# Episode 6 - Giving up Alcohol

- Podcast: GenX Adulting Podcast
- Published: 2024-09-06T10:00:00.000Z
- Audio: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2398379/episodes/15679491-episode-6-giving-up-alcohol.mp3
- Page: https://genxadultingpodcast.com/transcripts/podcasts/genx-adulting-podcast/episodes/episode-6
- Source: https://genxadultingpodcast.com/episodes/genxadultingpodcastepisode6.html
- People: Brian Barker (host), Nicole Barker (host)

## Summary

In this episode of Gen X Adulting, the hosts discuss their motivations for giving up alcohol as part of their journey towards a healthier lifestyle. They share personal experiences, the challenges of quitting, and the positive changes they've noticed since making this decision.

## Key takeaways

- Giving up alcohol can lead to better sleep and increased energy.
- Alcohol can negatively impact mental health, contributing to anxiety and depression.
- Hydration improves overall health and appearance, especially after quitting alcohol.
- Alcohol consumption can interfere with weight loss and overall fitness goals.
- Social norms around drinking can make it difficult to abstain, but support from friends is crucial.
- Quitting alcohol can help individuals confront underlying emotional issues they may have been avoiding.

## FAQ

### What motivated the hosts to give up alcohol?

The hosts were motivated by a desire to lead a healthier lifestyle as they age, wanting to remain active and present for their future grandchildren.

### What are some benefits of quitting alcohol mentioned in the episode?

Benefits include improved sleep quality, reduced anxiety, better hydration, decreased inflammation, and more energy for physical activities.

### How did giving up alcohol affect their social life?

The hosts found that alcohol was a significant part of social interactions, but they were able to adapt and enjoy social events without drinking, often opting for mocktails or non-alcoholic beverages.

### Did the hosts experience challenges when quitting alcohol?

Yes, they faced challenges initially due to habitual drinking patterns, but they found that the benefits outweighed the difficulties.

### How has quitting alcohol impacted their marriage?

Quitting alcohol has positively affected their marriage by reducing conflicts and allowing for more meaningful interactions and activities together.


## Referenced links

- [Watch on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIcyYnOhmeQ)
- [Listen on Apple Podcasts](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-6-giving-up-alcohol/id1764838823?i=1000668600958)
- [Listen on Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/episode/0rr1LenbLmcnzPBU1ivY0c)
- [Listen on Buzzsprout](https://www.buzzsprout.com/2398379/episodes/15679491-episode-6-giving-up-alcohol)

## Transcript

[Music]
Welcome to Gen X Adulting.
Today we are starting a conversation on
various changes we've made in our lives
to become lead a healthier lifestyle.
You know, as we get older, we're Gen
Xers, so we're aging, trying to age
gracefully and actively.
Today we're going to talk about some of
the motivation behind some
of the changes we've made.
And actually we'll start it off with you.
What's been some of your
motivations for the changes?
So I want to be healthy as we head into
the second phase of our life.
I hope to be a grandma someday and I'd
like to be an active
grandmother, be very present.
We want to continue to do physical
activity outside like hiking, traveling,
going to the beach,
all that type of stuff.
I want to still be doing that in my 60s,
70s, 80s. I want to be the
85 year old that's doing yoga.
So I knew that when I, around 51, I knew
that if I was going to be that person
that I was envisioning,
that I needed to make some major changes
in my life or I wasn't
going to make it to 80.
Or if I did, I was
not going to be healthy.
Now that all makes sense. Yeah. So what
was the first change you did make?
Begrudgingly, I gave up alcohol. That's a
good one. Yeah. And what led up to that?
So for a few months leading up to the
decision, I started doing research, which
probably was my first mistake
because ignorance is certainly bliss when
it comes to drinking alcohol.
So I learned a lot and in preparation to
give it up, and I use the term give it up
because I used alcohol
as a coping mechanism.
It was my crutch. I, like many people,
enjoyed it in
celebratory times and dark times.
If I'm cooking dinner, I would pour
myself a glass of wine. It's such a
diverse, good thing to do though, right?
Yeah, it was such a part of my life. And
we live in South
Florida, so every day is summer.
So you feel, you know, every day you have
an excuse to have a drink. So
I loved it. I loved alcohol.
The only negative
connotation for me was the hangovers.
Yeah, and they get
harder as you get older.
And they get much harder as you get
older. And I was giving up, whereas
before I could drink and still get up and
get through the day.
It became where I was in bed all day, and
sometimes I still felt
the effects the second day.
Yeah. So I was, if I drank, let's say
heavily on a Friday, I
could give up my entire weekend.
Yeah, and that just sucks.
So I realized that that was my life was
what I was envisioning for myself was not
going to happen with
everything that I learned.
In your research, was there one big thing
that had the most impact in
a sense to drive you there?
Learning about how alcohol affects your
brain, that it can lead to dementia and
Alzheimer's, that it can lead to brain
atrophy, basically,
which I didn't know that.
Brain atrophy.
Yeah. So that was like one of the main
things that it's so dehydrating, which
can affect your appearance.
Yeah. So I mean, as a woman, I obviously care
about my appearance. And so not just with
your skin, in the vanity way, how you
look, but inside, like you're just
completely dehydrated.
Another thing is that I kind of knew
this, but through my research, I
confirmed it is that it was completely
contributing to anxiety and anxiety.
Alcohol stays in your
body for about 72 hours.
So the effects of alcohol, the anxiety
can linger for that many
days after you've drank.
That's a trip.
Because when you drink, so it has a
depressing effect on your body, right?
So then your body releases stimulants to
counter the depressing effects.
So once the effects of alcohol go away,
the depressing effects of alcohol go
away, you still have all
those stimulants in your body.
And that causes the anxiety. It also
causes you to wake up.
I don't know about you, but I always woke
up at 3 a.m. after drinking.
It's very disruptive to sleep.
So disruptive. You never
really get into a deep sleep.
Yeah.
And those stimulants are
what's also waking you up.
And then you're awake.
And I would be awake for like
an hour or two with anxiety.
I always attributed that to though it's
like your body's processing it.
And there's something going on
metabolically with your
sugars and glucose levels.
Then or you just have to
get up and go to the bathroom.
Yeah. Yeah.
No. And also I have my little notes here.
People are watching.
They see just so I
wouldn't forget anything.
But your your body, you're right.
It does go through
the liver and processes.
But your body is going to process the
sugars from the alcohol before anything
else. So if you're drinking
so far as like losing weight,
you're never giving your body a chance to
start burning fat really,
because it's always working on what the
sugars that that you've put into your
body. It's going to go for that first.
Does that make sense?
Yeah. Yeah.
It goes for what's readily
available, run into your blood.
Yeah. So and then of
course it causes inflammation.
So I would I could tell
since I've given it up,
I was I was definitely inflamed.
I can see that I was more
swollen when I was drinking.
But of course inflammation
is the cause of most diseases.
Yeah. So it basically is
such a body of work now.
So much research is
being done on inflammation.
So much you're saying I mean, I don't
really drink anymore either.
Right.
Right.
And so I think mine is probably more
driven on feeling like shit versus
not feeling like shit. You
know, the hangover stuff,
the mental clarity is so much better.
The just the common sense of this stuff
can't be good for you.
No.
And it catches up with you
and you don't feel as you know,
it's just not nearly as much
fun as when you're younger.
Unfortunately, it's not.
Yeah.
I guess as we get older and have you
found any research on that in
terms of as you get older, does your body
just not handle it well,
or is it anecdotal and
we're just spot on anyways?
No, there is research about how it
affects you as you get older.
I I I remember reading about something
saying that your body gets so
used to alcohol in a
certain way that as you get older,
even as you try to only maybe have one or
two glasses of wine,
your body is still going to respond like
if you were having 10 drinks.
So you could end up feeling hungover,
just having one or two glasses of wine as
you get older because your
body's almost been trained.
If that may, I don't know scientifically
why I did read about that and
explain it. I can't
remember what it said,
but it's as you get older,
your body just gets used to alcohol in a
way where it doesn't matter
how much you drink, you're going to have
that hungover effect.
Yeah. It also raises like me and wine,
one glass of wine and I'm
yeah, feel like shit the next day.
Yeah. It also raises
cortisol, the stress hormone,
which especially for women is
you don't want to raise that.
So so I learned all these things.
And once I learned all of that and more,
I just couldn't go.
I couldn't go back. I
just, I couldn't, it sucked.
Like I said, ignorance was bliss.
But so there's a ton of bad
things in the world, right?
In terms of whether
it's diet or whatever,
what was that same primary
motivation to give up alcohol?
Then just the research
and information you found.
So everything I,
I knew that everything I wanted to do on
my health, new health journey,
I call it my midlife health journey.
I knew that none of it would be effective
to even maybe 50% of its potential.
If I was drinking, I feel
that alcohol in my body,
even if I drank on a Friday, it was still
my body Saturday, Sunday, Monday.
So if I'm doing all these healthy things,
Saturday, Sunday, Monday,
the alcohol is negating it. Yeah.
I might be getting some of the benefit,
but if I was going to
take this seriously,
drinking was going to negate so much of
what I was trying to do.
So that's, that's really,
once I had all the knowledge,
once I learned
everything I was going to learn,
I knew that I had to stop if I wanted to
truly embrace this health journey
authentically, like really do it.
So it's one of those deals where we walk
pretty much every morning,
we just work out a few times a week, eat
healthy and everything.
So would you say, was it a, how difficult
of a choice was that for you to,
to make? And were you either scared or
nervous going into it type of thing?
Well, I mean, I was a habitual drinker.
So like the mom style, I'm going to have
a glass of wine while
I cook type of thing.
So the first couple of
weeks were challenging.
I wouldn't consider you a lush by any
stretch of the imagination.
Well, no, it's
interesting. The first, okay.
So the first few weeks were challenging
because I was a habitual drinker.
So, but full disclosure,
I drank in high school.
I drank through college probably heavily.
Like most people do.
When we were in our
twenties, we were having kids.
So we only socially
drank. I only socially drank.
I only drink in the house during that
time when they were really young.
I think I did.
You might have, but it
wasn't, it was not a lot.
It wasn't, it was just
social, but we were very social.
Well, something happens as you,
as you raise the kids and you're in your
career and it's easy to be like,
all right, I'm going to have a beer or
I'm going to have a martini.
And it's Tuesday night. And to your
point, it becomes a habit.
It's like, all right,
Tuesday. And then Wednesday.
And then you're like, well, well, shit,
tomorrow's Thursday.
Then you got Friday. So it is easy to get
into that, that habit.
I think like you're describing.
It's then before you know it, your pet
years pass and you have been a habitual
drinker, not, not the
quote unquote drunk or,
or maybe that stereotypical
type of concept. You know,
it's not like we're going down to cheers
and walk in and say, Hey, Nicole,
Brian, you know that, not that kind of
thing, but you definitely use the gen X
reference there. There
you go. I think that,
that it's incredibly easy to incorporate
alcohol into your daily life.
It's society makes it so easy.
It's more normal to everywhere you go
that you watch the super bowl,
you're bombarded with
ads or whatever. Yeah.
Especially in
Florida, like you mentioned,
it's more normal to
drink than not to drink.
So, okay. So through our twenties,
I was just drinking socially.
Uh, my dad died when I was 32.
And I definitely started using drinking
as a coping mechanism for that.
So I'd say that I was drinking a lot
probably daily then.
And when I'm say drinking, it could be
like one drink a day.
I'm not, I'm not getting drunk every day,
one or two drinks a day.
So it's fully functional, functional.
Drink too. It's, do you mean I'm having a
stiff Martini or I'm having a glass
of wine or something along those lines
maybe depends on the day.
It varied. It varied. So, um, and then,
um, we popped up
pregnant when I was 39, 38.
Um, and we ended up having a baby and a
middle schooler and a high schooler.
So this was now into our forties.
And I would say that that's when things
got really crazy in our lives.
And we were drinking. Yeah. We were
drinking Martini's almost daily.
There was another, another phase there
too, for me at least was,
I love microbears.
I love IPAs and total wine came to town.
That's such a good selection.
So I remember going and getting, I don't
know, five or six different IPA styles
and drinking them over the next few days.
Yeah. I think that that's
all part of that whole period.
It's just that cultural thing. Yeah.
That period in our forties, especially,
but yeah, in our thirties too,
but really in our forties,
I think for me personally,
I drank the heaviest in my forties,
which was probably the worst thing I
could have done because I came down with,
I got Hashimoto's thyroid
disease around that time.
I was perimenopausal
without realizing it.
And then I'm drinking every day.
So once you stopped,
did you notice anything either
physiologically or psychologically or,
or some of those big changes? There has
to be changes, right?
And how you feel, how you
think, what do you think of that?
Yeah. So I immediately slept better.
Like that was immediate.
I think that's what I was
going to say when people say,
what do you feel first
that you sleep better?
You actually get sleep
because when you're drinking,
you're really never
getting into a deep sleep.
You're never getting a restful sleep.
So the alcohol just doesn't allow it.
So it was probably the first time in
years that I'd gotten a really good
sleep. Cause like I said,
even on nights, I didn't drink.
It was still in my system.
I, my bloating went down.
I was still dealing with bloating.
I'm still dealing with
bloating because of menopause now,
but I was perimenopausal
when I gave this up and I,
and thyroid disease, both
those can cause bloating.
Also the alcohol had wrecked my gut, not
just the alcohol food,
just not taking care of myself. I'm still
in the process of healing my gut.
So there's a lot of research
these days on your gut biome.
Yes. And the impact of
alcohol on it. Yeah. It does.
Oh, right. Well, well researched. It just
destroys it. It destroys it. Yeah.
This is the way I look at it. I feel that
for a good 10 years of my life,
maybe longer, I wrecked my gut completely
and that I've been on this healing gut
journey now for almost about a year and a
half, almost two years.
And I expect it to take
even long, a little longer. I,
I took years and years of wrecking it.
It's going to take some
time to heal it completely,
but the bloating, some
bloating went down. Um,
I wasn't as swollen because the
inflammation came down.
So I was not as swollen. Um, I really saw
that in my face. I was really,
I was hydrated. I had people
that would say, oh my gosh,
your skin is glowing. And I hadn't done
anything different except I had it
stopped drinking and I was hydrated. It's
amazing what being hydrated does.
Yeah. Yeah. It solves so many things.
I would say to anyone listening,
if you have something going
on, make sure you're hydrated.
Cause a lot of times that will solve
things like headache, tired, hungry,
irritable, just make sure you're
hydrated. Cause it's
interesting being hydrated
24 seven. I had not
been hydrated consistently
for a long, long time. A
good part of my life. Yeah.
So just giving my body
that, that hydration,
it's addicting now to be hydrated.
Like I don't go anywhere without my
Stanley or Stanley dupe.
And I usually have a cup of tea in my
hand or my coffee. I,
I leave the house with multiple cups of
things like most women and I'm
drinking in the car. I'm, it goes around
when I walk around the house,
I have something in my hand. It's just, I
constantly have something to drink.
I think too, what you're describing is
just the whole, with the gut biome,
hydration, the alcohol just really just
wrecks havoc on your body,
on all your systems, essential nervous
system, your auto immune system,
your vascular system, everything
basically. Yeah. And as,
and I had a lot more energy, so I,
it allowed, it gave me the energy to
exercise more and I was getting so much
more out of exercising because I would,
I would exercise hungover in the past.
I'd go on a good run, hungover.
To quote unquote, sweat it
out. That's a thing. Yeah. But I,
I now know I wasn't getting nearly the
benefits now that I'm getting the
benefits. I now know I had,
I put my body in a state of fight or
flight for years with this,
with the alcohol in my body was always
like, what's going, what are we doing?
What are we doing? It just
never knew what was going on.
Cause I was constantly shocking it with
alcohol, which, you know,
depressing it and then it's fighting the
depressants. And then, you know,
it's like, it's
digesting the sugars and it's,
everything was so out of whack.
It's such a cycle. Cause I can
speak for myself in terms of,
I don't really drink nearly as much as I
used to either. I don't,
you've probably been more disciplined,
but I could probably count on both my
hands so many times I've drank this year.
Um, but what, what I've noticed is you
get into a cycle, right?
If you drink and then
the next day you're like,
it's kind of the hair of
the dog concept. It's like,
and I kind of have this craving now and
it's to get that sugar back in you.
Yeah. You get the, the, the alcohol back
in you. Yeah. Right. And well, I, yeah,
that's the cycle of carbohydrates too.
100%. Yeah. I mean, empty calories,
empty carbs. It just makes you
want more. Yeah. You know, it,
and you're finding
that. So same with alcohol,
like if you eat a bag of chips or pizza
or something, the next day you want that.
Let's lay off the pizza.
But as I had more energy and I had more
time because in the past I would,
my day would kind of stop when I would
make my drink or wine.
Cause I was re quote unquote relaxing. So
I would, that's what I would do.
Like drinking became a real verb.
Like I'm drinking. So that's what I'm
doing. So I'm doing,
I'm doing nothing else. Would
you say it was, I, you know,
it's a curious thing. The motivation I
guess would be for you. Is it more of,
of I'm relaxing and I'm escaping and I'm
taking an edge off or what's the,
for me, I like, I like
alcohol cause I like the escape.
There's nothing in the world that lets
you shut off your mind. Then, you know,
a nice stiff martini and some music.
Yeah. And that's like, to me,
that's almost like, all right, I'm going
to my, my happy spot. Yeah.
I think for you,
especially because you're one of those
people and I'm sure there's people that
can relate to this, you
struggle shutting your mind off.
Your mind is you have a very
curious mind and it never stops.
So for you,
it really served a purpose of shut giving
your mind a chance to relax.
There's other ways to do that,
but that was the quickest
and easiest way for you.
But other things, other
substances don't do that.
I don't even mean other substances. I
mean like meditation,
yoga, you know, but even,
but I think even for you,
I just think you have one of
those minds. That's just really,
yeah, it's an interesting concept. That's
really hard for you.
It would be a new skill to learn to learn
how to shut off your mind.
Totally different topic and not going to
go down a rabbit hole,
but I found that solace,
that escape in cold plunging.
Yes. Getting in there.
And once I survived that
first 20 to 30 seconds,
I actually am able to shut my mind off.
That's an amazing thing. Yeah.
I'm still kind of sorting that out.
It's an amazing thing. Yeah. Yeah. That's
exciting. Yeah. I, I noticed it.
The past two days where I
get in and it's like, okay,
I'm just going to breathe
and I'm just going to breathe.
I'm going to focus on the sensations that
are running through my fingers and my
legs and how cold it is
and all of that. It's a trip.
I'm excited for you because there's very,
very few things that have worked. Well,
alcohol was it, I think.
It was the only thing. Yeah. To be
honest. So, so for me, you asked,
what was my motivation? So, um,
relaxation for sure. But in general, it
was a coping mechanism.
So like I said before,
I had more energy and I had more time
because that time when I would make that
drink and then that's what
I did the rest of the night,
I wasn't making that drink. So now I have
all this time on my hand,
not on my hands are still stuff I'm
always doing. Meaning I wasn't,
I wasn't escaping, I guess that's yeah.
So it wasn't escaping. It's a, yes.
Energy really leads to time. Yes. Right.
We've talked a little bit about that. I
think just casually about it,
but when you aren't drinking and you
don't feel like shit,
you now have this motivation to go and,
and maybe go on a walk or go on a hike or
go down to the beach or whatever it
might be. Right. And you're just
recapturing time lost in some respects.
A significant amount of time was given
over to alcohol in my life.
It will be one of my
regrets. You know, there's, there,
I think it's okay to have
regrets to talk about them.
That's one of my regrets
in life. I don't have many,
but now that I've stepped
away, if I could go back,
I would absolutely change my relationship
with alcohol. I will say this.
I do believe I started using it as a
coping mechanism in
high school because of
my stuff going on in my
childhood through college,
in addition to social
life. And so now, now,
once I stopped, I used it to deal with my
dad's death, all that.
Once I stopped,
then you have to face all those things
you were running away from.
That's a whole nother aspect of giving up
drinking that a lot of people don't
talk about is I kind of
was smacked in the face
with a lot of thoughts,
a lot of feelings, um,
and a lot to unpack.
And it was very overwhelming because I
couldn't turn to alcohol when I started
to feel all the things I
had to feel all the things.
So I went through months
of feeling all the things.
And that was a shock to my system. It was
hard. It was, it was very challenging.
Um, I'm still unpacking some stuff,
but it allowed me to
actually get to know myself
authentically and get
become a stronger person.
It's funny when I'm,
what I'm laughing at is we were talking
about this on our walk the other day,
how you said you started drinking in high
school. And I was like,
Hmm, you're a late
bloomer. It, because we,
I don't remember, I had older friends and
we would sneak beers or like Boone's
farm wine, right? Some
shitty brandy. And, and,
but we weren't doing it to escape or just
doing it to be kids of the eighties,
you know, in, in that kind of thing. And
you're hanging out with older kids.
And so it wasn't a, an escape per se. So
it's more of a party.
Yeah. But then I think as you get older
and your life is happening and you know,
you kind of fall into some of the things
we were just talking about.
Well, and I think for you, you had a very
different childhood than me.
So you didn't really have anything to run
away from or escape from.
I think there's a lot of people that can
relate to that experience where it was
like, oh, I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to do that.
But I think that's a really interesting thing. I think our kids, for our kids,
it was when they drank our older two
drink in high school. We know that our
youngest is about to go in high school
and into high school.
And I know at some point he
will drink. We're realistic.
I don't think they were escaping anything
for them. I think it's social.
I hope not.
You know, it kind of
brings up a good point.
Um, not drinking.
How has that affected your
social life when you, you know,
not just between you and I don't think we
have much of a social life,
but you know, when you
girls night out or, you know,
going to lunch with some
of those types of things.
Okay. So I never realized how much
alcohol was part of the human social
experience.
The fabric, the fabric of the world.
Until I stopped drinking.
And then I, it was a trip.
It was really a trip to
realize it's everywhere.
Birthdays, parties,
celebrations, funerals, um,
girls night out. It's it ever,
everything. You're
going to go to the beach,
bring bottle wine. You're going to go on
a picnic, bring a bottle of wine.
You know, and you sneak wine
into youth sporting events.
You're watching your kid play. Oh my God.
I think that was a big one for me to
like, this is crazy.
Everybody on the
sideline here. Oh my gosh.
I was drinking. I would bring the
whiskey, the whiskey,
with the little, uh,
clear shot glass. Yeah.
And it was, it's all, it was all
wonderful and so much fun at Halloween.
I mean, we would, I can't,
I can't think of anything
where alcohol every holiday. Um,
so at first it was a
trip. I'm very blessed.
I love my girlfriends.
They're the best. And they,
it was like, it didn't even matter if I
was drinking or not, you know,
they didn't bother anybody. Um,
I've noticed that too. And it almost
becomes, you go somewhere,
everybody's drinking. You're like, no,
I'll take an Iced
tea. Yeah. No one cares.
No one gives a shit really.
Maybe it's cause of our age.
It probably is good. Yeah. I think it's
our age. Cause I know for my,
like my girlfriends also do sometimes
abstain. So I think it was, you know,
but I think for like our kids age,
if they were to try to
not drink or when they do,
cause I know they have taken breaks,
I think it's more awkward when you're
their age, you know? Um,
so I do, I order mocktails.
A lot of restaurants and bars are
starting to really catch on, you know,
the generation that's really spurring the
no alcohol movement is Gen Z.
Yeah. I saw something
about that. Actually,
I read an article about
it today, how there it's,
it's having a material impact on certain
bars or breweries or
you know, that industry.
It's really interesting.
They are so educated and
care about their health.
And it's, it's, I love it. It's very
interesting. It's fascinating.
It's forcing restaurants. Yeah.
It's forcing restaurants and bars to have
a great mocktail menu.
And when there isn't one, I have my club
soda and either pineapple,
with a splash of pineapple, splash or a
splash of grapefruit and lime.
And I just pound those all night. I can,
I don't think I'll ever do the,
I'll take a non-alcoholic beer or I'll
take an, I'll just have a nice tea.
Oh. Or water. I'm not into the whole
mocktail or fake beer stuff.
If I wasn't gluten free,
I would totally have non-alcoholic beer.
I love the taste of beer. I miss it.
Now sometimes we do get
gluten free beer. Yep.
And I really, when I do have a drink,
I'll sometimes enjoy a gluten free beer,
but I would have a non-alcoholic beer.
I do. I love beer.
So I know you can't love me any more than
you do and just cherish me and look up
to me any more than you do, but what
would you, how do you think marriage or,
you giving up alcohol and it has say
affected your marriage and your,
even your family life, if it's, you know,
kind of combined the whole family,
you got your marriage and your children.
So giving up alcohol affected our
marriage so positively in that I think we
both ended up having, like we've said,
more energy to do more things.
So we started exploring more stuff,
doing different things
we hadn't done before.
And I guess being on this health journey
together has brought us closer.
Um, we've had years of
just having a blast drinking.
Like we've had so much fun. Um,
and I wouldn't
necessarily take those times away,
but we also had drunken fights. I mean,
we definitely got in drunken fights. We
got in fights over silly things.
Yeah. Stupid shit.
Stupid shit that, um,
could be just a simple little argument or
debate and turn into an all out.
Nothing. Just to be
clear, nothing physical ever.
But, um, just really just,
you know, when you're drunk,
you just, just nonsense,
you know, and emotions come out that are
cause you're drunk. Yeah.
So I would love to hear stories from
people on some, some zingers on that.
Yeah. It's just, you know, I honestly,
I could see how
marriages fall apart. Yeah.
I really could because you don't realize
that it's not you guys.
It's the problem. It's the alcohol. Yeah.
That third element you've allowed.
It's the third demon. Really? Like the
third rail train doc.
Yeah. I don't know about train talk, but
touch the third rail. Okay. But,
you know, if you, if
you didn't know better,
I could see marriages falling apart and
it was all the alcohol.
Could see how many do you think have,
right? It's statistically,
has to be one. I don't know if it's a
leading cause I'm sure financial problems
are, but alcohol has got to be top five.
Yeah, probably. And what's,
what's unfortunate is that
if the alcohol wasn't there,
they potentially could maybe still be
married. I don't
know. Cause you don't know
people, but I could just, I could see how
it could destroy marriage. Um,
so I guess I, um, I
guess I could attest to,
I think us not drinking,
you eliminate some of
that stupid nonsense.
So now you're somewhat more grounded.
You're not escaping things.
So you're more
present. You have more energy.
You do have more
time. And I think for us,
it has led to consistently walking in the
morning and walking is great.
You get a lot of good conversations and
yeah, good release. It's good, healthy.
Yeah. It's when we solve all the world's
problems. 100%. Yeah.
Everything is solved. Yes. Um, go down
the beach, you know,
we're about to go see a concert.
We're flying out of town in a couple of
days and going to go see a concert out
of state. I don't know if not that that
alcohol wouldn't have stopped that,
but no, but I just think the quality of
all of the experiences I,
I feel completely present.
I feel completely present.
And everything I'm doing right now, no
matter what we do, I feel I'm there.
I'm a hundred percent there and I
remember it all. And, and it's me there.
It's not that it's like,
I feel like a demon would get inside of
me sometimes. And it's like, ah,
it's really me in that state. It's not an
altered state of myself.
Well, what's interesting in saying that
it's when you get to where you're going,
you're not looking to where's the bar.
The bar doesn't exist.
Right. You're going to
wherever you're going.
And there's no concept of a bar where I
need to get a beer. Yeah.
I need a glass of wine. Yeah. It's,
you're kind of the weirdo maybe
meandering and looking at other things.
I mean, how many things have we done
where we're like, okay,
let's get a drink or where like you're
saying, where's the bar?
Or we should bring it with us or how are
we going to sneak it in? I mean,
even when we bring our kids universal, we
know that that one Mexican restaurant,
you can get drinks that I know Irish pub
and then the Irish pub across from the
mummy. Yeah. But he was listening. And
when you first walk into islands,
you can get a Mexican restaurant on the
right and you can get drinks there.
Well, the only redeeming, uh,
Disney park in my mind is Epcot because
you could go around the world and eat
all the food and drink all their drinks.
Yeah. I mean, and there's nothing,
first I just want to be clear. I don't
judge anyone for drinking.
And there's nothing wrong with that.
This is truly talking about my own
personal experience,
our own personal experience. So, um, as
far as you asked about the family, um,
so as far as the kids, so the kids
witnessed us at times,
fighting drunkenly. Um,
and I regret that. And I
would say that's another, uh,
thing I wish that I could go back and
that's a regret. I could go,
I wish I could go back and change that.
I'm a big believer that I want, uh,
that I'm fine with the kids. Seeing us
having disagreements,
you and I are constantly giving each
other shit. We're very sarcastic couple.
Um, and sometimes we'll have
spats and I'm fine with that.
Because I want our daughter to know she
has every right to speak her mind.
And I want my sons to know that their
wife has every right to speak her mind.
And I want the children to,
I always wanted the kids to witness
conflict and resolution.
And conflict does not mean isn't bad.
And it doesn't mean divorce that married
people fight. It's actually,
I'm a big believer when you stop having
disagreements or when you stop talking,
that's the problem.
I think one of the biggest things with
the say a new found consistent sobriety
is you realize I'm never wrong and always
right. So it's probably helped in that
sense. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I became
submissive. That was it. Yeah.
Not, not submissive. Just realizing.
Yes. That was part of the enlightenment.
That's a very good way to put it.
And for anyone that's not
catching the sarcasm completely,
we're not being
serious in any way, but, um,
so I think I have no issues with arguing.
I really don't in front of kids.
I mean, as long as it's
normal arguing, arguing,
but our drunken fights, um,
they sometimes were in the midst of that.
And I know that that affected them. I
know, especially the older two,
I would say they don't have a lot of
adversity in their childhood.
You and I have worked really hard to give
them as close as we can to the perfect
childhood. You and I have two different
motivations when it comes to that,
which I think we've
talked about in other episodes.
So I'd say the biggest adversity they had
in childhood was that there were a few
years where we were drinking and we would
argue and it wasn't pretty.
And it's just senseless,
senseless bullshit. But when you're in
middle school and high school,
yeah, yeah, it's, it's
fucking sucks. Yeah. You know,
and you probably wonder are
your parents getting divorced?
Even though we knew we weren't, but it
created instability. And, um,
so I do regret that. And, and, and the
kids talk to us about it. I mean,
it's not like it's the big elephant in
the room. We talked about,
we have very open
communication. I mean, they're fine.
Well, we've gone to
their, uh, frat parties.
Yeah. Oh yeah. We've drank
with the kids. So that was,
those were isolated incidents, but the
kids are totally just so everyone knows
kids are totally fine.
Um, but I would say that's,
it's positively affected the kids
probably in that that's not happening.
There's no chance of that
happening. And I want to be clear.
Every time we drank, we didn't fight.
It's those rare times we did that it was
just like a stupid drunken fight.
Yeah. I don't know what, what, why? I
know people go through it.
I grew up around it. Um, like I remember
my aunt and uncle,
they were both just raising alcoholics
and they were from Jersey city.
I won't name them by name. I
don't want to upset my mom,
but man, they had some good ones. I
remember my aunt and they were fighting.
They'd been drinking all
night. They hadn't slept.
And I was sleeping over at my other
aunt's and they got
in a fight and my aunt
was ready to hitchhiker,
catch a bus back to Jersey city,
but there's no buses where we live.
Right. Right. She's hitchhiking and
there's no one picking up hitchhikers.
Yeah. So yeah.
Yeah. It's yeah. So yeah, I think it's
for hundreds of years,
but it's been going on, you know? Yeah.
I don't think you and I
ever had anything in public.
I think this was always in the house.
Yeah, probably. We're not very public.
It was really just you stepping out of
line, get a couple drinks in you.
You step out of line. Yeah.
You were, you were a saint.
I think I was always,
always so saintly. So overall,
not drinking. How's
that affected say your,
your psyche and your worldview we've kind
of touched on some things.
Yeah. I'd say I'm more
content. I'm more at peace.
I have more energy.
I feel like I've gotten to
know myself in my mid, in midlife.
I've gotten to know myself better. Um,
and I've been able to have
a lot of self reflection.
I'm proud of myself and that those words
never come out of my mouth.
All the time, but I am proud of myself
because it wasn't easy and it's not easy.
I mean, and I don't want to make,
so I would say I would characterize
myself as I was a
functioning alcoholic and
it's not easy. I don't
want to make this sound easy,
especially for people that are struggling
with alcoholism or giving it up.
It's not easy to do. And you do still
crave a drink. You know,
like I would love to be able to pour a
drink every night and still have that
lifestyle. You still
want to have that drink.
Well, have you, have you
reintroduced? And I know I think,
feel like you have, but
yeah, no, I, I, I have,
let's go back to
second. So when you stopped,
feels like you might've been this year,
right? January 1st, I'm done cold.
No, it was January of 2023. Okay. So
we're on your year and a half,
year and a half into this.
So when you first stopped,
you went some period of time and I
remember there was some milestone event.
Right. So I stopped in January and I
didn't drink until our
daughter graduated in
May. Yep. That's right.
So that was a decent amount
of time. Yep. Then I, so I,
I drank at two days of
that weekend, like at dinner,
the two dinners we had. Um, and then I
didn't drink and that was fine.
I was fine stopping. It
didn't lead me to wanting to drink.
And then we were on vacation
in July and there was a family
reunion and I drank up in
Jersey at the family reunion.
That's right. Yeah. So I drank at the
family reunion and I drank a few other
days of that trip. We
were with our cousins,
your cousin, but my cousin's here. Um,
and so I drank, but then stopped.
And then I feel like in
September I had a drink or two,
don't know why stopped. And then, um,
September might've been anniversary or
something. Yeah,
that's probably it. Yeah.
So, so have, so this, this actually,
almost like a sense, right? This is,
this is how I drink. So I, um,
I drink special occasions
and holidays. So there's,
unless or if we're out to dinner and I
feel like it like the other night we
were out to dinner and I had two glasses
of wine. And then when we got home,
I wanted another glass of wine and I keep
non-alcoholic wine in the house in our
wine fridge. And I poured myself a
non-alcoholic glass,
a glass of non-alcoholic red wine, just
to have that. I'm big about my glasses.
So I like to have things
in wine glasses or like,
if I put this in the glass,
then it feels psychologically,
it feels like I'm having a drink. And
that, that's a different way.
I handled things. So I wasn't hung over.
I drank a lot of water.
I wasn't dehydrated. I
didn't want to drink the next day.
So sometimes out to dinner
holidays, special occasions.
And you, would you say at
least I think I know the answer,
but I'm curious to hear your response.
Would you say you you're pretty guilt
free about it? You have a drink.
If you had a glass of wine tonight,
you're feeling pretty guilt free,
or is that kind of the
hang with you at all?
I don't feel guilty like I'm breaking my
streak or that I'm going to go back to
drinking regularly. I'm just very
conscious of what it
could be doing to my health.
That's kind of where I'm
at. And I get hung up on that.
So I try to either only have one or two
and counter it with non-alcoholic stuff
or with a lot of water or tea. Um,
I have overindulged a
couple times and gotten drunk.
Yeah, I have. You're the
accidental. Oh shit. Yeah.
I didn't eat enough. Um, and then you
just start drinking.
I've done it a couple times. I've gotten
drunk. I'd say two times. And,
I'm not very much though, right? Not very
much. You lose your tolerance.
I lost my tolerance to solo. And I was
the one night I was just a drunken mess.
This hot girl mess.
Um, nothing bad happened.
Like both times you and I didn't fight.
Nothing bad happened.
I just, I'm just a, just mess. And I was
actually, I think we had some fun with
you. I think you did mess around with me.
We didn't paint like funny years.
No, but you know what?
You're gibberish. We had fun with. Yeah.
But I was so hungover. Yeah. And that
just, those times reminded me,
this is why I don't want this. So alcohol
is no longer a part of my life.
It's something I visit and I've been
successful. Yeah. I, I visit it.
Yeah. How are you? But
many, many people can't do that.
So that's why I don't want to like make
this seem like, Oh, it's so easy. Yeah.
I mean, I have my own
thing. I struggle. I also,
and we'll talk about
this in another episode,
but I've suffered from an eating disorder
for a good part of my life and still
have an interesting relationship with
food. So if I was
listening to someone that
was like, Oh, I just solved my eating
disorder, everything's fine. I'd be like,
Oh, what a bitch. Like it's not that
easy. So nothing's easy. No,
but there may be nothing
good for you as easy. I know,
but there may be people listening that
have a harder time with alcohol and are
like, she's making it sound so
easy. I'm just saying for me,
I was able to step away
from it and I can visit it,
but I understand there are people that
can't and I get why they can't.
And I don't know why I can't, I thought I
wouldn't be able to.
So far I've been fine with that. I've
been able to
moderately have it in my life,
but it's a mental thing.
Yeah. I am telling myself,
you will not have another drink tomorrow.
I don't think about
it personally. Do you?
Not a ton.
Just sometimes there's
days or nights where I'm like,
I'd love to have a glass of wine or I'd
love to have them. I'm, cause you know,
gosh, there is nothing like
a martini with blue cheese.
I want to have one. I know a martini.
So, and I don't mean to trigger anyone
who's listening to this that might be,
um, not drinking, but for
me, those are those moments.
And I just have to think, no, cause I
have to think, okay,
how are you going to feel? How does it
feel afterwards? And it's a lot of,
that's where I go
really, because I don't,
I have, you know, I kind of ask you about
your psyche, but for me,
I don't like to drink because I don't
want to feel like shit for the next three
days. Yeah. And I
don't like that, that, uh,
what's the right word persistent. I don't
want it stuck with me.
Yeah. And I want to be able to wake up
and feel good. Yeah.
And I hate that that's that. So it's not
guilt, but it's regret.
You have a drink or two and you wake up
feeling like shit. And then you're,
it lingers till the next night, the next
day. Oh, easily. I hate that.
Well, it's a toxin. It is. It's a poison.
It's a poison. And it's,
it's a poison and toxin that your body
is, as soon as it goes in your body,
your body's ready to fight. Yeah. So your
body, you know, it's, it's,
you're not supposed to feel,
you feel good for that moment and then
you're just ravaged. So,
yeah, you know, the,
uh, we didn't touch on it,
but for me,
I one of my primary drivers for not
wanting to drink
besides not wanting to feel
shit for three days. But
I, I believe, I know this,
it's a fact alcohol feeds cancer.
So I consider it my, my cancer prevention
program or part of it, right?
Limiting refined
sugars, limiting alcohol.
The cancer loves, loves
the bad stuff. It does.
Now I won't give up pizza
and I won't give up ice cream,
but alcohol and everything else is pretty
much off the table. Yeah.
Health wise, you
know? Yeah. No, it's, it,
definitely that that goes along with the,
um, the part of inflammation,
just all of that stuff. So it is, it is,
it is preventative care, you know,
to have a healthy relate,
to have no relationship with alcohol or a
healthy relationship,
relationship with alcohol. But I will
tell you it, it's insidious.
It it's such a part of our society. It's
such a part of mom life.
And there were so many years where the
mommy drinking wine thing
was so prevalent and it
may still be, I'm not in the,
the young mom community, obviously. Um,
and it's so accepting, totally.
But I think it creates a lot of
functioning alcoholic
women who are already under
so much pressure raising
children, usually working,
usually working, um,
and then coming home,
taking care of their children, taking
care of their house.
There's just so much that a woman carries
and it's also one of the reasons she
may drink. Um, but then the drinking also
just deteriorates so much of her
health and her psyche.
So it's a vicious cycle.
And that mommy wine
culture temporarily helps things,
but it really makes it worse. It's tough
cause it's also a social thing.
So it's a social support system to be
around other women and other moms.
It's a tough one. It's a
tough one. You know, it's,
it's easy to just down bottles of wine
when you're in that situation.
So what would you say
your overall perspective or
relationship is at this
point of view of, of alcohol?
I mean, I, I just, I have, don't judge
anyone for drinking. Um,
alcohol, like I said,
is something I visit.
I hope my kids have a much better
relationship with
alcohol than I did or you
I hope that they come to these
discoveries much
earlier in their life. Um,
you're Irish. I'm Armenian.
Both of our cultures drink. Um,
so you know, and we're very celebratory.
And when we throw
parties or social events,
it's one of the first
things we buy and we always will.
We have a bar in our house and I'm not
getting rid of that because that's a
social center of our home.
So I'm not altering everything just
because of these
health choices we've made,
but I'm just hoping that they can be
adapted in just a healthier way that that
continues. I think it will. And I hope
that I hope for the kids that they,
that they adapt to a healthier, I mean,
not that they have issues now,
they don't. So, you know, I
hope that it stays that way. Um,
but again, like I said,
I think the younger generation Gen Z is
way ahead of the game.
Then, um, Gen X and
millennials when it comes to alcohol,
I'm, I'm so surprised.
Well, they are in on a few fronts. Um,
alcohol, smoking. Yeah. Well, the vaping
shit drives me crazy.
Yeah. I would say millennials were the
ones who really got rid of the smoking.
I thought, but maybe it's
Jen. I lose track of it.
It might be Gen Z, but, um, no, it might
be Gen Z, but the vaping. Okay.
So that's, that's a big one. That drives
me crazy. It's horrible.
I'd rather they have cigarettes available
than this shit that's coming in from
foreign countries with who knows what the
hell's in it. Yes. I agree.
The fact that it's legal
is insane. Yes. It's crazy.
I have such an issue with vaping. It's,
it's where I draw a hard
line with my kids is vaping. Um,
and once you do it, it's, it's,
I think it's harder to quit than
cigarettes and that's
saying a lot because it's
hard to quit cigarettes.
It's incredibly hard to quit,
but I think it's harder to quit vaping.
It seems like it's so accepted and you
can do it everywhere.
Yeah. That's the problem.
So I think Gen Z does have that battle,
but at least they're countering it with,
um, and I'm just, I never thought that I
never really thought about it.
You know, that a general whole generation
changing their outlook on alcohol.
So what's, what's kind of interesting.
It's a whole different topic probably,
but alcohol and
smoking is less prevalent,
but now there's more,
well now shit, you know,
pots legal in most states, if not, uh,
recreationally it's
it's a medically legal,
but now there's a lot
of, you know, there's this,
this undercurrent of
psychedelics too for medicinal purposes.
Microdosing not even
medicinally talking about it.
Medicinally is the gateway to making it
recreationally acceptable. Yes.
And I'm fine with that. I think far
better choices in microdosing and
psychedelics than the in vape, even
alcohol, quite frankly.
No, I know there's the
vaping thing. Yeah. No,
it's interesting how it's expanded. So,
and maybe that means Gen Z is doing more,
um, like you're saying more,
more drugs, you know, more like, you
know, more record, more microdosing or
yeah. I think they call
it weed. It's so funny.
It's come full circle because it was weed
back in like the sixties and seventies.
And then we were, we call it pot and I
think they call it weed.
Yeah. I'm still
predisposed to calling it weed.
I think so.
Yeah. I struggle to call it cannabis.
Hey, let's go score some cannabis.
I don't know anybody who calls it that.
Let's go score some weed.
Let's go get some buds. No
one says buds except Gen X.
I think that's definitely just us. They
would say that, but yeah. So
Scooby snacks. Yeah. No, no one says
that. No, don't say that. I mean,
I, I think overall this has just been,
it's such a positive
thing for both of us.
And at least I can say for me, um,
and we're going to talk more about the
other healthy changes that I made that
I made, those healthy changes would not
have occurred if I hadn't given a
bowel call. If we hadn't
made that change, you know,
I do think that in that sense, it's very
foundational because if you
stop drinking, you, everything we talked
about, you have more energy,
you're a president
blah, blah, blah. Yeah.
That lets you get
into doing other things,
whether it's hiking or walking or biking
or lifting weights or
meditating, cold plunging. That's a
whole, whole new world.
Yeah. That's good stuff. Gardening.
Gardening. Yeah. Working in the yard,
landscaping all this.
Yeah. All the things.
And it's not saying that people don't do
that and drink. I think maybe.
I mean, way was a raging drinker, right?
And then he killed himself.
Yeah. So I wrote some classics and sailed
the Caribbean and caught some huge
fish. Yeah. Yeah. No. I'm people are very
functional. It's just for me.
I couldn't be anymore. And again,
it had to do with how do I see myself in
the future, the future me.
So me now is trying to
help future me. Yeah.
And I'm hoping future me looks back and
says, Oh, I'm so glad that you did that.
So I'm really, it's a
forward thinking attitude.
And maybe when you hit your fifties, you
really start forward thinking, you know,
you face your mortality and all that, but
maybe you start forward thinking more.
The first part of your life
is just, you're just doing,
and then maybe once you hit your fifties
midlife, you're looking ahead and you're,
you know, to your
point there, look ahead.
And do you want to, I, if I want to die
quickly, whatever that is,
I want it to be fast. I don't want it to
be some cancer. It's just grinding on me.
Right. Cause I've seen that at the end of
that show, we've all been to that.
And you kind of want
to go out, I think fast.
So you want to be old and die fast.
Yeah. I just don't want to
have a bunch of ailments, right?
And you want to keep, you
want to have all your faculties.
You want to be able to walk up steps and
down steps and maybe go up a hill.
You want to be able to pick up your
grandkids, you know, walk the dog,
all that stuff and
play basketball with them.
You've got to, in order to do that, you
know, and this is a whole, you know,
I think we'll kind of get into these
topics. Um, but you do need to do like,
you have to lift weights or resistance
training. It doesn't
have to be the weights,
but it's got to be stressing your
muscles. You've got to stay active.
You've got to stay limber, be able to
stretch, whatever those things are,
whatever it keeps you, but again, you got
to be able to move. But again, um,
I personally, I would not have, uh,
tackled and stuck with
any type of workout regimen.
If I was still drinking.
Yeah, I wouldn't have. Yeah. Yeah.
I just know that now some
people can't, I couldn't,
you do that when you're in
your twenties and thirties. Sure.
Yeah. In college, I could get up and go
for a run and I wasn't bloated.
I wasn't feeling like crap. I was, you
know, uh, but as you get older,
Tuesday morning, yeah, it was normal. So,
so that's the story of the first, the
first thing that the first change I made.
And I think we're going to do an,
and the next episode on a whole bunch of
other health changes that we made,
you know, whatever form or platform
you're listening to this on,
you know, shoot us what you guys are
doing too. We're interested to hear what
other people might be doing. Absolutely.
Yeah. Always. All right. Cool.
Thank you. Thank you. Bye bye.