Alcohol giving in the era of Covid-19

Several studies done last fall have found that drinking increased during the pandemic. In a study of more than 1,500 adults published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in September, it was found that the frequency of alcohol use increased by 14% over the previous year for all adults. For women, alcohol consumption increased by 41%.

Amanda was not a problem drinker, but she was worried that she could easily become one during the pandemic. “Removing the option felt a lot easier than expecting me to be moderate, given everything that was going on,” she says. She is part of a growing number of people inspired by the pandemic to adopt a kind of preventative austerity. In July, a survey of 2,000 people commissioned by the addiction awareness group Alcohol Change UK found that 7% of participants stopped drinking completely during the exclusion.

The liquor market for alcohol alternatives has exploded in the meantime and is now expected to exceed $ 29 billion by 2026. Spritz, quadrupled during the pandemic. “People realize they do not want to poison their power supply, while the state of the world is what it is,” says Batchelor. ‘They want to maintain their agency at a time that is already a state of mind. But the mentality is not, “I kicked alcohol.” It’s ‘I moved away from alcohol’. It’s a choice, rather than what we often see as a necessity,’s someone’s need to stop drinking – or otherwise. ‘

‘I think a lot of people these days come soberly from a fresh, modern, data-driven lens, where it’s so easy to measure the input in your life and what variables make you feel differently – what affects your sleep, your hydration, your awareness, ”says Bill Shufelt, co-founder and CEO of Athletic Brewing Company, a non-alcoholic craft brewery whose sales increased by more than 500% in 2020. “And I think isolation and being in their homes has especially helped people identify the variables that make them feel better or worse.”

People who give up alcohol often state that they are not doing it to address a drinking problem, but not to create it. “By the time people felt more anxious, it had become very common among the patients I see to prescribe alcohol,” says Chicago psychotherapist Kelley Kitley. ‘People say to me: I do not identify myself as an alcoholic, I do not darken. But with everything so elevated, I realize that I may be tempted to use alcohol as a coping mechanism. ‘

Chris Cucchiara, a 32-year-old broker in Pismo Beach, California, has not drunk anything since January last year. “I thought I would start as soon as the pandemic started, but I kept going,” he said with sobriety. ‘I’d used alcohol in the past to suppress anxiety. It became a goal to test myself during the pandemic, sort of a project. ‘Will sobriety hold once the pandemic is over? Mr Cucchiara says he’s not sure, but he’s happier now than he was a while ago.

“It’s interesting how a pandemic can fuel healthy choices as well as unhealthy ones,” said Manhattan psychologist Sarah Gundle. ‘People are definitely struggling to find ways to cope, as some of their other proven methods, such as the gym and friends, are being taken away. But a conscious decision to do something else during this time – as an experiment or a short-term goal or something more permanent – can provide a nice structure and focus that can be very soothing and helpful. ‘

Of her more introverted just sober patients, dr. Gundle reports heard that they can now hang out without drinking. “They’re home and more comfortable, and no one needs to know they’re drinking a seltzer and not a gin and tonic,” she says.

Even some who have never considered sobriety – and perhaps never again, once life is ‘normal’ again, have made the move for the pandemic. Brian O’Ceileachair, a 39-year-old content director and Irish expat living in Orlando, Florida, says the pandemic put an end to his twenty-year-long drink a few days a week. A friend posted on Facebook that he would be sober for one year, and Mr. O’Ceileachair was inspired to take some time. ‘

It did not take long before he saw a shift in his stress levels and general mood. “Work got easier, the kids got less annoying, mornings got significantly easier,” he says. ‘I’m currently on the longest sober streak of my life, and I honestly regret not noticing it years ago. Everyone knows me as a grumpy curmudgeon, but because I stopped drinking, I’m not the guy anymore. ‘

Ruby Warrington, author of the 2019 book “Sober Curious”, says she saw her Sober Curious Facebook group triple during the pandemic. “I’ve seen a lot more people who normally consider themselves social drinkers suddenly realize that they want to be sedated and know that it’s not great,” she says. “I also saw how many people who used alcohol as a social lubricant questioned their habits because it was no longer something they needed to socialize.”

In the UK, she says, the number of people who remember alcohol for dry January has risen from 3.9 million in 2020 to 6.5 million this year. It is estimated that 15% of Americans participated in Dry January in 2021 compared to 10% last year. Ms Warrington believes the shift has a lot to do with the fact that it can be much easier to completely abstain from alcohol than to try to moderate. “We drink a lot of brain power to drink, and once we had one, our response changed,” she says.

Before Covid-19, Lillie Marshall, a 39-year-old teacher, writer and mother of two in Boston, was a ‘classic mother drinker’, she says. “I will teach all day, come home exhausted, reward myself twice with a drink.” After the closure began and she taught from home, as well as caring for her two young children, she realized that she ‘could not survive this thing’ unless she was in top shape. She has never considered her once-a-day drink to be a problem, but feels sure it does not help.

Her best friend came to the same realization. She has Mrs. Marshall advised reading Holly Whitaker’s 2019 book ‘Quit Like a Woman’, which suggests that although alcohol is used as a coping mechanism, it feels like it helps, it ultimately hurts. Me. Marshall and her friend cut out the booze and started doing daily meditations.

It was not long before she noticed that she slept better, had more energy and was much less irritated. Her productivity was through the roof – no time wasted drinking or even the slightest hangover. “I was like, ‘Oh my God, from that one drink? ‘, She says. The friends set the goal of not drinking for 21 days, but almost ten months later, none of them looked back. “Besides, my husband does not work for pandemic reasons, and we save a lot of money,” she said. Marshall. “Oh, and I have abs again!”

-Dr. Drexler is a research psychologist and filmmaker in New York and the author of two books on gender and families.