Alcohol Withdrawal: How to Get Through It

It’s a good idea to talk with a medical professional before you begin a taper. They can help you decide if it’s the safest way to start your recovery, and they can help you make a taper plan. When you quit through tapering, you drink a little less each day until you’re able to have no alcohol at all. It can lower the severity of symptoms, and it can make you more likely to meet your goals. These can indicate a life threatening condition called delirium tremens. It’s important to seek urgent medical care if you experience any of these symptoms.

Examine alcohol health effects

For this reason, experts advise that alcohol cessation be monitored safely with steady effort between oneself and a physician. The amount of alcohol it takes to cause withdrawal symptoms can vary from person to person. For this reason, you should always talk to your doctor before attempting to quit drinking. You may decide to seek medical treatment for your withdrawal symptoms or make the choice to enter a professional detox or rehab center. Even if you don’t succeed the first time, there are still plenty of treatment options you can turn to.

Cold Turkey Method

• This means that an unsuccessful tapering attempt isn’t just a failed attempt; it can actually be harder to try again in the future.
• Once alcohol is stopped, your brain continues to be hyperactive until it readjusts to the absence of alcohol.
• If you’ve been drinking for a long time, tapering off can cause withdrawal symptoms.
• Because of this, it’s important to plan around the alcohol detoxification process carefully.

Medical detox programs for alcohol dependency commonly offer medications to ease the discomfort or pain of withdrawal. This is a benefit that isn’t available to all who attempt to taper at home. Medicines can be used to reduce nausea, severe anxiety, other flu-like symptoms, and treat seizures. Your insurance plan may cover some or all of the cost of treatment for drug or alcohol addiction. Our online health insurance verification system will estimate your in-network and out-of-network deductibles, coinsurance percentages and out-of-pocket maximums.

• Let them know your plan, your progress, and how withdrawals are going for you.
• Tapering increases the length of the detox process, but it might be better for you in the long run.
• When someone stops drinking, they must decide whether to quit “cold turkey” or taper their alcohol use.
• Keep it interesting and varied with sparkling water, virgin cocktails (also known as mocktails), fruit juices, low-fat milk, or kombucha.

Challenges of Cutting Down Your Alcohol Intake

This can taper you off alcohol while still helping you keep up with your normal drinking routine, making the process easier. Figuring out where to start your alcohol taper schedule can be challenging. Counting each drink you consume may seem simple, but all drinks are not created equal.

• Weaning off alcohol reduces the chance of experiencing withdrawal or the severity of withdrawal symptoms.
• You should plan to taper for between three and seven days depending on how much you’re used to drinking.
• This could mean opting out of the weekly pub quiz for a while, or if you tend to drink when eating out, try going to restaurants that don’t sell alcohol or simply volunteer to drive.
• These factors can make one person’s taper last longer than another person’s taper.
• In January 2020, more than 6 million people reportedly participated in Dry January, a campaign to reduce alcohol consumption organized by Alcohol Change UK.

Various treatment programs are available to help you recover from addiction. Risky withdrawal symptoms are not limited to the above.3 Learn more about alcohol withdrawal here and, once again, speak to a doctor first. Replacing alcoholic how to taper off alcohol beverages with non-alcohol drinks is a great method of helping during a taper. By substituting alcoholic drinks for non-alcoholic drinks, you can still engage in most of your habit without getting the alcohol that makes it addictive.

If you plan to taper your drinking in order to stop, make sure you limit your intake consistently, avoid fluctuations, and adhere to a weekly reduction schedule with a set date to stop. Quitting binge drinking may require different strategies than either tapering or cold turkey. This can sometimes cause unpleasant withdrawal symptoms, and these symptoms can make it hard to stick with your recovery plan. By cutting alcohol out of your life completely, you may notice a number of improvements to the way you look and feel.

Unsupervised Medical Care

However, it may be suitable for someone with a lower risk of experiencing alcohol withdrawal, or a person who has access to medical professionals at home. The main downside of cold turkey is how unpleasant and risky it can be. If you drink heavily, alcohol withdrawal symptoms can be harsh, dangerous, and even fatal. For this reason, it’s generally best to avoid quitting abruptly, or at bare minimum speak with a doctor first and have someone looking out for you. This method works best with gradual reduction, as alcohol withdrawal symptoms can start within 12–24 hours after stopping drinking. Generally, alcohol-free days are better towards the end of a gradual reduction, not towards the beginning.

When to Seek Medical Attention

Whether you’re sober curious, know for sure you’re ready to quit, or fall somewhere in between, Dr. Streem shares advice for how to stop drinking. If you’re living with alcohol use disorder (also known as alcoholism), you’ll likely benefit from additional medical interventions. Ultimately, you shouldn’t taper off of alcohol unless you’ve checked with your doctor first. Because of the risk of a lower success rate and prolonged alcohol exposure, most healthcare professionals will recommend a professional detox over tapering. Deciding to reduce or eliminate your alcohol consumption is a big step and will open up a whole new world of improved health and well-being. Whether you’re thinking about tapering off or going cold turkey, it’s crucial to understand the implications of both approaches and which strategy is likely the safest and most effective.

Find A Rehab Center Near You

• To create an effective taper, you must know how much you drink daily on average.
• Because of the risk of a lower success rate and prolonged alcohol exposure, most healthcare professionals will recommend a professional detox over tapering.
• That said, tapering off alcohol doesn’t completely eliminate withdrawal symptoms.
• Your GP may be able to arrange or signpost you to counselling and psychological support, and you could access local support groups to help you stay on track.

If you turn to alcohol to ease anxiety, try exercise as a healthy alternative. Instead of aiming for complete abstinence, for instance, aim to drink fewer than seven days a week. Use the NIAAA’s drink size calculator to determine the amount of alcohol in various drinks. If you identify with any of the scenarios above, try the expert tips below for reducing your alcohol consumption (or even eliminating it altogether). To determine whether—and where—you fall in the alcohol use disorder (AUD) spectrum, answer the following questions.