Featured Image Credit: YouTube/Jonathan Bourassa
Topics: Alcohol, Food And Drink, Health, Mental Health, Sex and Relationships
Olivia Burke
Topics: Alcohol, Food And Drink, Health, Mental Health, Sex and Relationships
A bloke who has been on the wagon for more than a year has revealed what the 'hardest' point of his journey to sobriety was - and it's probably not what you think.
And seen as though Jonathan Bourassa was a bartender for ten years, this is a guy who knows his stuff about alcohol.
However, his choice of career was somewhat to blame for him 'partying seven days a week, 365 days a year', as drinking a load of booze after serving it all night kind of comes with the territory of working in nightlife.
It all came to a head when Jonathan realised that in one way or another, alcohol was 'in every aspect' of his life - resulting in him downing a cocktail of beer, wine and spirits on a regular basis.
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He'd tried to cut back on drinking quite a lot over the years, but found he was unable to stick to his sobriety.
But all of that changed last year, when he decided to challenge himself to go without a tipple for an entire month by taking part in Dry January.
Although it was 'supposed to be just a month off' to give his liver a chance to recuperate, Jonathan decided to continue to remain teetotal - and he still is all of these months on.
He admitted that the first four months of abstaining from alcohol were 'the hardest and the weirdest' time he has ever gone through, but it all proved worth it in the end.
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However, if you are planning on taking a leaf out of Jonathan's book, do beware that the most difficult part about laying off the drink probably won't be the cravings for it - as it's the reactions from those around you that you need to be wary of.
In a YouTube video shared in April this year which marked 548 days without booze passing his lips, the former bartender warned that 'non-drinkers hanging out with daily drinkers' isn't an easy situation to navigate.
At the start of his sobriety, he revealed he didn't find it that bothersome because he was 'super motivated' and all of his friends had rallied round him in support.
"I went through the first month pretty easily," Jonathan said. "The biggest part of it is trying not to think about it, but sometimes it makes you think even more about it."
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But after he reached the month milestone of his sobriety, it seemed that his pals thought he would immediately revert back to his old habits.
The bloke explained: "My friends started telling me when I would go hang out or pass by like a Happy Hour or something, 'You achieved your goals, so here - have a have a drink!
"To me, the whole point of this exercise is to have control over my habits I had lost a control over. So why would I celebrate gaining back control by doing the exact thing that brought me here? It didn't make sense.
"But my friends were not too supportive anymore - it's kind of weird, it kind of flips. They were asking me why I wouldn't drink because I achieved my goal that I wanted."
Jonathan said he was dating a woman for a short time who had a similar stance to him being teetotal - asking him 'why he would make himself suffer more' by not drinking after a month of being teetotal.
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Needless to say, it wasn't true love for those two.
The YouTuber continued: "Alcohol is so ingrained in our society the idea of not drinking is to make yourself suffer. That does not make any sense. But obviously, I decided to keep going - it motivated me even more."
He urged others who want to cut back on boozing not to give into 'peer pressure' from their mates.
"The only difference between people that drink alcohol and people that don't drink alcohol, is people that don't drink, don't care if you drink," Jonathan added.