Midlife Drinking Audit
Problem drinking is far from black and white, and you don’t need to wait until you hit rock bottom before you realise you want to, or need to, live an alcohol-free life. Like so many things, problematic drinking falls across a spectrum. Lots of people drink alcohol, many people have some problems with it, and some people have many problems with it. There is, in fact, a huge grey area, which is rarely discussed, and when I realised that Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD) was a spectrum of problematic drinking, including binge drinking and drinking to avoid feelings, and not just a case of ‘normal drinkers’ versus alcoholics’, things began to make more sense.
Let’s Break it Down
The World Health Organization breaks down Alcohol Use Disorder into three categories in its AUDIT (Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test)1:
1. Hazardous drinking: People who drink above the recommended limits/units, but are not yet experiencing harm.
2. Harmful use: People who drink above the recommended limits and experience harm, resulting in effects on their physical and mental health and social consequences. Patterns of use are also a factor: for example, binge drinking has a higher risk of immediate harm from injuries, violence, and loss of self-control.
3. Alcohol dependence: This is a cluster of behavioural, cognitive, and physiological phenomena that may develop after repeated alcohol use. Typically, these include a strong desire to consume alcohol, impaired control over its use, persistent drinking despite harmful consequences, a higher priority given to drinking than to other activities and obligations, increased alcohol tolerance, and a physical withdrawal reaction when alcohol use is discontinued.
In addition to this, NHS statistics on Alcohol (2017) showed that 28% of men and 14% of women in the UK would be classed as having AUD2. This is over 10 million people. However, of this group, only 76,000 were treated for problematic drinking. This means that millions of Brits are drinking in a harmful or hazardous way, but few recognise this or seek help because they don’t fit the stereotype of the alcohol-dependent person.
The situation is similar in the US and Australia. In the US, around 16 million people have AUD3 and in Australia approximately 20% of adults drink at levels that put them at risk of lifetime harm.
Grey area drinking
So, if you are somewhere between the occasional drink and rehab you could be a Grey Area Drinker. This is culturally normative - binge drinking, stress drinking, increased drinking, setting rules that you can’t stick to, regretting drinking, are all signs. It’s highly personal and there is no judgement here but a question you could ask yourself is, ‘Do I use alcohol in a disordered way?’ And what does that look like for you? Be aware that comparison with unhelpful stereotypes can be a real pitfall for anyone looking to reassess their relationship with alcohol and hoping to make a positive change. It can stop you from:
taking the steps needed to get some help
choosing to quit the booze not because you have to, but because
you want torealising that when you put down the wine glass you are not
giving anything up, rather you are gaining the opportunity to live
a full, free, content, and happy lifeunderstanding there is a wide spectrum of problems with alcohol
and it isn’t a case of you either are or aren’t an alcoholic – there are many stages in between.It’s not necessarily the number of units...
...but your relationship with those units. This is a key point to remember, as simply counting units is a very imperfect method of assessing your alcohol intake. Although the medical guidelines around recommended units of alcohol can be helpful, but it can’t tell you how you feel.
The Midlife Drinking Audit
Alcohol can start to feel different in midlife and it’s actually an amazing time to get sober. If you are questioning your relationship with alcohol - WELL DONE! There is no shame here - I have been there, done it, got the T shirt so please know you are not alone.
Perhaps you're drinking no more than you used to, but recovering from it feels harder. Perhaps wine has become your quickest way to switch off at the end of the day. Or perhaps nothing looks particularly dramatic from the outside, but you're thinking about drinking — and not drinking — more than you'd like.
There doesn't have to be a crisis before you're allowed to get curious. You do NOT have to hit a ‘rock bottom’ to decide you are sick of drinking and want to make a change.
Rather than a list of questions about units and social impact (lots of us hide this and are high functioning), this audit is about how it feels for you. Take a moment to consider these questions.
Your drinking
How much and how regularly am I drinking now?
Has the amount or frequency gradually crept up over the last few years?
Do I regularly drink more than I intended to?
Do I drink on more occasions than I planned to?
Do I make rules about my drinking — and then find myself breaking or renegotiating them?
Do I sometimes feel completely in control of alcohol and at other times surprisingly out of control?
Do I think about drinking — or about trying not to drink — more than I would like?
Has the mental effort involved in moderating started to feel exhausting?
My midlife body
Does alcohol affect my body differently now than it did in my twenties, thirties or early forties?
Have my hangovers become worse, even when I haven't drunk particularly heavily?
Am I more sensitive to alcohol than I used to be?
Does drinking make symptoms such as hot flushes, night sweats, headaches, digestive problems or heart racing feel worse?
Am I waking during the night after drinking and struggling to get back to sleep?
Do I wake feeling tired even after what seemed like a reasonable night's sleep?
Am I noticing that alcohol takes longer to recover from than it used to?
Mood, anxiety & brain
Do I wake in the early hours after drinking with a racing mind or a sense of dread?
Does alcohol seem to make my anxiety worse the following day?
Do I feel more emotionally reactive, overwhelmed or flat after drinking?
Do I experience brain fog or difficulty concentrating after drinking?
Do I sometimes forget conversations or parts of an evening?
Stress & switching off
Has alcohol become one of my main ways of signalling that the working day is over?
Do I use alcohol to quieten a busy brain, numb overwhelm or help myself transition from work/caring/responsibility into the evening?
Do I sometimes rush through cooking, bedtime, chores or other activities because I'm waiting for my first drink?
Do I find it difficult to imagine relaxing, socialising, celebrating or going on holiday without alcohol?
If alcohol disappeared tomorrow, would I know how to give myself what I currently use it for?
Midlife & menopause
Has drinking become intertwined with loneliness, boredom, loss, caregiving, changing relationships or children becoming more independent?
Am I drinking partly because I don't quite know what I need at this stage of my life?
What is it costing me?
Do I regret things I've said, done or forgotten while drinking?
Do I feel guilt or shame about my drinking?
Do I hide, minimise or joke about how much I drink?
Is alcohol costing me more than money — sleep, energy, confidence, presence, health, relationships, time?
Am I less present with the people I love when I'm drinking or recovering from drinking?
Is drinking getting in the way of the things I say matter to me?
Do I ever look at myself and think, This isn't really how I want to be living anymore?
And perhaps the most important questions...
How do I actually feel about my relationship with alcohol?
How do I feel:
after my first drink?
after I've had a few?
when I go to bed?
when I wake in the middle of the night?
the following morning?
later the following day?
during a period when I'm not drinking at all?
And finally:
If nobody else got to decide whether my drinking was "bad enough", would I want something to change?
What does this tell you?
If you have answered yes to some of these questions, you have also probably been trying to control your intake through moderating. Alcohol is costing you more than just money. It’s having a negative effect on your health, happiness, and peace of mind at the very least. The good news is from my experience and from that of the women I work with, you will be happier going alcohol-free, you don’t need to justify it to anyone else. Please feel free to look around the site, listen to my Podcast and if you would like to talk this through, I offer a free discovery call - no obligation to work with me. Between us we cn work out the next steps.
Kate x
