I don't want to be totally AF......,

[ToMyHealth]

Frances, I want to grow up to be just like you! Truly.

NYE plans were to go see War Room but out of theatres already. That and pick up some crablegs for dinner. However, our first renter of our other condo arrives the next day so had to put cleaning on calendar. We're done with major work, cleaning carpets, moved personal items. Neither of us can do today as Wed is our Volunteer Day. Working together we may get out for a movie in afternoon. We only go to a movie once a year so it is a treat.

January 1 we signed upfor the Bloody Mary golf tournament. So we willl go meet our renter in a.m. to check her in, then go play golf with a hundred friends or so, however many they allowed in. Fee includes food, football after in clubhouse and, of course, the ol' Happy Hour pricing. Going to start thinking club soda with splash of cranberry!

How about everyone else?

[frances]

Hi there! Glad to hear everyone sounds like they're doing well! We had a very nice Christmas and during dinner I thought to myself how different things are for me now - back 'then' I would have been having refill after refill of wine and the bottle would have been out on the table for easy access. This time I gladly drank my water and had one glass of wine during dinner. It feels so much better not to overdo it!

What's everyone doing for New Years Eve? My family was going to go out of town to the mountains, but work schedules aren't cooperating, and my teenage daughter prefers to be able to hang out with her friends anyway. So, we'll be in town and probably just hanging out at home. And that's fine with me!

[blue1]

Hey everyone! Hope everybody had a great Christmas!!!! Mine was wonderful. My sister's boyfriend was home all by himself so I invited him over and my children and grandchildren came over so we had a lot of company. I hadn't seen him since my sister's memorial and every time I looked at him it made me think about my sister.....

I didn't do a standard mod....but I didn't over do it either. I ate good and danced with my grandbabies lol. I didn't drink enough water though....so that's what I'm drinking now lol

Hope you guys are having a successful Saturday!

[ToMyHealth]

Hi all, started a post yest, phone rang and I never got back to it. Was wishing you all a Merry Christmas. We had 2 couples join us for dinner. Both brought 2 bottles of wine each. And, of course, we had made a Costco run and bought various kinds. I had 1/2 glass during long Happy Hour and a couple glasses while eating dinner.

Woke up this morning feeling good and went for a workout. Now we've cleaned up the good dishes, silverware, managed to not break any crystal or special Christmas wine glasses. Dh left to go hit some golf balls. I have a book I need to finish by Monday so heading over to pool to just relax & read.

Am so glad it's over! How about you? Not that I'm not thankful, I am. It just gets to be too much running around. Having trouble remembering what day it is. That's one of the joys of retirement.....LOL. Happy Boxing Day!

TMH

[frances]

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope everyone had a great one!

[ducky]

Same to you Samstone! Thanks for popping in!

[Samstone]

Merry Christmas modders... hope you all are doing well!!!

[frances]

Hey there - I got almost all of my shopping done. Just a couple more items to get - maybe I will do that tomorrow morning early before I go to work. The wrapping always gets me cause I always wait until Christmas eve and I can't start until after 9:30 because of other things we usually do. I'm hoping to do some tonight and some tomorrow and Wednesday to try to minimize the marathon wrapping on Christmas eve!

Ducky I totally get the empty nester 'issue' - more free time, etc. - I sometimes think forward to that point and wonder how I will be. Especially when socializing, which I expect will increase for us once the kid obligations settle down when they are out of the house. Right now we almost never go out and do anything. Pretty boring, I know. I do think it's helped me with drinking so infrequently though.

Hi Blue - good to hear from you!

It's my husband's birthday so I better get to cooking his dinner :happy2: Have a good one everyone!

[blue1]

Hey guys! I'm really glad your mom is doing as well as she is!!!!
And, I never heard of harm reduction either but it sounds interesting. I'm still not modding as well as I would like to....but I'm still trying...and I'm not going to beat myself up about it.

I won't be done Christmas shopping until Christmas Eve.
My grandchildren decorated our tree....I was thankful for that cause my energy level has been very low....I don't know if it's the recovering from the asthma attack or a bit of depression or both.

I'm so glad to hear you guys are doing so well....keep up the good work!!! I was missing you guys and thought I'd check in....I will definitely be back to talk to y'all before Christmas!

Have a successful day!!!!

[ducky]

Hi Frances, I remember a member Nancy using the term. I think it has to do with the benefits of cutting back even if you do not cut back to the point of meeting the mod guidelines set up by the government. We are empty nesters here and tend to have cocktails most days. I just have not gotten to the place where I am ready to stop so concentrating on having less right now. I know you went AF for a long stretch and that is admirable! Hope you got your shopping finished. Have to do some wrapping here.

[frances]

H Ducky - great to see you, and thanks for the supportive words. I feel like I'm doing great but I am definitely not taking it for granted.

I'm not very familiar with harm reduction - what exactly does it mean compared to moderating? Anything I can do to help just let me know! You have been around MWO awhile (as have I!) so you are probably already aware of the toolbox thread - I'm sure there are other threads that are very useful too. For me habit breaking was key and just replacing my routine drinking activity with something else was extremely important. But others have a lot of other tips and tricks and ways to get past that feeling of wanting a drink.

I'm not sure why but something feels 'off' with me today. I am feeling tired and a little foggy. It is a very familiar feeling - very similar to how I used to feel when I was hungover! But this time I have it for totally different reasons (I can't quite figure out what it is...allergies maybe?). Anyway, I was thinking a few minutes ago how nice it is not to have this feeling so often like I used to! It's another thing I'm grateful for!

Off to hopefully finish my Christmas shopping now. Happy Holidays to you too!!

[ducky]

Hey Frances, sorry it is so quiet. You seem to be doing great. Glad your mom is ok and hope that continues. I totally get being nervous about your daughter. Hard to relax when they are not where we can see them. Sounds like she has a good head on her shoulders though. You are doing a wonderful job at mods. Congrats on that. Hope to hear from THM and Stewarts and others soon. I am trying to move from harm reduction toward mods and am making some progress. Happy Holidays to all!

[frances]

It's lonely over here. Hope everyone is doing well. Things are good here. Still so much to do before Christmas but with so many blessings I am so grateful for so many things. Mom continuing to do well is one of them - she gets another scan next month and we'll see whether the treatment she's on is working. I hope it is!! The one thing she has is pretty bad fatigue and so my prayer now is that the treatment is working and that the fatigue gets better for her. But all things considered, things are going very well for her in this situation.

My 15 year old daughter spent the night with friends last night. These days I don't know some of her newer high school friends the same way I used to when she was younger. That always makes me uncomfortable. But they are nice and I don't have any real reason to worry - just the usual parental worry that I will be living with for the rest of my life! My daughter is a good girl with a good head on her shoulders and so far has been very comfortable sticking with her own set of values and not being influenced by others. I hope that stays true! She is not at all like I was at her age -I have a lot of regrets but at her age I had already started drinking and though I was a nice person, I did some very stupid things because of my partying. I hope she stays away from that, at least throughout high school.

I've only gone to one 'evening' Christmas party this year and was with my daughter so it was easy to refuse the drink when offered. From time to time a thought still crosses my mind to have a drink after a stressful day but just pushing the thought away and making a cup of tea instead has been working for me. The thought always goes away after just a couple of minutes.

[frances]

Nice to see you TMH - sorry you haven't been meeting your goals. Been there so many times myself! Cutting back was always hard for me too - worked for a day or two but never much longer. That saying - if only one, why not none? - was what got me through many many days when I was completely AF for 9 months. It is so true! In and of itself there is nothing wrong with 'one' but for me, I could never consistently drink 'just one', so I had to go with none instead.

Not drinking through those holiday events would be hard - I agree. But once you get some decent AF time under your belt it truly does get easier to say no at events.

Glad you are feeling great now and hope you had a good golf game!

[ToMyHealth]

Hi ~ been around. Haven't been doing that great. Keep saying today is the day I quit and then I think about Tues night ladies only party (2 blocks away), the 19th Club Christmas party, and we are having couples over for Christmas Day. And we are invited to go with a group downtown on NYE. Did that couple yrs ago & I was DD and hated it.

So yest I said so ok, if you are not ready to quit at least cut back. Last night I had 1 drink, milk with dinner. And, of course, could not sleep, well after midnight. Was going to join biking group this a.m. But lack of sleep & 50 deg....bowed out. Went back to bed, feel great now. Will go lift wts, W/R couple miles and play 18 holes of golf.

My point is: if only 1, why not None?