Hopefully this piece of information will assist you in your battle in cutting down the drink. As reported by the BBC, the number of people dying of alcohol misuse has risen to 7,423 deaths in one year – a rise of 20% from 2019.

This is particularly shocking as treatments and awareness of alcohol related illness are far more widespread than they were 20 years ago.
The pandemic has clearly caused a rise in alcohol consumption and with it a rise in fatal complications from its use.

Alcohol is quite often a depressed individual’s first port of call. I’ve done (do) it myself. It makes it easier to not care, but long term it only serves to make the depression worse. I was reading about the making of the new Snow Patrol album and how it took Gary Lightbody five years to become sober and seven years to be able to write a new album. Insobriety makes us bury those things that are causing us psychological pain and it does it very effectively, but when the clouds begin to clear and reality strikes again it can be too painful to deal with so we reach for the bottle  and thus continue on a downward spiral of ultimate self-destruction.

This is a cycle that needs to be broken. As painful as it is you must seek help to deal with what’s causing you pain. Speak to a doctor or close friend. Get advice and get help.

The comedian Sean Hughes has died aged just 51. Sean had liver cirrhosis and this could well have contributed to his death. It acts as a stark reminder of how you can severely reduce your own mortality by being alcohol dependent. Every time I read a story like this it makes me stop and think, and swear to myself that I’m going to quit.

I was reading the autobiography of Loz Tolhurst a couple of months ago and there was a passage in that book where he mentions that his mother died in her later forties due to alcohol abuse.

Now I’m advancing into my forties it makes me realise more than ever that I am now really in the danger zone if I continue drinking a bottle of wine a night and more at the weekend.

I’ve recently purchased a few books aimed at helping me fight my addiction and will be posting reviews on this blog. Does anyone out there have any books they can recommend? Leave a message in the comments below.

Sometimes it’s good to have a library of scare stories to look upon; these can really make you think twice when you’re considering having a drink so bookmark them as a tool to aid you in cutting down. In alcohol recovery and support programs you often have a sponsor to talk you out of breaking but I can find these stories equally as effective. Here’s a recent story in the Telegraph: Alcohol is a direct cause of seven forms of cancer, finds study

I’ve just been reading an interesting article on the BBC website about Ottawa’s Managed Alcohol Program.
This is a program where alcoholics are given a measure of wine at hourly intervals in an attempt to change their drinking behaviour.

At exactly half past the hour, what’s known as “the pour” begins. A measure of Californian white – 13% alcohol, made on the premises – is measured into a jug from a draft tap behind the counter. One at a time, the wine is dispensed to nearly 50 alcoholics. For the first pour at 7.30am, most residents get a kickstarter of 7oz – nearly 200ml, a larger-than-average sized glass of wine in Europe. For the rest of the day until 9.30pm, they are given 5oz – just over 140ml.

This is for pretty hardened alcoholics, the type that need to be inebriated in order to survive. I’m not so sure it would work for your average alcohol dependant like myself who don’t feel the need to drink during the daytime whilst at work but binge in the evening but it’s an interesting concept. I don’t think too much about those that are so addicted it consumes them, like a heroin addict or something. I guess this is pretty similar to the treatments we offer severe drug addicts. Abstinence is the perfect solution if you can do it; I hear it becomes easier over time but I have not managed it to date.

Anyway, interesting article, worth a read.

I have long been a fan of the Levellers and recently I went to see a solo gig of Mark Chadwick’s, he is the lead singer of the Levellers. Taking a look at his website revealed an insight into the man and his struggles with alcohol and addiction and I thought anyone reading this blog would be interested. His album ‘Moment‘ is inspired by his battles and is a fine collection of songs.

Here’s what he says on his website:

The songs were written over a two year period, during which I went to rehab, gave up drinking for a year and had a good long look at myself and how I fitted into the world around me. Within this album I’m addressing that and look at the whole nature of alcohol and addiction. It picks up lots of other themes throughout but that’s the main thread of it.

The structure of the album and the way I’m exploring the songs is from the middle of your life point of view where you’re looking backwards and forwards and examining where you’ve been and where you’re going. It’s quite a traditional thing to do if you’re an artist. The last song on the album tells the story of all the things that I have seen and I think the overall conclusion is that I am, by the end of the record, at peace with where I’m at now.

The world takes a far too black and white view on addiction and alcohol. If you’re smart and you’re in Rehab you fight like a cat and dog to get out of what has been presented to you as a pretty defined programme that must be adhered to otherwise you’re deemed a failure. It’s an all or nothing approach as far as they’re concerned and that is just terrifying to people. The statistics pretty damming, 90% of addicts fail but people have to be allowed to come to their own way of dealing with it. Society doesn’t help by not really discussing what addiction is. It’s individual. One size does not fit all. And I did not fit the size but I knew I had a problem because I couldn’t stop. And I think those issues are discussed throughout the album in a sensible way and a more hopefully, insightful way.

Taken from http://www.markchadwick.org/about-2/

And if you’ve got the album then here’s a breakdown on what each song is about:

The real statement of the album is an exploration of what life is like right now for somebody like me who’s lived the life that I have led and hopefully it’s an honest look at drink, life and love.

WATERFALL
Most people don’t like to talk about alcohol issues in public unless there forced to in small rooms in public buildings under a banner. For good or ill it’s here to stay. Sometimes it’s heaven sometimes it’s hell but as someone who’s lived drinking I don’t think its anything to be ashamed of or avoid as a subject in song or life.

REDSKY
In a more than vain attempt to pass on advise to my son in lyrical form I wrote this. Hopefully not as puerile as Robby Williams latest and comes with the universal caveat that the forewarned is forearmed, so beware young man.

MOMENT
You can miss a lot in life. Most of it happens in a moment. I missed the fact that I was being mugged once on tour in the States. It saved my life that I never saw the gun. I thought my mugger just wanted to chat. We became friends. It seems the universe can be funny like that because we are all part of it and in pure physics we simply are.

BULLET
There’s a photo in my local pub of men having just beaten the boundaries of Lewes. This picture was taken in 1913. They didn’t have a clue what was about to occur, we all do now and we know how much it meant. I wonder if pictures of a similar nature are being taken right now and what they could mean to future generations, and would we take a bullet for them.

CHRISTIAN AND PAM
Never shit on your own doorstep, but from where I live I have witnessed a couple of alcoholics on a daily basis and have been left to wonder why and how they get through a day. Apart from the drinking, there’s history there and love and life and they go on like we all must.

KILLING TIME
Touring allows you to be the outsider wherever you go, what if you were to kill someone or just drink yourself to death in anonymity or both? Or you could just play on your iPad but where’s the fun in that?

DAUGHTER
Not Downtown Abbey but the true story of the conception of my father, upstairs downstairs as it happened just after WW2. He took advantage she became my grandmother

AIR
The overwhelming absence of another through death, or the death of a part of yourself , where do you go from there? And how abstract emotion can become at critical points in life and death.

MEDICINE
We can all get excited. We can say the worst or best things to each other when we get off our heads. Sometimes people stick by what they say in the morning my poorly best friend is one of those, a tonic.

LAST NIGHT
When you just can’t sleep and all the reasons why fly through your head. You can feel the whole world and all it contains going through your mind. Real or imagined you wait for dawn for the final release.

Also lifted from http://www.markchadwick.org/about-2/

This was something that has been on the cards for a while as I mentioned in my post last week. Well now the guidelines on safe levels of drinking have been reviewed and published in the first full review of alcohol guidelines since 1995.

In summary the new guidelines state that men and women who drink regularly should not drink more than 14 units per week. They also state that some days in the week should be alcohol-free. Binge drinking (i.e. drinking all 14 units in one session in the week is also advised against).

It’s the first time that guidance issued to people in England, Wales and Northern Ireland suggests that they should not get drunk. The number of weekly units are unchanged for women but reduced from 21 for men. Doctor’s groups have been advising levels and guidance similar to this since the mid-nineties but only now has a government decided to make it official (probably due to the fear of reprisals from producers and a potential drop in tax revenues).

The pregnancy guideline is simple: you should not drink at all. Previously women were advised not to drink but if they did then to limit consumption.

Effects on Health

Some studies have indicated that drinking some alcoholic drinks in small quantities could be beneficial, for example protection from heart disease in men, but the new guidance states that this is not so. It’s more likely that society has got better at preventing heart disease. This is however in direct contradiction of other studies into the same field.
Strong links have also been identified with drinking and various forms of cancer, such as throat, mouth and breast cancer; the chances of contracting any of these increases with the amount you drink. Apparently the links with cancer were not properly understood in 1995 when the last guidelines were issued. Again this is not necessarily backed by any scientific proof.

Should We Listen to This Advice?

It depends on who you talk to. Predictable boat-rockers such as Nigel Farage have come out rubbishing the advice and it seems that the team that drew up the guidelines, headed by civil servant Dame Sally Hawkins, have ignored a large number of studies in composing them. The age old argument of moderate drinking extends mortality versus any drink will substantially reduce your lifespan will undoubtedly continue for many decades to come.

Related links:

BBC – Alcohol limits cut to reduce health risks
BBC – New alcohol guidelines: What you need to know
The Register – Boozing is unsafe at ‘any level’, thunders chief UK.gov quack