Just Call Me Frank: Our Endeavour at Being Frank: On Our Sobriety and Alcohol

Friday, December 30, 2011

On Our Sobriety and Alcohol

*Just a reminder, unless the actual link address is shown here, all links take you to other pages of our blog that we are referencing, this is an ad free blog*

Some people speculated that something must have happened for us to make this decision to become sober, to quit drinking almost entirely.

Sure something happened. We pulled our head out of our ass. We realized that continuing to drink a bottle of wine or more everyday was not going to be good for us in the long run, and we'd be better off stopping drinking for an extended period rather than trying to cut down, and we figured it we turned it into a New Years resolution, and drank to the end of the year just because we could, that our success rate would decrease. Who really keeps New Years Resolutions anyway?

What we didn't mention much about in the post where we talked about quitting drinking - a post written by me with many of the et al feelings in mind, but not so much my own reasons - is that for almost the entire year of 2011 we hadn't been sober for more than two whole days; to be honest, it's been years since we hadn't been at least high every day, until we started drinking every day instead, though we never drank or did drugs AT work though. That is just unacceptable...for us.

Of course there were reasons why we drank, among them chronic pain (caused by the permanent damages of the car accident we were in, which yesterday was the 7 year anniversary of) and internal management (meaning it made the things going on in our head easier to manage, for some of us). We're not unhappy with our life, as a whole, sure we've had some pretty monumental things happen to us this past year and a half (most, but not all, of them are detailed in the pages of this blog), and very few of the positive ilk, but that's no reason to become an alcoholic, in my opinion. Furthermore, alcohol isn't exactly a pain reliever...and IS actually a depressant (which means if you're drinking because you are depressed...well, that's dumb, it's causing an endless cycle...do other drugs instead...ones that are less likely to make you cry in a puddle of your own snot on your living room floor).

It's been one week sober for us now, and it's actually not entirely as terrible as we thought it would be, though we have spent the last few days with a raging headache. It helps that most of us are stubborn as hell, and just like it's hard for us to ask for help from people, we're not going to pus out and think there is any help at the bottom of a bottle of alcohol. *que Superwoman music*

The only problem we're left with is the physical pain (we refuse to use pain relievers unless absolutely necessary), and the chronic headache though some headaches are normal with our "disorder", and we know from experience that no pain reliever will take THAT headache away.

This is not to say we wouldn't love a drink. Fuck it would be nice - but we also have a LONG "trip" that we can barely afford in just under three and a half weeks, and by not drinking we are saving $150-300 a month. Not to mention the calories. We were consuming from 600-800 calories a day in alcohol, which was making us stressed out about our weight.

We are treating ourselves to a bottle of wine to celebrate the New Year tomorrow, then following that we'll be sober for the foreseeable future (only exception being when we have cocktails with Tweeple in the UK, and then when we travel the USA next year), because it's the healthy thing to do, and it's also easier when it's not a dry-turkey forever situation, like in things like AA, because we're not an alcoholic, we are just trying to love ourselves better...and if we have to continue to exist, we'd like liver function as long as possible.

~ Frank

The World of Alcohol...and What You Will Think Is Useless Information
Fun little alcohol calorie counter: http://www.collegedrinkingprevention.gov/collegestudents/calculator/alcoholcalc.aspx

Note: Each example below is based on a 4-ounce glass. However, depending on the bar or the restaurant (or how much you pour yourself), glasses may be as large as 8 ounces.

Wine

Type - Calories |Carbs (g)

Cabernet Sauvignon (red) - 90 | 2.5

Merlot (red) - 95 | 2.5

Chianti (red)- 100 | 2.5

Chardonnay (white) - 90 | 1.1

Sauvignon Blanc (white) - 80 | 1.1

Port (Ruby) - 185 | Up to 10

Note: These approximate values are based on 1½ oz of alcohol and 8 oz of mixer. Keep in mind, however, that jumbo-size drinks in restaurants can contain much more. For example, a Long Island Iced Tea can pack up to 16 ounces and 750 calories.

Cocktails

Type - Calories | Carbs (g)

Gin & Tonic - 200 | 4

Vodka Cranberry - 220 | 5

Bloody Mary - 180 | 4

Margarita - Up to 500 | Up to 10

Long Island Iced Tea - Up to 550 | Up to 11

and don't even get us started on the calories in beer...

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Of course none of that makes any sense, or matters, if you don't know how many calories you need just to maintain your current weight:

Calorie intake for Weight loss
Sedentary Lifestyle: 20 calories per kg of body weight [Let's be honest...this is probably where you are at]
Moderately Active Lifestyle: 25 calories per kg of body weight
Heavy Activity Lifestyle: 30 calories per kg of body weight

Calorie intake for Weight Maintenance
Sedentary Lifestyle: 25 calories per kg of body weight [Let's be honest...this is probably where you are at]
Moderately Active Lifestyle: 30 calories per kg of body weight
Heavy Activity Lifestyle: 35 calories per kg of body weight

Calorie intake for Weight gain
Sedentary Lifestyle: 30 calories per kg of body weight
Moderately Active Lifestyle: 35 calories per kg of body weight
Heavy Activity Lifestyle: 40 calories per kg of body weight

Source: http://www.fitho.in/how-many-calories-do-i-need/

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This is not us preaching on the fucking dangers of alcohol, unless you're a moron you know drinking is among the few fun AND dangerous/unhealthy things you can do legally, and honestly...we don't care about your health. But in the event you have no idea the effect of alcohol to your internal organs...and you're too lazy to Google it, or you like things served on a silver platter, we present to you liver...(yummmmm, liver paté...on a silver platter).