The Inviting Shift Podcast
Embrace the authentic, confident you so you can feel good in your skin and have deeper relationships. The Inviting Shift Podcast focuses on how we step through this messy journey of life confidently so we can feel good about how we show up, have more connected relationships and connect to purpose and meaning. Or in short, how we manifest the lives we crave in practical, tangible ways.
The Inviting Shift Podcast
S3E10: Navigating Midlife Health and Happiness on the Sober (Curious) Path
Have you ever wondered what life could be like without alcohol, even if you don't hit rock bottom? Our guests, Laura Valvasori and Sarah Williamson, illuminate the empowering journey of becoming "sober curious," a path that invites us to reconsider our relationship with alcohol before it becomes a crisis. Laura and Sarah share their personal transformations, revealing how an alcohol-free lifestyle improved their overall well-being in ways they never imagined especially in midlife. Their stories remind us that sobriety is not just a response to addiction but can be a proactive choice to enhance life quality and personal fulfillment.
OUR GUESTS:
Laura Valvasori is a Business & Well-Being Mentor who helps women see what is possible, simplifies their path forward, and empowers them to live their best lives. As a multi-passionate entrepreneur who lives intuitively, Laura is the founder of Good to Grow Marketing, the creator of Still Me, But Alcohol-Free, the author of Good to Grow: Cultivate Your Mindset and Habits to Thrive as an Entrepreneur and a Certified Emotion Code Practitioner. Laura lives in Oakville, Ontario with her husband, two teenagers and dog Remy.
Laura has put together this guide of her favorite non-alcoholic mocktails.
Connect with Laura: Website | Instagram | Facebook
Sarah Williamson is a coach, trainer, public speaker, podcaster and published author. She has spent the last 15 years coaching and mentoring people who've struggled with their addictions and mental health, she feels that choosing to change your relationship with alcohol before you hit rock bottom is a powerful and positive choice to make and the choices you can make are not necessarily black or white. Sarah is passionate about spreading the message that our lives can be joyful and fun on the other side of our drinking careers and we don’t need to get hung up on what other people think of us if we choose to drink less or not at all.
Sarah offers her complimentary 5-Day Drink Less; Live Better experiment for you right here.
Connect with Sarah: Website | Instagram | Facebook | Podcast
HOST:
Christina Smith is a life coach specializing in confidence and self-love in midlife.
CONNECT with Inviting Shift & Christina:
Instagram | Facebook | Email me
FREE GIFT: The Confidence Tool Kit is here to help you walk into the second half like a queen (because you are one already). Get it here.
TUNE IN wherever you listen to podcasts:
Welcome back to the inviting shift podcast. This week we are going to talk about something that has really been something that I've been thinking about for the last few years, especially as perimenopause symptoms have hit me pretty harshly is alcohol intake and, you know, being sober curious. I love this word that we've come up with, and what I love about this topic and the beautiful woman that I have here is this isn't about having to hit rock bottom all the time. This doesn't even have to do with. You may not be an alcoholic, but you may just be looking at, wow, how is alcohol actually impacting my body and impacting my life?
Christina Smith:And so, with that, I just want to introduce our two really lovely women that are going to be here. We have this international connection here. Laura Valvasori and Sarah Williamson are going to be just chatting with me about being sober curious and what happened for them when they decided to not do alcohol anymore. So, without any further ado, I just want them to introduce themselves so they can tell you a little bit about themselves. Laura, how about you? Thank you for being here.
Laura Valvasori:Thank you for having me. I'm very excited. It's nice to have this international connection. I'm coming to you right now from Northern Ontario, so representing Canada in this conversation, and I'm a business and well-being mentor and I've created a program called Still Me, but Alcohol-Free, and it's based on my experience of going alcohol-free from a place of wanting more well-being and better health, not because of addiction, and for me, as you mentioned, perimenopause, that was really the trigger for me to start looking at my own intake of alcohol.
Laura Valvasori:I was not what would be considered an alcoholic, I was a social drinker and we have an active social life and around 43, I think, I was starting to sense that alcohol just wasn't agreeing with me anymore. But I did not want to admit that because I very much enjoyed my white wine and I was starting to experience some symptoms like anxiety that was coming out of nowhere. I was experiencing a lot of heartburn and just kind of digestive issues and not sleeping great and I, as I said, I was starting to suspect it was the alcohol, but I didn't want to admit it. So I did everything else that I could to try to combat it. I'd go to the natural path and I'd take supplements and I'd do all the things. And it got to a point, after a three-week vacation that we were on um, I'm coming to you right now from our boat. We have a boat as a family and we had taken a three-week boat trip and I drank every day on that vacation because it was a vacation and I wasn't drunk but I was, you know, having a cocktail or a caesar in the morning and a cocktail in the afternoon, and some wine was in it all. It was just sort of steadily drinking.
Laura Valvasori:And by the end of that three weeks I felt horrible and I felt like it was the build-up that made me realize that I had to make a change and to try as an experiment, going alcohol-free, to see how it impacted.
Laura Valvasori:So I didn't set a timeline, I just decided for a while I would quit and I would come at it from a mindset of not from being deprived but focusing on more well-being. And the shift was so dramatic for me the heartburn disappeared within the first week, my sleep changed, the anxiety decreased. So many positive things started happening that I thought I can't not continue to do this. So I just sort of kept going for a little longer, a little longer, a little longer, and that was four years ago at this point and it has just become a way of life for me that I don't really even think about other than when we're having these conversations, because my identity is just shifted to being someone who doesn't drink and I don't feel like I'm missing out on something or need something. It's just sort of who I am at this point.
Christina Smith:Thank you, wow, thank you. I don't think these are the stories that we're used to hearing about people who give up alcohol, which I think is like so amazing, right, we always think it has to be like those people who really messed up their lives. They're no longer going to work, they're you know, they're, they're, uh, abusing their family, like all of these types of thing, and so I really love that we're sharing these stories, because they're very relatable, I think, for so many women um rather than severe addiction stories.
Christina Smith:So, sarah, tell us a little bit about you. Thanks for being here.
Sarah Williamson:It's lovely to join you today. From just outside London in the UK, my business is called Drink Less, live Better, and I've got a story that is really quite similar to Laura's. I had spent about 15 years working in local government. One of the things that I did in my role was talking to young people pretty much all day, every day, about their substance use and misuse, and I hadn't realised that I'd really blocked off in my head that because of the substances the young people I was working with might not have been available to purchase legally. My substance of choice, which was white wine fizz gin available to buy in the supermarket, was not any kind of problem, but I definitely got to that point where I really recognised I was doing myself a disservice with how much I was drinking. I was also doing all the green smoothies, the yoga, the going for a run, buying the supplements and sometimes even taking them. The idea that I was adding all of these things in that were costing either time, money. All of these things in that were costing either time, money, energy or a combination of all of those things, and at the end of the day, necking that toxin started to not quite make sense to me anymore, and so, rather than the keep adding new things in, I decided to run this experiment of taking the alcohol out and it really was experimental to see how it felt. And I gave myself full permission um that I could go back to drinking at any point if I wanted to. I don't um view myself as never drinking again. I don't like hard and fast rules and boundaries in my life, so I choose not to drink. I'm not in any way attracted to alcohol anymore, but I just happen not to say I'm never drinking again, because that was a lie. I told myself. Every single hangover I ever had, I said I'm never drinking again, and of course, what I meant was I'm never drinking again until Thursday. I'm never drinking again, and of course, what I meant was I'm never drinking again until Thursday. So giving myself the permission to see how I would feel without alcohol, discovering how much better I did feel and choosing to carry on with that, has been such a gift.
Sarah Williamson:I think all of those messages that we receive media films, stories around that rock bottom around you know, getting a drink, driving offence, losing your job, blowing up your relationship All of you know somebody had to go into rehab or medical detox, whatever the drama filled story is. Or medical detox, whatever the drama-filled story is stories that get the spotlight, almost. And actually these are the stories where they're told that somebody is backed into a corner. They had to stop drinking, they were told to stop drinking and over here there's a real quiet corner of the world that is getting louder.
Sarah Williamson:That's saying, actually guess what? It's an empowering choice. It doesn't have to have anything to do with anyone else telling you what to do or advising you that this is best for you. This can just be a really quiet decision that you make and you get to design in your own way as you go along. And my story was one of significantly cutting down my drinking, drinking less over a period of time before I got to the point where I stopped and I wouldn't have had the language for it at the time.
Sarah Williamson:But now I reflect on it and recognize, you know, this was a period of me really successfully moderating my drinking. It was a period of harm reduction. It was a time in which I went from drinking if I was out with my girlfriends, you know, a whole bottle of wine to myself to if ever I went out with my girlfriends, drinking a maximum of two glasses of wine a month on an evening. And some people might say, oh you know, look at that person over there drinking two glasses of wine on a night out. She hasn't got any kind of problem. There's nothing to see here. She doesn't need telling to stop drinking.
Sarah Williamson:But for myself, I just knew I was not feeling great even with that small amount of alcohol. So I'm excited to have this conversation. Like you, I love that idea of sober curiosity. Christina. That wasn't something, you know, that wasn't language. That was in my head five years ago and I love now that this is a much more, I think, all-encompassing conversation that we can have that takes in everything, that's the shades of grey in between the hard black and the hard white.
Christina Smith:Yeah, thanks for sharing all that. Wow, yeah, so this is really about us being actually just more conscious of our own well-being. I think at least that's what it's been for me, and you know, to be just outright and honest with the audience, I am not sober at this moment.
Christina Smith:I mean, I'm sober in this moment, but I am not. I'm not on a sober lifestyle right now. I have been really curious. I am like Sarah, where I've cut down right and to the point where some people would look at me and be like, ah, she doesn't have a problem, like that's I mean. So what? She has a cocktail and she's out to dinner, like that's not a big deal, right, and it's again, it's not a big deal. I've never, like not gone to work because I was drinking. I've never you know, I've never abused family and blamed it on the alcohol. Um, none of those things have happened. And yet, um, what?
Christina Smith:What has happened for me is in the last two or three years, I've learned that if I drink alcohol the week before my menstrual cycle starts, I am feeling ill. When it starts, like, I have chills, I have sweats, my heart starts like doing that pounding thing, I feel nauseous and bad, and so like. So I guess there are like a week and a half to two weeks out of the month where I choose not to drink alcohol at all because it does not feel good in my body. And that's what motivates me the most, because I'm really against the whole white knuckling everything. I don't like to white knuckle things. I have done that in the past with things like when I was smoking. You know, I was like, oh, it felt like a white knuckling of letting go of that habit until I found a way and it's more like what you guys are saying is like I found this way of going. Wow, when I don't do that, I actually feel better. I can go up the stairs and not be winded, I can.
Christina Smith:And that's what I'm learning with the alcohol is like when I don't drink the alcohol, my perimenopausal symptoms are so much less and so I've started drinking less and less. And I am sober, curious. I am curious about like, when will I start my journey of being of just saying, hey, I'm not going to do that, it's not going to be today, it's my birthday. Saying, hey, I'm not going to do that, it's not going to be today, it's my birthday, and um doesn't mean that it can't be in the future, but I would say, um, both of you work with people who are really um, sober, curious, and what would you say are some of the symptoms that they come to you and they're like, maybe alcohol is not fitting in my life that they come to you and they're like maybe alcohol is not fitting in my life.
Laura Valvasori:I'll start so. I feel like a lot of the women the women in my program are midlife as well, so there's a lot of talk about sleep problems. Joint pain and general inflammation in the body is another one that comes up a lot, and anxiety I'd say those are the three that come up most frequently. And as people go through the program, I take them through a process where we um, we make a list of all the symptoms you're going to track. So what are you experiencing now and then throughout the time, because it's it's sometimes hard to notice when you're having small shifts and improvements. So being mindful about it helps. You see oh wait a second I am sleeping a lot better. I did have less of the anxiety. My knuckles feel better and they were always sore when I got up.
Laura Valvasori:So those, I think, are the top sort of physical things. And then I think that the other thing that comes up a lot is the mental brain chatter, that the other thing that comes up a lot is the mental brain chatter. So for women who are feeling like they need to explore their relationship, it's not something that happens overnight. It's usually something that's been building up for a while. They're starting to think about it and feel uncomfortable and and make commitments to themselves to not drink tonight, but then go out and have a drink and then beat themselves up. And so I think they get to the point where this mental chatter starts becoming so much of a weight that they're willing to look at what's happening in their life. Sarah, what's your experience?
Sarah Williamson:Yeah, definitely similar to that. I think those are some of the initial points that come out. I think it's so great to be able to point to almost the quick, the quick things that happen. You know people sleep improves really quickly right.
Sarah Williamson:Also skin you know the breakouts that you might have been having and not recognizing what they were to do with the idea. I think it's really important when we start having conversations about values, you know, and people will talk to me about how much they care for themselves in terms of exercise, nutrition, and then start questioning that point around oh, and then at the end of the evening I neck that toxin and where people are prepared to come to the truth or not, around the idea that alcohol is a poison and some people are going to be really resistant to that because it almost takes the fun and the edge off that thing that they weren't really enjoying. So I think the values piece is important and also increasingly I'm having conversations with my clients about what they're modelling for their kids. So my children are 16 and 17. Very happy that in my household they have got a parent who drinks nothing at all and a parent who does drink beers from time to time, and I like the idea that my kids see in their household that drinking isn't the default.
Sarah Williamson:It's not what you have to do If you have a stressful day at work. You don't have to come home and pour a glass of wine or crack open a beer. There are other ways of emotionally dealing with perhaps that overload, that overwhelm. Maybe you know the stress that's going on in your life and we can tell our kids as often as we like all the information we might want them to hear, but our kids are watching every single thing that we do and modelling for them A way that I would think to myself in the future. If I'm watching one of my kids have a tough time, I who knows whether they'll be having a drink or not having a drink whilst they're dealing with that hard time? But I enjoy the idea at the moment that I won't have taught them a default mode is pouring a drink hmm, I'll build on that.
Laura Valvasori:It's um. It's an interesting conversation because I have a 17 and 19 year old and so I also agree that I'm I'm modeling for them and my husband continued to drink. He's reduced his drinking, but he does still um have wine and beer from time to time. And my daughter is at university and she's 19 and she drinks. And if I were to say to her, I can tell her everything, all of the scary stuff in my program, I can tell her all the facts. I know that it's not going to mean anything to her at this point in her life, but she has seen me make the shift and I feel like it's part of a life experience that she's having right now and that she will, I'm hoping, come to an understanding early in her life about what alcohol is and how it fits into her life.
Laura Valvasori:But I think it's important to know that you can't just push this down someone's throat. You can't be like I'm the alcohol-free advocate, oh my gosh, because it is. When you start learning all the science you're like, oh my God. I want to tell everyone this and everyone should know, because I didn't know even when you mentioned. Alcohol is a poison, it's a toxin. I did not know that. I knew it wasn't good for you, but I didn't know that it was actually a neurotoxin, that is, a known carcinogen. So I think it becomes about role modeling and doing what's right for you and knowing that it'll have a ripple effect on people in the time that they're ready to receive it yeah, would I?
Christina Smith:so for me, my mother did not drink. She maybe, if she has two cocktails a year, like that's a big, that's a valor year for like, that's a big, that's a valor year for her, that's the most alcohol that I've seen her drink. Um, and I really didn't drink that much up until the pandemic happened. And then we were like home all the time. We weren't going anywhere Cause I was always like designated driver, cause I would drink the least and um, but once I was home and I got really comfortable with the vodka, I realized after like a year I was like Ooh, that's a lot, like that's a lot.
Christina Smith:And so, um. So I've had to look at like, what, where are my levels? And then, of course, perimenopause came and kicked my butt and was like um, maybe you gotta look at this a little closer. I've gotten much better, which I really. I appreciate that, and I feel like I'm in one of those women that are just about to say yes, to like a coach, like one of you, who would be like okay, now you're ready, right. So and I love that you mentioned that it's not like we notice, oh, this thing's bad for me, I'm not doing this anymore.
Laura Valvasori:I wish it was so easy, like that Right.
Christina Smith:But unfortunately, like we have to, I I at least. For me, I have to test waters. I'm a very late adopter. My husband is like the opposite, like if he tries something and he feels great about it, he'll do it every day for the rest of his life, or not do it, whatever the thing is. And I'm like I need to know that it's proven, that's tested. I want to make sure that I'm getting something out of it and I have noticed that, um, when I don't drink during my period and taking care of myself at the same time in other ways, like the, the motivation is no longer to white knuckle it. It's more like, oh, I want more of that. Oh, I had more energy today, I want more, I slept better last night, I want more of that. And so what?
Christina Smith:I think, laura, when you were talking about these like little shifts you know I do the same thing with my clients overconfidence, or having hard conversations, or self-validation. It's like these come in tiny, bite-sized things and sometimes they don't come until like we've had that cocktail and then we're like, oh, that was not a good idea, like I don't really. Or we wake up the next morning and like why did I? Why did I have those cocktails? I knew I wasn't going to feel good, I knew I had to do things today and here I am, you know, not feeling great. So I think sometimes we do have to go through things enough.
Christina Smith:But I think the important part is, you know, just even just starting to be mindful about it is what I'm hearing about from both of you is like just noticing, like even if you're not going to change any of your habits right now, just starting to be mindful and going, hmm well, how does this drink feel? Am I? How does this? And when I quit smoking, it was like the same thing, right, like how does it feel at first? You know, if I haven't had a cigarette all day to have that one cigarette that I thought I needed, and that's when I was like, oh, actually it kind of tastes gross, it kind of, you know, makes me feel a little nauseous at first and like all of those things start adding up.
Christina Smith:So what do we think that the first steps? Like if I was like I've gotten to the point that maybe Sarah has gotten to where she's like, ah, I'm just going to do this for a while and if, after X amount of time, I find it's not helping or, you know, I'm not getting any benefit from it, I'm going to give myself permission to go back. But what is, what are the sort of the first steps that you think that, um, women or anybody might need? I'm speaking specifically to midlife women because, let me tell you, you didn't even know how exacerbated the alcohol is making the symptoms I think the important first steps is around recognizing um why you're doing some of your drinking.
Sarah Williamson:So an example of that for me would have been that some of my drinking was habitual drinking. I had a particular Thursday night, one gin and tonic habit and that was particularly tied up in the job that I finished doing every Thursday the crystal glass that I poured it into the slice of lime, the chink of the ice out of the freezer. The gin, the tonic, leaning back against the kitchen counter and taking that first thirsty gulp and thinking that it felt so fabulous. So I would say that part of my drinking was habit. Say that part of my drinking was habit. Um, there was another part of my drinking that was about the let loose girlfriends, cocktails, dinner out type drinking. Um, and definitely there was another type of drinking.
Sarah Williamson:Funnily enough, it's the anniversary this week of one of my best friend's husbands. Um died in 2019 and the worst glass of wine I ever drank in my life was at the wake after his funeral and that you know. I now recognize all the emotion that was. It probably was a rough glass of wine anyway, but all of the emotion that was tied up in that time and how completely and utterly devastated and emotionally bankrupt I felt at that moment and how I thought that the alcohol might have taken the edge off what was going on. And of course we know how the story ends, probably because I did not stop at one glass of wine on that occasion. For me it was really useful in the beginning looking at which were the habits and finding gentle ways to start unpicking that.
Sarah Williamson:So if I give my Thursday gin and tonic habit, I hadn't recognized just how dehydrated I was on an average day and I was at that point in my life I was not drinking enough water, um, and so I made a very conscious shift to make sure, before I left the office to drive home, I was drinking 500 milliliters of water. On the way home, I was drinking a bottle of water, and what a huge difference it made to not feeling incredibly thirsty come five, six o'clock when I was cooking dinner, and I also made sure to start eating a really decent snack at 4pm in the afternoon also made sure to start eating a really decent snack at 4pm in the afternoon. So what that really beautifully did was take the edge off that five, six o'clock drink pouring time that I wasn't wanting to chew my arm off because I was starving, hungry and I was feeling really well hydrated. So that was about taking care of myself earlier on in the day to protect five, six o'clock version of myself, and what I then did was swap out the gin for alcohol-free gin, and what it turned out was a lot of that drink.
Sarah Williamson:Boring time was about the ritual, almost the ceremony, of that. This is my moment in the kitchen now. This is me changing gear on my day. This is me going from work into home mode and just making that switch. It turned out it was less about the alcohol and more about the being present with who I was in that moment. And then I guess for some of the other areas in my life where I was considering what I thought drinking was doing for me was considering, for example, the who nights out type of drinking. Was I actually really enjoying those activities anyway? Really enjoying those activities anyway? So was I perhaps drinking to make a slightly intolerable social situation tolerable? Was I actually better off just not going to that event in the first place, because I didn't really want to go in the first place? So exercising my no muscle became useful. Um, and.
Sarah Williamson:I guess, around some of the heavier stuff you know, using alcohol to take the edge off things. You know, alcohol it really. They say one of the best things about stopping drinking is feeling your feelings and one of the worst things about stopping drinking is feeling your feelings. So, yeah, for me, a a journey that has taken many different avenues over the last five years has involved getting closer to some of that stuff which at times has felt really uncomfortable, really edgy, but I think I'm more in touch with a more authentic version of myself than I was perhaps before.
Christina Smith:I love that you say that, because when we think about it, we know that alcohol numbs right. That's why some of us drink is to self-medicate, to become numb to whatever's going on. But when we do that, we also lose the access to the feelings that we really crave, which is love, joy, happiness. We're also numbing that, so it's like it's really kind of counter defeating. You know, it's counterintuitive to what, what we actually could be doing, which, again, yeah, the hardest and the best part, I'm sure, is feeling your feelings again.
Christina Smith:And that can be really challenging, if you know, for women who have gone years and years and years without doing that, and and I so relate to the habit it's like, oh, it's six o'clock, you know it's okay to have a cocktail now, and it's like, and that's what I could be doing for the rest of the night If I'm not conscious of just being like well, what else would I want to do? Like you're saying, sarah, like what else would I want to do? Maybe I don't want to go to these networking cocktail parties, maybe I would rather go sit in a book club, but I wouldn't do that while I was drinking, because reading and drinking at the same time doesn't seem nearly as much fun, does it? But I can be more intellectual when I'm not drinking and I read a lot more.
Christina Smith:So how lovely Cause. It's like you really got to know yourself, and what is it that I actually like, instead of just going in this mundane pattern of like okay, have the cocktail, it's Thursday night time to go out to dinner with my friends, all of that. How about you?
Laura Valvasori:Laura, I think I agree with all of what Sarah shared. I think that I would add thinking about your mindset in the beginning is really important, because I think that coming at it from a place of curiosity and being like an outside observer to your own behaviors can be really helpful. So when you're talking about those habits that are like the drinking without thinking, the ritual of, I just come home on a Friday night and pour a drink, because that's what I always do, noticing that you do that and then understanding what is it that I'm actually trying to achieve in this, as you said, like the shift of the day. Or for me it might have been sitting down with my husband and pouring a glass of wine together and it's the connection that I was looking for. So, similar to you, I have a lot of non-alcoholic alternatives and it's more about what's. It's not about what's in my glass, it's about what is created.
Laura Valvasori:So we use alcohol in kind of two scenarios. One is that the happy, celebrating, connecting, belonging, and then there's the coping and dealing with life. So for me, the happy celebrating that sense of belonging, for me non-alcoholic replacements have been supportive and for some people, particularly if there's an addiction problem, that's not always recommended but for me, from a wellness perspective, it gives me a lot of ability to still connect with people, feel like I'm a part of it, still stay within kind of the celebration of what it is, and then on the other side, on the coping, you're right, all the feelings come up and there's a lot of different types of well-being practices that can support you to deal with those things instead of turning to the glass of wine or the beer or whatever your drink of choice is. So in my program I brought people in to help people understand some of the different modalities, like bite-sized little practices of meditation and yoga and hypnosis and tapping and all different things that you can just have like a quick little thing that you can turn to if you're trying to deal with a stressful situation. Or simple things like having a bath instead of going and doing having a drink to try to calm your nervous system if you've had some kind of argument with someone or something.
Laura Valvasori:So I think that I would always advise people to just remember to stay curious and not and not beat yourself up, so you might have a drink at the beginning when you're trying to nod and if you think well, now I've failed and I might as well not even keep going. No, that's actually just evidence. That's just an experience that you had. Okay, well, why did I do that? Like? What was it that drove that behavior? So just continuing to learn and give yourself some grace as you go through the process and just staying curious and open.
Christina Smith:I love that you say about the having the wine with your husband and like and being really mindful about why you're drinking, cause some people think that all you have to do is replace that with a non-alcoholic drink and like. Of course that fixes it. But a lot of people, a lot of us I'll speak for myself, maybe me like I know, like, for me alcohol is the quickest way to get there, right, and and if I don't use my tools, I can easily say I need that alcohol, but I love how you're like. But you have to know exactly what you're looking for. You weren't looking for a buzz, you were looking for connection in some times, right, and I think a lot of us aren't looking for the buzz, like some of us, like you said, when it gets to coping, just trying to shut down those feelings, when really you know what is it that those feelings really want. They want us to look at them and go, wow, what's coming up for me and why is this coming up for me?
Christina Smith:And so having the help of a coach or a therapist or somebody who can help you kind of look at those feelings, even like a women's circle, finding better ways to manage those feelings might be just all that you need, or or finding you know why. Why is it that I'm drinking? So that's what I'm hearing is the biggest step is just to be start becoming mindful of, like you know, as I'm reaching for that glass of wine like why? Why am I reaching for this glass of wine right now Instead, instead of you know doing x, y or z instead and really finding out what is the underlying thing, not just the oh well, you know, it's like it's five o'clock. That's not the only reason you're grabbing that alcohol, right?
Sarah Williamson:yeah, it's so easy, isn't it, just to say, oh, it's because it's five o'clock, instead of the truth of the situation.
Sarah Williamson:And I really remember feeling quite full of, I think, probably shame and guilt around what one of my big emotions that I was struggling with at the time was one around isolation and loneliness.
Sarah Williamson:Isolation and loneliness, and a online sober community that I was in I used to see that people would post ideas of things to do at five o'clock or six o'clock, essentially in fractions, um, and it might say you know, there might be a list of somebody saying, oh, these are the things that I do to help me, and I go for a run around the block or I put on my favorite TV show, or I get in the bath or I light a scented candle or da-da-da-da-da, and because I couldn't say or wouldn't say out loud, but I'm feeling really lonely, great idea. So I take somebody's idea of a distraction and I hop in the bath, because that then kicks the can down the alley. I might stop thinking about the glass of wine while I'm in the bath, but then I get out of the bath and I'm still lonely. I'm just wet and lonely instead of lonely. So it's really easy to kind of take other people's I'm not saying other people's advice isn't a great idea but to take it unedited, without applying it to your own situation.
Christina Smith:So I would say, yes, you know, develop that amazing toolkit of the things that you really are knowing are going to help you, but specifically with the things that you're wanting to address and perhaps not wanting to admit to publicly and yes, I know exactly how that feels yeah, yeah, yeah, I think we do it to disguise a lot of our discomfort, whatever form that comes into right, whether that's loneliness or grief or sadness or anger or stress from the day, but it's very easy just to oh well, it's Friday, of course, you know, like, of course, I'm having a cocktail instead of going. Well, why is it that on Fridays, I feel like I need a cocktail and what am I trying to solve there? I think that's really true for just about any and, again, this doesn't have to be an addiction, but anything that we do mindlessly, right, any habit that we have mindlessly, that is possibly, you know, not helping us. This has been a very lovely conversation and I love that it's not all about just replacing it with a non-alcoholic drink, because I it's so much deeper than that. You know what I mean. Like I love, I love that there's so many options out there for mocktails and different things. Like I think that that's very lovely and I think that makes it easier for the, for those of us who, like, choose to, you know, do the non-alcoholic route.
Christina Smith:And what I'm hearing is it's deeper than that. Like there's, even if you don't have a serious addiction, there's, you know, a habit that's being formed and we're trying to get something out of it, and so figuring out what that underlying piece is is going to be more helpful than trying to white knuckle through a Friday night and be like I'm not having a cocktail tonight, so, um. So, before we go, I do want you each to offer one piece of wisdom or one takeaway that you want um people to take with them and then share with us how people can reach you and why, and all that good stuff about you and know that all of your links are going to be below, so you don't have to spell them all out for me, but they will be below.
Christina Smith:So if you hear something from Laura or Sarah that you really connect with, click on their links below. How about you, laura?
Laura Valvasori:So I think my my last piece of wisdom would be to really tune into what's right for you. I think that sometimes we want to do things with friends or have somebody that we want to be accountable with, or like when, at the beginning of my journey, when I was starting to feel like this was something I needed to do, I went to my best friend and said I feel like maybe we should stop drinking for a little while. And she was like why? I'm like, well, I just feel like maybe it's not great. And she's like I feel fine. She wasn't at the point that I was at, and if I had let that stop me and not done what was intuitively being triggered inside of me, I would have never gone down this road.
Laura Valvasori:So I think that listening to your own wisdom is really, really important, and you know when you're at the point where this is something that you want to explore. So to find me, you can find me on Instagram at Laura underscore Galvasori, and I'll drop a link below to a free guide. I have to non-alcoholic drinks that don't suck, because I've tried lots of them and there's many that do suck, and so that's just an easy little piece for someone to start with, and if you're interested in the Still Me but Alcohol-Free program, it's a six-week program and it's available as a self-study, so you can join at any time and go through it as a self-study. So you can join it anytime and go through it as a self-guided experience, or the next round will be in mid-January, to take us through dry February.
Christina Smith:Beautiful. Thank you, laura, and.
Sarah Williamson:Sarah, my piece of advice would be a place of acceptance around the idea that other people care less than we think they do. So, yes, absolutely, laura, you with that, you know getting yourself in the centre of your idea. But also, I wish I'd have known for a past version of me that lots of the stuff I was getting caught up in my head around what will other people think about me, what will other people say to me, actually don't matter as much as I thought they did, and also I probably thought other people were thinking about me a lot more than they really were. Most people are really just thinking about themselves most of the time. That is normal. Are really just thinking about themselves most of the time. That is normal, how life should be.
Sarah Williamson:Um, so that would be my piece of wisdom. Um, I am at um, instagram, at drink less, live better. My book and my podcast are also drink less, live better. Um, and if you hop across to my website of the same namecom, um, I have a free five-day drink less experiment, which gives loads of tips, advice, starting points for all of the stuff that we've been talking about today.
Christina Smith:Lovely, and all those links will be below. I think what I'm going to take away is that one thing that Laura said about like noticing what are the symptoms or the struggles, the challenges that you're having, like with the sleep and the anxiety, and like actually listing them out and then cause I journal every day, but I don't know that I necessarily am like, oh well, how was my anxiety, how was my sleep, how was? And so, just to be able to track those things and, you know, compare that to the times where I'm not drinking and maybe the times that I am, and just becoming more mindful about wow, look how this changes on those nights where I choose to drink one more piece to that.
Laura Valvasori:I have one more piece to your journaling exercises. It was super powerful for me. I started documenting every time I had a positive experience not drinking, because I was really mindful of trying to shift my mind to focus on all the good things that were happening. And so every little experience that I got through, or every positive little thing, I wrote it down in a journal.
Laura Valvasori:And going back to that journal. That's a really powerful thing, because you're always trying to keep your mind focused on what you're gaining versus what you're losing, so I would suggest adding a little piece to your package.
Christina Smith:Yeah that was really beautiful because I would tell my clients the same thing, Like one of the things I have them them. A journal is three things you celebrate about yourself, not gratitude, but what do you celebrate about yourself? So this is another way of like what do you, what are you celebrating? What are you getting out of this? A good night's sleep Like oh, wow. I actually had a really good moment out and because I was sober, I was conscious of whatever and I could take care of whatever and that's really awesome. Yeah, that's really awesome to think about, and maybe I won't be as lonely because more friends will call me, because they'll be like ah, you don't drink.
Laura Valvasori:You can be our designated driver or whatnot, yeah.
Christina Smith:Beautiful addition. Well, thank you both for being here today. This has been such a lovely conversation and such a easeful one. I always get like a little nervous when it's like, oh, I don't incorporate that habit yet, but it's just been really sweet to see that it doesn't have to be like the story of how I went down the drain and pulled myself back out. This could just be really a healthy choice for ourselves. So thank you and thank you, audience, for tuning in. We'll see you again next week.
