I ditched the drink to DATE SOBER

Suzy Beaumont made a surprising realisation about the kind of man she wanted to be with

- SASKIA MURPHY, KIM WILLIS

Stepping into my local pub, I looked around for the handsome stranger I’d been chatting to online. Spotting Dave, then 36, I smiled nervously, and we both headed to the bar to order a drink. It was September 2018, and just a year earlier, I no doubt would have ordered something strong to quell my nerves, but today, nine months into my challenge to go sober for a year, I ordered a peppermint tea instead. I’d always used alcohol to give me confidence, but today, as the conversation between me and Dave flowed, it turned out to be one of the best dates I’d ever had, Dave sipping tea opposite.

Throughout most of my adult life, I’d loved to drink. My 20s passed me by in a haze of midweek sessions on the booze, hungover work meetings, Saturdays in the pub and Sundays spent in bed.

I worked as a radio producer for BBC Scotland, and my colleagues and I were all young, carefree and single. Birthdays, leaving dos, promotions and bank holidays were celebrated in the pub. I was always the first person to get the sambuca shots in, and I was always the last to leave.

But what goes up must come down. The morning after a big night out, I’d always find myself consumed by anxiety and fear about conversations I’d had the night before, drunken arguments I’d witnessed, and toiling over things I might have said that I probably shouldn’t.

As I reached my early 30s, drinking didn’t feel as much fun as it used to.

Beer goggles

My hangovers could linger for days, and I found myself putting off important tasks at work just because my head felt hazy from the night before. I’d been single for a while, but I’d become disillusioned with meeting men in bars.