Pub chains such as Wetherspoons were seeing their customers’ demanding quality and variety not just quantity and rock bottom prices. Camden had just formed and Brewdog opened their first bar in sunny Aberdeen. My drinking became so awful that I began to add cider to lager, blackcurrant to Guinness and Red Bull to Port.Īt this point craft beer was about to explode into the public domain. However I just ignored it and hoped it would go away. I was enjoying the course the independence and spending time with my small group of friends, however, I was extremely lonely. Living away from my family and friends was difficult. This exercise was repeated for several weeks, great at the time but looking back, the damage I was doing to myself was immense, the things we do to fit in.
As awful as it sounds it worked and I was in. I discovered the best way to get yourself into a party was to knock on the door, hold up a bottle and smile. This led to one thing, drinking for the sake of drinking. University presented another challenge although I was a much more confident and outgoing individual, I had left all my friends and home comforts in Devon. Well so I thought!Īt 19 I moved to Cardiff. Eat less, exercise more, and lose weight, simple. By drinking the same as everyone around me suddenly I fitted in.Īround this time that I decided I needed to lose some weight. I had been an unconfident and overweight teenager, I would drink a few pints after the rugby or neck a Jagerbomb or three on a Saturday night, this made me feel invincible. I don’t know exactly when the link between the amount of alcohol consumed and the amount of fun you had manifested itself but it was definitely towards the end of my teens. There is a lot of pressure to do what you think is ‘socially normal’ and when you’re 17, on a ‘lads holiday and away from your parents that sadly is that the more you drink the better time you have. I didn’t particularly enjoy anything, and I certainly didn’t enjoy feeling sick and ridiculously hungover. As a result in four days I drank anything and everything.
I REMEMBER MY FIRST BEER FREE
Craft beer didn’t exist in Devon, Brewdog has only just begun brewing and companies like Camden and Magic Rock didn’t exist!Ī year later, I went on my first ‘lads’ holiday, the first holiday without parents and the first where alcohol was free and plentiful. In those days drinking wasn’t focused on quality, it was about buying the cheapest cider or lager you could, normally Strongbow or Fosters.
I was 16 before I plucked up the courage to buy a crate of alcohol. My first introduction to alcohol was when I was about 7 or 8 my parents were not big drinkers, my Dad occasionally enjoyed a can of Guinness or Boddingtons whereas Mum would drink a small Martini or Southern Comfort.ĭuring my early teens I could tell the difference between a Stella and a Guinness and that wine was either red, white or rose but that was it. “Some questions stand out why do I enjoy alcohol again and what effect has alcohol had on my mental health issues and recovery?”
I’ve had a strange relationship with alcohol, one which has gone from love to hate and back again! Lcohol, Anorexia and Me - How My Eating Disorder Helped Me Find A Passion For Craft BeerĪs I approached my 30th birthday I felt the time was right to look back and see how my approach to alcohol had changed.
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