Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, It's Stephanie Wilder Taylor and this is Drunkish.
I am really excited about my guest today. She's been
on the show before, she was one of my original guests,
but this conversation took us in so many new directions.
Her name is Suzanne ware and you might remember her
from before, but she is the founder of the Sober
Momlife dot com and she has a podcast called The
Sober Momlife. I did her podcast, and basically she is
a sober influencer. But I'm very excited to announce that
she has a book coming out called The Sober Shift.
And let me just give you something from the description
of it. Waking up with another hangover as the thirty
nine year old mother of a newborn, Suzanne Warey decided
enough was enough. It was time to quit alcohol for good.
In the years since, Suzanne has uncovered the myth of
model and the limitations of the hitting rock bottom narrative. Today,
she is a model for hundreds of thousands of people
around the world who are embracing her brand of joyful sobriety.
So let us welcome her back to the show. And
here we are with Suzanne. Whare I back on Drunkish Yay,
oh last name right, Well, don't forget. I did have
to ask you before before the first time.
Speaker 2: You came on, I was like, please, okay, but I
feel like even I say it wrong sometimes, how do
you say it? Well, I don't know, but I mean
it's not an easy one to remember. I'd feel like
so that you just like nailed it like it was nothing.
Speaker 1: Well, I had to. I had to make sure that
I learned it when you told me the first time,
and that I practiced it a few times before having
you on.
Speaker 2: Well, though, you nailed it. That's so good.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm so I'm so happy to be back. I
feel like I feel at home here with you early
you too, right.
Speaker 1: I don't get any of the like, oh god, I
have to remember everything. I feel like you and I
can just chat.
Speaker 2: We've literally been talking for like fifteen minutes before we recorded.
We can chat about anything.
Speaker 1: Oh we can, we can and we will what okay,
because we talked a lot on your first appearance. So
if anybody wants to hear the whole Susanne story, the
whole thing, you can listen to the first episode, which
was a couple of months ago. But there's always more.
There's always more to the story.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's more. And now I get to talk. I
feel like I I didn't know what I was doing
as far as the book goes. The last time I
was on Remember and You're like, yeah, no, say it,
And I was like can I and You're like, yes,
of course you can. At your book. I wasn't like
really in the promotional phase of the book, And now, man,
am I in it. I am like holding up a
sign outside my house being like the Sober Shift September
thirtieth pre order. It not like I will push it
to anyone who will listen.
Speaker 1: So I'm going to get those pre sales.
Speaker 2: My god, I know it is. It's all about the
pre sales, right.
Speaker 1: It's all about well it's it's okay, it's all about
the pre sales. They like you to have some pre sales.
But here's the thing. Yeah, you are going to sell
a lot of books because you have a lot of fans,
you have a lot of people that follow you. You're
an influencer. So I don't think you have to worry
too much, okay, but you do have to sort of
make yourself available to people who might not know who
you are, right.
Speaker 2: It's all it's just a very it's a very weird thing.
Even to hear you say like you have fans, I'm like,
that's insane, Like it's all very it's just weird. This
whole thing is very surreal. Like even having a book.
I don't I don't like have the actual book in
my hands yet, But when that's going to happen, I like,
it's just going to be weird, all of it. And
then to have people reading the words that I wrote
for so long, and a lot of it is my
story and stories that I haven't told on the podcast,
which I know is like shocking to some people because
I talk so much. They're like, wait, you have more
things left to say, And yeah, I do. I'm so
much to say and it's in there.
Speaker 1: And did you feel like did you feel like some
of those things? Okay, let me speak author to author
for a moment. Okay, when you were writing yeah, because
I know that, I was like, well, I've told my
story a lot of times to people, and then when
I went to actually write my story, I was like, oh,
I forgot about that. Yes, oh totally see, do I
want to tell that story because at this point I
could just not tell that story.
Speaker 2: Yes, oh it's so, yeah, it's can you hear my dog? Yeah?
Oh okay, good, it's so. It was. It was healing,
and it was also terrifying to like sit down and
I'm looking back at my life because most of it
is my story. It's other women's stories too, which I
really wanted to include. But in my story, yeah, I
had to look back and say, like, okay, like where
did alcohol come in? Like what did inform my opinion
and relationship with alcohol? Like what started that? A lot
of it is me going back and telling like part
of my dad's story, right, because that was my story too,
and that's really uncomfortable. He's no longer here, and so
that feels, you know a little like do I want
to keep this for me or I just want to
make sure that I'm i don't know, honoring him in
the best way I can while also really telling how
it was for me to grow up with a dad
who drank a lot for a period of time. And
then yeah, some skeletons that are out there and like
my not great moments, you know, these aren't I'm not like, hey, guys,
these are all the really great decisions I made. No,
this is like, yeah, here's a lot of shit that
I fucked up, you know, in my in my twenties,
and how it titled me the.
Speaker 1: Book that I Fucked Up.
Speaker 2: All the shit that I fucked up, that's a subtitle,
but it's true. And then, you know, I think, because
most of my drinking was before I was a mom,
I guess I kind of thought like, well, we'll just
leave that there, like that party girl, blackout drinker, leave
her there, and then it's not going to affect me
here like in my thirties and forties and as a mom.
And that's just not true, even if I no longer drank.
But and I didn't drink in motherhood the way I
drank in my twenties, but like the way that I
drank in my twenties affected me, affected me even when
I wasn't drinking, and that shame and those stories and
how I would do things that I never would have
done had alcohol not been in the picture. Right, And
so there's a specific story that I write about that
I am confronted very clearly, like as I'm in my
daughter's nursery and rocking her and something from my past
comes back kind of into my current day motherhood, and
it like jolted me and I you know when it
feels like you just get like punched in the gut
and like oh, holy shit, like I had forgotten about that.
And yeah, so there's there's all of that, like kind
of the reckoning of the wreckage that drinking caused in
my twenties.
Speaker 1: Do you feel like because you're making me think of
this for myself? Yeah, I also drank that way in
my twenties, blackout drinker, driving drunk, not really suffering too
many consequences, but not feeling great about myself, wondering like
do I drink too much? Humiliating myself sometimes. But when
I became a mom, I definitely thought, oh, now I'm
going to be this other kind of drinker, this wine drinker.
That's like it's going to be much classier as a model,
it's super classy. Yeah.
Speaker 2: First of all, it's wine, you know what I mean,
which just right there, So I'm just like, yeah, that's
like way different, you guys, way classier the bottles pink.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is now instead of partying, I'm going
to be unwinding.
Speaker 2: Yes, I'm a and like literally a lady who lunches like,
oh yeah during the day, Oh my god, day drinking
is like the most triggering thing to me. Oh my god.
I just don't think there's hell on earth more than
day drinking.
Speaker 1: I have a story in my book about going to
lunch when my older daughter, well, i'd met a mom
at Mommy and me and my daughter Elbie was, you know,
literally like six months old, and I had this other mom.
We were going to go do something and we went
to a Mexican restaurant. I don't know if you've remembered
this from my book, but I was like, well, we're
at a Mexican restaurant and we don't have jobs, and
we're with our babies, so like, obviously we're going to
get a margarita, right, That seems real obvious. And then
my friend was like, oh, not for me because.
Speaker 2: Like I have to drive or some bullshit excuse right,
loser nerd.
Speaker 1: And that was my thinking was just like what is wow?
Like how fun are these people?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: Oh, moms, they suck? Like I can't be friends with
other you know, And this is I think I believe
that she really just wouldn't let me bully her into
getting a margarita, and I did have to just get
one for myself because I was like, well.
Speaker 2: You're like, I'm not going to let you stop me.
Speaker 1: It's fun killer. Yeah, there's a but it seems so
embarrassing looking back, Like looking back, I cringed writing that
story because and I've talked to this is still a
friend of mine, really good, one of my best friends
to this day, and I've many times just been like,
what did you think when I was because I'm not exaggerating,
I really was trying to talk her into it, and
she says, oh, yeah, she just felt bad because she
was like no, But I really am kind of a
lightweight like I because I just feel like, you really
wanted to drink.
Speaker 2: I mean, okay, I'm laughing because I remember that story
in your book and I have a very very similar story.
But my friend did not say no, and we were
then like, well, yeah, obviously this is what we're gonna do.
We don't have to drive anywhere, Like we can walk
from the country club to my house. Keep it going,
you know, bottle of champagne. And that was the only time,
and this was my oldest was like nine months old.
Or ten months old, and so this was the only
time I was blacked out in front of any of
my children. And you know, she was obviously a baby
and didn't know what the hell was going on, and
thank god, nothing happened. Like it was fine, like she
was safe, like my best friend's daughter was safe. But
that moment, oh my god, stuck with me until I
quit drinking. Like from then on, I was like the
master of moderation and I had like the the strictest
boundaries and I controlled alcohol like so well, and I
hated it. It was horrible because the shame was the same,
like with moderation. Even if I was like, yeah, I'll
have two glasses of wine, I still would like just
it was just so wrapped up in shame for me
and the and just the energy it took to do
that and to figure out how to drink in this better,
more classy way, you know. Oh yeah, but that was
the that your story where it stopped. Mine kept going
right there on that night, and then my husband came
home at like, you know, from work, at like six,
and I was like blacked out because that's what happens
in day drinking. Did he know, Oh yeah, he Okay,
this is funny. I don't even know if I wrote this,
but he he was like, oh no, you know, like
what is my wife as like? And and my best
friend was also drunk, like he called her husband like,
we gotta do something about our wives because they're here.
The babies were asleep on the couch, and you know,
our wives are are wasted. And so her husband came together.
Speaker 1: Not funny, but it's kind of funny.
Speaker 2: It's funny now.
Speaker 1: It's funny to me because I relate because we're sober.
It's funny because we're.
Speaker 2: So funny because we are safe and sober and like
have lived to tell the table. You can you can
understand when I come down the next morning, do you
know what my husband did? But I don't know if
this is an asshole move or it's funny. But at
the time, of course, because I was like stee in
shame and like, oh my god, how could I have
let this happen? Right, I'm a mom. Now I'm not
supposed to like I thought I would just be able
to not do that. He had caution tape taped or
round the living room where the.
Speaker 1: Oh god, that's amazing.
Speaker 2: Even worse, I come down to like caution tape, like
like my my living room was like yeah, and it
was a wrack. Oh god it was. That was like
the last time and I had gotten like drunk in mother,
but never around my kids. I then made it like
I don't know, I was it was just like that
was just never going to happen again.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so when you say that it was that
made it it was worse when you're moderating. Why do
you say that because it was just hard to moderate
because you.
Speaker 2: Think, yeah, I think that I always come back to
this like anti grace quote that's ninety nine percent is
a bitch, one hundred percent is a breeze, And that
is so what it is for me, you know. I
just I was convinced that because I wasn't drinking every day,
I wasn't getting black out drunk every time I drank.
I wasn't you know, drinking them all of these things
that we think make us qualified for sobriety. I wasn't that.
And I could. I had so much evidence collected of
why I didn't need to stop drinking, and I just
I thought I had to figure out a better way.
I thought, like I'm an adult and I'm a mom
and I deserve to be able to drink wine, and
so I'm going to figure out how to make this work.
And yeah, it was hard because it's a highly addictive substance.
And like if you have a highly addictive substance in
your life, it's going to take willpower, it's going to
take energy, you know. And some people like the threshold
for that is higher. Mine was very high. Like my
willpower top notch. You know, like when I decide I'm
going to do something, I can kind of just like, yeah,
I'm going to quit sugar, and then I do it.
I Mean we'll talk about that. That's a different story,
but you know, like I can just decide, but it
takes so much. And then I wasn't ever looking at
the shame. And it was the shame around my relationship
with alcohol. And I always consider that like the mold
in the basement and the shame of the stories that
you know, decades of stories I had collected on like
what how I was when I invited alcohol in and
like what it actually took from me because it took
so much. And yeah, and then actually I don't I
didn't black out like around my kids until the last
time I was drinking when I nursed my baby in
a blackout, and that was ten years No, no, not
ten years later, that was five years later then.
Speaker 1: From when you had that caution tape, right, yeah, no,
I mean, and I think that's what this book is about.
And that's why your story speaks to me so much,
and maybe my story speaks to you is because you know,
maybe from the outside looking in, I think it's this
is really interesting and you may find this when you're
When the reviews start coming in, I'm very terrified.
Speaker 2: I know. You gotta help. You got to talk me
through that, because I will talk you through it.
Speaker 1: Don't read them.
Speaker 2: It's it's going to be a dopamine seeking thing though, right.
Speaker 1: Well, look, you're gonna to get reviews from people just
the same way you have on your podcast, where they
love you and they thank you and they see themselves
in your story and that's enough, you know, and some
people are not going to resonate. And for some reason,
those people are going to want to let you know that.
I don't understand what the thinking is. They like yourself,
don't care for something. But you need to really make
sure that the person who did this art created, this
knows that we can't.
Speaker 2: Do anything about that. Like it's it's done, like the
ink is dry, like I can't change it for you, sorry,
like it's done.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I for some reason, And I think it's because
I've written a lot of books. Now, yeah, I it
sometimes it doesn't bother me the same way it used to,
so I can read them and just go like, ah, yeah,
when I wrote Sippy Cups Are Not for Chardonnay, which
was like twenty years ago, now, oh god, those reviews
because people were real mad and that was not a
sobriety book. So but that was people calling me an alcoholic.
Speaker 2: And I really like, wait a second.
Speaker 1: Yeah, But what I was going to say is that
what's really interesting is that some people were like, wow,
I can't believe this girl who wrote this book, this
woman thinks she had like was high functioning. Yes, like
she was so clearly a really bad alcoholic. But then
there's other people that are like, well, she wasn't even
that bad, Like I don't even see why she quit drinking. Yes,
and yes, I think what you're seeing is like it's
it's such a personal thing because I think other women
might have some of the same experiences we had and
not feel a level of shame.
Speaker 2: Yes or just yeah, I think you're totally right, Like
I think I think I can say, like, yeah, I
nursed my baby in a blackout, that's what caused me
to stop drinking. But I didn't hit rock bottom. And
I can completely hear a hundred people saying, hello, that's
rock bottom, right exactly. I think it's all about the
evidence collection, right, and it's all about the like seeing
if you're still in the mind. And this is where
I I'm so careful not to put anyone in the
position to defend alcohol, like I don't want to do that,
and so like, if you are not ready to quit drinking,
well you're probably not going to listen to this podcast
if you're not ready to quit drinking, right, But anyone
in my life, like if they're if anyone's saying like, oh,
you you weren't quote unquote that bad, or you weren't
that bad or some sort of whatever, this amorphous like
finish line we have set for ourselves that says like, yes,
you can now enter into a life without alcohol. Yeah,
Like I think that there will be many people who say, well, no,
you hit rock bottom. But then then on the flip side, Yeah,
like I think that many women, I mean especially now
post COVID and during COVID, moms are drinking more than ever.
I don't think stories like mine and like yours are rare.
I think that we have like set up this like
idea of a normal drinker, maybe as like a I
don't know, take it or leave it or like stop
at one. And that's not how people women, moms especially
are drinking. It's just not like moms are drinking now
more than ever because we've been targeted and because we've
been sold that alcohol will help all of the things
that motherhood brings and that's the biggest lie ever. But yeah,
I think you're right. I gotta get ready.
Speaker 1: I gotta get ready for that people that drink, you know,
a glass of wine. Yeah, not like who we're speaking to, right, Yeah,
So like, let me tell you when my rock bottom,
which was driving drunk. Yeah, let me tell you how
that happened. I go to I'm having a fun time.
You know. The kids are really little. One of my twins,
I still don't remember which one I was with, but
one of them was. They were eighteen months. The twins
and my oldest daughter was four and a half. I'm
going to I'm invited to a friend's house who's having
like a bunch of fun people over. There is a
nanny there who's watching like the younger kids, and there's
like a little trampoline area and there's like it's like
a nice house and she's pouring Martini's. It's it's not
like like when you hear me say that I drove drunk.
I think what people picture is like I just went
to a bar, got wasted and was like driving around
town with my kids.
Speaker 2: Or like you have jack in a paper bag and
you're like swinging it while you're behind the wheel, right,
Like yes, No, it's like.
Speaker 1: No, I didn't not to get drunk. I set out
to like unwind like I always did, and I set
out in my mind to like have a drink, and
this is what I always did. And this is why
it turns out to be my rock bottom is because
it was the clarifying moment of like, oh, I don't
think there'll ever be a time where I really am
able to just have a drink and unwind. I don't
ever want one drink because yeah.
Speaker 2: That's not how it's designed like, it's not designed for
us to want one. And I think that we're not
in the minority of people who like I can think
of like just a few people in my life whoever,
just are like one. I'm good, right, I'll stop. The
majority aren't. Even if it's two, even if it's three,
it's still over the course of time, because of tolerance,
because of how highly addictive it is, it will ramp up.
And so even if you're not starting with five glasses
of wine, right, you're starting with two every night, and
then slowly and slowly it ramps up. And even the
two every night, I mean, you're still gonna especially like
I'm in perimenopause, and like you're gonna wake up at
three am with that spiral of like anxiety and all
of the stuff, like even just feeling dusty and foggy
in the morning when you have to get up and
mother and you need you need to be firing on
if not all cylinders, like three of them.
Speaker 1: Right, and then and then if you feel like you
really need that glass of wine at the end of
the day, then when you wake up with that like anxiety,
you're gonna convince yourself that, like Okay, I'm just gonna
cut I'm not gonna have I think I had too
many last night, but I'm gonna I'm gonna cut it
back to two. Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2: And they didn't eat enough, like that was it. I
just didn't eat enough. Or maybe it's the sugar in
the wine. Maybe I'll just do vodka right because like
or oh my god, I forgot to drink water in between.
Oh my god. Yeah, it's not user aerror. It's it's
just not user airor you knows you're not the problem.
Speaker 1: It's so true. And I think that, you know, we
all convince ourselves. And you know, I had already had
a try at quitting drinking before this incident happened. And
it was like when I decided to drive after having
those drinks, I wasn't thinking like, oh god, I've had
too many drinks. I was feeling good and fine because
you were pretty fine.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you weren't in your the alcohol had taken over
your brain. If you weren't the decision making Stephanie that
you were when you got to that party. The second
though alcohol hits your brain, your decision making is impaired.
I mean you are impaired. Right, and so it's not this. Yeah,
it's not a way that like, well, we just got
to do this better. I just have to continue to
make good decisions even after I'm drinking. It's a different brain,
Like the thing has taken over. I think, yeah, it's
it's any anytime I talk about like moms quitting drinking
and like motherhood and sobriety, I think it can start
to And I always want to make sure it doesn't
sound like I'm saying, like moms, we need to be
our best selves and so we need to stop drinking, right,
Like that's not it, Like there's no like best anything here.
What we have been sold will help us in motherhood
and like get us through and you know, help us
with the relentlessness of it. And just the constant needing
is hurting us, is hurting our mental health and is
getting us away from knowing what we need, and it's
keeping us stuck and quiet, and like there are many
people who are benefiting from us being addicted and quiet,
because when we're in a society who doesn't take care
of moms and who doesn't take the time to say
systematically what do moms need? From the time we have babies,
and then all the way through there's a lot of
people who benefit from us being quiet, and like, I
just got to the point where I was like, that's
the cost is too high now, and so whether that
is maybe it is one one glass of wine, right,
maybe it's two, maybe it's three, it'll it'll ramp up,
but whatever it is, now, if I think what you're
looking forward to at the end of the night is
your glass of wine, I think what we do is
we just stop a second and say, like, what why?
Like what am I? Is it to escape? Which is
totally fine because I want to escape too. Is it
to numb? Is it to cope or conform or like belong? Like,
let's get to the root of the why, and then
let's deal with that, because there are real problems under that, right,
Like you have actual needs that need to be met,
and the highly addictive substance is just masking that while
also causing so much other shit on top of it.
Speaker 1: I think you've just made some really important points and
I want to take that and tell talk to the
people out there who are like, okay, But so, so
let's say I'm a person with some ism to me,
and I'm not doing well moderating, and it is taking
up a lot of it's exhausting to moderate and I
really do want to check out at the end of
the day. Yeah, So how do how do you quit?
Leave the alcohol behind and just not do it? You know?
And what do I replace it with? And I'll start
because I'll say that, you know, I think that's a
really good question. I've imposed that question a lot. Okay,
well how do you do it?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: And like for me, I needed a bunch of support
and I did, you know, go to twelve step meetings
and surround myself with other people who are doing the
same thing. One of the tools that I used was
like calling somebody and just going like, hey, I'm like
kind of hurting right now. I just I'm feeling so anxious,
like I don't know what to do with myself. This
is when I would really have a glass of wine.
And then sometimes I would need to just be talked
through that moment, like yes by another sober person. Yes,
And I have I called a girl that wrote a
book called Mommy Doesn't Drink Here Anymore Rachel Browno. Yes,
And I called her once. Actually I was I ming
her over aol instant messenger, and I was like, I'm dying.
Help me, and she was like, okay, can you get
through like a few minutes? And I, you know, actually
this was like more about Xanax. But the point is
I was sometimes it's minute to minute. Okay, Now what
do I do? Sixteen years later, I'll tell you what's
like different for me, and then I want to hear
what's different for you. What's different for me is not
that I don't need to escape or check out sometimes
because my brain is very busy and I overthink and
I have anxiety and all the things. Right, So it's
not magic. It's not like, oh well, I just don't
drink anymore. It's like, no, I still overdo my phone.
I scroll and scroll, I play games on my phone.
I sometimes use the sugar. But what's changed is it,
instead of using the alcohol to mask the things or
whatever my little escapes are, I actually speak up for myself,
like I don't just try to eat it down, you know,
stuff it down and go No. I don't want to
say this. I don't want to tell my husband this
is bothering me, because then it's going to be it's
too much. Yes, I'm too needy.
Speaker 2: Like I don't want to take up space.
Speaker 1: Yes, now I just go like, you know what, this
is how I'm feeling. This stuff leads to me wanting
to do more of the checking out. So I'm just
going to speak up and say like, hey, I need
more help with this or you know, I used to
not be able to This is like a sobriety. I
used to not be able to tell my husband like, hey,
I need you to walk the dog because I'm busy.
Right now, I'd be like, oh, I'll just do it.
I don't want to put anybody out ever, so I
do I overfunction for everybody. Oh yes, I was drinking.
Speaker 2: That's you right, that's the only way you could do that, right, right.
And when you think about, yeah, that's the cost, the
cost of us, And that's such a relatable story for mine.
It's like, no, I got it, I'll do it. I'll
make that appointment. Oh right, I gotta get this, I
gotta do this. We're shouldering all of that, and the
cost is our mental health. We are last on the list, right,
and we really have to like elbow our way into
the shit and make space for us. And I think
that's part of the and this is kind of what
I do in the book, Like the first half of
the book, and each chapter is a shift from like
a shift from anonymous to a shift from to proudly sober,
or a shift from counting days to sober first or
whatever it is, right, So really like, yeah, it's shifting. First,
the first part of the book is going to shift
how you your entire perspective on alcohol. And so that's
like burn the shit down. So the first half of
the book is burning the shit down, burning the shit
about how we have learned about alcohol. Where did we
get the messaging, what alcohol was going to do for us?
What did it really do for us? Right, we're not lunatics.
What are we getting from alcohol? Like, we're getting something right.
And then the second half is the building. And I
think what you're talking about is the building, and that
takes time and it can be scary to live in
this kind of like barren wasteland of like, well, I
took away what was really useful for me for a
long time, right I and has been a constant in
my life. So you're I'm gonna take alcohol away. You're
not going to get to the building yet. And that's scary.
So there is a lot of that like discomfort period
of even just practicing being uncomfortable. And I talk a
lot about ways in the book how we can practice
being uncomfortable, because I think that's really the key to
all of it. And just like feeling our feelings, because
you guys have promised you I have felt all of
the feelings in sobriety, and like they don't they kind
of just go like you just feel them and then
you fall to your knees and you cry or you
like scream or whatever and feel anxiety and then they
just like leave, they don't stay, and you don't stay
stuck in them. I think that if someone's listening and
she's like, I'm so sick of moderating, like I have.
You know, I've done a dry January, but I've lasted
twenty days and I always just kind of fall back
into this like habitual cycle or maybe it's compulsive or whatever,
it is, just this cycle alcohol keeps coming back. I
think telling someone, like really like telling someone the truth
about alcohol and your feelings about it is step number one.
And that's really scary because we've been like we don't
talk about alcohol, we don't talk about the truth about it,
like because we're afraid that they'll say, like, obviously you
have to report to AA or whatever, you have to
go to rehab or whatever it is, right, Like I right, right,
and like.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call your husband and let it know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you will be on the front page of the
paper with the with the with the right and like
you have to find or reach out or connect if
it's your husband, if it's your best friend, if it's
an online Like that's why I created the Sober Mom
Life Cafe Go where women are telling the truth about
alcohol and begin to tell the truth. And for to
be in the cafe, you can still be drinking. It's
not like you can't. You have to be sober. And
it's very important to start to tell the truth. And
then yeah, I mean it's way leads on to way
in this thing, right, and then you do find ways
to escape, like I escape these days in like I
think music is a huge escape. I can put on
like I can go for a run. I'm a huge runner,
and so I could put on some like you know,
two thousand and seven rap and like go for a run.
And I'm in Atlanta, man, and I'm twenty seven years old,
and I'm or I'm in the clip club like I am,
like I'm right there, like it just reminds me of
a part of me that is still in there. Or
water like water is big for me, like crying in
the shower, cry like you guys, cry if you haven't
cried this week, what are you doing?
Speaker 1: Like some people can't just cry on demand, but I'd
rather like go look up Bonzi. Okay, yeah, watch like some.
Speaker 2: Watch watch Marley and Me or Beaches or yeah, yes,
just like cry put on like I will. I lost
my dad just a year into sobriety, which I talk
a lot about I write about in the book, and uh,
I loved I just a lot. It was almost you guys,
it's gonna sound weird, just like with me. It was
almost like an orgasm, like a good cry. It's like
a wave and I feel it like I am in
my closet. I shut the door, my kids, No, this
is one of my boundaries. If the door is shut
in my closet, don't come in like that is a
that is a she is in there crying.
Speaker 1: You don't want to see this.
Speaker 2: No, you don't know. This is not for anyone's eyes
but mine, okay, and the good Lord like, no, this
is not a safe zone for you. So and I
would feel like this like kind of wash over me.
I would put on a Pirate looks at forty by
Jimmy Buffett, his favorite song, and then I would just cry.
And I still do it, like anytime I feel myself
just like pissy and just like I have a hysterectomy,
so I don't know if it's PMS, but maybe like whatever,
I'm like, oh, I need a closet session, Like I
need to go in there and make myself the status
that I can possibly be to like release, and I
need like we all need that, and I think especially
in early sobriety and as moms, we're afraid of these feelings.
We're afraid of like our big feelings, right of getting angry, resemple, uh, anxious, sad,
all of these things. And it's like no, no, no,
lean in, like that's where the message is. Lean into that.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you. I wanted to bring up something
that that I think is a perfect that this is
a perfect lead into yeah, and that is for okay,
So this is something that I read on your Facebook
group oh, were in there, I mean in your Facebook group? Yeah,
and that's all.
Speaker 2: Is it like the wild Wild West in there, isn't
it wild?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah? Yeah, yeah yeah. It's a big group of
people and a lot of them are anonymous, so I
am not breaking anyone's in an But somebody said that
they were newly sober and they absolutely hate their husband
and and they just they just everything annoys them and
they think and it's very overwhelming feeling. They feel like
maybe they want to get a divorce, you know, because
it's just like so bad. And I think that it's
a really common thing. And what I told this person, so,
I said, you should go watch the movie When a
Man Loves a Woman, the Meg Ryan movie, Meg Ryan,
Andy Garcia classic. I'll tell you why this movie is
great because a lot of movies about people getting sober
are like and then they get sober, and then they
it lasts and then.
Speaker 2: And then everything's all good. Yeah.
Speaker 1: But in a Man Loves a Woman, Meg Ryan goes
to rehab and that's just where the movie like really
gets going because she comes home and she and Andy Garcia,
who we loved at the beginning because he loves her.
He's so cute. He's so like, we so, yeah, it's
really hot. He's really like, how do I make you happy?
I just love being with my wife, you know, And
then she just wants to kill him. When she gets home,
she's like seeing her rehab friends and like she's got
this whole other thing going on, and he just wants
to be like included, and he's not understanding why she's
having a little bit of a temper. Yeah, and her
whole thing is she's so And then there's this line
in there where she says like she's like I don't
want you to touch me or something, and he's like, uh,
forgive me if I want a wife who doesn't like
get grossed out when I try to touch her something
like that. Yeah, they are going to be separated. Mm hmm.
I don't want to, like I don't want to smell
the movie. But I think this is a common issue. Yeah,
and I think a lot of people feel this way.
And I wanted you to like speak to that. That's
sober shift totally.
Speaker 2: I think a lot of women, maybe not a but
I think some women are even afraid to quit drinking
because this might happen. Right if I quit drinking I'm
really going to be confronted by these feelings that I've
I know I'm numbing. I want to numb these feelings
because these are very uncomfortable feelings. I'm annoyed by him.
Maybe then his drinking is going to bother me, right,
And I can't tell you, like if you quit drinking,
your partner will then follow suit. I can tell you
that you just never know what's going to happen. But yeah,
I think it is common. You know, it's kind of
like after having a baby, and you know, around that
like I don't know three four or five week mark,
that you're just going to hate your husband and you're
gonna want to leave him, and like you're gonna be
like you are useless, like you're not like even if
you have a great husband, right, Yeah, And I think
that these are really important feelings and these are messages
that we can I mean, therapy helps. Therapy helps a
whole lot to help you kind of decipher. Okay, I
hate my husband, Well, let me let me like dig
into that. What do what do I hate? What does
this hate mean? Like? Am I feeling like I need
a boundary? Like my boundary is no one touches me
after five pm. Okay, it's a hands like my kids,
you know. But yeah, I'll like hug my husband when
he gets home, give them a smooch. But then I'm
not I don't want to cuddle. I don't want to
like I have been like poked and prodded, especially you
know during break when they're off I have they hang
on me like it starts to make my skin crawl.
And I don't want my people to make my skin crawl.
And so then I will say, you, guys, I am
touched out, like I just I need my space. This
is my safe space around me, and no one's well
in it, right, And that sounds maybe bitchy, but that
makes me a better Like that makes it so that
I'm not resentful of him. I think, you know, when
we are so used to kind of swallowing down our
needs and our feelings of the unpleasant ones that we're feeling,
that causes resentment, and like resentment is a huge sign
that you need a boundary. And so what's what I
would just try to with the help of the therapist
or with your husband, if if you know you have
that kind of relationship, like hey, like my husband I
have these not so much anymore like we've got it,
you know, we're clicking along, but early on it's like, yeah,
this is really really bothering me. Like I hate when
you have three beers at golf. I hate it. I'm
fine with two. That was my boundary. I'm not okay
with three beers.
Speaker 1: And so and well tell me more. Yeah, because of
the way, because of how the change.
Speaker 2: I think, because of how I grew up with my
dad who drank. I think that then I'm you know,
if you grew up with a parent who drinks, you're
you're like super vigilant and like you're very You're just
you're just I'm just like always very observing how people
are acting, especially when there's alcohol involved. And so then yes,
I could really see a difference and no hard liquor
like because that I could feel like there was an
edge that I didn't like. And I don't want an edge,
like especially if I'm sober. Like no, I just that
was a hard line for me. And so yeah, what
so two beers and it was amstelt lights and he's
a huge guy, like he's like six one pounds, so
it's not like two. I was like okay, three I
didn't like and it took a while. It was like
more than one conversation, these boundaries that we start to
have with our partners. You know, I knew that I
kind of flipped the script on him, like I was like,
just one day, I was like, I'm done drinking. I
didn't ask him. I wasn't like, hey, what do you
think if I was like, no, no, no, your input
is not needed because this is for me and this
is something I want to do. But it affected him, right,
and so then I had to kind of work with that.
He now is sober like a year and four months
or something, which just right, you guys wild, like I
would never have never have thought that's would have happened. Yeah,
so he started hating you after he got sober. Oh
my god, I wonder, oh I should ask him. I'm
gonna ask him. I'm gonna have him back on the
podcast not long.
Speaker 1: We all drink to tamp down some feelings, so and
having those feelings is uncomfortable and the person that you
live with, maybe yeah, the cause of you know of
some feelings that we're tamping down. I mean, and I
can't tell you right, So then you just feel raw
irritation and me, I think the only way through that
is to just have some conversations and you can just say,
I don't know, I'm feeling like super irritable right now,
and you know, like you said, make some boundaries or
just say like, hey, I need to be able to
tell you that I don't love it when you do
this or when I or or just start asking for
what you need or yeah, listen, maybe you're going to
see some things that you don't like, or maybe you're
going to give your spouse an opportunity to meet you
where you're at and you're going to be pleasantly surprised.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's the you know, that's the terrifying amazing
thing about this whole all of it, Like we get
to we get to experience new things like I quit
drinking when I was thirty nine, and like to just imagine,
like I didn't really know how to feel. If you
have alcohol in your life on a consistent basis, feelings
are gonna feel scary and new and just that idea
of like, oh my god, at thirty nine, I'm learning
how to feel and I'm learning what that means and
all of that like learning how to be bored and like,
what do I want to do with my time now
and my brain power and my mental energy now that
I'm not thinking about alcohol instead? Yeah, and talk about alcohol. Oh,
I know, I have ideas create a podcast and then
we'll just talk about alcohols.
Speaker 1: Well, I do love talking you know.
Speaker 2: Me too, It's so good. But yeah, it's it's terrifying,
but it's like the best kind of terrifying.
Speaker 1: It really is the best kind of terrifying. Yeah, and
you know, now is a great time. I'm not trying
to tell anybody what to do, obviously, but now's a
really good time to experiment with quitting drinking because there
is a lot of acceptance help Facebook groups, podcasts to
listen to.
Speaker 2: Uh, you know, yeah, you're not like a leopard now,
No one's going to be like, wait, I'm sorry, what
Like it's a cool like you guys were making it cheic, Like,
sobriety is chic and we're doing that. Yeah, Stephanie and
I have made it chic. Let me check, Yes, it
is chic. Okay, We've got it. So like yeah, now
is I mean I can't even imagine when you quit
and now even from when I quit, it's night and day.
So like when you quit, there was there was none
of that.
Speaker 1: I quit during blogging times. This was like this might
as well have been like the seventies because it was
like the the world was just full of bloggers and
they were all drinking and blog names like Mommy needs
her vodka or whatever, and I was just like, I
am going to be out of the girls club. But
it was honestly very surprising because a lot of people
were like, hell, yeah, I think I need to quit too,
and a bunch of people I don't want to take
all the credit.
Speaker 2: You should both, yeah, take take all of it.
Speaker 1: A lot of bloggers were like, oh shit, maybe I
have a problem too, And then a bunch of us
started to get sober.
Speaker 2: See you guys, we have Stephan need to think for real. No,
but it's true. Here's the thing, Like when I quit drinking,
I wanted to see like badass women who were sober
like I didn't. I wanted to see someone like me.
I wanted to see someone who I could look to
and be like, oh she's cool and she's not drinking
and that's you, and so like we do need yeah,
thank you.
Speaker 1: Well that it was I was the person who probably
caused a lot of women to drink, so like hopefully,
but I'm the same way. I wanted to see women
who who are sober because they used to drink too
way too much or they fucked up, not because they
love Jesus, you know.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, oh that's a whole other podcast I could talk.
Speaker 1: But like not because they're pious and they believe that
it's morally bad.
Speaker 2: I don't know, because we've seen some shit, you know,
We've always seen and done some shit and like we
come out the other side. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So the book is The Sober Shift.
Speaker 2: The Sober Shift.
Speaker 1: The release date is September thirtieth, thirtieth. Yeah, tell you that, Yes,
September thirtieth. You can. It's on pre sale right now,
and Suzanne and her publisher and publicists will be so
happy if you just like hit that pre order.
Speaker 2: Guys, I will. Oh and actually there's like incentives too.
You will get uh, you'll get three mocktails, one that's
not in the book, because the book does include ten mocktails,
and so you'll get one that's not in the book.
And then also you'll be included in a zoom with
me at some time in October, and so I wanted
to like hang out.
Speaker 1: Hell yeah, yeah right, So tell give us the You're
so the book available everywhere?
Speaker 2: Yep, and you can. Yeah, it's available everywhere you find books.
The best place to go is go to Suzanne ware
dot com and then that's where you can see you'll
see where to get the book. You'll see like I'm
going on a little tour, a.
Speaker 1: Little na tour.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'll get I'll tell you, Okay, we're we're firming
it up now. I'm going to so I have one
here in Chicago and one net cut at the bookstall
that's on pub day, and then I'll be in Indie
the next day. I'll get all all of the too.
I believe, Boston, d C, Santa Monica to Zibby. I know, kid,
you come, I'll tell you. Okay, hopefully it's.
Speaker 1: Not on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday.
Speaker 2: You know it is. I think it is, of course, Sure.
Speaker 1: It's not on a Sunday.
Speaker 2: Oh it's not. I think they're all either of Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.
Speaker 1: We'll find out. Oho I teach. I teach my writing
class on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. But from five to seven.
But we'll see, we'll see. Okay, maybe it's a week
in between.
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe it's on a Monday. That one might be
on a Monday.
Speaker 1: Well, then I'm in.
Speaker 2: I'll tell Okay, good, I'll tell you. And then one
more seattle exciting Yeah, I know, Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: All right, we'll go pick up the book. You can.
Speaker 2: They can follow you on the instagram, follow me on
the instagram at susay and where.
Speaker 1: I okay, and I will put that in the episode description.
And you also have the Sober mom is.
Speaker 2: A Sober mom life yep, the Sober Mom Life podcast.
Speaker 1: And the podcast is the Sober Mom Life. I have
been on it. It's an amazing podcast. Thank you so yeah,
you have all the things. Thank you so much. I
so helpful to some people.
Speaker 2: I do too. I hope so too. And just know
you're not alone. That's and that it's so much better
on this side. It's just it just all right, thanks everybody.
Speaker 1: Bye, it's done. Good