I share this concern, though at this point I have told several people and then relapsed, so it would be really cool if you could tell them once and then make it stick.
When I asked the list this question months ago there was a slightly different group of readers and we had a lot of fun with this question. Some examples include: claim diet, medication, religion, alcoholism.
A solution, if you must hang out with your drinky friends, is to figure out a complex and perhaps even expensive, non-alcoholic drink you can order and order it first when the server arrives at the table. My go to drink is tomato juice. I actually love it and it often looks like a bloody mary. You could even order it with salt. But I will move away from sodas this tiime around--they feel flat.
You might be the driver. I think once you can abstain in the presence of drinking you will enjoy yourself. That said, I am currently not going to bars or restaurants at all -- until I get some time under my belt. And then I will probably start trying out new restaurants where assumptions won't be made by common servers (small town). And I think bars are a thing of the past for me. So much so that hubby did not attend a karaoke contest in which he was a semi-finalist last night. No sweat. He read to me while I sewed. But a movie would have been just as good. But that will be my AM post....
Good luck, and as others have said, most people don't care. It is only us alcoholics that count everyone's drinks. Normies don't care.