Girls Know Nothing - S2 Ep20: Millie Gooch | Sober Girl Society, Culture Shock & Consent Lines

Episode Date: June 21, 2023

GKN is a female-focused podcast hosted by  @SharonNJGaffka @brittcarterr Full Videohttps://youtu.be/ym9-iMK9_2c: GKN Social Channels: Https://linktr.ee/girlsknownothing  Instagram: @girlsknownothingpod  Tiktok: @girlsknownothingpod TikTok: @girlsknownothing

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Message and data rates may apply. No purchase required. Terms apply. Available at pockethose.com slash terms. Yeah. I've liked sobriety, being sober curious. And I think it's always, for me in my young years,

it was down to peer pressure a lot of the time. And I'm sure you've had similar experiences and I didn't realize until like looking at people on social media and people coming out about being sober that it was there was so many people that were doing it yeah um and I put on Instagram asking people that like were sober curious or they were sober if they had any questions and so many people were like what is sober curious and what does it mean to be sober yeah so sober curious is actually a term coined by ruby warrington so she wrote the book sober curious so some people think it means like oh i'm curious about being full-time sober but actually the way that she says it is like you will be sober curious as a permanent state so you will never be like fully teetotal but you will be more

mindful about your drinking habits you'll constantly like reassess you might take a few weeks off and you know see how you feel before you plow on to the next drink so she kind of has it as like a default state so even if you're just like a bit curious about your relationship with alcohol then you are sober curious even if you're like listening to this podcast because you're like oh i want to hear about that then you are sober curious oh I didn't know that so technically I'm sober curious then yeah because you said like you've had breaks and you've taken time off so yeah I would say you are someone who's sober curious for sure I did not know that's what it meant I thought it was like you were literally just in the stages of going completely t total and that was it yeah which I

think is is how a lot of people are using it now i think it's a term that's kind of come into our society and we've almost adapted it and changed it but but technically where the origin is is that it's like a permanent state you learn something new every day you can start telling people you're sober curious now i know but do you know what i feel like i tick so many boxes of like random things already this girl like just adding stuff to this and you've been sober for over five years now right yeah yeah and I can imagine like you're still so young that you probably get so many comments um and things like that and I think one of the things I love about Instagram is that it's easy to like find

your tribe and find people that are also like you but I guess back when you were becoming sober probably not so much yeah which I always say is the whole reason I started sober girl society really like it was kind of from a selfish perspective because when I stopped drinking I did not know a single other sober person and I had so many like questions around it and it was like oh I'm going on a date when do I tell them or does anyone know of like a good alcohol-free drink that I can make and I just didn't have anyone to talk to about it so I was like seven months sober and I looked everywhere online and I found a lot of like recovery communities and obviously there's like AA but my kind of drinking I didn't and I know a lot about AA now I have a lot of friends who have

been through the program swear by the program but at the time all I knew about AA was that it was like how it's depicted on screen yeah so I thought I'm going to go into a room it's going to be 50 year old men and they're going to laugh at me when I say actually I can go a few weeks without drinking but when I do drink I just binge drink into oblivion so I didn't have like a community so I looked around looked on Instagram couldn't find anything and I thought well you know I know how to use Instagram that's cool and like kind of at the same time I was working in in journalism and I'd started writing pieces about sobriety so I started just like putting them into the community being like oh does anyone relate to this and I thought maybe oh 10 of us will meet up and then that'll be it and it just snowballed like it just I don't know what it was people are

like oh how did it grow so quickly and I'm like I just think there was nothing else out there so if I felt like I needed it then other people must have needed it too yeah because I feel like if you say to somebody I'm sober because I went through an AA program I feel like it's more socially acceptable to be like yeah actually okay I'm going to accept you're sober whereas if you're doing it by choice they probably don't accept it the same way like I remember back when you were becoming sober I was working in Westminster and I remember the person sitting a couple of desks behind me reading the paper about how young people were becoming sober drinking less um taking less drugs going to the gym spending more money whole foods and the comment

was young people just don't like to have fun anymore yeah which is is so wild because i just don't know where well i do know where that comes from because we have such a strong cultural bond with alcohol and we can't imagine having fun without it which was one of I think my biggest discoveries and shocks as well that actually I was still fun and I still enjoy doing all the same things which yeah that is one of the biggest stigmas I'd like to get rid of that that sobriety is boring for sure yeah I think you know um I've had lots of different questions that people wanted to ask you about sobriety and about how you manage different aspects of your life and I guess one of the things is about well we can go from

managing like events and like wanting to go to places like festivals and stuff where you're surrounded by alcohol what was it like the first time you went to something like that being sober? Yeah so I always say I'm like quite stubborn and so when I stopped drinking all my friends are like you're going to be so boring it's really lame and I kind of went you know what I'm going to prove you wrong so like my first night out I was literally like a week sober and it was my friend's birthday went out in Shoreditch and people were like dropping out throughout the night like one o'clock one of our friends would like say bye and I was like I have to be the last person here just to prove your point so I'm there four o'clock it's just me and my friend who it's her birthday she's like leaving her presents everywhere I'm like going

around scurrying up like after her and I was like I just have to do this and actually I don't recommend it to everyone because I think sometimes you need to ease yourself in but for me it was actually such a good like baptism by fire because I was like do you know what if I can do this like taking my friend to get cheesy chips at 5am like completely slain cold sober I was like I think I can do anything so like in a way it was it was such a good thing but it is a complete culture shock doing something like that sober I'm just wondering how you managed to stay awake until 5am pounding the red bull like absolutely pounding the red bull I think the next day I still woke up like jittery because I'd had so much caffeine but was it hard to manage your friendships going into that transition of being like the fun party girl to being completely sober?

Yeah, I think so. Like as a personal thing, I think my identity was so wrapped up in like being the party girl. It was like, oh, we're going out less like Millie will definitely be up for it. I was always a friend that you would like call if you wanted a night out. So that like as a personal thing was really difficult but also yeah trying to explain it to other people and I think my friends I always say were really like ambivalent at the beginning because I told them we've all said it I'm never drinking again like I must have said it thousands of times so I said I'm not drinking anymore and they were like yeah all right and

we'll see you next week yeah and I think it kind of got a few months down the line I always say like I went on holiday with my friend Char and she said to me oh but you're gonna drink aren't you when we're away and I was like no and then you just kind of saw the realization like dawn on her face actually this might be like a permanent thing and then I think by that point it was almost too late they'd seen that I was happier they'd seen that I was healthier they'd seen me on nights out I could still do all the same things so by that point they were kind of like oh just let her get on with it but I think some of my relationships definitely did change with people but I think on the whole I was actually quite lucky yeah because I think that I've had a couple of stints where I've been completely sober and in my earlier 20s I lost all of those friends because you know they were going

through their uni phase all of that party and stuff whereas I was just like no I'm not doing it and I mean it was fun at times when I was going home with more money than I went out with because I was everyone's taxi but they just they didn't get it yeah and I think one thing that scares a lot of people from jumping in is that they don't want to lose the friends they have yeah or like what do they do with the people they surround themselves with don't get it yeah and i i totally understand that and i think people don't necessarily have to get it but they just have to respect it like there's things that my friends do or like hobbies my friend ran a half marathon this weekend i don't get it like marathon's just not for me i'm like you hate it every minute like it's so painful i can confirm I just yeah like you've done a marathon

I know it's not for me I don't understand it but I respect it and I text and say you know congratulations that's incredible like so proud of you and they do the same when I like hit any milestones I don't think you have to necessarily get it to respect it I think as well as well one thing as well that I would put out there for me the friends that I've lost or like bits where I've been sober and realizing I don't like the people that I used to hang out with when I was drunk it just means you keep better friends yeah better company yeah and you don't have to force yourself to people you don't actually like exactly the quality is better even if the quantity goes down because I think you actually connect with people that you really have things with in common I think that's like another people that you really have things with in common

I think that's like another benefit of dating when I was drinking I would go on dates with anyone and be like I had a great time it's just because I was drunk like sober dating was a revelation for me for actually working out like who I could have a good conversation with and who I could connect with so it makes those like conversations much better I think yeah actually now like you said that I remember like the last person I dated like properly was back in December yeah and our second date was so good I was drunk yeah the day the day afterwards I was like I really don't like you yeah I would fall in love with anyone when I'd had like enough gin I would go home to my mom and be like they're the one buy a hat get married we'd

go out on the weekend sober and I'd be like they are so fucking boring like I just don't know what was going through my head but it it does it can do that to you do you think it puts people off wanting to go on a date with you if that if you tell them you're sober yeah I think I think it has done but I do think things are changing so when I first stopped drinking like five years ago I was single and when I would tell a lot of people like before a day they their replies weren't always nice I think like some of them were like well okay well how do we even have fun I remember one guy actually said to me how would I get into your knickers if you don't drink and I was like that is creepy and shocking. So definitely that was awful.

But I then was single again, like three years later, went back on the apps. And actually a lot of people seem to be more respectful. It's almost like it has really kind of gone a bit more into the mainstream and everyone seems to like know someone who didn't drink. They'd be like, oh, that's cool. Like my brother doesn't drink or I've been thinking about cutting down like it does seem to be getting better but I mean you still get the the people that are like oh god how boring but again it's I think quality over quantity like why would I ever want to be with someone that doesn't support me making choices

that do not affect them in any way that make my life better and make me happier like that's going to be the type of person that it's gonna be like, why are you going to the gym? Or like just anything. So I'm like, that is not the type of person. I want someone open-minded, like on board with it. And they don't have to be sober. Again, they've just got to get that you are.

I guess it means that they have to make, well, both of you have to make more effort to find things that are enjoyable outside of alcohol, right? Yeah, definitely. It actually, I think on first dates, it forced people to get quite creative and be like, oh, if you don't drink like I went on like kayaking first dates and I always sound like a pro at mini golf now because I've been so many times I'm dangerous at mini golf like I've learned that and I think that might be the booze yeah yeah but so are you

single now no no so when you first told them what it was like yeah what did what was their response they were actually so good about it like that it just I think this is the thing as well I I don't think I could be with someone whose like life is wrapped up in partying and drinking just because I don't think we would have as much in common that they don't have to be teetotal by any stretch but as long as they're kind of I don't know on a Sunday they're actually like getting up and doing stuff rather than just like being in bed hungover so when I kind of told them about it they weren't really a big drinker anyway so they weren't really like as bothered like you play football and like that's important and not being really hung over so

we were more aligned on on that respect I think that's um we were having a little bit of a conversation like off camera about when you're trying to navigate dating when you're sober when it comes to things like consent I did read like snippets in your um book about how you one of the realizations that you needed to change a relationship with alcohol was that you were in a blackout state having an intimate relationship with a stranger. And like that's terrifying. Terrifying. Yeah. When you wake up and you're like, I have no recollection. And it's such a hard topic because if you then bring alcohol into the conversation, you're kind of, in a way, victim shaming. You're saying you drank so much.

I also know that in a blackout, you can dance, you can speak to people, you can do all these things and have no recollection about it. So for me, like the consent lines are so blurry. Like the next day of being like, I actually don't remember if I consented, but actually I could have. Like it's such a hard conversation to navigate and I think what we need is more like awareness around alcohol and how it affects your brain like I was saying to you off camera with with kind of why you don't remember things a lot of the time alcohol interferes with putting things from your short-term memory to your long-term memory so it's not that you've forgotten those things it's actually those

those memories were never processed so they weren't put into your brain so try as hard as you might the next day you will not remember them so it's about understanding those things and then being able to make a choice about how much you want to drink yeah because i guess in this in those situations like neither party are to blame yeah especially if the other person's also been drinking yeah and it's it's not nice to know that about yourself yeah there's the conversation around consent and alcohol is so tricky because there is an argument that if you are drinking any amount you cannot consent fully because alcohol affects your brain in it like it affects your prefrontal cortex which is responsible for rational decision making

emotional response weighing up right or wrong so what you might agree to when you're sober is is maybe not what you might agree to when you're drinking and vice versa so it's such a tricky conversation yeah and i think that's how i i learned the hard way that the first time i'd be intimate with somebody i have to be sober like I was saying to you about how I went on a date with somebody I was drunk they weren't the first time we were intimate a little bit of a red flag yeah but I was agreeing and consenting to things that were way outside of my boundaries yeah and I wouldn't do sober so that the first time we slept together sober they thought that that was fine yeah and

it's not they're not it's not their fault because technically I agreed to it yeah you should ask for consent every time before you do certain things but yeah I was like what is this like this is not okay with me and then how do you approach that conversation yeah you and you have to like you said kind of every time you need to do that and that's that's one of the things that I've found now like not drinking it's so much easier because you don't let people cross your boundaries and I think just in like life generally like even outside of the bedroom not drinking has made me so good at boundaries because I'm so used to disappointing people now I'm so used to people being like that's really sad but it is like so many people if like I say oh I'm not drinking they're like oh come on it's my birthday many people if like I say oh I'm not drinking

they're like oh come on it's my birthday and I mean luckily I don't get it as much now because they're just used to it and they they can't put their energy into trying but at the beginning I think I was so used to people being like oh okay fine that actually I got better at being like less of a people pleaser in life generally I'd start saying no to things I didn't want to do because I was getting used to for the first time in my life not just going along with it and just drinking because I thought that people would like me if I was a drinker and I was the party girl and I was fun so it just made me a bit more boundaried in my life in general. Talking about boundaries with British culture obviously there's a big culture around booze but there's also a big culture around booze in the workplace

and we were talking about how we both said that we were in industries well we're in industries where booze was so prominent yeah but it's prominent in every industry I guess in some aspects one way or another 100% I've started doing like workplace talks well I've been doing them for a few years but the demand wasn't ever really that high and then this year I've been booked to do so many and it's everyone I speak to they're like oh my industry is really boozy I've yet to meet someone who is like oh my industry is not boozy at all like it just seems to be everywhere like healthcare professions like teaching every industry seems to have kind of like that element to it and I think it's so ingrained in

how we like network and socialize and yeah it's just so hard I think especially like you said with British culture I think especially like you said with British culture I think we also think that being a drinker is actually part of being British like it's so tied up in our like cultural identity that it's really hard to untangle yeah because I think people don't realize that even if you're not drinking on the job it can still be a massive part of like work culture and I think I've been guilty of it in the past like where I've managed a team and been like okay we're going to socialize after work we're going to the pub yeah and I think I've been guilty of it in the past, like where I've managed a team and been like, okay, we're going to socialize after work. We're going to the pub. And I think now that I'm older and I've really deeped it

and I was like, the people that don't drink probably felt really excluded. And that was really bad of me as a manager. And I think that that's, now I feel comfortable talking about it. I want other people to realize, oh yeah, maybe they're not doing right by their colleagues if they're excluding people.

Yeah. And you don't have to take alcohol away. It's just about like putting on more things that everyone can do so I don't know like going to like a flight club or something like that where there's an option to drink but also there's a fun activity if you're a non-drinker I think it's just about varying it and shaking it out because there's also so many reasons why people don't drink religious reasons medication like pregnancy there's so many reasons why people don't drink religious reasons medication like pregnancy there's so many reasons why people in the workplace wouldn't be drinking that it's important I think to have that like diversity of activities um talking about pregnancy as what um quite a lot

of women on my instagram were like how do I stay sober without people asking me if I'm pregnant yeah do you know what it's so hard I actually once got congratulated so I ordered it and I ordered mocked out at a restaurant and the guy came over the waiter came over gave it to me and said congratulations and my boyfriend at the time went oh my god how does he know you're like sober like he thought he was congratulating me like being sober which is such a like male perspective oh that's so innocent and sweet i was like no he's saying congratulations on being pregnant like it just happens do you know what my only kind of method now dealing with it is just like accepting it so like if i'm at a party and i'm not drinking and someone's like oh my god are you pregnant i'm like yeah can i sit down on your

chair because you know i've got a load of it's's the only way I can do it now. Gotta make it work for you, haven't you? Yeah, but it's so hard and it can be so triggering for so many people. Like I just can laugh it off now, but a lot of people stop drinking when they're trying for a baby. Like it's one of the things doctors recommend if you're finding it hard to get pregnant.

It's also, you know, like a lot of people that might've had a miscarriage afterwards because they're going through so much. They're like, okay, I'm not going to drink because, you know, that's when I'm going to probably end up crying about it. So there's so many, like, it's not just asking people if they're going through so much they're like okay i'm not going to drink because you know that's when i'm going to probably end up crying about it so there's so many like it's not just asking people if they're pregnant it's actually quite a triggering question for like a lot of people so i just if you're not sure just never ask someone if they're pregnant it's just

a bit rude isn't it it's like you wouldn't go up to a random person and be like congratulations and it's their weight yeah you just just don't say anything yeah i have had that once though with coffee oh i was ordering a coffee and someone asked me if i was pregnant i was like what's that to do with you yeah so i just feel like as a woman you're gonna get that everywhere yeah yeah so you might as well do it in a situation that you feel like you're in control yeah um and i think that a lot of um people to be fair a lot of the people that have been talking to me about being sober curious and looking into sobriety are very very young like 18 19 yeah and i think that one of the questions that people really wanted to know is like what would you say to the younger version of yourself

that's maybe at university or just graduated that was the party girl yeah what do you think you would say to her and what you think her reaction would be to know that at older her was sober if she knew that i was sober when i was 19 she would think i was so lame like the worst person because i was such a party girl and anyone who didn't drink i was like they are a total loser so that that is such an extreme thing and i think that's also why i really believe that people can change because i'm like i if i look back on the person I was when I was 19, she's a whole entirely different person. But I think I would probably just tell my younger self that like people don't love you because you're a party girl because I think that I just convinced myself

that people liked me because I was the fun friend. I was the one that they could rely on to go on a big night out with. I was convinced that that was the only thing that people really liked about me and that that's when I was at my best is when I was partying and being know being the center of attention and actually like now I've realized my friends really love me for me and all the other things that I bring to the

table and it's not about the fact that I could stay out till 4am and still be the life and soul of the party so I think I think that's what I would tell my younger self I mean if you still get invited everywhere then you must be it means you're actually more fun because you don't have to rely on something to make you fun exactly this is the argument I try and give I'm like I can still have a really good time and I don't need alcohol to do it so how does that make me boring and also like when I was drinking every weekend was just getting pissed being hung over getting pissed being hung over now like every weekend is so different and so varied i'm like it's not boring at all i think that was one of the things that i spoke to my personal trainer

about when i was preparing for the marathon i was like people think i'm weird because i started off by doing dry january yeah using dry january as an excuse for sobriety and then everyone was like and he was like no people actually find it weird like you're lame if you drink now yeah and that you know it's not he tells people not to drink on plans because it's not the alcohol that you're lame if you drink now yeah and that you know it's not he tells people not to drink on plans because it's not the alcohol that you're consuming it's the choices you make after yeah the food choices the things like with boundaries that we were talking about so it's not just what you're consuming it's everything that comes after that yeah and the next day like i would wake up i would be so hungover i'm like i'm ordering a dominoes at like 11 o'clock and

then like the entire day was a write-off. I would like shop to make me feel better. So I'd like just get straight on ASOS and be like, okay, what can I buy that's gonna make me feel better? Like- Is that why the share price has gone down for ASOS? Because you're sober? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Not mine as much anymore. That's why, because the next day, like it's all those kinds of choices that you make that follow it really. I used to do really weird stuff the next day if I had anxiety yeah I'd clean behind the fridge fridge freezer yeah my house face anxiety and then like all your other traits come out of like things that you want to do I didn't think anxiety was a thing until people started unsending messages yeah the next day like I'd get loads of Instagram notifications be like someone's unsent a message and I was like anxiety it's a hundred percent thing so like anxiety comes because of like many different reasons so the first one is actually the chemicals

in alcohol so the way it kind of works when you drink is you get like basically it affects your brain so that you feel really really chill but. But then the next day, your brain has to like almost recalibrate. So it shoots the things that make you feel anxious. This is a really reductive explanation. But it almost shoots the balance backwards. So because of that, you get a spike in like adrenaline and cortisol. And the next day you feel wired because your body is like, oh, hang on. We were too super chill.

We are going to reset that. And it basically puts you on overdrive it's like I always say it's like filling up a bathtub so while you're drinking the bathtub is just filling you pull out the plug and it just shoots out the next day so like so much chemical wise it's a thing but then also because of blackout so if you do drink and you black out you will not remember things so there's also that anxiety of like I genuinely can't remember what I did what I said so you've kind of got like two angles to contend with so anxiety is real but not everyone gets it because I used to get it so bad and I would talk to my friends they'd be like I don't understand why you're like asking me a million times if like you pissed us all off like they just didn't get it some people just don't get it do you think it's

because you push the boundaries of alcohol more than they did yeah quite likely but also like alcohol affects everyone differently so it affects men differently to women it affects depending on your body type and your body composition there's even evidence to show that like your race can have a factor it can depend on what you eat that day like there's so many things that influence how our body metabolizes alcohol that it can affect everyone differently. Do you think being a woman and being sober has so many different kinds of conversations around it to then if you were a man and sober? Yeah, I think so. I mean, there's also like a general stereotype school of thought that women drink more for emotional reasons.

So like because they're really stressed, because they're heartbroken,broken those sort of things and that men primarily their motivation for drinking is social so it's the way that they can bond and open up with their friends so I think there are kind of like different conversations when it comes to stopping drinking like for women it's it's kind of more focused on okay how can you relax without those if you've had a really shit week at work how can you like take the edge off but the conversations from like the men i see speaking about sobriety it's all about like how do you go to the pub with your mates like how do you actually have conversations with them when you are drinking i think there's different kind of conversations that are like the top of the agenda for different people and i was saying to you

earlier that i just feel like as a woman you couldn't win like if you did if something happened to you it's because you drank too much yeah if you're sober you're lame and you're boring and nobody wants to be your friend yeah exactly so then how do you win you can't win but there's so many things in life like you just can't win it's always that like peach analogy of you can be the ripest juiciest peach and there'll always be someone who doesn't like peaches like I think you just can't win I think that is to be fair another thing that surprised me is like taught me about life generally is I'm like I genuinely can't please everyone I can put up a post and I will have one person saying thank

you so much I needed to read this today I've been really struggling and I will have someone else being like oh my god I bet she's fun at parties like you just can't win in life in general my favorite thing to do when I've had a shit week is eat a tub of haagen-dazs and watch Disney plus oh yeah I'm here for both of those things I love a good cartoon musical yeah do you know what I've started doing I bought myself a Nintendo switch a couple of weeks ago and I've started playing Animal Crossing and it's the best decision I've ever made do you know what I'm gonna start doing that because I've got an Xbox so I'm gonna start playing like random games now instead just to unwind yeah my boyfriend's like oh you're right I'm like I'm just fishing on my little island

like you'll just feel like it's the best way to like just get out of your head I went through a really good phase of loving Mortal Kombat so maybe that's what I need to do but um so when you came to setting up Sober Girl Society you were seven months sober and you said briefly about like wanting to find your tribe and reach out to other people did you think it was going to be as big as it is no I really didn't like I thought that there would be like a few of us that would chat and it just snowballed. So like we first of all did one meetup that we literally organized on like an email thread and like took everyone's deposits

for what they wanted to eat that day. Like it was literally me on like email, emailing everyone individually. And then people came for the first one. And I actually didn't think anyone would like turn up. And when they all I was like this is amazing there was like 20 of us in King's Cross and then they all started posting about it and then more people were saying oh I would love to come to something like this so we would do another event and they just kept getting bigger and like growing and then people be like can you bring it up to Manchester can you bring it up to Birmingham so it just expanded like I never in a million years thought there would be such a demand for it and I know you

were saying earlier like there's a lot of kind of younger people asking questions when I first started running the meetups it was people that were like my age at the time so I was like 26 so it was kind of like 26 to like 35 now they are getting younger and younger the people coming i'm starting to feel like their mum slightly like oh god they'll come there like 18 19 and it's just like incredible to see so many young people like embracing it yeah because i when i was stalking your tagged post i saw stuff about um dry disco yeah and i've heard about silent disco and all that stuff I've never heard of dry disco yeah so dry disco myself and Steph Ellswood who is also sober we were both on someone else's podcast and when I went in um the girl Sophie she said oh I've just interviewed Steph she was like you two have to do something together so like me and Steph messaged but afterwards we were like oh let's jump on a zoom

call and Steph runs these amazing like non-profit dance classes called Stay Sassy and she was like maybe we can do like a little Stay Sassy Sober Girl collab and this is how the zoom meeting started and by the end of it we were like let's throw an alcohol-free festival and it just got wild and then we went to see Ministry of Sound because both of us were like wouldn't it be really cool if we can like hold it in an iconic club we went to see the venue and we were like oh we just want one room and they were like yeah that's not how it works you've got to get the whole venue so we were like right let's hope we're doing this so yeah we threw it and it was like 300 people we had like dance classes you had breathwork workshops you had a free booze this bar we had ashley james djing we had like two amazing panel

talks and it was just it was surreal like it was so surreal just looking around being like when I first started like Sober Girls IT I was like 20 people at a meetup and now there's like 300 people in a room who are all curious about this topic which is yeah I mean you had me at free open bar regardless of whether it's booze or not yeah I paid nine euros for a coke in Ibiza so it is wild and ibiza there's no prices like it so like i you had me at free bar but to see like 300 people in a room like i think if all if the music's what you want it to be then you don't have to have alcohol to have fun and the fact it was so it was all women as well and i have never seen anything like it in terms of like the disco

started girls were like taking their tops off slap dropping they were like all around each other in a circle that's what it is I've never seen a club environment like it where people felt so at home to like be really sexy and like get on the floor and twerk and and not worry that they were like being sexualized by other people and to also not have alcohol it was honestly just magical at the end I was just standing really like a right weirdo because I was just staring at people but I was like this is everything I've ever wanted just to see like a room full of people like so happy and just dancing and not drop of alcohol was it aimed to like was

the event aimed towards women or did it just happen to be that women signed up yeah no so we said um women and anyone from the LGBT community was welcome we just really wanted to provide like a fun safe space it's not saying the future you might not open it up but at the moment like that's kind of the audience that we wanted to accommodate so yeah it was targeted at women primarily no that's i think that's probably one of the nice things i think one of the hardest things as a woman sometimes when you go into a club is people being really sleazy and provided and not taking no for an answer and stuff like that so when you feel like you can there is a safe space and you're going to take the opportunity yeah you don't want to get on

the floor and like twerk and because you're worried about all men looking around and being like oh look at her she's just doing it for the attention so like to do it in a room full of women everyone was like clapping and cheering like it was just unreal i'm coming to the next one yeah oh my god please so we're gonna have one in december so that's my birthday month yes and december's the worst month as well in terms of like people's relationships with alcohol like mine in december is the worst yeah and then i think that's why christmas party that you can come to see and then that's nice to know that there's younger people as well because I always feel like when you're worried about going to these events it's just going to

be me in a room with 50 year olds yeah and you also think I think it's so ironic as well when even when I stopped drinking I was like god everyone I meet that is not going to drink is going to be so weird like I just I don't know why I just thought even that it was something that I was doing that other people who didn't drink I like still had that like internalized stigma that people who don't drink are weird and actually I've just met the most like fun normal incredible people who are really just like they partied too hard and now they've had to like rein it back in like they're all super nice super normal and you know what I think one of the things people are doing it younger as well is that one of my friends is sober has been sober for a long time she was drinking at 12 yeah so when by the time I started drinking I was like why are you sober like

I'm 18 now what's going on she was like no I did that just illegally very early on yeah yeah and that's probably why a lot of 19 year olds would be like I'm just not interested in it yeah I think there's like so many reasons why people are drinking less I do think like social media has had I think a good and bad effect on it in terms of like good because people everything feels more accessible like travel feels more accessible starting your own business feels more accessible so like people want to do those things instead of just going out and getting pissed every weekend but also I think there's the other side of it where there's that like fear of kind of instant documentation like you'll go

out and when i went to uni and i'm showing my age here i used to take a digital camera out and the next day would like plug it in upload the photos onto facebook yeah to an album and could delete any that i didn't want now it's like within two minutes you might be like i don't know on someone's snapchat like snogging your co-worker like it's really there's that fear now even like oh god if i go to like the races i might end up like snapped on the mail online drinking a bottle of rose like my knickers up like it's it's just a different world now so i think there's like a lot of things but i think also just the generation are more curious than ever about the things they're consuming so whether

that's the rise in like veganism or sustainability we're a lot more conscious about what we're buying what we put into our bodies and I think also gen z are like the first well millennials and gen z are kind of the first generation to be like why are we just doing stuff because it's always been done like it's not just the way anymore actually we we want to question things and why we're doing it yeah and I think that's coming on to the sober girl society handbook it like skyrocketed into being a top seller like is it on Amazon yeah well yeah you can get it in most most bookstores these days so what was the purpose and reason for you wanting to make the handbook yeah so I I've read

like a lot of sobriety books when I first stopped drinking and so many of them were like incredible and so helpful but I felt like there was kind of a couple of things missing one being that there wasn't really anything of someone young like every book I read was kind of written by someone who was like 35 and older which when I was 26 I was like these people aren't relating to my life so I wanted to write that I thought that there wasn't really much around alcohol mental health like a lot of the books I read were really focused on addiction or physical ramifications of drinking. There wasn't much on the kind of anxiety and the blackouts. So I wanted to write about that.

And also I just wanted something really practical because all the books were like people's stories and they were amazing to read. But then it kind of got to the conclusion of like, oh, sobriety, happy ever after. And I was like okay like yeah I've stopped drinking now but how do I go to a sober festival what do I do when I'm at a hem party and all those things I wanted to make it like really practical and approach as well so that was kind of like why I wanted to write it really and what would somebody that had the handbook what could they expect to get from it essentially yeah so it's like part part memoir part self-help so it's a little bit about my story and why I started drinking and why we all start drinking really in general and then it kind of goes into the mental health aspects of

physical health aspects and then it's really just like practical so every sober thing I've ever done whether that's bottomless brunch hen party like festivals it's like tips and practical advice navigating friendships there's also like lots of experts from other people and their stories so i interviewed loads of sober girls and they kind of gave me their perspectives on a lot of different things and there's a lot of like experts in there who talk about you know how to navigate grief or how to navigate sober sex the benefits of sober sex there's a whole chapter on sober sex so yeah there's there's a lot packed in there yeah I think I when you were telling me that there's a whole chapter on sober sex I feel like that's something that I'm going through like the dating

kind of phase now and that's something that I'm more conscious about myself so I think that that that's so good to know that there's something out there and also I think it will like help alleviate a lot of young people's fears about losing friends, not being able to like maintain work relationships and well, any form of relationship when there's booze involved. Yeah, there's a lot, a lot in there. Like hopefully you can highlight it and bookmark your favourite bit. I'm going to be sat there reading about it on the tube now. People are going to be like, what is this girl reading?

But yeah, no, I think it's nice to know that like you said a lot of people struggle with things when they can't find someone that's relatable to them yeah or has a similar journey and experience to them and even though you know I our relationships with alcohol been very different even though some of the bits I had read I was like yeah that's happened to me oh yeah I can relate to that or like I know people that have done the same thing yeah and I think that's one of the most important things when you start your journey is like again when you say with social media about finding people you can relate to and speak to yeah because it can be isolating especially like I kind of liken it to if you're the only single one in your friendship group and they're all like married or engaged or whatever

they can't necessarily relate to what you're going through so my friends although supportive they couldn't give me advice on things they couldn't say oh this is the point when you should tell someone that you're going on a date with that you don't drink like this is how you navigate dealing with your feelings instead of drinking they just couldn't help so finding people that do get it I think it's just so so important and reading things like that and being like oh my god this person feels the same way I do so what tips would you give to somebody who wanted to support either a sober friend or a sober partner yeah I think um celebrate them is one thing like I love it when my friends are like oh my god like really proud of you because

you hit xyz milestone I think knowing that they are really behind me is so lovely but I think just asking them how they want to be supported so it's someone's hender you're going away say to them like what would make you feel comfortable do you want us to like bring you alcohol-free drinks like do you want to skip this part or are you comfortable coming to this like if you want to leave do you want to just like go and not tell us like just ask them what they're comfortable with I think having like that kind of open conversation is is really important I think always make sure like you're including them in things like even if they say no for the first like six months they might not want to come out but then they might hit six months and actually go okay I'm ready now so don't like stop the invites come in like keep inviting them I think

they're some of the like key things I'd say. I guess it's like a fear thing as well when they're trying to like, when you first try to do something is very scary. Yeah. And then when you realize, yeah, I'm strong enough mentally to be able to go out and do these things

and not participate in certain aspects that I have no interest in. And then I think that's one of the things that people worried like, oh, I don't want the invite to stop coming. So I'm just going to participate in stuff I don't want to participate in. I think that's one of the things that people worried like oh I don't want the invite to stop coming so I'm just going to participate in stuff I don't want to participate in I think that's not a really important message you shared and I think that another question I got is tips for people that want to be sober or like want to start moving into that and how do they tell their friends yeah

so the biggest tip I always say for like if you want to be sober is understand your relationship with alcohol you cannot change your relationship with alcohol unless you understand why you're drinking in the first place so there's a school of thought that people will drink for like two reasons and most reasons will fall under this category one is to increase pleasure so you might drink as you enjoy the taste because it makes you more confident because it makes you happier or it's to reduce pain which could be to reduce stress to feel less insecure so understanding why you drink is the route to changing it so if you drink because you think it makes you more confident then you need to look at how do I be more confident without alcohol

maybe read books on confidence maybe go to confidence seminars and put yourself in scary situations if you are drinking because you think that people like you more when you drink, then you need to really interrogate like why that is. Why do you feel like people only like you because you drink? If you drink because it's the only way you know how to have fun,

look at other things that you might enjoy doing, like connect with hobbies that you used to. I think understanding why you drink is like the biggest way to changing it. So for me I drank because I was desperately insecure I had a lot of like mental health issues I was really struggling with anxiety so when I stopped drinking one of the best things I did was go to therapy talk to people about it went on medication and that was so good but for so long I hadn't been dealing with those things I'd just been drinking instead so yeah getting to the root cause is first first way to change it that's really amazing and um I'm gonna ask you similar last question to what I ask all of my guests

um what would you say to anybody that doubted your ability to stay sober based on the fact that you used to be a big party girl? Oh, do you know what? I always use this. So are you a Friends fan? I am a massive Friends fan. So there's a line where Rachel says, she's talking to her dad on the phone. Like it's like the first episode.

And she's like, what if I don't want to be a shoe what if I want to be which one you were going to talk about as soon as you said that I was like I know exactly which line and I wrote in the book and I always think you can become anything that you want to be if that's what you truly want to be if you want to change your life if you want to make a really really positive change you can do it and all the naysayers like Rachel's dad like look at Rachel by the end of Friends she's like living like without her dad's money she can do it and I think yeah I would just say to anyone you can change the course of your life you can change the trajectory like you just have to to put your mind to it really. I guess think about the people that are around you yeah like be around supportive people. 100%. But congratulations on being over five years sober.

Pregnancy or not, like congratulations on being five years sober. And I think it's amazing. And, you know, even when I talk to people about you coming on the podcast, they're like, I don't know how she does it. So huge respect for you. And I really respect you for being open about a lot of the things that you've had to deal with in your journey to sobriety um even in the snippets of the book that I read so yeah massive

kudos to you and thank you for coming no thank you so much for having me