The idea | I Quit Drinking Four Years Ago. I’m still dealing with Drinking Cultures.

Maybe you made a New Year’s resolution to cut back on the amount of alcohol you drink or to stop drinking altogether. Maybe you’re committed to Dry January. Maybe you were shocked when the surgeon general said last week that alcohol consumption is the leading cause of preventable cancer, and that alcohol should have the same warning labels as cigarettes.

Whatever the reason, a rethinking of alcohol in our lives is in the air.

As someone who quit drinking four years ago, shortly after my brother died – for me, a moment of reflection – I’m always encouraged when people tell me they’re thinking about quitting. This is partly because I know that quitting involves more than just overcoming your thirst; and it’s about confronting the aspects of our culture that normalize and romanticize drinking and suspect and drive away those who quit.

I stopped drinking because I was tired of being tired, foggy and sick, and not knowing myself. I felt like I was dying, and I wanted to live.

But giving up didn’t come without fear.

I didn’t know who I could be without alcohol. I didn’t know if I would still be fun and funny. More importantly for me, I didn’t know if I would be able to reach my creativity without some means of achieving transcendence.

In her autobiography, the late singer Natalie Cole explains that, at one point in her career, “I really believed that I needed drugs to perform at my best.” At one point, I worried that the poetry of the language would escape me without drinking.

That concern turned out to be unfounded.

Quitting drinking was one of the best decisions I ever made. I am healthier and happier. I think clearly and sleep soundly. I no longer lose things or forget things. I can sit quietly with my thoughts without getting angry. And I saved an amazing amount of money.

Someone once told me I was one of the lucky ones: My drinking was a habit, not a physical addiction. Indeed, my body did not crave alcohol, and I did not experience withdrawal. When I stopped drinking, the trial revolved around difficult emotional times.

Later, I realized that drinking was my way of reducing the weight of feeling depressed. When I drank, I could lower my temperature. Sometimes life was cruel, so I ignored it.

Turning off the urge to drink was just one step in the right direction; fighting culture about drinking was another.

I always understood the moral judgments about overeating, but I didn’t expect those about not eating.

Non-drinkers are derided as nagging, deprived of pleasure, vibe killers or lacking the self-control to participate appropriately in the normal part of adult communication. Of course, people often seem to think, something sad must have boosted your sanity, a devastating diagnosis or a big disappointment – you didn’t choose the bench, you were kicked out of the game. The problem was you, not the alcohol.

It’s as if some people need a trauma story to make sense of your decision to stop drinking; otherwise, your self-control suddenly hurts by continuing to use them, and they read your personal choice as their criticism.

For this reason, people who stop drinking are often asked why; I get asked this all the time. Some people have a satisfactory answer to this question – if they describe, for example, hitting the ground – but others do not. However, it is not anyone’s business.

Now sometimes I end this question with a joke: “I stopped because I drank everything.” This is often self-deprecating enough to make people move on.

But the question often remains in the oblivious gaze: Why can’t I continue in the glamor of high-class alcohol, when people become ateur sommeliers, displaying their knowledge and collections of fine wines as a mark of class? Why couldn’t I enjoy the occasional pretentious cocktail brewed with herbs or exotic bitters and garnished with dried fruit or edible flowers?

Well, aristocratic alcohol is still alcohol, I don’t want or need it anymore.

I don’t think everyone realizes what it’s like to be treated like a freak because you made a healthy choice.

It is because I am under these judgments as a non-drinker that I try not to judge those who drink. My boyfriend is a moderate drinker, and sometimes I’ll meet friends at the bar.

But now the sadness of those spaces is what hits me, and I can’t connect to the part of me that I used to enjoy. How did I get used to the smell of dirty towels and cheap disinfectant? How could I not see the loneliness hidden in this great laughter? How could I not see it then, as I see it now, as a funeral disguised as a festival?

At home, I keep alcoholic and non-alcoholic options available for company. From time to time I host cocktail parties — I’m still searching for a better word that immediately conveys “evening gathering” — and I’m surprised that an increasing number of guests join me in not drinking.

My role in the group of friends is not to be scolded but to act as a strong sobriety. I’m trying to de-stigmatize the killjoy so people know they can break free and stay in the community. I’m trying to change the culture.