Yep, I'm pretty fresh into a break from alcohol (haven't called it quits officially, but know I needed a break to gain some clarity and really look at the reasons why I was drinking). I had a pretty slow progression, drank like most kids do in college, then some nights and a lot of weekends when I was working 9-5, Monday through Friday. Things really ramped up when I got a 48 hour on, 96 hour off schedule. All of a sudden I had all this free time during the week where I could be hungover 2-3 days in a row, have some day beers on the fourth, and make it into work just fine.

From reading about people who have stopped drinking, but didn't consider themselves alcoholics, one of the biggest common threads, and something I realized I had done myself, is that a lot of people think that to quit drinking they need to have a major "wake-up call", like they need a doctor to tell them they'll die if they don't stop, or they need to wreck a car, ruin a relationship, etc. I felt like this, and I from what I can gather, others did too, that we needed something like this to both justify it to ourselves as well as our friends. It's a lot easier to be firm about not-drinking, or I imagine it would be, seeing as how I hadn't really had one of those events, to tell a drinking buddy who invites you out that "I'm not drinking because I'll die if I do" or "I had this awful event happen to me and I needed to change." I think it's because it sounds more serious than how I felt, which was "I don't like the way alcohol makes me feel or behave, I'm not physically addicted, but I want to stop and see how I feel" and that that makes it sound less serious so people wouldn't/won't take my change as seriously and I'll be more tempted myself.

I realize that this is silly, but it's true, at least for me. A lot of times I thought about taking a break I would be like: "well, I'll just drink with the fellas tonight and not say anything because I don't want to be a downer, it's not like I'm an alcoholic who gets the shakes." But looking back I realize that you don't need to be an "alcoholic" (in quotes because I understand the technical definition is somewhat different from how the word is commonly used) to stop drinking, you just need to be aware of how you use alcohol and how it makes you feel, and, that if you don't like that, you don't need a major justification, all you need to say is "I'm taking a break."

For me it was when I began to suspect alcohol was negatively affecting my mood and sleep. I realized I was drinking a lot more than "normal" people (most of my friends are heavy-drinkers, so my definition of normal was very skewed), so I started just buying light beer for the house. That kinda helped, I wouldn't wreck a bottle of whiskey on an off night, but I realized I didn't like drinking just a few light beers. I could do it, I didn't need a bottle of whiskey, it didn't make me crazy, but I realized that I didn't like it because I wasn't doing it for the flavor or the motions, I wasn't getting high. Kinda made me uncomfortable, and, like you said, it doesn't need to be a (big) problem for one to see that it could easily become a problem.

I don't know how long my break will last, if I've stopped completely, or if I'll start again. But I do know that it has allowed me to gain some insights into how and why I was drinking and that I currently feel better than I did when I was drinking heavily and am enjoying my time off.