Dry January: Could you pull it off?
Going cold turkey after the excesses of the holidays is a growing trend
Could you quit drinking alcohol for a month?
The creative minds behind the Baroness von Sketch Show toyed with the idea of a dry January, as the annual ritual has become known.
Going cold turkey after the excesses of the holidays is a growing trend.
We asked readers to weigh in.
The question: Could you pull off the dry January challenge?
'Everything called for a drink'
Jenn Goldie did it, and kept doing it.
The Ottawa woman's dry January turned into a year-long cleanse.
"I'm glad I did it. I'm going to keep it going. The benefits far outweigh anything that I've lost," Goldie said.
How does she describe her bond with alcohol before she quit?
"We were committed. We had a very intense relationship."
Putting a cork in her booze consumption is something she admits she needed to do.
"Any day that ended in 'y,' any excuse. If you were sad you drank, if you were happy you drank, if you were celebrating, if you were commiserating — everything called for a drink," she said. "You start to look at your watch and wonder when it's 5 o'clock."
'The sober guy'
Wesley Rodney wasn't a big drinker, but wanted to drop a few kilos, so he also decided to quit booze in 2019. Like Goldie, he kept going.
He lost a few pounds, but nothing close to his goal of 18 kilos, or 40 lbs, and admits he may have compensated for the liquor with sugar.
"I'm going to have to try something crazy like diet or exercise," he laughed.
Rodney did manage to save some cash.
"I did find I was saving a lot of money. In a restaurant these days, two beers is $25 off the bill."
He's going to ask friends and family if he should continue to abstain, or as he puts it: "Should I become 'the sober guy?'"
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Meanwhile, friends have given Rodney a bottle of his favourite beer with a label that reads, "Open on January 1st, 2020."
"So that's waiting for me if I decide to start drinking," he said.