No Alcohol Needed: The Podcast

Join us as we kick off Season 2 with an incredible conversation about how to beat alcohol cravings.

Besides learning how to beat alcohol cravings, we help you work through:

• Coping with FOMO when it shows up as a trigger

Katie talks about her toolbox, that she uses to help her stay sober. Here's her list of tools:

• Call my sponsor

Meet our guests:

Robbie started his sobriety journey due to being sick of the same old story he would put himself though. He found his cannabis and alcohol use getting worse as the years went on. He used them to cope with everything and anything. Robbie is now nine months sober, and couldn't be happier with his decision to take on this new journey. Robbie co-hosts Golden Hour Adventures podcast and can be found on Instagram @runshills605.

It doesn't matter if you're a few days sober or ten years sober - cravings happen. At their best, they are annoying. At their worst, the sneak up on you when you least expect it and smack you upside the head and suddenly everything is spinning and you don't know which way is up. By the end of this episode, you'll have a whole new stack of tools to add to your sober toolbox, and you'll realize that cravings aren't actually something to fear or feel bad about at all.

Katie B is 42 years old from Dallas, Texas but currently lives in Everett, WA. She has a handsome husband of 7 years with 1 16 year old son,  Jakob,  and 2 bonus kids, Layla, 15 and Isaac, 20. For the last 2.5 years she's worked at the same rehab facility where she got sober. Her sobriety date is March 16th, 2016 after 28 1/2 years of active addiction and alcoholism. 

Matt is a 38 year old father of 2 from Burnt Hills, NY who works in State government. He’s an avid outdoorsman, and his favorite times are those he gets to spend with his children playing games, reading, and coaching his son's sports teams. Matt has attempted both inpatient and outpatient treatment multiple times in the past 5 years,and last year had the opportunity to experience residential sober living at Release Recovery in Westchester County. He encourages people who are still struggling to reach out and know it's ok to ask for help. You can find Matt on Instagram @shamman780

Watch Matt's story on YouTube here.

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Visit our website at throughtheglassrecovery.com

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"Say No Without Feeling Guilty" is our last re-release for the summer, before we get back to producing new episodes! We've had an amazing couple of months off, and we're also so excited to get back to regularly producing new content to help support you, no matter where you are in your recovery journey.

In this episode, we chat with Antje, Kelsey, and Sonia about overcoming people pleasing and learning how to say no without the guilt. It’s easy to want to keep everyone else happy, but we do so the expense of our own happiness. We agree to things we don’t want to, out of fear that we will disappoint others, and the result is that we disappoint ourselves.

Some of the points and topics we cover include:

• Over-explaining ourselves

Kelsey started a TikTok account to share her sober journey and inspire others. Since she started, she’s gained 23,000 followers. You can find her at https://www.tiktok.com/@kelseygoessober and on instagram at https://www.instagram.com/kelsey_sorensen_/

Sonia is the creator and owner of EverBlume, a recovery resource that places members in small support groups based on their specific needs and situations. For more information, visit joineverblume.com or visit Sonia’s Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/joineverblume/

Antje first discovered drinking as a way to “fix” her eating disorder. She thought that drinking was more acceptable than binging and purging all of her meals. When drinking grew more and more out of control, she reluctantly considered sobriety in January of 2022. Soon after, she found connection and support in an online sober community. She is so glad to that she took that first, scary step and gave sobriety a chance.

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Instagram – @through_the_glass_recovery

Are perfectionism and addiction connected? Join us we we dive into how perfectionism is linked to addiction, and how we've overcome it in recovery. We’re joining recovery coach and Instagram sober superstar Daph, the host of Creating Ripples podcast, Alex, and our good friend John to talk about how perfectionism shows up in our recovery. It seems like some people struggled with perfectionism, and it was one of the causes of their drinking. And others fight perfectionism now that they’re in recovery, wanting to make up for lost time. Either way, we’re diving into perfectionism into this episode, sharing what we’ve learned and sharing where we’ve struggled.

Some of the concepts we cover include:

• Trying to ‘perfect’ our recovery

In this episode, as we explore the idea of rebuilding trust in addiction recovery, we learn that we must always start with learning to trust ourselves again. Listen as we are joined by Debs, Brian, and Antje in what was our first official Through the Glass Recovery Podcast episode. We were still figuring out what we were doing, but this conversation was raw and honest and beautiful and filled with wisdom, and it's an honor to be able to share it with you. It remains one of our favorite and most powerful podcast episodes, and we're excited to re-release this remastered copy. 

In this episode:

• Trusting yourself to maintain sobriety

• It's our job to show others that they can trust us

• Overcoming the damage caused by lies

• Lying by omission

• Understanding the other person's point of view

• Recognizing that it takes time for our growth to be visible to others

• Rebuilding trust with our children in addiction recovery

• The freedom of no longer feeling like a fraud

• Learning to trust others with our stories

• Trusting our own authenticity - that we will be accepted just as we are

• Keeping promises to ourselves must be the priority.

We would love to hear your thoughts:

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In this episode, we discuss what we've learned about managing negative emotions in recovery.  Most of us with alcohol problems used drinking to numb the emotions we didn't otherwise know how to deal with. The hard ones - grief, sadness, depression, anxiety, regret, dread. When we decide to get sober, we have to find ways to deal with those emotions, without turning them off. Listen as we are joined by Molly, Chelsea, and Brian to share how we've learned to accept our emotions and move through them in healthy ways.

• Healthy distraction as a coping mechanism

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When we quit drinking, one thing we worry about is how our relationships and friendships are going to change. It can be intimidating. Will we be any fun to hang out with anymore? Will our friends support our decision? Are we going to lose friends? Listen as we share our experiences with all of these questions, and a lot more. In this episode, we talk with Debs, Brian, and Ben about how nurture healthy friendships in recovery

• How we've inspired others by being honest about our recovery

What we end up realizing is that we used to drink to feel like we fit in. Now we share our sober, authentic selves and we learn where we truly belong. As Brene Brown says, "Fitting in is the greatest barrier to belonging."

We would love to hear your thoughts:

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Let's chat about the importance of honesty in recovery. Have you ever hidden a bottle of alcohol from your partner and worried all day that they’d find it? Told someone you’d quit drinking, but just hid it from them instead? Have you ever told the hair dresser you love your new style, when inside you’re cringing?

Honesty seems easy… until we really get honest with ourselves. In this episode, we talk with Brian, Antje, and Michal, with special guest Corina, about honesty in recovery. Most of us consider honesty to be an important value in our lives, but the more we dig into it, the more we realize the places where we tend to be more dishonest than we thought – lying to make others feel better, lying by omission, lying to ourselves. Listen as we dig into honesty, and talk about some of the areas we struggle, and what we’ve learned.

• Being brutally honest with ourselves is the foundation of recovery

In the introduction to the topic, Julie mentions the book Rewired by Erica Spiegelman. Rewired is the book that Julie used to jump-start her recovery journey, and reinforces the importance of honesty in recovery. For more information about the book and the author, visit www.ericaspiegelman.com

Sign up for our newsletter at throughtheglassrecovery.com for sober tips, tools, and motivation, and get access to our free weekly sober support meetings.

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Supporting a loved one with addiction adds a whole new dimension to our own recoveries. Sadly, for many people recovering from alcohol and other drug addictions, supporting a family member who is also struggling is a dynamic they must also face. When this episode was first released, we were overwhelmed with the comments from listeners who appreciated so much the people in the episode who were willing to share their journeys. We're re-releasing it today to make sure the words of wisdom and encouragement in this episode make it to all of the people that need to hear it. If that's you - know you're not alone, and that with the right support and the right mindset, you'll be able to take care of yourself, while still supporting your loved one in a way that's healthy for both of you.

The helplessness and hopelessness that comes with having a family member in addiction is heart wrenching, and our guests share some of the wisdom they’ve gained with their own experiences with this. But we also get a glimpse into what it was like for our families, while we fought our own addictions. Listen as we learn what it means to find healthy ways to help those we love who are struggling with addiction.

Some of the ideas we talk about include:

• Understanding what our own families went through

For the most complete explanation of codependency we've ever seen, check out Melody Beattie's book, Codependent No More.

Meet our guests:

Derrick Deidel is 3 years sober. He has come from the depths of addiction, trauma, mental health , prison and homelessness to be a light in this world. He loves recovery and is a huge advocate for it and those seeking help. He works for Mile High Recovery Center managing the Residential treatment house, he is a peer recovery coach and personal trainer. He tries to be kind and gracious to everyone cause that same stuff changed his life.

Jenn is from Arizona. She is 51 years old and coming up on 2 years May in her sobriety!  She works in early childhood education as a preschool teacher and has 2 adult children who also struggle with alcohol. She's faced lots of changes in her life since she's been sober. It’s been one challenge after the other but she is determined to stay sober not just for herself but to help support and guide her children in the right direction.

Ann lives in Pennsylvania and will be 2 years alcohol-free on May 6, 2023. She believes in community, daily meditation, and reading everything you can get your hands on about recovery, sometimes over and over again. With alcoholism in her immediate family, she is a member of Al-Anon to support her recovery and wellbeing. For her, detachment with love is a magical tool, and life is too short and too amazing to dilute with alcohol.

Raul is so thankful for the sober community and he is involved in many different platforms.  His foundation/bedrock is the AA program.  As it relates to this pod cast, his son went to a 30 day in person recovery facility in California as he was given an ultimatum at work. Raul's recovery afforded him the opportunity to be present and to let his son know he loves him.  Raul said he would love his son no matter what he decided, but this was all his decision to make and he decided to go.

Sign up for our newsletter at throughtheglassrecovery.com for sober tips, tools, and motivation, and get access to our free weekly sober support meetings.

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We originally released this episode for Valentine's Day, but understanding and redefining love is necessary every single day once we are in recovery. As we continue to re-release our favorite episodes from Season 1 throughout the summer, we hope you find new nuggets of wisdom and new things that you can apply in your life, wherever you are in your recovery journey.

In this episode, we explore what love means to us, now that we are in recovery. Many of us stopped maturing emotionally in our teens due to substance abuse, and so our understanding and grasp of love stopped developing, too. We explore everything from romantic love, to love between a parent and child. We talk about emotional safety and availability and what that looks like, and we put words to the feeling that is always so hard to understand and describe.

• How we practice self love in recovery

Meet our guests:

Lynn: “You can find me pretty much every day @thesobergrandmaroadtrip and I invite your listeners to click on my IG bio link for bits of my story and my fav resources. My very first podcast guest appearance and the one I always invite people to checkout is the one titled “Thesobergrandmaroadtrip is born” because it chronicles step-by-step every resource and action I took in my very early days alcohol FREE.”  https://linktr.ee/thesobergrandmaroadtrip

Michael : My name is Michael, I’m just a regular guy, I do regular things. I’m an entrepreneur and employed. I run lots and lots of miles and I read a lot of books, mostly horror stories. I know a few things about a few things and am grateful for 4 years trauma informed conscious and sober. I believe we help ourselves by helping others.

Alex: Outside of being a mother of four, Alex is a sober warrior She started her intentional journey in February of 2022 after dealing with legal issues and being tired of the power she allowed alcohol to hold over her life. She deeply connected with a sober community through the I Am Sober app. Sobriety has been a learning journey of honesty with self and others, authenticity and mostly, what true self love and worth looks like and she wants to share what she has learned and the joys of sobriety along with creating a new sober life with others.

We would love to hear your thoughts:

Visit our website at throughtheglassrecovery.com

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Anxiety in recovery is a battle so many of us must face. For some people, anxiety almost goes away with the alcohol. In fact, I've talked to people who thought they had generalized anxiety disorder, but then they stopped drinking and realized it was just the effect alcohol was having on their nervous system.

But for others of us, the anxiety sticks around. It's the real deal, and while it's decreased significantly, we have to learn other ways to cope with it, since numbing it with alcohol is no longer an option (and never really worked anyway.)

We're re-releasing "How to Cope With Anxiety in Recovery" this week, because it's chock full of tips and ideas on how to work with your anxiety, instead of working against it. For me, the conversation was so helpful in reframing anxiety and turning it into fuel, instead of something I just felt like I was constantly battling. It's not easy, but every little bit of information helps.

Some of the concepts we cover include:

• How to stop ruminating

Travis mentions grounding exercises often used for anxiety. You can find more info here.

Julie mentions the I Am Sober app. You can learn more about the app on their website.

Antje and Julie talk about how much the book Alcohol Explained by William Porter helped them understand the connection between anxiety and alcohol.

Meet Our Guests:

Antje first discovered drinking as a way to "fix" her eating disorder. She thought that drinking was more acceptable than binging and purging all of her meals. When drinking grew more and more out of control, she reluctantly considered sobriety in January of 2022. Soon after, she found connection and support in an online sober community. She is so glad to that she took that first, scary step and gave sobriety a chance.

[email protected]

Visit our website at throughtheglassrecovery.com

Find us on:

Instagram

Facebook

Tiktok