From January 6th to February 20th I drank zero beers. I did have some glasses of wine and a few whiskeys on certain occasions, but I definitely had zero beers in that time. This wasn’t a challenge I put on myself, there was just a period where I felt like I was starting to get sick, and I didn’t want to be sick, so I decided not to drink alcohol. I even went to a wedding in this time period and had about 17 glasses of water with zero alcohol in them.

What I learned from not drinking beer is that beer is the main thing that makes me gain weight. And I now know this because in this one month +14 days of not drinking beer I dropped a few pounds and finally made it under 200 (like right under, like 199.9, but it still counts).

Since this one month +14 days of no beers, I had a few beers last weekend and I’m now back over 200 (like 201-204 depending on the morning). And yes, I weigh myself in the morning before I put anything into my body. That’s how you know you’re getting your lowest weight. It’s not cheating if you only weigh yourself in the morning (if you weigh yourself one night then a few days later in the morning and brag about all the pounds you lost, that is cheating. Who are you cheating? Yourself!).

Everyone’s body is different and what works for one person may not work for someone else. And for me not drinking beer seems to be working. I’m not forever quitting beer though, just maybe have it every once in a while (also, going out to dinner and not having a beer can take about 30-50% off of your bill). Next, I just need to work on eating a bit better.

Lately, I haven’t been eating the healthiest of meals, but I somehow still ended up losing weight, so I keep eating not so great. It also doesn’t help when people tell you, “You look like you’ve lost some pounds.” Whenever someone tells me that it makes my brain say, Great! Now we’ve earned some pizza/taco bell/burger king or all of the above. That’s why I rarely tell people they look skinnier, I don’t want to trigger that voice in their brain.

You don’t have to tell me I lost some weight. I know I’m a bit skinnier, and not just because the scale told me so. I know I actually lost some weight because I can now fit into my skinnier jeans.

In my closet, I have my three or four pairs of regular jeans for when I’m feeling a bit hefty. I also wear these when I’m going out to eat a whole bunch of junk. I also have a few pairs of thinner jeans. The ones that are just one size too small. I don’t fit into all of these pairs right now, but I do fit well into at least one of them and that’s a major improvement. When I can fit into all three of my thin jeans, then it will be time to turn those into my “heavier” jeans and buy a pair in the next size down (but let’s not get ahead of ourselves).

Since learning that beer is my Kryptonite, I haven’t had too many. But, I still have been stuffing my gob with some not so healthy food, as you’ve all seen (on Instagram and Facebook). I’m still making delicious burgers, tacos, pizzas and cookies and all kinds of stuff. There’s also all of those late night eats after shows and rehearsals (bagel bites, dino nuggets, pizza rolls and more) which aren’t very shareable and no one sees, but me.

My next test will be to continue not drinking beer, but also to eat a little better and see what that does to my body. John Mayer once said, “Your body is a wonderland,” but that’s not true. All of our bodies are not Wonderlands. In fact, all of our bodies are just little science experiments that we get to borrow while we’re here on Earth. And the best way to find out what works for you is trial and error.