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The end of year celebrations are over, they were the occasion for some to drink alcohol, sometimes in an irrational way. If you want to embark on Dry January, or “sober January” to compensate, you may conversely suffer from FOMA or “Fear of missing alcohol” or fear of running out of alcohol, literally. What is this fear? Explanations by Dr Philippe Batel, addictologist, head of the addiction service at the Charente public mental health establishment.
At the beginning of January, you challenged yourself to spend the month without drinking a single drop of alcohol. This is also the time to study your relationship to drinking and see if you suffer from FOMA or Fear of missing Alcohol.
“We can link this fear to “craving”, another English term which means an irrepressible desire. In fact, this fear is partly psychological. It occurs because of expectation effects: when you invest a drink for something. For example, a shy person who goes for a drink or two before going to an important appointment where she will have to speak. Alcohol is taken for the disinhibitory side” details Dr. Philippe Batel. Hence the fear that can be born, by starting an abstinence or by just thinking about it.
“By starting a Dry January, which consists of stopping drinking alcohol for an entire month, you have to take the opportunity to question your consumption. To go back to the previous example, the person must ask themselves: can I go to this dinner without drinking first? This is one of the questions to ask, both to measure the lack induced by alcohol, but also to reflect on the place of alcohol in one’s life. emphasizes the specialist.
“Estimate its short, medium and long-term capacities”
For Dr. Batel, each person must position themselves in the short, medium and long term in their relationship with alcohol, in particular people taking on the Dry January challenge. “At the end of the month, people realize that they have succeeded in being totally sober and resume their consumption in a reasoned way, by estimating to what extent they can continue in the short, medium or long term. Overall, participants continue to moderate their drinking for the next six months, on average“Explains the doctor again.
“In addition to this alcoholic abstinence, people gain self-confidence and this month is often also the opportunity to start smoking cessation or scratch games, for example.“. A good reason to overcome this fear, then.