I did it!

I have achieved something I swore blind was impossible! I’ve gone 40 days without a single drop of alcohol.

Forty days marks a specific milestone for me because of lent. I grew up Christian and although I’m not practicing, lent has provided an annual reminder to me that I simply could not manage without any alcohol for 40 days and 40 nights.

Every year, Shrove Tuesday would come around and I would think, ‘I really should give up alcohol for lent this year’. Then that little voice would pipe up. ‘You’d hate it! You’d be miserable and anyway, there’s zero chance of you sticking to it. Don’t even try.”

I remember visiting a friend’s house during lent last year and her 9 year old daughter proudly announced that she had given up sugar. All sugar. Gulp! I sat with her mother later that evening and told her how much I admired the child and how I could never, in a million years, do what she’s doing and give up my vice for that long.

Yet, here I am, reaching the 40 day mark – and it’s not even lent! And I’m not stopping today! I’m going for another 60 days.

It’s a wonderful feeling.