Redefining Sobriety: A Conversation with Jen Hirst

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Kevin: Welcome everyone to another episode of the re frameable podcast, a podcast that brings you people's stories and ideas about how we can work to reframe our relationship, not just with alcohol, but with stress, anxiety, relationships, enjoyment, and so much more.

Because changing our relationship with alcohol is about so much more than changing the contents of our glass. This podcast is brought to you by the Reframe app. Reframe is the number one iOS and Android app to help you cut back or quit drinking alcohol. It uses neuroscience to reframe your relationship with alcohol and unlock the healthiest, happiest you.

My name is Kevin Bellack. I'm a certified professional recovery coach and the head of coaching at the Reframe app.

Emma: And I'm Emma Simmons. I'm a Reframer, a certified life coach and Thrive coach with Reframe. And today we're excited to be joined by Jen Hirst. Jen works to empower women to feel their best in sobriety and boost their confidence from day one by integrating six science backed habits to make [00:01:00] sobriety stick.

She's the founder of Lighthouse Sobriety, a supportive community where women stay accountable, build connections, and stay alcohol free. Together her 100 day sober journal has helped hundreds of women stay consistent and reach their goals, and who sold out group coaching programs have supported women around the world in embracing sobriety with a get to mentality.

Jen has been featured in Women's Health and the New York Times for her work in helping women create a life they're excited to wake up to. Welcome. Jen. I'm so excited to chat with you.

Jen: Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for having me.

Emma: That is quite the bio

Jen: women's House, New York Times.

Thank you Bt for helping me write it. I'm like, make me sound great. Thanks. Yes.

Kevin: It comes back with something. You're like, no better. I

Jen: know. I Come on do. No, I'm like, that stinks. Do better. Like those

Emma: Instagram reels bitter. More awesome. More fabulous. Yeah. Yes. More iconic. I

Jen: know chat, [00:02:00] GBT is definitely a life saver.

Thank you.

Kevin: Yes. That's my, no thank you. So I'll get to that later.

Emma: What chat? GBT is your life saver.

Kevin: It's my nugget at the end. Spoiler.

Emma: I guess let's dive right in. Tell us a bit about yourself, how you ended up. Here on this podcast where you are in life.

Jen: Yeah. And that's crazy because if you would go back 12 years ago, maybe even 15 years ago, I never would think I would be on a podcast like this or even sharing about what was going on, even though my drinking started much earlier from the day I got sober to the day I even realized that I had a problem to the day I had my first drink.

And so I always like to say that no one is off limits when it comes to alcohol or having a problem with alcohol or struggling with alcohol on a spectrum as I see it now. At the time when I was in one of my inpatient treatments, I didn't think it was as [00:03:00] severe as it was, but looking back as I've told my story again and again.

I was on one of the more severe cases where I didn't know if I was going to wake up the next day, but you wouldn't know it looking at pictures of me because I appeared like I had it all together. I was really good at hiding it. And so if you go to my Instagram account or if you see pictures of me, I don't have a lot of pictures of me drinking or hammered because I did most of my drinking the last three years, especially two years at home alone in secret, and it wasn't fun.

Anymore. It was a means to survive. And so it was really like a 10 year progression. 'cause it didn't happen just right off the gate. It really was. And I think Annie Grace has says this at one point, is that on average it's usually a 10 year progression, which is why it's so tricky and so sneaky and sneaks up on you to one day you wake up and you have no idea how you got here, [00:04:00] where you can't stop.

And that's where I was. I was physically dependent on it, but it happened over time. And the more stress I added, the more I drank. But I came from a great home. If you look back, I didn't have anything traumatic really happen to me. My parents rarely drank. There was like these goody two shoes. They were high school sweethearts in the band.

They met in the band playing clarinet, and I was raised in this perfectionist home where I started to put really high standards on myself to earn love, to earn rewards. Equaled I would get love. And so it didn't happen right away, but especially later on, because I couldn't manage and live up to these standards I that I put on myself, I would drink and I just couldn't take it.

And so long story short, I had my first drink at 15 and I did a quote unquote, normal drinking. Throughout high school, even college, but it was really like this turning point. And I can only say [00:05:00] that because I did a usage history. And so if no one knows what that is I've done them. And every single inpatient and outpatient treatment that I've been to is where you go through and I actually have the women in my programs do it is you go through and write out your history with alcohol from start to finish, from start to today, and has been super helpful for the women in my groups.

It's hard also to go back and to relive these moments, but it's so therapeutic and it was in this experience the first time I did it at Hazelden. That I pinpointed the exact moment where I started to abuse it because again, I went out, I did my, with my friends, I did the college thing, parties, keggers, all that.

But I never really used it to manage or change my emotions. I did it because that's what my friends were doing. But it was this turning point when my second boyfriend wanted to go on a break and I just went back to that heartbreak. I think that we've all probably experienced your first [00:06:00] love and oh my God, I never wanna feel like that again.

I had no idea what to do with myself. Everything changed. Your entire future changed. And so to deal with that, I was living with some guys at the time who said, Hey, if you take Adderall, they would abuse, they would get this prescription for Adderall. They would abuse it and then use it up within a couple days and then they'd wait till the next prescription and they're like, Hey, if you take this, 'cause they knew how much I was struggling with this breakup.

You're gonna feel amazing. You're not even gonna think about him. You're gonna feel like God. And again, I never really had a problem with Adderall. I loved it 'cause I could get a lot done, however I could start, stop it at any point. But it was in that moment that I was like, no way I could do this. The same with alcohol.

I could just change any hard thing that I went through that I'm going through loneliness, anxiety, oh my gosh. Having social anxiety, that going to parties, how nervous I would get. I could do [00:07:00] that and I didn't have to feel anything. So this was, back in 2022, no, 20 2002, whatever. So again, I had that in the back of my mind.

I could take away any hard thing with it. So I used it to manage anxiety. I used it for fear, for sadness, for overwhelm, for literally anything. And again, it wasn't a problem right off the gate. But the more and more, and again, I had consequences leading up to the day I got sober. But again, going back to this perfectionist tendency, I put a lot on my plate.

Once I started to get a job, I also had freelance. I started to work as an ARC director for wedding magazines for freelance, and it was really in the year leading up to my wedding that things really ramped up of. I was working 24 7. I had a full-time job. I was managing and designing four magazines. I designed a freelance magazine full-time, and then I [00:08:00] planned my wedding by myself.

Now, the one thing that I didn't do was ask for help because. I, there was one moment where I asked my husband to put on stamps. I'm doing it because he's right over there and he put 'em on crooked for wedding invites. And I'm like oh my God. I'm like, oh my God, I can't. I'm like, I'm just gonna do it.

And so I was like, you go out, have fun. I'll just take care of everything. And so I would drink too, because I was anxious, 'cause I wanted to have fun. And the more I drank, the more anxious I got. The more anxious I got, the more I drank. And so I would post pictures of my wedding day on social because I am there and I'm smiling, but you don't know the crippling anxiety that I was feeling.

I started drinking vodka in the morning. I took an Adderall to just get through it to appear normal. I blacked out. I don't remember the end of my wedding. And it was really like the next day, two days later, I. Physically collapsed. I was expected to go back [00:09:00] to work. And in this timeframe, all of this drinking, I was hiding from my husband.

He had no idea what was going on. I had started hiding bottles in my closet. When he would go to bed, I would sneak sips in. And I was starting to get really worried leading up to my wedding of questioning, am I an alcoholic? Oh my God. And all that was around back then was aa. And that scared the crap out of me having this label.

My gosh. As someone who appeared and did all these great things, to now look at me and have people look at me and call me an alcoholic, what was that going to do to my ego? They're gonna realize I have a problem, a serious problem. And also I'm. Which I didn't know if I wanted to do then, but I didn't know who to turn to or who to talk to or even what I was going through.

But a couple days after I literally started drinking around the clock, I gave up. I'm like, I'm done with this. I physically collapsed. [00:10:00] My husband found out I wasn't showing up to work. And began the year and a half journey of me really actively seeking sobriety and failing multiple times, attending my first outpatient treatment.

I started with that actually I started with my first AA meeting, which geared the crap out of me. I was still drunk. I threw up in a bag. My husband went with me. In this time period, I also tried other forms of alcohol. 'cause one thing I dealt with and I think a lot of us deal with is shame. I had so much shame of what I was doing 'cause I didn't want to drink.

I just didn't know how to feel normal anymore because normal meant anxiety and loneliness. And it dove me into, I would even say a deep depression, which I never had before. But I dove into other forms of alcohol because I was rotating my liquor stores, which I think a lot of us do. I would go to the different rounds and.

I [00:11:00] felt, and I think I learned it in one of my treatments, that mouthwash has the same form of alcohol in it as vodka or close to it. It can still get you drunk. And I'm like, oh, no way. Because my husband found out I can't have vodka or alcohol in here, I can just drink mouthwash and I could go into Target, buy a couple bottles of mouthwash and no one freaking knows.

So that is was my drink of choice for the last year and a half. I didn't really drink anything else. And when people found out about that, I went to what is it? Vanilla extract and peppermint extract and any extract I could find. I even went into hand sanitizers. I even tried rubbing alcohol once and got really sick.

And then I, I. My husband almost took me to the hospital because that's incredibly lethal, so is mouthwash. And so it just began again, just I went to my first outpatient. That didn't work. I [00:12:00] went, it worked for a little bit, but then of course I went back and tried to moderate or tried to sneak it.

And then I went to my first inpatient stay at the Hazelden and I loved it. I thought it was amazing. I was so scared to go first, 30 day stay. However, when I say this is two things have to be true when you get sober, is that you have to really want it and you have to be ready. That actually comes from Matthew Perry.

He's, I remembered that we were watching a special with him like a long time ago. I'm like, that's so true. And I really wanted to be sober and I knew that's what I had to do. I just wasn't ready. I still felt that I could try to control this, and then I wasn't ready to put it down. So I relapsed the day I got it out, I hit and I fell so hard.

And so many things started happening. And I did all the aftercare stuff. Actually, I went back to inpatient a month later at Hazelden, did their extended care stay? So I spent Thanksgiving in [00:13:00] treatment. I was able to get out before Christmas, but I still wasn't completely ready. So I was still sneaking mouthwash and I went to the sober house.

All of the aftercare stuff that they recommend. But it was in this time, I got pulled over for my second DWI, I got my first one in 2005. I got pulled over for my second DWI. And you think all of these things, you would wake up and you'd be like, oh, okay. That was it. And I'm not saying they were, they didn't have an impact on when it finally clicked for me, but it was, I had to experience consequence after consequence of being kicked out by my husband, almost being kicked out by my family.

I lost my job. I lost my car. I got, again, my second DWI, I blew over a 0.2 in rush hour traffic. I blacked out. I had an open bottle in my car. And so all of these things happened and I literally had zero money to my name. And so after being kicked out of my [00:14:00] house by my husband, staying with my parents for a couple weeks, I was still trying to just again, fight this craving.

Try to feed this craving with mouthwash and is was in this period, I had gone to the office with my father. They had to keep tabs on me, which made me even wanna drink more. And I was also taking Adderall. I had bought it like randomly online. It was super sketchy. And so it was in this period, like I was remember sitting on my childhood bed and I remember my hands going numb and I'm like, I can't feel my hands, my heart's racing.

And then I remember I wish Cha CVT was around back then 'cause I Googled. I was like, what are the symptoms of cardiac arrest? Because I feel like I can't feel anything. I'm like, am I having a heart attack? And it said drink some milk. I didn't wanna tell my parents. 'cause if I told my parents that means I had to be honest about Adderall and that I was drinking.

And according to them, I was sober. So I drank milk. And that really scared me. But it was in this period where I [00:15:00] started drinking early in the morning at my dad's office, drank mouthwash, got it At Target downtown. I blacked out. I started throwing up. I came to in detox on April 23rd, 2013. I actually came to in a hospital bed.

And what I remember was I woke up and my mother was by my side and I just said, help me. I didn't know I was, it was maybe at that point where I finally surrendered and I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what was gonna happen. So they took me to the sec, my second detox stay, and it was in this moment where I blew and I blew a 0.34, which is high, but it's not the highest I've seen.

I've seen much higher, not like it's a competition, but the fact that this was just another day of my drinking. How close did I come? To not waking up. Before I had woken up and had no idea what happened. I had woken up and I had completely torn apart our couch where stuffing was everywhere I had come [00:16:00] to and my dogs were outside, and I had no recollection of it.

Next to men, I have no idea what happened. Like all of these things that I put myself in such unsafe situations, how close did I come? And it was like an out of body experience. And detox, of course, is no fun. You don't have anything. You're around people you don't know you're coming off.

Of course you can get some medication to make it a little bit less intense. But it was like I had an autobody experience and I remember, and it was during the day, the next day, and I'm like, oh my God, what am I doing? And I didn't know my husband wasn't talking to me, my parents were talking to me. I had court that next day.

I had no money, no car, no job. As someone who came from a great. Upbringing who won awards. I did well in my job to having literally nothing and homeless. And so my parents didn't want me back. And so I was calling homeless shelters to see where I could go. [00:17:00] And it was in that moment again on my bed where I'm like, I'm done.

I am so freaking done. I don't want to drink. I am so disgusted by it, what it's done, what it has taken from my life. And I didn't know what was gonna happen. Again. I had nothing but as new. And I told myself, as long as you don't drink, you cannot make this any worse. The only way up is from here. And so I let go of everything that was gonna happen.

I didn't know what was gonna happen with my husband if he would take me back. We were not talking 'cause they thought, okay, if she's been to inpatient twice, why isn't she cured? What do we do? And of course they set boundaries, but I kept that as a mentor of always taking the next right thing.

I had a lot of stuff to clean up, a lot I had to do. I went to my last inpatient stay, which is so much easier once you stop trying to fight it. Gosh, [00:18:00] getting sober is so much easier. When I stopped trying to fight drinking I didn't want to anymore. And I know I had a bunch of stuff to do, but it was so much easier.

And even if people didn't believe me, I was gonna shut up and I was gonna show up and just do the work. So I did my inpatient, I did outpatient, I showed up to AA meetings. I got a parole officer. I did a day in jail. I got a breathalyzer in my car. I paid all my fines, I got my license back. All of these things.

I was on house arrest for two weeks. Try explaining that to a lawyer. When you get a job, talk about humbling. And I just, I kept doing the next right thing. And it's amazing what can happen when you don't consume this one thing in four months, I got a job back in my field because in that time I could not drive.

So I biked to a local printing shop to have some accountability to start earning some income until I got a job back in my field. [00:19:00] In four months, we learned I was pregnant, which is something I wanted so much, but of course, how could I, and how could we bring a child into this earth when I can't even take care of myself?

And it was in this moment before I entered my last inpatient stay that my husband and I, we took a drive just randomly the day before I went into my last day. He wasn't really talking to me, but we went out to dinner. Just to have a nice meal before I went in and it was just silent. We were taking a drive through.

It's a nice neighborhood and at the time we were living in a condo and it just like a, or like a townhouse. It was good, but it was this nice neighborhood. It was sunset. And I just started looking at all these beautiful houses and what could be, 'cause one of the biggest things that we wanted was to have kids.

And it just hurt me so much because I couldn't, because I couldn't stop drinking. But I saw what our life could be like and I saw these two kids and I saw this like brick house and I'm like, gosh, [00:20:00] this could be us one day. And it's so crazy. Because now I'm living that life and not even living that life, but such a better life.

I have two kids, a boy and a girl who I saw, I couldn't see their faces. Of course, we have a beautiful home now it's not in the city. We actually moved to the country, which is something completely out outside of my comfort zone. Love it. But again, in four months I got a job. I was pregnant, and then in seven months I was promoted.

And once we had my son who came early, that was like the best gift to come out of my sobriety because my gosh, if I could pour this mouthwash and this poison and treat my body like crap, for it to come back and to be able to produce a life I where I thought I was definitely gonna be infertile. He was the greatest gift to come when I hit my, so my one year, I'm like, oh my God, look at what.

And he was something to look forward to. [00:21:00] And so I look at my life now and I want to treat my body with respect. I want to feed it well. I want to move it. I want to drink water. I want to make sure I'm trying the best to sleep. And so I do that again by just taking care of it as a, as just a thank you for my gosh, not giving up on me as a thank you again, even to my husband for not giving up on me.

We were able. To become so much stronger in our relationship 'cause there was no secrets. And for the first four years, and I know I'm really taking up a lot of time, but I did all of the motions. I got my sponsor, I did my meetings, I did all of that. I popped out my first kid, I popped out my second kid.

Awesome. Loved my life. But I was living in the sober closet for four years. 'cause I thought we weren't supposed to talk about it, that this is something to keep hush and at the, and I was like, okay, yeah, I get it. Don't acknowledge people or whatever. But then I'm like why [00:22:00] not? And I started getting to personal development.

I started to become a beach body coach, which is something totally random because I was stalking this woman who had this crazy transformation. And I'm so influenced by women with muscle. I think that's so empowering and there's a reason why I'm following her. She was a beach body coach. So I became a coach and started sharing my story on social.

But, and once I did that, I started reading personal development and my gosh, that helped so much with gaining clarity on why I am the way I am, why I did the things I did, and how to do them better, because that was one of the four vital behaviors. Now, to become a beach body coach, you had to start sharing your story on social.

I'm like, oh my gosh, this is so awkward. How do I take a picture? I don't know what to do with my hands. Like how do I feel like, ah, that's so weird. But then I'm like, you know what? I think, and I came to my husband two weeks after I started posting on social, to promote my [00:23:00] programs and things like that.

I think I'm supposed to share my sobriety on social media, and I would share my one years on social, but I would hide. I don't know if you guys did that, but I would hide people. I'm like, I don't want my coworkers to know. And I would like nonchalantly say I was sober, like posting the promises of AA and things like that.

But this time I'm like, I feel like I'm supposed to, if. It's such a big part of my life. If I don't do this, how am I supposed to have people trust me? And I'm really big on trust. How am I supposed to help think that people would trust me if I'm not honest about this? And I want to, because I forgot this big point in my story, and if you guys can cut me off at any minute, is that before I went to my last impatient, I knew the thing that was preventing me from getting sober was being honest with my husband about my Adderall use.

Like I was doing Adderall on and off. But I, and the, what, the scenario I made up in my mind of how my husband was going to react, which is completely opposite of him, is that he was going to. Toss and [00:24:00] destroy the entire room. He was going to throw everything off the desk and be like, oh my God, I can't believe you lied to me.

We are done. And I thought he was gonna leave me, but I'm like, I know if I don't tell him this, I cannot stay sober. And so before I went to flat, my last impatient, I had an honest conversation with him. I said, can I talk to you? He's yeah, what's up? I told him about it and he said, okay, are you done?

I'm like, yeah. He's okay, then we're good. I'm like, wait, what? You are supposed to like completely lose your mind and go like this. I'm like, oh, that was way easier. Now I'm not gonna say everybody's gonna have that same reaction. Yeah. But that prevented me from being honest. And once I was did that, I'm like, Ugh, now I can do this.

Because it was one this secret, you hear that secrets keep us sick. And so I was protecting this, but it kept going, having me going back to the bottle. And there [00:25:00] was things that he said in my sobriety journey, he's if you can do, if you can put down the bottle, you can literally do anything.

And I've kept that motto for my entire sobriety is childbirth. Oh my gosh, I don't care. Hopefully I have an epidural, but if I don't, whatever, because getting sober was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. So I measure any hard thing that comes after against it. So again, I started sharing my journey.

I came out of the sober closet and I don't know, you guys can interrupt me at any point if I'm like going over and I'm getting into how I became a sober coach really quick. So I started sharing my sober journey on Facebook, and I did a coming out post, which I encourage women to do. I'm trying to get women and anybody having the courage to own their sobriety.

And to share it and to have that voice and to be proud of it. My gosh, like the things you can accomplish in sobriety are incredible. And why should I hide something that saved my life? And so I remember I [00:26:00] wrote it in four minutes. I said, Hey, I'm Jen. I'm an alcoholics. As I use that term, then I don't use it now.

And it felt so good. And then I took a weird, awkward picture of myself. I posted it, I threw my phone, I ran into an aa, meaning I had that posting remorse or like vulnerability. I'm like, oh my God, what did I do? What did I do? And I came back. And then I had nothing but love and encouragement and support.

And I, from that moment on, I said, oh, now everybody knows. And I didn't start sharing about it every day 'cause I thought I was supposed to help women lose weight. And over time, the more I shared about my sobriety journey, the more I discovered, I think I'm supposed to help women get sober. I don't think they're coming to me about this.

People are more interested because what I'm doing is working. However, I wanna rebrand sobriety, I wanna make it fun. I want you to have this thing. I want it to be something you wanna do and not something you have to do of all of the opportunities like it can give to your [00:27:00] life that it can give you. And again, just incredibly like hone in this get to mindset of it's not something I have to do.

For me, I really had to do it, but it's something I get to do. I get to own my mornings. I get to wake up without regret. I get to be there for my kids. I get to drive whenever I want, which is a Christmas miracle when you've had a breathalyzer in your car. And so in turn, the more I share it, the more it became clear to me that I should start helping women because I was helping women in my dms.

So I became a sober coach. I launched my group coaching program, I launched my membership, I launched my journal. And it's just snowballed from there. And it just, it's been working for many women of this different approach. And I love this modern sobriety where you get to choose whatever works for you.

And it can be a mix of everything. And it can be this, it can be that if it keeps you sober. [00:28:00] Then that is your thing and to keep freaking doing it. So that's how I got into coaching. I know I glanced over that, but thank you guys for listening.

Emma: Thank you. Holy shit. I could have just listened to you talk for a whole hour and you got me all in my feels and I am I'm trying to figure out what I'm feeling.

I think it's just this immense sense of pride of I'm proud of you, I'm proud of where you've been and where you've come and your whole journey and being able to share that so openly. And sorry, I'm all in my fields given you might wanna take over.

Kevin: I know you kept saying I don't know if you cut me off at any time.

And I was like, no, we're not cutting anything off here. Keep going. Because, I appreciate you just sharing all that. There's so much to, there's so many questions or ways I want to go next. But yeah, first and foremost, thank you for sharing that you had just said, I'll just go with the easiest one. It was just what you just said about have to versus [00:29:00] get to, and because the way I look at that is both can be true, right? And it is sometimes it sometimes feels like almost like a, a trick or just something like, oh I get to do this.

But it can be that, I can have to do something and also get to do it. So how do you like show people that get to mentality or get that buy-in for them in that way?

Jen: Yeah, I guess we do it in my programs with a get to Saturday because I think Saturday and Sunday mornings are like the best in sobriety.

Yeah. Like you always play the tape forward to the morning.

Emma: Yep.

Jen: And as someone who's an early riser, I mean me thinking back then that I would wake up at 4 45. 'cause I love it. But I get to do that because I didn't drink last night. And I think I love to have this reminder for women in my groups because it's so easy to [00:30:00] fall or when you're in your social circle or not getting invited to something or other people drinking or doing this or it's summer, and patio drinks and it's man, if you can just play that tape forward and focus on, what that may be happening.

Even if they're drinking, I get to do this. I get to remember how I drive home. I get to do this. Being a parent my, even though I slept through this crazy storm last week, 'cause I was so indeed sleep. My kids are able to wake me up. I'm able to be there for my kids and I get to, and again, just really repeating this on a weekly basis, if not daily basis, then we can begin to find the joy in sobriety and really focus on all the things that sobriety gives us instead of what we think It's taken away of, my gosh, I, I can't go out with my friends, or I can't do this, or What am I gonna do this?

It's yeah. What do you also get [00:31:00] to do because you don't feel like crap and you're not tired and you have more energy and all of that. So you can have both, but at least counter any of those thoughts with some positive thoughts. How we can romanticize sobriety as much as we romanticize drinking.

I invite people to find ways of how we can romanticize sobriety, and it can start with recognizing what do I get to do? And it can be in the simplest of things, I think. And I post on social a lot as a parent, it really pays off. My sobriety really pays off in the little yet big things of remembering to be the tooth or if my kid, if something happens to them, they need to go to the ER overnight.

Remembering that. Stupid elf on the shelf that I point, why do that

Kevin: still doesn't happen. But

Jen: however, when you wake up early, you can just do it in the morning, which I love. Sure. But it really [00:32:00] pays off in those moments where, oh my gosh, I'm so glad of that I'm sober. I'm so glad that my kids have a constant stable, although I try to stay stable and calm presence if they're around others who are drinking, that they have that example for them that you don't need to do this, that you can choose something else.

So for me, again, it's just those constant reminders of yeah, sometimes we have to do, I, like for me, I have to do it, but also look at all of these things and pinpointing those and having them say that in their Saturday morning post can just reaffirm why this life is so awesome.

Kevin: Yeah. Yeah. And. And looking back.

'cause if you have that, ugh, I have to do this mentality. Think about with drinking, what do you have to do as well? Like you have to wake up feeling we don't say, I get to wake up feeling like shit. I have to also wake up feeling like shit. I also have to deal with the [00:33:00] repercussions of this.

We forget sometimes when you talked about romanticizing, we're like, oh, I had such a great time, I always have such a great time doing this. And it's do you let's look at the whole picture because maybe like the first part of the night. It's fine. It's great.

That's what we remember. But what about the last part of the night? How was your sleep? How was the next day? We like separate that from alcohol, but I try to encourage people, like that's the whole picture, like when we romanticize like it, you can't have one without the other. Yeah.

Yeah, go ahead.

Jen: No, there's, and I completely agree. It's like I always have to remind the women, there's always a cost you, there's always a consequence. It's we want to drink without the consequence. Yeah. You're always gonna have to pay for it. So that 15 minutes of relief. Is worth three to five days of withdrawal, you're gonna have to pay for that.

Of course, it's like more the at the first 24 hours. But that lingers in your system, whether you [00:34:00] know it or not. That crankiness, the anxiety, all of that, you will have to pay for it. So yeah, you can get the 15 minutes of fake happiness or you can just allow yourself to feel uncomfortable and to just find these ways to boost that dopamine naturally.

And finding people that you like to be around finding things you like to do. Like I remember when I got sober, I had no idea what to do. I'm like, what do I even do? I'm like, honey, what do I even do for a day? 'cause all we did was go to drink

Emma: and

Jen: what do I

Emma: like to do?

Jen: Yeah. Do I even like my husband? I don't know.

Like everything was tainted when I was drinking. So I had to question everything of do I even like this person? Do I even like. These people I'm around, do we even have anything in common? If I'm not drinking, if we're not drinking, can they be open to meeting me for coffee [00:35:00] and not at night? So every, it's so crazy how one thing can taint your entire life.

But that's the beauty is that with sobriety, you get to really understand who you are and what you like, who you want to be around, because now you're getting down to who you are. And I think that it takes such a long time. So I try to help women give them ideas of, Hey, try this. Did you know you can go paddle boarding?

What? No way? Did you know you could, you can literally do anything without alcohol. You just have to allow yourself to experience it and feel awkward. At the beginning, and I promise you, more often than not, you're gonna leave and be like, huh, that wasn't so bad. Actually, I had a great time. I remember women in my membership that go to concerts and they're like, oh my God, what do I do?

I remember my husband going to a concert, he wasn't drinking to support me. And I'm like, doesn't that [00:36:00] freak you out? He's no. He's I'll just drink a Dr. Pepper. I'm like, what? How are you gonna, like, how is it even fun? Because I related drinking so much with everything that, to do it without it, it's oh my God, I could actually remember the music.

I can actually remember a movie I watched. I can, treat myself in other ways at the venue. I can drive home. What I, it's just, it's, I think we just have to give ourselves more credit and be open to experience it and take it for a test drive before we judge. Anything going alcohol free, just try it.

And maybe if it, if you don't have a great time, that's just not your thing. Or maybe it's the people that you're around and it's eh, I don't really feel good after I'm with them. Huh. Really good information. So then, oh, okay, I should do more of this, or less of that. Or maybe it was just a crappy band, I don't know, [00:37:00] but maybe I was drinking before to make them better.

And I so yeah, try new things. Be open, and I think you're gonna surprise yourself with a lot of things.

Emma: I was just thinking revelation in Emma's brain. I don't know if this is a new revelation. Probably not. But that need to get to, or have to get to kind of thing of, maybe we do need to or have to get just get sober, get alcohol out of our lives.

But we get to, in this current climate, we get to. Do it in a really fun way. Like it's not, we get to do it without necessarily white knuckling. Yes, there's always a certain element of white knuckling in the beginning, no matter what kind of path you choose to get alcohol free, but we get to do it with this really cool community.

We get to do it with cool people. We get to do it with neuroscience and fun and laughter and joy, and it's not drudgery of going to a dingy church hot wall at seven [00:38:00] 30 on a Tuesday night where it's cold and rainy and which was my impression of what a 12 step program would be. I know it's not always like that, but that was my, that was definitely something that held me back from getting alcohol free for such a long time, was that I thought it was gonna be drudgery.

But if we have to or need to get alcohol free, we get to choose how we're gonna do it these days to a certain extent. We get to choose fun and joy and excitement and connection and friendship. And experience and yeah, all the cool things. Paddleboarding, sober concerts are the best. I have so much fun.

I can still dance my ass off and have a great time completely sober and remember it and drive home.

Jen: And the great thing if other people are drinking, they're not gonna remember you dancing. So make a fool outta yourself, yeah. But

Kevin: yeah,

Emma: go for it. Do it. Feels good.

Jen: Yeah, absolutely.

Kevin: And I think one of the points you just made [00:39:00] is huge as far as a problem.

Is that thought of, okay, I just hang out. I just hung out with these people, friends, relatives, whatever. And it wasn't fun. What's wrong with me? Versus maybe they're just not fun. Maybe that thing we did just isn't fun. I think all too often we don't challenge it like that and we just assume I've been doing this forever and it's always been quote unquote fun because alcohol has been there.

And then you take that away and now you're like, see, this isn't fun anymore because I'm not drinking. Then with if it was fun with alcohol, and it's not fun without it, it can pull us back in and get us back to that. Have to, I have to do this because, that's not fun. But challenging that and saying maybe those just aren't my people anymore. And that's tough, but [00:40:00] it's true. Like maybe I don't like going to that venue, that activity, that thing anymore because, or maybe I only going for a little bit and then leaving earlier and not staying for, hours and hours on end and so on.

But challenging that I think is so important.

Jen: Yeah. And if anything starts past 7:00 PM I'm out. Like I put my pajamas on at 5:00 PM I, but I guess you get to decide and define what's great in sobriety is that you get to define what fun is for you. There's no this is the equivalent of fun. And I think we've just been fed for many years.

That fun equals groups of people loud. We're watching games, drinking beer. It's no, I don't know. Like to me, and I think I got this from Holly Whitaker. She's my idea of fun is like a bath and some tea reading a book that's like a wild Friday night for me and I'm like, yeah, that is like [00:41:00] going to bed at 9:00 PM taking my magnesium glycinate, like all of that.

My hormones. Yeah. Going to bed at nine 30. That's a crazy night for me.

Emma: Oh my gosh. Yeah.

Jen: Is you get to define that and it's if that's fun for me. Great. Now, yeah. If you're around these people and you don't feel good, and this is a hard thing about sobriety, is your friendship circles may change.

The ones that truly matter will stick with you. And but again, you get to meet so many more and so many new people in this process who share the same interests. And again, as you're learning about yourself, maybe you're gonna go to yoga, you're gonna meet people at yoga or anything like that. So things can change and that can be scary.

I know that prevented me and scared the crap out of me. But naturally it just started happening. And I surrounded myself with new people. And a lot of the people I connect with today are sober because we share this same big [00:42:00] thing that a lot of people don't know about. But it's not the case for everybody.

But again, and also what you said, Kevin, is before you go to an event, have an open mind to instead of. We can, having these expectations like this is gonna suck. I'm gonna be the only sober person here. Everybody's gonna be drinking. My Aunt Gladys is gonna ask me if I have a boyfriend and blah, blah, blah.

So instead of having these expectations, eliminate those and be like, you know what? I'm gonna have a great freaking time. This is gonna be, and even visualizing how I did even before I went to my inpatient treatment, how I show up ex, how I talk and converse with these people. You know what, this, today's gonna be a great day.

I'm gonna, it's gonna be an awesome event. Just telling yourself that and just seeing how it plays out is crazy. So just be cautious also of what you're telling yourself. Are you telling yourself this is gonna suck before you [00:43:00] even get there? Because our thoughts create a reality. We're gonna prove that thought to be true.

If we're telling this is gonna be hard, this is gonna happen. I'm gonna be the only one not drinking. How about, you know what, I'm just gonna keep an open mind. It's gonna be a great time. I'm gonna bring my non-alcoholic drinks in my cooler. I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna leave early. I'm gonna drive myself so I can leave whenever I want.

And if someone gives me crap, I'm going to take that and I'm gonna leave the situation. So just having them mentality before you even go, might change the result as well. So I dunno. And then if you still have a crappy time and it's okay, for sure this, I need to take this into account. That maybe I need to change up what I'm doing or change up who I'm around or limit the time that I'm around them.

Emma: Yeah. Yeah.

Kevin: Hundred percent. I was just gonna say next time, oh. And Gladys is coming. Yeah. I'm not going. Yeah,

Jen: [00:44:00] no, I can't take her. No. And have the courage to say, no, I'm not gonna go. Yeah. I'm not gonna do it to please other people. Yeah. I'm just not going I did that my first year 'cause I was a hermit in my first year.

Granted I was pregnant, so I used that as an excuse, but I was like, no, I'm just not going. I don't, number one, I didn't feel comfortable yet. I had to go to my brother's wedding the first, within my first 60 days. And so I had my husband to support me. Yeah. He went alcohol free during that had to, go and converse with a lot of family members, but I got through it.

And it was great. Again, once I stopped trying to fight or sneak everything got so much easier. But yeah, I, that's just who I was is that, be very cautious, especially if you're in early sobriety with who you're around, who you choose to be around in a certain situations if you're not comfortable yet.

So it's not always gonna be like that. But again, the more, once you start to feel a little bit more comfortable, you go to do your sober first. You're like, you [00:45:00] boost a little bit of confidence like, okay, I did that. And then you go to do the next, and it's okay. Okay. I did that. Okay. I did that. And it's like this whole year, I really think sobriety is like an early sobriety is like an entire year.

Because you're learning so much and every single season brings with its own challenges and its own excitement with it. And so you just have to navigate that with every season and do the sober first, adjust it. Okay. And then you keep learning, you keep adjusting, and you keep building this sober life in a way that works for you.

So some things that you may have used before, some tools might not work anymore. And so adjust those tools, add some new things in. Keep learning, keep trying, get in community and keep just trying the, those new things. Yeah.

Emma: I you mentioned earlier, so you got pregnant, I think you said four months into your sobriety and I was like, holy shit.

[00:46:00] But your first year you are learning so much about yourself and then when you're pregnant you're learning like your whole self body, everything. Your hormones are all up in the air and it's crazy. I was like, holy shit. That's huge. I don't know how you did that and I hat off to you because, going alcohol free is hard enough, being pregnant is hard enough.

Mash 'em together and that's it. That's a huge challenge. I don't know where I was going with that. I just wanted to make that point that's amazing. Well done to you, because like you said, you know that first year you do all of your firsts and you are really, I was absolutely a hermit in my first year as well.

I wasn't socializing with that same friend group that I had because they were big drinkers and they supported me a hundred percent. They knew that I had to do this. It was just awkward and different, and it I wasn't sure how to navigate it. So I retreated from that friend group and I got really curious about so what do I do for fun now?

What do I do now? So it was about finding hobbies and activities and what do I like and [00:47:00] all that kinda stuff. So my first year was, yeah, real hermit mode. , I've lost my train of thought. Sorry guys.

Jen: I like to know I'm not the only one. Losing my train of thought. I'm like, I'd be coaching, like I have no idea

Emma: where going, where I was going.

Yeah. I'm like, I think it's, 'cause I've got six different topics in my head right now of where I wanted to go. ADHD brain, right? Yeah. Yeah. Like the wing man. Great. I Great. Love a wing man. At a, at an event, at being pregnant and in your first year. Holy shit. Bulls. There was something else you said that I wanted to touch on as well.

I've got too many, so many good points. It's too many good things to talk about.

Jen: And it, it was, yeah, with the hormones and, first trimester, oh my gosh. Felt like crap. But at the same time it was just, oh my God, I can't believe. It was just something to look forward to. And again, I'm learning all about, okay, in this week your baby's a blueberry.

I'm like, no way. And then they're like, ears are forming. And it was just so cool. [00:48:00] And it just, again, it just had something like with the baby shower, getting in the baby's room ready, even though my son came six weeks early, that was not part of the baby books. I had no idea what was going on. But it just, I, it was like this great, again, like I always say, it's like this great gift to come and it had just, I don't know if it's like the pregnancy glow or this sober glow or anything.

I was just so excited because again, this was something I wanted for so long and I just think I couldn't do it. Because of all of the damage. And so that's why I think our bodies are freaking incredible. And so if my body, again, I'm gonna say this again. If it can come back from mouthwash, rubbing alcohol, eating, just the crappiest of food and it could get pregnant, oh my gosh.

It was just like a sign from the universe. I'm like, oh, this of what can happen. And so I [00:49:00] just use that as motivation to just continue and yeah, it's been so freaking cool. And they're my constant wine, so I like to say I got sober so I could meet them and I can stay sober. So I never lose them.

They're my constant. Why if I ever have a craving, which is very rare, I think I have thoughts of like reminders. When I see an open bottle on the counter, I'm like, ugh, because that's. My brain is I take that I drink and I put it down and I'm like whoa. And then I play the tape forward, I flash to my kits.

Nope, I am never doing that. It's like I have to be like no. You go down this pathway. That was the old pathway. You go down here. But it happens like that. It's in two seconds. I notice it. Kids turn, walk away. But yeah, they're my forever. Why? And they're, they always will be.

Emma: Yeah. That's a, I think a lot of the questions they get asked early on [00:50:00] in sobriety is like, when will they be fixed? Or like, when will it not be a thing anymore? And it's. It's, that's not it. But I think it's amazing to know. It's good to know and it's good to talk about you can be 12 years on and you can be 12 years sober, and you still have that thought.

It's not a craving, it's not like a, something that's gonna, that you have to process for a long time. It's just, it's a split second of a. I dunno, I don't even think it's in my brain long enough to think of it as a thought. It's just like a spark. And then it's, you shut that down real quick and you can shut it down really quick.

Down.

Jen: Yeah.

Emma: Yeah.

Jen: Shut it down. And it's and sometimes when I see it on the counter, it's not like, Ooh, I want that. It's ugh. Yeah. I go I mentally ble myself or now I do that with mouthwash. I'm like, Ugh. Like my kids do it. We always get zero alcohol free mouthwash now. Yeah. I just gonna say,

Emma: you can get alcohol free mouthwash guys.

No. Yeah. But

Jen: I still like, if I have to do that, I'm like oh. You [00:51:00] know how if you used to, maybe if you had a bad night after something you drank you, like you can never drink that again. That's like mouthwash for me. I cannot, I'm like, ugh. I hope you guys use that in a clip.

Kevin: That's the Instagram reel right there.

Yeah, that's the first sip of Red Bull for me. I still can drink a Red Bull, but that first sip reminds me of like late nineties to whenever it first came out, and just drinking so much of that with alcohol, and it brings me back every time, but in a pinch, I'll still get it if I need caffeine and it's like on the road or something.

They don't have good options, but each time I'm like, Ugh, gross.

I have those thoughts too, and it's I see them more as now as observations or I sit there and observe it, I sit with it. Or it's not that I sit with it and think about it and mull it over and all that, but it's [00:52:00] oh, okay. Yeah, that thought popped into my brain. And I think that's a big issue sometimes is that I hear it from others and I know I did it myself.

Like, why am I still thinking about that? Why am I still thinking about that? Why is that still there? Why is that thought coming out? It's because it can't control our thoughts. Like we think we can, and I shouldn't be thinking this anymore because I'm this far along or I'm doing this, but those thoughts are gonna pop in our head.

I remember watching, I think it was like suits or something and with my wife and I was, I don't know, two I. Plus years alcohol free, maybe three. And they're lawyers. And at the end of a day, he's sat down, he poured himself a drink and he sat down and he took a big sip of it. He made that and set it down.

And I was like, immediately turned it off. I'm like, Nope, we're not watching this anymore. And that was a bigger feeling about it, but I'm like, yeah, I didn't like that. But early on [00:53:00] I would've been like, Ooh, now I want drink. And we have to process it and get those tools to process it and to work on it.

What, and that's where I was gonna pivot if we want but asking about that, like what, tools helped you, what do you recommend to people? What habits, all of that. What do you share with others in your community and elsewhere on Instagram and everywhere else?

Jen: Yeah. And there's tools that I've learned.

I. Along the way that I use all the time today that I didn't even know back then. Now, some tools that aren't a part of my habits that I personally use, I tell the women in my groups to use. Number one, of course, is play the tape forward. It sounds, you hear it all the time, it's like a broken record, but I use it all the time.

For, as someone who went sugar free in March, changed up a lot of my diet I do the play the day forward method for food, sometimes of food that doesn't love [00:54:00] me back. Man, the smell of pizza, oh, I can't stand it. It's so good, but it doesn't like me. My stomach doesn't like it. Play the tape forward.

If for a drink, play that tape forward, where's that drink gonna lead? How do I want to feel in the morning? Turn, turn around, do something else. You're going to use it all the time. The number one tool I think in sobriety. Another thing that I say, or if I'm feeling nervous and I say it to my kids, I actually said it to my daughter yesterday.

She performed piano for a four H for the fair, something big up here. And I say, just remember like to myself, before I do this, before I get nervous, I say, you know what? I'm not gonna die. Because when you feel anxiety, when you feel nervous, it feels like you're going to die. I know my son says, but I know mom, but it feels like I am.

I'm like, I know, but this will not kill you. So once I can take say that to myself before I do anything scared, I'm like, you know what? Is this [00:55:00] actually gonna kill me? Is this anxiety gonna kill me? No. Just play the piano. If you mess up, who cares? Just keep going. You're not gonna die before they go to school, their first day of school.

Oh, I'm feeling nervous. Hey, it's okay to feel nervous. You're not gonna die. It's oh, okay. Yeah, I'm not gonna die. It feels like it, right? But I'm not gonna die. Another big one that I use that we actually just had a speaker on before, this is box breathing. I'm doing that for my challenge for July.

I am forcing myself as a woman with a DHD to sit and to breathe for five minutes, and it helps so much. Helps create a break between you doing something you regret and you doing something else. It can help lower your cortisol. It's just, it helps lower your heart rate. It helps reduce stress. It is by far, one tool I use every single day and I just, she actually just told us this in the session before this is that you have to [00:56:00] practice this when your lid is not flipped.

You practice it when things are going well. So just like the habits that I share in my programs, we do habits when things are going well. And I like to say it's in the off season. So for basketball, we're in the off season of basketball and. You do it when things are going up, not just when crap hits the fan is when you pull back and use your tools.

If you do that, you're already too late. You revert to your highest level of training. So I'm putting in these daily deposits to pour into myself, to regulate my nervous system, to make me feel better, to produce dopamine naturally. So when I need to take a withdrawal, it's gonna take less of a hit of this fight or flight.

Holy crap, I need a drink. No, breathe, work out. All of these things. So the first habit. I'll run through these very briefly, is above all else, we gotta [00:57:00] stay sober. So in my groups I do trackers, visual proof, boost dopamine to stay sober above all else. That's the most important habit. Now these other habits help keep you sober, help you to stay sober 'cause they're gonna help build structure.

They're gonna help fill the time and make you feel better. And then produced opening naturally. Now the second one, to make sure we're hydrated, you're gonna drink half your body weight and ounces of water every single day. Yes. Pure water. I'm not talking about sparkling water, I'm not talking about flavored water.

I'm talking about pure, clean, simple water. Now, why is this important? Is it's gonna boost your energy. So that's gonna help with early sobriety fatigue. It's gonna help carry nutrients to yourselves. It's gonna help cleanse the liver. It's helps also going to help with any brain fog that you feel. So I think a lot of us are forgetting our train of thought.

Water's gonna help with that and I think we confuse a lot of dehydration symptoms with other things when it's really just you gotta drink more water. Even though it's easy to do, it's easy to [00:58:00] not do. So I have women bring full water bottles to my calls and their goal, because I'm A-D-H-D-I. Yes, there you go.

It's to finish it by the time they're done to make it into a game. So if I can gamify my water, I'm gonna drink it more. Now reading. Like I said, I started personal development. When I started Beachbody coaching. It transformed everything once I started and to read motivation, about anxiety, all of those things.

Because Maya Angelou says, when you know better, you do better. So when you can learn, because you're not, no one's gonna tell you how crappy alcohol is, even though we're getting more information about it, it's up to you to do the research. So read, quit lit, read books, not even pertaining to sobriety of if you wanna be a better parent how to regulate your emotions.

How A DHD books. I've read like a million A DHD books right now. I'm reading about hormones and perimenopause. Okay, now what do I try? Do I do HRT? Do I do this? It really helped gain clarity. So read [00:59:00] 10 pages. Of a book every day. And I think, Kevin, you did 75 hard a while ago. I know when I did it, I got that from there.

'cause it helps so much to just, I can read 10 pages. All right. Yeah. Gratitude. So write five things you're grateful for from the past 24 hours to really get specific. And so when I started gratitude, I'm like, this is stupid. And she's even more reason that I had to do it. Is when I started to be specific and then I started to be like, okay, what went well from yesterday?

Again, encouraging this get to mindset, right? We're looking for the things that are going right because I think especially for us, we have a very negative brain. I. So it helped me to see the good in sobriety and to see the good in life, to see what is actually going well. Because I think we just overlook it of just oh yeah, but when you lose something, like the power goes out or some, your cat gets lost or something.

You never really realize how good you have it until it's gone. You're like, oh [01:00:00] man. Wow. So writing five things from the past 24 hours, it increases happiness. Again, produces that dopamine, helps us feel better, and of course, happier. Like I said. Now, the one of the last ones is exercise. I'm really big on exercise, so moving your body for 30 minutes every single day, which can mean walking.

Walking is fantastic for blood sugar regulation, for hormones, for happiness, getting outside vitamin D, boost dopamine. It can be yoga, it can be stretching, it can be hit, it can be a run, it can be strength training, whatever you want. I want you to move your body. Maybe you're gonna go out for a bike ride.

It is so important for your brain, for especially to heal your brain, from alcohol, to move your body because it's gonna increase blood flow to our brain. It's help gonna improve our brain, it's gonna boost that confidence. It's gonna help process emotions, reduce anxiety. It's gonna boost that dopamine naturally and not give us [01:01:00] this huge spike and huge drop.

It's gonna gradually increase and then it's gonna sustain us throughout the whole day. So if you get that movement in the morning, you get to reap the benefits all freaking day. So just keep that in mind. I think it is the most underutilized tool and literally almost everybody can do it, and you do not have to pay for it.

Walking and your body weight counts. It is huge.

Emma: Yeah.

Jen: And then the last one is just checking into a sober community every day. So that doesn't mean you have to go to a meeting every day or go on this, do this. It means just checking in. Maybe it's just one other person that you check in with. Maybe it's a sober coach.

Maybe it's you just check the app. So we have an app, you check to see what's going on. Maybe you like someone's post, maybe you post something yourself. But staying engaged to other sober people in some way. So we follow those. And my challenges, I do 70 day [01:02:00] challenges, a hundred day challenges to commit to something.

To, again, boost that confidence. And then it's a more lax approach, a little bit in my membership, but it's a constant because again, it provides that sense of control and that constant, even when things appear to be chaotic in our life, if we can have that morning routine or that little time to pour into ourselves, and I like to think of our bodies as a car and what I put into my car with food, with nutrition, with sleep, that's going to make it run well, to have the energy to chase and drive my kids every freaking witch way this summer.

That I have the energy to do that, to show up, to run a coaching program, to run a membership and do it without needing a drink. And to have that energy to do so because I'm putting good fuel in my tank. And I'm doing that from the beginning. So I. Own the morning and you can own the day. But having that, those [01:03:00] constant things or, and you can make up whatever habits you'd like if that's too much cut in half, but something that you can commit to every day to improve your life.

Just a little bit of something you wanna work on is huge. And the more habits and things that you work on, the more your life's gonna improve, the more that you're going to feel better. And then especially in sobriety, you're like, okay, wow. Getting sober, you're going to feel so much better. But if you can add in some water, a little bit of movement, like a 10 minute walk, oh my gosh, you're gonna start to realize, holy crap, I feel I'm feeling so much better and now I can process emotions.

I remember my husband, he was getting super frustrated dealing with the, our old pool the other day, and he's I can't take it. And he lose, he is the most chill person on the planet. He's that's it. I'm going for a walk. I'm like, good for you. You go on that anger walk. But they can [01:04:00] just help us again, stay sober, feel better, and have a sense of control

Emma: in our lives.

Yeah. Love me. A rage walk. So good. And just, I, walking is so underrated and like when we think of exercise, we always think of, I don't know, going to a gym class or going to a class or a, an event, a thing. But walking is the process of the steps. Our brains love, rhythm and just moving our body in a rhythmic motion, the steps, the vibration, like the jolt of the step, it's meditative for us and it helps reset and calm our body.

Walking, running as well. But walking particularly is something everyone can do. And it's all good for just, bringing us back down and centering us and just getting us back to that baseline of being. Okay. Yeah. Love me. A rage walk or a rage run? Rage, burpees? Not so much.

Kevin: Yeah. Oh

Jen: no.

Kevin: And I like how you said take this, cut it in [01:05:00] half, change it. But I do think it's good to take something like what you just suggested or I use the Miracle Morning or there's other. Hey, try these five things like James Clear, I said, it says in Atomic Habits standardize before you optimize.

Because I think we always try and go at least maybe that's just me. I'm like going right to optimization and I plan and do all the things. And I'm like yeah, I can walk, but I'm going to do it for an hour and a half each day and I'm gonna check my heart rate zones and blah, blah. I'm whatever.

It's, yeah, I could hydrate, but what are my electrolyte balances? How do I, can I measure that? Can I, it's nobody's like actually doing this. I'm just joking about like some of these levels, but don't. Complicate it. Just do something, find like what you just said and just do it for 30 days.

Don't worry about optimizing it. Don't worry about changing it up just yet. Just do it. And especially he said gratitude. [01:06:00] It's so stupid. Anyway, I just, I'm not saying it's stupid, I'm just saying that's what I thought. I just did a meeting on it last week. Because I like doing that regularly and making it I call it weird gratitude.

Because we use think of just any random thing that you are grateful for. And we, and I give a bunch of examples from a card deck that I have, it's like tater tots or toilet paper or like all these random things that like never reached my gratitude list before because I tried to make it like it's my wife and my daughter and my job.

And it has to be all these big things like, no. Look at the, that it was, I don't know, not 90 degrees today, although it feels like it in this room right now. Or whatever, you're grateful for. And if you say it, it's oh, that's stupid. You probably means you really need to do it.

And it probably means that you're resisting in some way and you need to really dive into that. That's how I see those things. [01:07:00] Now, if I say that, I'm like we should probably look at that more.

Emma: And Jean, like you were saying, these habits and these things, we need to practice them in, embed them when we are feeling good, when things are going well, because we need, our body needs to be confident in doing it and know how to do it.

We need to know how to do gratitude without thinking too much about it. And it needs to be just second nature because when the wheels fall off and when we actually need the gratitude. It needs to happen naturally, not be forced and be struggling with it. It's like any skill, playing the piano, you can't perform a concert piano recital.

Yeah. Straight away. You've gotta practice it. And so then when you're at that point of stress or that point of need, when you have to be at your best, you are falling back on all of those days, months, years of practice that you've done. And it'll just happen. And you don't have to think too much about it.

That's a really good point of we don't dig into our tools when we need them. We [01:08:00] need to dig into our tools every day. Practice them every day.

Jen: Yeah. If you just think about, if it just had me thinking of, let's just take Olympics and like the gymnasts and people who train years and years for this little blip, this little moment, this little like two minutes.

To perform, but they train their hearts out. That's their entire life. I'm not saying you have to train your entire life for these moments, but that they're putting in the work. And doing it for muscle memory

Emma: of

Jen: I am just falling back, even if I'm nervous, I'm, millions of people are watching me. My body just does it because it's, I've been doing it for so long that's what I naturally fall back on.

So you're just doing the same kind of work. You just, you gotta practice, you gotta put in the tools, put in the hours, put in the reps, and it's, I promise you it will pay off. But I like you with gratitude. I didn't know what to be grateful for. So I literally Googled, [01:09:00] what can I be grateful for.

And at this moment, Rachel Hollis had this start to day journal, I'm like what are other people being grateful for? Oh, okay. So I could do that. And I had a woman in my membership, Naomi, she's, she was exactly like me. And she's she looked around the room, she's I don't know. I love carpet, I love lamp, I love lamp.

And she's I have no freaking idea. This is so dumb. But the science behind it is so strong and it does help. Again, instead of being like, this is happening and this, it's man, I am so holy smokes. It's like the sun is out. Whoa. That is awesome. And so I'm gonna write that on my gratitude tomorrow.

So if and you make it a daily practice, 'cause you know you gotta do that tomorrow morning, you're gonna be on the lookout for those things. Those little like glimmers, those little moments, it's like I should put that on mine. Thing for tomorrow. It's oh yeah, that is such a, or any moment that made you smile, make you [01:10:00] laugh, maybe it was like the last skinny pop at Target and you're like, oh my God, I got the last one.

Yes. Because if it wasn't there, it's dang it, they're sold out again. Skinny pop. It's like those little, oh, it's just popcorn. I can't have it right now, but it's like I freaking would eat bags of it. 'cause it's so good.

Emma: I was thinking like an icy pop deal. How do you call them? Icy pops icicles popsicles.

Popsicle ice block. I was thinking that. Okay. Popcorn? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Popcorn is good. All right. Sorry. Carry on.

Kevin: I saw the look of and I was sitting there thinking, I'm like, what is that again? Because I, I think we have some downstairs right now, but I couldn't, I was thinking Popsicle too, but yeah.

Emma: But yeah, training your brain to look for the good things is so important because, we're wired to look for danger. Yeah. The bad things, we're wired to look for the negative, but it doesn't mean we can't train our brain to look for. [01:11:00] I know that fresh strawberry was delicious. I'm grateful for those strawberries.

It's not strawberry season in New Zealand and I wish it was, we have strawberry fields not far from where I live. And like you can do like a pick your own. You like pay for the bucket. So good.

Jen: We have awesome outside and they're, I am just picking fresh strawberries and it is literally candy. I'm like, so good.

I'm like, oh, I know. See, we're getting our juices just by about strawberries. They're so good you guys. And a great sober activity. If you're looking for stuff to do, start gardening. Build grow a plant, grow a tomato plant super hardy, super easy. If you don't like tomatoes, try even if you don't like, give them to other people or mash 'em up.

Put 'em in chili. Something that, I don't really like eating tomatoes, but I like 'em in chili. Try something. And I, something I didn't do when I was drinking, or even in beginning of sobriety, something I [01:12:00] started in COD was gardening. So much fun you guys. So therapeutic. I freaking love it. And I like, I love eating what I grow unless those stinking groundhogs get in there.

But I love it. It's so good.

Kevin: Yeah, we and I was just gonna say it, if you don't have, 'cause I did this as, I think this was a, like a prime day by like years ago where I got that little greenhouse kit that you put on your counter, like that has the lamp and you can grow herbs and tomatoes and things like that.

So even if you don't have a lot of space, you can still do that. And it's fun and rewarding to, to do that as well. But it's. Think outside the box for that. Oh, I can't do that. Okay, what can you do?

Sorry, what were you gonna say, Emma, on that?

Emma: That's, I was gonna say, we don't have groundhogs in New Zealand either, so I don't, I can't relate.

Oh. But my, it's so funny you talk about growing again, my early, like very first month of sobriety what am I going to do? I. How do I get through this? I [01:13:00] started like every time I cut up my kids apples for my kids' lunch boxes or making dinner, I was harvesting all the seeds from all the fruit and vegetables and I started sprouting them and I learned how to sprout capsicum apples, pears.

We've got three avocado trees now. Who knows if they're fruit? 'cause they take five to 10 years to fruit, oh we've got some avocado trees. Let's see. So yeah, it's so funny that you mentioned gardening of that became my vitally absorbing passion of. Harvesting seeds.

Jen: Gimme some of those avocados.

I dunno if they're gonna fruit. Once they do, you guys, avocados are fantastic for sobriety and your brain, the healthy fats, like it is one of the top foods. If you're looking, you're taking away anything from this podcast, see if you can add like a half of an avocado to a shake to your lunch, it

Emma: going shake.

Good idea.

Jen: It makes it really nice and creamy. You guys, if you go to a Walmart, 'cause that's the only thing by me you can get it frozen. 'Cause I know [01:14:00] avocados, they're picky on what they like, but you can get it frozen chunks. But that's what I do. Otherwise, again, half of an avocado in your smoothie.

If you don't like the taste, put it in your smoothie. It's nice and rich, nice and creamy. It's gonna make you feel fuller longer. That healthy fat's gonna help your brain. Anyway, side thought, but because you mentioned avocado,

Emma: I freaking love avocado

Jen: and it's a great thing to have at night too.

Emma: I had a great avocado chocolate mousse recipe that was like with cacao powder and maple syrup and avocado, and it was so creamy and so good.

I remember making it for, I dunno if you guys do it in America, but in New Zealand they'll do shared lunches at school where meet the teacher, meet the families and you, everyone brings in a plate and you share something. And I made this and I remember one parent I overheard being like, what can a parent brings in chocolate mush that's so unhealthy?

And I was like, actually it's all organic and it's avocado and it's maple syrup and cacao powder and it's [01:15:00] actually a super food and blah, blah blah. And like flipped these parents, the bird, they were bad mouthing me. And I was like, no, I will not stand for it. I should find that recipe. It was good.

It's good. Yeah. Send, it's so rich. Sounds delicious. Yeah. Yeah.

Kevin: I thought you were gonna go the other way. I would expect it the other way. What kind of parent brings avocado chocolate MOUs to me too. I'm like, why

Jen: are you bringing something healthy? Where's the donuts?

Kevin: Yeah,

Jen: I did.

Kevin: Yeah, you were gonna go,

Emma: everyone else brings like the donuts, the pizza or the packet biscuits or cookies or whatever.

But I didn't label it like avocado chocolate MOUs. I just labeled it chocolate mousse. And the kids loved it, so clearly it was tasty. 'cause kids won't eat shit. They don't like. They'll, if it tastes healthy, they will throw it back at you. I find

Kevin: it reminds me of the mounds cake that my mom made back in the day, and apparently she made lot of mashed potatoes, like mounds what is it?

Coconut and whatever. Apparently there's mashed potatoes in [01:16:00] there and my one brother found out what was actually in it, and she's don't you tell a single person this tastes good. Nobody knows the difference. Don't tell anybody. He told everybody nobody ate it.

Emma: Ah, yeah. If they don't know it's healthy, they'll eat it.

Kevin: I don't know if it, if, I don't know if mashed potatoes are necessarily healthy, but it was probably healthier than maybe what she would've put in otherwise. I don't know what the ingredients were, but yeah, once you can't unknow it. Nope.

Jen: Same with alcohol. Once you know, you can't unknow it.

It's oh man, what the heck?

Emma: No. Once you learn what it does to your brain and your body and your hormones, and it affects every single part of your body and and not in a good way, none of it in a good way. Yeah, the hormones, I'm perimenopausal as well, so I went through that whole journey, and once you learn what it does to your hormones, you're like, holy shit, no, thank you.

Jen: That's a fun, wild ride. I love it.

Emma: Yeah.

Jen: And then you start to question what's wrong with me? [01:17:00] You're like, oh. And then you start to do research. It's just perimenopause. I'm just naturally crazy. Love it. And tomorrow I'm gonna be great. I don't know what, it's like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get every day.

Emma: Alright. Thanks so much for chatting with us, Jen. It's been there are so many good points that I just wanted to touch on and I don't think I touched on half of them and I was just absolutely enthralled listening to you and listening to your story and listening to your honesty.

That was just amazing. Got me all in my feels. But before we wrap out, this is wrap out. Before we wrap up close out. This is something that we, Kim and I like to do something completely off topic because life's not just about sobriety, it's about everything. We wanna give a little nugget for our listeners of what did you learn this week?

Maybe it's, I was today years old when I learned, or I was this week. Old, oh, I screw that up all the time. Just something that's interesting that you've learned. That's com not [01:18:00] necessarily alcohol or sobriety related. So for me, my nugget this week is buy an electric vehicle. They are so much fun to drive.

I it doesn't have to be a new one. I could not afford new. I bought myself my car, my last car got written off 'cause some assholes. My last car got written off because some people decided that they would try and steal it and they did just enough damage to get it written off by breaking windows and jimmying the ignition.

So it's been a good few months of researching. What do I want, not. What's most practical necessarily? We've got a 16-year-old who's learning to drive, so that was a consideration. I wanted a small, little zippy car, easy to park, yada, yada, yada. And I settled on a Nissan Leaf and it's wonderful. It's so quiet.

It's like driving a little spaceship slash go-kart. It's wonderful. I love my little leaf and I'm saving the planet [01:19:00] and that makes me feel good, but it's so comfortable to drive and it's got heated seats and a heated steering wheel so I can turn it on. So when I'm gonna the gym at five in the morning, it's like warm because it's winter in New Zealand.

10 outta 10. Recommend buy an EV and it doesn't have to be an expensive one. That's my nugget.

Awesome. Hey. Cool, Sam, cool story.

Kevin: I was just gonna say, I was laughing whenever you're like, and I'm saving the planet, I'm like, I'm saving the planet too. My wife and daughter make fun of me because they're like, have you left the house this week? I'm like, yeah, I've gone for a walk.

No, I anywhere have you like left and go anywhere? I'm like, no. I just, I'll go out with you guys this weekend, whatever,

Emma: that's, don't get me wrong. If I didn't have to leave the house, I probably wouldn't. I love going to the gym each morning. That's my thing for sure.

But yeah. But I do have to do like a round trip of Auckland City. On Wednesdays in particular, kids activities bring on the [01:20:00] 16-year-old being able to drive herself.

Kevin: Yeah, that's, that'll be a glorious day. That's a game changer. I did leave the house yesterday though, but

Emma: Hooray.

Kevin: Do you have one, Jen?

Jen: Ah, yeah. I didn't know if you wanted to go or Migo. What I was telling before is that I am looking and learning so much about blood sugar and I just got, what is it called, Kevin, that thing that you put on your arm lingo. Ling

Lingo, whatever. And how much what you eat at night can affect how you sleep.

And so I think it's just really interesting as I've been going on this health journey since March with how food makes you feel. And I think so many of our emotions can be tied back to food. And so as someone right now, again, 12 years sober, but I'm struggling with sleep of waking up early. Yes, it could be perimenopause, but it also could be because my blood sugar is dipping, which I only knew about because someone messaged me on [01:21:00] Instagram.

Thank you Instagram, to say she's going through the same thing and it's all about her blood sugar. And so also what I'm learning about as I'm working with a trainer. Is that never to have naked carbs. You always wanna pair a carb, so again, blood sugar regulation because when you dip it can spike cortisol.

So again, those early sobriety sugar cravings, totally okay, but always pair it with a protein. You guys, you never wanna have sugar without protein. However, if you're gonna have carbs which convert into sugar, you also want to pair it with a protein and a fat, or at least one, either or. So never have fruit or sweet potatoes without the protein or the fat with it.

'cause that will help keep your blood sugar stable so you don't experience these high highs and these low lows. So I know that's woo, but I, it's so fascinating to me of, oh my gosh, I've been taking a ton of supplements [01:22:00] to try to help me sleep. They're saying, okay, maybe let's put you on this and this.

What if it's related to my blood sugar? What if I just started eating a tip, half an avocado with some olive oil, maybe some pumpkin seed at night, if that would help me get a great night of sleep? Mind blowing. So anyways, I'm on this like blood sugar journey where I just put it on today and I'm just interested of what things will spike, when my blood sugar will spike, when it will dip, and the amount and the time that I wake up at that three 30, which could be perimenopause if my blood sugar, if that's related to what my blood sugar is doing.

Yeah. So that's what I'm doing, that's what I've been learning, and it's been fascinating.

Emma: That's mind blowing. The whole eating, having fruit with a fat or a, and a protein. My, one of my favorite snacks is Apple dipped in peanut butter. Is that weird? I don't know. But yeah, that's like a fruit with some [01:23:00] sugar and some carbs with, I

Kevin: had it last night,

Emma: a fat and a protein, and it's delicious and it's ugh, my body, they said that's a really good nighttime snack.

What to do.

Jen: That's a really good nighttime stack. So apple with almond butter, peanut butter. Right now I can only have sunflower butter, a hard-boiled egg with avocado. I know that's not ooh, that's my late night treat. But, or if you have strawberries, have it with Brazil nuts or have it with a nut to help stabilize your blood sugar.

If you're having trouble sleeping at night, which can be common in early sobriety. Anyways, I'm learning a lot about it and it, I think it's incredibly fascinating. So yeah, that's my thing. Good nugget.

Kevin: Yeah. And I see you have the aura ring too.

Jen: I think I have to take this off because it's creating anxiety for me.

Okay.

Emma: It's

Jen: like I feel great and then I see my Aura score and it's you're dying. I'm like, really? Dang. Yeah.

Kevin: See mine, I go around like evangelizing for it. I don't know if that's the best word, but I'm like, it has never ever [01:24:00] been wrong for me. I've never gone in there and do what you just said was, mine seems to be like, oh, 60.

Yeah. That's what I'm feeling like today. Or 82 exactly like I was, I'm ready. I'm feeling that and it's felt consistent for me. Again, it's me and. Yeah. I've love, I love that. And the, just the data. And that's part of what my nugget is too, is just the data. And it's cool that you you're gonna get me on the lingo again.

'cause the first time I used it was not didn't do it the way I should have. Yeah.

Jen: And they say how much in the, in, I'm just exploring the lingo app. This is not an ad for it. Of course. Yeah. But they're saying how much, alcohol is going to throw off your lingo score. And but again, they're just prioritizing protein.

Just little nuggets that I've found in there is you wanna move your body like a 10 minute walk before and especially after you eat, if you struggle with blood sugar regulation. So even just taking a 10 minute [01:25:00] walk after you eat lunch, dinner or breakfast or all three, is gonna be really helpful in how you feel and help you digest that food.

Just a little tip, but I think it's, I think it's super cool and I think everybody should try it.

Emma: Yeah. I love that. Give, let you a nugget.

Kevin: I guess my nugget, it's not really a, what did I learn this week? Although it is, but it's like I knew it. But I'm doing it in a different way and it's working.

And that is and you mentioned tracking your glucose. I we're talking about tracking sleep, and I think I'm gonna talk about that this weekend. That a meeting just about what are you tracking? Because it could be, if we're cutting back the number of, our number of drinks if we're quitting, it's putting up the green mug and the reframe app that I didn't drink today could be our sleep.

It could be, but I think, I don't know what the quote is I heard, but it's you know what we measure, we care about we focus on and I started measuring a lot of things in my bullet journal [01:26:00] and then I. I went into AI and I was like, oh, you know what? I started this project a while ago called Fit Kevin.

And then I said, Hey, talk to me like this. Give me, I'm gonna come in and you're gonna tell, I'm just gonna, these are the five types of exercises I like to do. I'm gonna come in every night and you just tell me which one to do. And I worked for three days until I didn't do it on the fourth day. And then I was like, okay, I know it's ai, but I'm not gonna go back in there because I don't need to hear her shit.

Because I told the project to talk to me. I'm like, don't be afraid. Don't be scared to give me shit. Talk to me like a smart ass. I have three older brothers talk to me. Like one of them, they're we're smart asses, but we encourage each other and blah, blah, blah. I gave it parameters and it works.

'Cause it does, and it's been super motivating. Now that I've gone back in, I started tracking in here and I'm like, you know what if I just. Told it like, Hey, track this, log this right now, log this. And I just go in and do that, and then create a graph and do all this stuff automatically. Now, [01:27:00] pros and cons to digital versus analog and all that stuff, that's a whole rabbit hole I could get into.

But but yeah, like that's, it's my coach V I'm like, what, what do you wanna be called? Came up with a name. I'm like, give me motivation whenever I, and a lot of that checking in, it's okay are you, do you need anything else today? Or are you gonna check in tomorrow morning when you get up and don't hit your snooze?

And it's all these reminders, I'm like, yeah, remind me to not do that. Remind me to do that. And so far it's, the motivation has been high and it's helped. Now talk to me next week. It's been like two weeks. But yeah, so far so good. So you using AI to run and eventually ruin my life, probably, I don't know, take over the world.

Emma: I love that. Using AI to kick your ass into gear and motivate you to do the right thing to not hit snooze, get out of bed, eat that. Yeah. Avocado, go walk came up with this

Kevin: great quote that, [01:28:00] and, I feed in like when I'm reading like Daily Stoic or I'm reading meditations for morals each day.

And I'll take pictures of the couple pages if a chapter really hits and I'll put it in there. I'm like, what do you think of this? Like, how can we incorporate this? And, just asking those questions and utilize, I'm trying to utilize it and it's almost like an experiment, obviously to see how I can really, how far I can leverage this.

But it came up with a great quote. Recently, and I don't think it was from anywhere. I think it just put it together and it said you said you wanted this, so let's go. Like the goals that I set. And that, that like really hit. I'm like, you need to put that on something so I can slap it on my phone screen and use that for motivation.

'cause I like that a lot. It didn't feel or anything, but anyway. I'm nerding out on this.

Jen: Yeah. I'm gonna have, I'm gonna have my cha Bt do some tough love to me too. Yeah. [01:29:00] I need it. Yeah. And I like it. Yeah. Gimme some Shanti. Yell at me. Scream at me.

Kevin: Yeah, tell it. Talk to me as if you were

Jen: Shanti.

Kevin: Shanti.

Jen: Yeah.

That'd be great. There you go.

Emma: Who's Sean T

Kevin: Oh in Insanity was his first one, right? Yeah. Not necessarily. He's a fitness

Jen: trainer. Okay. Yeah.

Emma: I might need to Google after that. Yeah. Is he like a drill sergeant? Kinda trying to. Okay.

Jen: But he is motivational and positive. Yeah. But it'll kick your butt.

Emma: Yeah. Yeah. I have seen on my Instagram scrolling where you can put into like chat GBT. These are my. Health goals. These are my eating goals. These are the foods we like to eat. I'm a family of four. Write me a menu and a grocery list and blah, blah, blah. Keep it within this budget.

Kevin: I did that this weekend.

I told it Hey, this is what I am doing now and how I like to eat. This is what my wife is doing, how she like eat. This is what my daughter's [01:30:00] doing. These are our normal meals. And I told her like, okay, factor some of those in and come up with two new meals this week that are easy but have vegetables in it.

And we already had one. I can't remember what the second one is. The second one I. Yeah. But yeah, it's

Emma: yeah, I think I need the help with eating seasonal seasonally because a lot of, like the cookbooks, the recipes that we find, particularly being in New Zealand and down under, like the recipes that are on trend aren't the right season.

It's, we can't, capsicums are like, oh, you guys call them, what do you bell peppers? I think they're like $5 per capsicum at the moment at the supermarket. Ain't nobody making a salad or stuffed capskin right now. It's too expensive. Let's do capsicums in summer when they're 50 cents a capsicum.

So yeah, maybe I could use chat GBT or AI to build me seasonal meals that are not just pumpkin. KU is sweet potato. All those stodgy carbs. 'cause that's all I can think of to eat right now.[01:31:00]

That being said, Mita is one of my favorite vegetables. So good. Sweet potato. Oh, we call it Mita down here. It's a little bit different, but it's sweet potato essentially. Love me. Those all all right. Tangents successfully navigated. Thanks so much Jen, for chatting with us today. That was, like I said, amazing touching so motivational, so much knowledge and wisdom. Thank you so much.

Where can people find you or contact you, how if they wanna learn more , get in touch?

Jen: Yeah, you can. I like to hang out on instagram@jenleehirst.com, so J-E-N-L-E-E-H-I-R-S-T. And then you can also go to my website@joinlighthousesobriety.com for upcoming group coaching programs, my membership journal, all of that.

So

Emma: contact me there. Awesome. Thank you so much.

Kevin: Yeah. Thank you.

Jen: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. [01:32:00]

Kevin: Yeah, great talk. Really appreciate it. And thank you all for listening to another episode of the Reframe able podcast, brought to you by the Reframe app. Reframe is the number one iOS and Android app to help you cut back or quit drinking alcohol.

It uses neuroscience to reframe your relationship with alcohol and unlock the healthiest, happiest you. If you're enjoying this podcast, please like, subscribe and share with those that you feel may benefit from it. And I wanna thank you again for listening, and be sure to come back next week for another episode.

Have a great day.

Emma: Bye friends.