Alcohol is the tough one for me. I love micro brews and wine. Beer and wine are a frequent enough part of my diet to know that alcohol is a significant amount of my calories. When I'm not drinking alcohol, I'm drinking water. I enjoy beer and wine too much to completely cut them out; but this month, I am going to try to abstain from alcohol.

I suffer from this too. The one month where I cut out alcohol completely I lost significant weight. Admittedly I exercised more too, but then months where I've exercised but not cut out alcohol I've not seen nearly as many benefits.

But alcohol, it's hard. I like a beer or few to relax after work, but I think for me it became a habit. Cutting out alcohol at home was a neat compromise (allowing myself to indulge the couple of times a month I go out for programming group meetups) felt a bit like what I imagine giving up smoking would be like. It took me a couple of weeks to get used to not having a drink in my hand in the evening, and I didn't like it at all. Compounded by the fact that I don't drink soda, and rarely fruit juice (mostly water, coffee or tea).

However taking it a day at a time I did cut it out, and I became noticeably healthier. I started going to bed at a regular time, I felt more alert in the mornings. I think my work improved, I felt healthier in general, I lost weight and I felt like I had more energy.

I've 100% relapsed over Christmas, but I'm going to pick it up again in the new year.

Totally agreed. It's disturbingly easy to drink several thousand calories in a very short amount of time.