Before you hit 25, your hangovers are virtually non-existent.

At their worst – a mild headache – they can be cured with a bacon sandwich, or you can just get right back on the horse.

Then they worsen, and that’s why most responsible people cut back on what they drink and when they drink it. Life kicks into gear, adulting has to happen, and the hangovers become unbearable.

Welcome to your 30s.

Those of us who have gone over that hill like to fondly reminisce about the good old days when five tequilas didn’t equate to three days of recovery time.

Now it looks like a lot of young people are giving away their glory days in favour of sober living.

CNN breaks it down:

Charlotte Underwood, 23, from East Anglia, hasn’t had a drink in six months. She is one of many younger people who consider themselves “sober-curious” — exploring the possibility of life with less alcohol or none at all.

The countercultural idea has been gaining traction in recent years, among all age groups, both in the United Kingdom and the United States. The number of Google searches for ‘Dry January’ this year, for example, was more than double that of 2017.

This trend comes hot on the heels of the success of Brooklyn-based journalist Ruby Warrington’s 2018 book, Sober Curious.

The sober-curious are not necessarily alcoholics. They may not want to be teetotalers. But they want relief from the pressure to drink to excess.

Heavy social drinking is so often treated as an obligation, rather than a pleasurable choice. Like the clingy friend who pesters you into going out when you secretly wanted a night in, alcohol creeps into people’s lives, robbing them of time and energy.

I deal with those friends by using a very simple monosyllabic word – “no”. But that’s just me.

Perhaps this is the most convincing appeal of cutting back for the sober-curious. A person’s relationship with alcohol need not be medically dangerous to feel like a trap, or to drain time and money that might be more satisfyingly spent on other things.

I’ll be sticking to my weekly glass of wine, thanks. I have nothing against sober-living, though, and people must do what people want to do.

In fact, we recently looked into the easiest way to party hard without booze.

Just remember – everything in moderation, including moderation.

[source:cnn]