I was ploughing through the items in my google reader today and came across and article from writer, Sarah Wilson, on her personal blog. The article is a personal insight into how Sarah became the face of Australian-based charity FebFast. FebFast helps raise funds for organisations that work on research, prevention and awareness of alcohol and substance abuse by young people. Every year, during the month of February, FebFast calls on the public to take up the challenge of going alcohol free for a month. And I registered today!
Some of Sarah’s insights into how the opportunity came about rang true with me as if I had written the words myself:
…..I told myself I drank two glasses a night, which is healthy, right? Thing is, my two glasses often constituted half a bottle, which is four standard drinks. That’s what alcohol does. It creeps up and deludes. I didn’t have a problem, mind! Oh no! I just would never – not in a million turns of the earth – have given it up. I was too scared to.
Sure alcohol is addictive. But for most of us this ain’t the issue. What really scares us is the idea of being at a party or a dinner with just our sober selves to rely on – nothing to cling to, no external distraction to steer the vibe. Or of heading home after work with no salve to look forward to, no treat for a day that hurt. It feels like free-fall.
When I spent a couple of sessions with a dietician last year I was in an uncomfortable position of telling the dietician how much alcohol I drank and how frequently. It is a question that dieticians asks all their clients so they know what caloric intake their clients have when writing up an eating plan. In my response to the question I ended covering up the real answer with a “watered down” version of what I was consuming because I was ashamed to admit what I drank in reality. At the moment I consume at least 2 glasses of wine per night, which would be close to 4 standard drinks (a standard drink of wine is 100ml). And it is very rare if I have two alcohol free days a week, which was another question asked by the dietician.
It makes me feel very guilty and silly – yet another thing I allow me do to myself that damages my body. I would say that the alcohol I consume contributes to half of the reason why I have put on 12 or so kilos of weight in the past two years. As Sarah has written: “It creeps up and deludes”.
So what perfect timing for this article to come along! It ties in nicely with my fitness goal and will really help me get my goal off to a good start. The real challenge here for me though is the mental challenge. When I gave up smoking 9 years ago I spent alot of effort trying to dissociate things I did in everyday life with smoking. Now I have to do it all over again for drinking. And there’s no arm patch out there to help this one!
I hope that the next month shows me just how detrimental it has been to my health and that once midnight the 1st of March clicks over that I won’t go back to my excessive ways.
Is this something that you could do too? Head over to the FebFast page and register if you want to give it a go yourself. But If not, why not support me with my teetoatler challenge and give a donation to a very worthwhile cause.
To go to my FebFast Page, click here.
[Photo by ifindkarma]
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