How Can I Start Dating After Sobriety Without Making It a Big Deal?

There's never been a better time to be sober and dating. But other people can only be as comfortable with your sobriety as you are.

A quick bit of housekeeping—I’m planning to skip the newsletter next week, as I’ll be home with my family wrangling two delightful, very lively nieces. That said, if I find myself with both time and energy (ha!) I’ll try to crank something out. Either way, happy holidays. Always feel free to email me at askasoberlady@gmail.com.

1883 – Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Dance at Bougival

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Hi SL,

I just started dating after getting sober almost 7 months ago. Like everyone, I’m on the apps, and most people I match with suggest meeting up for a drink. I don’t mind meeting someone at a bar and ordering a Coke or mocktail, but one of two things happens:

1. When the other person finds out I’m not drinking, they often get weird about it. Like they feel bad for having a drink or feel uncomfortable that I’m not drinking.

2. They’re cool about it but then don’t know I’m sober (that I never drink, not simply not drinking that night), and it feels like something I have to reveal at a later date, which also makes it feel like a bigger deal than it is.

The few times I’ve told someone before meeting up, it feels like it becomes this thing they have to work around, where they insist on coffee or something, which is nice, but I feel like they don’t believe me when I say I don’t mind meeting in a bar and we don’t have to change plans because of it. How do I date like a normal person without turning sobriety into a thing?

Sincerely,

Dating Sober

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Hi Dating Sober,

Congratulations on seven months and for leaping back into dating. I empathize with how you’re feeling—I got sober at 23 and eventually found myself spending hours on OKCupid (back when it was just a website), trying to explain my “situation” in a way that was both casual and fun and also clear that no, really, I don’t drink at all ever. I came up with something like “I don’t drink, but I don’t care if you do,” which is boring and fairly brusque in retrospect, but I thought it made me seem less like Carrie Nation (a proto-Prohibitionist who had a habit of attacking saloons with a hatchet).

Of course, many of the guys I matched with didn’t read my profile terribly carefully, and I ended up in the same situation as you—being invited to drinks and debating if I should go and not drink or say something. It was over a decade ago, so I can’t remember the breakdown of my decisions, but I generally remember that the responses fell into one of three buckets: guys who were a hard no on dating someone sober, guys who were clearly reluctant/unsettled by it but tried to pretend otherwise, and guys who were cool with it. You’re mostly encountering people who fit in the first two buckets. I know it sucks to feel like you can’t just be upfront and honest about something that shouldn’t be a big deal.

Let’s deal with the first bucket immediately because it’s the easiest: If your sobriety is a dealbreaker for someone, there is a 100% chance that person is also a dealbreaker for you. Maybe the person has their own issues with alcohol, or maybe they’re in the wine business and can’t imagine life with a partner who doesn’t drink. Either way, it’s not your problem, and it’s not personal. It may feel charged because getting sober can be so intense, but it’s no different than a person saying their potential partner must care about football or opera. It’s a square peg in a round hole.

Since Tinder didn’t exist when I was dating, I asked my good friend and writer of The Book Project newsletter,

Hanna Kozlowska

. Hanna is writing a book about the history of online dating; her knowledge of the dating app scene blows mine out of the water. While there are apps specifically for sober people (Loosid, Single and Sober), if you’re not already on those, it’s likely because you're interested in a broader pool of potential matches. But according to Hanna, lots of the most popular apps have places where you can note that you don’t drink (Hinge, Match, and OKCupid all do); wherever possible, I suggest doing that if you’re not already.

You are far from alone on these apps. In 2021, GQ published a story about sober dating. I highly recommend reading this whole article—I think it will resonate with you and maybe alleviate some fears—but one statistic jumped out at me. “Nine percent of Hinge users marked “no” next to the drinking icon last year, up from eight percent in 2019. (Along those lines, the percentage of users marking “sometimes” is rising as “yes” declines.).”

I’m willing to bet good money that in 2024, that number is higher. According to a 2023 story in The Times, “nearly three-quarters of Tinder users now state in their profiles that they never (or only occasionally) drink.” Lots of people aren’t drinking right now, and it’s not always because they have a long, sordid history with booze. (You might not have a long sordid history with booze!) The ‘sober curious’ discourse is virtually inescapable on social media—and I’m glad about it.

The problem is that you don’t feel like you’re in good company, regardless of what the statistics say. You may have truly terrible luck and are matching almost exclusively with people who have thinly veiled misgivings about your sobriety, but I don’t think that’s the most likely scenario.

I do not doubt that some of the people you’re encountering are, as you say, “weird” about your sobriety, but I wonder what proportion that truly is. Throughout the rest of your letter, you say, “It feels like something I have to reveal at a later date, which also makes it feel like a bigger deal than it is...it feels like it becomes this thing they have to work around.” That’s a lot of feels, my friend.

Is it possible that these people are picking up on some uncertainty or awkwardness that you have around disclosing your sobriety? Might you be reading into normal first-date jitters or attempts to be solicitous about where you meet? I understand the impulse, but if someone suggests coffee instead, why do you feel the need to stress that a bar is fine with you? You could just meet for coffee and go from there. Reading between the lines is a normal part of dating, especially in the early days, but it doesn’t mean that what you’re reading is correct.

People pick up on the energy around how you approach something. There’s a difference between swaggering into a bar and ordering a club soda like it’s the most normal thing in the world and mumbling a question about non-alcoholic options. Maybe they’re getting the impression that you aren’t totally comfortable with the situation, which makes the other person unsure how to proceed.

All of this is conjecture; of course, you could be the freest of non-alcoholic spirits, exuding casual cool with every breath. But I don’t know anyone who has gotten back into dating after getting sober without a few awkward speed bumps here and there. If that’s the case, it doesn’t necessarily mean you aren’t ready to date. It may just mean you’re still getting comfortable with sober dating. Or that your general first-date nerves are manifesting as this anxiety around sobriety. Again, all of that would be completely normal. Just try to keep in mind that if you’re looking for a long-term partner, it will need to be someone who is comfortable with your sobriety, and the more comfortable you are with it, the more comfortable they'll be.

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I’m not a doctor or mental health professional, so my advice shouldn’t be construed as medical or therapeutic. You are free to take or leave it.