An alcohol free existence
Thanks to my Mum for pointing me in the direction of a new Irish blog Year of the Big Drought. Markham, a 25 year old Dubliner, is going to give up alcohol on St Patrick’s Day for a whole year and chronicle his experiences online. This should make fascinating reading. His candid posts to date already have me hooked.
He says that reactions so far have been mixed, ranging from "how will you survive?" to "so what?". Well, I recognise that this is a huge undertaking and wish him the very best of luck in his quest. I say this as someone who has never been drunk. I’m teetotal and never see this changing. I just don’t like the taste. The drinking culture in Ireland does everything to discourage this type of behaviour.
In fact, this country’s attitude to alcohol is ridiculous. Parents kick off if their teenagers get involved in smoking cigarettes or cannabis, but they usually have no major difficulty with them getting seriously drunk on a regular basis before it is even legal to do so. Employers frown upon sick leave but turn a blind eye to occasional major hangovers which leave employees barely able to converse. The health service would be in considerably better shape if so many resources were not used up coping with the aftermath of consuming alcohol. Yet, the majority refuse to accept that Ireland has a major problem with alcohol. Sure we’re just having the craic!
I have always got major hassle for not drinking. In fact, I have been made feel like a complete freak on many occasions. Although I don’t keep it a secret, naturally people generally only find out when I go for a drink with them and (shock horror) order a soft drink even though I don’t drive. They are generally amazed and full of questions as to why I’m like this. I’ll be questioned on many subsequent occasions also (not just when at pubs) and I’ve lost count of the number of times people have offered to buy me “real” drinks just to encourage me to give it a go! Then they will ask whether my boyfriend drinks or my sister drinks etc just to find out whether I’m the only one with the weird gene or whether it’s some sort of cult… Word will go round and the next time someone in the particular group who missed the occasion sees me, it’s often the case that the very first thing they will say, regardless of the setting, is "so, I hear you don’t drink…". I’m the only one who seems to find this questioning strange or excessive. It is just assumed in this country that everyone drinks alcohol. It must make being a recovering alcoholic even more difficult than in other countries. It has often struck me when I’m being quizzed (before people know my reasons) that however bad it feels for me, it would be infinitely worse if I had a drink problem.
I fear this is started to reek of a rant but that wasn’t my intention. I simply wanted to make the point that although I know nothing of the physical problems of giving up alcohol, I can appreciate that it’s a big deal simply to conquer the peer pressure. Ireland expects you to drink and you don’t get an easy time if you don’t. Hopefully, Markham’s social circle will support him wholeheartedly in his quest which should make things substantially easier. Good luck Markham, and start saving for the big holiday you may be able to afford when you stop lining the pockets of Diageo & Co. But be warned, in rip-off Ireland soft drinks are the worst value drinks in the pub!
March 7th, 2005 at 2:24 pm
Well I’d probably be one of those annoying ppl asking you why you don’t drink….I guess the fact that I do it so much makes me curious about people who don’t….I think I go on my guard a little knowing that in three hours there’s a good chance I could be lecturing them on the merits of cushioned toilet paper while they in their sobriety recall the exact conversation the next day!
Your point on recovering alcoholics is dead on. I have a relation who is a recovering alcoholic and only when they are in Ireland do they come under pressure to come to the pub for the ‘craic’. AA advises alcoholics to steer well clear of pubs so it really upsets me when I see family members, who are well aware of our relaiton’s problem, putting undue pressure on them to come to the pub. I’ve even heard people accusing my relation of being anti social for not joining the rest of the family in the pub which irks me beyond belief. I cannot think of anywhere worse in the world to live as a recovering alcoholic than in this country.
March 7th, 2005 at 7:14 pm
i was off drink for three years, which is a bloody hard thing to do in dublin. the most annoying thing about it was one particular friend, living in london, who’d always plonk a pint in front of me everytime we met in dublin (cause, invariably, whenever you meet someone in dublin, you have to meet in a pub).
the only really really hard time i had when i was off drink was those late nights / early mornings in some godawful hole like break for the border and i’d be the only sober person in a large group. alcohol actually radically improves your sense of humour and things just don’t seem so funny when you’re stone cold sober.
(c) fmk
March 7th, 2005 at 7:39 pm
caoimhe - i actually don’t find people asking me about it annoying. it’s only natural. i’m just as curious when i meet someone who doesn’t eat sweets
it’s when the same person then *keeps* bringing it up and acts like i’m some sort of alien that i begin to feel uncomfortable.
fair play fmk - looks like markham won’t get into the record books
3 years is impressive!
since my post was already half a mile long i didn’t get into the issues of being the only sober one around the pub table. i don’t find it any fun and so getting the last bus is a wild night out for me :> i tend to *assume* that everything would be far more enjoyable if i was drunk. however, never having been in that situation, perhaps it just would not be my scene anyway…
March 7th, 2005 at 9:24 pm
I admire anyone that can go off the booze in this country for three years and not become totally bitter and twisted. I’ve had harsh words from friends on nights out even when I wasn’t going dry. Limiting myself to four pints and a good old wander through some of the city centre pubs was enough to put one girl in a huff for days.
I chalked it up as one of my best nights out of the year, and even managed to fully enjoy the company of some of my wasted mates in the Porter House.
Yolonda (not her real name) was not amused. We HADN’T gotten wasted and HADN’T ended up in a cramped nightclub dancing soullessly to mid-nineties pop. How could we have possibly enjoyed ourselves?
It’s a mystery to me. Then again, I wasn’t wearing heels on Temple Bar cobbles. Maybe that was it.
Roll on Paddy’s Day.
March 7th, 2005 at 9:28 pm
By the by, cheers for a lovely gushing write-up. Obviously I’ll be delighted to provide a recipro-link when I have a chance to fiddle with my html. (Only learning, y’see…. Things take time)
Markham
March 8th, 2005 at 6:20 pm
fmk, i’m well impressed. i gave it up for the first 6 weeks of the year and then gave in…. such a weakling at these things!
March 8th, 2005 at 8:14 pm
hi Janine,
As someone who gets major hassle for not wanting to go to the pub, (i’ve been boycotting them due to their ridiculous prices), I think you deserve a lot of praise for sticking to soft drinks in a country that want’s you to drink so badly, they’ll charge you less for a beer than a mineral!!
Irish people don’t exactly win in the originality stakes for places to meet. It’s always in a pub, in order to counter the boredom of supposed “social” situations you end up knocking back drink! Or at least I do.
Often I’ve argued the toss with barmen as to why a mineral costs more than alcohol and I have yet to hear a convincing answer.
But in a society that expects you to be at the very least merry on a regular basis, you have great guts for sticking to your guns.
March 11th, 2005 at 7:48 pm
bluire - thanks, it’s not that hard to stick to your guns when you just hate the taste and are stuck in your ways
doesn’t mean i feel mega comfortable with my attitude either mind…
markham - thanks for the link and enjoy your last drinking weekend! and if you need any html help just holler (not that i know any
)
March 13th, 2005 at 2:51 pm
I know exactly how you feel about the not drinking issue. I’m a non drinker because I simply don’t enjoy it.
My friends think it is very ‘cool’ to say to me,”I can’t wait to get you loaded.”
What I thought was so sad it was almost funny was when I told my parents that at these parties I was pressured to drink. My Dad told me to have a drink, but to keep sipping away at it the whole night.
I was surprised that he said that. I thought it was a morbid thought to think that my parents would condone me drinking, they wouldn’t tell me not to. I said,”You want me to be like them? I can’t make a stand and just.. not??”
That’s the way it’s become over here. Regarding underage drinking, it’s completely ignored. In my town there is an exact place were some ‘underagers’ go, and the police don’t go there because…?
April 25th, 2005 at 12:36 pm
Hi Guys,
As a 22 year old recovering alcoholic I AM finding this not drinking business Very hard! (Please dont get the wino/down and out image in your head.. Im a very successfull person career wise who just went a bit mad on the whole party scene for a few years… If I have one drink then something inside me wants to get plastered so its best that i dont do it at all) Although I dont actually want to drink anymore, I DOO feel like an alien when Im in work or among friends who 90% of the time talk about what they did the last time they were all out and drunk, the stoopid things that someone else did or where they are going the next time they go out to get hammered! Before I wouldnt have noticed how much other people talk about it cos I would have been doing most of the talking but now i feel like I cant contribute the conversation at all!
Fair play to Markham for giving up the drink for a while, but (soory have to say) people have been giving up drink and have been sucessfully off it for years and no one has battered an eyelid, why is this such an issue now… although hopefully it will high light the complete lack of social activities in Ireland that dont revolve around drink!
Some people think that your bitter when you dont drink and you dont want to go to a niteclub/late bar after being out with them.. but id like to point out that its no fun being told the same story youve just discussed TWICE in the pub AGAIN instead this time having it spat at you beacuse as the night goes on and the music gets louder they invariably become more passionate about whatever it it they are talking about!!
I do think that it is amazing how differently people act around me when I go to social occasions when they realise I dont drink, before they realise they are all chat and when I tell them or they figure out I can see them them trailing off looking around the room for someone who they can potentially get drunk with as clearly i’d be “no fun” as I dont drink.. even tho I have as much of a laugh as the next person (until it gets to the messy stage of the nite and then im outta there)
Anyway best of luck to you Markham, Im looking forward to following your progress and seeing how you handle some of the situations that I have come across in the past year!
Janine I really enjoyed your post aswell!! I wish I had the sense you had! Could have saved myself a few awful years! Ah well - Ive come out the other side now.. atleast I know what’s there for me if I was to go back! :o)
April 26th, 2005 at 8:37 am
thanks for the feedback abby and kat.
it’s great to know i’m not alone abby and that i’m not the only one who thinks non drinkers get a hard time - some of my drinking friends think it’s all in my head.
but kat, i really admire you for sticking at it. as i said in my post i find it such a pain that i can’t imagine how difficult it is for someone who has to battle against drink every single day. you go girl!
June 15th, 2005 at 5:31 am
i think its sad how peer pressure can sway you from what you want into what everyone else is doing. i dont drink alcohol at all and everyone thinks i have mutated genes or are socially unwell just because i choose not to drink, especially as all my mates would jump at the chance to go down to the pub and booze their figgin lives away. is it so bad in our society for people not to drink? why are we considered frigid? why is it frowned apon to remain sober all our lives? i am a regular person whos into partying, rock and guys. so why is this one thing we choose not to do so bad? vegetarians and lesbians are accepted better than we are.
why? i cant even comprehend.
June 17th, 2006 at 7:54 am
I’ve just decided to stop drinking. I have been thinking about it for a very long time and have decided enough is enough. I just can’t see that it has any benefit to my life whatsoever (and that really it never did!). I am in no doubt that his decision is one of the best things I’ve ever decided, but I’m yet to go out and have to tell everyone. No one wants to be a social pariah, and I don’t want or need to avoid going out, so I’m looking for some advice on how to deal with those people who will keep bringing it up. The last thing I want to do is get in arguments or have to spend the whole night discussing it with someone because it threatens them. What’s the best way to brush people off and get on wih some more interesting chat?
June 17th, 2006 at 8:05 am
p.s. vic: it’s because lesbianism and vegetarianism are not highly addictive toxic poisons that almost everyone takes on a regular basis for no good reason! You not drinking makes them realise that they are controlled by alcohol because they think they need it to have a good time, and this makes them feel stupid because it is!
September 15th, 2006 at 3:24 am
I think we Irish see someone not drinking the same as we’d see someone coming to a restaurant and not eating. Handy tip, drink Becks non-alcoholic and people leave you alone, it’s a friggin miracle!
August 22nd, 2007 at 12:30 pm
Im researching the idea of opening a alcohol free pub in a rural area in the southeast area. I am the parent of a nineteen year old alcoholic and drug user. He has received residential treatment one year ago and has been clean for most of the time since, with the exception of 3 or 4 relaps. I feel the main problem in his recovery is the absence of an alternatitive to the pub, and peer pressure is constantly leading him back there. I would welcome comments from people (young or old) to my idea, or from people who know of such an establishment.
August 24th, 2007 at 10:42 am
John, that sounds like a great idea! In travelling around the world I got to see that the egyptians have it down to a tea, quite litterally! The meeting places are tea shops where they sit outside the shop and chat, they smoke pipe or sheesha and chill out and hang out. A very nice way to spend socialising and not a drop of drink! I gave up drink 4 months ago and have seen my health improve drastically. Would love to hear of a new evening tea joint where the drink taps are replaced with tea bags!
September 11th, 2007 at 11:07 pm
I know this post was written in 2005, but I was wondering, if you get notice of this comment somehow, if you could ask Markham to contact me. I would like to read his blog, but it’s invite only, and there is no contact information for him. I’m a non-drinker and have been forever and am interested in how his non-drinking experience went in Ireland, where the drinking culture sounds very similar to here in Australia. I know I get treated like a freak when people find out I don’t drink, so I was wondering what sort of reactions he got.
Thanks!
September 12th, 2007 at 1:05 am
Hi Puss in Boots,
I see what you mean about the big drought blog now being password protected. However, a quick Google suggests that the same Markham (I hope!?) is now blogging at http://expad.ie/ and believe it or not is actually over working in Oz at the moment!
As a non-drinker myself I know what you mean about people treating you like a freak. I did not realise drink was as big a deal in Australia. I think it gets easier as you get older. Now I’m in my late 20s *sigh* I find I don’t care as much what people think. I don’t drink - get over it!
July 11th, 2008 at 11:17 am
Hi All,
Makes for very interesting reading! I am researching a newspaper article on people who don’t drink in Ireland and would love to talk to as many of you who are still on the wagon (I realise that this thread is over a year old but am hoping some of you still check it)
Thanks,
Sara
August 24th, 2008 at 10:03 am
hi guys. Unfortunatly everything you say about irelands love of alcohol and absolute disregard of all us disadvantaged souls never to have enjoyed alcohol is true just wondering is there any societys clubs etc. Apart from the pioneers operating out of leinster region where like minded people can come together and enjoy social outings without being hounded to drink
August 25th, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Hi John,
You might be interested in the Non Drinkers Group. Most of the events are Dublin based and the group has its own message board at boards.ie. The website address is http://www.nondrinkersgroup.com/
October 3rd, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Its not easy been a non drinker in Ireland. As a non drinker myself i have been ridiculed as a freak, a dry shite, as tight as a camels arse in a sandstorm, (I don’t see the logic here), that’s like saying someone is tight because they don’t smoke. That’s a choice you make, it’s nothing to do with the money. Now i used to drink, i tried it for about a year and i just got fed up with it. I was not enjoying it so i just stopped. Ever since then i have become a social outcast. Its almost impossible to meet new people now, and i find myself slowly losing touch with my friends. Just what other options are there for the non drinker in a Country where binge drinking is the norm?
October 11th, 2008 at 10:55 pm
steve
Just taught i would respond to your comment what you say is dead right as a result of this your confidence hits rock bottom as you cannot meet any new people as all social outings are centered around drinking just wondering if you had any suggestions on how to rectify this situation that the mindset within ireland has presented up with