The person in entrance of me appears to know rather a lot about my life. Curious, once we've by no means met earlier than. I squint at him, perplexed. However the voice, sure, the voice is acquainted.
'Have we been launched?' I ask.
'Liz, it's James. I sit subsequent to you at work,' he says, puzzled.
Oh, heavens. How drunk am I?
'I've by no means seen you sporting glasses earlier than,' I ad-lib frantically. 'And also you've parted your hair in another way.'
Prosperous over-50s are endangering their well being by consuming far an excessive amount of, specialists have warned (File picture)
Nobody is fooled.
Rattling, rattling! The social gathering had been going so effectively. I'd even switched from prosecco to white wine to cease me knocking again bubbles too quick. What I'd clearly forgotten is that dry white wine with out meals is like woman petrol.
The following day, feeling wretched and hungover, I attain for my deal with e-book. Just one individual can save me, alcohol discount professional and medical hypnotherapist Georgia Foster.
With greater than 25,000 copies bought of her hit e-book The Drink Much less Thoughts, Georgia is in fixed demand for alcohol discount seminars within the UK and Australia.
She has hypnotised billionaires, politicians, actors and high-profile musicians, although she's far too discreet to call names.
'Let's simply say I've labored with classical musicians who have been consuming a lot to fight efficiency anxiousness that they have been falling off their chairs because the conductor walked in,' she says.
Georgia and I've historical past. A number of years in the past I attended one in all her workshops in London.
For a day, I and a bunch of strangers lay on the ground beneath blankets listening to Georgia's hypnotic voice as she soothed us right into a state of deep rest.
As she spoke about consuming much less, consuming extra slowly, relishing each sip and alternating alcohol with water, I felt immediately calmer.
When she reminded us that we spent the primary 18 years of our lives completely satisfied with out alcohol, I almost burst into tears.
Georgia specialises in alcohol hypnosis. Her process is to indicate us the best way to reprogramme our unconscious thoughts (which has an impact on bodily capabilities corresponding to the center, lungs and digestion) to wish much less alcohol.
It was a superb day — and it labored. All that Christmas, armed by Georgia's hypnosis CDs, I stored to 2 glasses of fizz. My pores and skin was clearer and I slept higher.
The difficulty is my life is fairly chaotic. I ended listening to the CDs and drifted again to my dangerous outdated methods. I meant to e-book into one other workshop, however by no means appeared to have a free weekend.
And my escalating alcohol consumption was making me nervous.
'However you're only a social drinker,' buddies protested.
Oh, sure, I'm social all proper: hotter, extra flirtatious, after the primary few glasses. However then it ideas.
The difficulty is I actually like consuming. Like many fiftysomething girls, I depend on it because the crutch to get me by social events at Christmas and New Yr.
I hardly ever drink at residence, however after I exit with buddies, I binge-drink. I'm having such a superb time that I don't need the night to cease. The dangerous information is that there's proof to say the occasional binge-drinker — a class statistics present is dominated by girls — does extra hurt to her liver than the regular ordinary drinker (as a result of the liver goes into shock).
A part of the issue is the beneficiant dimension of drink measures. My technology has overlooked what a small glass of wine seems to be like.
Prosperous over-50s are endangering their well being by consuming far an excessive amount of, specialists have warned.
They might seem to take care of themselves by consuming effectively and exercising frequently, however their alcohol consumption is a 'hidden well being and social drawback', based on new analysis by Age UK.
However Georgia believes we are able to study to handle alcohol — retrain our habits — quite than give it up fully. She desires us to drink to get pleasure from, quite than escape, our lives.
My objective is to drink half of what I'm consuming now and to change into extra conscious of having fun with what I drink, quite than gulping it down (File picture)
A Jungian-trained psychologist and voice coach, she is a agency believer that most individuals who drink an excessive amount of will not be alcoholics (hooked on booze in merely a bodily manner), however emotional/stress drinkers.
And he or she has change into one thing of a cult determine for girls like me.
In her clinic within the Metropolis of London, she sees personal shoppers (80 per cent are girls; lots of them older, high-flying professionals) in addition to operating programs and writing bestselling books.
Her hypnotherapy programs are for individuals who recognise their consuming behaviour interferes with their lives in damaging methods.
A heavy drinker herself 20 years in the past, she has nice ideas for resisting peer stress: little white lies corresponding to 'I'm on antibiotics' or 'I've obtained a hangover from final evening'.
And he or she advises not telling your loved ones you're reducing again on consuming as a result of they may flip into the 'wine police' and make you too self-conscious. Once I contact Georgia to admit I've been indulging an excessive amount of once more, she tells me she's devised a brand new on-line programme, 7 Days To Drink Much less (£54), that I can do within the privateness of my own residence.
Hurrah! I can do the hourly periods every evening earlier than mattress and nonetheless drink over Christmas.
What I really like about Georgia is she isn't an abstinence queen. The Authorities's advice of 14 items per week is fully arbitrary, she explains.
She's not there to guage me, however to assist me relax.
My objective is to drink half of what I'm consuming now (right now of 12 months, my consumption can attain 40 items per week with all these festive lunches and events) and to change into extra conscious of having fun with what I drink, quite than gulping it down.
I join the course on-line. After logging in, you click on on every day's hypnotherapy tapes to take heed to Georgia's voice.
She advises that that you must be mendacity or sitting someplace heat and secure, ideally along with your eyes closed.
The course begins by explaining that once we shut our eyes, we drift right into a 'fantastic unconscious state' known as hypnosis.
'Hypnosis is quite like daydreaming, the place our acutely aware thoughts strikes into the background because the unconscious involves the fore,' she says.
Being on this state helps us really feel calmer (the physique releases constructive endorphins as a result of we really feel secure). And our minds are extra impressionable to new messages — corresponding to consuming extra mindfully and making constructive modifications in our life.
The session ends with a 24-minute hypnotherapy recording by which Georgia explains, in her hypnotic voice, how a lot happier and extra constructive we'll really feel if we are able to study to drink much less.
I go away my laptop computer by my mattress and drift off. Apparently, it doesn't matter if I go to sleep, my unconscious thoughts remains to be absorbing the messages.
Georgia sees many individuals like me who drank rather a lot of their 20s and by no means broke the behavior; individuals who haven't had many alcohol-free days in 30 years.
We could have tried to drink much less and failed. It's not about missing willpower, she says kindly. 'It means your unconscious thoughts thinks that is your regular sample.'
Usually, we discover ourselves consuming once we don't actually need to. Our unconscious thoughts can set off the need with out us being conscious of it.
What she desires us to do is relax our 'emotional over-drinking' behaviour.
An necessary factor of the course seems to be at how many people habitually use alcohol as an emotional crutch. There are questionnaires to fill in on-line to search out out when, and why, you drink.
I discover myself ticking: 'I really feel extra fascinating after I drink.' And 'I usually suppose if folks actually knew me, they wouldn't like me'.
Many people attempt to block out paranoid ideas by consuming. This paranoia is proof of our inside critic at work, Georgia reveals.
The inside critic is aware of every thing about us, from our worry of failure to the cellulite on our thighs. Mine spends all day saying bossily: 'You haven't any self-control, you're hopeless.' By one other of Georgia's on-line assessments, it emerges I'm a 'pleaser' persona.
At first it sounds nice — a pleaser has loads of buddies. However that's as a result of we don't confront folks. And we're pitifully eager to be the life and soul of the social gathering.
The way in which to relax the inside critic is to tune into the 'wholesome assured' a part of our thoughts, says Georgia. We have to educate it to be extra current in our life, then we'll handle alcohol higher.
Most of the week's hypnotherapy recordings are based mostly on increase vanity and confidence. Over per week of events, earlier than which I play my hypnotherapy tapes, I discover my behaviour subtly altering.
I can't mislead you — I'm nonetheless trying ahead very a lot to a drink and letting off steam with buddies.
However after I attain for that second glass too quickly, somewhat voice asks: 'Are you positive?' I then realise the night has solely simply begun and I must tempo myself higher.
Out for dinner one other evening with buddies, I consciously stick to 2 to a few glasses (as an alternative of my traditional 5 - 6).
By the tip of the week, my traditional whole of 40 items is right down to a extra modest (for me) 21, due to hypnotherapy
True, I slip up at a celebration on the Saturday, however I perceive why: I arrived hardly understanding anybody and wanted Dutch braveness.
'A lapse will not be a collapse,' intones Georgia. 'Don't beat your self up.'
However, sure, in hindsight perhaps going to the social gathering solo was a problem too far.
Peer stress is one other factor to look out for. It's necessary to draw constructive folks into your life, she stresses, encouraging you to tell apart between 'Radiators' (glowing optimists who make you be ok with your self) and 'Drains' (individuals who drive you to drink).
Throughout the course, she introduces a self-hypnosis recording that you simply obtain and play as usually as you want on alcohol-free days.
I handle three nights in a row with only one G&T and really feel absurdly proud. One evening I pour a second glass after which can't discover it once more (I'm having DIY carried out to my home and each floor is roofed in books). I shrug and go away it. Final Christmas I might have ripped the home aside!
With every glass I attempt to savour the pleasure quite than bolting it down. And I respect not feeling hungover the subsequent day.
Once I'm feeling low or worrying a few nerve-racking occasion, I take heed to Georgia's sing-song voice (I've even grown to like the plinky music on the recordings) and really feel that somebody has obtained my again.
'It's a bit like going to the gymnasium. You're working a muscle that will get stronger and stronger,' she says.
By the tip of the week, my traditional whole of 40 items is right down to a extra modest (for me) 21, due to hypnotherapy.
I'll positively preserve listening to the tapes. And the good factor? I haven't had to surrender consuming alcohol fully.
However I've realized one essential level: it's not how a lot you drink, it's why you drink.
- Go to georgiafoster.com and howtodrinkless.com
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