And my father also encouraged me to drink. But in both cases I flatly refused, assuming they were trying to hurt me, because I knew alcohol wasn't for kids. My sister, on the other hand, did start drinking that way.
I was drinking wine by the time I was 3. There were no taboos in my household about drinking alcohol. On hot summer days, my grandfather gave me sips of beer . At family parties, I made my own mixed drinks. When I became a teenager, unlike my friends, I did not go out on drunken binges. I did not think of alcohol as a drug; I thought of it as a beverage that went with meals and socializing. As a middle-aged adult, I have a glass of wine with my meal most days of the week. If I go out with friends, I typically have one drink at the bar while I often watch those friends get sloshed on drink and drink which they tend to swallow down like water.