Spending 100 days alcohol-free is not something that I thought I’d ever want to do, or even something I thought I COULD do. Luckily I overcame my doubts and fears by finding others on the same journey. Others who helped me stay positive about being alcohol-free and focus on the day that I was in. Accepting a 100 day alcohol-free challenge, and completing it successfully, changed my life for the better. Immeasurably! Join us in our BOOM RETHINK THE DRINK community for endless support and resources to succeed at your 100 days of change.
We invite you to download and print the PDF at the end of this post . It can easily be bound and will serve as a Workbook to go with this post. There are many links included in this post that will not be accessible with the PDF. Please use both, as well as our community at www.BoomRethinktheDrink.com
Guide to Your 100 days alcohol-free
Introduction
How to use the Boom Rethink the Drink Community for Support, Accountability and Resources
In our Boom Rethink the Drink Community we offer an anonymous, private space online, without sales pitches for products, services, or coaching. Boom is just people supporting people to live their best lives. Many of our original members are still with us after ten years together. There is no better place to find the support and inspiration you need for this 100 day challenge.
Before you set your start date, look around BOOM and get comfortable.
- Our #DailyCheckin posts is a great place to start. You’ll find them archived in the featured section. Read the post and leave a comment.
Our Best Resource is the Knowledge We Share
- Read How do you Stop Drinking? Our Community Shares What Worked for Us on Boozemusings
- Read the comments to this question in BOOM – What Advice Would You Give Our New Members About Those first 30 or 40 Days .
- Read the posts in Getting Started Alcohol-Free . A section inside Boom that is full of posts written by our members about the “How To’s” of staying alcohol-free in the first months.
Ask questions, offer support, tell us about yourself.
Please post often. ( this explains posting How Posting Works )
You can write as much or as little as you’d like in your posts.
Start by telling us why you’re here. What do you hope to achieve?
Success begins with understanding your Why
There are many reasons that people give for wanting to take a break from drinking.
- Are you an occasional drinker who wants to try living without alcohol because you’ve heard that no amount of alcohol is good for your health and actually elevates your risk of cancer considerably?
- Are you someone who drinks routinely, assumes that you aren’t addicted, but you want to take a break and reset your drinks-consumed-counter?
- Are you addicted and troubled that you might soon be dependent?
Knowing your why can help you decide how best to succeed with this challenge.
- If you are just an occasional drinker than your challenge might easily include setting challenging fitness goals. You won’t be triggered by the daily routine of life. You also most likely won’t be triggered by many of the other things that trigger habitual drinkers. So you’ll have energy to focus your accountability more than one direction.
- If you drink routinely, several nights a week, you may be surprised to find that you are triggered more often than you expect. A trigger is somewhat different from a craving. It is a feeling, event or activity that you associate with alcohol. So before you begin your 100 day alcohol-free challenge have a think about identifying what you think might trigger you and how you will prepare to handle that feeling, event or activity without drinking. Find more about tackling triggers to follow.
- If you know that you are addicted to alcohol and afraid that you might be dependent, please make sure that you fully understand the risks of withdrawal from stopping cold turkey. You are welcome to ask questions in our community but it’s always best to talk with a doctor before starting a challenge to break an addiction.
Understanding your why is part of preparing for a successful 100 day alcohol-free challenge. It is the first step in making yourself accountable. Accountable to yourself.
Once you have identified your why and are ready to start your 100 day alcohol-free challenge it is wise to be accountable to the people who you live with and others who are in your life routine. Let them know that you are taking 100 days free of alcohol and that their support will help you reach that goal. If you aren’t comfortable sharing details of your why it’s fine to let them know that this is a commitment you’re excited about!
Let them know that if you reach out to them in a few days looking for encouragement to have a drink or two, the best thing they can do to support you is encourage you to stay on track. Encourage them to be your champions. Let them know how they can help.
Do some basic research
Before you begin your 100 day challenge it’s important to understand how alcohol affects you. Whether or not you personally are addicted alcohol is addictive. Alcohol contains chemical that grab you and make sure you keep coming back for more. Understanding what those chemical hooks are will help you understand why you feel deprived when you stop drinking. Understanding that the feeling of deprivation is artificial, will help you look for satisfaction in other ways.
Watch What Alcohol Does to Your Body, Brain & Health from Huberman Labs
Watch Dr. Anna Lembke & Steven Bartlett: Dopamine Hacks & Alcohol’s Impact Explained in 10 Minutes
Read this PDF https://hams.cc/dopamine.pdf
Read these posts from our Boozemusings blog and print them for your workbook if you’d like to.
Prepare your environment
Preparing your home environment will help you succeed at tackling triggers to drink as they pop up each day. Don’t be surprised by triggers. Expect them and be ready.
If possible start by getting the alcohol out of your home. If your partner drinks ask if they can keep their bottles in an area outside of your afternoon routine. This post may help you tackle other issues with going alcohol-free with a partner who continues to drink. How do You Stop Drinking and Stay Sober with a Partner Who Drinks?
It may seem impossible to stay alcohol-free when surrounded by alcohol but you can! Here is inspiration in more posts from our blog
If I were to make a list of every trigger I can think of that you may encounter in your 100 day alcohol-free challenge, and posts that you can print for your workbook to tackle those triggers, that list would be long. It would include
- Stress – Self Medicating With Alcohol? How to Get Off the Stress Carousel
- Anxiety – Anxiety, Alcohol and Sobriety
- Boredom – Is Sobriety Boring
- Peer Pressure – Beating Peer Pressure to Stop Drinking and Stay Sober
- Anger – Anger Management in Early Sobriety – Facing Your Feelings Alcohol Free
- Mood Swings – Surfing the Waves of Emotion in Early Sobriety
- Loneliness- Loneliness and Meditation
- Cognitive Dissonance – Cognitive Dissonance
- Fading Affect Bias – Understanding Fading Affect Bias
- Euphoric Recall – Life With Alcohol Was A Rollercoaster and it was time to get off the ride for good
- FOMO – I Was Afraid to Stop Drinking
You’ll see drinking on television, drinking on the screen at the cinema, drinking on social media. You may be triggered while cooking or eating out, and at most social occasions. Advertisements for wine and beer may seem to be every where you look on the way home from work.
The trick with succeeding at an alcohol-free challenge, whether it be for 1 day or 100, is excepting that you will be triggered and being ready to still NOT DRINK.
Understanding the acronym H.A.L.T, Hungry-Angry-Lonely-Tired is crucial. Everything you ever wanted to know about HALT is explained thoroughly here – HALT: 4 Early Sobriety Triggers That Can Lead to Relapse.
Prepare – Prepare – Prepare
- Prepare your kitchen.
- Make sure that you have healthy treats, snacks and interesting non-alcoholic things to drink. Afternoon snacks become important when you take a break from drinking. The HUNGRY trigger is one of the most urgent and it will kick in around 4 pm. Make sure you have something satisfying ready to eat around that time daily. You may find that dinner at 5 pm is a good idea. Satisfying the HUNGER trigger will help you not crave alcohol.
- Decide what treats you’ll indulge in and come up with a plan. Maybe you’ll be extra careful to keep your eating healthy all day and indulge in some sweets or ice cream in the evening. Make a plan. Prepare. Alcohol is what most adults treat themselves with at the end of a long day. Make sure you have an alternative.
- Prepare your routine.
- Be Ready to Feel Low Energy in the Early Evening.
- One of the chemical hooks in alcohol is adrenaline. You may find that after work, when you’re ready to start your evening routine, you miss the adrenaline kick of the drink you used to pour. Do something different! Prepare to know that instead of relying on that chemical hook you will, go for a walk or run, take a shower or bath, sit down with your feet up and relax a bit, meditate, do some weightlifting, stretching or Yoga, take a short nap, have a cup of tea or coffee, or indulge in a few squares of dark chocolate.
- Be Ready to Feel a Bit Lost and Empty
- Drinking is an activity. When you suddenly stop drinking it helps to have other activities to fill the empty space. Prepare to combat this feeling of emptyness by picking up some books you’d like to read. Decide to learn to knit and get the supplies you’ll need. Decide to learn to paint or get an adult coloring book and set up a play list to didtract and inspire you.
- Be Ready to Feel Low Energy in the Early Evening.
Prepare to stay focused
- Sometimes you literally have to resort to reminding yourself that “The Only Way Out Is Through”, “Get Comfortable with Being Uncomfortable” and “Just do The Next Right Thing”. The next right thing will not be drinking because you have accepted this challenge to live alcohol-free for 100 days. Remember you why and stay focused on knowing that you can indeed do this.
Prepare to Post!
- One of the wonderful things about our community is that you can come in and post whenever you are feeling triggered or expecting to be triggered and you will find people who have been in that position and found ways to ease the moment.
Stay in the Day You’re In
Thinking beyond the day you are in can be exhausting and overwhelming. Whether you call it “One Day At A Time” or “Stay in the Day You’re In” there is no more important tool.
You know your Why. You’ve done your Research. You have prepared. You have a great team to help you work through the tough spots and celebrate the great moments.
Now download your pdf. Print it out as a workbook if you wish. There will be more pages to print as we go through the 100 days of Change Together!
100 Days of Change Free Downloadable PDF
In the PDF below, you will find pages based on the text above. Some of the text from links is included, but not all of it so please use both as resources.
You can start whenever you are ready!
You can make a 100 days alcohol-free workbook using that text plus the pages of Daily Inspiration, Writing Prompts, Check off Chart for 100 days of change and Alternate Covers in full color and black and white.
How you use this workbook is up to you. ( Taking into account our guidelines of use on page one. )
Maybe you will decide to make take the 100 day alcohol-free challenge and make the 100 days in a row non-negotiable.
Maybe you will decide to take it a few days at a time. Check out and check back in, and plan to get 100 alcohol-free days over a specified period of months.
Maybe you will decide to use this as a mindful, moderate drinking goals chart.
Or maybe you are already alcohol-free and will join the challenge in BOOM to support others, but use the chart and workbook pages to track different goals.
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