Rachel Casey (00:00:08):
Welcome to Sober Banter.

Rachel Casey (00:00:10):
Today is going to be a girl's banter.

Rachel Casey (00:00:12):
Colin is at work.

Rachel Casey (00:00:13):
It is just me hosting solo and my name is Rachel and I am joined by such a bright light.

Rachel Casey (00:00:20):
This is Heather.

Rachel Casey (00:00:21):
She's a startup tech pro,

Rachel Casey (00:00:23):
book lover,

Rachel Casey (00:00:24):
world traveler,

Rachel Casey (00:00:26):
and someone who not only did she quit drinking,

Rachel Casey (00:00:30):
quit your entire

Rachel Casey (00:00:31):
identity,

Rachel Casey (00:00:32):
job,

Rachel Casey (00:00:33):
hustle,

Rachel Casey (00:00:34):
and reclaimed your life and started to focus instead of that busyness in life to

Rachel Casey (00:00:41):
focus on living alcohol free.

Rachel Casey (00:00:43):
So welcome to Sober Bouncer.

Rachel Casey (00:00:45):
Thank you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:00:47):
Yes, you intro'd me wonderfully.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:00:49):
So thank you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:00:50):
I have been sober for 18 months.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:00:53):
Congratulations.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:00:54):
Yes.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:00:54):
I'm just going to give myself snaps for that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:00:56):
So I agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:00:59):
It even feels surreal to say out loud.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:01):
And just for further context, like I'm 35 and thinking about how –

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:08):
Almost like I feel like my biggest regret is not doing it sooner,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:10):
but I'm so glad I made these changes when I did.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:14):
It has been the most life-changing eight months.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:17):
And in a lot of ways, I've become unarmed, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:22):
So many things were interconnected with alcohol.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:26):
And it's been this messy, beautiful journey of untangling.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:30):
And like you alluded to, I quit all my vices at the same time.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:34):
I'd been working at a company for over a decade that just honestly was not setting

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:39):
me up for an environment to have boundaries or to really lean into sobriety.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:45):
I was numbing with alcohol and busyness, and I quit all my vices at the same time.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:51):
I quit my job.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:52):
I quit a lot of my...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:54):
Volunteer opportunities or board seats or just things that I was filling my space

Heather Trumpfheller (00:01:59):
with to really untangle.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:02):
It was crazy to learn that what I turned to for the distraction was actually the root cause.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:09):
I was the one playing the active role in letting the chaos and that ear-splitting

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:14):
volume into my head.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:15):
And so Getting Sober started with me working on my drinking,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:19):
but it ended up with me working on anxiety,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:22):
anger,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:23):
trauma,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:23):
my health,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:24):
my nervous system,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:25):
and my boundaries or lack of,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:28):
my people-pleasing,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:30):
intimacy,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:31):
just so much.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:32):
It's been amazing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:33):
Being present in every activity and place and experience, and it's changed everything, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:38):
It's changed how I spend my time, how I travel, and how I view relationships.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:44):
And as you know,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:45):
you sit deeper in the good and the bad things without alcohol because you're not

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:50):
numbing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:51):
And I think for me,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:52):
the biggest fear was realizing that I don't think I'm better than anyone who

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:58):
drinks.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:02:59):
I just know I'm better than who I used to be.

Rachel Casey (00:03:01):
And that's what I know.

Rachel Casey (00:03:03):
I love that so much because I can't emphasize enough.

Rachel Casey (00:03:07):
You said it so well.

Rachel Casey (00:03:09):
I don't.

Rachel Casey (00:03:09):
Other people that drink it really is not like I'm better than you.

Rachel Casey (00:03:13):
I'm sober.

Rachel Casey (00:03:13):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:03:14):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:03:14):
I know that either A,

Rachel Casey (00:03:16):
you don't drink like how I drink or you don't drink or turn into a monster at

Rachel Casey (00:03:21):
times.

Rachel Casey (00:03:22):
She's going to say a monster.

Rachel Casey (00:03:23):
So I'm like,

Rachel Casey (00:03:24):
so either I am looking at if you're drinking near me,

Rachel Casey (00:03:28):
I'm either like,

Rachel Casey (00:03:28):
it's baffling that you can just like,

Rachel Casey (00:03:31):
yeah,

Rachel Casey (00:03:32):
do that.

Rachel Casey (00:03:32):
And it's like a glass of wine at dinner.

Rachel Casey (00:03:35):
I'm like, oh, it's like an art.

Rachel Casey (00:03:37):
Actually, I'm probably not even thinking about it.

Rachel Casey (00:03:38):
I'm probably focusing on my drink, my thing, my attention.

Rachel Casey (00:03:42):
Really...

Rachel Casey (00:03:43):
Now and later sobriety.

Rachel Casey (00:03:45):
So you're 18 months.

Rachel Casey (00:03:46):
I think at around probably a year to 18 months is when I don't focus on other people as much.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:03:52):
Agreed.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:03:53):
That is something I actually just met a woman who's about six weeks sober and I've

Heather Trumpfheller (00:03:57):
been chatting with her and,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:03:58):
you know,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:03:59):
hyping her up.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:00):
I told her, you think about alcohol probably all the time still.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:04):
I actually don't think about alcohol as much anymore,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:07):
but I think even less about what other people think about my alcohol.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:12):
And I agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:13):
It's like very much that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:15):
And for me, my biggest thing was like I hated myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:19):
When I would drink, like you said, you turned into this monster.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:22):
Mine was less of, you know, embarrassing myself at the bar.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:28):
Mine was the day after self-loathing, self-sabotaging, self-punishing,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:33):
hatred of myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:35):
I just went so dark and so deep.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:39):
I felt like I saw so much success from drinking, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:43):
Like I operated at this high capacity life of the party.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:47):
I was single and always had the stories.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:51):
I felt like I was relevant to all my friends because I was like the fun person.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:55):
I would remind myself like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:57):
You know,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:57):
half my friends,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:04:58):
when we go out on a Tuesday,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:05:00):
this is their like one night of the month they go out.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:05:02):
This is my Tuesday.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:05:03):
I was just operating at this capacity where it was like every night was like a

Heather Trumpfheller (00:05:07):
bachelorette party kind of thing because I felt like my brain and my identity was

Heather Trumpfheller (00:05:11):
it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:05:12):
But what no one saw was the hatred I had the next day for myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:05:17):
I was so scared that I was going to lose these things that I loved about myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:05:21):
but I actually realized the best parts of myself are still here and were

Heather Trumpfheller (00:05:25):
highlighted even more when alcohol was removed.

Rachel Casey (00:05:28):
i can like a thousand percent identify with that and one thing i think even further

Rachel Casey (00:05:35):
that i've noticed at least for me is when i talk about being the life of the party

Rachel Casey (00:05:41):
being friends with everyone i i didn't realize how much i gossiped until after and

Rachel Casey (00:05:47):
it was a people-pleasing thing i don't even think i was trying to gossip to trash

Rachel Casey (00:05:51):
talk i think i was doing it because if i brought the juice to the bar oh

Rachel Casey (00:05:56):
I had something worthy and like, let's drink over this.

Rachel Casey (00:06:00):
And I'm not thinking about the other person who I'm hurting, who I'm talking about.

Rachel Casey (00:06:03):
And they're likely friends with them.

Rachel Casey (00:06:05):
That's where the next day you have people like,

Rachel Casey (00:06:08):
hey,

Rachel Casey (00:06:08):
probably shouldn't tell Rachel this anymore because she's going to go to the bar

Rachel Casey (00:06:11):
and gossip.

Rachel Casey (00:06:12):
And that's where a lot of the self, because I felt so...

Rachel Casey (00:06:16):
in it and then I hear what I said a lot of it wasn't true a lot of it was

Rachel Casey (00:06:20):
embellished totally I think I got in the moment and I really think there's a part

Rachel Casey (00:06:25):
of the alcohol that made me think it was true I sold it because I think drunk

Rachel Casey (00:06:30):
Rachel really wanted the gossip to be real I agree and I felt like a terrible

Rachel Casey (00:06:36):
person because I know inside I'm a good person I just wanted to be included I

Heather Trumpfheller (00:06:41):
relate to that I think my biggest fear in life is to become irrelevant and

Heather Trumpfheller (00:06:46):
And I watched my life not go similar paths of everyone else, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:06:52):
By 35, most of my friends are married with kids.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:06:55):
And I felt like if they're ahead of me in the family department,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:00):
I need to be ahead of them in this whole other part of life.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:05):
So I'm not irrelevant.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:06):
So that when they're talking about

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:08):
These things, I can bring something relevant to the party, but I'm with you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:11):
Where my things I was bringing to the party were destructive behaviors or things

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:16):
that were not aligning with myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:18):
Like, even just pushing myself professionally in my career was to stay relevant.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:23):
And I totally relate to that where I feel like I ended up sabotaging some people.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:30):
And I remember someone asked me if I was afraid to lose friends when I stopped drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:35):
And I told them I've already lost the friends that I was going to lose because of

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:39):
being a bad friend when I was drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:41):
So I absolutely agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:43):
Mine was less about being afraid of losing friends because I had already been that bad friend.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:07:49):
And I already lost the people I was going to lose.

Rachel Casey (00:07:51):
I lost so many friends when I got sober because most of the people,

Rachel Casey (00:07:55):
if I wasn't drinking,

Rachel Casey (00:07:57):
I wasn't someone they really wanted to be around.

Rachel Casey (00:07:59):
I wasn't even someone I really wanted to be around at first.

Rachel Casey (00:08:01):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:08:02):
And I can I can just so relate to that.

Rachel Casey (00:08:05):
For me, I kind of dived into a because I feel like the steps helped me re-identify myself.

Rachel Casey (00:08:11):
And I really did stick with that.

Rachel Casey (00:08:12):
So what was your beginning like?

Rachel Casey (00:08:15):
Because I know for me, it was weird.

Rachel Casey (00:08:18):
It was so weird to be like, who am I?

Rachel Casey (00:08:21):
Because alcohol was my identity.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:23):
On the sort of timeline of mine,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:26):
right,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:26):
I felt like I was constantly proving to myself that I was an alcoholic.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:31):
I didn't feel like I fit the mold of an alcoholic.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:33):
I used to think like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:35):
oh,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:35):
I don't get up in the morning and drink a handle of vodka in a brown paper bag.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:40):
And I learned, right, it's not about the frequency.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:43):
It's not even really about the quantity.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:45):
It's like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:45):
For me,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:46):
it was the amount of energy I was still putting into drinking and thinking about

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:49):
drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:50):
And even when I'm in sober seasons, I'm still spending my time thinking about drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:55):
I did dry January for seven years to prove to myself that I could binge drink the

Heather Trumpfheller (00:08:59):
rest of the 11 months of the year.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:01):
Because if I could be sober for this month, I'm not an alcoholic.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:04):
So I was going on all of these sort of like cycles of

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:08):
where I was still coring my energy into thinking about drinking, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:12):
Or like you said, I was watching everyone else drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:14):
And I was thinking like, oh, well, I drink similarly to them.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:18):
So if they don't have a problem, I don't have a problem.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:21):
Well, Valentine's Day 2021,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:26):
Two, maybe?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:27):
I remember being home alone,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:30):
self-loathing,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:31):
just this whole thing that I had been drinking at this season.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:33):
But I told myself,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:34):
where can I go to feel better when all my friends are out with their husbands?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:38):
So I actually went to AA.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:39):
And I remember sitting there.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:41):
Really?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:42):
Yes.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:42):
First time ever,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:43):
I just walked in on Valentine's Day and I was like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:45):
this feels like a safe place to be.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:46):
But I felt like...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:48):
Damien on Mean Girls, though, where it was like, she doesn't even go here.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:52):
I was hearing all of these people have already cleaned up their lives.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:09:57):
So I felt like I needed to go clean my life up before I could go to AA, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:03):
It was a great experience,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:04):
but I felt like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:05):
okay,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:06):
the perfectionist in me,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:07):
I need to go clean myself up.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:09):
So I actually never went back to AA.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:11):
Until my one-year anniversary, I was like, damn, I'm going to go get my sober chip.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:16):
So then I went back to AA, but I didn't really, like, follow the typical AA.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:21):
But what I did do is I am a community-centric person, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:25):
Like, in my friendships, in my life, in my career.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:28):
So I did the same with alcohol.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:30):
While I didn't do AA formal,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:33):
if I actually look back at it now,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:35):
I absolutely did all of the steps.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:37):
And I found community who had been through AA online.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:41):
to sort of be this pseudo sponsorship aspect.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:45):
Again, I'm such a perfectionist.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:46):
I literally looked at my calendar and I was like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:49):
if I can't go to every single one of these AA meetings,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:52):
I'm not going to do it because I'm all or nothing in drinking,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:55):
all or nothing in AA.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:10:57):
So I found the community, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:00):
Like I made this really public.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:03):
So I stopped drinking and

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:05):
We can talk about that in a second.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:06):
But I just basically got really public with not drinking,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:09):
like told my community,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:10):
told my friends,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:11):
told my family.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:12):
Actively,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:13):
at the end of the day,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:13):
I would say probably my first six months of sobriety,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:16):
I would sit down at the end of the day with a journal and I'd be reflecting on how

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:20):
did I feel?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:21):
How was each interaction?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:22):
What was hard for me that day?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:24):
Who made me feel good and who made me feel bad?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:28):
What Instagram accounts do I need to unfollow?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:30):
What places do I need to not go back and do?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:33):
On the separate side of it, I would write down the first time I did something sober.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:38):
It was like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:38):
okay,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:39):
my first wedding sober,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:41):
first bachelorette,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:42):
first girl's trip,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:43):
first movie without a drink,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:44):
your first concert.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:46):
I feel like there was half the time I would do things...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:49):
just to have an activity to drink at,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:51):
but then I wanted to reward myself for doing them still and learning,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:55):
okay,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:56):
Heather,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:56):
you still like concerts.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:58):
Heather, you still like movies.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:11:59):
Heather, you still can go on a first date without having too many martinis.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:04):
I started writing all these things,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:06):
but then I started setting up my environment a little bit better,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:09):
right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:09):
It came with boundaries.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:10):
who is easier to be around?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:12):
Who do I feel like I need to drink to be around?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:15):
Then that person probably doesn't need to be in my life.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:18):
And that's kind of also what led me to quitting my job.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:20):
I didn't feel like my physical environment,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:23):
I could set up some boundaries because I had been there for 10 years.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:26):
They had known me as the drunk

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:29):
crushes the happy hour with clients kind of person.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:32):
And so I felt like I couldn't do this rebrand,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:34):
but my community,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:36):
I either kept my same community who was like accepting of this,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:40):
but then I actually did find sober community as well.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:44):
So again, I live in Austin, and I think Austin does community better than most places.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:48):
But two, Austin is very pro-sobriety.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:52):
We've got Sands Bar, which is like a full NA sober bar in Austin.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:12:56):
We've got Deer Dry Drinkery and some other sober bottle shops.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:00):
We've got probably six or seven sober influencers.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:03):
We've got different community events.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:05):
You could do something every night of the week with a sober community.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:08):
And so that really felt better for me.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:11):
So I really leaned into that and I met a lot of friends through that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:15):
And then I started inviting my community into those spaces.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:20):
And then I started learning a lot of my friends actually thoroughly enjoyed my

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:24):
sobriety because it gave them permission to also not drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:28):
I had friends being like, hey, do you want to grab dinner on Tuesday?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:31):
And I'd be like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:32):
oh,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:32):
they actually want to spend more time with me because they know they don't have to

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:36):
drink tonight.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:37):
They can go to dinner without feeling the pressure as well that,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:40):
oh,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:40):
the person across from me is going to order a drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:42):
Val,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:43):
I can't go to dinner on a Tuesday because I can't be hungover on Wednesday for that

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:46):
meeting.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:46):
A lot of people spend so much mental bandwidth thinking about if they should be drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:13:52):
And when you just cut out like, oh, you don't drink anymore, the decision fatigue went away.

Rachel Casey (00:13:57):
You touched on so many great things.

Rachel Casey (00:14:00):
And I want to say for number one,

Rachel Casey (00:14:03):
I think there are so many people out there that have that experience that you did

Rachel Casey (00:14:09):
with AA that you go in like you did on Valentine's Day.

Rachel Casey (00:14:13):
And it is that Regina George that like does she even go like in the hoodie zipped up.

Rachel Casey (00:14:20):
And that was one thing that kind of had me walk in a different direction or look

Rachel Casey (00:14:24):
for something new rather because I still say the steps saved my life.

Rachel Casey (00:14:28):
And I am always in debt to AA for helping me because that's what did help me.

Rachel Casey (00:14:34):
But I watched that happen at times,

Rachel Casey (00:14:37):
especially with older members that grew up,

Rachel Casey (00:14:40):
I guess,

Rachel Casey (00:14:40):
in a stricter way.

Rachel Casey (00:14:41):
And that's what worked for them.

Rachel Casey (00:14:43):
Great.

Rachel Casey (00:14:44):
But I would see them kind of shun these young people.

Rachel Casey (00:14:47):
I'm so,

Rachel Casey (00:14:48):
so,

Rachel Casey (00:14:48):
so thankful that you like you still wait and sought out because there are a lot of

Rachel Casey (00:14:52):
people that you go into an AA meeting.

Rachel Casey (00:14:55):
You get that kind of feeling.

Rachel Casey (00:14:57):
Right.

Rachel Casey (00:14:58):
And then you feel you have nowhere to go get help because now you don't fit in with

Rachel Casey (00:15:02):
the crowd you're in.

Rachel Casey (00:15:03):
Now you can't drink.

Rachel Casey (00:15:04):
You can't fit in there.

Rachel Casey (00:15:05):
And you went tried to go to an AA meeting and now that feels uncomfortable.

Rachel Casey (00:15:08):
And that is one of my biggest challenges.

Rachel Casey (00:15:11):
If I could change something, it's some of that stigma.

Rachel Casey (00:15:15):
Because I feel like they're the only ones keeping the stigma alive.

Rachel Casey (00:15:18):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:15:19):
To be honest.

Rachel Casey (00:15:20):
And I know that's a big claim.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:21):
AA is amazing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:24):
And I have so many friends that I have literally leaned on their AA experience.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:29):
Yeah.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:30):
And it's actually amazing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:32):
So fast forward to now.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:33):
It's crazy, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:34):
I've been sober for 18 months.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:36):
And I actually have a boyfriend now.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:38):
And I met him at a sober Friendsgiving.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:41):
And I told everyone that it was pretty much all people had gone through AA.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:46):
A girl I'd met on Instagram invited me to this Friendsgiving.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:50):
I went, didn't know anyone, met someone there.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:53):
And we've been together for about seven months now.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:56):
But he went through AA about seven years ago.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:15:59):
And he had such a great experience.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:02):
He has all these friends through it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:03):
He found mentors through it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:05):
But I will say,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:06):
I think people who got sober 25 years ago,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:09):
it is so different now when you're getting sober.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:12):
There are non-alcoholic options that can make it easier to get into.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:16):
There are accounts and, like, people are public.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:19):
People who are not even, quote unquote, in recovery are very proud to be sober, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:25):
So I feel like the stigma is shifting.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:28):
And so the community has shifted with it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:30):
I have a lot of conversations with him about it that I'm like, that's amazing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:32):
You have friends who have been sober, but I wasn't sober in the pandemic.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:36):
I want to talk to the people who have recovered from these aspects.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:39):
So I agree, like finding a community that works for you is so important.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:44):
I really leaned into books,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:45):
podcasts,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:46):
conversations,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:47):
social media accounts,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:48):
and kind of leaned into that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:50):
But for me also...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:53):
I feel so lucky that I had – the day I stopped drinking is actually wild.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:58):
I was on a girl's trip with my best friend.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:16:59):
We were in Asheville, North Carolina, and we were so hungover the next day.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:04):
It was terrible, and I was miserable.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:06):
It was a day that I was so excited about.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:08):
We were going to the Biltmore at Christmas.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:11):
And I was too hungover to even enjoy it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:12):
And we're sitting in this like Bojangles parking lot just hungover trying to get

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:16):
chicken fingers into our stomachs.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:19):
And that night we were sitting at this nice dinner and I look at her and I say to

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:24):
her and I said,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:24):
Kate,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:26):
I'm going to order a nice glass of Chianti red wine.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:30):
And this is going to be the last drink I'll ever have.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:32):
Because I'm going to reclaim this on a high note.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:36):
I can't start sobriety being hungover.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:38):
And I can't start sobriety in a negative headspace if I'm going to do this.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:43):
And so I told her.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:44):
So I...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:46):
wanted to start sobriety in a positive way.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:49):
I had this conversation with my best friend.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:51):
And Kate essentially looked at me and I said, do you think that I could do this?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:55):
Like, do you think that this could truly be my last drink?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:17:59):
And she said, yeah, I do.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:01):
And there was so much seriousness of this person that just...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:05):
has seen me at my best and my worst and all these things because she believed in

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:09):
me,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:10):
I believed in me.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:12):
And we were actually going to Europe a couple weeks later,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:14):
and I told her,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:15):
I said,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:16):
I'm going to really need someone in my corner,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:18):
right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:19):
We were going to a wedding in London,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:20):
and then we were traveling for a couple weeks,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:22):
and then I ended up solo road tripping around Ireland.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:25):
And I said, I'm going to be in a lot of drinking areas.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:28):
I already booked my ticket to the Guinness Brewery in Dublin.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:32):
And she was like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:33):
I think you're going to learn that you do not have to change or lose the things

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:38):
that you love doing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:39):
You're actually going to love them more.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:41):
And that's why I started my journaling of every activity.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:45):
Like literally, I wrote like first brewery drinking in N.A.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:49):
I loved it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:50):
Yeah.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:50):
And it was just all these things.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:51):
And so actually, that's even what my necklace says.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:54):
It says, she believed she could, so she did.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:18:56):
And that's like a shout out to all my friends.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:00):
And that's why on my one year anniversary, I actually threw a sober party for myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:05):
Because I think not just babies or weddings need to be celebrated.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:10):
I did something I worked my ass off for that had taken so much intentionality and

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:16):
time and energy and space and research and thoughtfulness.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:20):
Like I said, I upended my whole life.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:22):
I quit my job.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:23):
I set up parameters, set up boundaries.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:26):
But I wanted to thank my community because I didn't have to lose them.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:30):
And I wanted to celebrate them.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:32):
So I invited them into the space.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:34):
We rented out Sober Bar, which is a full non-alcoholic bar and had a party.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:40):
There's 65 people came and it was amazing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:42):
People celebrated me,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:43):
but they learned so much about sobriety themselves and how to have fun without

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:49):
alcohol because that's the thing is I just think so many people use alcohol as a

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:53):
filler because we actually don't know what we like to do.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:56):
Like truly, if you ask someone, what do you like to do?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:19:59):
Or what are your hobbies?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:00):
People hate that question because it's normally a way like drinking on a patio with friends.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:05):
And same.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:06):
I just now I'm drinking athletic versus a local craft IPA.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:11):
But yes, I think the fact that I didn't have to lose my community, I wanted to celebrate them.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:16):
But I also challenge everyone who's listening to this,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:18):
invite your community in to celebrate you as well.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:21):
Because having a sober party was truly awesome.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:24):
The amount of people that told me,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:26):
because of your publicness about this or because of the way you had a sober party,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:30):
I want to do something similar.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:32):
I want to celebrate starting my LLC or I want to celebrate this or like just other

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:37):
milestones that are not normally traditionally celebrated.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:41):
And I just think that's a big part of how I got sober was treating it like a positive thing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:48):
It wasn't like something was taken from me.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:50):
Sobriety wasn't a punishment because I was a bad drinker.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:54):
It was actually a reward.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:20:56):
And I just needed to create and facilitate an environment where I could be sober

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:00):
with the people around me,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:02):
the city.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:02):
Like I said, Austin is an amazing place to be sober and I feel super lucky.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:06):
But the job that I was in, the relationships, how I was dating, how I was spending my time.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:12):
We had our Chianti.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:13):
We went to dinner.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:13):
We went home.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:14):
We went back to our Airbnb.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:15):
A couple hours later, I told her, I said,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:17):
What happens if I drink again?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:18):
What if I do this?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:19):
Like I started just like shame spiraling of like failure aspect.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:24):
Essentially what she said to me was like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:27):
you need to do this for yourself,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:29):
not to prove to other people.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:31):
And everyone always hears that, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:32):
Like you do sobriety for you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:34):
I read this book called Not Drinking Tonight.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:37):
And it was talking about how when you're dating or when you're married or when

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:40):
you're a mom,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:41):
there's other people who are impacted by your sobriety,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:45):
right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:45):
Like, I know a lot of people where the woman doesn't drink and her partner does drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:51):
And I think to myself all the time,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:53):
like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:53):
this is actually a perfect time to make some really big life-changing decisions

Heather Trumpfheller (00:21:58):
because all I'm doing is focusing on myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:01):
I needed that time and space to focus on myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:04):
But I had this person who is really integrated into my everyday life who was there

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:10):
to root me on,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:11):
right,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:11):
to cheer me on,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:12):
to create situations for me.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:14):
Like her and her husband have done things like sneak six packs of N.A.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:18):
beers into bars or weddings because they both keep N.A.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:23):
in their car because they're like, what if we get somewhere and there's not N.A. ?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:27):
Like I started having friends who started incorporating that into their operating

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:32):
rhythms were like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:33):
well,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:34):
if we're going to go to dinner,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:34):
I checked and there's no non-alk on the menu or there's not this or like that dive

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:39):
bar might not be the best place to watch that sporting event when we could go to

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:43):
this patio,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:43):
which feels a little safer.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:45):
And so I feel like I started having people honestly like allyship and advocate for me.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:51):
And it started with being that vulnerable with her.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:54):
But yeah,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:55):
I think really just reminding myself that like someone asked me six months in,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:22:59):
they said,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:00):
if you had to summarize the last six months,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:02):
what would you say?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:03):
And I said freedom.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:05):
And in a lot of ways,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:06):
looking at it now,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:07):
18 months in,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:08):
right,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:08):
the newness of sobriety has worn off.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:10):
But I get these little reminders every single day still of why life is better and

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:16):
why I'm a better Heather.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:18):
And I remember telling this to her on my trip too,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:20):
that I was like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:20):
my biggest fear is to like make sobriety my whole personality.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:24):
I don't want to do this shift.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:26):
But now it's so hard not to make my personality because everything in my life is

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:31):
better because of it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:32):
I've sat on patios in a new city and it's 75 and sunny and I'm drinking a Sam Adams N.A.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:39):
Hazy and feeling grateful.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:41):
I'm so glad I journaled.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:42):
I'm so glad I invited people into it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:44):
I'm so grateful for progress and N.A.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:47):
options.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:48):
And that you can still travel and do things and try the local beers because there's

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:55):
so many NA now.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:23:56):
But I think freedom is the word that I would say I feel now that if you're

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:00):
listening to this and you're not feeling free,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:04):
like alcohol might have a huge grip on that that you have no idea.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:07):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:24:08):
It's hard to look at situations throughout the entire day where I'm like,

Rachel Casey (00:24:12):
oh,

Rachel Casey (00:24:12):
my God,

Rachel Casey (00:24:13):
I wouldn't handle that so differently if I was still drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:16):
And I actually really relate to that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:17):
So the current season that I'm walking in is kind of a challenging one.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:22):
I just lost my dog.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:24):
which was like my child.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:26):
And, you know, he was eight years old.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:27):
48 hours later, he unexpectedly died.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:31):
My grandma died 48 hours later.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:33):
And a couple weeks later, my house got pretty much completely destroyed in a storm.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:39):
I have a rental property as well.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:41):
And a couple weeks after that,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:43):
her air conditioning unit,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:45):
her hot water heater flooded her apartment,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:46):
just like all this stuff.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:48):
I remember thinking a lot of my friends started checking in on me.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:51):
And they were like, how are you doing?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:53):
How's your mental health?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:54):
How are you feeling?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:55):
And I was like, I actually don't need a drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:24:59):
And I think to myself, I could not have gotten through this if I was drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:04):
And I think a lot of people think that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:06):
Like, you're right.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:06):
Like, alcohol is a masterful way to have an immediate shutoff valve.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:11):
It gives you this excuse to be off.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:14):
And I loved that, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:15):
I loved that numbing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:17):
Like, alcohol is definitely my drug of choice when numbing, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:20):
And there would be times where I would even go home and drink alone because I

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:23):
wasn't drunk enough by the end of the night to feel like I could shut off.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:28):
And in this season that I'm currently in where I'm just feeling with a lot of

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:33):
logistics and a lot of like sadness and grief,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:37):
I know that I would normally not want to feel those things and I would numb those

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:41):
things.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:42):
Knowing that you can navigate things better because of sobriety is amazing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:47):
And again,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:47):
back to the point of like journaling about that,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:50):
you only know that when you can reflect on that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:53):
But I truly believe that like I could not do the season that I'm in right now if I

Heather Trumpfheller (00:25:57):
was drinking.

Rachel Casey (00:25:58):
And I like 100 percent relate to that because there's just no way I'd be able to podcast.

Rachel Casey (00:26:05):
This whole podcast was started off the fact of not drinking,

Rachel Casey (00:26:09):
but it is really hard to not have instant gratitude almost every day.

Rachel Casey (00:26:16):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:26:16):
And I also relate to being like,

Rachel Casey (00:26:19):
because I'm 31 and I'm like,

Rachel Casey (00:26:21):
is my whole identity,

Rachel Casey (00:26:23):
am I going to be like 70 years old,

Rachel Casey (00:26:25):
still talking,

Rachel Casey (00:26:26):
bantering about alcohol?

Rachel Casey (00:26:28):
There is something about that.

Rachel Casey (00:26:31):
Being that low in that instant gratitude that is just like something you can't get

Rachel Casey (00:26:39):
anything other than addiction or alcohol.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:26:42):
And I actually feel really lucky.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:26:43):
I go to a church here in Austin.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:26:46):
Shout out Red Rocks Austin.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:26:47):
where my pastor actually did an entire series on addiction, mental health, numbness, etc.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:26:55):
I feel like that was super contradictory to talk about in the church.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:26:58):
So it was amazing that they did.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:26:59):
They asked this question at the end, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:01):
He said, if you knew you could make a choice that would make your life better, would you do it?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:08):
Because there is a parable in the Bible where Jesus asks, do you want to be well?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:12):
Do you even want to be healed?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:15):
Not even to make this religious, but I started thinking about that question.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:18):
Would I do it?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:19):
If I knew I could make a choice that would make my life better, would I do it?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:24):
And I think for the longest time,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:25):
I kept trying to just grip control to make changes so that I didn't have to do the

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:31):
one thing that I knew would make my life better.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:34):
And I agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:35):
Like someone might stop drinking and their life might dramatically change as much as mine did.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:41):
But when I got asked that, I knew in my gut that drinking would change everything.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:47):
And I was so scared to stop.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:49):
And so it was the second that I stopped, I just started seeing the ripple effects, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:53):
And the newness of sobriety has worn off.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:55):
But there is something every single day that I see that I'm like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:59):
woo,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:27:59):
thank goodness for sobriety,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:01):
right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:01):
And now I'm dating this wonderful man.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:03):
We've been together for seven months.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:05):
We just went to Mexico City last week.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:08):
And we're both sober.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:10):
And I told him on the flight home, we're sitting there.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:14):
Neither of us are hungover.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:15):
We both felt like we stayed up to date on work and life, like we get to rest on vacations.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:22):
And I remember telling him that, that I was like, I am so grateful that you and I

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:28):
get to live fully in these places, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:31):
And I think there's so many people that are like escapism with it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:34):
And now I look at travel, like at first I was afraid that I would lose travel, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:38):
And my whole wall back here is like a travel memento wall.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:41):
And I was so afraid that I would lose the love of traveling, but now I don't.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:45):
And I get to have this partner that travels the same.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:28:47):
And I agree, it's that freedom.

Rachel Casey (00:28:49):
Oh, it's so good.

Rachel Casey (00:28:51):
It's such a freedom.

Rachel Casey (00:28:52):
When I've traveled now in sobriety,

Rachel Casey (00:28:55):
I can't imagine why I would want to drink because it's so beautiful.

Rachel Casey (00:29:01):
For example,

Rachel Casey (00:29:02):
one of the things and I would have never done this had I've not been sober because

Rachel Casey (00:29:06):
I would have been focused on the bars,

Rachel Casey (00:29:08):
hungover,

Rachel Casey (00:29:09):
trying to get back from the hangover.

Rachel Casey (00:29:11):
Most people don't think about drinking like that, but that's how it ruled my life.

Rachel Casey (00:29:15):
That's how I knew it was wrong.

Rachel Casey (00:29:17):
But we're doing this meditation in Sedona and we're in the vortex and

Rachel Casey (00:29:23):
Here, the vortex is more like a cell tower than anything.

Rachel Casey (00:29:26):
And I can't imagine being hungover, being tipsy.

Rachel Casey (00:29:32):
I would miss this beautiful moment.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:29:36):
Yeah, you sit deeper in the highs and the lows.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:29:39):
But for me, it was also learning how to...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:29:43):
appropriately process my emotions, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:29:47):
Like shout out Brené Brown.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:29:48):
She has the book Atlas of the Heart and she talks about all of the different emotions we feel.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:29:54):
But to me, I was only feeling a small range of, you know, happy, sad, angry, but tired.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:00):
When I stopped drinking,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:01):
I actually had to learn how to appropriately define what I was feeling,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:07):
how to process it,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:08):
sit deeper in that processing,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:10):
but then move on from it versus just hovering in that space.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:15):
So I absolutely agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:17):
You sit deeper in the lows because you're not numbing,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:20):
but you sit so much deeper in the highs too.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:23):
It is incredible.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:24):
Absolutely.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:30:24):
Absolutely.

Rachel Casey (00:30:26):
Oh, my God.

Rachel Casey (00:30:26):
Brene Brown is who I want to be.

Rachel Casey (00:30:28):
Like literally when I got sober and I've gone back to school,

Rachel Casey (00:30:33):
I've almost changed from psychology to social work just because of Brene Brown.

Rachel Casey (00:30:37):
Because I'm like one of the things in and I've used it in sobriety for so long.

Rachel Casey (00:30:44):
And she's sober.

Rachel Casey (00:30:45):
When she talks about choosing a moment of discomfort over a length of resentment

Rachel Casey (00:30:52):
and she talks about grabbing her ring and,

Rachel Casey (00:30:54):
like,

Rachel Casey (00:30:54):
she'll say something tough to her husband and be like,

Rachel Casey (00:30:57):
would I rather have a moment of discomfort or create a resentment?

Rachel Casey (00:31:00):
That is what the 12 steps taught me.

Rachel Casey (00:31:04):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:31:04):
And in a more modernized, nicer... Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:31:10):
Inclusive tone.

Rachel Casey (00:31:11):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:31:12):
I think the thing about...

Rachel Casey (00:31:14):
And I've talked about this.

Rachel Casey (00:31:16):
Bill created this thing that saves so many lives.

Rachel Casey (00:31:20):
The thing that people have now like clinged on to, I think is like what's now a hindering.

Rachel Casey (00:31:25):
It's like,

Rachel Casey (00:31:26):
He said it's going to grow.

Rachel Casey (00:31:29):
Let it grow in the way it is.

Rachel Casey (00:31:31):
But people are like, don't touch or change anything.

Rachel Casey (00:31:34):
Everything's the same.

Rachel Casey (00:31:36):
And it's like, well, it's not the same, though.

Rachel Casey (00:31:40):
It's not.

Rachel Casey (00:31:41):
There were not cell phones when the Big Book was written, OK?

Rachel Casey (00:31:44):
It would be like giving the sex talk from 1920 to someone in today's world.

Rachel Casey (00:31:50):
Absolutely.

Rachel Casey (00:31:53):
rex is the same the steps that's all the same but we didn't have to go into detail

Rachel Casey (00:31:59):
about pictures sending selfies talking about online language is strange yes what's

Rachel Casey (00:32:06):
the website the only fan like those things did not exist and so i think and

Rachel Casey (00:32:15):
especially like you talk about the promotion of alcohol yeah that wasn't around

Rachel Casey (00:32:20):
when the well i mean it was

Rachel Casey (00:32:23):
To a degree, it's the only kinds of ads you see on Super Bowl.

Rachel Casey (00:32:27):
Right.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:32:28):
So and that's why I actually speak in the Super Bowl.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:32:31):
I loved how many NA ads there were at the Super Bowl and how many people are

Heather Trumpfheller (00:32:37):
putting their ad dollars into that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:32:39):
Even some of the big brands like the Heinekens and the Modellos.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:32:44):
And I love Blue Moon Zero and Corona Zero.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:32:47):
And they are making quality beers.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:32:50):
But I'm glad they're also giving their ad spend dollars to this movement.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:32:55):
And it's funny because my brother actually has a brewery.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:32:58):
And he's told me the last few years, dry January kills us.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:02):
But we are seeing in general, he's in a vacation town in Florida.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:07):
He's like, people are not coming on vacation to rage anymore.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:12):
They might buy a six pack at the bar,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:14):
but they're not spending their day on vacation holding at a brewery as much.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:18):
Like people are just changing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:20):
And I think there's seasons for that, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:22):
And that's why I always tell people,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:24):
especially when I was dating,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:26):
I would go on a date with someone and I would tell someone like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:28):
oh,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:28):
I don't drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:30):
And you just watch their reactions because they're having their own internal dialogue.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:35):
They think,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:36):
one,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:36):
I'm either saying that I'm better than them,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:38):
or two,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:39):
that I have my shit together and they don't,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:41):
or three,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:42):
they're thinking like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:44):
oh,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:44):
did I drink too much?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:45):
Did I do this?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:46):
I've had so many men pretty much ghost me the day after our first date because they

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:50):
were like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:51):
I kind of went to bed hungover and I couldn't remember everything I said,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:54):
and so it was easier to ghost you than to acknowledge that you were sober and

Heather Trumpfheller (00:33:58):
remember everything and I don't.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:00):
And it's crazy because I'm like –

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:03):
I didn't say anything about your behaviors.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:05):
I didn't actually care that you had a drink or five at dinner.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:09):
And it's like back to what you're saying at the beginning.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:11):
It's just, I know that I like Heather sober better than I liked drinking Heather.

Rachel Casey (00:34:16):
Honestly, one of the things I say to people, if they like...

Rachel Casey (00:34:21):
I don't have it commented very often anymore.

Rachel Casey (00:34:23):
For anyone listening that's new or anyone you work with,

Rachel Casey (00:34:26):
I try to go back to that six weeks and it was very different.

Rachel Casey (00:34:30):
When I'm talking about the way I think about alcohol and like my identity, it's evolved so much.

Rachel Casey (00:34:36):
Like at six weeks, I was very hot and cold at times.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:40):
Oh, I needed so much rest.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:42):
I actually told that to someone the other day.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:44):
She was not six weeks in.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:45):
And she's like, I'm having a lot of mood swings.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:48):
I feel like I'm grieving.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:49):
I agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:50):
That's where A is amazing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:51):
Acknowledging that there's different seasons and steps and phases in a very methodical way.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:57):
You're grieving something.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:34:58):
You're also probably really angry.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:01):
You're sad.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:02):
You are feeling shifts in where you used to draw energy.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:06):
That is super real.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:07):
So I agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:08):
For anyone who's listening to this that's like six weeks in,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:11):
I feel like my first six months was the tumultuous unlearning season.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:18):
Like of just,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:18):
ooh,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:19):
I need to process that or I need to write that down or I need to navigate that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:23):
But it was kind of stay alive the first six months.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:25):
And then my second six months was add back things into my life in a positive way

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:32):
with boundaries,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:34):
with space.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:35):
with these conversations.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:36):
And so then I feel like probably one year in was the most that I ever felt like myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:43):
Like it took probably one whole year.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:44):
And I actually never used the word alcoholic until I was one year sober because I

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:50):
can't not,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:51):
because I thought that was too big of a word to label what I was feeling.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:35:56):
There would not have been this much positive change if there wasn't a big word with it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:00):
And back to my best friend on our girls trip in Asheville.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:03):
I remember telling her, I was like, okay, I need to stop drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:06):
I need to learn to moderate.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:07):
And she was like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:08):
how about you give it a year and take this super seriously and treat it as extreme

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:14):
like the language of I'm an alcoholic and see what happens.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:19):
And I remember thinking to myself, I can give it a year.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:21):
So I'll be honest,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:22):
I think probably my first six months without drinking,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:25):
I went into it thinking this is a year long thing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:28):
And then on month seven, eight, nine, I was like, oh, fuck, I can't go back to that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:32):
Like I am having too much positive changes to not take this as seriously.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:38):
as I should.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:39):
And so then I actually started using the language like I'm an alcoholic or I was an

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:44):
alcoholic or I'm recovering from alcoholism because you can't not use that word and

Heather Trumpfheller (00:36:50):
see all the goodness of the changes in my life without acknowledging that there was

Rachel Casey (00:36:54):
a problem.

Rachel Casey (00:36:55):
I totally agree.

Rachel Casey (00:36:57):
I mean, I cried the first time I said I was alcoholic.

Rachel Casey (00:37:00):
And there is something about like the more time you spend,

Rachel Casey (00:37:03):
like if you're in the rooms of AA,

Rachel Casey (00:37:06):
the word just becomes such a normal part of the language.

Rachel Casey (00:37:09):
Sympathized.

Rachel Casey (00:37:10):
I totally relate to the sense of the word alcoholic because there is still a stigma

Rachel Casey (00:37:16):
attached with it.

Rachel Casey (00:37:17):
Absolutely.

Rachel Casey (00:37:18):
And I see this.

Rachel Casey (00:37:20):
I'm very open.

Rachel Casey (00:37:21):
One thing I was told that didn't feel very good.

Rachel Casey (00:37:23):
But after one month, I felt so happy.

Rachel Casey (00:37:26):
I didn't think I could make it a month.

Rachel Casey (00:37:28):
I could never make it the dry Januaries and make it a month and like be happy.

Rachel Casey (00:37:32):
That was like and like envisioning that I'm I wasn't saying never, but I'm like.

Rachel Casey (00:37:39):
accepted that I'm an alcoholic, I have a problem.

Rachel Casey (00:37:42):
I posted on Facebook and I started posting and I got kind of told,

Rachel Casey (00:37:48):
hey,

Rachel Casey (00:37:49):
really should we be putting that on social media?

Rachel Casey (00:37:51):
The arguments like your ego,

Rachel Casey (00:37:53):
you don't want to represent AA because if I'm involved with the program and then

Rachel Casey (00:37:58):
you go relapse,

Rachel Casey (00:37:59):
you're going to be a bad reflection of that doesn't work.

Rachel Casey (00:38:02):
I'm like, so you're kind of contradicting because you're telling me my ego.

Rachel Casey (00:38:06):
I'm not the end all be all.

Rachel Casey (00:38:08):
But can I also not be the end-all be-all that they're going to think I represent AA

Rachel Casey (00:38:12):
because I don't think I'm that big?

Rachel Casey (00:38:14):
There's a lot of contradictions of that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:16):
A lot of people think they have to hit a rock bottom to make a change, and you don't.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:23):
That's what's amazing about it, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:25):
And I think women,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:26):
like all the women listening to this can relate,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:29):
if you're not drinking,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:30):
you're pregnant,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:31):
right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:31):
That's what people associate with or things like that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:33):
But now it's so much more normalized to just not drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:37):
For the longest time, it really was that extreme.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:41):
I absolutely agree with that.

Rachel Casey (00:38:43):
Oh,

Rachel Casey (00:38:43):
people thought I was,

Rachel Casey (00:38:44):
it was heartbreaking that my first three months,

Rachel Casey (00:38:48):
everyone thought I was pregnant.

Rachel Casey (00:38:49):
And I'm like, nope, just alcohol.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:50):
Wouldn't I be grieving that too?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:52):
Like that might be a whole other layer of what it is.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:38:55):
So also in the book, Not Drinking Tonight, I thought this was a wild thing that I learned.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:00):
That alcohol is the only thing that when you're not doing it, people have a problem with.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:07):
Like if I told people like, oh, I don't smoke cigarettes, they'd be like, great.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:11):
Oh, you don't drink?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:12):
Why?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:12):
And it's like telling someone like, oh, I don't want cheese on top of that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:17):
They get to like ask me these questions.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:19):
Like I just told you I'm not drinking or I don't drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:22):
But people think that that is a topic that is open for discussion.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:27):
So then I started really trying to figure out like what is language that I feel

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:31):
comfortable with?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:31):
So I started saying things like, oh, I went pro and retired early.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:36):
Or like, alcohol is not working for me in this season of life.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:39):
Or just like, I'm a better version of self.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:41):
Like, trying to find that language around it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:44):
But it is so funny how many people think that they can ask you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:47):
Like, the amount of people that were always like, oh, did you get a DUI?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:51):
I'm like...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:52):
Whether I did or didn't, it's not your damn business.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:54):
Like, whatever at Thanksgiving, I don't even really know you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:39:59):
But people think that they can ask you these questions.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:03):
So everyone wanted to know about my rock bottom.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:06):
And when people were learning I didn't really have one,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:09):
they were like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:10):
oh,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:10):
so are you actually an alcoholic?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:11):
Did you actually do this?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:12):
Look at these life changes.

Rachel Casey (00:40:14):
So let me tell you that when I say my husband and I, we got sober on the same day.

Rachel Casey (00:40:19):
And people always... The first thing asked, like, who went to jail?

Rachel Casey (00:40:25):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:40:26):
Who's divorced?

Rachel Casey (00:40:28):
You know, who... And it was actually...

Rachel Casey (00:40:32):
surprisingly because of how much we did drink how and we at the end i mean it was a

Rachel Casey (00:40:38):
lot i'm surprised someone didn't say something you know sooner but yeah i mean

Rachel Casey (00:40:44):
every single time it was must have been a pretty bad day the cops called do you

Rachel Casey (00:40:52):
relax me

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:52):
That is not something to be ashamed of regardless.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:56):
People think that there has to be like cause and effects.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:40:59):
Like make it make sense.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:00):
Like must have been a rock bottom because that is what we hear.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:03):
Like you court ordered AA and now you're sober.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:07):
People are actually just making better life choices for themselves because they're

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:11):
listening to their bodies.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:12):
They have more access to information.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:14):
Representation is key because people are probably watching you and they're like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:19):
I know how she used to drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:21):
And if she can be sober, I can be sober.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:23):
And I remember people used to say that to me.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:25):
And at first I was like offended.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:27):
They were like, oh, if you could stop drinking, I can stop drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:30):
But I remember people telling me that at first I was offended and now I'm proud

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:34):
because I'm like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:35):
yeah,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:36):
I did this.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:36):
So like you could do it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:37):
And the amount of people that now have followed in that footsteps because I've

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:41):
encouraged them and championed them.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:42):
It's amazing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:43):
And so that's where I told myself, I'm like, I can't stay quiet about this.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:46):
I have to be public about this because I want other people to find the same freedom

Heather Trumpfheller (00:41:50):
that I have found.

Rachel Casey (00:41:51):
And that's exactly how I felt.

Rachel Casey (00:41:53):
I can tell you that I would have been louder sooner, faster.

Rachel Casey (00:41:58):
Because I'm all or nothing.

Rachel Casey (00:41:59):
I was perfectionist.

Rachel Casey (00:42:01):
I had to do the steps.

Rachel Casey (00:42:03):
I had to follow the traditions.

Rachel Casey (00:42:05):
And I had to learn about it.

Rachel Casey (00:42:06):
I did studies.

Rachel Casey (00:42:07):
I went...

Rachel Casey (00:42:08):
to the ends of the lengths until I realized,

Rachel Casey (00:42:11):
and I mean,

Rachel Casey (00:42:11):
it was probably two years,

Rachel Casey (00:42:13):
that I was like,

Rachel Casey (00:42:15):
I got really heavy in meditation and something didn't feel right.

Rachel Casey (00:42:19):
And it's like,

Rachel Casey (00:42:20):
when you start being that authentic part of you,

Rachel Casey (00:42:24):
when you feel like you're being put in a bubble,

Rachel Casey (00:42:27):
that no longer feels good.

Rachel Casey (00:42:28):
That used to be my safe space.

Rachel Casey (00:42:30):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:42:30):
But now I'm like...

Rachel Casey (00:42:32):
Something doesn't feel right.

Rachel Casey (00:42:33):
Like, I don't like that I can't put stuff on social media.

Rachel Casey (00:42:36):
I've had positive and negative reached out.

Rachel Casey (00:42:38):
That's another thing I feel like I don't emphasize enough on the podcast anymore.

Rachel Casey (00:42:43):
Not everyone likes when you get sober.

Rachel Casey (00:42:45):
Most people that don't like that you get sober are the ones with the problem,

Rachel Casey (00:42:49):
too,

Rachel Casey (00:42:50):
because either they lost their drinking buddy.

Rachel Casey (00:42:52):
Or number two, they don't want to realize that they have a problem.

Rachel Casey (00:42:56):
And if you have a problem and we drink the same, well, that's not me.

Rachel Casey (00:43:00):
I'm not saying anything about you.

Rachel Casey (00:43:02):
This is a me choice.

Rachel Casey (00:43:03):
I remember someone told me, you know, that I would relapse.

Rachel Casey (00:43:08):
Like, I mean, they were like, deep down, you know, you're a drinker.

Rachel Casey (00:43:13):
You only know how to live without alcohol.

Rachel Casey (00:43:15):
They were shocked every year.

Rachel Casey (00:43:17):
Okay.

Rachel Casey (00:43:18):
I agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:19):
I feel like now I'm at this place.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:21):
It's such a lifestyle thing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:23):
I'm past the proving to other people that this is going to stick.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:28):
But I also remember when I stopped drinking,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:30):
the amount of people,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:31):
especially women,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:32):
were like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:33):
oh my God,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:33):
you're going to save so many calories or you're going to save so much money.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:36):
I still needed my sugar intake.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:39):
So I got so much more into sweets, which is so real, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:42):
Like the pipeline from

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:44):
Alcohol addiction to sweets is so real,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:49):
but also just I didn't save money because I was buying non-alc and a mocktail at a

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:54):
bar is like $2 less than a drink.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:43:57):
That's their motivator is like lose weight or do this.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:00):
And if you're health conscious, right, like you can't be a marathoner and a drinker.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:05):
Like, you really can't.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:06):
Like, maybe you can casually do both.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:08):
But, like, there is a huge thing within that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:10):
And so I feel like that's also been getting a lot of momentum, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:14):
And there's this, like, joke.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:15):
I feel like people in their 30s are like the Harry Potter.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:19):
You get into your sorting hats.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:20):
Like, you're either going to grad school.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:22):
You're either getting sober.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:23):
You're either running marathons.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:25):
You're either having babies.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:26):
Like, there's the sorting hats.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:27):
And, I mean, I think there's a lot of crossover between.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:30):
But I agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:31):
Fitting into the bucket and the label is...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:33):
but not doing it for the right reasons,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:35):
but being okay with like pissing off some people for your sobriety because misery

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:40):
loves company.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:41):
Not everyone likes that you're happy.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:44):
And I think that's why I wanted to have a one-year sober party.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:46):
I even heard some grumblings at my one-year sober party of people kind of being

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:50):
like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:50):
this isn't really fun.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:51):
Can we go somewhere where we can have a drink?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:53):
And I remember thinking to myself,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:55):
like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:55):
you're in a room with 50 people that you love and you can't just sit and have a

Heather Trumpfheller (00:44:59):
conversation with them when you're drinking a non-alcoholic espresso martini that

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:03):
is fabulous because you need that numbing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:06):
Like, you're not having fun at my party because that says something about you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:10):
I agree with that, but I had to put up boundaries.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:12):
I had to grieve that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:13):
My friend that's new or sober,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:15):
I told her,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:16):
you may go home from every social interaction right now and feel really heavy,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:20):
really sad,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:21):
feel like a lot of people are looking at you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:23):
That was really normal.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:24):
That was my first six months.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:26):
The second six months, it was really positive.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:29):
Things started flowing back in.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:30):
People started realizing, well, this is a lifestyle.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:32):
They weren't waiting for me to relapse or have the flip.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:36):
And then they were like, oh, now we can catch Heather on the fun time again.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:40):
One of my best guy friends actually said to me,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:41):
you are still the life of the party without alcohol.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:45):
I remember being like, that's a sentence to you, but that is affirmation to me.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:49):
Like that is what I needed to hear.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:51):
I was still dancing on a bar top at a bachelorette party and people were like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:56):
we didn't even realize you were drinking.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:45:57):
Those are the affirmations when you start learning.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:46:00):
I didn't lose part of myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:46:01):
I actually gained so many amazing things.

Rachel Casey (00:46:04):
I 100% feel,

Rachel Casey (00:46:06):
I feel like I gained myself because alcohol,

Rachel Casey (00:46:09):
it drowned me in the alcohol and it made me not to even just mention the fact it's

Rachel Casey (00:46:15):
literally a poison.

Rachel Casey (00:46:16):
To your point that I've started thinking about with the culture of,

Rachel Casey (00:46:21):
no,

Rachel Casey (00:46:22):
you don't have to hit a bottom.

Rachel Casey (00:46:23):
You don't have to have a DUI.

Rachel Casey (00:46:26):
a challenge that i've kind of i've tried to think to myself like what's like a

Rachel Casey (00:46:30):
level of like how you can kind of try to define your relationship with alcohol if

Rachel Casey (00:46:35):
even taking a month off if you're like could you stop drinking alcohol for a month

Rachel Casey (00:46:39):
and like you hesitate i would challenge to say how are you using alcohol in your

Rachel Casey (00:46:46):
life yeah other things is can you go to dinner

Rachel Casey (00:46:51):
And not order a drink and be okay.

Rachel Casey (00:46:54):
Right.

Rachel Casey (00:46:55):
If you're saying no to that, I'm not saying you're an alcoholic.

Rachel Casey (00:46:58):
There's not a litmus test.

Rachel Casey (00:47:00):
Agreed.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:00):
I had... I literally was like, Chad GPT, am I an alcoholic?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:04):
Like, there's a litmus test.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:06):
I'm with you.

Rachel Casey (00:47:06):
But I would say that if you say,

Rachel Casey (00:47:11):
I wouldn't...

Rachel Casey (00:47:11):
And a lot of the answers I get,

Rachel Casey (00:47:13):
well,

Rachel Casey (00:47:14):
why would I do that?

Rachel Casey (00:47:14):
I don't want to.

Rachel Casey (00:47:16):
OK,

Rachel Casey (00:47:17):
well,

Rachel Casey (00:47:17):
then alcohol is probably taking up more brain space and bandwidth than you're

Rachel Casey (00:47:22):
probably realizing.

Rachel Casey (00:47:23):
Because.

Rachel Casey (00:47:24):
Oh, yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:47:24):
I didn't realize,

Rachel Casey (00:47:26):
like you had said,

Rachel Casey (00:47:28):
how much it's waiting for five o'clock,

Rachel Casey (00:47:31):
waiting for the weekend,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:32):
waiting for the fatigue is so great.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:35):
How many drinks have I had?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:36):
Have I drank more than everyone else?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:38):
Have I had any water?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:39):
Do you think I can still drive?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:40):
Would Uber be surcharging?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:42):
What time is my meeting in the morning?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:43):
Do I need to do this?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:44):
It's like, that's gross.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:46):
While I'm just waiting at the bar for my next drink, none of those anymore.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:50):
And literally,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:51):
that's what the Bug Not Drinking Tonight said is when you're actually trying to

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:54):
drink moderately,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:56):
you're actually making even more decisions.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:47:58):
But when you make the decision that, oh, I don't drink,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:01):
The end, you just removed all of that decision fatigue.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:04):
But I'm with you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:05):
The brain space.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:06):
Like then my first six months without drinking, I thought about alcohol so much.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:11):
And now that's why I feel like freedom is the word that I use because I have

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:16):
relieved all of that brain space that was consumed by alcohol.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:20):
By either wanting to drink, is it 5 o'clock yet?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:22):
What am I going to drink?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:24):
Do they have drinks at this?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:25):
What time is happy hour?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:27):
So many thoughts.

Rachel Casey (00:48:28):
Yes.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:28):
Yes.

Rachel Casey (00:48:29):
And it's totally normal.

Rachel Casey (00:48:31):
And I do remember I went through the seven stages of grief at random different times.

Rachel Casey (00:48:40):
And some of the things that did help was talking about it.

Rachel Casey (00:48:44):
Number one, like finding someone talking about it.

Rachel Casey (00:48:46):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:48:47):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:48:47):
It doesn't have to be a like there are people look on law.

Rachel Casey (00:48:52):
I mean,

Rachel Casey (00:48:52):
there are so many Instagram accounts now,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:54):
but there are so many terrible things about social media.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:57):
And then there's so many positive things for me.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:48:59):
Finding sober community on Instagram is

Heather Trumpfheller (00:49:02):
unfollowing a lot of accounts that really are not great for you and plugging them

Heather Trumpfheller (00:49:07):
in with sobriety things and encouragement and sober events.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:49:11):
And now there's literally sober everything, right?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:49:14):
It's like, I'm a part of a sober walking club.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:49:17):
There's sober dating apps.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:49:18):
There's sober events in your city.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:49:20):
There's sober events online, sober coaching for women, group coaching, et cetera.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:49:25):
Now it's everywhere.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:49:26):
My For You page, I'm like, I love this shift.

Rachel Casey (00:49:28):
I love that.

Rachel Casey (00:49:30):
I guess...

Rachel Casey (00:49:31):
I don't remember what I did about social media in the beginning.

Rachel Casey (00:49:33):
I feel like it's naive to say three years ago, obviously.

Rachel Casey (00:49:36):
I think I just stuck.

Rachel Casey (00:49:37):
Like I said, I'm a lot like you, perfectionist.

Rachel Casey (00:49:40):
A, type A, all in or nothing.

Rachel Casey (00:49:44):
And so I went all in.

Rachel Casey (00:49:45):
Like, I think a lot of the things that I had the hardest time with

Rachel Casey (00:49:51):
was the resentment I had with myself.

Rachel Casey (00:49:55):
And that's where in AA, they talk about that a lot.

Rachel Casey (00:49:59):
I don't think that I'd ever heard that before sobriety.

Rachel Casey (00:50:02):
I didn't even know you could have that deep of a resentment with yourself.

Rachel Casey (00:50:05):
But it took time for me to see that all those stupid things I said,

Rachel Casey (00:50:10):
all those stupid things I did,

Rachel Casey (00:50:11):
all that gossip,

Rachel Casey (00:50:12):
all those bad things,

Rachel Casey (00:50:14):
Yes, it sucks.

Rachel Casey (00:50:15):
And yes, I wish I didn't hurt anyone.

Rachel Casey (00:50:19):
But at the same time,

Rachel Casey (00:50:20):
had those things not happened,

Rachel Casey (00:50:22):
I might not have realized I had a drinking problem.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:50:24):
I regret something, but also be grateful that it motivated you for a change.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:50:29):
I very much agree with that.

Rachel Casey (00:50:31):
And I think everything in sobriety now,

Rachel Casey (00:50:34):
it's not making my entire life about being alcohol-free,

Rachel Casey (00:50:38):
but I can see the two roads that it would have been.

Rachel Casey (00:50:41):
And it's just so hard to not instantly be so grateful.

Rachel Casey (00:50:46):
I know we're approaching the hour and...

Rachel Casey (00:50:50):
I just wanted to hear if there was one main thing about sobriety that's a huge

Rachel Casey (00:50:55):
misconception,

Rachel Casey (00:50:57):
what would you get rid of?

Rachel Casey (00:50:58):
If you could tell someone one thing that you probably didn't expect about sobriety is?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:03):
My gut reaction to share is, again, not everyone hates themselves.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:09):
Like,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:09):
I just kind of thought that everyone walked around and sort of like their own

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:15):
self-loathing and numbed the way they needed to because life is hard.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:21):
So I kind of just thought that everyone was like doing their best.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:26):
And I think people are.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:27):
But not everyone hates themselves.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:30):
And so I think, again, cutting out alcohol is not taking something away from you.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:36):
It is literally not a punishment.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:38):
It is a privilege.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:39):
It is a reward.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:40):
There are a lot of people that I do not think that they might get sober in their lifetime.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:45):
I think that's scary and I think that's sad.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:47):
So I think if you are working on sobriety, you're giving yourself literally your life back.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:53):
Like you are...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:51:55):
So much closer to freedom because not everyone hates themselves.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:00):
There are really people who are going around and finding freedom and gratitude.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:05):
I just didn't realize that.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:07):
I guess I thought that everyone hated themselves and we were all just numbing through life.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:12):
And that is just not the case.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:14):
I really want people to do it for themselves because they know that they need that freedom.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:19):
And I think that's the amazing thing is I obviously now believe that I can be

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:25):
sober,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:26):
but I also now know that I deserve to be sober.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:30):
Like I deserve to be free.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:33):
I deserve to love myself.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:34):
Like I deserve to be happy and feel alive.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:40):
Like I want to be alive and free.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:42):
I didn't feel like I deserved that for the longest time.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:45):
And I also think that's why I'm now in really healthy relationships and friendships

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:49):
because I deserve to be loved.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:51):
I am allowing other people to love me the way that I want to be loved.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:54):
And I think for the longest time, alcohol was preventing that too.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:52:58):
So just realizing like you can do it, but you also deserve it is something huge.

Rachel Casey (00:53:05):
Yeah.

Rachel Casey (00:53:05):
And I think you framed it a really good way.

Rachel Casey (00:53:08):
Instead of thinking this is a punishment, it's not a punishment.

Rachel Casey (00:53:12):
Like I've even thought about challenging people because in the beginning I had this

Rachel Casey (00:53:18):
like part where I hated alcohol and I wish it was like banished off the planet.

Rachel Casey (00:53:22):
And like,

Rachel Casey (00:53:23):
I don't feel that way now,

Rachel Casey (00:53:24):
but there was a day where I was just like,

Rachel Casey (00:53:26):
it like was ruining people's lives.

Rachel Casey (00:53:28):
It's ruining my lives.

Rachel Casey (00:53:29):
Like both my parents are alcoholics.

Rachel Casey (00:53:31):
Like, I mean, I had this whole, but that's like your seven stages, right?

Rachel Casey (00:53:34):
Like,

Rachel Casey (00:53:34):
think knowing that you can step away from it and it doesn't have to be a negative

Rachel Casey (00:53:39):
it can be like hey what if i just tried not drinking if you subbed it with cocaine

Rachel Casey (00:53:46):
if everyone's like hey do you want to go get some cocaine after work would you flip

Rachel Casey (00:53:50):
out i mean it's still a drug it's the same drug as like drink but drinking is just

Heather Trumpfheller (00:53:54):
normalized it's a drug that people ask you why you don't do it oh sorry i had too

Rachel Casey (00:53:59):
much cocaine last night look at you like you were sideways and

Rachel Casey (00:54:03):
It's like you get in deep enough in drinking, cocaine's around.

Rachel Casey (00:54:09):
And I mean,

Rachel Casey (00:54:09):
I got to the point in service industry where it's like,

Rachel Casey (00:54:12):
and then you're like,

Rachel Casey (00:54:14):
you get in your head like you had no idea how many people actually partake.

Rachel Casey (00:54:19):
And I thought this whole world was numbing.

Rachel Casey (00:54:22):
Everyone does it.

Rachel Casey (00:54:23):
That's not true.

Rachel Casey (00:54:25):
If you think there's this big world with drug use,

Rachel Casey (00:54:28):
drinking,

Rachel Casey (00:54:29):
there's an even bigger world of sobriety and it is so much more.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:32):
Then the community is inclusive and accepting and they want people to be a part of it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:37):
It's like the cult that everyone's like, come join.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:40):
We're obsessed with each other.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:42):
And it really is such a positive thing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:44):
Thinking about

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:45):
My boyfriend, Henry, on our first date, I remember already thinking, he gets it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:49):
I don't have to explain this entire part of me to someone.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:53):
Alcohol was never a part of our relationship.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:55):
It's something I still talk about every day in my life.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:54:57):
But knowing that alcohol is what led to 99% of my relationships ending...

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:02):
Knowing that that's not even a fear that I have in that is amazing.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:06):
I totally agree.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:07):
You get to start at this brand new baseline.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:09):
The sober community is so insanely inclusive.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:13):
Like people genuinely want to welcome you into it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:16):
And I think that's what's so awesome about it.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:18):
Find community,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:19):
get involved,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:20):
stick with it,

Heather Trumpfheller (00:55:21):
realize that you can do it,

Rachel Casey (00:55:22):
but know that you deserve to be doing it.

Rachel Casey (00:55:25):
I love that you deserve it.

Rachel Casey (00:55:26):
And I think the other cool thing is right now we and you have just such a positive, happy aura.

Rachel Casey (00:55:34):
I think the other thing that's great in the sobriety community is I can share about

Rachel Casey (00:55:38):
a shitty situation you talked about.

Rachel Casey (00:55:39):
You had a really rough time with your house.

Rachel Casey (00:55:42):
I'm still sorry about your dog.

Rachel Casey (00:55:44):
You could go to a sober community and say, I just had the worst day ever.

Rachel Casey (00:55:48):
And they're not going to be like, oh, what a party pooper.

Rachel Casey (00:55:51):
They're like, oh, my God, me too.

Rachel Casey (00:55:52):
I've totally been there.

Rachel Casey (00:55:53):
And like, hey, what can we, you know, either, hey, it's OK.

Rachel Casey (00:55:58):
Go stay home.

Rachel Casey (00:55:59):
Go get rest tonight.

Rachel Casey (00:56:00):
Go take care of yourself.

Rachel Casey (00:56:01):
Rest in general is like something that I didn't like.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:05):
There's a difference between hours of sleep and quality of rest and just having a

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:09):
restful spirit.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:11):
That's what I found with alcohol.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:12):
Again, there's so much goodness.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:14):
If you're listening to this and you're like, should I do it?

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:16):
You're never going to regret it.

Rachel Casey (00:56:17):
You're only going to wish you did it sooner.

Rachel Casey (00:56:18):
I think the way I used to look at it is like my little one because my son was two

Rachel Casey (00:56:23):
when I started and he would have these growth spurts and he would sleep extra,

Rachel Casey (00:56:27):
right?

Rachel Casey (00:56:27):
Because during a growth spurt, usually hungry and grow.

Rachel Casey (00:56:31):
It's the same in sobriety.

Rachel Casey (00:56:33):
I feel like

Rachel Casey (00:56:34):
When I had a big growth or a big realization, aha, I required more rest.

Rachel Casey (00:56:39):
And it was because it's growth.

Rachel Casey (00:56:42):
That's good.

Rachel Casey (00:56:42):
I am just so grateful.

Rachel Casey (00:56:44):
Thank you so much for this entire time that you've given to the podcast.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:49):
Just reaching out if you have questions or you want to share more because this is real.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:53):
This is your life.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:54):
This is not perfectionism.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:56):
This isn't proving it to someone else.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:58):
This matters.

Heather Trumpfheller (00:56:58):
So.

Rachel Casey (00:57:00):
100%.

Rachel Casey (00:57:00):
I've had over 25 guests on this podcast and not one of them has ever been like,

Rachel Casey (00:57:05):
I regret getting sober.

Rachel Casey (00:57:07):
And it's just like you are such a joy.

Rachel Casey (00:57:10):
Thank you for sharing some of your story.

Rachel Casey (00:57:12):
Thank you for being.

Rachel Casey (00:57:13):
And I'm so glad that I will tag you.

Rachel Casey (00:57:15):
So if anyone wants to reach out, I have your Instagram.

Rachel Casey (00:57:19):
I have Instagram.

Rachel Casey (00:57:20):
did you want me to put your email as well?

Rachel Casey (00:57:22):
Or like, I was like, I will go look at what you put for what I can put for following.

Rachel Casey (00:57:27):
Again, just thank you for coming on Sober Banter.

Rachel Casey (00:57:29):
Thank you.

Rachel Casey (00:57:30):
I look forward to having everyone here this episode.

Rachel Casey (00:57:33):
It's such a great resource for so many women and men.

Rachel Casey (00:57:36):
I think the women too.

Rachel Casey (00:57:38):
So thank you so much.