The questions always come in the same sequence. First, surprise. Then, concern. Then, the interrogation: But why? As if choosing not to drink requires a diagnosis, or at least a dramatic backstory. Mine has none of these. I just stopped wanting it.
For context: I am a journalist who writes about food and travel. Everywhere I go, there’s alcohol. It is, in the most literal sense, part of the job. Which makes what I am about to say quite ironic. To begin with, I was never a big drinker. I was drinking because the people around me were good company and the glass was part of the setting. When I realised that, the glass became optional, and finally unnecessary.
What I didn’t anticipate was how much that would bother other people. In social settings, not drinking is treated as either a moral position or a medical one. You have either found religion or lost your liver. The thought that someone might have simply lost interest doesn’t count as a valid reason. So when you decline, people investigate. You really don’t drink? When did you stop? But why did you quit? The questions are often accompanied with genuine bewilderment. The honest answer, that I just lost interest, is never enough. There must be a health scare, a resolution, a rock bottom. The idea that someone might simply stop, without incident or intervention, leaves people confused.
Honestly, there are things I miss about being sober. A whisky with my husband on a Saturday evening. A cold beer on a sultry Mumbai afternoon. Those were real pleasures. But I found substitutes—sparkling water with lime, a good tonic water, things that give the hands something to hold and the mouth something to taste.
The changes in my health have been significant. I started sleeping better, not the shallow, fitful sleep that follows a drink. I am at the gym more consistently, because there are no slow Sunday mornings to sleep off and my skin cleared. My weight has steadied. Nothing dramatic, but the cumulative effect is hard to ignore. The research backs this up. For years, moderate drinking was presented as not just harmless but beneficial. “Earlier claims that moderate alcohol protects against heart disease are being questioned because of biases in older observational studies. There is no scientifically established amount of alcohol that can be recommended for improving health. The sleep claim hasn’t held up either. Alcohol negatively affects sleep architecture despite making people feel sleepy initially,” says Dr. Prasad Bhate, Head of Gastroenterology at Manipal Hospital, Pune.
Dr. Nachiket Dubale, who practices gastroenterology and hepatology at Apollo Hospital, Pune, sees the consequences daily. “There has been a rise in alcohol-related health issues among patients in urban India, particularly among younger adults and working professionals,” he says, pointing to workplace stress and easier access. The gut is often the first place damage shows up. Recovery, by his account, is just as quick. “Even short periods of abstinence can produce meaningful benefits.” He also flags a detail that doesn’t get discussed enough. “Women have lower levels of enzymes involved in alcohol breakdown and a lower proportion of body water compared to men. So the same amount of alcohol produces higher blood alcohol concentrations and greater physiological effects.” None of this is why I stopped. But it does make the decision easier to live with.
For Priya Chaphekar, a yoga educator and founder of Priyog Wellness in Mumbai, drinking often led to dehydration, exhaustion and a feeling of being run down. One of her lowest points involved throwing up in a parking lot before a 6 am class she was due to teach. Around the same time, her body had also become far more sensitive to alcohol. “Even a single drink would affect me far more than it used to. I wasn’t enjoying it the way I had in my twenties, so it started feeling pointless rather than pleasurable,” she says. The shift became permanent last year, after surgery for a malignant tumour. “That’s when I knew with complete certainty that this wasn’t a phase. Alcohol has left me, rather than me constantly resisting alcohol. It no longer feels like a sacrifice.” She still keeps a full bar cabinet at home. She has no urge to open it.
I am not sober-curious, and I am not part of any no-alcohol movement. The things I loved about those evenings had nothing to do with what was in my glass. The Saturday evenings are still there. While my husband pours his whisky, I have tonic water with lime. We sit in the same chairs and talk about the same things. What’s in the glass is different, but everything else is the same.
Nivedita Jayaram Pawar is a Mumbai-based food and travel writer.