05/01/2026
What I learnt six months sober?… (well, just shy by a day or two)
What started as a 90 day health reset challenge passed 25 weeks, or 178 days to be precise, with no booze.
Contrary to my initial intrepidation, it was mostly plain sailing.
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I found that without alcohol, I could read my body more clearly.
If I woke up groggy.
Despite no booze.
No sugar.
No carbs.
I'd be like...
'What's this then?'
So I had to look elsewhere.
Sleep?
Late meals?
Dehydration?
Mouth breathing?
Rule one out, tweak, repeat.
It seems they all contribute!
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Refined sugar and carbs were easier to drop than I expected too.
Especially being a sweet field, who usually had bread of some form for breakfasts and with dinner.
Before the first 21 day gut reset lapsed, I could feel the cravings and urges subside.
The few carb cheats I did have at social occasions came with that familiar grogginess the next day...
.a carb hangover, likened to a glass or wine or two.
Bonkers how sensitive I'd become to reading my body.
It made me wonder if that had previously been my daily baseline, unbeknown to me, along with the sugar crashes? 🤔
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If I was out, I’d have soda water with lemon
or Guinness 0% if I was treating myself and not fasting.
But after a couple...I must admit that I did find myself sloping off early more than once.
Where I’d previously have been one of the last to bed...usually after scoffing something sweet or stodgy.
There were even times I'd politely decline in favour of a dusk beach run. How things change.
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People would asked me how I felt,
suggesting I was missing out on all the good stuff.
But the truth is...other than a bit of FOMO,
there were periods that I felt amazing.
I'd say the days I felt best included morning daylight, meditation, and exercise.
Alongside eating between 10am and 6pm.
Whilst abstaining, these were now all easier to achieve consistently.
and things seemed to snowball positively.
Late evening meals and snacks, often hand in hand with 🍷or working late, clearly affected my circadian rhythm
and hence my energy and neurochemistry.
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In my previous corporate days I was touching what thay call Metabolic Syndrome.
My blood pressure and lipid profile were already significantly regulated by lifestyle and environment change over the past few years.
But the impact of the initial 90 days of this health reset was still very tangible.
My BP continued to fall within safe levels, and the stubborn LDL and Total cholesterol ratios now followed suit to sit within National guideline levels.
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31st December marked six months since the start of the challenge.
So having eventually banked in my booze cheat days over Christmas, I decided to celebrate it sober, with another 72 hour fast.
The 4th since 1st July, another test in willpower.
(Punishment for some I know 😅, and this time midway in it was, but that's for another post)
I'm not planning on continuing the 2026 journey in the same way.
In fact I have no plan.
But like carbs and sugar, which I can now do without, something seems to have stuck.
Whatever comes next, I’m listening more closely.
and am dead keen to keep hold of my microbiome's reigns. They've clearly been protagonists!
