Today I talk to Sarah who shares how her need to fit in was a red thread through her drinking days, how she felt shame and terrible anxiety as a young mum, and how societies mummy drinking culture fed the narrative that wine time was a solution. Sarah's good friends question on why she was fighting to moderate when alcohol made her so miserable made her realise that she had been looking the wrong answer all along!

Hi everybody, I'm Victoria

and I don't drink.

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Today I'll talk to Sarah, whose story

has some uncanny similarities to my own.

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A big move from Scotland to

Manchester as a child started

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a pattern of wanting to fit in.

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Longing for then becoming a mum,

brought unexpected challenges and

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feelings of guilt about drinking.

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After years of failed moderation, Sarah

chose freedom from alcohol, going on

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to write Beyond Booze and become a

sobriety coach to help many others

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start their alcohol free journey.

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So, hi, Sarah, thank you so

much for joining me this morning

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for me and the afternoon.

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I think it is for you because you're

joining from across the planet.

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, it's lovely to have you with me.

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I was really keen to speak to you because

I've been listening to your audio book.

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and it's brilliant.

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I wanted to get you to come on

and talk to me, not just about

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your book, but about your story

and just start from the beginning.

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who were you when you were drinking

alcohol and what was that thought process?

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What happened?

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Was there an event?

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Was it just a slow reckoning,

which often it can be?

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how did you stop?

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And that's where we'll start and then

we'll go on to some of the other bits.

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Is that okay?

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Perfect.

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for having me.

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So I am joining you from

Australia, but I am from the UK.

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So I grew up, first of all in Scotland

and then at the age of 13, we made

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the move from Scotland to Manchester.

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and that, you know, looking back I can

see that was quite a pivotal time for me

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because it's a hard time anyway to uproot

from all your friends, move to another

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country where you feel like You really

stand out because you've got this thick

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Scottish accent and it was just, it was

a really difficult time and I struggled

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to settle into the new life in Manchester

and Looking back as well something I've

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realized that I did to start with was

I was using sugar as my coping strategy

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they say sugar is the gateway drug and

I remember I was I was really lonely I

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was really homesick for scotland and

we lived in a beautiful community there.

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We had all these Neighbors and friends

that i'd grown up with they were part

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of my whole life and all of a sudden

we were in manchester We didn't know

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anybody I went from a very normal

state school to this really posh

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all girls school where the girls

were playing hockey and lacrosse.

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And I just felt like a fish out of water.

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I felt so out of my depth.

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I remember I would come home

from school and I would sit in

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the kitchen eat crumpets and

layer them with chocolate spread.

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it was like I had this hole inside me

and I was just trying to fill that hole.

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the way that I was doing

that was with food.

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And then fast forward a couple of

years end of my 14s, coming into

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15 was when we discovered alcohol.

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And by then, you know, made some friends.

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We would go down the local park

or to the local roller rink.

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We would fill up bottles with whatever

we could nick from our parents drinks

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cabinet and just fill up these SodaStream

bottles with like Southern Comfort and

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Bacardi and Cinzano and Martini and

mix them all together with a bit of

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coke then you'd go down the park, you'd

drink your bottle, probably vomit,,

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you might snog a boy and then go home

and, do it all again the next weekend.

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And that was just like this

rite of passage into alcohol

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and what it would be like.

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And what happened quite quickly

for me was, I really liked

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how alcohol made me feel.

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I loved it.

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I loved that all of the

worry kind of disappeared.

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I didn't have to worry about fitting in.

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I felt like I belonged.

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like getting pissed with a girl and

her being like, you're my best friend.

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I love you.

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That was like music to my ears as

just a way to feel like I belonged.

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And that was all I wanted was

to have that sense of belonging.

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alcohol then featured pretty

heavily for the next few years.

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you know, this was manchester

in the 90s So there was also,

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some recreational drugs.

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There was like this real party scene

of Going out hedonistic, you know, it

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was the girl power era It was the girls

couldn't match the lads down the pint,

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you know down the pump pint for pint

We we were just living our best lives

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or so we thought and honestly at that

point There were no negatives to it like

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even if you Felt a bit hungover It was

just something to laugh about have a

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can of diet coke and a packet of crisps

a couple of paracetamol You'd be all

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right, and then you'd be drinking again

the next night it was just a very very

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normal way of doing life You know, went

to university, which is very, very boozy.

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And, you know, I was always, I was always

drawn to people that drank like me.

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So I always wanted to be

around the other big drinkers.

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If someone wasn't a party animal

and didn't want to drink, it was

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kind of like, you are not my person.

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We can't be friends.

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I just gravitated.

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Or perhaps attracted the people that were

going to drink in the way that I was where

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it was Let's get pissed before we go out.

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Let's keep drinking while we're out

Let's go back to someone's house for

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drinks afterwards that was just how it

was I had a huge capacity for alcohol

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I wasn't someone that had two drinks

and was legless I could drink and drink

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and drink and I saw that as something

to be so proud of And something that

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was you know, like my badge of honor

I left uni and moved to London when my

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first job was working in recruitment.

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So this was in the late nineties and

the fourth stage of the job interview

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process was going to a bar to do

shots of Sambuca to see how well you

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could handle your alcohol before they

decided if they offered you the job.

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I got the job and then I remember being

on one of the teams where we would go

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and take a new person to the pub and then

we'd all be like, Nah, we can't hire them.

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They didn't drink enough and they

didn't seem like they liked their booze.

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And we would basically decide if we

wanted to hire them based on that.

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and it was just again, boozy, boozy time.

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And while I would get feedback from

my manager, kind of going, you're a

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great recruiter, Sarah, you've got

a promising career ahead of you,

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but you just drink a bit too much.

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You just like make a bit of dick

of yourself a few too many times.

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Like you need to rein it in a bit.

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that was probably the first time anyone

said anything to me about my drinking.

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Because I was getting myself

into some right old states.

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And, but, you know, I would get feedback.

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You're hilarious when you're drunk.

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You're so fun when you're drunk.

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So you create this whole persona

of, I'm Sarah the party girl.

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I've got to keep the party going.

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And there is a part of me that

is like that, even now, five

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and a half years into sobriety.

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But there's also another part of

me that really isn't like that, and

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I never really got the chance to

know her while I was growing up.

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I was trying too hard to fit in

all the time, and thought that the

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way to fit in was just drinking

and getting pissed all the time.

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And so fast forward the next few years,

it was London, it was work hard, play

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hard, drinking, boozing, partying.

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Then I went traveling for a year

and that was where I met my husband.

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my chat up line to him was, Do you

want to come and play my drinking game?

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So it kind of had the writing on the

wall as to what that relationship was

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going to be like And funnily enough

today's our 18 year wedding anniversary.

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oh, congratulations Oh, thank you

for coming on your anniversary.

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He's not home from work

yet, so it's all good.

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And then probably the first time I

really thought about my drinking was

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when we were trying to get pregnant

Because it didn't happen that easily

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for us and looking back It's just

hilarious the way that I was behaving.

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It's not hilarious.

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It's actually quite sad and I was naive

at How ingrained alcohol was into my

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psyche, but how oblivious I was To

some of those, you know, the impacts.

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I was having acupuncture.

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I was doing my green smoothie shots.

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I was doing legs up the wall

after sex for half an hour.

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I was doing all the things that they

tell you to do to help get pregnant.

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But did I look at my drinking?

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No.

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Not at all.

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No one even, I think I lied.

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I think we went to specialists and

they said, how much are you drinking?

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And I was like, no more

than 14 units a week.

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Um, which I mean, God, I could

probably have had 14 units

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in one session back then.

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I did have time off alcohol.

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I didn't drink every day.

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So I would generally have like Monday,

Tuesday, Wednesday, sometimes Wednesday,

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sometimes not, Monday, Tuesday, right?

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and I finally got pregnant and

didn't find it hard to not drink

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at all during the pregnancy.

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I so longed to be a mom and I

thought that my drinking would

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then change because I was a mom.

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I remember when William was three

months old it was my birthday and we

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went to a pub for lunch with a big

group of us, like all my crew, and

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we took the baby with us like you do.

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my husband was more in charge of the baby

than me and I was drinking we got home and

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people came back to our house because we

had to get the baby back home for a nap.

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And then I just remember thinking,

not for a nap, for his sleep

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because it was probably, 6, 7 p.

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m.

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by then.

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And we'd gone out, we'd done that,

we'd put him to bed, and he was

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a brilliant sleeper, William,

so we were so lucky there.

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but I just remember at one

point going, what are you doing?

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You're a mum now.

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Why, why can't you just have gone

for a lunch and then gone home

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like a normal mum would have?

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Why have you brought

people back to your house?

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Why are you trying to

keep the party going?

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And I felt such shame that next day,

and ironically the next day was Mother's

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Day, I remember walking through Clapham

Common, And I just felt disgusting, like,

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I couldn't look at myself in the mirror

that day, I was like, I felt so shameful,

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I tried so hard to get this beautiful,

perfect baby, and I had this baby, and

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he was barely three months old, and I

was back to drinking, it just didn't

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sit well with me, and it was a red flag.

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But then you've got this whole thing

because it's mummy wine culture and before

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you know it every catch up seems to be

like mums like wine and you can go and

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have a few wines and then you look around

and everyone else seems to be drinking

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like you it's perfectly normal to be on

Northcote Road in Clapham and see all the

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mums with prams having a glass of wine

and it was it was a really confusing time

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because it didn't feel right within me.

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But at the same time,

it just seemed normal.

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Just like, you know, the

adverts are everywhere.

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Mum deserves wine.

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Mum can have wine.

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the baby whines, so mum drinks wine.

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And so, you're really

confused with where you're at.

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And at ten months old, when William was

ten months old, we moved to Australia.

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And I got pregnant then,

really, just straight away.

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which I hadn't expected,

because, it had taken two years

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to get pregnant with William.

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So then I would say that was a big

turning point for me was suddenly having

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two under two And being on the other

side of the world not having my support

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network and not having any family just

trying to make new friends and I met some

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beautiful people But it's not like your

old mates that you've known for 20 years.

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These were people that i've known for two

weeks and I was really, really homesick

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and struggling, I wasn't working, and

I'd gone from having a really successful

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career in London that I got a lot of

personal satisfaction from, to being

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on the other side of the world with

two kids under two, where the only

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highlight of the day was leaving the

house to go to Monkey Music or Baby

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Rhyme Time, and you're cleaning up stuff.

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And you're pureeing carrot and you're

trying to keep them entertained and

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you haven't go to the loo on your own.

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And I just didn't know who I was.

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that was when I was starting to

drink more at home on my own.

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So not during the day when I was

with the kids, but it was definitely

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like that five, six o'clock,

Gus would come home from work.

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And I was like, right

now I can have a drink.

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it was never to the point of

blackout, but it was just this,

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um, I was looking forward to it.

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It was unthinkable that I wouldn't have

it and that was when drinking stopped

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being about partying and socializing

and fitting in and started instead

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to be a way of numbing emotions and

hiding that feeling of loneliness and

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confusion and discontentment because

I knew that I wanted to be a mum.

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I wasn't working, I was with

my two beautiful kids, but

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there was just this sadness.

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I just felt really confused and

alcohol's freaking great in the

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moment for taking those feelings away.

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Stops you having to feel and

that was all that I wanted.

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And so, alcohol then, I had scarlet

when I was 35, and then my next,

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the next few years were quite boozy,

and then 41, like I'd got to the

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point where alcohol was really

starting to impact my mental health.

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, Like really bad anxiety.

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By this point I had my

own recruitment business.

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So I worked from home, you know, the kids

had just started school The school was on

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the same road as where we lived But there

were some days when I would take the kids

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to school feeling really anxious hoping

that none of the school mums would try and

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talk to me I felt really just like weird

and then I would come home and I would

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crawl back into bed and lie in bed Playing

candy crush because I had no energy.

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I had no motivation and that's not me.

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Like I'm such a driven,

energetic, passionate person.

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And it was just slowly, but surely it

was like my soul was being destroyed.

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It was like the fire and the

light inside of me was just.

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Gradually, gradually, gradually going out.

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And then this accumulated into one

night at a friend's 40th, I got

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ridiculously drunk, went outside to

have a cigarette, crouched down to put

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out the fag, fell forward, no reflexes

because I was pissed, and landed

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face first onto a concrete driveway.

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So, cut my lip open, cut

my nose, blood everywhere.

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My friend took me home and put me to bed.

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then I woke up the next morning

to my five year old daughter,

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Scarlett, standing by the bed,

Mommy, what happened to your face?

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oh god, you can imagine I just felt

disgusting i'd love to tell you I

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didn't ever drink again but that night

I drank wine through a straw like

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I couldn't hold a glass to my lips

because they were so smashed up But

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I needed to get alcohol into my body

because I didn't know any other way

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to make the feelings of shame and self

disgust And self loathing go away.

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And so I drank and You It was

a couple of weeks later that I

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decided I'm gonna do a 21 day reset.

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21 days to break a habit because they say

that, you know, that's what how long it

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takes in my mind I just had a bad habit.

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I didn't drink on Mondays and Tuesdays.

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So therefore I decided

I wasn't an alcoholic.

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I didn't drink in the morning.

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I sometimes took breaks from alcohol.

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I wasn't vomiting.

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I didn't have liver disease like I

didn't tick the boxes that in my mind

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were the boxes to tell you if you're

an Alcoholic and I didn't tick those

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so in my mind, I would just had a bad

habit and so I Decided to do 21 days

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and just kept going because I couldn't

believe the difference in a short space

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of time Like my anxiety disappeared.

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I was sleeping really well.

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I felt really energized.

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I felt really productive.

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I felt You I just felt happy.

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I felt really positive.

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I felt clear headed.

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Like people would go to me,

what's different about you?

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You look great.

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And I'm like, I've stopped drinking.

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And then that was a weird time

because some people would be

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like, Oh, don't be so boring.

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what do you mean you stopped drinking?

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Cause I was Sarah, the party girl.

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and then other people were like,

great, but when are you drinking again?

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You know and so it was with mixed

feedback that happened and I got to 100

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days and this was 2017 So there wasn't

the tools and resources and support

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and podcasts that there is now It was

you're pretty much doing it on your own.

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I read Annie Grace's book.

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Um, and and I think that was pretty much

it And I got, I went back to drinking

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after a hundred days because I thought

I'll just be able to have one or two

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drinks every now and then I'll be fixed.

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I'll be a normal drinker because I

clearly don't have a problem because

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I've just taken a hundred days off.

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that first night that I had a drink again,

I went out for dinner with my husband

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and my best friend and her husband.

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And we were sat there and I just

had one glass of wine, which I

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like, that would never have been me.

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The old Sarah was like, I'm not driving.

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I'm going to have a bottle of wine.

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And I had my one glass and

I was like, oh, look at me.

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I'm all grown up now.

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I'm just like one of those normal drinkers

and didn't take long, a few weeks.

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And I was back to drinking because that's

the way it is with gray area drinkers.

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your brain doesn't forget.

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And once you open that door, just an

inch, it starts every time something

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happens, every time you face any

kind of adversity, anytime you're

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stressed, anytime you're pissed off,

anytime you're lonely, whatever it

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is, your brain goes, have a drink,

because you're drinking again, right?

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And so it just slowly, but

surely builds back up again.

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So what followed was just two years.

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Taking breaks, going back to drinking,

taking breaks, going back to drinking.

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But every time I took a break, and

this is what I say in my coaching

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now, is we learn something every time.

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All those breaks were really important in

my journey of getting to the point that

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I got to where I was like, nah, I'm done.

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I needed to get the evidence and the

information, well two things I needed.

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I needed to get clear evidence

of what my life was like

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without alcohol and how I felt.

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And also I needed to prove to myself

Many many many times it turns out that

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moderation didn't work for me because I

kept fighting moderation I kept thinking

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I've just got to be able to moderate.

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Maybe if I take six months off i'll

be able to moderate Maybe if I take

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a year off i'll be able to moderate

And then it dawned on me and I had a

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conversation with a friend and she was

like Everything in your life is better

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when you don't drink you're happier.

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You're more positive.

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You have more energy your anxiety

disappears You have a different

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relationship with your kids your

different relationship with your husband

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like everything is different when you

don't drink So why the hell are you

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fighting so hard to keep it in your life?

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Yeah, and that was a

really pivotal moment.

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Um, and it was like a great friend.

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So she was someone I've met online,

and she'd been with me through all the

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stops and starts and stops and starts

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That's it.

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No more.

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So it's been just over five

and a half years now, and

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it's been quite the journey.

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Wow.

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What a story.

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Do you know what, as I was listening

to you, I like literally our lives were

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in parallel, so I moved from Scotland

to Liverpool when I was, yeah, when I

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was, um, probably 11 and horrendous.

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Everyone made fun of my voice,

everyone, it was, it, there was lots

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of things, like lots of insecurities.

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I ended up as well, , living near

Clapham Common, and wandering

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around, actually, Wandsworth Common.

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Wandsworth Common, which was very

close to my house and, and drinking

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on the Northcote Road and had, Exactly

the story that you had around, well,

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how old was my son when I went out?

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It was someone, it wasn't my birthday.

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It was someone else's birthday and it was

my first time out drinking,. And I went

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out to a bar and, drank far too much.

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and had that horrible feeling

the next day of what am I doing?

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Almost exactly the same story.

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Just what am I doing?

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I've got this baby who I wanted so much.

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and I'm sort of letting him down.

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It was this really horrible

thing, but it also didn't stop me.

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I mean, I carried on for

years and years as well.

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Just fascinating listening to stories

thinking, Oh my God, there's so many.

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Little things there.

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So you, it's, it's nice to have you

on talking about the fact that you

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kind of had some stops and starts

because often what I find is.

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Because I just stopped and

that was the end of it for me.

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I had a final night and it

wasn't a catastrophic night.

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It was just another horrible

night and I went, right, I'm done.

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lots of people do have the stop

and start and they always seem to

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feel this awful guilt about it.

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So it's really good to hear that

you can utilize that and actually.

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Really learn something every time.

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And it will build you to

a place where you stop.

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So not to, be disheartened

so much of that happens.

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Cause you see quite a lot of that.

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Don't you?

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In sober groups, people who've fallen

off and then they're like, Oh, you know,

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I'm awful or this is impossible for me.

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But it's lovely to hear from someone who's

been so successful and gone on to build

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a career out of this, as well as, you

know, a personal successful life that, you

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know, You can do it that way really well,

so not to lose heart if you do fall off.

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Yeah, and for many people it's

actually part of the process.

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Like they wouldn't actually get

to sobriety if they didn't have

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those stop starts because they're

often part of the process and

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a learning part of the process.

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And, you know, I always think of

the quote in Batman where, Batman's

378

dad is teaching him to fly and his

dad says to him, Like, Batman, why

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do you think we fall down so much?

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And Batman says we can

learn how to get up again.

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And, you know, and that's part of

the process with sobriety is we

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learn, we learn what triggers us.

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We remind ourselves it's not

how we want to be feeling.

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It's, it's just all part

of the process for so many.

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people but I see so many people beat

themselves up so badly about it and think

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that it's something to be so ashamed

of and that they failed I think we just

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need to reframe that and just see it

as an important part of the process

388

and don't lose sight of the end goal.

389

Yeah, Absolutely agree with you.

390

so when you stopped, what did you

find the most challenging thing?

391

was it the first few weeks?

392

Was it a particular time of day?

393

was there something that was

very challenging for you?

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I think the first couple of months I

actually found fine because I was so ready

395

for it and I'd done it a few times before,

so I knew my silver toolkit, I knew like

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I had a bath every night at five o'clock

to get me out of the kitchen, like I

397

love a bath, I'm so English, my essential

oils, Staying focused on the quick lit.

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So always having a sober book on the go.

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So the podcast on the

go, adding in exercise.

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So I'd learned so much from

all the other attempts.

401

And by now I was in a few Facebook groups.

402

I was in the Love Sober community

with Kate and Mandy, which was

403

amazing and really supportive.

404

so I knew the things that I had to do.

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So that wasn't hard.

406

I think actually it was

hard for me later on.

407

So once I've got past the hundred days,

because I've done that twice, And then, do

408

you know, one of the most common times for

people to have slip ups is around day 104.

409

Because you get to the hundred

and that's your focus, I'm gonna

410

get to triple digits, you know,

and then it's like, oh, what now?

411

Because It takes time to build a

life that you love without alcohol.

412

It takes time to work on the

reasons why you were drinking.

413

So often people think I'm going

to feel amazing as soon as I stop.

414

But for most people, they're drinking.

415

It's not the problem.

416

They're drinking as a

solution to a problem.

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And so when the drinking goes

away, they're left with the

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problem, but without a solution.

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So many people can actually feel

worse if they're not getting

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the proper help they need.

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And so I quit in the April and then

at the end of June, I went into

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therapy and Not because I thought

there's loads of stuff there.

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I just thought, if I want to give

myself the best chance of sobriety,

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I think, I know there's some stuff

there, so let's go and explore it.

425

I mean, my god, that's been quite the

journey, let me tell you, and I could do

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a whole other podcast with you on that.

427

But what I would say is that that gave

me a huge amount of self awareness.

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a huge amount of self compassion tool

to learn how to sit with my feelings

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because i've never really done that

before i'd just numbed uncomfortable

430

emotions the moment they happened And I

and so like there was a few things then

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but I think that there is that period

between sort of three and six months

432

where It can just feel a little bit

icky and it can just feel a bit like

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I know I don't want to go back to

drinking, but I'm not fully settled

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yet in my sobriety to the point

where I'm feeling really comfortable

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socializing without booze or getting

through a Friday without booze.

436

And so you're just in that

kind of middle ground.

437

and I support, you know, a lot of

women through that stage as well,

438

because that can be quite tricky.

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But then once you come through

that, I think it then starts

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to get a lot easier again.

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Yeah, I think there's

something about that point.

442

You're right, because you

get to the hundred days.

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And for me, that was a big focus.

444

I was in a hundred day challenge.

445

and then when you get there, you suddenly

realize that if you're like me and you've

446

decided that this is actually forever,

and that was just part of it, it's

447

like, it feels like a very long time.

448

And you do have to, consider a little

bit more all of the different things

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you might start to get to situations

where for example you're going to your

450

first wedding or you lose someone you

love or something you know after it

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becomes like this life doesn't it this

whole life rather than this challenge

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that you originally have for the hundred

days yeah it is tricky i think you have

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to have lots of tools in place to be

able to manage that oh i've lost you

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So it turns out I did lose Sarah

and my technology decided to fail

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me at the end of this interview.

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But a really good lesson and

one that we can use in sobriety.

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So just because something goes

wrong doesn't mean you have

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to throw the whole lot away.

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So I've let this one go out despite the

fact that we dropped off at 27 minutes.

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And I'm going to use the

opportunity to thank Sarah.

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Thank you so much for coming on the

podcast,, and for joining me and an

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ungodly hour to make sure that your story

was available for other people who are

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trying really hard to stop drinking or are

curious about , about what it's like and

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what life can be like at the other side.

465

a quick shout out for

your, book Beyond Booze.

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It's a really great book with

some really good examples in it.

467

I'd definitely give

that a read or a listen.

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, I'm listening to it on Audible

actually, , and thoroughly enjoying that.

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So thank you, Sarah!

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So that's a wrap for this season

of Sober Alcohol Free Stories.

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I've absolutely loved learning from

all of my guests and sharing their

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wise words and stories with all of you.

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I'm preparing for season two, which

will be coming out in January, so

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make sure you follow the podcast

for reminders for the first episode.

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Don't forget, you may not be able

to change the beginning, but you can

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start right from where you are and

you can always change the ending.

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Make your catchphrase, I don't drink.

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I'm Victoria and I don't drink.