Try Damp January to Cut Back on Drinking in the New Year

Raise a mock margarita or a phony Negroni — Dry January is once again in full swing.

The upsides of taking a monthlong break from alcohol are clear: You’ll likely feel better and save money. But people sometimes struggle to go directly from the boozy glut of the holidays to 31 days without a drink. Some may have already considered abandoning their plan to stay sober this month.

“For most people, the idea of a binary isn’t very helpful,” said Ian Hamilton, an associate professor of addiction at the Department of Health Sciences at the University of York. Instead, he and other experts said it may be more sustainable to try a “damp” January, or making an effort to drink less without abstaining from alcohol entirely.

“Damp January might be perhaps a better start to changing your behavior in the long-term,” said Matt Field, a professor of psychology at the University of Sheffield.

Here’s what to know about the benefits of cutting back, and how to get started.

Damp January vs. Dry January

When you stop drinking completely, you’ll likely sleep better, see clearer skin and find yourself with more energy throughout the day. Then there are the long-term benefits, including a lower risk of cancer, cardiovascular disease and other health concerns.

But you can improve your health just by drinking less. For people who have two or more drinks a day, reducing your alcohol consumption can lower your blood pressure, said Dr. Timothy Naimi, director of the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research at the University of Victoria. Scaling back can also improve your sleep so that you wake up less often throughout the night and feel more refreshed from day to day. It may also lead to weight loss.

And since Damp January means you are deciding, drink by drink, when to opt for alcohol and when to refrain, you might feel “a sense of greater control” and choice over drinking than if you abstain altogether, said Richard de Visser, a professor of health psychology at the University of Sussex who researches alcohol use.

Damp January can help you build good habits that will last beyond the month, too. The more you practice turning down a drink, the easier it becomes to do so, he said.

“If you think, ‘I can’t go out and have dinner without drinking,’ and you try it once and it works out — once you’ve had a number of those situations, that gives a sense of, ‘Actually, I can manage that.’ And that’s a skill that you carry with you,” Dr. de Visser said.

How to cut back

If you’re opting for a more moderate approach to scaling back drinking, experts suggested reducing the number of days you drink each week, like having alcohol only during the weekend. However, they cautioned against “saving up” your drinks. It’s true that if you go from drinking a glass of wine a day to, say, five glasses of wine just on a Friday night, you’re still reducing your consumption overall. But binge drinking can harm your liver and other organs and break down important barriers in your intestines over time.

A drink diary — which can be as simple as a smartphone note where you tally your drinks over the course of a night — can help you keep track and make you more intentional about your consumption, Dr. Hamilton said.

You could also alternate between alcoholic drinks and mocktails or sodas when you do drink, Dr. Field said. This will slow down your drinking, and help lower the number of alcoholic beverages you drink throughout a night. You may also want to consider what kind of alcohol you’re drinking: The higher alcohol percentage a drink has, the greater an effect it has on your body. So consider ordering a lower alcohol beer rather than a martini.

If you find yourself more prone to drink around certain people, or in specific settings, it might make sense to reassess your social life, Dr. Naimi said. Consider trying “new things for the new year that may be fun, but may not be so alcohol-centric,” he said — using this as an opportunity to expand your horizons, rather than depriving yourself. Maybe that means hanging out with friends in a restaurant instead of a bar, or going out for coffee instead of for drinks.

If you do drink more than you were planning to on a certain night, show yourself some compassion. That’s the beauty of Damp January, Dr. Field said. “The advantage of a more moderation-based approach is that failure is possible,” he said. “Failure is human.”