SUMMARY KEYWORDS

perimenopause, drinking, burnout, alcohol, felt, life, people, women, hormones, stress, menopause, happen, thought, podcast, casey, sobriety, piece, friends, friendships, talking

SPEAKERS: Casey McGuire Davidson + Wendy McCallum

00:02

Welcome to the Hello Someday Podcast, the podcast for busy women who are ready to drink less and live more. I’m Casey McGuire Davidson, ex-red wine girl turned life coach helping women create lives they love without alcohol. But it wasn’t that long ago that I was anxious, overwhelmed, and drinking a bottle of wine and night to unwind. I thought that wine was the glue, holding my life together, helping me cope with my kids, my stressful job and my busy life. I didn’t realize that my love affair with drinking was making me more anxious and less able to manage my responsibilities.

In this podcast, my goal is to teach you the tried and true secrets of creating and living a life you don’t want to escape from.

Each week, I’ll bring you tools, lessons and conversations to help you drink less and live more. I’ll teach you how to navigate our drinking obsessed culture without a bus, how to sit with your emotions, when you’re lonely or angry, frustrated or overwhelmed, how to self soothe without a drink, and how to turn the decision to stop drinking from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life.

I am so glad you’re here. Now let’s get started.

I’m jumping in before the episode today because I wanted to let you know that if you haven’t checked out some of the free resources on my website, you are missing out on some great support that could be helping you on your journey to drink less and live more. If you go to HelloSomedayCoaching.com you can grab the free 30-day Guide to Quitting Drinking. Over 10,000 women have downloaded the guide and it is really comprehensive what to expect on day three and day five, what to shop for, how to get ready to quit drinking, what you might feel on day 16, tips and tricks and resources to tap into. You can just go to my website, enter your email address and it will be sent right to you. 

Also at HelloSomedayCoaching.com you can sign up for my completely free 60-minute masterclass, Five Secrets to Taking a Break from Drinking, even if you’ve tried and failed before. These are the mindset shifts that I go through with my private coaching clients when we first start working together. And if you’ve been stopping and starting with drinking, take 60 minutes out of your day to watch this, it will help. You can sign up for a time that works for you. And if you don’t end up being able to make that time a recording of this session will be sent to you. 

And if you’re ready to make this whole quitting drinking thing easier or take a longer break from alcohol, I want you to check out my signature online sober coaching course, The Sobriety Starter Kit®. It will help you move from day five and day 10 to 45 and 60 to six months and beyond by building not only your sober foundation and sober muscles, but life skills that will serve you well for the rest of your life. If you want to learn more about it, just go to sobrietystarterkit.com. And now let’s jump into the episode.

 

Today we’re talking about perimenopause, burnout and alcohol and how burnout in perimenopause interacts for women in midlife, the connection with increased drinking in midlife and how alcohol can make it all so much harder. My guest today is Wendy McCallum. She’s a burnout and alcohol coach and a wellness expert and the host of the Bite-Sized Balanced podcast. Wendy teaches busy professionals who are nearing burnout and often use alcohol to cope, how to reclaim their time for themselves, how to reduce stress, build healthier habits and increase their daily joy. No stranger to burnout when she spent over 12 years working as a lawyer then partner in Calgary. As a busy litigator and a mom of two young children she struggled to find her work life balance. And in 2008 she left law to create a life she didn’t need to escape from. Alcohol-free since January 2018, Wendy is also a senior certified Making Mind Alcohol Coach and Wendy, welcome to the podcast. 

 

Hi, thank

 

04:48

you so much for having me. I’m so happy to be here.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  04:50

I’m happy to be here too, because in such a timely way which always seems to happen, just before we got on this call I had a call with a client. My aunt, who is a primary care doctor with three kids, sees patients in a community health center for 12 hours straight on Mondays, and then has to stay up till 10:30 at night to finish her notes and is totally on burnout and is 40 days into sobriety. And all we were talking about is the fact that it’s unsustainable. She’s been trying to reduce overwhelm, and you know, get more efficient at work for 15 years, and that something’s gotta give, right. It’s a reason that you drink, to tolerate your life, even if every aspect of it is good, and something that you care about.

 

05:45

Yeah, that’s such an important point. But I’m so glad you raised that right at the beginning, Casey, because one of the things that I like to remind people of is that it’s totally possible to burn out doing something you love, you know, we often just assume that it happens for women who are doing something that isn’t fulfilling them and doesn’t light them up. But it can, it can absolutely happen when you’re doing something that you love, whether that’s a career that you love, or it’s taking care of other people. And I think it’s really important to stress that because I think oftentimes women think they can’t possibly be in burnout, because, you know, their life, you know, seemingly looks pretty great. And they’re actually enjoying a lot of the parts of it.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  06:22

Yeah. And yet, you know, she was saying, why can I cope and other people seem to deal? And shouldn’t I be happier? And, you know, everything is important, nothing can drop. And, you know, that’s something you know, we always talk about in coaching. I’ve mentioned it on the podcast that someone said to me, who I interviewed, I wish I remembered who and didn’t look it up. But that like, when you stop drinking, there are two types of problems, there are the aftermath problems, right, that you’re trying to eliminate the hangovers and fuzzy memories and self loathing and guilt and worry. And then there are the underlying problems, which is what made drinking quote unquote, work for you in the first place. And overwhelm is such a big trigger. And it’s something that kind of has to be addressed, if you want to, like you said, build a life you don’t need to escape from.

 

07:23

Yes, absolutely. And I’d be curious to know whether this client noticed that any of that overwhelm is reduced as a result of taking alcohol out. So I often hear that from clients. And oftentimes, alcohol takes like this layer away, that was there, but, and people expect it to solve all the problems, right. But when it comes to burnout, usually there are some really deep underlying circumstances that have been there for a long time. And it’s a really complicated puzzle. So it’s often the first piece. And as I think, you’ve I’m sure you’ve talked about on this podcast, and I talk about this all the time, this idea that, you know, taking alcohol away doesn’t solve all of our problems, it just makes it easier for us to see the ones that are still there. And, and for a lot of women that is, you know, that brings into clarity, just the number of stressors in their lives and the amount of obligations they have on their plate. And when alcohol doesn’t solve it, it’s a really clear sign that something does have to give, and maybe it is time to actually start looking at some of these, some of these underlying causes for the stress.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  08:26

Yeah, I completely agree. And, you know, I was frustrated when I stopped drinking, you know, when I stopped drinking, so much got better, right? The beating myself up by how I felt physically, how anxious I felt, at the end of the day, feeling like I was hiding something all the time and spending all that time thinking about drinking, all of that was better. And then, you know, and then you go through early sobriety, which is by definition difficult, and you have to sort of treat yourself with kid gloves, because it’s a very hard thing to do. But when I hit about four months, I had sort of this full anxiety, panic attack related to a whole bunch of things at work. And I was really upset because I was upset that I wasn’t fixed. Like I gave up this huge thing in my life. I did this really hard thing. Why is this still here? And exactly like you said, it didn’t solve everything. It’s solved a lot of those sort of, you know, problems that happen after drinking the aftermath problems, but there were these underlying problems which it didn’t fix, but it finally gave me the clarity to be able to deal with them for the first time.

 

09:47

Yeah, I always say it’s, you know, you have two ways of looking at it. You can see it as like frustrating and unfair that there’s another problem that’s presented itself after you’ve dealt with what you thought was like the biggest problem of all, or you can see it as a Gift, an opportunity really to grow more, you know, and to improve your life more. 

 

So, for me, one of the things I realized after I stopped drinking is that I, because I was really struggling with why I was drinking, like, I could not figure it out, I had everything, you know, everything else kind of on paper in place, I was, you know, happily married with the kids that I’d always wanted. And, you know, I really didn’t want for anything. So it made no sense to me why I was drinking. And it wasn’t until I stopped drinking that I realized that I was, I was trying to escape not because of, it was less about what was already there in my life and more about what was missing. And, and that sometimes is also a contributing factor to burnout is this feeling, you know, where you’re, you’re doing all the things for everybody else, but you’re not doing anything for yourself. So it’s, it is really frustrating when it happens. But it happens all the time that we remove alcohol, and we realize, oh, shoot, it didn’t actually fix all of my other problems.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  11:01

Yeah. And for you what was missing?

 

11:06

Well, it was, that’s such a good question. I mean, I’m four and a half years out now from alcohol, and I’m still figuring it out. It was a process. And I think it’s a process for most women. The first thing that was obviously missing for me that I started changing was the nature of my coaching practice. So I had been coaching for already, probably seven or eight years, by the time I became alcohol free, not in the, in the sphere of alcohol, but just generally around burnout. And I realized that what I was doing wasn’t really fulfilling and satisfying me. So I worked to kind of reorganize my business and narrow my niche and really focus in on what I wanted to do. And that’s when I went back and got certified with This Naked Mind as an alcohol coach. So that was a piece of it for me. 

 

I also realized that I had while I had happily put my business aside for the 15 years or so when my kids really needed me. And I was sort of working part time as a coach. And that was, that was fine. My kids had reached an age where they really didn’t need me anymore, I had a lot of free time on my plate. And I had done nothing to fill that time with business. And I was also somewhat resentful of the fact that my husband, during that same time period, had built this booming, successful company. And I hadn’t done that. So, so that was a piece of it, too, was just building and growing my company and really saying out loud that I had goals around what it would look like to be successful as a business person. So that was a piece of it. 

 

The other thing that I realized was missing was female friendships. So I had lots and lots of friends when my kids were little, mostly my kids’ friends’ parents, and as my children got older, when they started driving themselves places, and I wasn’t invited anymore to, you know, watch practices and games and things like that, I just, I just felt like that social network had started to kind of fall apart. And it was also just coincidentally at the same time as COVID, when everybody was sort of separating and isolating. So working on making new friends was another piece of it for me, which was very awkward, at the age of 50. But incredibly rewarding. 

 

And then for me for sure, the last piece was a recognition that I had not been serving a really important piece of who I was, which was the creative part of myself. And that one took the longest to figure out and it took me the longest amount of time to figure out what the thing was exactly that I wanted to be doing. I tried every craft out there, including felting. I always say I felted this beautiful red lobster with Bob Allies, and it did nothing to fill the gaping hole in my soul. But I tried. I tried everything, Casey. I tried needle painting and all, I like painting. And then I just serendipitously, a friend of mine sent me a note to let me know that Ann Dowsett Johnston, who’s the author of Drink, was running a writing class and was looking for joiners. And I thought, oh my gosh, I’m not a writer, I don’t like to write. But I also knew I needed to keep trying to find things to fill my time. My kids are going to university next year, so I was trying to plan for that. And I said, Oh, what the hell and I joined this writing class. And it was very awkward at first, but it became really apparent to me early on that I had never stopped being a writer. I was a writer when I was a kid. I got derailed a little bit by my law career where I wrote all the time but it was very boring what I was writing about. And so I just got back into that and that’s just become Oh, it’s just my joy now I do it all the time. And I work privately with Ann and I’ve got a project on the go. 

 

Super fun. Yeah, I

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  14:46

am so glad I asked that question because you said about eight things that I was like, oh my god, oh my god. Oh my god. But um so first question, how was the class because I saw it reviewed and I saw when she released that class and, and was just curious.

 

15:06

So I loved it. I went on to do, so the first class she does is called Writing Your Recovery, I think and then she has a Reading Your Discovery. I’m in like my second iteration of Writing Your Recovery. I also have a small writer’s group of writers from that workshop that we meet on the alternate weeks. And I work with her privately. 

 

You write? 

 

Yes, I well, I have never said that out loud. I can’t believe you just got me to admit that Casey, I am writing something. I’m writing something whether it becomes a book or not. Like I’m, it’s yet to be seen but I’m definitely writing. And I’m writing a lot about exactly what we’re talking about today, actually. So the project that I’m working on is really all about the intersection between midlife and burnout for women. And you know how we naturally, many of us naturally get to this place where we are going through the you know, perimenopause, which is really the 7 to 10 years before we enter full menopause. And, and I think it’s just a natural confluence of circumstances for us where we’re just at the, you know, at the end of the period where we have been throwing ourselves at work, we’ve been throwing ourselves at taking care of kids. And that has led to a complete exhaustion. And at the same time, our hormones are shifting.

So you know, we’re down, where we’re kind of, we call it like a hormone soup that we’re in during perimenopause, where everything’s all over the map. And we’re having, we’re struggling with all kinds of feelings and symptoms, and it’s hard to discern what’s related to perimenopause, what’s related to burnout and overwhelm. And, and also, like, like I said earlier, I think for a lot of women, it’s also a time where they start to realize, oh, my gosh, something’s actually missing here. So it’s not even so much like I have way too much on my plate, it’s that the things that I need aren’t present. And that can lead to this real feeling of, for me, I felt a little bit lost. I wasn’t entirely sure who I was if I wasn’t a mother, as my kids got to that stage where they didn’t need me anymore.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  18:01

Hi there. If you’re listening to this episode, and have been trying to take a break from drinking, but keep starting and stopping and starting again, I want to invite you to take a look at my on demand coaching course, the sobriety starter kit.

The sobriety starter kit is an online self study sober coaching course that will help you quit drinking and build a life you love without alcohol without white knuckling it or hating the process. The course includes the exact step by step coaching framework I work through with my private coaching clients, but at a much more affordable price than one on one coaching. And the sobriety starter kit is ready, waiting and available to support you anytime you need it. And when it fits into your schedule. You don’t need to work your life around group meetings or classes at a specific day or time.

This course is not a 30 day challenge, or a one day at a time approach. Instead, it’s a step by step formula for changing your relationship with alcohol. The course will help you turn the decision to stop drinking, from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life.

You will sleep better and have more energy, you’ll look better and feel better. You’ll have more patience and less anxiety. And with my approach, you won’t feel deprived or isolated in the process. So if you’re interested in learning more about all the details, please go to www.sobrietystarterkit.com. You can start at any time and I would love to see you in the course 

 

Yeah, for me, I mean, I think the most awkward points in early sobriety were just me overthinking what I was going to say. I mean, I remember that. A woman who lived in my neighborhood who, you know, I wanted to be friends with, she had a son, my age, she worked, I work, she asked me, Hey, do you want to join this book club where these really cool women and I get together every month, and we drink a ton of wine and blah, blah, blah. And I was like, two months sober. I mean, like, really early days. And so I was talking to my husband, and I was like, What do I tell her? Like, do I tell her like, that I have running club that night? Or do I tell her that like, I don’t do book clubs, or what, you know, what should I say? And he was like, you don’t drink? Tell her you don’t drink. 

 

And I was like, Oh, my God. And my impression was she’s not going to want to be friends with me. Because she mentioned wine. Because you know, when I was drinking yet, you’re totally right. I thought, I mean, literally anyone who didn’t drink, I would think they were lame. pregnant or an alcoholic. Like literally, those were my three categories. And so I didn’t want to be lame, or an alcoholic or, or pregnant your God. So finally, I just said to her, I said, Oh, I’d love to hang out with you. I really like you. I just stopped drinking, you know, two months ago. Could we get coffee sometime? And I was so surprised. She was like, oh, yeah, absolutely. I’ve taken breaks at different times. You know, drinking is something I really need to watch. And so that made us actually closer. Like, I felt like we actually had this like, a little bit of vulnerability on her side too that the next time I saw her, I was like, Oh, you’re a friend. You know what I mean? It’s not like you’re putting on the like, oh my god, I hang out with the coolest women and we drink and we talk about our jobs kind of thing. 

 

More awkward was we had a bunch of people come in from New York from my New York office, and we went out to a bar. And we were all sitting around sort of like talking networking, whatever. And there was like a big boss person there. And so I ordered a ginger beer just like, you know, as they go on the Oh, ginger beer for me. And the waitress friggin stopped, and said, you know, there’s no alcohol in a ginger beer, don’t you? And I was like, yes. And she’s like, I just don’t want you to be angry when it comes if there’s no alcohol. I was like, I’d like a funk. Like, could you please not announce it to the entire table. But like, at least I had sober friends. So I like went to the bathroom. It was like, You’re not fucking going to believe what just happened to me. It was like total cringe worthy moment.

 

22:56

Having those sober buddies to go out with I mean, that is so, so beneficial for you. When you’re on your soul sobriety path, isn’t it just to have someone to go Oh, God, this was so awkward. So embarrassing, because they feel the same way. But what you said reminds me, like we spend so much time thinking about what’s in someone else’s brain, which we can’t control. And we will never find out whether it’s true or not. So we think people are thinking the worst about us. And they’re thinking that we’re boring, and all those other things. But actually, I don’t think they are. And we could spend all our lives guessing what somebody’s thinking about you. But we’re actually never going to know. And I think that’s something that comes with sobriety is that you, you sort of have to let the opinions of others drain off you and just go well, they can think what they like because I know I’m doing the right thing. 

 

And also, as you say, like your friend, I think people want to meet people that don’t drink because they often have issues. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have a sort of weird relationship with alcohol, even if it’s that one glass of wine a day or one glass of wine a year. It’s like why are you having one glass of wine a year? Anyway, like everybody has their own intricate little relationship with it and I think when you stop people go, oh, actually that’s kind of amazing. And you’re like this magical little elf everybody wants to sort of follow around because they actually don’t want the hangovers and they don’t want to make dicks out of themselves every time they go out. And they find you quite inspiring. 

 

It was funny in your story also reminded me of when people decide to say things and like now when people talk about alcohol I feel like my, you know when people are talking about a night out and mates have done this and done that. I do feel like my shoulders, I do get awkward because I know that I’m not part of that conversation anymore. But the other week I was at the local hospital. My son has epilepsy and I was coming out of the hospital after a really stressful day. And the nurses as I was walking out the door grabbed me on the shoulder and said, And why don’t you just go home, open a couple of bottles of wine and sit and watch telly and you just relax and I just went, Oh, fuck sake, I don’t fucking drink. I was just in that mood where I just couldn’t go. Oh, yeah, you know, sometimes you just kind of pretend the drink just to ease everybody because you don’t want to make them feel taken affronted by your behavior. So I just felt

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  25:27

when you think about it, you’re like, Yes, tomorrow coming back to the hospital with a brutal hangover will make it so much better. You know,

 

25:35

it was just the fact that it was a nurse in her nurse’s uniform, telling me to open not one, two bottles of wine when I got home. Yeah,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  25:44

well, I have to say that. I mean, I honestly like, I work with women who are wanting to stop drinking. And I’ve worked with a number of nurses as well as doctors. So I mean, we’re not the only ones who have sort of a problematic relationship with alcohol, it really in society cuts all people and there is that period of like, being completely oblivious before you start to be like, yikes, this is a problem. I mean, I remember telling people at work. Oh, yeah, I drink a bottle of wine a night, not thinking that it was that yours are bad. Or like, maybe I shouldn’t help people with that. You know what I mean? Yeah.

 

26:27

Well, that’s the exact problem with the normalization of alcohol in society. That’s, that’s, you know, you’ve hit the nail on the head. We don’t know it’s wrong because everybody else around us is doing that. We’re just doing, we’re following the crowd. We’re absorbing ourselves in our social environments, and surrounding ourselves with people that drink so therefore, why would you look out of that bubble? It’s not necessary. You’re just doing what everybody else is doing? 

 

Yeah. And then when you stopped drinking, it takes a while. But when you look back on that, you’re like, Oh, my God, I was just following the crowd. I was just, really, I was just being a sheep. And I knew it was doing the damage. I mean, there were points in my life, where, you know, after I had kids, and I started to question my alcohol intake, for I’d be lying in bed with my, you know, my finger on my pulse, thinking that I was going to die. I mean, that’s how bad it was. The anxiety and shame of not being able to look after my children, because I was hungover caused me to feel like I was gonna die. I mean, that’s that one bottle of wine a night. That’s not, it’s not that extreme. It’s that real, you know, acceptable level of drinking in society, which is where the real problem lies, I believe, especially with mental health and anxiety, and depression, all of these things that run alongside it. I mean, anxiety and alcohol go hand in hand. And it was something I severely suffered from. But as I said, before, you know, it was actually the thing that made me stop. So I am appreciative of my body screaming out to me in that way.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  27:56

Yeah, I mean, there comes a point where your body’s like, you can’t do this anymore. And I also, like, have extreme anxiety, I think I always have, and I still do, but it went from like, a level nine, to like, a level five, sort of a manageable level of anxiety. But I mean, the reason I finally stopped is I was really scared about my mental health, like, you know, pretending everything is fine, going to work, coming home, taking care of the kids, I was like, I can’t cope with life. Like, I don’t think I can do this. And that’s terrifying as well. So I think it was sort of the anxiety mental health piece that actually made me say, I need to stop. And you’re right, like, you know, what’s funny is I talked to him all the time. And, you know, it is interesting, like, literally elementary school teachers will be like, well, teachers, that’s a big drinking culture. And then sales. There’ll be like, that’s a big draw. Yeah, sure. And then, like, you get to lawyers, and I was in marketing, and they’re like startups, and I’m like, Oh, my God, everything. stay at home moms. That’s a big drinking culture. You know,

 

29:08

everything. Yeah, everything is, it’s a career, isn’t it? It’s a whole other career. It takes up probably 30 hours a week. It’s probably quite simple, just don’t get paid for it. The mental preoccupation is probably more than having a full time job.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  29:24

Yes. Oh, God. Yes. I spent more time thinking about that than almost anything else. What I was gonna say is interesting is you know, it was something someone said to me stuck with me, right where they were like, You need to give sobriety a couple chances. Like the first time you go to a barbecue, the first time you go to a concert or on a date, without drinking. Yes, it’s awkward. But give it a couple of times, like it gets better. And what they said to me was, you’ve given drinking thanks. Listen chances, like, how many times did it go bad and you were like, well, let’s just try one more time. And I was thinking about that in terms of sober awkward because I had a shocking number of truly, truly awkward cringe worthy moments when I was drinking, and you probably did to

 

30:22

I mean, my life was a, you know, a calamity of those things. My life was just a huge, awkward hangover, where I got lost in this sort of drinking no man’s land, because I couldn’t remember my own behavior the next day. So not only was I fearful of what I could remember, I was also overwhelmingly scared of what I couldn’t. So it’s like I was, I also, I will often say, I got stuck between the joke and the punch line. It was like, when you’re hungover, you don’t know where you’ve been, what you’ve been up to. I mean, that was the level of my binge drinking, I went into a blackout quite early on. And I was functioning, you know, I was dancing or getting a taxi or, you know, vomiting tequila shots into a toilet in a dodgy nightclub. I was functioning like a robot with the lights on, but no one home. 

 

And that now scares the bloody hell out of me. I can’t believe that I did that. But it was always awkward. You know, there was I’d wake up with a weird guy in my bed and be like, Oh, good morning, who are you? It was just a repertoire of awkwardness. And I just thought those stories at the time, gave me some sort of kudos like, you know, I could meet my friends down the pub the next day for a bacon sandwich and you know, a bloody marys to talk me up. And I had the stories. I had the terrible promiscuity stories I always had, I always had a cut on my chin from doing some stupid dancing. I always had something to bring to the table like a comedy show to say, look, here I am, I know what you want from me. And I’m going to bring it to you. I’m going to deliver on what is expected of me as your friend.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  32:05

And it’s also a defense mechanism, right? Like, if I make fun of everything I did, then no one else really can.

 

32:13

Absolutely. And also, it was my identity. I didn’t know another person. All I knew was drunk Vicki, who is the life and soul and doesn’t care about anything and can do whatever she wants, and nothing matters. I was totally invincible in those days. And I never ever stopped to self reflect. And I think it’s because I grew up in a family that were big drinkers, it would have been more awkward for me to say no to alcohol from a young age than to say yes. 

 

And I mean, if we go really intrinsically into it, I think alcohol made me feel loved. And that was that little addictive love hit that I was getting from my parents, from my friends, from everybody around me. And it all stemmed down to this little bullying situation I had at school, I say little, every drama is, you know, trauma is relative. So for me, it wasn’t as big as some people’s trauma. But I was bullied at school, there was no hitting or, or fighting. Two of my best friends just decided they didn’t want to like me anymore. And I was 14 or 15. And just at that age where I just loved them. And they just walked away from me one day. And from that moment on, I think my drinking changed slightly. Because that was the most awkward I’d ever felt in my life. And the only way I knew how to deal with that was to drown out those feelings. Because I mean, what else was there? I wasn’t going to get therapy at that age or talk to someone about it. I was just like, Oh, these people don’t like me anymore. As in that developed into this huge people pleasing problem. Because I not only wanted to please everybody, I wanted them to stay and I wanted them to not walk away like those people have. 

 

Yeah. 

 

And yeah, that developed into me over drinking and lots of awkward situations. I mean, the most awkward is me blowing my finger off with a firework on the millennium.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  34:04

Oh my gosh, okay, you can’t. 

 

Yes, but one of her fingers is not as long as yet.

 

34:11

And funnily enough, Jean McCarthy you know, who does The Bubble Hour. Yes, she has the same finger missing, but I don’t think hers was a drunken injury. We’re like, we’re like so sober stumped sisters. We discovered it when I was on her podcast. Yes. Some sisters. Yeah.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  34:27

That’s like sober trivia. Yeah. Podcast hosts have one finger missing.

 

34:37

So funny. Yeah, so I just was that person. You know, I was that person who was always doing the craziest thing, which led to me, I mean that those anxiety filled hangovers are awkward. That’s what it is. That’s why you feel anxious because you can’t remember anything you’ve done. You don’t know how to deal with it. And of course, I soaked that up with the next drink. I’d have huge drinks on a Sunday, Monday, I’d feel like shit Tuesday, I feel like shit. Then Wednesday, I’d be waving a tenner at the bottom and ordering another drink. So it was just this never ending cycle of feeling awkward and then using alcohol to numb it out. And then in sobriety, it’s like a different kind of awkwardness where you’re, you’re suddenly your authentic self, and you have to do the opposite to what you’ve always done, which is why it’s so hard.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  35:24

Yeah. I mean, I think it’s interesting to have this conversation because my drinking was very much like yours in terms of I would often blackout like, I would often not remember what happened in the evening. But differently, you know, I met my husband when I was 22. We were always together. So we did more drinking, like at friend’s dinner parties, or at home or on date nights, like it was not me at the bar, going home with different people. At the same time, like I had so many awkward moments, like, to the point of like, my bet, you know, it was part of my personality, too. Everybody knew I was a red wine girl. 

 

I would show up at every party with like, two bottles of wine, pretending to be generous, but it was really because I was worried they wouldn’t have, you know, enough for me. And I didn’t know, I was like, Well, if I brought one bottle, that would be okay. But I drink more than one bottle at a party, including a dinner party. So I mean, I had moments where I had kids, and I went over to my best friend’s house for a party. And at some point, I climbed into their master bed to take a nap, like, under the covers, and my husband found me and was like, What are you doing? I’m like, I’m allowed to be here, you know, like, just getting really belligerent. And I don’t remember any of that. Or I went to a party at our CEOs house, at, you know, for a holiday thing, and drank so much, I could not drive home. So my boss who was VP drove me home. I mean, I don’t know how I thought this was okay in a working situation. But I woke up the next morning and did not know where my phone was. And so I did find my phone. And it was 10 miles away in her car. So talk about awkward. I had to call her on my husband’s phone to be like, I think and then like, the most awkward part is trying to play it off. Like nothing to see here move along. I mean, it’s just so cringe worthy. And you know, tripping on a business trip and skinning my knee on the walk home from a restaurant. You know, there’s so many awkward moments, and it’s awkward afterwards, you’re trying to somehow mitigate the harm done the night before.

 

37:51

Yeah. And I think for some reason, you get away with it for a while. It’s like in your late teens, early 20s. You’re just kind of, you’re kind of skimming across the surface, aren’t you? You’re capable of keeping it all under wraps, and disguising it as a very normal drinking habit. And I’m just letting myself go. I’m letting my hair down. I love that phrase, letting your hair down. It’s like no your head is dipping in the toilet bowl, not letting you hair down. It’s just very interesting to see how we see it. Now in sobriety, we look back and go, actually, that behavior was awful. And when I went to therapy fitted for my drinking, I wrote down all of those awkward moments, I wrote down the time, I was driven out of a resort in Thailand for kicking a hole in the door, which I don’t remember, I wrote down all the promiscuity, the times that I offended people or slept with someone’s boyfriend, all of these awful things. I wrote down the list. And I really recommend anyone doing it actually, because it is very insightful. 

 

I wrote down every single thing that I felt awkward about throughout my life throughout my drinking career. And I read through them and I read them out loud. And I remember looking at the piece of paper and going, is that who I am really? Is that the person that I am or want to be? And I looked back at it and I was like, No, that is a completely mad person. That is a crazy maniac who is completely out of control and has no idea what she’s doing, where she’s going or any self respect. That was the main thing I noticed from it. I was giving myself away to strangers and giving my mental health away. I was so uninterested with myself I realized now and I went through the list and then afterwards after I’d read it I went through and wrote not okay, not okay, not okay to every single one on it. I mean, there were probably 50 things on there that I could list off to you. And I realized that that is not who I am. 

 

And that’s now why Casey I don’t have any shame about any of my behavior. I have no regrets about it. I did these things. That’s why I’m happy to talk about it, because that’s not who I am. That is not the person I am now. And I realized that that is someone that was heavily under the influence. It doesn’t represent me intrinsically as a human being. So I can step out of there and go, Wow, that was pretty crazy. But that is not Vicki. So therefore, I’m not. And here I am now to show you like, actually, this is just who I am. And I’m alright. I go to bed early. I drink tea. And I have boundaries. And I’m okay.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  40:28

Yeah. Well, I mean, you know, it’s weird. I don’t have any shame either about my drinking. I mean, maybe I should. But honestly, I think most of the stories are actually really funny in retrospect, not all of them. Not all of them. But I mean, they’re funny. Not funny, right? Like, when you age. I mean, right? Before I quit, I was at a resort with my family and drank too much red wine, because that’s what I did, and went into the bathroom in the middle of the night and was throwing up and trying to throw up really quietly so my kids and husband wouldn’t hear. I call it drunk. Right?

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  41:09

And so like, no, that’s well, actually, I still think that’s kind of funny. But, you know, once you can distance from it, it’s not so emotionally charged. It’s just like, wow, that was fucked up. You know?

 

41:24

Yeah, I had a really good saying recently, which is something about living in the past creates depression and living in the future creates anxiety. So somehow, you’ve got to learn to live in the now and you perhaps in sobriety don’t have that wiggly wiggly lines of ups and downs. And you have to accept that you live in this sort of more content place, which doesn’t have the same euphoria and it doesn’t have the same level of panic attacks. But it’s actually a much more satisfying place to live, isn’t it? And you realize that those stories, even though they are embarrassing, you wouldn’t be here doing what you’re doing without them. And they are funny. I mean, I was going to ask actually, did you ever relapse once you gave up?

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  42:05

I did. You know, a couple things. One, I was trying to moderate quote, unquote, with drinking for a long time. I stopped for like four months, the first time I was like, Oh, shit, I need to stop drinking. And I did go to AA meetings, 12 steps on the advice of my therapist. I was sober for about four months, and then I got pregnant. So for better or worse, like 12 Step didn’t resonate with me. But I really backed off once I got pregnant, because I was like, Well, I’m not drinking until after my daughter is born. I was like, Oh, that was just situational. You know, ignoring the previous 15 years of my life, like, I don’t really have a problem, I’m in a better place now. I’ve got a more or less stressful job. 

 

So I went back to drinking and very, very quickly, it became the same and as bad as it ever was, you know, drinking a bottle or more. Every night, 365 nights a year, it took me 22 months to stop again. Now weirdly, I don’t consider that a relapse. Like, in my own mind. I wasn’t like, I’m relapsing. It was like, I chose to drink again, because it was very conscious. And the whole time I was like, I know I’m gonna have to stop. Like, I know this is bad. I know. It’s unsustainable. But in my mind, I was like, I don’t want to stop yet. Like I could probably eke out a couple more years. And just

 

43:38

yet, should he say, oh, yeah, a few more years of like, logging out of the diary on a Sunday and feeling like we have mental health issues. I mean, that’s what we used to do. I used to,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  43:49

but that’s not out. During that time. I was not trying to be like, Okay, so I’m not gonna drink this week. I need to take a break. I need. But yeah, what about you? Did you relapse? Do you consider? You know,

 

44:03

I just wanted to. I was just wondering, because we were talking about that shame thing, I was, suddenly had a thought that perhaps, if we still feel shame about our drinking, whether it makes us more likely to relapse. And that’s why I asked because I just thought, gosh, we’re both saying here that we don’t have shame about it now. And I wonder whether that’s something that comes, you know, a bit later on in sobriety, because I wonder if people relapse sometimes because they do feel such stigma that surrounds it, and that they feel like they’re doing something wrong, and they can’t see out of it. And they feel like they’re always going to feel shame. 

 

Yeah, what we both said, it’s like if shame does go away, and you don’t have to feel it anymore. Sorry, what was the question? Well,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  44:42

I was thinking if you do it right, and I know this. Yes, I think two things help. One, you know, getting help for whatever the underlying issue is, right? Like drinking is really a maladaptive coping strategy. So you take away that coping strategy and then You still often have whatever led you to drink. So figuring out and working through other ways to solve for those issues is important once you’ve stopped drinking, but the second part is not thinking that it is a huge, awful thing to stop drinking, but rather feeling like this is something to be proud of. It’s a healthy choice. Wow, I’m a badass. Like, I’m not the only one. That makes it kind of less likely because you have fewer triggers to want to drink. But you also feel less deprived? Because you’re just like, No, I’m choosing this. What do you think? Yeah.

 

45:39

Well, for me, I remember waking up. I mean, I’d started to question my drinking after the birth of my first child. And then I tried to combine those two lives. But there’s that place where people don’t talk about which is that, you know, being a mum and being a party girl, and those two worlds, that transition is really hard if you’re a big drinker. So I went from being out at nightclubs and being this crazy girl that I’ve talked about. So then being stuck at home, in an apartment with a crying baby on my own. And of course, the only thing I knew how to do to escape that was to go out and find a mother’s group and be like, Come on, let’s you know, rip our shirts off to Blondie on the dance floor and go crazy. 

 

So that’s what I did. So for four years, even though anxiety started to infiltrate my hangovers, though, every Sunday because I was incapable of looking after my child. I still did that thing that you did, you know, I tried to combine these worlds that were obviously colliding, and it was getting messy. I didn’t know another way of being me. So I just went on, and on. Every Sunday, the anxiety was getting worse. And I had to listen to my husband getting the baby ready. Taking the baby out for the day. Well, I sat in bed and ran to the toilet every two minutes. It just was really horrible. And then after my second child was born, I managed to get pregnant again. Six weeks after she was born, I went out and got hugely wasted. And I think for me, it was just, I had been struggling with it. And I knew I was struggling with it. But I didn’t know sobriety was a possibility. It just seemed extremely far fetched. I was like, Nah, I’m not doing that. 

 

So but that one Sunday morning, I remember waking up lying in bed with waves of fear crashing over my body feeling extremely unlevel in my brain, you know, that equilibrium had just been battered. Yeah, and I just walked into the lounge and said to my husband, I cannot do this anymore. I am doing something that I hate. And I’m trying to work out ways, like moderation or beers, just drink beers or, you know, wines, water between wines, all that rubbish, that I think it was just one hangover too far. And that was it. And I never drank again. Well, I got therapy. I literally found a therapist that morning, I started therapy, and that was that. Because I realized I was drinking for a reason. It was because of that situation at school. It was because I was people pleasing. And I didn’t realize I was drinking for a reason before then. 

 

And that’s the beauty of therapy or getting any sort of help, whatever problem you have, is that you need somebody else to go, this is why and this is why you do this and you are filling that hole in your heart with alcohol, you didn’t have a choice and all of these things. And with therapy, I was able to build that new foundation for my life that didn’t include alcohol, and be the person I knew I was inside that nobody else got to see. I mean, everybody thought I was boring afterwards. But I’m not boring now. Like, I’m living a fascinating life, like doing all this sober curious stuff and doing everything I do. It’s hugely interesting. It’s much better than me being passed out in a gutter. It’s just opened up this whole new world to me. And I just feel like wow, why would I go back to that? 

 

Of course, I have moments of craving, you know, and nowadays I just, you know, go for a walk and go and look at the sunset and do something, you know, appeasing to me. That’s going to make me feel better. I have all these tricks of the trade, and I accept that cravings are going to be part of my sobriety. I think that’s something people, they try and avoid them or try and run away from them. I think I’ve got cravings, I’ve got cravings. I think something really helpful to do is actually embrace those cravings as part of your sobriety journey and go oh, yeah, there it is, breathe in those cravings or go and put the kettle on go, oh, yeah, I used to drink that, of course is going to happen because my brain is wired in that way and distract yourself with something else. I know those cravings can feel overwhelming at times because they certainly have for me, but it does get easier the longer you’re sober for sure. And I think that’s why I haven’t ever relapsed is because I just feel the mental and physical improvement within me is so severe like, why would I? Why would I go back there? I just, I know so much about alcohol now. Like I’ve educated myself on the damage. And I know the bigger picture. And I think that’s a really good thing to do is like, really, really go into it. Really find out your science behind it, what it’s doing to your brain. I don’t know, we interviewed William Porter, have you spoken to him? But yes,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  50:22

I love him.

 

50:24

I just love him. And like, we were talking about those, you know, waters between wines and all of that business. And he I remember, even then it was only probably six months I spoke to him. He said, no matter what you do, your body has to process the alcohol. And that is what causes the hangover. So no matter what you do, you are always going to have a hangover, and you’re always going to have mental health issues the next day. I was like what? And Lucy was telling me she used to eat a piece of salmon before she’d go out because you’d heard that salmon may not have hangovers.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  50:58

Oh my god. It’s so much work. Isn’t it? Like,

 

51:02

oh my god, imagine for what?

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  51:05

Yeah, yeah, Blackout. I know, I know. My husband. When we finally talked about it. I was like, and then the next day, I would feel this crushing anxiety and wake up at 3am and feel ill and try to pull it together. And he was like, Wow, that’s quite a reward. He was like, tell her what she’s won for her big night out, you know? 24 hours. Self loathing. 

 

Yeah, we oh, I had William Porter on and it to this day is one of my favorite episodes. Because yeah, he just explains everything so well. Actually, his book is called Alcohol Explained. And my podcast episode with him is called Alcohol Explained as well. But he’s, I like what a, I like his accent, which, you know, it’s just very nice. But also he just explains things in such a logical and non judgmental way. That I feel like it’s really approachable.

 

52:01

Yes, I feel exactly the same. I just love his story. He was a lawyer going into work with some cans of beer under his smart work jacket sipping, sipping on the tube on the way to work. I mean, it’s so relatable and how quickly his drinking spirals and that’s the thing about this is that, you know, your stories resonate with everybody, like no matter. Like everything you said today is like, God, you sound exactly like me, like waking up at 3am. With palpitations, with doom and gloom bearing down on you. It’s just awful that we did that to ourselves for so long, isn’t it? I mean, yeah, it’s such a relief not to do that.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  52:39

And I don’t have to just tell people like, just to be like, Yeah, this Yeah, you know, I, I love talking with other women who quit drinking, because, and like becoming friends with them. Because a, you know, they have really good stories, like I laugh more with women who have quit drinking than anyone else. And there’s less like posturing trying to look like your life is perfect, or like the sort of shallow surface level conversations because they’ve done some work like they get real. I’m like, today sucked. And it’s not just today sucked because my work had XYZ or my boss did X. It’s like, my boss did x. And this made me feel this way. And here’s what it triggered in me, but in a really good, cool way.

 

53:32

That’s so funny, because that can cause some social anxiety, awkwardness, because now I feel exactly the same. But if I go and meet a group of women who still drink, and the conversation is very, very one level, because I’m used to go like if I organize a sober meetup, which we do one a month, literally, it’s like, why are you here? And you get to the nitty gritty, within two seconds of that person sitting down. It’s like, what is your relationship like with your mother in law? Why do you drink? Tell us your most disturbing story from your childhood? You get the level of conversation from sober people is so deep and so fascinating, fascinating and so funny. That when you actually meet people that still drink, you’re like, Oh, yeah. What’s the weather like? Yeah, yeah. Where do you live? It’s just, oh, my god, I can’t do this. I just want to go in. I’m like, so come on. Let’s get to this. I just, I cannot be bothered with this, like one level conversation anymore. And it probably causes me they probably think I’m completely weird, because I’m like, Yeah, I was a drinker. And I did this and I was crazy. And they’re probably just thinking, I’m completely mad. I often don’t get a second invite.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  54:42

That’s funny. Yeah. I mean, I think that you get a lot better with like, more discerning with the people you hang out with, like, I’m always like, Okay, if it’s not gonna be fun, if I’m not gonna drink, maybe it’s just not fun. Maybe those just aren’t the most interesting people. Pour. Maybe they’re the kind of people who always try to make you feel like shit because they’re trying to project that everything’s perfect. Like, yeah, if you if you don’t think it’d be any fun if you’re not drinking, it’s just not

 

55:13

fun. 

 

Somebody just wrote on my social network, literally, just before I spoke to you, I read a line, which said, I’m really having problems staying out after 10pm. I was like, those out after 7pm. Nothing good happens after 10pm. It’s just someone spitting in your face, telling the same story over and over again, probably some sleazy guy trying to dribble all over you. Like you don’t, you don’t have to live that life anymore. And you have to live a different life, you have to socialize in different ways. When I get up in the morning, I do my socializing at 5:45. Now, I go out to my little like free boot camp down the seafront, we all go for a swim afterwards. And then we will go and have a coffee. And I laughed my head off. And now I’m done. I’m like, right, I’ve done my socializing, the day is brilliant. And you got to change it up. You know, you can’t go to the same horn you used to go, you can’t, you know, go and see your old mates in the same pub in the same place. Doesn’t work like that. You got to change it up when you get sober. And, you know, that can feel extremely awkward. But it’s also going to be the most satisfying thing you ever do.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  56:17

Yeah, and I am right now extraordinarily jealous of you. Because I also work out in the morning with other women. But I live in Seattle, it just turned April. We work out in a parking lot garage because it rains so much in the dark. So. 

 

Oh, down by the waterfront in the Sunshine Coast of Australia. I know I’ve been there. I know how incredibly gorgeous it is. And it’s well done. I mean, had a summer too, right?

 

56:48

Yeah, I mean, it’s still like I don’t know what you, probably 80 degrees every day. Yeah, yeah. So that’s nice.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  56:54

Your morning socialization sounds a little bit better than mine. But still,

 

56:59

I’m sure we both love. I’m sure we both laugh just as much. Yes,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  57:03

I’m sure. Well, so tell me about all the things that you’re working on and where people can find you. Because I know you have a new project called Cuppa. But obviously you’ve got your podcast and your blog. So

 

57:17

yeah, so I started writing the day that I gave up drinking, I started writing a diary about everything that was happening to me because I did feel like the only person in the world that has quit a binge drinking issue. So I started writing a diary, which has become my book, which I hope to be published next year. It’s called the 1000 Wasted Sundays, of course, and it’s a comedic book about all the crazy shit lawyers get up to, and what it’s like now and becoming a parent, how, you know, that changed me. 

 

And I write the blog drunkmummysobermummy.com, which you can go on. And there’s loads of information for anyone who’s sober curious on there. I host the Sober Awkward podcast, me and Lucy record that every two weeks, because we have these crazy busy lives. So it’s not every week, unfortunately. But it takes us a while to pull ourselves together and get to the recording studio. And I’ve just released my new project, which is Cuppa. It’s a free social network for the sober and sober curious. So we have all these wonderful Facebook groups, but this is kind of going to be a combination of all of those. I’m so excited about it. And we’re trying to normalize having a cuppa, having a cup of tea, rather than having a beer. That’s the basis of it. 

 

So me and Lucy are big tea drinkers. Now we do like a tea and porridge session when renowned for it. And we’re trying to say, look, this, this sobriety journey has to be supported professionally, like I agree with you, Casey on that one. And this Cuppa site can be a bit of a backup to that. We’ve already got loads of members that are posting every day. So imagine Facebook, specifically for sober people. That’s what it is. But the best thing about it is, when you log in, if you want to put your name and where you’re from, you can click a button that says near me. And you can find all the sober people that live in your area and you can click on them and arrange to meet for a cup of tea. So it kind of replaces meetups, there’s an area on there, which is called events and you can just add your own sobriety events. 

 

So it just opens up the sobriety world to everybody. You can create your own group so there’s like yesterday I created a 5k a day sober walks and people are putting all their walk pictures on there. There’s a drunk mommy sober mommy group. There’s a sober dad’s, there’s sober dating, there’s daily affirmations group. It has all of that. So what we realized with Lucy and I was that our Sober Awkward listeners wanted. They wanted more, they wanted to meet people like Lucy and I did, you know? Lucy got sober three days after meeting me because she just needed to resonate with someone who just needed to meet someone that wasn’t boring, so that she could see that sobriety was a possibility for her. And that’s what copper is. It’s like a huge version of that. Meeting people for a couple you can meet online

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:00:00

I mean, you can do zoom calls and it’s all completely free. That’s what we wanted to do. Yeah, because one of the things that I get asked all the time is how do I find other people who are on the alcohol free journey in my area? And you know, I’m a member of different sober groups. I’ve been a member, you know, my favorite one for nine years. But you know, the best suggestion I have is like, Oh, why don’t you post you’re from Madison, Wisconsin. Is there anyone around? And that’s hard? Like I’m incredibly lucky that in Seattle we have a She Recovers sort of sharing group that’s 200 women that are super great. Yeah. I love that I did her in kappa. Is it mostly people from Australia right now? 

 

1:00:51

Someone from Korea joined yesterday, there’s people in Germany, there’s, someone set up a meet, a cuppa meet for a Cup event in London, it’s going to be everywhere. In fact, most of the Sober Awkward listeners are in America, it’s taken over Australia. So I’m hoping there’s going to be loads all over the place that if you ever run in the events, you can just whack them on there, and people all over the world won’t be able to see them. So it’s a really good way. And I just stick to the theme of everything being free, no paid events. It’s just a way of sober people meeting, no matter how it is. And also the people I really want to get on there is people that are a bit further along in sobriety so that they you know, you have at all with that it might not feel like it but you have one up like you know the tools to get zoom. It’s like having a sober buddy at AA, having people on there that have been there and done the same things as you and being in that, you know, that spot of questioning your own behavior, but not knowing what to do. That’s what Cuppa is for. It’s for people to reach out and go here. I’m feeling this today. Is this normal? And everyone will go yes, it’s totally normal. And we’re here for you. So it’s basically a community and online community. And it’s cuppa.community online. Cool. Well,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:02:07

you sent me that link so I can just put it in the show notes and all. 

 

Yeah, for sure. 

 

Alright, thank you very much. I know it’s so early and you had a long night with your kids. But it was lovely to have this conversation.

 

1:02:20

It was so nice to meet you. I think we’re very similar, aren’t we? If you’re ever in Australia you have to come for a cuppa with me.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:02:27

I would love that because I’m a huge fan of Australia. So some day. 

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:08:16

 

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

drinking, sober awkward, sobriety, feel, people, alcohol, life, thinking, stop, person, podcast, anxiety, hangovers, night, awkwardness, wine, friends, relapse, stories

SPEAKERS: Casey McGuire Davidson + Wendy McCallum

00:02

Welcome to the Hello Someday Podcast, the podcast for busy women who are ready to drink less and live more. I’m Casey McGuire Davidson, ex-red wine girl turned life coach helping women create lives they love without alcohol. But it wasn’t that long ago that I was anxious, overwhelmed, and drinking a bottle of wine and night to unwind. I thought that wine was the glue, holding my life together, helping me cope with my kids, my stressful job and my busy life. I didn’t realize that my love affair with drinking was making me more anxious and less able to manage my responsibilities.

In this podcast, my goal is to teach you the tried and true secrets of creating and living a life you don’t want to escape from.

Each week, I’ll bring you tools, lessons and conversations to help you drink less and live more. I’ll teach you how to navigate our drinking obsessed culture without a bus, how to sit with your emotions, when you’re lonely or angry, frustrated or overwhelmed, how to self soothe without a drink, and how to turn the decision to stop drinking from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life.

I am so glad you’re here. Now let’s get started.

Hi there. If you’re listening to this podcast, I’m betting you’ve been going back and forth for a while now on whether or not you should stop drinking. And I want you to raise your hand. If you’ve had any one of these thoughts.

You might have been thinking, I’m not that bad. I actually don’t want to stop drinking completely. I just want to drink like a normal person. Or maybe you come home after work. And you think I know I shouldn’t drink tonight. But I literally can’t relax or have fun without it. It’s really common to say I’ve tried to take a break from drinking before. But it’s just too hard. I always give up anyway. So what’s the point in trying again? Or here’s one I hear all the time from women. Everyone I know drinks. If I stopped drinking, I will be bored. Or I’ll be boring. I’ll have no fun. I’ll never be invited anywhere. I’ll just sit home and be miserable. Or maybe you can insert whatever your reason is there.

So is your hand up? If it is that is totally okay. And that’s because taking a break from drinking and changing your relationship with alcohol. This shit is hard.

And that’s why I’m really pumped to invite you to my completely free 60 minute masterclass the five secrets to successfully take a break from drinking, even if you’ve tried and you failed in the past.

After you take this free class, you’ll realize why what you’ve been doing up until now hasn’t been working, and what to do.

Instead, we’re going to cover all the juicy topics, including what questions you need to stop asking yourself, because they’re setting you up for self sabotage, not for success. We’re going to talk about exactly what you need to do differently. So you can stop the exhausting cycle of stopping drinking and then saying screw it, and starting again.

And we’re going to talk about the real reasons you haven’t been successful. And I’m betting they’re not what you think they are. And this isn’t surface level stuff. I am handing over the strategies and the mindset shifts I go through every day with my private coaching clients. If you’re listening to this podcast, I really encourage you to take a moment and sign up for this completely free masterclass. It will help you on your journey to drink class and live more to feeling better. So if you want to save your spot, go to hellosomedaycoaching.com/class while the class is still available, and I really hope to see you there.

Today I’m talking with someone you might know. Victoria Vanstone is the host of Australia’s most popular sobriety podcast, Sober Awkward with Lucy Good. She started writing about addiction and parenting on the day she gave up alcohol four years ago. Since then she’s penned a book about being a sober mum and also writes the blog, Drunk Mummy Sober Mummy. Victoria is an alcohol free living advocate and is passionate about helping others stuck in a pattern of normalized social binge drinking. She’s from the UK and now lives on the Sunshine Coast in Australia with her three uncontrollable children and a very patient husband. And you can follow her on social media at Drunk Mummy Sober Mummy. So, Vic, welcome to the podcast.

 

05:19

Hi, thank you so much for having me. It’s lovely. I may look a bit tired at 6:30am here in Australia, but I’m ready to go. And I’m excited to be here. Yeah. And

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  05:28

you were telling me before we jumped on that all three of your kids were sick last night. So combine that with 6:30 in the morning, thank you for coming out.

 

05:38

I think it’s actually a bit of a COVID Hangover that they’ve got. They had it about three weeks ago. And it seems to cause some sort of congestion afterwards, it seems to be going on and on. So it does feel like one of those parenting battles where everybody’s sick all the time. And I just seem to spend my days in and out of the fridge getting Panadol and then holding cold towels on heads and all that sort of thing. So I feel like the battle might be over a bit today. I’ve seen them all this morning. And they’re looking a bit more sprightly.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  06:07

Yeah, and you were telling me your children are three year old seven year old and your oldest is how

 

06:12

old? 

 

10.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  06:14

Yeah. So you’re right in the thick of it.

 

06:17

Yeah. I still can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  06:21

It comes like I feel like once the youngest hits, like four and a half is okay. Good. The crazy tantrums.

 

06:29

Okay, great. I look forward to that. Yeah,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  06:32

you’re right. Yeah. Hard to,

 

06:35

like, call me. I can grit my teeth and bear until then,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  06:38

gosh, oh, my gosh. Well, so I told you that I invited you on the podcast, because I had heard a lot of people start mentioning your show Sober Awkward. And particularly how funny it was like everybody was like, this is hysterical. And once I started listening to it, I knew I wanted to invite you on the show, because I love the name Sober Awkward. And I think that’s how a lot of us feel when we’re sort of navigating situations for the first time without alcohol. So can you tell me a little bit about why you guys decided to name the podcast that?

 

07:18

We did that thing where we sat down with a piece of paper, we wrote down all the things, all the words that are related to us and our drinking days. And then we sat down. I mean, a lot of them were words like vomit, promiscuity, all of those awful things that we got to and then we said, well, no one’s going to be very inspired by that. So, and we need to have the word sober in it. And then we really sort of focus on how do we feel? How do we actually feel when we get sober? I know, we say we feel amazing, and we feel wonderful, and life is so much better, and all of these other cheesy lines. But actually, for most people, sobriety is extremely awkward in the beginning. And it can be awkward all the time. And that’s when we said that word awkward we realize like that is how we feel that is how we felt from day one. And which is often why people relapse because the awkwardness is so unbearable, that they go and have another drink again. So we just called it Sober Awkward because that represents sobriety for us. I’m not saying it isn’t brilliant and wonderful. It is that at some times, but it is also extremely uncomfortable.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  08:25

Yeah, absolutely. And I know that one of the reasons that I started drinking a lot or loved it was because I felt awkward, right? I went off to college, and suddenly I’m meeting all these people and meeting all these guys and just felt extremely awkward. So I started drinking. And I think that like, sometimes when you get used to drinking in all situations, it stops you from having to develop sort of some of the normal ways of navigating life.

 

08:55

Absolutely. Well, I think the reason most of us start drinking is because we feel awkward. I mean, I started drinking when I was probably 12 or 13. And for me, that escalated when you know boys came into the equation and socializing when I felt awkward as a teenager. So I didn’t get the opportunity to find out whether I was someone that was socially awkward or not, because I numbed it out from a very young age because for me alcohol was the answer to confidence. So as soon as I had a couple of drinks, I could talk to boys. So I never really had the opportunity to see beyond the alcohol and find out whether I was actually a socially awkward person anyway, I think probably I wasn’t, I was just going through those normal teenage feelings, and just being very, very self aware at the age which everybody goes through. 

 

But unfortunately, that’s the time when alcohol is introduced to most of us. And we tend to numb ourselves out and abandon ourselves in those very early years. So we’re actually all very awkward most of the time because that’s, as humans sometimes we don’t know how to interact. For me, I didn’t and I know most teenage girls didn’t either. And I used it as a way of being accepted into the, you know, into the cool kids crowd or into any crowd, quite honestly. Because I was probably awkward. 

 

So, yeah, the name is so good. And so many people resonate with it, they’re like, Yes, I mean, that is how I feel. And often, you know, I’ve likened sobriety when you first go out to those first social functions to being like that bright light shining on you and exposing every part of you. Like, I remember feeling like people could see, like the vet the bloods pumping around in my veins, and every movement of me, I just felt so raw. And that is an awkward feeling. And to get to a point where that light dims in your sobriety can take a while. And I think it’s unfortunate sometimes when, you know, it’s hard to get to a point where the light dims. And I think always our messages, look, this is going to be awkward, and you’re going to feel like that light is blaring at you at every direction. But actually, it is going to get easier. 

 

Yeah, and the first

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  11:05

time you do anything, it’s awkward. But not only that, I think that we have so many thoughts about drinking and not drinking and wanting to stop and not wanting to stop, it’s so important to us. And we surround ourselves with drinkers that it’s almost like it would be less awkward if we weren’t so invested in drinking culture.

 

11:29

I mean, that preoccupation with alcohol was something that in the end was what caused me to stop. I mean, it’s funny these things, you know, the awkwardness, and all of these things, we talk about the anxiety and the shame and guilt, we talk about them. Like they’re the big kind of elephant in the room, or the monster that was out to get us. But actually, all of those things are what leads us to sobriety. So, you know, I embrace those, the awkwardness and the, and the anxiety and all the horrible things that happened to me, because they make us who we are, and they make us feel like we’ve battled something and won. And that’s what makes it also worthwhile.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  12:09

Yeah, for sure. And so I wanted to ask you, because I certainly have a number of them. What were some of the most awkward moments you’ve had in sobriety?

 

12:22

Just the thing is, it’s nothing dramatic, is it? It’s going to that first time to a bar, and standing there with a fizzy water like you’ve never done before. And feeling like you’re sticking out like a sore thumb. And everybody knows that you don’t drink and everybody suddenly hates you. But it’s such an internalized thing. Like you’re thinking the worst, we’re going to like worst case scenario in every situation, because we’re not used to feeling soberly awkward. But of course, when you do it a few times, like practice, of course, is going to make perfect in any of these situations. If you do it a few times, it does get easier, and it feels so much better. 

 

But I remember the first time actually deciding to tell people it took me 18 months, I’ll be honest with you on my goals, 18 months where I didn’t tell anyone I’d got sober and I hadn’t found the sober curious community. I was completely alone, feeling like the only person who had ever stopped, mid range binge drinking problem. And that, you know, I was like this kind of person on an island on my own. And I remember thinking, God, I’ve got to, I’ve got to get out there. I’ve got to live my life. I’ve got to live it now in a way that suits me. Because I was a huge people pleaser. Everything I did throughout my life was to please everybody. You know, I was the one doing the, you know, the swan dives on the dance floor and weird robot moves to make everybody laugh. I was the one with the punch line and the round of drinks and the glitter boobs at Glastonbury, you know, that was me.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  13:54

I’m sorry. What are the glitter boobs at Glastonbury?

 

13:58

I haven’t painted glittered boobs yet? No. Come on, get with the program. So like if you go to a festival, you just get all your gear off. And then you paint your boobs with glitter. So it looks like you’ve got like a little glitter top on.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  14:12

Was that when you were younger?

 

14:16

I can assure you I don’t do it now. Only in private

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  14:20

I was going to say, my breasts are not what they used to be.

 

14:23

Yeah, me neither. They’re like wind socks.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  14:26

Yeah. You were I mean, I’m also impressed with the like worm on the dance floor. But, you know,

 

14:33

I was that person. I was that person that was out to entertain. Like when I entered a room, I felt like it was my responsibility to make everybody happy in it. And the only way I knew how to do that was to drink and entertain everyone and be crazy and probably take a few people home with me. So I had to step out of that. And when you give up drinking, there’s this transition that happens that you’re one person and then suddenly else you’re the person that you’ve always hated. 

 

Yes. 

 

So I’ve always hated sober people throughout my entire life. Because I don’t want somebody there remembering my behavior. I don’t want somebody near me who knows what I’ve done the night before, when I, when you know, I can’t even remember what I’ve done. So the last thing I want is some smug, sober person saying, Oh, you were a bit of a mess last night. So I’ve avoided them like the plague throughout my life. And then suddenly, I find myself standing in a bar, being a sober person, and it is absolutely overwhelming. 

 

And I remember I took my two best mates out with me and I just finished reading The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober. And I just remember thinking, very similar to how I think we’ve even been to a few of the night, same dodgy nightclubs. And I think, I just thought I have got to tell them, and we went up to the bar, and I ordered the pineapple juice, and they were like, oh, yeah, you’re gonna have vodka in that? I was like, no, no, I’m just gonna have a pineapple juice. They’re like, Oh, god, you’re pregnant again, aren’t you? You’re pregnant. No, no, I’m not pregnant. I’m just like, Wait, all I want is a pineapple juice. And then they were like, looking at me very strangely. I didn’t approach it right then. But then we sat down, I said, Look, I’ve decided that actually, I’ve been not drinking for 18 months. And nobody’s actually noticed that I’ve always had an excuse. You know, when you’ve got an excuse, you really got kids, you can always say one of them’s got diarrhea, and I can go home early. So it’s, it’s things change in parenting, because you’re not as sociable as you were. So I was able to keep it quiet under, under wraps for a while. 

 

And my huge surprise in that moment, even though it was awkward telling them and I felt uncomfortable. And really, I felt like I was letting them down. Which is really bizarre. But because I’d always been such a reliable drinking buddy, I felt like I was letting my mates down by not being that anymore. And that was like, you know, it’s like coming out of the closet. It’s like, you know, here I am. This is the authentic me, are you going to accept me? And what I found was incredible, was they just went, Oh, nice. One night, you know, good work, like, well done. 

 

And I was absolutely astonished by people’s reaction to my sobriety. I think there’s only been a couple of times where people I didn’t really know have gone, oh, you’re boring, or you’re this or you’re that. Oh, come on, one won’t hurt. It’s generally been people going, Wow, that’s amazing. How have you done it? And why have you done it? And it’s usually the big drinkers that are asking the questions, because I find they’re the ones that are most intrigued. They’re the ones I get the secret emails from now saying, Look, I’ve been following what you’re doing and can you help me? So I think that’s a wonderful thing and your listeners as well. It’s like, don’t be shy about that, because it might feel awkward. But once you do it, the reactions from people are so surprising that it makes you more and more confident within yourself and you go actually, it’s me that’s doing the right thing. I know it’s out of the box, and I know I’m not going with the flow of society.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  18:01

Hi there. If you’re listening to this episode, and have been trying to take a break from drinking, but keep starting and stopping and starting again, I want to invite you to take a look at my on demand coaching course, the sobriety starter kit.

The sobriety starter kit is an online self study sober coaching course that will help you quit drinking and build a life you love without alcohol without white knuckling it or hating the process. The course includes the exact step by step coaching framework I work through with my private coaching clients, but at a much more affordable price than one on one coaching. And the sobriety starter kit is ready, waiting and available to support you anytime you need it. And when it fits into your schedule. You don’t need to work your life around group meetings or classes at a specific day or time.

This course is not a 30 day challenge, or a one day at a time approach. Instead, it’s a step by step formula for changing your relationship with alcohol. The course will help you turn the decision to stop drinking, from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life.

You will sleep better and have more energy, you’ll look better and feel better. You’ll have more patience and less anxiety. And with my approach, you won’t feel deprived or isolated in the process. So if you’re interested in learning more about all the details, please go to www.sobrietystarterkit.com. You can start at any time and I would love to see you in the course 

 

Yeah, okay. The other thing that cracks me up: Do you know Kristi Coulter?

 

19:23

Yes, well, not, I don’t know her. But I’ve read I’ve read her. Yes. 

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  19:26

So she wrote Nothing Good Can Come from This. She wrote the essay Enjoli that went viral. She actually lives in Seattle, and we’re friends and I wrote her when I was like 96 days sober or something like a totally cold email and was like, I live in Seattle, and you work at Amazon. And I’ve been in tech and I’m quitting drinking. And I heard you on this podcast and I just wanted to tell you how nice it is to know you’re out there too. And she wrote me back and it was amazing, but the reason I was laughing was you mentioned felting, which is not something that typically comes up in podcasts. And one of the first essays that I read from her was called The Otter of Sobriety. And I will put it in the links to the show notes because it’s like my favorite, but she was writing about how you know, in Seattle, she was walking back from this store, happened to be like a sec store, they bland, Capitol Hill, Seattle, and she writes how I think it was for an interview or something, but does not matter. We are not. That’s fabulous. No. 

 

But she said, I was walking back to my car when I spotted the otter I thought might get me sober. He was in the window of a craft shop next door, waiting to be made from bits of brown and orange wool and a barbed needle felting it was called, it had never occurred to me, that felt was something people made. I assume it just sprang out ready to rock. But I start stared at the otter contemplating all the things I could learn about in the world if I ever got my head, right, you know, and then she said, like, I won’t read it all, but she had a hopeful shamed relationship with crafting stores, saw them you know, as all this thing, I would drop lots of cash on yarn and scarves I plan to donate to homeless shelters, etc. Her crafting plans for large scale and Fila tropic, my crafting plans were always large scale, partly to compensate for the world putting up with me, but also because I needed a project. 

 

So she talked about, you know, I had not yet tried an otter. She had tried all these things to stop drinking. And you know, she still wanted to have a glass of Chardonnay, that would become more. But basically, she saw it in a closet. And she took it downstairs and showed her husband after she quit and said I found the otterr of sobriety. And, you know, basically, you know, she said, you know, just looking at him makes me feel exhausted. And she said to her husband, I asked a lot of this otter and he said you did just the idea that like I tried all the things I tried, you know, 5:30am classes and morning Pilates and running a 10k and going to therapy and not talking about my drinking and switching from red wine to beer because I didn’t like it and all the rules. You know, like the otter of sobriety, this felt, this is gonna make me stop drinking.

 

22:50

Yeah, it’s so funny. And I’ve actually read that essay as soon as you said that, I shot I remember that. But it was so good. And then that’s kind of, I never made that connection back to my felt is lobster. But I will say we were just cleaning our house out because it’s on the market. We’re selling my kids childhood home, which is in itself is like a crushing amount of stress for me right now. But we found my husband was cleaning out the cupboard. And he said, What is this big piece of foam for? Oh my god. And I said, don’t throw that out. That’s for felting. Maybe I’ll go back to felting Lobster. Lobster. But know that, you know, I think you’ll have to try all of these things. And for me it was a process and I ended up in this writing course. And now I work with Ann privately and it’s just changed everything. And I feel like it’s filled in a gap and I would say to my clients, it’s like speed dating, you know, you have to go out and try all of the things and some of them you’re going to be able to reject in a minute. And some of them you might need to spend a little more time on like maybe felt a lobster but you’ll eventually find the thing that’s the right fit for you. And, and I think that’s a big piece of what’s happening for us in midlife too. It’s just filling in, you know, the holes that are left behind from the things that filled our lives for so long that are just no longer there by virtue of the fact that our kids are older, our careers are more established. For a lot of us. We’ve kind of reached that pinnacle. And it feels like okay, I got all of these things, but it didn’t quite fill me up. So what else do I need? Right?

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  24:21

Yeah. So let’s talk all about it. Weirdly, I think that actually filled in but let’s talk about burnout and perimenopause. Right and how that intersects for women in midlife.

 

24:35

Yeah, well, I think that it naturally intersects in terms of like the timeline because again, but many women are moving into perimenopause in their early 40,. early to late 40s. That’s really what we’re in perimenopause. For most of us it can start earlier than that. But you know, and that’s also the time for many women when our kids are getting to a place where they don’t need us as much and so we are at the end of like the head You nurturing, right? And we have spent our 30s, if you’re anything like me, you spent your 30s just taking care of everybody else. And also, if you are working or working parent, then you’re also probably have been nurturing a career on the side or, you know, in parallel with that. And all of that involves a ton of work and stress. So by the time we get to our 40s, and we’re just in, you know, just kind of moving into that perimenopause phase hormonally, we are also very often exhausted, like we’re just at the end of our rope. And, and so I think that’s, that’s how those two things intersect in terms of burnout, specifically, and the hormonal shifts that are going on. 

 

That’s really fascinating to me, because I learned in the last year so I’ve been, I’ve had on my podcast, I’ve had a regular guest, who’s a naturopathic doctor who kind of specializes in this area for women. And she has been explaining all kinds of things to me and my listeners about perimenopause and stress. And one of the things that happens when we’re in perimenopause is that obviously, our body is trying, our hormones are overtime, they’re slowly depleting, right? So in perimenopause, they’re all over the map. So we’ve got like highs and lows, and it’s kind of wild. Then as we move closer to menopause, our hormones start to sort of just decrease slowly until they sort of like we call it flatlining, sort of level out right. And there’s actually take it from someone who’s on the other side of that I’m actually through full menopause. Now, on the other side of it, it’s actually much calmer, it feels much more manageable on the other side, but perimenopause can feel really crazy, because of how all the hormones are going. 

 

One of the things, though, that’s happening that’s really fascinating is that your body is obviously trying to make enough of these hormones to keep you afloat, but it’s having to compete with if you are under stress. And your body’s also trying to create stress hormones. Cortisol in particular is one of the main stress hormones, your body is, there’s a competition going on for the primary ingredient that we need to make both cortisol and progesterone. So those two both of those hormones one is the stress hormone, one is a reproductive hormone. They’re both using the same primary ingredients. So when we’re stressed out in perimenopause, our body is looking for something called pregnenolone. Our body’s looking for that to make cortisol and also progesterone. But the thing is, is that our body’s always going to prioritize our short term survival over our long term survival. So when we’re really really stressed out, our body is going to go to make cortisol over progesterone, which means the more stressed out exhausted and burnt out we are and the which really, I mean, burnout is really just elevated, chronic stress that goes on mitigated, that’s really what that is. So the more of that that’s happening, the less progesterone our body’s able to make, because the more cortisol is having to make. So what we end up with is exacerbated symptoms of perimenopause, sometimes as a result of our body trying to manage burnout at the same time. Does that make sense? 

 

Totally makes sense. 

 

Yeah, it’s a layperson’s example. I’m not a doctor or health professional. But this is my understanding of it. And I think it’s really fascinating because so many women find themselves there and feel like they’re going bananas, right? Like I, what is going on? I’m having all of these things. I can’t manage any of this, my moods all over the place, my anxiety is through the roof. And a lot of that is connected to perimenopause and what’s going on the underlying hormonal situation? But then, of course, the stress and overwhelm and burnout is just contributing to all of that and making it so much worse. Yeah.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  28:34

And what age do women typically go through perimenopause?

 

28:39

Well, okay, so let’s work it backwards. So the average age of full menopause, which is where you have gone for an entire year without a period is 52. That’s my understanding, and perimenopause normally happens seven to 10 years before full menopause. So I guess the average age of perimenopause would be, you know, 42 to 45. It’s where it starts. Does that make sense? I think I’ve got that math right. So it’s usually in like, in your mid 40s your, most women I think are in perimenopause, in their mid by their mid 40s. But some women go into perimenopause in their late 30s to so it’s really a you know, for me i i was in full menopause at 49. So it really is an individual thing.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  29:23

Yeah, yeah, no, I’m turning 47 in August, and I’m sort of trying to figure out if I’m hitting that yet or not.

 

29:33

I’d say you’re probably there.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  29:35

I know. I’m just not, I’m not totally aware of it yet. Half of my podcasts are me learning about subjects that just piqued my curiosity or having an interesting conversation. So this was one that I was like, Alright, I need to learn about this.

 

29:53

Mm hmm. Yeah, it’s actually really fascinating. And the reason why I’m so passionate about talking about it, just opening up the conversation is that we don’t talk about And so you’re going through these things and it feels like we’re all alone. And it did for me, it did feel like I was kind of losing my mind in my mid 40s. And, of course, for me, the other factor that was just exacerbating all of this is that I was drinking. So I quit drinking when I was 46. And that was an incredibly positive step when it came to also managing all of this stuff that was going on that I didn’t know was really attributed to could be attributed to kind of this burnout and perimenopause thing. It made a huge difference for me to remove alcohol at that point, because it was making everything so much worse.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  30:36

Yes. And I have to tell you, after I knew we were going to do this episode, I follow friends who make those incredible cards on Instagram, and they posted one of the cards that was on perimenopause, and I have to read it to you because I just took a screenshot, it was so amazing. It said, “Perimenopause. It’s like puberty, except nobody knows when it will start or end. We don’t talk about it. They don’t make cute movies about menopause. And when it begins, you’re old enough to worry that you may be dying. Clearly, it’s up to us to celebrate, to celebrate surviving this shit.” So I got you this card. Really, it’s for both of us.

 

31:23

That’s perfect, right? That’s exactly what’s happening. And you know, it’s, in some women, some women kind of sail through perimenopause. And they don’t have a lot of symptoms. And that’s amazing. I’m, I wish I was one of those women, I wasn’t. And I had, I did have a lot of symptoms. And then I am somebody who kind of, I always say I dropped off the cliff with my hormones. I went into menopause very, very quickly. It was very dramatic. And there were some very severe symptoms associated with it, but it’s different for everyone. But I do think if we’re not talking about it, then we’re just likely to assume that what’s going on with us is, you know, our own fault or something that we have, you know, maybe a little more control over than we do. 

 

I know that for me one of the things Casey that was just like, it was such a relief when I realized this might be perimenopause is that in my 40s I started having these moments that I now call ‘menorage” where I would just lose my mind and it was like an out of body experience. You know, I could kind of, I was watching myself do it but I couldn’t stop and you know, be yelling at a kid or my husband or something and it would just be the reaction would be completely out of proportion to whatever the you know, the trigger was. And now I know that that can be part of perimenopause for women. So that was a huge relief to understand that. And also, you know, we know that the other kind of intersection between burnout and perimenopause is that anxiety can increase during perimenopause for women and alcohol drinking alcohol causes our body to produce cortisol which is of course again, that stress hormone that is part of the the anxious response. So you know, excess stress, combined with perimenopause can lead to really heightened anxiety for women sometimes as well. So there’s so many ways these things are connected, and we are just not talking about it at all.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  33:12

Yeah. And so all of that contributes to increased drinking, in midlife, right and even badly, those of us who were big drinkers throughout our lives.

 

33:27

Exactly. And I mean, I was drinking, to manage, like, in part, the fact that I felt horrible that I kept losing my temper at people and you know, so it’s just a vicious cycle. It really was for me in terms of the symptoms of perimenopause being exacerbated by the alcohol, but then using the alcohol as a way to kind of, you know, put a soothing balm on, you know, the stress and the burnout and the symptoms of perimenopause. So yeah,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  33:54

and a lot of times I found I drank, because I felt those negative emotions, and, you know, didn’t want to express them or felt bad for having them and then drank to push them down. And then of course, once you’re drinking, they all come out anyway. And in the morning, you blame yourself.

 

34:13

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it just makes, just makes it all that much worse that I was very, so I quit drinking when I was still in perimenopause. And I remember being gobsmacked and I don’t know why this was so surprising because it should have just been obvious to me. But I realized after a couple of weeks of being alcohol free that I hadn’t had one middle of the night anxiety fueled insomnia session. Right? And I think I had been attributing that to perimenopause because of course, another symptom of you know, hormones and flax for women can be problems with sleep. So it’s, it’s really difficult to separate these things out and, and that’s why I’m always advocating if you’re someone in perimenopause and you’re you’re, you know, you’re drinking. You’re still drinking and you’re struggling with a lot of symptoms that are affecting your quality of life, just do an experiment around alcohol because maybe taking the alcohol out will actually really improve your sleep and really have an impact in terms of your ability to manage stress and anxiety. 

 

And, you know, if you’re having another one of the common symptoms is hot flashes or night sweats. Night sweats were my Achilles heel, they almost brought me down, I was having some nights like 15 full night sweats, like, so gross, Casey, so sweaty, and I, I’m totally always going to talk about it, because I want women to know that this is normal, and it happens. So for me, those night sweats, you know, what I didn’t realize is that alcohol acts, especially my poison of choice, which was red wine, acts as a, you can act as a vasodilator. And make all of that that much worse. It’s a trigger for, you know, an inability to regulate your body temperature. And then there are histamines and red wine that can make that even worse. So I was basically just, you know, dumping fuel on that fire at night. And I didn’t realize that.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  36:06

You know, it’s interesting, you’re talking about the fact that the symptoms of perimenopause mimic the symptoms sometimes of the impact of alcohol. And I also did an interview on burnout with Kate Donovan, who, who works in that field, on the signs and symptoms of it. And she talked about how the physical and emotional symptoms of burnout can mimic those of hangovers and alcohol withdrawal as well and can be really hard to distinguish. So also by removing alcohol, you know, we talked about how it doesn’t solve all the problems, but it allows you to see them clearly and gives you the capacity to deal with them. And it’s also a process of, you know, taking away one variable that you can control to determine you know, whether headaches, neck tension, sleep issues, physical and emotional exhaustion, cynicism, detachment, purposelessness, is that the alcohol is that burnout is that perimenopause symptoms, you know, what is it?

 

37:16

Yeah, absolutely. And that’s exactly what I’m talking about. It’s like, which pieces of this puzzle do I have control over? And how can I, you know, actually get into the process of elimination here and try to figure it out, so that I can get at the root cause maybe and give myself what I need. I will say that I was a few years alcohol free by the time I went into full menopause, and kind of fell off that cliff that I was talking about. And this is when I started having these, like 15 night sweats a night and like it was crazy, I hardly slept for about four months. And what I was so grateful for during that time was that I knew that it had to be hormones, I knew it wasn’t anything else, because I had dealt with the burnout and stress. And I had created a pretty calm life for myself. And I had lots of like, I call them sort of foundation tools in place for resilience that I knew were helping me manage and mitigate stress, and there was no alcohol anymore. So it was so clear to me that this had to be a hormonal hormonal imbalance. 

 

And the other little piece that we didn’t talk about, I just wanted, I just thought of it as that. We also know that excessive drinking can also cause our bodies to produce estrogen. So it can in itself contribute to it and can just mess up the natural balance. And you know, and that’s an important thing to keep in mind too, because it’s, as I said, in perimenopause, menopause, my understanding is it’s less of a like, slow, steady decline of hormones, which is kind of what I thought was happening. But my naturopathic buddy tells me that that’s not actually what’s happening. It’s more this like wild ride where sometimes estrogen is up and progesterone is low, and they’re all over the place. And I also might have been, it’s been explained to me that really what matters in terms of how you feel is what the balance is between your progesterone and your estrogen and not the levels of it. It’s more the ratio that’s important. So again, if alcohol is a contributing factor to throwing that ratio off, we’ll take it out for a while and see whether that makes a difference. Because it may actually help you.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  39:16

Yeah, absolutely. And so in terms of the work you do, and being an alcohol free coach and working with women to remove alcohol. Tell us about your approach, because obviously, we’ve talked before I’m a coach, too. I think our work aligns really well in our approaches, which is why I love what you do, but I know also that each one of us is different.

 

39:42

Sure, yeah. I mean, I’m a Naked Mind certified coach and I use that. That’s how I ended up becoming alcohol free was using Annie Grace’s book and approach and I loved it and it really resonated with me and worked well with me. So that’s, as soon as I got to a place where I felt Like, I’d made alcohol small and irrelevant, I knew that I wanted to be able to offer that to the women that I was already working with. Because, of course, for years, I was coaching around burnout. And it’s not like the alcohol problem wasn’t there, Casey, it’s just that I felt totally, like disingenuous, even addressing it because I was still drinking, and it was a problem for me. So I just sort of avoided that elephant in the room, you know, and maybe touched on it. But I wasn’t, I certainly didn’t feel like I was qualified, or in an appropriate position to actually try to give women any guidance around it. So adding that to my coaching kind of toolkit was really amazing. 

 

And the approach that I take is really, it’s really like looking at, it’s a holistic approach, I’ve always approached them. And I mean, holistic in the true sense of the word like, what’s actually going on in your real life here, I’m, I’m always, I’m always, you know, in the beginning, working on helping women figure out how to let go of alcohol. But at the same time, what’s always on my radar is what are the underlying root causes here that are actually contributing to this need to drink? And so trying to identify, not only, you know, the, the obvious reasons why we drink but the real underlying root causes that I know from my own experience, and from an experience, all the experience I have coaching, are still going to be there once alcohols gone. So we can start working on some of those at the same time. That’s great, because then they have a much greater chance. They get closer and closer to freedom from alcohol, you know, staying free from it? Yeah, yeah.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  41:37

And so what are the first steps that someone should take if they are listening to this podcast? They’re nodding their head, they’re like, Wow, I think I’m both burnt out and going through perimenopause. And I drink too much. What do I do?

 

41:59

Yeah, so first of all, I would say you’re not alone in that. It’s, I just want you to know that it is so so so common, and it’s exactly where I was five or six years ago. And I would say the first step is the awareness that you’re feeling right now. And that’s actually something to celebrate as crummy as it feels to think, Ah, this is me. You’re, you can’t make any change until you have that awareness. So try to celebrate that. And then, and then I would say, you know, we always talk about identifying your one big Domino. And so when we’re dealing with like burnout, menopause, and alcohol, it’s a good idea to actually figure out which one you want to start with. Because if you try to tackle all of those things at once, it’s probably going to feel really overwhelming. So what’s the one big thing that if you were able to change, it might make everything else in your life easier? Start with that. 

 

For a lot of the women that I work with it is alcohol, again, because it is just as we were talking about earlier, it’s having this trickle down effect. And all of these areas, probably just making everything that much worse. So we often start with alcohol. But sometimes we don’t, sometimes we start with burnout. Sometimes we start with the stress side of things. If they’re very, very unhappy and overwhelmed in their life, then we might start there. So it’s, it’s about identifying, like the place to start first. And then of course, because I’m an alcohol and a burnout coach, I do all the things and we kind of figured out a roadmap that’s going to work, hopefully work best for them. 

 

I think it’s really important to not assume that there’s one way to do this because there isn’t there’s so many different paths to recovery from burnout, recovery from alcohol, and for moving through perimenopause, moving through this transition into menopause. So don’t get too caught up in, you know, all the advice out there on how to do this, right? My guess is you already know, you have a pretty good knowing as to what needs to give. And you may not know what you need more of. But again, that is a process of experimentation. And I’m huge on the alcohol, at the idea of an experiment around alcohol, but also in all areas of your life. treat everything as an experiment, just try your best to not fall into that trap that I think we do a lot of the time where we just assume that we already know how this thing is going to go. Because the truth is, you don’t know how it’s going to go. You’ve never been there before. 

 

And for me this was the thing that kept me stuck in drinking for so long is that I just assumed it was gonna suck to not drink. And so as a result of that I just kept drinking, I was just hell bent on figuring out how to keep it in my life because I could not imagine living without it. And that was largely because of a whole bunch of assumptions I was making that were based on absolutely no actual evidence. The only evidence I had was evidence of what it was like to be a drinker. I had no evidence as to what it was like to be a non drinker. And so you know, treating that as an experiment but also read all the rest of it too around the burnout and the stress but also as we were talking about, like the crafting the creativity, like you have to try all of the things and every time you try something you’re learning Jumping. And if it doesn’t work, then that doesn’t mean you failed. It just means you’ve got some more information and you’re able to kind of tweak or adjust your course towards what is going to work better for you.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  45:10

Yeah, I love that you said that because I know that whenever we’re thinking about changing our lives, and I’m saying this for me, too, we all have all these objections, right. And some of them are internal. Some of them are external, you know, my job, my mortgage, my kids, I’ve gone to grad school, I can’t, my boss won’t let me scale back. You know, both for burnout. And for drinking. I mean, so many of us love drinking, or it’s a huge part of our life, or our social life, or we have a ton of fears around what we’ll be like, what our life will be like, without drinking. And so what, in your experience, obviously, when women reach out to you, they know they want to make a change. They are at the point where they know that they need support, or you know, that something’s got to give. But what are the big objections that you hear from women when you are working with them to go from this isn’t working in my life to it’s time to make actual changes? Do you know what I mean?

 

46:25

Yeah, I do around. Can we talk about burnout? That around burn? 

 

Yeah, let’s do, let’s do all of it. 

 

Yeah. So I think around burnout, the most common thing I hear is that I can’t stop. So if I stop, and so then I always ask, Well, what will happen? What do you think will happen? And the answer is usually kind of catastrophic. It’s usually something like, this is all going to fall apart. And I remember feeling that way. I remember feeling like if I just, if I stopped, I’d never start again. It would just be the end for me. And so a lot of this is where that experimentation piece comes in a lot of this around stress and burnout is like, Alright, start small. Let’s start small, let’s just say no to one thing, or not do something and see if this guy falls. Let’s just practice saying no, in a place where it feels less risky, and see what the actual consequences are from that. Do you feel better as a result of not having taken on that additional thing? Is it as hard as you thought to say no? Does the person disown you and never speak to you again, because you said you couldn’t help them with this thing? 

 

I mean, this all sounds like I’m making fun of it. I’m not. I was in that place where I felt like everybody relied on me for everything. I needed to prove to myself that that wasn’t the case. And that involved an experiment for me as well, just like slowly stepping back. And in the beginning, it felt really uncomfortable to say, no. So instead, I would say things like, Let me think about that, or can I get back to you those were kind of my early phrases. And you know, now I’m pretty good at just saying no if it doesn’t serve me, but it takes us a while to warm up to that and get comfortable with that. So that’s the number one thing I hear around burnout is like, if I stop, everything’s going to fall apart. Yeah, you know. And so that takes a little courage. There’s a little little bit of a leap of faith that has to happen there. And I always say start small. 

 

Yeah, with alcohol. Oh, my gosh, there are so many things that hold us back. I think, like I said, the biggest one is if I stopped drinking, life’s just not gonna be fun. 

 

Yeah. It’s probably the most common one, right? And it’s okay to feel that way. But if you again, if you can kind of dig into curiosity around like, like, what actual evidence do you have of that? Chances are, if you’re like me, you actually don’t have very much evidence. On the other side, I always say like, we’re often just playing with half the deck, right? Like, we have half of the deck of the cards. That’s all about what it’s like to drink. But we don’t have any of the cards on the other side. So are you really making an informed decision about continuing to drink if you haven’t actually given yourself an opportunity to experience what it’s like without it? Yeah. And if you can go into an experiment around this with a really open mind, and a lot of self compassion, that’s the other key piece where you just recognize that it’s probably going to be hard and not maybe smooth sailing but you’re going to learn from all of these things. And that’s going to help you at the end of your experiment, make a really informed and reasoned decision as to whether you still want alcohol in your life, or whether you want to keep going. 

 

Like I never, and I think it’s really important to say this, I did not know that I was never going to drink again, ever. In fact, I still don’t know that I still don’t say that. So what I did was I did the first 30 days, I knew I needed to take a break. I knew I only had half the deck, I wanted to give myself the other half. The 30 days was really hard but it was also incredibly great. And at the end of the 30 days, I thought, am I ready to try to moderate because moderation was my goal at that time? Am I ready to moderate and I thought about all the things that I was putting at risk that I could lose and play the tape forward all the way and Just sort of said, I am not ready yet. And so I said not yet. And I think I did another 30 days. And then after that 30 days, I went through the same exercise. And I said not yet. And then I said not yet. And I just ‘not yet’ myself to 365 days. And by the time I got there, I couldn’t figure out why I would drink. Because I was so happy. My life was so great. And I had done everything for the first time pretty much without alcohol, and it had gone really well. Yeah. So you know, it just became an intuitive decision at that point. But you don’t need to commit to anything more than a break. And to just like collecting the other half of the cards.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  50:36

Yeah. And I think that a lot of women, do the 30 day break, and then go back to drinking, and think that they can stop again, and anytime they want. And, unfortunately, find that you know, that sober momentum is really precious. And it’s hard to get, and it’s hard to start again. So I love what you asked yourself. And my question is, what was it that you thought that you would be giving up? If you went back to drinking.

 

51:11

I mean, this makes me emotional now, because it’s so clear and obvious to me now. And I remember struggling with this decision at the time, but peace of mind, the peace of mind that I have as a non drinker, will never be available to me if alcohol is part of my life, and I just am so clear on that now. And by peace of mind that really encompasses like, self love for me. I realized, oh, you know, again, these things were somehow revelatory to me, and they should have been so obvious was like, Oh, I haven’t beaten myself. Once since I stopped drinking. Like, I’m actually talking to myself, I was writing about this the other day, it’s like, you know, now I’m actually like, I’m happy to hear what it is I have to say to myself, like, I’m not afraid of my own thoughts anymore. Because I’m, I have this piece now that I didn’t have before. And of course, it wasn’t as solid as it is now. It grew over the years, but like the seeds of that were planted in that first 30 Day experiment. And I remember thinking to myself, you’re potentially putting this at risk. And this is something you haven’t felt at the I don’t think I had felt that in like 20 years. Yeah. So that was the big one for me, that was the big one. But then, of course, other things, right, like energy, no hangovers. I was getting great sleep for the first time in a long time. Probably because I was in perimenopause. And this was just making all the things worse, you know, and so taking away alcohol improved that. So there were lots of other things too. But really, that sense of peace that I had, I’m just just not being my own worst enemy for 30 days was just such a relief to me.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  52:50

Yeah. And I think that, you know, I love your approach of just having it be an experiment. And I also, you know, went through something similar, I worked with a sober coach, it was Belle from Tired of Thinking about Drinking. And she did a 100 Day Challenge. So setting that goal beyond 30 days. And I told everyone in my life, I was doing it just a no alcohol challenge for my health, for my sleep. So I had that accountability that when I got to 30 days, it would, I told everyone, so you know, anything that makes it harder to backtrack? Yes, awful. So I got to 100 days. And same thing as you except I said, I feel so much better. I want to see what six whole months feels like, you know, I don’t want to go back to the way I was feeling and living when I was drinking, I was curious and kind of excited. And then when I got to six months, my next goal was a year. And again, like you it wasn’t until I got to a year that I said, I think I’m done. I think I’m done drinking, which had never occurred to me before. But I also do not spend a lot of time. I mean, I’m six and a half years in. I don’t spend any time debating forever, or thinking about forever. And the reason is, is I’m like I have no intention of drinking again. But I don’t sit here and be like, Well, what about if I’m 65? And I’m in this situation? Would I drink them? Because it doesn’t do me any good. Right? But I’ve, I got, adopted the identity as a non drinker. You know, it would be out of alignment with the person I am right now to pick up a drink.

 

54:43

Yeah, no, I totally agree. And the truth is, I can’t pause. I can’t even envision a scenario where I would want to have a drink. But I also just don’t think it’s important to say forever on anything. And in fact, I think it actually backfires. For most of us in that If there’s no way to succeed at that you never feel like you can celebrate or succeed. If the goal is to never drink again, then you’re always just, there’s always just one more day. I mean, you know, I guess when you’re dead, you can celebrate, but then you’re dead. So that’s no fun, right? So I prefer to just, just kind of do I always say, like, I just do. And this has become kind of my motto for my life, which is does it serve me? Yeah. What serves me? And this is the best question. If you’re listening to this podcast, and you’re feeling overwhelmed and burnt out, and you think you’re drinking too much about all the things, does it serve me? How does it serve me? And if the answer is it doesn’t serve me that is worth working on. That’s worth working on. And for me, alcohol doesn’t serve me and I, again, I can’t see a scenario where it would. But as long as it doesn’t serve me, I won’t choose it.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  55:49

And one thing you mentioned earlier was what was missing in your life was friendships, adult friendships. And I was amazed, I thought that my social life would shrink completely when I stopped drinking, and realized that instead of that, I made more friends in my first year of not drinking than I had made, probably in the previous decade. And a lot of that was friends I met on the alcohol free path. Honestly, online was how I met some of them. And then they became in person real life friends, but also, sort of considering and pursuing friendships with people who didn’t drink a lot or didn’t drink in my, in my normal life, who I had never really spent a lot of time with before. And then try new activities, like joining the morning workout group, and actually investing in those friendships or, you know, I did, you know, a mindful triathlon where you did, you know, running a 5k, and meditation and dance and yoga and inviting people to that, who I wouldn’t normally invite, or, you know, going to a yoga retreat, like all of these things, were activities I’d never done when I was drinking, which brought me in contact with new friends. And I kept, you know, I would say, I kept 90% of my, of my previous friends. But it was just a very small group, once you’re an

 

57:30

adult. Hmm, well, that’s just it. I mean, it was just the natural process of attrition. For me, I think over time that led to that place. And I just think that probably what happened is the alcohol just distracted me from that. I don’t, I don’t know how connected the alcohol was to any of it. But I know that when I took alcohol away, it became painfully obvious to me that I didn’t have as many close important friendships as I wanted, and needed. And so I started working on that. And same as you I have met so many people through being alcohol free. And obviously I’m in that circle like you are, because I’m a coach, and you know, I need, I meet all kinds of people all the time in this arena. And most of my existing friendships didn’t change, a couple of them did, but most of them didn’t. And, you know, I think it’s just a matter of like, with, like, with everything else, you have to stay mindful around it, it’s easy to just kind of fall into entropy and just let it just, you know, let things kind of devolve. And that’s what happened to me with my social life. I would say, my kids were the platinum sponsors of my social life for like, 15 years. And then they, they kind of, you know, went on their own way. And I was like, Oh, hold on now.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  58:42

Yeah, who’s making

 

58:43

this happen? Yeah, because they’re not here anymore. So it just required a little bit of intentionality around that. And I’ve made some really pretty incredible friends in the last few years. And I also believe, I don’t know what, how you feel about this. But I just think my ability to connect in a meaningful way with people is so much richer as a result of not drinking. Yes, I’m just way more present with everybody. And the friendships that I have are just so much. They just feel so much richer and deeper to me than they did when I was drinking.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  59:14

Yeah, I completely agree. And I also think that, you know, when I was drinking, I didn’t, you know, I was, you know, I felt like, I had this secret to hide, you know, because I was so worried about my drinking that I never wanted anyone to look too closely at me and I wanted everyone to think that my life was good. And so I kept things fairly surface and didn’t talk about a lot of the things that actually kind of worried me, because I thought so many of them were related to my drinking. And then once I stopped drinking, you know, I’m a big fan of like, you only tell people as much as Sir See you and you don’t owe your story to anyone. And you can kind of tell the people who are genuinely interested versus maybe wanting some gossip. But I realized that when I, when I mentioned, I’d stopped drinking, when I mentioned even that it was related to wanting to feel less anxiety, and it wasn’t serving me or waking up at 3am, I felt people kind of felt comfortable confiding in me that their life also wasn’t perfect. And it doesn’t have to be alcohol, it can be their marriage, or struggles with kids or work or whatever. But we just, we just had way more honest conversations, which brought us closer.

 

1:00:40

Yeah, I totally agree. I’m such a fan of vulnerability. It’s crazy. And I was the opposite. When I was still drinking, if you told me when I was still drinking, that I’d have a podcast. And I would be doing this kind of thing, talking to people on podcasts and telling my story and writing whatever this thing is I’m writing I would have said forget it. But that’s one of the real gifts of becoming alcohol free for me is just this ability to first of all, I think see myself through the lens that probably most other people see me through, which was not the lens I saw myself through for so long. You know, when you take that bale of alcohol away, you can kind of click see yourself clearly. So I think there’s that, but just also that the confidence that comes with it.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:01:20

Yeah, I completely agree. And I think that we sell ourselves short, so much. Meaning we see so many more flaws in ourselves that other people don’t see one of the things I love to do with my clients. That was actually suggested to me by Libby Nelson, who I did a podcast on. She’s a coach on, you know, Brene Brown’s work in midlife. But she had me do early on this thing called the essence project, where you just very casually text a whole bunch of people like I did, like 20 people in my life from work. And my, I asked my mother and sister and I gotta tell you, I was terrified to hear what they would say. And, you know, my friends and my husband and my kids and all these people and just said, Hey, I’m doing a project for you know, whatever, a class coaching, whatever it is. And would you just quickly don’t think about it too much. Text me back three words that you think of when you think of me or that describe me. And the very cool thing was that I still have it on my wall. You know, that people, people wrote back, but they were so consistent. And they weren’t the things that I thought that people would say, even if they were being complimentary, about my strengths. And I was shocked how many even acquaintances had that but also the people who knew me really well. And I keep it up, because I truly believe there’s this kind of quote that says, If you could see yourself just for a day, you’d see yourself how everyone else sees you. And my God, you’re fucking beautiful.

 

1:03:15

Yes, I love that so much. I think we get so, especially really busy women and that’s really who this podcast is for, like burnt out, overwhelmed, busy women, equate our worth with what we do, and our productivity becomes our currency. And we start to see ourselves as what we do so often. When I asked my clients like, who are you? The answer is, oh, I’m a lawyer. I’m a doctor. I’m a mother, I’m a teacher, I’m a wife, you know. And so I love that idea. Because what we are not very, it’s not easy for us to do. We all know how to naturally do this. It’s just been a long time since we’ve done it, I think, is that we’re just not great at being, you know? 

 

And so I love that question. Because I think what that does is help you figure out how you want to be and I don’t know about you, but we do. I often do a coaching exercise with clients around fulfilment where we talk about, you know, at the end of your life, if people are sort of talking about what you’ve accomplished, and who you were, what do you want them to say? In the beginning, it’s, it’s really hard exercise for a lot of busy women, and they’ll still, you know, they’ll start reading a list of accomplishments like actual, you know, things that they’ve accomplished or and, and it really forces them to start to think about like, what is it? Who is it that I really want to be? 

 

And this is the beauty of moving into menopause, I think, is that this all becomes easier. Yeah. Because it’s like everything, just like I said, it’s like, we can use the word flatline, which sounds really negative, but it’s more just like a leveling out. That happens and just a confidence and assurity and, uh, I think, you know, a lot of the complexities start to fall away because we’re not actively parenting like we were maybe or I’m in the throes of perimenopause, everything just feels a little bit simpler and more level. And for me anyway, it became so much clearer to me along with, I should say, removing alcohol, it became so much easier for me to start to articulate who I was, I want to be, you know, for the next 40 years, or however long I have left on the planet.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:05:19

Yeah, I love that in terms of like thinking about what you want people to say about you, or what you truly care about. And one of the things that I like about the essence project, too, is like, you can see, when people reflect back to you, is that actually who you want to be? You know, I mean, that’s another thing. And I was sort of shocked that, you know, these are work colleagues, people I work with, you know, and, and I even asked my boss and stuff like that. And, you know, I thought of myself as one of my, one of my biggest strengths that they would probably say, when you think of me, what are you going to do was, like, efficient and organized. And those words only came up one set of like, 34 words, all the other ones were like, real, and kind and caring and joyful. And I was like, wow, like, my boss thinks that like, that’s pretty awesome.

 

1:06:21

directly tied into saying no, by the way, because you think everybody loves you, because of all the things you do for them. They don’t, that is not why the people in your life love you, they love you because of who you are. So the sky won’t fall, if you say no, and stop doing as much. In fact, it probably just got a whole lot better.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:06:39

All right, I love that. So everyone listening to this, you know, just do the essence project, just be like, Oh, I heard something interesting on podcast, you know, text like 20 people and be like, you know, just tell me what you think when you think of me immediately, like what characteristics and then you can look at it and say is that how I see myself? Is that in alignment with who I want to be? And like, if not, I can shift it, but I bet you will be very surprised in a positive way what comes back like, like Wendy said, it’s probably not, you know, your productivity or whatever it is. And like, put that front and center. Put that somewhere where you’ll remember it. I did this project three years ago, and I still hold on to it. So definitely do that. The other thing I think I’ll do is like put em and friends favorite menopause greeting cards in the in the images just because I love it. But I found it another one and it said, you know, welcome to menopause. On one hand, there’s brain fog and headaches and insomnia and whatever happened to my knees. On the other hand, there’s a breathtaking power of truly not giving a shit what anyone thinks anymore.

 

1:07:55

Hallelujah. Right? Yeah, that’s what I say all the time. I think all of that my again, my naturopathic friend Sarah Bailey, and I talk about this a lot on my podcast, but the, the fact that that estrogen that we have, it’s a nurturing hormone. It’s what keeps us from eating our young, right. And it’s pumping through our 30s. And, and it’s what drives us to take care of everybody and everything else. And I think that what happens in menopause is that that starts to come back home. And you start to actually start taking care of yourself in a really meaningful way. And life just gets really good. So if you’re terrified, I was terrified too, it’s actually really pretty great on the other side.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:08:34

Awesome. Well, I think that is a great place to end this. Tell us how people can listen to your podcast, get in touch with you, learn about the work you do, because this has been one of my favorite conversations. So I’m sure people are gonna want to follow up.

 

1:08:50

Oh, you’re sweet. Thank you. Well, you can find me on my website, which is WendyMcCallum.com. And my podcast is called Bite-Sized Balance and you can find it on iTunes or Spotify or Google podcasts or anywhere you listen to podcasts.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson  1:09:03

Really awesome. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to come on.

 

1:09:06

Oh, it’s been so much fun. Thanks, Casey.