It’s the Holidays, and that signals a rash of articles about how to avoid “overdrinking”, whatever that means to you. I suppose they’re okay for some drinkers– just not the ones we work with. For our group, it’s mostly a waste of time and effort.

If control strategies had worked for our patients, they wouldn’t be our patients.

Anyway, here’s an example:

How to drink less during the holidays: 5 expert tips to help you cut back on alcohol

Some of the recommended strategies, along with comments heard from treatment clients.

Plan or attend holiday events where alcohol isn’t the main attraction

“Tried it. I realized I don’t really like to be around other people all that much. Unless I have a little something to improve my mood.”

Consider only drinking on special occasions

“I was surprised how many special occasions there turned out to be.”

Find an accountability buddy

“My accountability buddy drank as much as I did.”

Develop a drinking strategy

“My strategy was to abstain during the week and tie one on at the weekend.”

Embrace the world of mocktails and other non-alcoholic drinks

My favorite response, from a man in group therapy: “Why?” It made no sense to him. He wasn’t after the taste. It was the effect he needed, and that comes from the alcohol.

Perhaps the most common tactic is to swear off alcohol entirely for the duration of the Holiday season. Then, having ‘proved’ to oneself (and, hopefully, to skeptical others) that you can abstain, you feel you no longer need to. So you promptly resume drinking.

The test, you see, has been ‘passed’.

With alcoholism, of course, efforts to control can become extreme. Probably the most radical strategy I’ve encountered was the physician who used Antabuse to control his consumption. As you may know, Antabuse induces intense nausea when combined with alcohol. Here’s his story:

“I would take the medication daily, and then when I drank, I’d feel myself starting to get sick. So I’d stop for a while, see? Until I felt better. Then start in again, slowly. Until it got uncomfortable again. I could do this until I finally had to stop for good or I knew I’d be in the toilet the rest of the evening, puking my guts out.”

“How long did you manage to keep this up?” I asked.

“Oh, quite a while. I got pretty good at it.” He seemed proud. “But then I had the heart attack and had to quit,” he lamented.