini-cab!

One of the very best things about giving up booze, (along with the fact that, having lost the muffin top, I can now see my feet! And I can afford to buy great shoes to put on them!) is being able to drive ALL THE TIME.

If Mr SM and I have a 'date night' in a fancy West End restaurant, I don't need to book an expensive taxi to get us there and back. Oh no. I just drive and park right outside. Because nobody drives into central London at night time, so you can park anywhere. For free.

If I go to a party, when I decide it's time to go (usually in the middle of someone telling me a 'hilarious' story for the third time), I don't have to find the host to ask for the number for a cab firm, then try to sound sober while I book the cab, then try to look sober when I climb into it.

Oh no, I just leave surreptitiously, find my car (which is usually right outside) and drive home.

I even offer lifts around to all my drunk friends. It's a great way to stock up some brownie points, (or maybe make up for past misdemeanours). It's amazing how popular being a 'designated driver' can make you.

And one of the real joys is being able to sail past police cars confidently, knowing that there is absolutely no way that you are over the limit. 

In fact, I have been known to deliberately drive 'erratically' around police cars in the hope that they will breathalyse me, so I can watch with huge smugness while the light remains stubbornly on GREEN.

Even if you are incredibly responsible about drinking and driving, and always take a taxi or public transport home, there's always the niggling fear that you might just still be over the limit in the morning. On the school run. Or driving into work. 

Give up drinking, and that's totally impossible.

So, yet another fine reason to quit the booze.

In other news this week, the makers of Jaffa Cakes, in their wisdom, have decided to cut the number of biscuits (cakes?) in a pack from twelve to ten. It's a disaster.

During my early days of not drinking I mainlined Jaffa Cakes. Ten would not have been enough, would barely have touched the sides.

New this week on the SoberMummy Facebook page: some fabulous women talking to the BBC about giving up booze, the stories (and before and after pictures!) of fifteen celebs who have gone sober, including Angelina, Adele, Samuel L. Jackson and Drew Barrymore, and the funniest video I've seen in ages.

For inspiration, information and a few good laughs every weekday at wine o'clock, join the SoberMummy Facebook page. CLICK HERE, and 'like' to stay updated.

Love to you all, 

SM x

Getting Through Wine O'Clock

The most difficult thing about giving up the drink is getting through the witching hour.

For me, it was longer than an hour - it stretched from around 5pm until about 8pm.

The clock seemed to move agonisingly slowly, and the wine witch would be jumping up and down inside my head yelling at me to stop being such a kill joy and just open a bottle of wine! (You don't need to drink the whole thing...)

I found that distraction really helped. Finding something interesting to read, or something funny to watch, or connecting with other people in the same boat.

Which is why I've created the SOBERMUMMY FACEBOOK PAGE! It's aimed at anyone who wants to quit or cut down on booze, or just drink more 'mindfully'.

I'm going to post something every weekday at wine o'clock UK time (I'm afraid that'll make it lunch time, or thereabouts in the USA) to inspire, inform or just entertain you.

There'll be newspaper articles, book reviews, mocktail recipes, TED talks, celebrity drinking stories (I know it's puerile, but I do love them. It makes me feel a little more glamorous) and much more. All upbeat and light-hearted - things you'll, hopefully, be happy to share.

If you check out my page now you'll find a the most widely shared TED talk on addiction, a newspaper article about Carol McGiffin drinking two bottles of wine a day, a wonderful video about parenting which I swear will make you cry (in a good way) as well as my favourite Absolutely Fabulous clip (because I blame Patsy and Edina for the pickle I found myself in!).

I'm on a mission to provide an antidote to all those drinking memes that crop up on your Facebook timeline!

All you need to do is to click the link here, or type SoberMummy into your Facebook search bar. Once you find my page, if you 'like' it Facebook will keep you updated with new stuff as I post it.

I'd love to make it all a proper community, so please do share, comment and message me via the page with any suggestions of content you'd like to see up there. You can also e-mail me on sobermummy@gmail.com.

Once we've got enough people on board I can set up some community areas like a 'Dry January' group or a '100 day challenge' group, so you can chat privately to people with the same goals as you and egg each other along.

So please, please drop in and 'like' my page (I'm aware I'm sounding needy!) I'd LOVE to see you there. And please leave any ideas, suggestions, issues in the comments below.

Love SM x

CLICK HERE TO GO TO SOBERMUMMY'S FACEBOOK PAGE

P.S. After two and a half years of blogging, I have finally managed to work out how to post images as well as words! That's my kitchen clock at the top of this post.

Will I Lose all my Friends?

This is the question that haunted me when I first quit drinking. In fact, I posted with this same title back on day 13. (To read that post click here).

And the truth is that I didn't lose any friends, in that no-one called me up to say Good God, you are SO BORING that I never want to see you again. (I really had expected that to happen).

What has happened, though, is that there are some friends who contact me a lot less. Needless to say, generally the ones who can't contemplate the idea of a night out without getting totally hammered, and don't want a sober person there pouring rain on their parade.

I'm not angry about this. I get it. I would have done the same, back in the day. I would have justified this to myself as being 'because they're no fun any more', when actually I was just worried that it would shine a light on my own out of control drinking.

This slight negative is, however, totally drowned out by the positive, which is that I have made lots of new friends. 

I hadn't made many new friends for years. It felt like too much effort. I was also somewhat aware that my old muckers would be more forgiving of any wayward antics than brand new, shiny friends.

But now I have a much wider social circle, including several women who hardly ever (or never) drink, the ones I would have written off in the past as being 'not my type.'

Then yesterday the lovely people at Go Sober for October sent me these fascinating statistics from a survey by Macmillan Cancer Support.

7 MILLION BRITS DITCH THEIR FRIENDS FOR DRINKING TOO MUCH

Apparently, 13% of adults (6.7 million people) have stopped going for a drink with at least one friend because they believe they drink too much.

And a Go Sober survey found that one quarter of UK adults avoid drinking with certain friends because of the way they behave after a tipple. 54% say their friend gets too aggressive, and 47% say they get too loud.

This is all driving a trend towards 'soberlising' - socialising without the booze - which is particularly popular amongst the young.

So, don't fret about losing your friends when you STOP drinking, worry about losing them if you CARRY ON!

And if you need some fabulous help and encouragement, then join my friends over at Go Sober for October.

(You'll also be raising money for Macmillan Cancer Support who were a huge help to me through the whole breast cancer thingy).

In other news, are any of you called Nigel? Apparently NOT ONE baby was named Nigel last year in the UK. This makes me sad, as my first ever snog was a Nigel. On a school trip, aged eleven. Just saying.

Love to you all,

SM (Clare)