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Speaker 1: Hi everyone, I'm Katie Kuric, and this is next question.

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Speaker 1: You may not know, but April, along with being the

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Speaker 1: cruelest month, is Alcohol Awareness Month, and it happens to

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Speaker 1: be a subject I've been wanting to tackle for a

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Speaker 1: while now because during the pandemic I noticed some pretty

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Speaker 1: frightening headlines about alcohol use, particularly among women. Americans are

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Speaker 1: drinking far more than they did in previous years. Alcohol

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Speaker 1: abuse is surging among women during the pandemic. Women increase

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Speaker 1: their heavy drinking days, more mothers are drinking, and it

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Speaker 1: could lead to alcoholism. One substance abuse doctor calls it

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Speaker 1: an epidemic in a pandemic. Before the pandemic, yet we

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Speaker 1: were seeing this rise in in alcohol use. That's Dr

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Speaker 1: Don Sugarman, a clinical psychologist and researcher at McClain Hospital

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Speaker 1: in Massachusetts and an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School.

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Speaker 1: There used to be this gender gap in rates, and

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Speaker 1: so you know, in the early eighties, the epidemiological studies

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Speaker 1: were showing about a five to one ratio between men

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Speaker 1: and women. That had sort of shrunk in the nineties

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Speaker 1: to about two to one, and now it's it's getting

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Speaker 1: close to one to one. With the pandemic. We you know,

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Speaker 1: it's still sort of early on in the research, but

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Speaker 1: one study found overall there was an increase by fourteen

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Speaker 1: percent in drinking, and that women had a higher increase

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Speaker 1: at seventeen percent, but that they're binge drinking, which we

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Speaker 1: would say would be about having four more drinks in

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Speaker 1: a short couple of our period of time had for

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Speaker 1: women had increased forty one percent, So that's quite a jump.

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Speaker 1: So is there something about women that make them more

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Speaker 1: susceptible to alcohol abuse? Apparently the answer is yes. Women

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Speaker 1: absorbed and metabolize alcohol differently than men. For instance, women

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Speaker 1: have less total body water, so when they drink, the

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Speaker 1: alcohol is less diluted in their body, so it's more concentrated.

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Speaker 1: They also have less of an enzyme that breaks down alcohols,

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Speaker 1: so they don't metabolize it as much. So for a

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Speaker 1: woman of the same weight as as a man who's

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Speaker 1: drinking the same amount, they're going to have more alcohol

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Speaker 1: in their system, more concentrated alcohol in their system, and

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Speaker 1: it's going to stay in there longer. So that makes

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Speaker 1: them more vulnerable to having the physical negative consequences of alcohol.

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Speaker 1: So on today's episode, women and alcohol abuse. We'll talk

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Speaker 1: to two women who hit rock bottom and not only

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Speaker 1: found their way out, but made recovery spaces for people

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Speaker 1: just like them. Will also hear from an interventionist on

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Speaker 1: how to help someone you love. But we begin with

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Speaker 1: my co host for this episode, Elizabeth Vargas, award winning

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Speaker 1: broadcast journalist, podcaster, and author of Between Breaths, a memoir

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Speaker 1: of panic and addiction. I'm here with my friend Elizabeth Fargas,

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Speaker 1: who has experienced what it's like to be a woman

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Speaker 1: who has a drinking problem and who has come out

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Speaker 1: the other side. Elizabeth and I've known each other, Gosh,

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Speaker 1: I don't want to say how long, but we just

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Speaker 1: say for decades. Perhaps our most famous television appearances when

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Speaker 1: we were trying to figure out what the Internet was

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Speaker 1: in Internet is, uh, that massive computer network, the one

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Speaker 1: that's becoming really big? Now, what do you mean? How

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Speaker 1: does want? What do you write to it? Like mail?

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Speaker 1: You know a lot of people use it and communicate it.

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Speaker 1: I guess they can communicate with NBC writers and producers. Allison,

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Speaker 1: can you explain what Internet is? It's sort of embarrassing

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Speaker 1: after all the work we've done, that that is sort

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Speaker 1: of one of the one of the most um it

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Speaker 1: shared every couple of years and exactly heards. But Elizabeth

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Speaker 1: has not only written about women and alcohol, She's lived it.

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Speaker 1: As I said, She's done several hour specials on it.

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Speaker 1: And UM, I'm so grateful, actually, Elizabeth, that you've taken

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Speaker 1: time out of your schedule to really educate me and

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Speaker 1: all our listeners about this issue, which has become really

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Speaker 1: a huge problem. And why don't we talk just briefly

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Speaker 1: before we talked to some other experts, because I feel

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Speaker 1: like you're an expert yourself. You describe yourself, Elizabeth, as

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Speaker 1: a high functioning alcoholic, and you were able to hide

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Speaker 1: this for years, weren't you? Yeah? Oh yeah, I mean

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Speaker 1: I had George Stephanopolis, you know, um, interviewed me on

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Speaker 1: Good Morning America about this and he said, I have

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Speaker 1: sat next to you for hundreds of hours of live

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Speaker 1: television at that point, because we co hosted and Ring

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Speaker 1: America Get Together and even during nine eleven many of

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Speaker 1: the specials together. He said, I've never once, ever, ever

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Speaker 1: seen any sign of this issue in your life, and

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Speaker 1: close girlfriends of mine were like, what, no, not you?

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Speaker 1: The only I really did keep it very very hidden. Um,

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Speaker 1: similar to the way I kept my anxiety hidden, which

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Speaker 1: was what I was self medicating. UM. And it sadly

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Speaker 1: also kept me in denial because I thought, oh, I

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Speaker 1: can't be an alcoholic. I can't be addicted to this substance,

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Speaker 1: that this can't be a problem for me because I

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Speaker 1: don't look like that. I haven't you know, I'm not homeless,

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Speaker 1: I'm not jobless, I'm not you know, I'm a mother,

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Speaker 1: I'm a wife, I'm a network news anchor. I'm all

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Speaker 1: these things. Therefore, I cannot be an alcoholic. And and

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Speaker 1: I managed to quit, you know, when I got pregnant.

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Speaker 1: Although the first time I got pregnant it was so

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Speaker 1: hard to quit. That should have been a massive warning

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Speaker 1: sign for me. How did you finally come to terms

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Speaker 1: with it? And how did you finally stop? You know? Um,

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Speaker 1: I didn't stop after my very worst variances. You know,

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Speaker 1: I write about this in my book that I had

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Speaker 1: a very scary experience that set me to the emergency room.

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Speaker 1: And it was the really the only really true blackout

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Speaker 1: I've ever had. I wasn't one of those people who

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Speaker 1: blacked out all the time. UM. And But that what

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Speaker 1: that didn't scare me sober, and I did go to rehab.

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Speaker 1: I wit to rehab two different rehabs. One of them

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Speaker 1: was really really great, one was not so great. But

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Speaker 1: it wasn't rehab that finally got me to stick to

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Speaker 1: get sober. It was me quietly finally deciding I can't

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Speaker 1: do this anymore. I can't lie anymore. I can't hide

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Speaker 1: this anymore. I don't want to. That's the key. I

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Speaker 1: don't want to. UM. I spent a lot of time,

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Speaker 1: you know, looking for as I called it, door number three.

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Speaker 1: You know, there's got to be another option here. Um,

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Speaker 1: But I couldn't. There wasn't another option, and it I

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Speaker 1: had to finally sort of come to that decision all

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Speaker 1: by myself. And I'm so gratefull I did well. I'm

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Speaker 1: not only proud, so proud of what you've been able

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Speaker 1: to accomplish personally, but your courage in talking about this publicly,

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Speaker 1: I think has helped so many people because it was

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Speaker 1: so shrouded and shame and secrecy. It's still a Katie,

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Speaker 1: it still is and stigma. We know. I'm on the

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Speaker 1: board of directors for the Partnership and Addiction. We do

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Speaker 1: a lot of science based research for the government on

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Speaker 1: this and we know that stigma is the singular most

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Speaker 1: important reason people do not seek help. They're afraid to

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Speaker 1: They're afraid to admit they might have a problem. They're

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Speaker 1: afraid to admit they need help. They're afraid of the

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Speaker 1: consequences they will suffer in their personal and professional lives

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Speaker 1: by making that admission. And only I firmly believe I mean, listen,

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Speaker 1: I was outed when I was in rehab. It was

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Speaker 1: a deeply painful experience for me. It was excruciating. But

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Speaker 1: and I don't know that I would have written my

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Speaker 1: book if I hadn't been outed. But my story was

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Speaker 1: already out there. I thought, well, I might as well

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Speaker 1: tell my old story since everybody else thinks they know

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Speaker 1: the whole story. Um. But I deeply believe that more

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Speaker 1: people talking openly is the best where we can ship

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Speaker 1: away the stigma and the shame, because then we realized

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Speaker 1: that I and I have never felt lonelier in my

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Speaker 1: entire life than when I was struggling with with alcohol

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Speaker 1: because I didn't I was too afraid to tell anybody

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Speaker 1: what was going on. And that's why I wrote my

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Speaker 1: book so that you know, people can see some one

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Speaker 1: other person's story. And there are a lot of great

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Speaker 1: books out there now, really good books especially by women

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Speaker 1: um talking about their struggles with alcohol and why they drank.

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Speaker 1: And those books helped me. They helped me a lot

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Speaker 1: realize that I'm not alone when we come back to

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Speaker 1: successful women who almost lost everything. When Katie Oluwatoyan started

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Speaker 1: her sober journey, she didn't see herself in any of

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Speaker 1: the recovery spaces she sought out, from the familiar twelve

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Speaker 1: step to rehab an outpatient programs to online communities. I

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Speaker 1: always wondered why I was the only Black person in

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Speaker 1: those spaces when I know it's just common sense that

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Speaker 1: black people, people of color go through a lot of

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Speaker 1: trauma and and it just makes sense that they too

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Speaker 1: would have problems with alcohol. Through her own recovery, Katie

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Speaker 1: started something to fill the void for black women like her.

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Speaker 1: The Sober Black Girls Club started as a blog, a

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Speaker 1: space for Katie to share her story. In twenty nineteen,

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Speaker 1: the blog grew into an online collective, a small support

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Speaker 1: group of black women who identified with Katie's experience. The

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Speaker 1: pandemic expanded the community even more with weekly zoom meetings

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Speaker 1: and eventually in person regional meetups. Today, the Sober Black

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Speaker 1: Girls Club has more than twelve hundred members. Tell us

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Speaker 1: about your relationship with alcohol and how it developed. When

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Speaker 1: did you start drinking. It was later in life, right, correct,

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Speaker 1: I started drinking. Um, when I when I started college. Honestly,

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Speaker 1: I could actually remember like the first day, literally my

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Speaker 1: dad and my brother dropped me off, unloaded all my

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Speaker 1: clothes and and dorm items. And as soon as they

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Speaker 1: left or had got like a knock on the door

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Speaker 1: and there was a fat fat dude, some fat guy,

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Speaker 1: some fat boy, and literally, like I remember, we went

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Speaker 1: we party that night and we drink my first time drinking,

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Speaker 1: and it was just amazing. The relief, the just the looseness,

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Speaker 1: like just be feeling very loose and feeling very free.

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Speaker 1: It was just a crazy experience and it was something

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Speaker 1: that I have never ever experienced before. Um, it was

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Speaker 1: my first time drinking alcohol, and during that time it

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Speaker 1: was was pretty good. I thought it was interesting. And Elizabeth,

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Speaker 1: I know you've read this too, that Katie's background, her

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Speaker 1: Nigerian background. Culturally, Uh, your family, you guys didn't drink

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Speaker 1: a lot, Well, most families don't drink a lot when

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Speaker 1: there when their kids are Yeah, I guess, but you

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Speaker 1: didn't really, um, you know, it wasn't part of of

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Speaker 1: your culture. No, honestly, like not at all. Um. For

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Speaker 1: a while, I went to a private school, like an

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Speaker 1: Irish Catholic private school UM in New York City. So

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Speaker 1: it's pretty strict, you know, uniforms, always being disciplined in

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Speaker 1: a time it was like a different hour. It was

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Speaker 1: pretty strict. And then even when I started attending public school,

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Speaker 1: UM again just having the parents that I had, UM

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Speaker 1: literally school Monday through Friday. Then after going to kalan

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Speaker 1: classes Saturday, I was in a Saturday science and math program.

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Speaker 1: Sunday was Sunday school. It was just NonStop um work

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Speaker 1: and order and and just activity. So there was honestly

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Speaker 1: not even any room, let alone. My family definitely didn't

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Speaker 1: drink or keep alcohol in the in the home at all.

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Speaker 1: You start of drinking just really to party right in college,

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Speaker 1: which is not that unusual. And when did it go

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Speaker 1: from drinking social drinking to drinking on a regular basis,

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Speaker 1: sort of at all hours of the day and not

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Speaker 1: not in a social setting. Oh my gosh. Okay, So

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Speaker 1: I graduated law school just finished graduating law school. And

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Speaker 1: this is not funny. I can laugh about it now

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Speaker 1: because I'm in a better place, But back then, none

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Speaker 1: of this was hilarious or funny in any type of break.

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Speaker 1: But I had just graduated law school. Um, you know,

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Speaker 1: I had my firm, I just sent a lease in

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Speaker 1: New York City. I had broken up with my boyfriend.

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Speaker 1: You know, I just was so ready to stop this

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Speaker 1: new chapter in life. Um, However, there was this thing

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Speaker 1: I had to do. I had to pass the bar.

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Speaker 1: I had to take in and I had to pass

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Speaker 1: the bar. And I remember feeling a lot of pressure

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Speaker 1: because there was this there was this thing. I don't

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Speaker 1: want to pull a stigma, but there was this thing

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Speaker 1: that like, black students don't pass the bar on the

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Speaker 1: first try. Now, looking back, when you compare the ratio

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Speaker 1: the amount of black students that were in my law school,

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Speaker 1: compare them too, the right students, the white students. Excuse me,

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Speaker 1: ratio wise, we all passed and feel at the same time. However,

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Speaker 1: when it's just like five of us in the class,

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Speaker 1: it kind of looks and we all fail. It kind

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Speaker 1: of looks really really bad. So I had a lot

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Speaker 1: of pressure for one just being known to be known

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Speaker 1: to being really smart and intelligent. I had a lot

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Speaker 1: of pressure on that side. Then I had pressure and

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Speaker 1: I had a job, and even though my job wasn't

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Speaker 1: contingent on passing the bar, I still didn't want to

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Speaker 1: be working and had not passed the bar. And then

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Speaker 1: the pressure of being I didn't want to be one

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Speaker 1: of the black students to fail. I just did it.

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Speaker 1: So I started to take medication, and um, I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: say a lot of caffeine, basically caffeine pills, not even medication,

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Speaker 1: so like working out pills, caffeine pills, thinking a lot

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Speaker 1: of coffee. And I was studying literally from like nine

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Speaker 1: a m. To like ten p m. However, when you're

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Speaker 1: drinking so much coffee in the morning, I wasn't able

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Speaker 1: to fall asleep. So I was using wine. I remember distinctively,

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Speaker 1: wine and moonshine, you know, because I was broke, clearly

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Speaker 1: studying for the bar. I was using wine and moonshine

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Speaker 1: to fall asleep. I was just guzzling bottles and bottles.

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Speaker 1: And that's when it started. Literally in the summer of

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Speaker 1: two thousand and seventeen, as I was studying for the bar,

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Speaker 1: morningtime caffeine pills and coffee, and then nighttime moonshine and wine.

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Speaker 1: You had no idea, Katie, that you had a drinking problem, really,

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Speaker 1: which seems hard to for people to wrap their heads

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Speaker 1: around until you went to a therapist and she basically said,

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Speaker 1: we have to address this. And I'm curious, were you

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Speaker 1: just in denial? And I think, Elizabeth, you can probably

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Speaker 1: speak to this. No, I had the same thing, you know.

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Speaker 1: I was like, what do you mean, what do you

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Speaker 1: mean have a drinking problem? It never occurred to me

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Speaker 1: either that I had a drinking problem. And Katie, I'll

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Speaker 1: be honest, my doctor didn't think that, you know. He

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Speaker 1: was like, just cut back, you know, just what, it's

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Speaker 1: no big deal. And I would I would come in, um.

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Speaker 1: I don't know if you had the same experience, but

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Speaker 1: I would come in like, you know, dehydrated and with

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Speaker 1: clearly what the physical effects were of having had too

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Speaker 1: much alcohol and um, And nobody said for the longest

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Speaker 1: time that you have a drinking problem. It's very difficult,

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Speaker 1: and especially if culturally, as you were just saying, you

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Speaker 1: grew up in a in an environment where nobody else

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Speaker 1: was drinking, it might be it's difficult to actually understand

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Speaker 1: and recognize that in yourself, honestly, and two thousand sevens here,

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Speaker 1: if you would have have even with a law degree,

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Speaker 1: with so much education, if you would have said, Katie,

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Speaker 1: what does an addiction mean? Now, I'll be like, what

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Speaker 1: does it mean to have an addiction? What does a

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Speaker 1: indiction look like? I would have said so one houseless

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Speaker 1: on I had no idea that it was even scientifically

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Speaker 1: possible for me to have an addiction, especially to alcohol

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Speaker 1: and drugs UM. I literally thought that, you know, you

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Speaker 1: know the show Shameless. I thought that addiction was like

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Speaker 1: white people's problems, and honestly, that's just what I thought.

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Speaker 1: It was just I thought you had to be houseless.

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Speaker 1: I thought you had to have a big belly. I

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Speaker 1: thought I got so many like physical characteristics of what

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Speaker 1: I thought like a person suffering from an addiction UM

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Speaker 1: would look like. And I said, that's not me. But

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Speaker 1: then when I spent the year just living my life,

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Speaker 1: still working, I realized as I went through jobs, as

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Speaker 1: I went through apartments, as I went through friends and partners,

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Speaker 1: that I actually might have a problem, and I had

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Speaker 1: to accept that alcohol UM was was pretty much a

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Speaker 1: part of that problem. Did anybody in your life tell

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Speaker 1: you that otherwise, like any of your friends or somebody

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Speaker 1: who was who was seeing what you were doing to yourself?

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Speaker 1: You know, you know that's actually a really good question.

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Speaker 1: You know, I actually, um, I think that for a

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Speaker 1: long time, everyone just really knew me as a very

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Speaker 1: uh you know, a strong, strong black woman. Excuse me,

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Speaker 1: you know the girl who's who is? You know? I

295
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Speaker 1: say what I want what I want to. Um, I'm smart,

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Speaker 1: I can back it up with the facts. I can.

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Speaker 1: I can support myself, I can support a community. So

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Speaker 1: this is just my attitude because in all reality, my

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Speaker 1: drinking problem really developed into an aggressive like personality that

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Speaker 1: I thought at the time was just me. But it

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Speaker 1: wasn't until I got sober that I realized, like, oh,

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Speaker 1: this really isn't all me. That had a lot to

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Speaker 1: take with the alcohol that I was consuming. You know,

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Speaker 1: a lot of my story I can look at, uh backwards.

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00:17:50,520 --> 00:17:54,280
Speaker 1: Emily Paulson is a sober, working mom of five, but

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Speaker 1: her drinking began long before she became a mom. I

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Speaker 1: used it to cope from a very young age. But

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Speaker 1: my behavior always mimicked the people around me. You know,

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Speaker 1: when you're drinking in high school, it's you know, it's

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Speaker 1: against the rules, and you're already doing something you shouldn't

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Speaker 1: be doing. But it wasn't out of the ordinary. And

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Speaker 1: you know, got to college and did some binge drinking,

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Speaker 1: but again kind of normalized in college, so it was

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Speaker 1: always hidden, um, even when it was problematic, and it

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Speaker 1: really you know, I drank in my young adult years,

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Speaker 1: and it was really when I became a mom that

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Speaker 1: I I really started using it to cope. And what

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Speaker 1: was hard about it is is that I didn't fit

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Speaker 1: the mold. If I if I googled, you know, in

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Speaker 1: my an alcoholic, which I did many times, Um, I

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Speaker 1: couldn't check all the I couldn't answer all the questions,

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Speaker 1: like I couldn't check yes and all the questions. You know,

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Speaker 1: I didn't grow up with alcoholic parents. I UM, I

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Speaker 1: could stop because I stopped, you know, five times for

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Speaker 1: five pregnancies, nine months at a time. So I thought, no,

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Speaker 1: it's it's it's not a problem. And it wasn't that

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Speaker 1: something bad happened every time I drank. But anytime I did,

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00:19:08,760 --> 00:19:10,640
Speaker 1: you know, getting a really big fight with my husband

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Speaker 1: or send a text message, I didn't want to send

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Speaker 1: or feel ashamed about something. Alcohol was always the common denominator,

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Speaker 1: and I think being pregnant so many times back to

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Speaker 1: back really kept it at bay. Um. And when really

333
00:19:26,040 --> 00:19:27,879
Speaker 1: was when my last child was born, it was kind

334
00:19:27,920 --> 00:19:31,800
Speaker 1: of like all bets were off and my drinking really escalated.

335
00:19:32,640 --> 00:19:37,760
Speaker 1: But again I was looking around me and you know,

336
00:19:37,840 --> 00:19:40,679
Speaker 1: other moms drank, and you know, it was kind of

337
00:19:40,720 --> 00:19:43,399
Speaker 1: a joke. It was this, uh, you know, that's what

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00:19:43,440 --> 00:19:49,040
Speaker 1: moms need to do. Yeah, I mean you wine, I wine, right,

339
00:19:49,080 --> 00:19:52,680
Speaker 1: All those jokes that really normalize something that I deep

340
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Speaker 1: down really felt was a problem, and I just didn't

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Speaker 1: want to admit it. I didn't want to look at

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Speaker 1: it further. Um. And I would always say, but I

343
00:20:03,400 --> 00:20:06,320
Speaker 1: haven't you know, this hasn't happened yet. I haven't I

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00:20:06,359 --> 00:20:08,520
Speaker 1: haven't gotten in trouble with a law. I haven't. You

345
00:20:08,520 --> 00:20:10,639
Speaker 1: know all of these things I thought should happen, these

346
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Speaker 1: rock bottom things, and I really didn't have a place

347
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Speaker 1: to go. Um. I think that's one thing along the

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00:20:17,640 --> 00:20:20,520
Speaker 1: way now looking back, that I wish there was a

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00:20:20,600 --> 00:20:24,280
Speaker 1: place for people who were questioning who who again couldn't

350
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Speaker 1: check all those boxes, who hadn't had all those rock

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Speaker 1: bottom consequences because eventually then when I did well, then

352
00:20:30,520 --> 00:20:32,159
Speaker 1: I fit Then I was knocking on the door of

353
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Speaker 1: a and I fit right in because I've had the

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00:20:34,000 --> 00:20:35,800
Speaker 1: d U I and I've been in the hospital, and

355
00:20:35,840 --> 00:20:39,520
Speaker 1: I had marriage problems and all of these things. Um,

356
00:20:39,560 --> 00:20:42,080
Speaker 1: but I can look back and see that I had

357
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Speaker 1: nowhere to go for a really long time. There's a

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Speaker 1: saying that the people who take the alcohol quizzes are

359
00:20:48,400 --> 00:20:51,720
Speaker 1: because they're taking the alcohol quiz they have an alcohol problem,

360
00:20:51,960 --> 00:20:53,560
Speaker 1: you know, like it should just be a pop up

361
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Speaker 1: if you google that, like, yes, go if you don't

362
00:20:57,480 --> 00:21:00,480
Speaker 1: have an alcohol problem, you're not online taking a quiz

363
00:21:00,640 --> 00:21:03,040
Speaker 1: or taking the quiz in the back of Cosmo magazine

364
00:21:03,040 --> 00:21:06,160
Speaker 1: when they used to have that. Um. And all these

365
00:21:06,240 --> 00:21:09,919
Speaker 1: movements that have popped up that are sober curious or

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Speaker 1: just you know, opening this discussion and dialogue about your

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Speaker 1: relationship with alcohol. UM, I don't remember seeing any of

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00:21:16,840 --> 00:21:20,600
Speaker 1: these before I got sober, um, you know, which was

369
00:21:20,760 --> 00:21:23,679
Speaker 1: you know, several years ago now. But UM, it seems

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00:21:23,720 --> 00:21:25,440
Speaker 1: like we've had a lot more of these movements pop

371
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Speaker 1: up since then. And I often wonder, you know, maybe

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Speaker 1: I would have stopped sooner or managed it better sooner

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Speaker 1: if I had been able to be in a room

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Speaker 1: with a bunch of other women who were talking about this, right,

375
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Speaker 1: because I think there is a point where once you're

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Speaker 1: using it to cope, I think there's a point where

377
00:21:43,560 --> 00:21:45,400
Speaker 1: there's a point of no return, right, Like you can't

378
00:21:45,440 --> 00:21:49,000
Speaker 1: unpickle a cucumber if you're aware. It's like, there's not

379
00:21:49,080 --> 00:21:52,840
Speaker 1: enough informed consent out there to know, Hey, this could happen.

380
00:21:52,880 --> 00:21:55,040
Speaker 1: This is an addictive substance and you could get addicted

381
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Speaker 1: to it. You don't have to check all these boxes.

382
00:21:57,119 --> 00:21:59,240
Speaker 1: You don't have to hit some proverbial rock bottom. It's

383
00:21:59,280 --> 00:22:01,720
Speaker 1: just an And it's not a moral thing around drinking

384
00:22:01,800 --> 00:22:05,320
Speaker 1: or not drinking. It's just, hey, maybe maybe you should

385
00:22:05,320 --> 00:22:08,960
Speaker 1: know these things about this substance so that you can

386
00:22:09,000 --> 00:22:12,000
Speaker 1: make informed choices. And it's funny, Elizabeth. I don't know

387
00:22:12,040 --> 00:22:14,600
Speaker 1: if it's funny is the right word, but it's it's

388
00:22:14,800 --> 00:22:18,200
Speaker 1: It reminds me because your book came out um after

389
00:22:18,359 --> 00:22:21,800
Speaker 1: I had been hospitalized, um for I had taken sleeping

390
00:22:21,840 --> 00:22:25,320
Speaker 1: pills and champagne, and I was in hospital and I

391
00:22:25,359 --> 00:22:27,639
Speaker 1: was still at the point. I remember reading your book

392
00:22:27,720 --> 00:22:30,920
Speaker 1: and having to put it away because I was still

393
00:22:30,920 --> 00:22:33,720
Speaker 1: at the point where I was reading things just to

394
00:22:34,760 --> 00:22:38,560
Speaker 1: um proved to myself that I wasn't bad enough to quit.

395
00:22:39,560 --> 00:22:42,520
Speaker 1: And as I was reading your book, I'm like, oh, oh,

396
00:22:43,280 --> 00:22:46,600
Speaker 1: this is resonating um. And I wasn't ready to face

397
00:22:46,680 --> 00:22:52,119
Speaker 1: it until again, it was January when I finally got sober,

398
00:22:52,160 --> 00:22:55,720
Speaker 1: and and I think it was I think it was

399
00:22:55,760 --> 00:22:58,720
Speaker 1: something you said about, you know, loving your kids so

400
00:22:58,840 --> 00:23:04,280
Speaker 1: much that I would die for them. I couldn't. Yeah,

401
00:23:04,600 --> 00:23:06,240
Speaker 1: I would, I would die for my kids, but I

402
00:23:06,240 --> 00:23:09,480
Speaker 1: couldn't stop drinking for them. And I don't think anybody

403
00:23:09,480 --> 00:23:12,840
Speaker 1: ever put that into words. And like, I'd had so

404
00:23:12,960 --> 00:23:15,600
Speaker 1: much shame at that point, how could I keep doing

405
00:23:15,640 --> 00:23:19,680
Speaker 1: this to my kids? And it was like, like someone

406
00:23:19,720 --> 00:23:23,800
Speaker 1: else gets it? Yeah, you know. Yeah, I don't know

407
00:23:23,840 --> 00:23:27,200
Speaker 1: about you, but when I'm in the rooms of recovery

408
00:23:27,240 --> 00:23:30,920
Speaker 1: even today, it's the moms who are in the rooms

409
00:23:30,960 --> 00:23:34,720
Speaker 1: who feel like they I know from my personal experience

410
00:23:34,760 --> 00:23:39,800
Speaker 1: that the deepest reservoirs of shame for me surround the

411
00:23:39,840 --> 00:23:42,119
Speaker 1: fact that I was a mother who drank, you know,

412
00:23:42,160 --> 00:23:44,280
Speaker 1: not not just that I was a woman who drank,

413
00:23:44,320 --> 00:23:48,240
Speaker 1: because there's that too, Like somehow it seems somehow okay

414
00:23:48,359 --> 00:23:53,760
Speaker 1: er for a man to be drunk or tipsy, um,

415
00:23:53,800 --> 00:23:56,840
Speaker 1: but not for a woman. But it's even less okay

416
00:23:57,200 --> 00:24:00,720
Speaker 1: for a mother. There's so much pressure and there's so

417
00:24:00,840 --> 00:24:07,360
Speaker 1: much in society about the bad mother right and judging

418
00:24:07,400 --> 00:24:12,520
Speaker 1: yourself against those standards. I was telling Elizabeth during my

419
00:24:13,320 --> 00:24:17,280
Speaker 1: short lived talk show, I had someone on, and I was,

420
00:24:18,040 --> 00:24:21,800
Speaker 1: I think, in retrospect, kind of judgmental about this trend

421
00:24:22,400 --> 00:24:26,640
Speaker 1: to have wine boxes, like the you know, we give

422
00:24:26,640 --> 00:24:30,119
Speaker 1: our kids juice boxes, but there were wine boxes or

423
00:24:30,200 --> 00:24:33,000
Speaker 1: doing like while the kids were on play dates, the

424
00:24:33,040 --> 00:24:37,520
Speaker 1: moms were drinking wine and and I remember saying, gosh,

425
00:24:37,760 --> 00:24:41,359
Speaker 1: that that sounds kind of dangerous and is that really

426
00:24:41,400 --> 00:24:44,640
Speaker 1: a good idea? And I got a lot of pushback,

427
00:24:45,200 --> 00:24:48,159
Speaker 1: um from people in the audience, but also from people

428
00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:52,560
Speaker 1: on my staff that I was kind of being holier

429
00:24:52,600 --> 00:24:56,400
Speaker 1: than thou about these women and these hard working moms

430
00:24:56,600 --> 00:25:00,439
Speaker 1: who had the right to relax and be, you know,

431
00:25:00,560 --> 00:25:04,560
Speaker 1: connect over a glass or two or three of wine.

432
00:25:05,200 --> 00:25:07,920
Speaker 1: You know, it's funny because if you say, there's so

433
00:25:08,000 --> 00:25:11,520
Speaker 1: many things that are demonized right like from the time

434
00:25:11,560 --> 00:25:14,360
Speaker 1: you give birth. It's like breastfeeding or formula feeding, or

435
00:25:14,440 --> 00:25:16,640
Speaker 1: you know, right, cereal or not, like all of these things.

436
00:25:16,640 --> 00:25:19,240
Speaker 1: And so I think, just being a mom, it comes

437
00:25:19,240 --> 00:25:21,520
Speaker 1: with this shame in this judgment, and I think we're

438
00:25:21,560 --> 00:25:24,240
Speaker 1: just waiting to come back and just be like, Hey,

439
00:25:24,320 --> 00:25:26,160
Speaker 1: don't tell me I can't do that thing. Look how

440
00:25:26,160 --> 00:25:28,199
Speaker 1: hard I work, Look how difficult this is. I deserve

441
00:25:28,320 --> 00:25:33,040
Speaker 1: this thing, and it when you really look at it,

442
00:25:33,080 --> 00:25:35,040
Speaker 1: and you look at the marketing around it, and you

443
00:25:35,080 --> 00:25:38,399
Speaker 1: look at the messages were being sent. Why is that

444
00:25:38,440 --> 00:25:40,640
Speaker 1: a necessary thing? Why do we need to drink at

445
00:25:40,640 --> 00:25:42,960
Speaker 1: ten am at a play date? Which, again, all these

446
00:25:42,960 --> 00:25:45,080
Speaker 1: things are things that I did. I don't say this

447
00:25:45,119 --> 00:25:49,639
Speaker 1: as a judgment, it's it's in looking back that I realized, Gosh,

448
00:25:49,680 --> 00:25:52,119
Speaker 1: I remember going on a cleanse and demonizing sugar and

449
00:25:52,359 --> 00:25:56,720
Speaker 1: gluten and dairy, but I never took out alcohol. Um,

450
00:25:57,160 --> 00:26:01,160
Speaker 1: why why aren't we talking about this? By remember googling

451
00:26:02,200 --> 00:26:06,560
Speaker 1: sobriety groups again, Katie A. Lou Wittoyan, and I remember

452
00:26:06,600 --> 00:26:09,679
Speaker 1: the first one that popped up was a twelve step

453
00:26:09,800 --> 00:26:13,359
Speaker 1: UM twelve step traditional meeting. I went to my first

454
00:26:13,440 --> 00:26:17,240
Speaker 1: meeting and it was really really far from where I lived,

455
00:26:17,240 --> 00:26:19,480
Speaker 1: and at that time I was really down bad um

456
00:26:19,520 --> 00:26:22,800
Speaker 1: in other words, I was in a bad place. I

457
00:26:22,840 --> 00:26:25,360
Speaker 1: didn't have a car. I had to take public transportation

458
00:26:25,480 --> 00:26:29,600
Speaker 1: everywhere I went UM, Uber's buses, trained subways, et cetera.

459
00:26:29,960 --> 00:26:32,640
Speaker 1: And I remember I had to travel about an hour

460
00:26:32,680 --> 00:26:36,200
Speaker 1: and a half to the nearest twelve Step meeting UM

461
00:26:36,240 --> 00:26:38,719
Speaker 1: at that time, and when I went, I was the

462
00:26:38,760 --> 00:26:42,159
Speaker 1: only black person there. Uh. And at first that didn't

463
00:26:42,160 --> 00:26:44,840
Speaker 1: really ring alarms, because the truth is, in a lot

464
00:26:44,840 --> 00:26:47,840
Speaker 1: of spaces that I UM were in up to that point,

465
00:26:48,200 --> 00:26:51,399
Speaker 1: I was pretty much one of the only few black

466
00:26:51,400 --> 00:26:53,000
Speaker 1: person in a lot of spaces that I was a

467
00:26:53,000 --> 00:26:56,080
Speaker 1: part of UM in high school and college and law school,

468
00:26:56,280 --> 00:26:59,800
Speaker 1: So it didn't really bother me too much. But I remember,

469
00:27:00,040 --> 00:27:02,000
Speaker 1: and it was a speaker's meeting, and I remember the

470
00:27:02,040 --> 00:27:05,400
Speaker 1: speaker telling her story of how, you know, she got

471
00:27:05,440 --> 00:27:08,240
Speaker 1: into addiction, and when she was talking about her time

472
00:27:08,280 --> 00:27:12,040
Speaker 1: and addiction she was, she had basically said, for lack

473
00:27:12,080 --> 00:27:14,840
Speaker 1: of better words, that life was so horrible. I was

474
00:27:14,880 --> 00:27:17,480
Speaker 1: living in this neighborhood and the neighborhood that she said

475
00:27:17,520 --> 00:27:21,399
Speaker 1: was my neighborhood, and the way she talked about my

476
00:27:21,440 --> 00:27:24,560
Speaker 1: neighborhood was just in such an awful way. But the

477
00:27:24,640 --> 00:27:27,560
Speaker 1: truth there's there's nothing wrong with my neighborhood, just the

478
00:27:27,600 --> 00:27:32,399
Speaker 1: fact that it's just not white. There's absolutely nothing wrong

479
00:27:32,480 --> 00:27:34,600
Speaker 1: with my neighborhood. I live in one of the safest

480
00:27:34,640 --> 00:27:36,880
Speaker 1: balls that you could live in New York City. Yes,

481
00:27:37,040 --> 00:27:40,080
Speaker 1: it's like somewhat segregated where we have one you know,

482
00:27:40,119 --> 00:27:44,600
Speaker 1: the not Shore. I was just putty much multicultural Black Asians, um,

483
00:27:44,600 --> 00:27:46,880
Speaker 1: Spanish folks, and then you have the South Shore, which

484
00:27:46,920 --> 00:27:49,680
Speaker 1: is more white folks, and that's where the meeting was at.

485
00:27:49,920 --> 00:27:52,960
Speaker 1: But there was nothing wrong with my with my neighborhood. Um.

486
00:27:53,040 --> 00:27:55,719
Speaker 1: So after that, I was like, absolutely not and I

487
00:27:55,840 --> 00:27:59,119
Speaker 1: just didn't attend that meeting anymore. And I started to

488
00:27:59,680 --> 00:28:02,399
Speaker 1: I joined Instagram, and I remember and I started to

489
00:28:02,720 --> 00:28:05,960
Speaker 1: you know, be involved with the Instagram community. However, that

490
00:28:06,040 --> 00:28:10,119
Speaker 1: community was also white, and it wasn't a problem that

491
00:28:10,160 --> 00:28:13,639
Speaker 1: they were got. It was a white community. My problem

492
00:28:13,640 --> 00:28:16,520
Speaker 1: with the Instagram recovery community at that time was that

493
00:28:16,600 --> 00:28:20,320
Speaker 1: it was painting a one sided picture of addiction and

494
00:28:20,359 --> 00:28:23,960
Speaker 1: recovery at that time, sobriety was this thing where you know,

495
00:28:24,040 --> 00:28:26,600
Speaker 1: you do yoga and you drink coffee and you're doing

496
00:28:26,640 --> 00:28:29,240
Speaker 1: this and everything was just so bright and pink and cherry,

497
00:28:29,520 --> 00:28:31,199
Speaker 1: and at that time, I was it was such a

498
00:28:31,280 --> 00:28:33,720
Speaker 1: dark place. I was in such a dark place. Excuse me,

499
00:28:33,920 --> 00:28:35,960
Speaker 1: I was in a bad place and I just couldn't

500
00:28:36,000 --> 00:28:39,520
Speaker 1: understand like what was going on. And that's what, you know,

501
00:28:39,600 --> 00:28:43,480
Speaker 1: encouraged me to create my blog. But the first two

502
00:28:43,520 --> 00:28:45,800
Speaker 1: things that I did that didn't work was definitely a

503
00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:49,680
Speaker 1: top stop traditional program um and then just trying to

504
00:28:49,720 --> 00:28:53,240
Speaker 1: get into this holistic lifestyle in the beginning. It didn't

505
00:28:53,240 --> 00:28:56,360
Speaker 1: work because I actually needed professional help. It wasn't enough

506
00:28:56,400 --> 00:28:59,120
Speaker 1: that I was doing yoga and drinking coffee and saying that,

507
00:28:59,160 --> 00:29:03,000
Speaker 1: like you know, like sobriety is just this amazing, great thing.

508
00:29:03,160 --> 00:29:06,840
Speaker 1: I actually needed a professional to help me with the

509
00:29:06,880 --> 00:29:10,680
Speaker 1: physical part of my addiction. I wanted to ask you,

510
00:29:10,760 --> 00:29:15,800
Speaker 1: Elizabeth about this because I know a A is inclusive,

511
00:29:16,320 --> 00:29:22,320
Speaker 1: anybody can come, it's open to all, and yet I

512
00:29:22,360 --> 00:29:29,600
Speaker 1: find it fascinating that implicit bias can creep into a

513
00:29:29,680 --> 00:29:34,560
Speaker 1: twelve step program and the things that made it hard

514
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:37,640
Speaker 1: for Katie to get there, you know, public transportation where

515
00:29:37,640 --> 00:29:42,080
Speaker 1: it was located, despite the fact that they want to

516
00:29:42,120 --> 00:29:45,000
Speaker 1: be open to all, in some ways can make it

517
00:29:45,120 --> 00:29:50,680
Speaker 1: unwelcoming for people of color. I find that so interesting. Yeah,

518
00:29:50,720 --> 00:29:55,200
Speaker 1: you know my experience is that, UM, first of all,

519
00:29:56,120 --> 00:30:00,640
Speaker 1: Katie's right. In most UM uh twelve step A A

520
00:30:00,760 --> 00:30:04,240
Speaker 1: meetings I've gone to, UM it is mostly white people. Um.

521
00:30:04,280 --> 00:30:06,320
Speaker 1: I there have been a couple of meetings where there

522
00:30:06,360 --> 00:30:09,240
Speaker 1: has been only one black person, one person of color.

523
00:30:09,720 --> 00:30:14,080
Speaker 1: Depends on how you defend you defined person of color. Um. I.

524
00:30:14,160 --> 00:30:16,719
Speaker 1: You know I learned and heard early on that you know,

525
00:30:17,520 --> 00:30:20,240
Speaker 1: try another meeting. There's some meetings that you go into

526
00:30:20,360 --> 00:30:24,240
Speaker 1: and certain parts of Manhattan where I live, where you know,

527
00:30:24,480 --> 00:30:26,800
Speaker 1: UM it's I don't fit in with that group is

528
00:30:26,960 --> 00:30:31,320
Speaker 1: as much UM. There are meetings for every sort of demographic.

529
00:30:31,360 --> 00:30:35,120
Speaker 1: Their meetings that cater to LGBTQ communities, their meetings that

530
00:30:35,160 --> 00:30:37,680
Speaker 1: are women's meetings. There are meetings that are men's meetings.

531
00:30:37,720 --> 00:30:40,880
Speaker 1: There are meetings that are grittier, and meetings that are

532
00:30:41,120 --> 00:30:46,920
Speaker 1: very you know, UM high society problems dominating. To put

533
00:30:46,960 --> 00:30:51,720
Speaker 1: it kindly, UM, it's basically it's group therapy, UM where

534
00:30:51,760 --> 00:30:55,280
Speaker 1: people can get into a room and you know, bear

535
00:30:55,320 --> 00:31:00,400
Speaker 1: their souls and UM and hear about other people's ruggles

536
00:31:00,400 --> 00:31:02,840
Speaker 1: and triumphs, and you know it is really I have

537
00:31:02,920 --> 00:31:05,280
Speaker 1: found great comfort in it. I will also say I

538
00:31:05,320 --> 00:31:07,760
Speaker 1: didn't like it at first, but I think that had

539
00:31:07,800 --> 00:31:09,720
Speaker 1: more to do with I didn't like having to call

540
00:31:09,760 --> 00:31:12,120
Speaker 1: myself an alcoholic. I didn't like having to deal with

541
00:31:12,120 --> 00:31:13,960
Speaker 1: the fact that I had a drinking problem. I didn't

542
00:31:13,960 --> 00:31:16,280
Speaker 1: want someone to take away my crutch. I want a

543
00:31:16,320 --> 00:31:20,360
Speaker 1: door number three, Like you know, where's door number three? Please?

544
00:31:20,640 --> 00:31:23,280
Speaker 1: And I spent a couple of years like banging around

545
00:31:23,320 --> 00:31:25,920
Speaker 1: looking for door number three before figuring out there wasn't one.

546
00:31:26,720 --> 00:31:31,680
Speaker 1: And and so everybody comes to sobriety and acceptance of

547
00:31:31,720 --> 00:31:34,760
Speaker 1: your disease of alcoholism if you want to, you know,

548
00:31:34,800 --> 00:31:38,080
Speaker 1: accept that it's a disease or whatever however you define it,

549
00:31:38,800 --> 00:31:42,920
Speaker 1: but it's um. You have to accept that first. You

550
00:31:42,960 --> 00:31:46,200
Speaker 1: can't be in denial. I was in denial for a

551
00:31:46,200 --> 00:31:48,480
Speaker 1: long time. And I, you know, and to my detriment

552
00:31:48,600 --> 00:31:51,000
Speaker 1: because sort of like you, as you were just saying

553
00:31:51,040 --> 00:31:54,720
Speaker 1: at the beginning, drinking was lovely and great. I've defined

554
00:31:54,800 --> 00:31:59,280
Speaker 1: my quote unquote career of drinking in three stages, magic, medicine,

555
00:31:59,360 --> 00:32:03,680
Speaker 1: and misery. And it was magical at first because it worked,

556
00:32:04,240 --> 00:32:06,680
Speaker 1: and then it was medicinal because I needed it in

557
00:32:06,760 --> 00:32:09,080
Speaker 1: order to get through, and then it was miserable in

558
00:32:09,120 --> 00:32:11,560
Speaker 1: the end. And it's amazing how long a person will

559
00:32:11,600 --> 00:32:16,200
Speaker 1: stay in the miserable stage, you know, and refuse to

560
00:32:16,280 --> 00:32:20,320
Speaker 1: take that enormous step of admitting you need help and

561
00:32:20,720 --> 00:32:24,800
Speaker 1: uh and and and seeking that out. It's difficult. I

562
00:32:24,800 --> 00:32:26,560
Speaker 1: if I may, I first, I love the three um.

563
00:32:26,680 --> 00:32:29,360
Speaker 1: That's like amazing in a perfect way to even describe

564
00:32:29,400 --> 00:32:32,520
Speaker 1: my drinking history. I also wanted to say at the

565
00:32:32,560 --> 00:32:35,760
Speaker 1: time that I was trying, I did attend my first

566
00:32:35,760 --> 00:32:38,800
Speaker 1: tolf step meetings, and then eventually later on in my sobriety,

567
00:32:39,040 --> 00:32:41,440
Speaker 1: I started to still attend of a fellowship. However, I

568
00:32:41,520 --> 00:32:43,400
Speaker 1: knew that this was not point. I wasn't going to

569
00:32:43,400 --> 00:32:44,959
Speaker 1: do the steps. I don't I didn't want to sponsor.

570
00:32:45,040 --> 00:32:47,080
Speaker 1: I was just there for fellowship at one point, at

571
00:32:47,120 --> 00:32:51,520
Speaker 1: a different meeting with more people of color from the

572
00:32:51,760 --> 00:32:55,480
Speaker 1: various different backgrounds and religious beliefs. But I will say

573
00:32:55,520 --> 00:32:58,880
Speaker 1: that at the time that I did try my first

574
00:32:59,160 --> 00:33:02,800
Speaker 1: TOLP step meeting, there was this thing of like outside issue.

575
00:33:02,880 --> 00:33:04,920
Speaker 1: So they might have had like a woman's meeting, and

576
00:33:04,960 --> 00:33:06,880
Speaker 1: they might have had this meeting, but they didn't have

577
00:33:06,960 --> 00:33:10,000
Speaker 1: meetings for for people of color. And even in the

578
00:33:10,040 --> 00:33:13,600
Speaker 1: meetings that it wasn't until George Floyd it's twenty twenty,

579
00:33:13,680 --> 00:33:18,240
Speaker 1: which I think is extremely embarrassing. Um, because it's so obvious.

580
00:33:18,320 --> 00:33:22,000
Speaker 1: How if you can accept that women and experiences that

581
00:33:22,080 --> 00:33:24,640
Speaker 1: we face as women can play a role in all

582
00:33:24,680 --> 00:33:27,840
Speaker 1: of trauma, how can you not think that being black

583
00:33:27,960 --> 00:33:31,280
Speaker 1: or being of color would pay some type of role

584
00:33:31,400 --> 00:33:34,320
Speaker 1: in the trauma the black people face. But at the

585
00:33:34,400 --> 00:33:37,560
Speaker 1: time when I did my first twelfth Step meeting, I

586
00:33:37,560 --> 00:33:41,560
Speaker 1: couldn't talk about anything that involved me being black, And

587
00:33:41,640 --> 00:33:44,520
Speaker 1: that to me was just a big red flag because

588
00:33:44,600 --> 00:33:48,080
Speaker 1: who is this who is this rule protecting? You know,

589
00:33:48,160 --> 00:33:51,840
Speaker 1: who is this rule aiming to heal? Clearly not meet.

590
00:33:54,800 --> 00:33:58,080
Speaker 1: The day I actually stopped was very It was a

591
00:33:58,200 --> 00:34:02,120
Speaker 1: very normal day for Emily. Even admitting she had a

592
00:34:02,200 --> 00:34:06,800
Speaker 1: drinking problem took a series of rock bottom moments. Um,

593
00:34:06,840 --> 00:34:08,920
Speaker 1: you know, I've had the d U I I'd had,

594
00:34:09,239 --> 00:34:12,880
Speaker 1: I'd been in the hospital several times. Um. You know

595
00:34:12,920 --> 00:34:16,439
Speaker 1: it really helped was after I got a d Y,

596
00:34:16,880 --> 00:34:19,640
Speaker 1: I had to do classes, you know, court mandated classes,

597
00:34:19,920 --> 00:34:23,680
Speaker 1: and I had a breathalyzer put in my car, which

598
00:34:23,840 --> 00:34:27,239
Speaker 1: is just I mean, there's there's a whole thing that

599
00:34:27,239 --> 00:34:29,400
Speaker 1: goes along with that, like giving the third grade teacher

600
00:34:29,440 --> 00:34:31,640
Speaker 1: a ride on the field trip. Like that conversation you

601
00:34:31,680 --> 00:34:35,600
Speaker 1: just don't think about having when you're getting behind the wheel, right. UM.

602
00:34:35,680 --> 00:34:39,279
Speaker 1: So the when I when I had to get the breathalyzer,

603
00:34:39,960 --> 00:34:43,319
Speaker 1: it really opened my eyes to how much I had

604
00:34:43,360 --> 00:34:48,040
Speaker 1: been drinking, even though even though I knew. UM, I

605
00:34:48,120 --> 00:34:50,759
Speaker 1: was like, Wow, I couldn't drink and I couldn't drive

606
00:34:50,800 --> 00:34:52,759
Speaker 1: the car if I drank. So if I was going

607
00:34:52,800 --> 00:34:54,920
Speaker 1: out to dinner, it's like, oh, okay, I can't drink here.

608
00:34:55,160 --> 00:34:56,879
Speaker 1: Oh I can't drink here. I can't drink here. I'll

609
00:34:56,880 --> 00:34:58,399
Speaker 1: go to the book club. Oh, I can't drink because

610
00:34:58,400 --> 00:35:00,719
Speaker 1: I can't drive my car. UM. And then there were

611
00:35:00,719 --> 00:35:02,839
Speaker 1: times when I would drink and then not be able

612
00:35:02,880 --> 00:35:04,120
Speaker 1: to start the car in the morning to take my

613
00:35:04,200 --> 00:35:06,680
Speaker 1: kids to school because there was still alcohol in my

614
00:35:06,719 --> 00:35:10,719
Speaker 1: system And it was so confronting that part of it

615
00:35:10,760 --> 00:35:13,440
Speaker 1: was UM. And then the conversations I had to have

616
00:35:13,480 --> 00:35:17,080
Speaker 1: with my kids, uh my, you know my kids were young,

617
00:35:17,160 --> 00:35:19,759
Speaker 1: but my oldest two were ten and eleven. Once I

618
00:35:19,760 --> 00:35:21,840
Speaker 1: got the d u I and had the breath lizer

619
00:35:21,880 --> 00:35:26,760
Speaker 1: put in, and their questions were like they were so simple,

620
00:35:26,800 --> 00:35:28,920
Speaker 1: and yet I never talked about it. I'd never had

621
00:35:28,920 --> 00:35:32,040
Speaker 1: to answer those questions like, hey, you know, why if

622
00:35:32,040 --> 00:35:33,719
Speaker 1: you have to drink or if you have to drive home,

623
00:35:33,719 --> 00:35:36,399
Speaker 1: why did they serve alcoholic restaurants? And I'm like, that's

624
00:35:36,400 --> 00:35:38,920
Speaker 1: a really good question, and I've never had to answer

625
00:35:39,000 --> 00:35:41,520
Speaker 1: that before. And it was really like, hey, you know,

626
00:35:41,560 --> 00:35:43,400
Speaker 1: if you've got in trouble for it, why are you

627
00:35:43,400 --> 00:35:47,759
Speaker 1: still drinking? And that to me was like, oh, I

628
00:35:47,800 --> 00:35:51,280
Speaker 1: don't know, Like I don't know. And I was still

629
00:35:51,360 --> 00:35:54,160
Speaker 1: enough trying to fit that square peg in that round

630
00:35:54,239 --> 00:35:56,759
Speaker 1: hole and making this thing work because I just thought

631
00:35:56,800 --> 00:35:59,759
Speaker 1: it'd be easier to be a person who drinks. And

632
00:36:00,000 --> 00:36:03,200
Speaker 1: and you know, I woke up on New Year's Day

633
00:36:04,320 --> 00:36:06,000
Speaker 1: and again I just gone, We've gone out to dinner

634
00:36:06,000 --> 00:36:08,120
Speaker 1: with friends. It wasn't a rager. We just drank till

635
00:36:08,200 --> 00:36:11,440
Speaker 1: midnight and then went home. And I had blacked out

636
00:36:11,680 --> 00:36:14,000
Speaker 1: like an entire weekend of my life. And and blackouts

637
00:36:14,000 --> 00:36:18,000
Speaker 1: were becoming much more frequent, but this was so confronting

638
00:36:18,080 --> 00:36:23,080
Speaker 1: because I had blacked out, like, you know, things I've

639
00:36:23,120 --> 00:36:25,359
Speaker 1: done with my kids over the weekend, I had just

640
00:36:25,480 --> 00:36:28,879
Speaker 1: I'd missed so much of my life. And I heard

641
00:36:28,920 --> 00:36:31,760
Speaker 1: my husband downstairs with the kids, and I had already

642
00:36:31,760 --> 00:36:34,160
Speaker 1: been in the hospital. I had already, you know, been

643
00:36:34,200 --> 00:36:36,719
Speaker 1: in trouble with the law, like I was losing everything,

644
00:36:36,719 --> 00:36:39,200
Speaker 1: and it was just so like it's like I could

645
00:36:39,280 --> 00:36:42,520
Speaker 1: hear my life going on without me, and I could

646
00:36:42,520 --> 00:36:46,600
Speaker 1: hear what that I was just like eliminating myself from

647
00:36:46,640 --> 00:36:51,399
Speaker 1: my life. UM. And that was finally the point where

648
00:36:51,440 --> 00:36:54,040
Speaker 1: I just called the one person I know who or

649
00:36:54,360 --> 00:36:57,680
Speaker 1: I knew at the time, UM, who was in a A.

650
00:36:58,000 --> 00:37:00,560
Speaker 1: And I'm like, tell me what to do, tell me

651
00:37:00,640 --> 00:37:03,799
Speaker 1: what to do. I like, if I drink again, I

652
00:37:03,840 --> 00:37:07,520
Speaker 1: just think, like, I think this is gonna kill me. Um.

653
00:37:07,520 --> 00:37:09,319
Speaker 1: And I started going to a A. And just at

654
00:37:09,320 --> 00:37:12,160
Speaker 1: that point, it was just unraveling how I had gotten

655
00:37:12,160 --> 00:37:14,879
Speaker 1: to that point, um, and how it had been so

656
00:37:15,960 --> 00:37:18,920
Speaker 1: hard to stop. Even all of those red flags, those

657
00:37:19,000 --> 00:37:22,320
Speaker 1: rock bottom things were not enough to make me stop.

658
00:37:24,480 --> 00:37:28,719
Speaker 1: You know. Scary when we come back, how Katie and

659
00:37:28,760 --> 00:37:33,319
Speaker 1: Emily built recovery spaces that fit their needs and the

660
00:37:33,320 --> 00:37:46,240
Speaker 1: needs of their communities. So you saw this huge vacuum, clearly, Katie,

661
00:37:46,800 --> 00:37:52,440
Speaker 1: that wasn't being filled, and you decided to start the

662
00:37:52,520 --> 00:37:56,360
Speaker 1: Sober Black Girls Club. Honestly, when I think back to

663
00:37:56,480 --> 00:37:59,160
Speaker 1: two thousand and eighteen, that's when I created SBGC. And

664
00:37:59,160 --> 00:38:00,960
Speaker 1: it wasn't a collect it at that time. I just

665
00:38:01,080 --> 00:38:04,360
Speaker 1: created it, you know, as a blog to hold myself accountable.

666
00:38:04,760 --> 00:38:07,719
Speaker 1: And when you fast forward to now, um, when the

667
00:38:07,719 --> 00:38:11,080
Speaker 1: pandemic hit, that's when a flock, a huge flock of

668
00:38:11,120 --> 00:38:16,480
Speaker 1: women started to send me emails and d ms basically

669
00:38:16,560 --> 00:38:18,920
Speaker 1: saying that they think they have a drinking problem, but

670
00:38:19,320 --> 00:38:23,239
Speaker 1: they weren't too short um. And it reminded me of

671
00:38:23,280 --> 00:38:25,400
Speaker 1: my time into the seventeen when I was studying for

672
00:38:25,400 --> 00:38:28,680
Speaker 1: the bar. You know, all that stillness that I had

673
00:38:28,800 --> 00:38:30,880
Speaker 1: by myself. I wasn't you know, I was in the library,

674
00:38:30,920 --> 00:38:33,879
Speaker 1: locked into the cubicle, studying, studying. It was in those

675
00:38:33,920 --> 00:38:37,040
Speaker 1: moments of isolation that I really only had two things

676
00:38:37,040 --> 00:38:39,200
Speaker 1: that I can said in my friends, coffee and my

677
00:38:39,360 --> 00:38:41,880
Speaker 1: caffeine pills and then a bottle, you know. And I

678
00:38:41,920 --> 00:38:44,920
Speaker 1: can understand that these women who are so used to

679
00:38:44,960 --> 00:38:48,880
Speaker 1: doing ten thousand things at one time are now in

680
00:38:48,920 --> 00:38:52,080
Speaker 1: the moments of stillness and they don't know what to

681
00:38:52,200 --> 00:38:55,839
Speaker 1: do with it now, and what is the easiest thing

682
00:38:55,880 --> 00:38:59,080
Speaker 1: to do, especially when you haven't really been paying attention

683
00:38:59,120 --> 00:39:01,920
Speaker 1: to your mental health, who haven't really been paying attention

684
00:39:02,000 --> 00:39:04,200
Speaker 1: to your hobbies? What is it that you truly like

685
00:39:04,280 --> 00:39:06,480
Speaker 1: to do? Your life has been about your kids, that

686
00:39:06,520 --> 00:39:09,239
Speaker 1: has been about going to school, has been about raising um,

687
00:39:09,360 --> 00:39:12,840
Speaker 1: you know, doing doing two jobs at once. The easiest

688
00:39:12,880 --> 00:39:15,120
Speaker 1: thing to do is to beat to the bottle. Yeah,

689
00:39:15,160 --> 00:39:17,880
Speaker 1: we've seen that. We've seen that in the pandemic, especially

690
00:39:17,880 --> 00:39:21,239
Speaker 1: with women, that more than men, they've been impacted by

691
00:39:21,400 --> 00:39:27,280
Speaker 1: mental health challenges, anxiety and depression and self medicating that anxiety, depression,

692
00:39:27,320 --> 00:39:29,719
Speaker 1: drinking has been off the charts among women in the pandemic,

693
00:39:29,800 --> 00:39:32,799
Speaker 1: much more so than men. And the isolation you were

694
00:39:32,840 --> 00:39:35,239
Speaker 1: just talking about, which is, you know, thank God. Can

695
00:39:35,239 --> 00:39:38,640
Speaker 1: you imagine if this pandemic hit before we had zoom,

696
00:39:38,680 --> 00:39:41,400
Speaker 1: before we had an ability to connect at least online.

697
00:39:42,000 --> 00:39:44,279
Speaker 1: I don't know what a lot of these I don't

698
00:39:44,280 --> 00:39:46,879
Speaker 1: know how people in recovery would have would have navigated that.

699
00:39:47,320 --> 00:39:49,279
Speaker 1: But I'm not surprised that you started hearing from so

700
00:39:49,320 --> 00:39:52,640
Speaker 1: many women because they had nowhere else to turn and

701
00:39:53,360 --> 00:39:56,480
Speaker 1: dealing with the isolation and the responsibility which we know

702
00:39:56,600 --> 00:40:00,279
Speaker 1: falls mainly on the women's shoulders, in any fai only

703
00:40:01,080 --> 00:40:02,960
Speaker 1: when it comes to childcare and that sort of thing.

704
00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:05,480
Speaker 1: We had kids going to zoom school in the other

705
00:40:05,560 --> 00:40:08,000
Speaker 1: room or sometimes all in the same room. It was

706
00:40:08,160 --> 00:40:10,799
Speaker 1: such an enormous challenge for women during this pandemic, and

707
00:40:10,920 --> 00:40:13,839
Speaker 1: so many of them we know statistically, have have turned

708
00:40:13,840 --> 00:40:17,719
Speaker 1: to alcohol as a result. I'm interested, though, in in

709
00:40:17,719 --> 00:40:22,439
Speaker 1: in narrowing the focus to Black women, because I think

710
00:40:22,480 --> 00:40:26,960
Speaker 1: women in general, as Elizabeth points out, we're really affected

711
00:40:27,120 --> 00:40:33,960
Speaker 1: by the pandemic and alcohol abuse increased dramatically. But can

712
00:40:34,000 --> 00:40:38,520
Speaker 1: you talk about what women of color, black women who

713
00:40:38,600 --> 00:40:42,000
Speaker 1: you heard from some of the specific issues they were

714
00:40:42,040 --> 00:40:45,440
Speaker 1: dealing with, because I just found it so interesting the

715
00:40:45,480 --> 00:40:49,640
Speaker 1: added pressure you felt Katie as a black woman even

716
00:40:49,719 --> 00:40:54,920
Speaker 1: before the pandemic and perhaps exacerbated during the pandemic. I

717
00:40:54,960 --> 00:40:58,919
Speaker 1: think one of the main problems the effect Black women

718
00:40:59,040 --> 00:41:05,040
Speaker 1: and particularly is that we think that the outlet to

719
00:41:05,320 --> 00:41:11,640
Speaker 1: our trauma, regardless if it's cultural trauma, racial trauma, um

720
00:41:11,680 --> 00:41:15,880
Speaker 1: any type of trauma, is either pleasure or producing. So

721
00:41:15,960 --> 00:41:19,760
Speaker 1: there's this stereotype that this is statistic. It's not stereotype.

722
00:41:19,880 --> 00:41:23,440
Speaker 1: Is actually true that Black women are the most educated

723
00:41:23,719 --> 00:41:27,760
Speaker 1: group demographic um in terms of degrees, higher education degrees

724
00:41:27,800 --> 00:41:31,600
Speaker 1: or degrees in America, at what costs to do folks

725
00:41:31,640 --> 00:41:34,520
Speaker 1: think that that's true? You know, that is costing us

726
00:41:34,520 --> 00:41:41,160
Speaker 1: our sleep, our health, our our our enjoyment, our our hobbies.

727
00:41:41,280 --> 00:41:45,439
Speaker 1: It's costing us so much. And we do feel that

728
00:41:46,160 --> 00:41:50,360
Speaker 1: we have to overcompensate in regards to the negative stereotypes

729
00:41:50,400 --> 00:41:54,719
Speaker 1: that are plaguing that are plaguing society. Some of the

730
00:41:54,719 --> 00:41:57,400
Speaker 1: stereotypes that I'm thinking that black people are lazy, that

731
00:41:57,440 --> 00:42:01,840
Speaker 1: we're crazy. There's all these stereotypes. Uh, we don't want

732
00:42:01,880 --> 00:42:05,120
Speaker 1: to adhere to. We don't want to show, even if

733
00:42:05,160 --> 00:42:08,440
Speaker 1: it means that we deny our own selves, our humanity.

734
00:42:09,080 --> 00:42:11,960
Speaker 1: I've never ever ever seen until I created a Blackers

735
00:42:12,000 --> 00:42:15,719
Speaker 1: club or even heard of of a woman become an

736
00:42:15,719 --> 00:42:18,759
Speaker 1: addicted to anything. I've never seen and I didn't hear

737
00:42:18,800 --> 00:42:21,440
Speaker 1: about it. But it doesn't mean that it wasn't happening.

738
00:42:21,600 --> 00:42:24,880
Speaker 1: It does happen. However, we just keep it a secret

739
00:42:25,280 --> 00:42:27,439
Speaker 1: because we feel like we're going to be labeled as

740
00:42:27,480 --> 00:42:30,279
Speaker 1: crazy or lazy, or it's going to be used, it's

741
00:42:30,360 --> 00:42:32,719
Speaker 1: going to be mentioned or used against us as some

742
00:42:32,840 --> 00:42:38,160
Speaker 1: type of excuse. And also in regards to men, and household. Um.

743
00:42:38,239 --> 00:42:41,759
Speaker 1: I think this is also another statistic that black women

744
00:42:41,920 --> 00:42:45,800
Speaker 1: generally make more or the bread winners of the household.

745
00:42:46,120 --> 00:42:49,560
Speaker 1: At what cost? At one expense? Do folks actually think

746
00:42:49,560 --> 00:42:54,520
Speaker 1: we like going out and working NonStop? No, we don't. Um,

747
00:42:54,680 --> 00:42:58,760
Speaker 1: it's just a lot of pressure in regards to always producing, producing, producing,

748
00:42:59,040 --> 00:43:03,200
Speaker 1: And when the pandemic it and there was hardly you

749
00:43:03,200 --> 00:43:05,600
Speaker 1: couldn't really produce much. We couldn't go to the gym,

750
00:43:05,840 --> 00:43:07,600
Speaker 1: you know, a lot of our jobs was shut down

751
00:43:07,640 --> 00:43:10,680
Speaker 1: for a period of time. Then what to return to pleasure?

752
00:43:11,200 --> 00:43:14,560
Speaker 1: It's usually just production or pleasure. If we're not producing,

753
00:43:15,000 --> 00:43:18,200
Speaker 1: then we looked to pleasure to release ourselves. And what

754
00:43:18,239 --> 00:43:20,680
Speaker 1: was that? That was alcohol? And I think that that

755
00:43:20,880 --> 00:43:24,560
Speaker 1: was basically a generic story that I was constantly hearing.

756
00:43:25,440 --> 00:43:30,120
Speaker 1: How were other black women reacting to what you were doing?

757
00:43:30,320 --> 00:43:34,560
Speaker 1: And an ability for them to voice some of these

758
00:43:34,600 --> 00:43:39,000
Speaker 1: pressures and concerns and forces that were making them more

759
00:43:39,120 --> 00:43:45,320
Speaker 1: predisposed to abusing alcohol. I think first, UM, like something

760
00:43:45,320 --> 00:43:47,719
Speaker 1: that I do constantly here is I don't even know

761
00:43:47,760 --> 00:43:49,600
Speaker 1: what I like. I don't even know who I am.

762
00:43:49,800 --> 00:43:53,440
Speaker 1: I don't even know what is it that I wanted

763
00:43:53,440 --> 00:43:56,080
Speaker 1: to be? You know I didn't. I don't know who

764
00:43:56,160 --> 00:43:58,239
Speaker 1: I am as a person. You know, a lot of

765
00:43:58,239 --> 00:44:00,279
Speaker 1: the women that I meet through the club know who

766
00:44:00,320 --> 00:44:02,719
Speaker 1: they are as a mother, as who who they who

767
00:44:02,800 --> 00:44:05,359
Speaker 1: they are as a wife, who they are as as

768
00:44:05,360 --> 00:44:08,000
Speaker 1: a student. But when all that was taken away during

769
00:44:08,000 --> 00:44:12,680
Speaker 1: the pandemic, they couldn't they couldn't define themselves for themselves.

770
00:44:13,080 --> 00:44:17,760
Speaker 1: And that was definitely a common thing that that created. Honestly,

771
00:44:17,800 --> 00:44:22,480
Speaker 1: the experience, especially on Thursday group. I know folks think that, Um,

772
00:44:22,520 --> 00:44:25,399
Speaker 1: I know there's this misconception that SPGC all we do

773
00:44:25,560 --> 00:44:28,439
Speaker 1: is is is talk about race. I'm done talking about race.

774
00:44:28,480 --> 00:44:30,879
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be very honest. You know, I stopped doing

775
00:44:30,920 --> 00:44:33,840
Speaker 1: a lot of interviews and podcasts about race and recovery

776
00:44:33,880 --> 00:44:36,960
Speaker 1: realm because I'm tired. I want to help woman, I

777
00:44:37,000 --> 00:44:40,600
Speaker 1: want to help myself, get back to the basics and

778
00:44:40,680 --> 00:44:45,360
Speaker 1: literally find out what makes us us as individuals and

779
00:44:45,400 --> 00:44:49,000
Speaker 1: then use that information in a collection in a community,

780
00:44:49,080 --> 00:44:52,799
Speaker 1: collective forward way. Um that is really the goal of

781
00:44:53,080 --> 00:44:56,200
Speaker 1: s b g C. I'm so I'm really tired of

782
00:44:56,000 --> 00:44:58,879
Speaker 1: of of the race talk, and not because it's not

783
00:44:59,040 --> 00:45:03,560
Speaker 1: necessary or needed or because it's not true. Because I

784
00:45:03,560 --> 00:45:05,760
Speaker 1: don't think it helps black women. I think it helps

785
00:45:05,800 --> 00:45:09,960
Speaker 1: the society as a whole try to understand race relations.

786
00:45:10,120 --> 00:45:12,720
Speaker 1: But again, why is that on the back of black women.

787
00:45:12,920 --> 00:45:15,960
Speaker 1: It just feels like everything when it comes to community,

788
00:45:16,080 --> 00:45:18,760
Speaker 1: especially the black community, is on for the black woman.

789
00:45:19,160 --> 00:45:20,839
Speaker 1: You know, even when I created a s b GC,

790
00:45:21,400 --> 00:45:23,840
Speaker 1: I had men telling me that I needed to create

791
00:45:23,880 --> 00:45:26,719
Speaker 1: one for them, because the truth is, I think that

792
00:45:26,800 --> 00:45:30,520
Speaker 1: the black men's plight is a specific plate um. However,

793
00:45:32,040 --> 00:45:36,880
Speaker 1: patriarchy has been a you know, a theme in my trauma.

794
00:45:37,200 --> 00:45:38,799
Speaker 1: I'm not creating anything for you. You do have to

795
00:45:38,800 --> 00:45:40,640
Speaker 1: do it yourself. I can help you, but that's not

796
00:45:40,800 --> 00:45:43,279
Speaker 1: something I'm trying to take on. I'm actually trying to

797
00:45:43,400 --> 00:45:46,000
Speaker 1: learn how to not take on other people's problems and

798
00:45:46,040 --> 00:45:49,279
Speaker 1: focus on myself um as an individual, because what I

799
00:45:49,280 --> 00:45:52,600
Speaker 1: focus on myself, I'm focusing and helping my community. And

800
00:45:52,640 --> 00:45:56,520
Speaker 1: I also think it's important to note that Black people

801
00:45:56,520 --> 00:45:59,680
Speaker 1: do not have a long history of mental health treatment.

802
00:46:00,160 --> 00:46:02,239
Speaker 1: Like you know, for a long time, we were seen

803
00:46:02,239 --> 00:46:07,160
Speaker 1: as objects. And it's crazy to me that I found

804
00:46:07,239 --> 00:46:10,960
Speaker 1: out that even in the eighteen hundreds, when this nation

805
00:46:11,120 --> 00:46:13,920
Speaker 1: was going through the Tempest movement, when this nation had

806
00:46:13,960 --> 00:46:18,680
Speaker 1: decided that alcohol was was negatively affecting the society, that

807
00:46:18,760 --> 00:46:23,120
Speaker 1: they purposefully left black people out. Racism is prevalent in

808
00:46:23,280 --> 00:46:28,320
Speaker 1: every aspect of this nation, including recovery. And it's embarrassing

809
00:46:28,480 --> 00:46:34,040
Speaker 1: and wrong for anyone to to think that all recoveries equal.

810
00:46:34,280 --> 00:46:36,759
Speaker 1: Even when I went to rehab, and I did go

811
00:46:36,800 --> 00:46:39,600
Speaker 1: to rehab, it was my first time there, and a

812
00:46:39,640 --> 00:46:41,600
Speaker 1: lot of this and I was the only Black person there,

813
00:46:41,719 --> 00:46:44,399
Speaker 1: and a lot of them this was their third fourth time.

814
00:46:44,440 --> 00:46:47,000
Speaker 1: And is that judgment? No, because I think I think

815
00:46:47,040 --> 00:46:49,200
Speaker 1: most people do need a second time to go to rehab.

816
00:46:49,239 --> 00:46:52,040
Speaker 1: The first time, you don't know what you done. Statistically, Yeah,

817
00:46:52,080 --> 00:46:55,040
Speaker 1: that's that's true. Most people have to try several times.

818
00:46:55,080 --> 00:46:56,560
Speaker 1: It's I think there's an amage of three or four

819
00:46:56,640 --> 00:46:58,920
Speaker 1: or five attempts before it gets sober. Yeah, and and

820
00:46:58,920 --> 00:47:02,480
Speaker 1: and and and have you know, constantly hearing about families

821
00:47:02,480 --> 00:47:06,480
Speaker 1: who had um uh say similar issues, families of getting

822
00:47:06,560 --> 00:47:10,719
Speaker 1: treatment and and figuring out recovery and being in recovery.

823
00:47:11,160 --> 00:47:14,880
Speaker 1: That's not a clipical to black folks. Really, this generation,

824
00:47:14,960 --> 00:47:17,840
Speaker 1: the millennials are finally saying enough is enough. We're getting

825
00:47:17,880 --> 00:47:20,279
Speaker 1: back into nature where filks, we're taking care of our

826
00:47:20,320 --> 00:47:24,160
Speaker 1: mental health. We're trying to understand our our parents problems

827
00:47:24,560 --> 00:47:28,160
Speaker 1: because they didn't take care of their mental health. They

828
00:47:28,200 --> 00:47:33,520
Speaker 1: had their own issues that involved their race, that involved um,

829
00:47:33,640 --> 00:47:37,680
Speaker 1: their gender, and their sexual irritation, and that looked totally different.

830
00:47:38,080 --> 00:47:41,520
Speaker 1: So so our meetings provide us connection. We have to

831
00:47:41,560 --> 00:47:44,319
Speaker 1: make connection to all these points. It's not enough to

832
00:47:44,360 --> 00:47:46,040
Speaker 1: say I have a drinking problem and I need to

833
00:47:46,080 --> 00:47:49,799
Speaker 1: find myself. I need to understand that. Why after I

834
00:47:49,840 --> 00:47:53,040
Speaker 1: went to college, I did gymnastics, you know, you tell me,

835
00:47:53,239 --> 00:47:57,160
Speaker 1: you know, you know, I didn't not homosexuality, I dated

836
00:47:57,160 --> 00:47:59,480
Speaker 1: a man, I went to law school. Why am I

837
00:47:59,560 --> 00:48:04,160
Speaker 1: still miserable after doing all these things? And why because

838
00:48:04,200 --> 00:48:09,000
Speaker 1: I kept on putting my self worth into tangible items.

839
00:48:09,200 --> 00:48:11,840
Speaker 1: I kept on putting it, I kept on listening to

840
00:48:11,920 --> 00:48:13,799
Speaker 1: what people told me to do. And who are these

841
00:48:13,800 --> 00:48:16,239
Speaker 1: people who did my parents want me to listen to

842
00:48:18,040 --> 00:48:20,840
Speaker 1: white folks. That's something that we all try to please.

843
00:48:20,920 --> 00:48:23,880
Speaker 1: We try to not be that that you know, we're trying.

844
00:48:24,280 --> 00:48:26,120
Speaker 1: We live our lives. We're trying not to be that one,

845
00:48:26,239 --> 00:48:28,520
Speaker 1: that black person, right, we want to be trophies. We

846
00:48:28,560 --> 00:48:30,640
Speaker 1: want people to know that we're trying. So hard, and

847
00:48:30,680 --> 00:48:34,040
Speaker 1: we're trying to do. That's pressure, and that does affect

848
00:48:34,080 --> 00:48:37,360
Speaker 1: and contribute to our self esteem and how I see myself.

849
00:48:37,600 --> 00:48:40,120
Speaker 1: I'm happy that I went to law school. I do

850
00:48:40,239 --> 00:48:43,840
Speaker 1: like luxury things. I do like to have money. However,

851
00:48:44,080 --> 00:48:46,200
Speaker 1: I want to be okay with just being Katie, even

852
00:48:46,400 --> 00:48:49,319
Speaker 1: even with those things. I don't want my worth to

853
00:48:49,400 --> 00:48:52,120
Speaker 1: be based on those on those things. So I feel

854
00:48:52,160 --> 00:48:56,759
Speaker 1: like our meetings are it's not only about getting to

855
00:48:56,880 --> 00:49:01,520
Speaker 1: know who we are. It's really understanding our history. It's

856
00:49:01,600 --> 00:49:06,640
Speaker 1: it's knowing that slaves did how we're you know, given

857
00:49:06,680 --> 00:49:10,920
Speaker 1: alcohol to keep them domicile. It's knowing that for the

858
00:49:10,920 --> 00:49:12,960
Speaker 1: Tempest movement, black people were not a part of it.

859
00:49:13,000 --> 00:49:15,440
Speaker 1: They had to make their own Tempest movement, you know.

860
00:49:15,600 --> 00:49:19,759
Speaker 1: It's it's knowing what the society and what does racism

861
00:49:19,760 --> 00:49:22,239
Speaker 1: and sexism and and you know, even as a queer

862
00:49:22,320 --> 00:49:25,360
Speaker 1: person homophobia that I grew up so homophobic, and I

863
00:49:25,400 --> 00:49:29,520
Speaker 1: grew up very anti black, even myself perpetuating these these

864
00:49:29,560 --> 00:49:32,920
Speaker 1: things and not even knowing and understanding it. How do

865
00:49:33,120 --> 00:49:36,520
Speaker 1: these um is ms play a role and how I

866
00:49:36,560 --> 00:49:44,120
Speaker 1: see myself and other people. Emily talked about Sober Mom

867
00:49:44,200 --> 00:49:47,920
Speaker 1: Squad which you started during the pandemic. Was this to

868
00:49:48,080 --> 00:49:51,000
Speaker 1: fill the need that you felt wasn't there when you

869
00:49:51,080 --> 00:49:54,400
Speaker 1: were googling? Am I an alcoholic? Yeah? I mean it

870
00:49:54,480 --> 00:49:56,759
Speaker 1: was a couple of things. So I was working as

871
00:49:56,760 --> 00:49:59,799
Speaker 1: a as a recovery coach at the time. Um, and

872
00:49:59,800 --> 00:50:03,000
Speaker 1: I is working really one on one with women who

873
00:50:03,160 --> 00:50:06,400
Speaker 1: who had similar stories to me, who you know, really

874
00:50:06,840 --> 00:50:08,440
Speaker 1: tried to control it for a really long time and

875
00:50:08,480 --> 00:50:11,480
Speaker 1: then hit rock bottom. And they were either uh, they're

876
00:50:11,640 --> 00:50:14,160
Speaker 1: you know, coming out of rehab, going to a a

877
00:50:14,360 --> 00:50:18,080
Speaker 1: you know, really just to supplement um, you know, people's

878
00:50:18,080 --> 00:50:21,520
Speaker 1: other recovery modalities. And once you know, it's just a

879
00:50:21,520 --> 00:50:23,399
Speaker 1: couple of weeks in the pandemic and all the kids

880
00:50:23,400 --> 00:50:27,440
Speaker 1: were home, I started getting messages from moms saying, you know,

881
00:50:27,480 --> 00:50:30,560
Speaker 1: I never questioned my drinking before. Um, and now I'm

882
00:50:30,640 --> 00:50:33,680
Speaker 1: drinking a lot more and it's scaring me or my

883
00:50:33,800 --> 00:50:37,280
Speaker 1: kids are noticing me drink now. Um. And I don't

884
00:50:37,320 --> 00:50:40,280
Speaker 1: know how you know that line of demarcation from coming

885
00:50:40,320 --> 00:50:42,560
Speaker 1: home from work and having that quiet time in the car,

886
00:50:42,680 --> 00:50:45,759
Speaker 1: like you don't have any downtime. So women were using

887
00:50:45,800 --> 00:50:50,919
Speaker 1: alcohol really as again as a coping mechanism and you know, hey,

888
00:50:50,960 --> 00:50:53,040
Speaker 1: can can you help? Can you work with me? And

889
00:50:53,120 --> 00:50:56,359
Speaker 1: meanwhile I'm home, also working with my five kids with

890
00:50:56,440 --> 00:50:58,560
Speaker 1: no extra time, wondering what the heck I'm gonna do,

891
00:50:59,280 --> 00:51:01,480
Speaker 1: And so I just honestly put out a call to

892
00:51:01,520 --> 00:51:04,520
Speaker 1: action on on social media. You know, I said, is

893
00:51:04,560 --> 00:51:09,160
Speaker 1: this with other recovery coaches, counselors, is this what you're seeing? Um,

894
00:51:09,200 --> 00:51:12,960
Speaker 1: does anyone want to help do something? And um, you

895
00:51:12,960 --> 00:51:17,040
Speaker 1: know a few other women in the recovery space, We're like, yeah,

896
00:51:17,040 --> 00:51:19,000
Speaker 1: I'll help, I'll help, I'll help. And we started having

897
00:51:19,000 --> 00:51:22,560
Speaker 1: just a free meeting every Wednesday, and the only requirements were,

898
00:51:22,840 --> 00:51:25,600
Speaker 1: you know, if your mom and you're questioning your use

899
00:51:25,600 --> 00:51:29,000
Speaker 1: of alcohol, or if you're just a mom who doesn't

900
00:51:29,040 --> 00:51:32,239
Speaker 1: want to be in the sea of of women telling

901
00:51:32,280 --> 00:51:34,480
Speaker 1: you to go poor your quarantine e or you know

902
00:51:34,520 --> 00:51:38,600
Speaker 1: that all these wine messages were really strong at this point.

903
00:51:38,800 --> 00:51:41,400
Speaker 1: You know, it takes a what it thought, what was

904
00:51:41,440 --> 00:51:45,120
Speaker 1: my favorite one? It takes a glass of wine to

905
00:51:45,520 --> 00:51:48,040
Speaker 1: have a kid, and it takes a vineyard homeschool one

906
00:51:48,160 --> 00:51:51,560
Speaker 1: or something like all of these messages that and also,

907
00:51:51,880 --> 00:51:54,759
Speaker 1: you know, Elizabeth was mentioning the other day, like what

908
00:51:54,920 --> 00:51:58,200
Speaker 1: businesses we're thriving. It's like, we're still open. It was

909
00:51:58,239 --> 00:52:00,640
Speaker 1: the grocery store, at the drug store, in the liquor

910
00:52:00,680 --> 00:52:05,160
Speaker 1: store and the essential service and sort of laughing about that,

911
00:52:05,239 --> 00:52:08,359
Speaker 1: but it's a it's a big red flag, isn't it. Yeah, well,

912
00:52:08,360 --> 00:52:12,120
Speaker 1: on the biggest growth in alcohol with single serve drinks

913
00:52:13,000 --> 00:52:16,640
Speaker 1: because it was easily accessible. And if you're at the

914
00:52:16,680 --> 00:52:19,839
Speaker 1: pharmacy and you're getting your bleach in your hand sanitizer

915
00:52:19,880 --> 00:52:21,480
Speaker 1: and all the other things that were sold out, and

916
00:52:21,480 --> 00:52:25,280
Speaker 1: you're at the checkout line, that little can looks really benign.

917
00:52:25,920 --> 00:52:27,839
Speaker 1: It looks like it's like, oh, no big deal, it's

918
00:52:27,960 --> 00:52:30,640
Speaker 1: right here. It's super safe. And meanwhile, it's like two

919
00:52:30,719 --> 00:52:34,200
Speaker 1: and a half servings of alcohol and it's just as

920
00:52:34,200 --> 00:52:37,000
Speaker 1: easy to throw down as a you know, sparkling water.

921
00:52:37,680 --> 00:52:41,720
Speaker 1: So even if I'm questioning my use, it's being delivered

922
00:52:41,719 --> 00:52:46,480
Speaker 1: to me so so easily. Um So you know this,

923
00:52:46,880 --> 00:52:49,719
Speaker 1: These were the messages that I was hearing. Um and

924
00:52:49,760 --> 00:52:53,200
Speaker 1: so yeah, we started meeting every Wednesday, and then it

925
00:52:53,360 --> 00:52:57,160
Speaker 1: just kept growing and growing and growing, and women were like, hey,

926
00:52:57,160 --> 00:53:00,040
Speaker 1: can we do more of these? And um so I

927
00:53:00,080 --> 00:53:03,239
Speaker 1: just kind of went with what women were asking for.

928
00:53:03,440 --> 00:53:05,480
Speaker 1: They wanted to have more meetings, they wanted to have

929
00:53:06,040 --> 00:53:09,600
Speaker 1: you know, coaching available, They wanted to have a place

930
00:53:09,640 --> 00:53:12,880
Speaker 1: to connect. And you know, women's communities are are nothing

931
00:53:12,920 --> 00:53:15,640
Speaker 1: new online. I have friends who I met in a

932
00:53:16,160 --> 00:53:18,000
Speaker 1: it was a baby center or something. I was in

933
00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:20,600
Speaker 1: an online group when my seventeen year old was when

934
00:53:20,600 --> 00:53:23,320
Speaker 1: I was pregnant with him, um and we're still friends.

935
00:53:23,400 --> 00:53:27,360
Speaker 1: And so it really is just a place. It's a

936
00:53:27,400 --> 00:53:32,200
Speaker 1: community where you can talk about anything from you know,

937
00:53:32,280 --> 00:53:34,279
Speaker 1: how you know your baby sleeping through the night or

938
00:53:34,680 --> 00:53:37,239
Speaker 1: you know, better WiFi connection with all these kids doing

939
00:53:37,320 --> 00:53:40,919
Speaker 1: school from home, and it just is there's no wine

940
00:53:40,960 --> 00:53:43,840
Speaker 1: mom messaging around it. Nobody's going to tell you to

941
00:53:44,040 --> 00:53:47,799
Speaker 1: go just pour a glass of wine. Um So our

942
00:53:47,800 --> 00:53:50,720
Speaker 1: members really are anybody from women who just don't drink

943
00:53:50,960 --> 00:53:53,359
Speaker 1: just because they don't or it's never been a thing

944
00:53:53,400 --> 00:53:55,640
Speaker 1: for them, they just want to avoid all that messaging.

945
00:53:56,239 --> 00:53:59,319
Speaker 1: And then the whole other side of the spectrum, women

946
00:53:59,320 --> 00:54:01,919
Speaker 1: who really request sing their drinking sober curious, and women

947
00:54:01,920 --> 00:54:05,759
Speaker 1: who have been in recovery or are currently um in

948
00:54:05,760 --> 00:54:09,719
Speaker 1: in recovery. UM So it's just really a community for

949
00:54:09,840 --> 00:54:13,480
Speaker 1: moms who don't want to be in that Sea of Wine,

950
00:54:13,520 --> 00:54:19,879
Speaker 1: Mom Marketing, Sober Mom Squad. I know is membership based, right,

951
00:54:20,280 --> 00:54:24,680
Speaker 1: and it's not unlike Tempest, The Naked Mind and some

952
00:54:24,760 --> 00:54:28,160
Speaker 1: other organizations that have popped up Emily. You have to

953
00:54:28,200 --> 00:54:30,680
Speaker 1: pay a fee to be a part of this community.

954
00:54:30,800 --> 00:54:35,240
Speaker 1: And I'm curious why you decided to go for that model.

955
00:54:35,360 --> 00:54:39,080
Speaker 1: And are you worried about creating a barrier for for

956
00:54:39,160 --> 00:54:42,239
Speaker 1: women who may not be able to afford it? Yeah? Sure,

957
00:54:42,280 --> 00:54:44,120
Speaker 1: And this is a question that comes up a lot.

958
00:54:44,160 --> 00:54:47,359
Speaker 1: And you know when you have paid for recovery groups, right,

959
00:54:47,760 --> 00:54:49,919
Speaker 1: And first thing is we started as a free group

960
00:54:49,960 --> 00:54:51,840
Speaker 1: and we still have a free meeting every Wednesday. We

961
00:54:51,880 --> 00:54:53,680
Speaker 1: have a free Facebook group. We have a free meeting

962
00:54:53,680 --> 00:54:58,960
Speaker 1: every single Wednesday. Um. And the reason that you know

963
00:54:59,200 --> 00:55:02,240
Speaker 1: I grew the community was really because women were asking

964
00:55:02,280 --> 00:55:04,839
Speaker 1: for it, Like we want more of these meetings. We

965
00:55:04,880 --> 00:55:08,920
Speaker 1: want group coaching. We want to have different you know,

966
00:55:08,960 --> 00:55:11,120
Speaker 1: we like have E F T tapping and we have

967
00:55:11,200 --> 00:55:15,960
Speaker 1: writing for recovery. And I also value you know, what

968
00:55:16,000 --> 00:55:20,680
Speaker 1: women put into their work, and so for recovery coaches, counselors, um,

969
00:55:20,719 --> 00:55:24,000
Speaker 1: you know, for my writing expert like I pay them um.

970
00:55:24,040 --> 00:55:27,520
Speaker 1: And so our membership really goes to pay for the community,

971
00:55:28,200 --> 00:55:30,120
Speaker 1: UM and for the people who are doing work in

972
00:55:30,160 --> 00:55:33,760
Speaker 1: the community. And because we charge, you know, a fee

973
00:55:33,800 --> 00:55:37,480
Speaker 1: for membership, we do offer scholarships to literally anybody who

974
00:55:37,520 --> 00:55:42,279
Speaker 1: asks UM. So it's really come about and I think,

975
00:55:43,239 --> 00:55:45,239
Speaker 1: you know, there are so many free things out there,

976
00:55:45,239 --> 00:55:48,680
Speaker 1: and I think if that works for you, that's awesome.

977
00:55:48,760 --> 00:55:50,279
Speaker 1: And I, you know, I'm a person who still goes

978
00:55:50,280 --> 00:55:53,279
Speaker 1: to a a so like, I see the value in that.

979
00:55:53,920 --> 00:55:57,759
Speaker 1: But there are people who want other things, and I

980
00:55:57,800 --> 00:56:01,360
Speaker 1: don't think it's out of the questions to uh, you know,

981
00:56:01,400 --> 00:56:04,200
Speaker 1: pay people for their work. What would you tell moms

982
00:56:04,480 --> 00:56:10,239
Speaker 1: listening to this right now, Emily, who are kind of

983
00:56:10,280 --> 00:56:15,839
Speaker 1: on the precipice of thinking, gee, this is taking too

984
00:56:17,360 --> 00:56:21,239
Speaker 1: much space in my life, or this is becoming too important,

985
00:56:21,640 --> 00:56:24,320
Speaker 1: or I just don't want to get to the point

986
00:56:24,400 --> 00:56:30,120
Speaker 1: where you know you were honestly or where Elizabeth was

987
00:56:31,200 --> 00:56:35,640
Speaker 1: UM or if I am there, what do I do next? Yeah,

988
00:56:35,880 --> 00:56:38,200
Speaker 1: But the first thing I always say is, you know,

989
00:56:38,239 --> 00:56:41,600
Speaker 1: it's not your fault for getting addicted to an addictive substance,

990
00:56:42,640 --> 00:56:45,760
Speaker 1: So to take that whole piece of shame out or

991
00:56:45,880 --> 00:56:49,279
Speaker 1: you know, we we would never question our use of

992
00:56:49,560 --> 00:56:52,600
Speaker 1: any other addictive substance. We just say, oh wow, I'm

993
00:56:52,680 --> 00:56:55,719
Speaker 1: questioning this, I'm going to stop using this. So that's

994
00:56:55,760 --> 00:56:57,239
Speaker 1: the first thing I say is it's not your fault

995
00:56:57,239 --> 00:57:00,160
Speaker 1: for becoming addicted to an addictive substance. And I'll so

996
00:57:00,320 --> 00:57:02,360
Speaker 1: like your rock bottom is where you stop digging. You

997
00:57:02,440 --> 00:57:05,799
Speaker 1: do not have to fit any of the checklists. You

998
00:57:05,840 --> 00:57:10,080
Speaker 1: don't have to match anyone else's story. It doesn't have

999
00:57:10,200 --> 00:57:14,640
Speaker 1: to get bad before you stop and look at what

1000
00:57:14,640 --> 00:57:17,120
Speaker 1: what good do you want instead of what are the

1001
00:57:17,160 --> 00:57:19,240
Speaker 1: bad things you want to avoid? If that makes sense,

1002
00:57:19,360 --> 00:57:21,200
Speaker 1: you know, because it's a different even though you're saying

1003
00:57:21,200 --> 00:57:24,120
Speaker 1: the same thing. It's like I don't want to be

1004
00:57:24,200 --> 00:57:27,240
Speaker 1: hungover every day, or you know, I want to wake

1005
00:57:27,320 --> 00:57:29,400
Speaker 1: up clear headed every day. You're saying the same thing,

1006
00:57:29,960 --> 00:57:32,560
Speaker 1: but it's just flipping the script on what do I want?

1007
00:57:32,600 --> 00:57:34,600
Speaker 1: You know, I want to be more present for my kids.

1008
00:57:34,760 --> 00:57:38,360
Speaker 1: I want to remember my date nights, I want to

1009
00:57:38,800 --> 00:57:40,480
Speaker 1: you know, whatever it is. It's like, what do you

1010
00:57:40,520 --> 00:57:42,680
Speaker 1: actually want? And how much better could your life be

1011
00:57:43,280 --> 00:57:46,040
Speaker 1: if you didn't have this substance that was that was

1012
00:57:46,120 --> 00:57:50,560
Speaker 1: running the show. And I think we also underestimate how

1013
00:57:50,720 --> 00:57:56,240
Speaker 1: much mental work it takes to to try and control

1014
00:57:56,440 --> 00:57:59,840
Speaker 1: the substance. Um. I know for me, it was a

1015
00:58:00,040 --> 00:58:02,800
Speaker 1: huge amount of mental freedom once I was just like, oh,

1016
00:58:02,880 --> 00:58:05,200
Speaker 1: I don't have to do that anymore, Like Wow, I

1017
00:58:05,560 --> 00:58:09,720
Speaker 1: don't have to try and make all these rules and

1018
00:58:09,760 --> 00:58:12,000
Speaker 1: do all these things to try and make this fit

1019
00:58:12,000 --> 00:58:14,439
Speaker 1: in my life, Like, this isn't something I have to do.

1020
00:58:14,720 --> 00:58:17,800
Speaker 1: When you recognize that it's a choice and not a

1021
00:58:17,880 --> 00:58:21,680
Speaker 1: requirement as an adult, Um, it's there's a lot of

1022
00:58:21,800 --> 00:58:25,560
Speaker 1: freedom there. Um just looking at you know, how good

1023
00:58:25,560 --> 00:58:27,760
Speaker 1: could your life be if this wasn't running the show?

1024
00:58:29,680 --> 00:58:31,640
Speaker 1: I love what you just said about you're not It's

1025
00:58:31,640 --> 00:58:34,360
Speaker 1: not your fault. You became addicted to an addictive substance.

1026
00:58:34,400 --> 00:58:37,280
Speaker 1: I think that I've never heard that. That's fantastic. Well,

1027
00:58:37,440 --> 00:58:40,800
Speaker 1: think about cigarettes. You would never say to somebody, are

1028
00:58:40,880 --> 00:58:42,680
Speaker 1: you sure you don't want to just have one or two?

1029
00:58:43,160 --> 00:58:45,240
Speaker 1: Just just don't smoke the whole pack and just have

1030
00:58:45,560 --> 00:58:49,760
Speaker 1: We never we don't expect anyone to moderate any other drug.

1031
00:58:50,480 --> 00:58:53,680
Speaker 1: But it's really again, it's that kind of that double

1032
00:58:53,720 --> 00:58:57,160
Speaker 1: standard if we do expect people to be able to

1033
00:58:57,160 --> 00:58:59,920
Speaker 1: have control over something that's addictive. When you think of

1034
00:59:00,000 --> 00:59:02,440
Speaker 1: about it, it's just not something I never thought of

1035
00:59:02,600 --> 00:59:08,120
Speaker 1: until again I was free from it. When we come back,

1036
00:59:08,360 --> 00:59:12,040
Speaker 1: professional help on what you can do if you or

1037
00:59:12,160 --> 00:59:30,640
Speaker 1: someone you love is struggling. Before we move on once again,

1038
00:59:30,680 --> 00:59:34,680
Speaker 1: here's Dr Don Sugarman to explain what alcohol does to

1039
00:59:34,720 --> 00:59:40,600
Speaker 1: the brain and how sobriety can help it recover. So

1040
00:59:40,760 --> 00:59:44,000
Speaker 1: alcohol is what we would call it anxiolytic. People will

1041
00:59:44,080 --> 00:59:47,200
Speaker 1: notice that in the short term when they take a

1042
00:59:47,240 --> 00:59:51,600
Speaker 1: sip of alcohol that they feel immediately relaxed. The problem

1043
00:59:51,680 --> 00:59:55,680
Speaker 1: is that in the long term it increases anxiety, so

1044
00:59:56,480 --> 00:59:59,200
Speaker 1: it becomes this crutch for people that's not a very

1045
00:59:59,240 --> 01:00:03,000
Speaker 1: effective hoping tool for anxiety. And in the brain, what

1046
01:00:03,080 --> 01:00:06,640
Speaker 1: happens is that alcohol is a depressant. It suppresses the

1047
01:00:06,720 --> 01:00:11,760
Speaker 1: central nervous system UM, so it slows down those systems,

1048
01:00:11,800 --> 01:00:14,760
Speaker 1: which is again why you're feeling more relaxed. But when

1049
01:00:14,800 --> 01:00:17,240
Speaker 1: alcohol starts to leave your body, when you start to

1050
01:00:17,240 --> 01:00:20,400
Speaker 1: go through sort of what it's called alcohol withdrawal, then

1051
01:00:20,560 --> 01:00:23,080
Speaker 1: those systems ramp back up, and that's when you get

1052
01:00:23,080 --> 01:00:26,400
Speaker 1: the increased anxiety. I think the other way that it

1053
01:00:26,440 --> 01:00:31,760
Speaker 1: increases anxiety is that you become reliant on that as

1054
01:00:31,800 --> 01:00:35,400
Speaker 1: a way to to cope when you're anxious, and so

1055
01:00:36,080 --> 01:00:39,040
Speaker 1: when you're in situations where you're unable to drink alcohol

1056
01:00:39,040 --> 01:00:41,680
Speaker 1: and you don't have that sort of crutch, then you

1057
01:00:42,120 --> 01:00:45,720
Speaker 1: become more and more anxious, and it becomes more of

1058
01:00:45,720 --> 01:00:49,280
Speaker 1: an anxiety about having a way to deal with your anxiety.

1059
01:00:49,360 --> 01:00:54,200
Speaker 1: That's not always effective, But as Dr Sugarman says, there

1060
01:00:54,440 --> 01:00:59,439
Speaker 1: is some good news. There are studies that show that, um,

1061
01:00:59,680 --> 01:01:03,640
Speaker 1: the you know, cognitive impairments related to drinking, if you

1062
01:01:03,680 --> 01:01:08,960
Speaker 1: stop drinking within the year of abstinence, those do seem

1063
01:01:09,000 --> 01:01:12,400
Speaker 1: to reverse, with the exception that if you're really drinking

1064
01:01:12,440 --> 01:01:15,400
Speaker 1: at quite an extreme level where they're sort of permanent damage.

1065
01:01:15,480 --> 01:01:19,800
Speaker 1: But for the most part, stopping drinking will help improve

1066
01:01:19,840 --> 01:01:23,520
Speaker 1: your health and can reverse some of those cognitive impairments.

1067
01:01:25,200 --> 01:01:29,160
Speaker 1: Elizabeth and I also spoke with Dr Louise Stanger. She's

1068
01:01:29,200 --> 01:01:33,360
Speaker 1: a clinical social worker and interventionists with more than thirty

1069
01:01:33,400 --> 01:01:36,760
Speaker 1: five years of experience in the world of substance abuse

1070
01:01:36,880 --> 01:01:41,080
Speaker 1: and addiction. She told us how to approach people who

1071
01:01:41,120 --> 01:01:45,160
Speaker 1: may have a problem. What are the questions you ask people,

1072
01:01:45,240 --> 01:01:51,760
Speaker 1: Louise to determine if they've gone from having a healthy

1073
01:01:51,800 --> 01:01:55,120
Speaker 1: relationship with alcohol or casual. I don't even know how

1074
01:01:55,160 --> 01:02:00,400
Speaker 1: to describe it to something that is really dangerous, imaging

1075
01:02:00,480 --> 01:02:04,840
Speaker 1: and incapacitating. So um, when I'm doing a family map,

1076
01:02:04,800 --> 01:02:09,800
Speaker 1: where I would asked you, um, Katie. Um, first of all,

1077
01:02:10,160 --> 01:02:12,600
Speaker 1: you take a look and you say, what's more important

1078
01:02:13,440 --> 01:02:15,920
Speaker 1: the event or the substance? So right now you and

1079
01:02:15,960 --> 01:02:19,400
Speaker 1: I are drinking coffee. Um, but let's say we go

1080
01:02:19,520 --> 01:02:24,480
Speaker 1: out to dinner. Right If that glass of wine is

1081
01:02:24,560 --> 01:02:28,040
Speaker 1: more important to you than the event, I'm going to

1082
01:02:28,200 --> 01:02:30,600
Speaker 1: know that because it's not gonna be just one glass

1083
01:02:30,600 --> 01:02:33,840
Speaker 1: of wine, that's gonna be two glasses. You asked people,

1084
01:02:34,040 --> 01:02:39,600
Speaker 1: have there been any unintended consequences? Um? With you know,

1085
01:02:39,680 --> 01:02:41,640
Speaker 1: college students? She said, say, hey, did you ever wake

1086
01:02:41,720 --> 01:02:44,720
Speaker 1: up and someone else is dead? For example? Have you

1087
01:02:44,800 --> 01:02:51,320
Speaker 1: ever missed a class? Have you ever lied or cheated

1088
01:02:52,000 --> 01:02:56,040
Speaker 1: on anybody? Have you ever missed a class? Have you

1089
01:02:56,160 --> 01:02:59,880
Speaker 1: ever has anyone to bail you out? It's taking a

1090
01:03:00,000 --> 01:03:02,520
Speaker 1: look at what have you ever had a d u I?

1091
01:03:02,560 --> 01:03:07,600
Speaker 1: Have you ever been yet reprimanded by your boss? Have

1092
01:03:07,840 --> 01:03:11,680
Speaker 1: you ever fallen asleep with your baby in your arms?

1093
01:03:11,720 --> 01:03:16,960
Speaker 1: There's all kinds of unintended consequences. Do you talk to

1094
01:03:17,040 --> 01:03:19,640
Speaker 1: your partner. If you have a partner, you know, what's

1095
01:03:19,680 --> 01:03:24,400
Speaker 1: your relationship um with everybody? So you try and take

1096
01:03:24,440 --> 01:03:26,920
Speaker 1: a look and you ask people you know, on a

1097
01:03:26,960 --> 01:03:29,080
Speaker 1: scale of one to ten, how's this working for you?

1098
01:03:30,000 --> 01:03:32,640
Speaker 1: And then how do you convince them to take the Yeah,

1099
01:03:32,640 --> 01:03:34,680
Speaker 1: because a lot of people. First of all, there are

1100
01:03:34,720 --> 01:03:37,080
Speaker 1: a lot of people who have consequences like that after

1101
01:03:37,240 --> 01:03:39,920
Speaker 1: one bad night, like I have lots of you know

1102
01:03:39,960 --> 01:03:42,240
Speaker 1: when when I when I started telling my girlfriends that

1103
01:03:42,320 --> 01:03:44,280
Speaker 1: I had a problem with alcohol, they were like, no,

1104
01:03:44,400 --> 01:03:47,520
Speaker 1: you don't, so and so does you know she's had

1105
01:03:47,560 --> 01:03:50,120
Speaker 1: all the consequences that we've seen you. We've never seen

1106
01:03:50,200 --> 01:03:52,720
Speaker 1: you do any of those things. And that's true. I

1107
01:03:52,760 --> 01:03:56,480
Speaker 1: didn't so and for a large and I was able

1108
01:03:56,520 --> 01:03:59,200
Speaker 1: to stop drinking when I got pregnant, and so I

1109
01:03:59,320 --> 01:04:01,600
Speaker 1: that gave me my ability. I was like, I don't

1110
01:04:01,640 --> 01:04:03,800
Speaker 1: have a problem. I can control it. I have controlled it,

1111
01:04:04,360 --> 01:04:07,200
Speaker 1: and I haven't had all those dramatic negative consequences at

1112
01:04:07,240 --> 01:04:10,720
Speaker 1: least not yet. And so how do you convince somebody

1113
01:04:10,920 --> 01:04:13,360
Speaker 1: to take the step to get help when denial can

1114
01:04:13,400 --> 01:04:16,240
Speaker 1: be so strong, and you can point to so many

1115
01:04:16,240 --> 01:04:19,160
Speaker 1: other people and say, well, she's much worse than I am.

1116
01:04:19,400 --> 01:04:22,200
Speaker 1: So first of all, I my word of recommendations. You

1117
01:04:22,240 --> 01:04:24,560
Speaker 1: never go one on one with anybody who you believe

1118
01:04:24,640 --> 01:04:27,320
Speaker 1: is active in addiction. That is one of the most

1119
01:04:27,360 --> 01:04:30,160
Speaker 1: full heartiest things in the world. So I'm really known

1120
01:04:30,680 --> 01:04:35,880
Speaker 1: for an invitational strategy UM or intervention, and an intervention

1121
01:04:36,000 --> 01:04:39,280
Speaker 1: is merely an invitation to change. But if you really want,

1122
01:04:39,320 --> 01:04:41,960
Speaker 1: if you're really worried about someone, you want to do

1123
01:04:42,040 --> 01:04:44,840
Speaker 1: a lot of backwork and do due diligence, and you

1124
01:04:44,880 --> 01:04:47,880
Speaker 1: want to be able to interview their friends, their family

1125
01:04:48,560 --> 01:04:53,640
Speaker 1: because individually, because if I and I don't. If I,

1126
01:04:53,880 --> 01:04:57,040
Speaker 1: for example, I wanted to learn about you, I might

1127
01:04:57,120 --> 01:04:59,880
Speaker 1: talk to your producer, I might talk to your husband,

1128
01:05:00,240 --> 01:05:02,120
Speaker 1: I might talk to your best friend, I might talk

1129
01:05:02,200 --> 01:05:06,840
Speaker 1: to your mother. But somebody usually calls me and not you,

1130
01:05:07,000 --> 01:05:09,600
Speaker 1: because you're the identified loved one. If we use you

1131
01:05:10,280 --> 01:05:13,720
Speaker 1: whose heart is hurting, they beg, they pleaded, they nag,

1132
01:05:13,960 --> 01:05:17,920
Speaker 1: They don't know what to do because they see with

1133
01:05:18,120 --> 01:05:22,520
Speaker 1: their eyes that someone is drowning. So how often how

1134
01:05:22,560 --> 01:05:25,280
Speaker 1: often does that person say, Okay, I'll get help, Like,

1135
01:05:25,720 --> 01:05:29,520
Speaker 1: what's what's the that? Well, here, I've been very fortunate,

1136
01:05:29,560 --> 01:05:33,760
Speaker 1: I'm in success, but I don't show up and just

1137
01:05:33,800 --> 01:05:36,720
Speaker 1: say hi, guess what. It takes a lot of work.

1138
01:05:36,840 --> 01:05:39,640
Speaker 1: So when we're we're doing with the family, I do

1139
01:05:39,760 --> 01:05:42,360
Speaker 1: I do do the family map. It takes me twenty

1140
01:05:42,360 --> 01:05:45,760
Speaker 1: to thirty hours of backwork, but fever before I would

1141
01:05:45,840 --> 01:05:50,000
Speaker 1: ever stage or invite you to change. The way I

1142
01:05:50,040 --> 01:05:53,200
Speaker 1: see an intervention, it's collective in the respect that it

1143
01:05:53,240 --> 01:05:56,200
Speaker 1: takes a village to move someone. Recovery in and of

1144
01:05:56,240 --> 01:05:59,840
Speaker 1: itself is connection. It takes a village. It is an

1145
01:06:00,040 --> 01:06:04,000
Speaker 1: intervention in that we intend to invite or seek someone

1146
01:06:04,080 --> 01:06:08,440
Speaker 1: or motivate them to change, and we create a positive

1147
01:06:08,520 --> 01:06:14,520
Speaker 1: crisis in which there's an opportunity for you to understand

1148
01:06:14,560 --> 01:06:18,000
Speaker 1: that this is coming from a place of love, this

1149
01:06:18,080 --> 01:06:20,680
Speaker 1: is coming from a place of hope, and that there

1150
01:06:20,800 --> 01:06:24,440
Speaker 1: is a solution and people will walk with you. Um.

1151
01:06:24,520 --> 01:06:28,160
Speaker 1: The strategy is you've got to be very flexible. But

1152
01:06:28,360 --> 01:06:31,240
Speaker 1: you don't just walk into someone and you say, oh, hi,

1153
01:06:31,520 --> 01:06:33,800
Speaker 1: you've been drinking, you need to go, or you don't

1154
01:06:33,880 --> 01:06:36,680
Speaker 1: do it in a dismissive way, but you try and

1155
01:06:36,800 --> 01:06:41,280
Speaker 1: learn everything you can about that person and then help

1156
01:06:41,600 --> 01:06:45,120
Speaker 1: other people speak from their heart. So when I talk

1157
01:06:45,160 --> 01:06:49,440
Speaker 1: about intervention, I'm talking about heart hurt and hope. What

1158
01:06:49,560 --> 01:06:53,280
Speaker 1: have you experienced in the last couple of months that

1159
01:06:53,800 --> 01:06:58,920
Speaker 1: are years have made your heart hurt and what is

1160
01:06:58,920 --> 01:07:01,960
Speaker 1: your hope? And you can't do an intervention without having

1161
01:07:02,200 --> 01:07:08,120
Speaker 1: a solution in place. Whether it's UM with alcohol, I'm

1162
01:07:08,120 --> 01:07:13,200
Speaker 1: going to be clear, because it's both physiologically and psychologically addictively,

1163
01:07:13,280 --> 01:07:18,320
Speaker 1: you need residential medical detox. You just can't just go

1164
01:07:18,520 --> 01:07:21,240
Speaker 1: cold turkey on your own. You stand too much of

1165
01:07:21,280 --> 01:07:25,240
Speaker 1: a risk for a seizure for some other problems. So

1166
01:07:25,640 --> 01:07:28,640
Speaker 1: it would be full hardy to say just stop. You

1167
01:07:28,680 --> 01:07:31,080
Speaker 1: can die. You can die from alcohol. Have a friend,

1168
01:07:32,480 --> 01:07:35,480
Speaker 1: I have a friend whose son died. Yeah, So you

1169
01:07:35,880 --> 01:07:39,440
Speaker 1: have to really understand what you're doing. People don't realize

1170
01:07:39,440 --> 01:07:41,880
Speaker 1: how dangerous that is. I mean coming off of heroin,

1171
01:07:42,000 --> 01:07:44,520
Speaker 1: being dope sick. You'll feel like you want to die,

1172
01:07:44,720 --> 01:07:50,120
Speaker 1: but you won't actually die. People die from alcohol withdrawal absolutely.

1173
01:07:50,280 --> 01:07:52,919
Speaker 1: And also you have to with the family that you're

1174
01:07:52,960 --> 01:07:57,880
Speaker 1: working with, give them three gray treatment UM solutions. I'm

1175
01:07:57,880 --> 01:08:00,720
Speaker 1: not related to any behavioral health care center in the world.

1176
01:08:00,920 --> 01:08:03,680
Speaker 1: I've had the good fortune of training or teaching at

1177
01:08:03,680 --> 01:08:06,440
Speaker 1: many of them and working with many of them. Just

1178
01:08:06,600 --> 01:08:11,320
Speaker 1: based on you know, my reputation or my my ability

1179
01:08:11,720 --> 01:08:15,800
Speaker 1: to do good work. Well, you know, just to wrap

1180
01:08:15,880 --> 01:08:21,080
Speaker 1: things up, I hope that that all these people, and

1181
01:08:21,200 --> 01:08:25,200
Speaker 1: we're talking about women more specifically, but anyone who has

1182
01:08:25,960 --> 01:08:31,400
Speaker 1: a substance abuse issue that's developed during the pandemic will

1183
01:08:31,439 --> 01:08:36,479
Speaker 1: get help. UM. Because the numbers are frightening. They are

1184
01:08:36,640 --> 01:08:41,559
Speaker 1: they're they're absolutely at astronomical. We are a country in

1185
01:08:41,720 --> 01:08:47,519
Speaker 1: crisis and our mental health, our anxiety UM is at

1186
01:08:47,560 --> 01:08:51,639
Speaker 1: an all time high. We have UM we're being fueled

1187
01:08:51,640 --> 01:08:55,400
Speaker 1: by the alcohol industry, that marijuana is she the pill

1188
01:08:55,479 --> 01:08:58,960
Speaker 1: industry UM. And what we need to do is help

1189
01:08:59,040 --> 01:09:02,439
Speaker 1: rewrite the fact break. But for women, especially because this

1190
01:09:02,560 --> 01:09:06,200
Speaker 1: is dedicated to women, I want them to know there's

1191
01:09:06,240 --> 01:09:09,879
Speaker 1: always hope, there's always a solution, that you're not alone,

1192
01:09:10,720 --> 01:09:13,400
Speaker 1: that you're not crazy, that you feel it's awful to

1193
01:09:13,479 --> 01:09:17,640
Speaker 1: be inside in zoom land. It's not awful to be

1194
01:09:17,800 --> 01:09:22,679
Speaker 1: scared that your child is not thriving. UM, that there

1195
01:09:22,720 --> 01:09:28,280
Speaker 1: are there is help available. Help is available. If you

1196
01:09:28,479 --> 01:09:31,680
Speaker 1: or anyone you know is struggling with alcohol use. You

1197
01:09:31,720 --> 01:09:34,920
Speaker 1: can start by calling the National Drug and Alcohol Treatment

1198
01:09:35,000 --> 01:09:39,559
Speaker 1: Hotline at one eight hundred six six to help. That's

1199
01:09:39,600 --> 01:09:43,719
Speaker 1: one eight hundred six six two four, three five seven,

1200
01:09:44,200 --> 01:09:46,080
Speaker 1: and you know what. You can also check out the

1201
01:09:46,080 --> 01:09:49,640
Speaker 1: groups we discussed, like the Sober Black Girls Club, the

1202
01:09:49,720 --> 01:09:54,000
Speaker 1: Sober Mom Squad, and Alcoholics Anonymous, of course, will have

1203
01:09:54,120 --> 01:09:57,840
Speaker 1: links and more information and the description of this podcast.

1204
01:09:58,560 --> 01:10:00,840
Speaker 1: A big thank you, by the way to my co host,

1205
01:10:00,880 --> 01:10:04,479
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Vargas, who I've known for many, many years and

1206
01:10:04,520 --> 01:10:08,000
Speaker 1: I so admire how she has not only dealt with

1207
01:10:08,040 --> 01:10:11,759
Speaker 1: her issues but shared her story to help other people.

1208
01:10:12,600 --> 01:10:16,439
Speaker 1: Go check out her memoir it's called Between Breaths. And

1209
01:10:16,520 --> 01:10:19,559
Speaker 1: also she's got a great podcast where she talks to

1210
01:10:19,640 --> 01:10:22,479
Speaker 1: lots of different people in the alcohol and addiction space.

1211
01:10:23,000 --> 01:10:31,920
Speaker 1: That podcast is called Heart of the Matter. Next Question

1212
01:10:31,960 --> 01:10:34,280
Speaker 1: with Katie Kurik is a production of I Heart Media

1213
01:10:34,400 --> 01:10:38,479
Speaker 1: and Katie Kuric Media. The executive producers Army, Katie Curic

1214
01:10:38,600 --> 01:10:43,240
Speaker 1: and Courtney Litz. The supervising producer is Lauren Hansen. Associate

1215
01:10:43,280 --> 01:10:47,719
Speaker 1: producers Derek Clements and Adriana Fasio. The show is edited

1216
01:10:47,800 --> 01:10:52,080
Speaker 1: and mixed by Derrek Clements. For more information about today's episode,

1217
01:10:52,240 --> 01:10:54,720
Speaker 1: or to sign up for my morning newsletter, wake Up Call,

1218
01:10:55,040 --> 01:10:57,760
Speaker 1: go to Katie Currek dot com. You can also find

1219
01:10:57,760 --> 01:11:00,679
Speaker 1: me at Katie Curic, on Instagram and on my social

1220
01:11:00,720 --> 01:11:04,719
Speaker 1: media channels. For more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit

1221
01:11:04,760 --> 01:11:08,160
Speaker 1: the I heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you

1222
01:11:08,280 --> 01:11:15,720
Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows. H