Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Welcome to the alcohol tipping point, podcast. I'm your host deb Maisner. I'm a registered nurse, health coach, and alcohol free badass. I have found that there's more than one way to address drinking. If you've ever asked yourself if drinking is taking more than it's giving, or if you've found that you're drinking more than usual, you may have reached your own Alcohol Tipping Point. The Alcoholiday Tipping Point is a podcast for you to find tips, tools, and thoughts to change your drinking. Whether you're ready to quit forever or a week, this is the place for you. You are not stuck and you can change. Let's get started.
[00:00:40] Thanks for listening to this special q a episode of the Alcohol Tipping Point. I am so grateful for you for sending in your questions. I really want to thank you for that. And if you have any other questions, please send them to me. I'm happy to do whole podcast episodes about topics that you're interested in, and so you can always email me at Alcohol Tipping Point and send me your questions or topics you want me to take a deeper dive into.
[00:01:12] I also want to remind you that if you are looking for support to take a break from drinking, whether for a month or a year, come join the next live alcoholiday group. It is just chock full of a lot of tools to change your thinking about drinking. We have twice weekly meetings, we have daily emails. Just a lot of accountability will help you manage your cravings and just become a better thinker. I think a lot of this is about how do we view alcoholiday? How can we learn other coping mechanisms? How can we manage our cravings without willpower? And how can you get practical tips and tools? And how can you just take 30 days off of not drinking and get all the benefits that's related to not drinking? Like lowering your blood pressure, helping improve your kidney and liver function, having better sleep, improving your mood, having better focus. All the good stuff that comes with being alcohol free. So you can sign up for that. I'll put a link in the show notes, and again, that's at my website, alcoholtippingpoint.com alcoholiday. Because I really feel like this break is a holiday. It's a gift for yourself. And so come join sober. October is our next one. And what a better month. What a great month, really, to take a break from drinking.
[00:02:42] So let's get started with your questions that you sent in. This first question is about marijuana versus alcohol.
[00:02:52] The question is, are they both addicting and harmful? Is one more addicting than the other? I will preface this by saying marijuana, it isn't my thing. It never was my thing. Drinking was my thing. So I don't know as much about marijuana, THC, CBD, all that good stuff, but when we're talking about it, we're going to be talking about the THC part of marijuana. And so just to share marijuana and alcohol, they're both classified as depressants, which just means that they slow down the activity of the central nervous system and they produce a calming effect.
[00:03:34] Marijuana contains hundreds of compounds, and some of those have therapeutic benefits for various conditions like pain, anxiety, insomnia, nausea, vomiting. There has been medical marijuana use for glaucoma, for treating seizures.
[00:03:55] And alcohol is just a simple molecule. It has no medical use as far as ingesting it. Of course, we use alcohol to sanitize and clean, but otherwise we don't use it as a medical use versus marijuana that has, like, a medical marijuana therapeutic use.
[00:04:17] They have found that alcoholiday is more addictive than marijuana. They do still say, though, that weed, weed mary Jane they do say that it is addictive. It definitely has an addictive component. There's some data that suggests even 30% of those who use marijuana may have some degree of marijuana use disorder. So it definitely has an addictive component, just like alcohol.
[00:04:47] However, when we're looking at the health risks of how harmful was one of the questions, marijuana versus alcohol, which one's more harmful? Alcohol, hands down, is more harmful than marijuana, both to the individual and to society? We know alcohol can cause liver damage, brain damage, cancer, heart disease, all kinds of health problems. And then it's also associated with more violence, accidents, injuries and death compared to marijuana. And so I think that that shows, really, hands down, alcohol is worse if we're going to compare the two.
[00:05:29] And alcohol is more addicting as well.
[00:05:34] Great question.
[00:05:37] All right, next question is, is addiction to any substance, alcohol or drugs hereditary? So that's the genetic question.
[00:05:48] And they do find that there is a genetic component to addiction, and they find it's just one of many factors that leads to you developing some kind of disorder, alcohol use disorder, substance use disorder, whatever that is. They don't know how much it contributes, and they actually haven't found like a quote unquote gene, addiction gene. But they have shown that the risk of developing alcohol use disorder is three to four times higher in those with a close relative with a condition. I've also seen a stat that it's 30% higher. So you see various descriptions, various stats related to genetics and addiction.
[00:06:39] And what we do know about addiction is that it's complicated and there are many different ways that we may develop an addiction. And so what I like to stress is did a little loop. I'm going to edit that out.
[00:06:59] And so genetic is one component to developing an alcohol use disorder, but there's also lots of other components. So one would be the age that you start drinking. It could be if you had trauma in your life, if you have a family member in your household that's drinking.
[00:07:21] And that would also probably lead to a very disruptive home life, too. More risk of trauma and those adverse childhood events that they talk about, the Aces. It can also be related to if you're drinking for stress or loneliness or anxiety, if you're drinking to just tamp out those negative emotions versus just drinking at social events. So there are all kinds of factors that go into when you may develop alcohol use disorder, but in the end, anyone can develop it.
[00:07:58] But it does make it easier and quicker. Easier, quote unquote, quicker for you to end up with an alcohol use disorder if you do have a genetic component. So I hope that kind of answers that question.
[00:08:13] This other question is a great question. It says, discussion of strategies to push back against big alcohol. Any active political links, or will it be grassroots? Vote with your nonalcohol spending? Both. What can we take from the demise of Big Tobacco as an example?
[00:08:35] All right, a great question. I love it. It's huge. It has worldwide and nationwide and local components to it. We could really get into this, and I will touch on it, but I think this is worthy of a whole episode on its own.
[00:08:59] A lot of people have said, is alcohol going to end up like tobacco, where people just don't drink in public anymore? In the past, doctors were smoking. They were encouraging smoking to their patients.
[00:09:16] People smoked on airplanes. There was a smoking and non smoking section in restaurants. And that has all changed dramatically. And so what we can learn from the tobacco control policies that might work for alcohol as well would be to increase taxes, raise the purchase age.
[00:09:40] We're already at 21. That's probably not going to work. But that is a control, a public control policy that's, in effect, you can put bans or restrictions on marketing. And so that would be advertising, promotions, sponsorships. We have seen a huge influx of celebrity sponsorships of alcohol products, even non drinkers.
[00:10:10] This makes me so Jennifer Lopez came out with her own alcohol beverage line. She's famously been a non drinker, and she's married to Ben Affleck, who is famously sober, and yet she has her own alcohol line, and it's infuriating. Blake Lively is another one who she doesn't drink, but she's got her own alcohol not mocktail. She has her own alcohol cocktail.
[00:10:41] And so you don't see that with cigarettes. They took cigarettes off television ads, I believe. I don't even remember when that was. And of course, I'm just talking about the United States, really. It's so complicated, our public health campaigns, how we regulate alcohol, it's controlled by the government. And so it's going to be different where you live and even in the you know, you have your federal laws and then your state laws and then your local laws, so many, many different layers to how we're regulating alcohol. But going back to the marketing, that is something that we could do, is regulate how we are advertising and promoting it. We can change how available it is.
[00:11:30] And that I've noticed just from people in my groups, like some people can get hard liquor in a grocery store, some people can't because some people, you can't buy alcohol after a certain time or you have local laws and you can't purchase it on Sundays and it seems very restrictive. But they have shown that those kinds of restrictions can help decrease the amount of alcohol consumed. And then the other one's about warning labels, and this is an interesting one, because on alcohol, at least in the United States, there's no nutritional label or warning label on alcohol products.
[00:12:15] And some reasons why is because alcohol is not considered a food product.
[00:12:22] In the United States, the Food and Drug Administration puts labels on products and they don't label alcohol. So it doesn't have the same labeling requirements as food products. So you don't see the ingredients, calories, nutritional values. Some companies voluntarily put them on their products, on their alcoholiday products, some don't.
[00:12:46] And this becomes complicated too, because alcohol labeling, it's influenced by various stakeholders such as the alcohol industry. And then you have the public health advocates who are advocating for more labels, more information, and then you have the policymakers, the people who are making the laws, and they have different interests about what should or shouldn't be on alcohol labels and what impact it might have on consumer behavior and health outcomes. So the alcohol industry may oppose mandatory labeling that discourages consumption or like, harms their brand image because it's all about money, right? And then the public health advocates, they're going to want labeling that inform people about the risk and harms of alcohol consumption, just like you see on cigarette packages.
[00:13:40] And so that is something to consider and that would be something that would help. They've shown when we started putting those kinds of labels on cigarettes, on tobacco products, we saw just a huge, not a huge, but a decrease in people who were smoking, but also an increase in knowledge and education about, oh, this really is harmful, right?
[00:14:07] This shit can kill me.
[00:14:09] Now, there are some countries and regions that are implementing some labeling. And in the European Union, they have proposed mandatory labeling of ingredients and nutrient content on alcoholic beverages by the end of 2022. So this was an old article, so let me know if you're in the European Union, do you have labels on your products?
[00:14:35] And then by the end of this year, 2023, warning labels on their alcohol products. And that's just part of Europe's beating cancer plan, which aims to help reduce harmful alcohol consumption and prevent cancer. And then in Ireland, there was a Public Health Alcohol Act in 2018 that required alcohol products sold in Ireland to display health warnings, including a warning on the link between alcohol and fatal cancers, as well as information on alcohol content, calorie content, recommended low risk guidelines, and that act also prohibited alcohol advertising in certain places and restricted alcohol sponsorship of events. And again, going back to the sponsorship, I was talking about celebrity endorsements, but think about all the sporting games you're at and all the alcohol ads. Amazing. All the Super Bowl alcohol ads.
[00:15:38] It's everywhere.
[00:15:40] And you don't see that with cigarettes as much. It's not so in your face. So that can be something that would really help just educate and also reduce consumption.
[00:15:53] And then as far as individually, the individual person, yes, buying the nonalcohol drinks, which is a booming industry. Money talks, definitely.
[00:16:04] And then one of the things you're already doing now, if you're listening to this podcast, you're educating yourself about the risks of alcohol, and that can be really beneficial for people. And another thing you can do is join some kind of alcohol policy advocacy group just to help raise awareness and influence your policymakers. A lot of people recommend just writing to your local government, writing to your senator. They are there. They're supposed to represent you and serve you and just voicing your concern for alcohol being a problem.
[00:16:41] There are two groups I just want to talk about that may be helpful, you might want to look into. One is called Alcoholiday Justice, and you can find it on the web. Alcoholjustice.org, that's a nonprofit advocacy organization.
[00:16:59] It's basically an industry watchdog. And so it wants to help promote evidence based public health policies and then organize campaigns against harmful practices perpetuated by the alcohol industry. This one started back in 1987, and so they are really working to seek changes in corporations that make and sell alcoholiday. So a lot of organizations are working on the public health side. This one's on the policy side, and so that's one you could check out. And then the other one, which it's still around, guys. Mothers Against Drunk Driving Mad. That started in 1980, actually, by a mother who lost her teenage daughter who died after being struck by a drunk driver. And I remember that being really big when I was growing up because I grew up in the what's interesting to me is how much women have changed in their views of alcohol. Because if you recall from history lessons, that prohibition back in the 20s was started by women and it was kind of tied also to just the women's right to vote. This is all the United States again.
[00:18:23] And women were really the driving force in recognizing like, okay, this drinking is a concern. I'm concerned about the people in my life who are drinking.
[00:18:37] It's causing accidents, it's causing violence, it's causing all these just harmful effects, public health effects and personal effects, too. And so women were really the driving factor against alcohol, basically.
[00:18:55] And then it shifted because now we've seen such a dramatic increase in the amount of women who are drinking. And with that, the amount of alcohol problems that women have, I think they had shown a study, it was like a 15 year study of women who develop problem drinking. I believe it went from the mid ninety s to two thousand and fifteen.
[00:19:20] So yes, that would be about 15 years, but it showed an 80% increase in women with problem drinking.
[00:19:28] So it's interesting to me that women were for prohibition. We have this huge organization called Mad Mothers Against Drunk Driving, and then we started keeping up with the men and developing our own problems with drinking. However, what we see now in this new kind of, quote unquote, modern recovery, sober, curious movement, it's really led by women again. And women are starting to sound the alarm like, okay, this alcohol thing, this is getting out of control, this isn't healthy, I'm going to take a deeper look, I'm going to change my drinking. And so this whole sober, curious thing is majority run by women. So very interesting to me how this is all playing out in history.
[00:20:20] And the other thing you can do just to help others and really promote just the alcohol free lifestyle is to share your story.
[00:20:34] It is so helpful to share your story, whether you're sharing it with just people around you in your life. If you want to come on the podcast and share your story, it's so helpful. It really is because you're not alone and you can change. And there's others like you who are just kind of stuck in this drinking loop. And so that can really just help inspire and motivate and encourage people. So if you want to help raise awareness and reduce stigma about being alcoholiday free, come share your story, whatever that looks like for you. So, great question. I think we could take a deeper dive into it. I really appreciate that question.
[00:21:20] All right, our next question is why does one's relationship with alcohol change over time from fun and social to lonely and habitual?
[00:21:30] Well, there are a lot of factors that can go into this. One is just tolerance, independence. So over time you develop a tolerance to alcohol. So you're requiring more and more amounts to get the same effect.
[00:21:44] And so that can lead you to just drinking more. And then naturally when you're drinking more, your body's going to want more. And so you develop this kind of dependence on alcohol, whether it's the habit or physical dependence or psychological dependence, whatever it is.
[00:22:02] So that's building up over time.
[00:22:06] What we find is when people use alcohol to cope, when you're turning to alcohol, when you're giving it a job to cope with anxiety or stress, then it can become even more of a habit because your body wants to maintain homeostasis, it wants to move away from pain and towards pleasure. And alcohol has done that, and it does that really fast. So you're learning your go to response whenever you have stress or anxiety or some emotional challenge is to drink. And so you're strengthening your habit.
[00:22:47] Another thing that can happen in our life as we get older is we can have these life events that can increase our drinking. So we actually see a lot of people when they retire that they end up drinking more and developing a drinking problem.
[00:23:06] And part of that is they're just drinking more, they have more time, maybe going to a job, having meaning purpose was keeping them alcohol free. And now there's no guardrails. You kind of had guardrails when you were working because you knew you had to get up in the morning, but now those guardrails are gone. And then the other thing is, as you get older, your body starts to become less tolerant of alcohol and you process it differently.
[00:23:38] I think we can all remember like hangovers when we were teenagers, young adults, no problem, we were up and going just like that the next day. But the older we get, the more the hangovers hurt.
[00:23:52] And that's just part of getting older and then also just our metabolism slows down when we get older and so we're not processing the alcohol as well.
[00:24:05] So those are just a few of the reasons why your relationship with alcohol can change over time.
[00:24:12] Great question.
[00:24:14] All right, so next question. Why does alcohol affect people differently? Whereas my spouse can have one or two every few weeks, no problem. I can never have just one and have a tendency toward problem drinking. Yes, the people that can take it or leave it.
[00:24:34] Man, I have some of those people in my life, so I totally get it. So again, we're just kind of going back to a combination of genetics, biology, psychology, environment, all that stuff. So we have seen that some people do process alcohol differently. There are some people that have a bigger dopamine response when they drink alcohol. So it's more pleasurable to them, so they seek it out more, it feels better.
[00:25:09] And so those people tend to drink more. And the take it or leave it, those are the sippers. Those are the people that don't finish their glass.
[00:25:20] It confounds me, those people. But anyway, we have seen there is a difference in the metabolism of alcohol in different people. And then that genetic factor too, can play a component.
[00:25:35] Like I said, 30% is related to whether or not you have a family history of it. So even though there's not a gene, there's some sort of genetic component related to alcoholiday and the processing of alcohol. Some people have different enzymes in their body. So how you break down alcohol can make a difference. And that can make a difference also in how quickly you become intoxicated and how you feel after drinking. So the quicker you become intoxicated feel that buzz, the more likely you are to drink more to keep that buzz going. I mean, think about when you drink on an empty stomach versus a full stomach. When you're on an empty stomach, you feel it right away. When you're on a full stomach, you don't feel it as much and so you're able to kind of pace yourself. It's those kind of guardrails that we talk about. And if you recall from my conversation with Kyle, the dietitian about people who have had bariatric surgery, part of the reasons they have an increased risk for developing alcohol use disorder is their stomach is smaller and they feel the effects of alcohol quicker. So the quicker you metabolize them, the quicker you feel it, the more you're going to keep drinking to feel that buzz, the faster you feel the buzz, again, it can be environmentally how you grew up. So someone that started drinking, you were mentioning your spouse who could take it or leave it, maybe they didn't start drinking till they were in their twenty s and you started when you were in your early teens, so they're still catching up to the drinking. And the interesting thing is, eventually we could take a person, we could put them in a room, and we could make them become addicted to alcohol because it's exposure over time, right? And so what we find is everyone has a ceiling where they hit that level where drinking becomes a problem. And so some people are going to hit that ceiling sooner than others. And the people that will hit that ceiling sooner are the people that started drinking at an early age, have a family history of drinking, are drinking because of trauma, or are turning to drinking as a coping mechanism. So those people are going to hit that problem ceiling sooner than the other person who maybe didn't even start drinking till later in life. Maybe they're the retired person that we talked about who didn't start drinking as much or as often until they retired. So lots and lots of contributing factors go into this question.
[00:28:33] So thank you for asking it.
[00:28:36] Next question is, do you believe there is a difference between people who get addicted to alcohol out of habit or coping badly to a life circumstance or self medicating due to underlying issues like anxiety versus the people talked about in the Big Book, described as having a mental obsession combined with a physical? Allergy the people that mostly from the start of putting alcoholiday in their bodies have an issue. Okay, so is there a difference between people who it sounds like, is there a difference between people who like it right away and kind of know, like in high school, let's just say early on, like, okay, I have a problem, I have an issue. Is there a difference between those people and then people who have developed this bad habit or they had a life circumstance or they're self medicating? Is there a difference between those two people?
[00:29:36] All right, well, that's a good question. And I think again, it kind of goes back to is it genetics? So is there something in problem drinkers brain that makes us process alcohol differently and makes us like it more. And again, they haven't found an alcohol gene, an alcoholic, quote unquote gene. There are genes that can increase or decrease our risk for developing a problem. And the same thing goes like the question was alluding to our childhood experiences. Are any traumatic events having another mental illness like anxiety and the level of stress we have as adults? So all of those would make it more likely for you to develop a drinking problem. They have found, though, that some problem drinkers have a greater release of endorphins. So that's interesting. So again, that's how we're processing the alcohol. So for some of us, when we drink it, alcohol feels fine, it feels okay. Those are the take it or leave it people. And then for others, it's amazing. And if it feels amazing for you, then the more likely you are to drink because we want to feel good, right?
[00:30:53] And so I think that kind of helps answer the question. So I would say, yeah, there probably is a little bit of a difference between people and how they develop a drinking problem.
[00:31:06] Once you get to that problem, though, that ceiling that I said everyone has the potential for hitting, it doesn't matter as much anymore how you got there. What matters is how are you going to get out and how will you unwind it? And so I always emphasize like, okay, let's not focus on the problem, let's focus on the solution. And so that can involve taking breaks, taking medication, going to counseling, just undoing this habit that you've gotten yourself into.
[00:31:41] All right, next question. How long does it take a couple of glasses of wine per night drinker, no daily hangovers to get past that desire of wanting to have it nightly? When does it get easier?
[00:31:55] Yeah. So when do the cravings go away?
[00:31:58] This is so different for everybody. I don't have like a scientific answer, but I will say anecdotally based on the many people on my podcast and who I've worked with and myself, the number we have come up with is six months. Probably about that six month mark is when you don't have as many cravings. I would say even after the first 30 days when you can really get it out of your system, then your cravings start to go down and it gets easier. So if you're someone that this is why I recommend taking like a continuous break just to see how you feel and if your cravings go away. Because if you're someone that is constantly going back to drinking again and again, then you're constantly feeding that habit loop, that feedback loop of drinking, that craving loop where you want a drink. And so the longer you can separate yourself from alcohol, the easier it's going to get. Yes, it's hard at first, but it will get easier. Will cravings go away completely? I would say no. I still occasionally get them. They're kind of like flickers. It's like a little itch, but I don't have to scratch it. I just kind of notice it. And it's usually tied to something.
[00:33:26] The last one I had, I was actually driving to my friend's house. I was going to stay at her house. She was out of town, so I was going to be alone. And I realized as I was, because it was a two and a half hour drive, I started thinking like, you know, I could drink tonight. I'll be alone, I'll be in another town. No one will know. How will they know?
[00:33:52] And I really was like, whoa, where the hell did that come from? That was this summer. And I realized it was the being alone in that whole halt acronym. Hungry, angry, anxious, lonely, tired.
[00:34:06] Part of it was like, oh, I'm never really alone because I'm married, I have two teenage daughters. And so for me, that was an experience I'm not routinely exposed to. I haven't gotten good at managing my cravings when I'm alone because I'm never alone, I haven't gotten practice. And so that was an interesting one for me. But I wasn't scared of it. I could remove myself and become the observer and be curious about it. And that's what we talk a lot about in the group that I run in the alcoholiday days. It's like how to manage our cravings and how to step out of them and just observe them and just notice them. Like, I'm having the thought that I want to drink. I'm noticing that I'm having the thought that I want to drink. Where could that be coming from? And then checking in with your body and whatnot like, okay.
[00:35:03] And then the other thing is with that desire of wanting to have it, I think a lot of people want to get rid of that desire and they're afraid of it. They're afraid like, oh, I don't want to have a craving. I'm going to go to this event. I'm scared I'm going to have a craving. And so what I would say to that is just instead of being scared of it, expect it. Just expect you're going to have a craving because you've had them most your adult life, right? Of course you're going to have a craving at 05:00. You regularly have cravings at five.
[00:35:41] Know, I would expect it. And sometimes it can help to just label that craving given a name like Ursula, like Ursula the urge. So Ursula is very punctual. She shows up at 05:00 every night after work, right?
[00:35:57] She's at every party that you go to. She shows up when you are having a stressful day at work. Ursula just shows up. And instead of being afraid of her, just expect her like, oh, hey, knew you'd be know, and just notice her. Notice the craving and tie it into whatever's going on to you. Oh, of course you're. Here, Ursula. You're always here at dinner time, or you're always here when I go to a party.
[00:36:30] And so that's just a way of kind of examining it and not getting all tied up to it. You don't have to drink because you have a craving.
[00:36:39] You can just ride that craving out. It's an emotion and it's a feeling, and no feeling is final or they all go away.
[00:36:50] It doesn't seem like it seems like it's going to kill you at the time, but it won't. The feeling won't kill you. The craving won't kill you. The alcoholiday might, but the craving won't. So that's just kind of my answer to that question. When does it get easier?
[00:37:07] Our last question, last question today is how do I take a break when I can never seem to get myself into the mindset of fully committed? What a great question.
[00:37:19] And so common, right? I think a lot of people end up taking a break or changing their drinking because you feel miserable. You just get to a point where it's taking more than it's giving. That's that alcohol tipping point. Right? And so your motivation for taking a break is because you feel like shit. Now, if you're a one to two night drinker, if you're not having as many negative effects, but, you know, like, this isn't good for my health, I should take a break. So then how do you become committed? And so what I would say is just I would find your why, first of all, just list all the reasons why you're wanting to take a break, why you want to be alcohol free. Write them down, get it out of your head and onto paper.
[00:38:12] And then I would just start small.
[00:38:15] I would start with a weekend or do a ten day break. I have a free ten day email. It's in the show notes.
[00:38:25] Start small.
[00:38:28] And that can kind of help you and help you manage it and make it not feel so overwhelming. And then if you want even more of a break, you could do the 30 day alcohol day. You could come join the October group. And then you're building in an aspect of accountability, and you're getting support and you're tying it to a timeline. I think that for me, anyway, it's very helpful for me to tie my goals into timelines. So that's why I like to do alcoholiday every month, because you're starting at the first of the month. You have your day one, day two, day three. You're tracking it.
[00:39:15] You know, there's an endpoint, the 31st. After that date, you can decide if you want to drink again or not or what you want to do. But you have a manageable timeline that you're working on. So I would do that. Some people just need to visualize your goal again. So sometimes you're writing it down, sometimes you're visualizing it. What do you really want for yourself and for the future? And what is that going to look like a year from now?
[00:39:48] What role do you want alcohol to play in your life?
[00:39:52] And then I think a good thing. I do think what you're doing now, listening to this podcast, learning from others, reading books, that's all really helpful. That's all part of the planning process of making a change, because sometimes there's this whole trans theoretical model of change. And so this is how we make a change. We have pre contemplative stage. We're not even recognizing we want to make a change or have a goal, right? And then we have contemplative change that stage of contemplation, of thinking about it. And that's what a lot of these podcasts are for. Like, okay, I'm thinking about changing my drinking. I'm gathering information now. We can kind of get stuck in this stage. We can get stuck in it. I've heard it called analysis paralysis, where we're just reading about it, listening about it, but we're not really practicing it. So be aware of that. That's why it helps to like, okay, I'm going to do this weekend, or I'm going to do the month of October or whatever that looks like for you. And then you also have a planning stage. So the planning stage might be the week before or, okay, here's my start date. I'm going to get all my alcohol free drinks. I'm going to tell people I'm taking a break. I'm going to sign up for a program or whatever that looks like.
[00:41:23] And that's part of your planning phase. And then action phase is when you're actually taking a break, when you are practicing not drinking daily, that's the action phase, when you are practicing being alcohol free.
[00:41:40] And then after that comes maintenance. And then it just becomes part of your life. So that's how we change. So I would just say it's a normal feeling to not feel committed. And you can use some of these steps to kind of help you take that next jump, that next step, the next leap. But again, just make it small and manageable so that you can be successful.
[00:42:09] All right, well, I am going to wrap it up. I really appreciate all the questions. Again, please keep sending me questions. You can email me. Alcohol Tipping Point if you want to join that October group or the next alcoholiday just Alcohol Tipping Point. Alcoholiday and podcast listeners can use the code Love L-O-V-E Capital, all capitals to get 20% off guys. It's less than $3 a day. It's really manageable. And it's a small group. It's not hundreds of people. Our September group has 20 people. So you won't get lost in it. You'll get lots of support and access to me. So I would love to see you in there. If not, that's okay too. I have a lot of free resources on the website, and there are a lot of free and paid for resources out in the sober, curious community. So check it out. Thank you so much. Have a wonderful week.
[00:43:10] Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Alcohol Tipping Point podcast. Please share and review the show so you can help other people too. I want you to know I'm always here for you, so please reach out and talk to me on Instagram at Alcohol Tipping Point and check out my website, Alcoholiday Tipping Point Free Resources and Help. No matter where you are on your drinking journey, I want to encourage you to just keep practicing, keep going. I promise you are not alone and you are worth it. Every day you practice not drinking is a day you can learn from. I hope you can use these tips we talked about for the rest of your week. And until then, talk to you next time.
