I guess you begin at the beginning. The beginning of this was mid-December 2015. You can never know what will inspire a life change, or a wake-up moment, but something clicked right before Christmas. I can really only speak for myself but I'm pretty sure that The Wolf was feeling the same, both of us a bit overweight (ok, he was a bit overweight, me I was a lot overweight), feeling sluggish, tired, a good night sleep was becoming elusive, unmotivated by life in general. Still overwhelmed by our move to Seattle more than a year later, it was time for a change.
I wish I could pinpoint the moment when we decided to stop drinking alcohol. I know it was sometime right before the real holiday season began. It wasn't a post holiday "OMG I cannot imagine drinking another beer, ever." This was a all of a sudden; I think it's time to stop, just stop. Let's see if we can make it to the end of January. How hard can that be?
Well, if you know us, you know that's not an easy thing to even contemplate. We enjoy our cocktails. Wine, we're both pretty meh about that. But the chemistry behind that perfect combination of strong and bitter balanced with sweet and sometimes savory. Oh, the joy of it all. We're not Jeffrey Morgenthaler, but we can blame him for some of our favorites. Summer in a glass, aka Richmond Gimlet (Google it). Of course we make our own maraschino cherries. A trip to Total Wine in Reno Nevada could easily put us back a few hundred dollars just to have the perfect mixer. Crema di violetta liquor was essential, albeit in 1/4 ounce occasionally when we wanted an Aviation Cocktail. It got a bit crazy.
Don't misunderstand though, we didn't go all puritan or anything. We just needed to step back and take some control over our lives. So far we're almost 9 months in and other than a couple glasses of wine, compared to bottles of wine per week, we're doing good. We are both enjoying the benefits both physically and medically of limiting our alcohol intake. It's no longer a day to day thing. It has become how we live. There is so much more to this lifestyle change experiment, but this post is about the beginning. I hope you will continue with us on our journey to trying to figure this whole thing out.
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