KarrieJay

I've been sober for about four months now, and one of my biggest worries when I decided to stop was how I would cope if anyone put pressure on me to drink. There is a huge "drinking culture" here in the UK and it has tripped me up in the past.

But I was pleasantly surprised by the reaction of my friends. None of them put pressure on me to drink! Most of them don't seem to care that I'm not drinking, and were almost bemused by the fact that I mentioned it at all. One of them asked me why I stopped, and I just said that I can't handle it these days. She ended up admitting that she thinks she drinks too much herself and would like to cut down.

On the whole, people were so uninterested in my non-drinking that I began to think that my worries were paranoid.........and then it happened. I went out with my colleagues after work to the company's Christmas "do". It's a typical "drinking" event and my colleagues reaction to my non-drinking was everything I'd feared.

When I got to the event, I went to the bar for a Lime & Soda and then joined a group of colleagues that I've known for years. They were all on the wine and beer, and when they noticed my Lime & Soda, they immediately started questioning me, very persistently, about why I wasn't drinking. "Why aren't you drinking"? "Are you on a health kick"? "Are you driving"? "Have you given up drinking"?etc. I just said that I didn't want to drink, and they were visibly shocked by that answer. It was almost as if I'd admitted to a crime or something. They kept going on and on about it and were really badgering me and because I wasn't expecting it, I felt ambushed and cornered. For a second, I thought I was going to run out of the room.

But the feeling passed almost immediately, and then I just felt a weird mix of annoyance and pity. Annoyance that they felt qualified to question my choices, and pity that they obviously felt that it was impossible to enjoy a social event whilst completely sober.

I eventually told them, nicely, to back off. I explained that I didn't want to drink, I was having a nice time without it and it was none of their business anyway. I pointed out that I wasn't trying to monitor their behavior, and I'd prefer if they didn't try and monitor mine. And I finished by asking "What's it to you anyway?". To their credit, they did back off and from that point on they were fine.

The rest of the evening was great. A different experience than in previous years, but still good. I left earlier than I would have done previously, but I left sober, with my dignity intact and with the full knowledge that no-one would be gossiping about me in the office the next day.

I'd would have been nice to think that everyone would just respect my choice, but that was always a bit much to hope for. So I'm glad it happened. I'm pretty certain that if it had happened in my first week of sobriety it would have broken my resolve, but I'm stronger now and I feel that my reaction to it showed that. And I now know I can handle other people's reaction.

If they can't handle me not drinking, it tells me more about them than they'd probably want me to know.