The 44-year-old started drinking as a young teen, a trend which continued for nearly three decades, while working in shearing sheds.
"It’s just what you did, it was the culture."
When it rained and sheep became too wet to shear, the shearers and woolhandlers affectionately renamed raindrops to "party drops", as they signalled drinking could begin soon.
"You were full noise until it fined up and you could go back to work."
His childhood was spent in Alexandra and Waimate.
At age 17, he moved to the North Island to shear in King Country in 1999.
"That’s where I got a real taste of it."
In King Country, there was more work and bigger crews and plenty of opportunities to "get stuck in" to the drinking scene.
He and his wife Tess bought the shearing run in King Country in 2005 and operated it for 16 years.
They returned to the South, basing themselves in Oamaru, and he sold shearing gear across the South Island for three years.
Their current business McSkimming Contracting was established by buying a shearing run near Kurow and services sheep farms across the South including Central Otago, Mackenzie District, Strath Taieri and Waitaki.
A couple of previous attempts to reduce the amount of alcohol he was drinking had been unsuccessful.
"I’m not a halfway kind of joker, it is all or nothing."
He started by limiting himself to up to six beers each night after work but the tally slowly crept up to a box of 24 beers.
"It was always, just one more. You get stuck in a cycle."
This time, he decided to go cold turkey.
On giving up, he realised what he had been missing in life by drinking alcohol.
"You often think you need it to kill pain, or whatever it might be, but you don’t, all that s... goes away when you stop."
He now had no cravings for alcohol, even when life throws him a curveball.
"They are easier to deal with now than they ever were."
He did not miss the feeling of waking up with memory blanks, or replaying the previous night in his head, wondering if he had annoyed anyone and if damage-control was required.
In the past, when he tried to cut back, he became reclusive to avoid a night out turning into a bender.
This time, he is older and wiser and goes out regularly and happily tells people he no longer drinks alcohol.
"You have to get your head right to say no and mean no."
Any friend who did not hassle him for his choice was a mate worth keeping, he said.
He could comfortably be sober and socialise with people drinking.
"It doesn’t bother me one iota."
His extra energy and focus after giving up drinking had been directed to helping the community, such as being an emcee at Young Farmers club events and coaching sport.
He was talking about his two years on the wagon to highlight the benefits, including improved family life and fitness, a clearer mind, becoming more patient, sleeping better, shearing better and making sharper decisions.
If his story could help one person in any way then it was worth sharing.
People who wanted to make a lifestyle change had contacted him because they did not know where to start.
"You don’t have to announce it. You don’t have to justify it. You just have to be honest with yourself."
Sometimes the toughest moves ended up being the most freeing, he said.
He was not anti-booze and had met some great people and shared great times.
"I’ve had some fun but I don’t need it any more."
He preferred to put his energy into his health, family, work and future.
"The ripple effect has been massive."
