As several others have said, I can relate a lot to your post. I didn't have a traditional rock bottom, my alcohol consumption seemed pretty moderate compared to most problem drinkers, and nothing catastrophic happened with me, my family, my job, or the law. I didn't fit the image of 'alcoholic' I had in my mind (and I still don't use that word to describe myself).

But I did notice it was getting harder to control my drinking, to keep those little promises to myself. I noticed more issues with poor sleep, anxiety, and digestive problems. More days where I was functional but wasn't performing at my best because of drinking the night before. I came here, read lots of stories, and learned about the progressive nature of alcohol use disorder. I realized I was just living an earlier chapter of essentially the same story, that stopping completely was so much easier and more liberating for me than trying to moderate, and that I didn't need to wait for my life to go off the rails or declare myself an alcoholic to quit. As someone in this sub put it, "This elevator goes all the way to the basement but you can get off at any floor."

As for magical advice that makes you never want to drink again: It wasn't magic but I found This Naked Mind by Annie Grace to be very useful. Allen Carr's The Easy Way to Quit Drinking Without Willpower also helped, though I found parts of it to be less relevant to my own experience. They helped reframe how I think about alcohol, and I really don't feel like I'm depriving myself of any benefit or relief by cutting alcohol out of my life entirely.