Never have I ever had more regret than my drinking days and dating. I would wake up feeling anxious about what I said knowing I had over shared on every area of my life, potentially suggesting we should pick up drugs and most probably ending back at theirs. The sinking feeling of knowing I will probably not ever see them again. What I really wanted was to feel held and feel love even if it was for a fleeting moment. The cost of these fleeting moments were a spiral of self deprecation and feeling even worse about myself than I already did. This was the destructive cycle of my dating life pre 2018. Just about as destructive as my drinking and drug taking. I would most probably already be half cut by the time I even got to the date. I would often think of all the potential boyfriends that maybe would have been had I not been such a mess in my dating heyday (although now I am very grateful that none of them actually did become my boyfriend).

When I got sober I started my true journey of self love where I learnt to practice self love and not seek validation from external factors (in my case the opposite sex), I started to create boundaries in my dating life, get really intentional about the type of person and relationship I wanted. I started to get to know myself and figure out what I actually wanted instead of just caring if someone was good looking and was going to get drunk with me (no wonder things never really worked out).

Regardless where you are on your hangover free journey, which might be fully sober, mindful drinking or sober curious, I would always encourage a first date to be a sober one. I have found many benefits to sober dating from helping build my inner confidence away from alcohol, to making better dating choices and having better experiences to not wasting as much time as I can really ascertain how I actually feel about someone quicker. I don’t wake up feeling anxious although I definitely still overshare (I suppose I can’t blame alcohol for everything). It really has been a journey of self – discovery and growth that has allowed me to work on myself and given me insights into how I can show up better for myself and for others that I really don’t think I would have learnt had I still been in my booze infused dating bubble.

Below is my honest debrief of sober dating outlining the positives and negatives so you can make up your own mind about whether this could work for you.