Sober Motivation: Sharing Sobriety Stories - Quitting Alcohol Without Rock Bottom | John’s Sobriety Story

Episode Date: March 11, 2026

Alcohol addiction doesn’t always look like rock bottom.In this episode of the Sober Motivation Podcast, John shares his story after more than 20 years of drinking and drug use — and the painful realizations that came when he finally got sober.From the outside, his life looked normal. No arrests. No dramatic collapse.But inside, alcohol was shaping decisions, regrets, and memories he would carry for decades.This conversation explores grief, shame, regret, and the realization that some of the biggest consequences of alcohol aren’t the ones people see.They’re the ones we carry internally.Today John is over seven months sober and sharing his story to help others realize they don’t need to hit rock bottom to question their drinking.John on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/withorwithoutbacon/Sober Motivation Community: https://sobermotivation.mn.co/Support the Podcast: https://buymeacoffee.com/sobermotivationContact me anytime: [e-mail] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome back to another episode of the Sober Motivation podcast. Today's conversation with John is one that really stayed with me after we finished recording. From the outside, his life didn't look like what people usually imagine when they think about addiction. No arrest, no dramatic rock bottom moment. But inside, he was carrying years of guilt, shame, and memories that alcohol and drugs only made heavier. John spent more than two decades drinking, believing for most of that time that he didn't really have a problem. In this episode, he opens up about growing. up in a loving home, the sudden loss of both of his parents, and the painful moments he carried

with him for years, moments that can't be undone, and the kind that quietly stay with you long after they happen. It's an incredible honest conversation about regret, grief, and the realization that sometimes the biggest consequences of alcohol aren't the ones people see on the outside. They are the ones we carry on the inside. And it's a story about choosing to finally face those things and start living differently. And this is John's story on the Sober Motivation podcast. Welcome back today. We've got John with us. John, how are you? I'm great, man. Thank you. Appreciate it. Yeah, thanks for being willing to jump on the podcast here and share your story with all of us. What was it like for you growing up? Growing up was great. I was extremely fortunate and privileged to be born to two wonderful parents.

I had two awesome siblings in a beautiful house in a little rural area outside of a very safe, cool, upstate New York City. We had a yard, a lot of forests, a lot of friends, my age, wiffle ball, kickball, riding bikes, you know, real ideal childhood. I am the baby in my family, though, by like 10 years, 10 and 11 years to my brother and sister. So I grew up under like a little, a little different circumstances than they did. My parents had a much more like laissez-faire attitude with me. I was kind of left alone. Like, for example, if I didn't like what was served for dinner, I was allowed to go pour a bowl of cereal, right? My brother and sister did not grow up like that.

I wasn't forced into activities and things. I was allowed to quit stuff. My parents essentially just said, we don't think it matters. And I think it certainly does. And then the age gap also, things in my youth changed when I was in like second, third grade, right, eight or nine years old. My brother and sister left for college. And so then really never came back.

So after that, I was kind of like an only child. And then my mom started working full time at the same time. She became a teacher and my dad's already working. So I'm a latchkey kid by like third grade, fourth grade, came home, had a lot of time to myself, read the snack. closet, you know, play with friends, really kind of had to entertain myself for quite a bit. We still had family dinners, still a very safe, loving home with my family. But things really changed when I was in the, it was the winter of seventh grade.

My mom sat me down and told me that her and my dad were getting a separation and that she would be moving out and my dad was staying and keeping the house. this was a huge shock to me. And I've even talked to my brother and sister. Like, they're adults at this stage. They're in their low 20s. None of us knew that anything was happening. Like, there was no signs.

No arguments, no yelling. My parents apparently had been in counseling for like a year. Didn't tell anybody. And I found out kind of later in life as talking to my sister and brother. Our family didn't really talk about the bad. things. They kept it hidden. And so I think I picked up on that. So this was a shock to me as a kid. And then I was given the option of deciding where I wanted to live. And so I'm 11 years old. And it's like, what do you do? So I decided to stay in my house, my room, my yard, my friends. I didn't

want to leave that. So it really didn't matter which parent left or stayed. I was staying. I have talked to therapists in my adult years and they said that they probably would have recommended the same thing as long as the parent that was remaining wasn't like toxic or abusive. Keep the environment as consistent as possible on the child. But this is the point of my life where I started to connect a lot more with my environment and with things, you know, not people because it was safe because I could control it. I started to push my parents away a little bit, had some resentment. then never got help, never got therapy, never anything, just kind of, this is like the new

life. And it was sad. It was hard. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that too. I mean, it's a common theme, common thread sort of on the podcast. I feel like a lot of people kind of share, you know, not the exact experience, but two people separateing and going one way or another. A lot of people identify that too as possibly, you know, turn in the story or where other things started to come about. Where do you go from there? You know, I had some, I think, some typical little rebellious made bad decision things. Nothing crazy. Things didn't get bad for me until college. During the high school experience, you know, like my dad, so my observation of alcohol was my father. So as much as he was a great dad and he was the drinker. He stopped at the Elks Club on the way home from work,

had however many drinks there, came home, had more drinks. And so I saw this all grown up. He always drank. He was, by definition, an alcoholic. But he was not a bad drunk, if that's such a thing. He was not aggressive, abusive, absent, anything. He was a very happy drunk. And so I just kind of associated this with this is what adults do. Now, my mom didn't drink. She was the unique one, the weird one, right? Like, why doesn't mom drink? Because it's so common and accepted. So I just grew her up, up around this and thinking that that's just what adults do, that there's nothing wrong with it. Now, I can look back and say, okay, he probably shouldn't have been driving me and my friends around, right? Like, little things like that, but it was me that pushed him away. He wasn't absent with

his drinking. He always wanted to spend time with me. It was me that was like, no. And then, you know, when I got older in high school, 11th, 12th grade, that's kind of when I just started your typical rebellious kind of experimental activities. I didn't have that moment. that I've heard a lot of people have were like, I drank the first time or I smoked weed the first time, and like that was it, where I just had to find that and chase it all the time. I didn't.

Now, I really liked the social element of it. I liked being around people. It was like you kind of looked cool, and I was around people that maybe I didn't normally hang out with, like, cooler kids in high school. And so there was like parties. Somebody stole some beer. Somebody's brother bought some stuff.

And it was kind of some random occasional things, but nothing like I didn't spiral. at that point in my life. It was when I got to college. And it was like immediate. Immediate when you went to college. Did you leave home for college? I did.

I went to another New York State school. I moved into the dorms and the guy that lived across the hall for me, he was like a year older than me. He immediately befriended me and he was a huge pothead. And he wanted a smoking buddy and I was happy to do that. I sat there and smoked with him and he pretty much kept me high the entire semester. And I thought, like, this is really cool. He was also in a fraternity. And so he brought me to some fraternity parties. And that I thought was cool as well.

Tons of people, activities. These people seem like they're cool. They're wearing these awesome shirts. The house was immaculate. It was this mansion up on Lake Ontario that should have been a historical marker, but it was a fraternity house, right? And like, I wanted that. And that's where I started to be able to drink a little more and I started to get drunk and I'm still smoking weed with him. And I really liked just the kind of sense of belonging. And so then I joined the fraternity and being a part of something to like set myself apart from other people, right, that little bit of status that came with it. That's what I really liked. Other drugs were introduced at that point, right? Like acid, ecstasy, you know, just started kind of doing those random things. And

that's what my first semester was. I didn't focus at all on school. I skipped my classes. Really just spent the time having fun. But I also thought, that's what you do when you go to college. I didn't think anything was wrong with it. Not until the end of my first semester

when the college informed me that I was not welcome back for the second semester, that my grades were that bad. They were just like, go away. 0.8 or something, something bad. So I go home. I don't remember any major consequences,

any like come to Jesus moments with my parents. I know there was some disappointment. Nobody knew how I was living up there and what I was doing. I think they just chalked it up to like college is hard. It was a hard adjustment. Luckily, there was a college in my hometown and other state school. So I enrolled that next semester.

I enrolled in like three classes, worked part time. My dad got me a job. And that's what I did that next semester. I was able to do a little better in school. I kept my job so I could have some money. But I continued to pursue this college lifestyle. I'm making friends on campus.

I still have friends in my hometown. I'm going to house parties. I got a fake ID. I'm going to bars. And one of the biggest issues is I'm living outside of this small city. So I'm driving all the time. Luckily, nothing happened. But, you know, that's essentially the decision making.

I thought there's nothing wrong with it. I can get away with it. And wasn't hanging out with the best of characters sometimes. And at that point in my life, I was very much a do it, take it, ask what it was later type of person. Yeah. You know, ended up, snorted heroin a couple times. Threw up on my drive home. I had to pull over because it messed my stomach up so bad.

Pull over and throw up in a parking lot. one of the lowest moments was I picked up and met the guy that I was getting weed from and he had crack on him and we sat there for hours in my car smoking crack yeah you know like where I wait go ahead just thinking about I think it maybe even you were leading into it how you grew up and what you've seen and you know the picture of you know your earlier years seems completely completely different than where you're at right now in your life. When you're going through all of this, I mean, are you looking around and ever wondering, too, like, how did I end up here?

Why am I going down this road or not really? 95% no. That specific moment, I got home that night and walked into my house and my dad sleeping 20 feet down the hallway. I walked into the bathroom and looked in the mirror and was like, what did you just do? That moment. My life in general, no. I thought, again, this is what you do.

I'm going to house parties. I'm partying. I'm drinking. I'm around people. I didn't see a problem with it. I thought that was normal. There were throughout my life, there were these little like micro moments that I thought that was bad.

But the overall behavior, the overall lifestyle, I never really considered that I had a problem with anything. Never would have admitted it during those times. And not even until extreme recent where I've started to look back at my life after some things that have happened in my adult life and finally getting clean and addressing some things. Now I look back and I'm like, you had a problem, especially where I grew up with. Yeah. Yeah. with, you know, my brother and sister, Mike, listen to this.

They don't know some of these things. Yeah. Yeah. Of how you were, yeah. It can be a slippery slope too, I think, when you're, you know, when you, it's relatable a lot to me, man. I was, I grew up and things were, things were pretty good. And then I found myself, you know, into the mix of all of this stuff.

And having sort of those little moments to where it's like, wow, what did I, um, get myself into? Yeah. what is actually going on. But also, I think my, my pull to be included or to be a part of something or to belong somewhere was so, was so much. And this is like me speaking from, you know, now at the time. I had no idea at what was going on. I thought this would be a phase of my life that obviously I would outgrow and things would be good and I would achieve goals in life and have everything. And with time, I realized that wasn't just going to happen on its own either. But,

Yeah, I think when you look back, it can kind of sound like what was going on. But then if we dig into it and explore a little bit more, you get a better understanding of kind of why maybe this made sense at the time for your life. So that's very relatable too. And maybe that has something to do with when your parents separated there too of kind of that scenario too, of like I have to sense of belonging was so important. I mean, I'm only guessing there. But no, 100%.

I look back and it was like I was kind of striving for connections and, you know, unfortunately, I picked some wrong decisions or wrong paths. Now, I had options. So there's something else I have still not unpacked of why I did that. My freshman year of college when I'm in the dorms, my roommate is one of my best friends from high school. We went to the same place. We roomed together. He did not drink. He didn't do anything. He went and played an intramural basketball. Like, I had options. I gravitated. to this other lifestyle. I still don't know exactly why.

I'm sure it'll come up over time, but it was definitely, though, the people, to be around people. I think some of this, I think the way I felt when I was using and drinking was masking some of that unresolved trauma and depression from that. And things didn't get better.

Some pretty bad things were about to happen. I get back up to call. reapply. I somehow get through this home semester thing and I reapply and I go back up to school. And the next two years are essentially much of the same. Just partying as much as I can. I'm living in the dorms and then I live in a house with a bunch of guys. And of course, that's a nightmare. I never lived in the fraternity house. I really wasn't into the fraternity like culture. I just like the parties and some of the people and then the access to the drinking and the drugs. So, but I'm able to like keep my grades up enough to where I don't fail out again. So I think this is like a badge of honor in

college. How messed up can you be and still pass your classes? And that's again how I lived. My fourth year, after living with those guys, I was like, I can't do this anymore. I need my own, I need my own place. So I get an apartment and I stay up there for the summer and I'm working part time and I start my fourth year of college and I'm nowhere near a senior. I'm so far behind in credits, but it's my fourth year. So I'm 21. I'm a little older. my mom and sister are coming to visit me on this one Saturday. They hadn't seen my new apartment. And I go out that Friday night before Saturday and just get destroyed.

I don't remember what I did. There had to have been some drugs because I was up all night. And I go to my part-time job on Saturday and I'm struggling. I'm struggling to get through. My mom calls me to tell me that she's on her way. And at this point, I'm kind of like regretting this. I'm like, God, I don't want to do this. I just want to go home and go to sleep, right?

but I'm like short with her on the phone. I'm like, okay, cool, see you soon. Bye. And I hang up. That's the last time I've ever spoken to her. She died in a car accident coming up to see me. That was pretty hard. That was hard, right?

Even 25 years later, it's still hard to talk about. Yeah. And so, you know, obviously I feel bad about our last interaction. A lot of stuff happening at this point. I get, I get home to be with my family and I'm 21 and I just drank all week. Something happened. I don't remember. I did something around my family, like around my family, got drunk.

I don't know. Causes seeing yelled. I don't know. Not a good week. But after the services and everything, like I didn't want to be home anymore. I just wanted to get back out from like under the eye of everybody. So I get back up. My brother drives me back up, drops me off in my apartment, he leaves.

And I immediately call my friends. And, you know, they're very sympathetic to what I'm going through, but they're also more than happy to buy me drugs or get me drugs and buy me drinks. And that's what I did for a long time after that. Yeah. Never got counseling. Never got therapy. Never addressed anything.

Barely talked about stuff unless it came out, you know, like in a drunken, sad moment. Tons of emotional swings. My mom was a teacher. She did not have money, right? Because they don't pay teachers. But there was like a life insurance policy. And so that got cashed out. And I got a chunk of that.

And I'm 21 years old with a drug and alcohol problem. And I just got handed $30,000 in. cash. I'm I was not buying Apple's stock. Like, it was, I'm probably lucky I didn't die. That money was gone, I think, in like six

months. Just drinking. Just partying? Yep, drinking in Coke. I was taking $500 out of the ATM at a time, $300 on Coke, $200 of the bar multiple times a week. One time, and this is another one of these moments I look back on, and I'm like,

That moment was bad. Like, I bought a bag of Coke and I sat in my apartment for four days straight, didn't talk to a single soul and did the Coke and was drinking like Captain in Cokes. That was my thing at the time. And that's all I did for four days. Still, at the time, though, I'm like, I just went through this horrible thing. I'm allowed to do this. And I still won't school.

Somehow I kept my grades up enough that I didn't fail out. But outside of that, I'm just, I'm an absolute. train wreck, train wreck of a person. Yeah. Yeah. When you look back at this kind of span of your life here, what do you think if you could put a finger on it prevented you from sort of reaching out for help? I mean, I know you kind of touched on earlier too, maybe growing up as a family, maybe not

communicating what was going on. Like, I don't know. Some people share too. They just kind of pick up on that, too, as a way to just move forward. Is there anything that you reflect on in this span? I think that there was certainly embarrassment of how I was living, right? So I would have had to have acknowledged it to like my brother, sister, or my dad didn't want to. And I do think that after my parents separated, I got really used to handling my own stuff.

Look, this is where I have downplayed a lot of stuff in my life for a long time. my parents were still great after they separated. My mom didn't disappear. She was 10 minutes away. So when I say things like I had to grow up early, I always think of other people that were born into worse situations or parents died when they were really young or they had to take care of their little brothers and sisters, right? But I did start to have to kind of figure out my own stuff and I pushed my parents away so I didn't always feel comfortable asking for help. And so I think during this time, this is starting to like come to fruition. and like repeated patterns throughout my life that I'm not asking for help.

And I'll be honest, I don't know if I would have taken it if I even, even, no. I don't know. I was so far into this soothing. I don't know if I would have. But yeah, no grief counseling, no therapy, no nothing, just drugs and drinking. Yeah. Did your dad or your siblings like pick up on that you were really struggling at this point? or you're just, you're not at home, right?

I'm not. I'm living full time up there now in my apartment. I'm not going home that often. So everybody in my brother's got his, he's got a family at this point. My sister's got her life going. And, you know, we didn't see each other all that often other than holidays. And I think I, I think people knew. I think they just thought like, oh, John, you know, John smells like weed, right?

John's having some drinks. Nobody knew what I was doing like in the shadows, right? Or at these other times. I certainly kept that hidden, try to. Yeah, which is a common trend. I mean, you don't want people to know it. It's sort of that point, too. Man, a lot has happened for you, John, up until this point in your life, you know?

And it's interesting, too, as you're sharing this, I think you're reflecting back on your journey. And that really hit home, man, of downplaying our own stories compared to other people. but I think it's really important to honor our journeys too as like they matter and they're important and they've shaped us and affected us. There's always going to be somebody with something better or something that's maybe more difficult. But you know, that that's an important part and it sounds like you've gotten there. Where do things go for you moving forward here? So after that, so the somber stories aren't done yet. So I get back. I somehow stay and I'm on the five and a half year plan because I'm so far behind my credits from failing out.

And I like, I lowered my class load after my mom died because I was like, I don't want to do 15 credits and work part time. So I started doing 12. So I'm on like the five and a half year plan. And at that point, I get offered a job. And I'm like 23 or something. So I leave college and I moved down to Ithaca, New York, my third college town in a row living in. So now I'm like technically an adult. but I'm living the same.

I just have a salary now and a job, right? I'm still going to college bars. I'm still drinking. I'm binge drinking. I'm doing drugs when they come around. At one point, I had a connection for, like, OxyContin, and I'm for months at a time, I'm buying these pills, and I'm cutting them in half, and I'm taking one in the morning,

going to work, taking one at 4 o'clock, so it would hit on my drive home, and I'm smoking pot all day while I'm working, and then I'm drinking on the weekends. I'm throwing up a lot because the pills in my stomach. But I don't think anything's wrong. This is life. I'm, you know, ha-ha to the man. I have a job.

And I'm still living like this. Like, again, like that badge of honor that I can live like this and still be, you know, somewhat successful. So this goes on for a little bit. And then in, so four years after my mom died, my dad gets diagnosed with cancer. So, like, I'm still struggling and I haven't addressed anything. And then this happened. And this, it wasn't that much of a shock the way he lived.

He smoked Newport's his whole life and he drank. But it was still hard to go through. It's hard to watch. So between me and my siblings, somebody's always going home every weekend to help him through his treatment. and my sister and I lived the closest and my brother's got his family so he can't come up as much. And so we're going fairly often. And I'm going home on the weekends to help with laundry, shopping, et cetera.

I'm getting tired of it, to be honest. I was very selfish at the time. And I go home this one weekend and I don't really want to be there. It's late March, early April, four months after his diagnosis. and, you know, I come home on Friday night. And between Friday night and Saturday morning, I do whatever I got to do, is laundry, shopping, whatever. I make plans with my friend to go back home to smoke weed, drink beers,

and watch the NCAA tournament at my house. I don't tell my dad. And so on Saturday afternoon, I start, like, putting stuff in my car, getting ready to go. And he's sitting on the couch. He's got his oxygen tube, right? and he's like, oh, are you leaving? I was like, yeah, yeah, I'm going to go. I got stuff to do.

I got things to do before I work, you know, some BS. And he's like, oh, okay. Well, I thought we were going to watch the games tonight. He's like, all right, we'll drive safe. And that's, so I leave. And he passes away like three days later. So another one that's, uh, hard to live with. A lot of shame about that. Again, still to this day, hard to talk about it,

hard to reckon with that. I wanted to share those today. I thought about can I do this. And I wanted to share those because one of the reasons I wanted to come on here and talk to you, was I never faced a lot of consequences for how I lived. I didn't get arrested. I didn't get hospitalized. I didn't, like, lose my wife and kids, right? Like, no huge major consequences. But I've had to live, you know, with some of these memories.

You know, and here I am, like, almost 47 and still struggling to deal with the person that I was. Like having that, that mental image of him sitting on the couch and me walking away because I wanted to go, you know, get messed up with my friends. My last two moments with my parents, you know, were, like, tainted by my

usage of drugs and alcohol. And that's hard to live with. Right. So anybody who's like is questioning how they're living, their choices, what they're doing, but they don't think that they're that bad because they haven't had that moment, right? There are small moments that can be like just as impactful and just as bad. I can't make amends for these things. I can't apologize.

I can't write a letter and make things better. All the therapy in the world and it's still hurts to acknowledge. I have not told in my life many people, these stories, less than 10 in my 47 years, and several of those were therapists. I didn't tell my sister about that moment with my dad until three years ago. I don't think I've ever told my brother. How does it feel sharing all of this now? I think your inspiration is to, you know, highlight that, you know, you don't have to lose it all for this to, for you to kind of lose it all. Yeah.

It's, you know, again, up until extremely recently, I still never thought I had a problem. And I know from listening to your, to your podcasts, to other experiences in my life, there are so many people that will not admit or acknowledge. that they have a problem, but they're struggling on a daily basis, right? Because they're, again, I didn't get arrested. I didn't kill somebody. I didn't, you know, I didn't die myself. We don't have to wait for that, right? And a lot of these little moments can be like just as painful and just as hard.

All of my consequences have been in my head, right? The things that are up here, the regrets, the shame, the guilt. And it's really held me back, you know, the last. 20 years as I've grown up. And being almost 47 and looking at like the short window that I've left, it's starting to get really challenging to look back and see how much of my life I wasted. And so yeah, somebody can make that change, right? To live a better fulfilling life now, not have some like some moment that will live with them

forever that's been tainted again you don't know when somebody you love you're never going to see them again right um we always think there's more time we always think there's tomorrow and it doesn't always come it's not promised yeah i think that's an extremely powerful message to send out there too because the longer i think that we lean into alcohol we really alcohol drugs whatever it is we open ourselves up for you know things to happen right i mean i'm kind of on the other side. I've been arrested so many times and I'm thinking, I'm sitting here thinking, man, what you went through is that hits more, man. That's like way more emotional and impactful, you know, than any time that I've been arrested. You know, I think that sometimes we can be looking

for these indicators, but I think it all comes down to. Do we want to get honest here about what's really going on. Because at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter what, you know, what the outside forces if we're not really willing to look honestly at ourselves to say, yeah, this thing has gotten way out of control and is impacting my life. You know, are we going to do anything before that? And that's sort of an interesting thing. But I hear from you here, John. I mean, in a lot of ways, man, you're doing the best you can with what you have in so much of your story. And it's not like letting you off the hook of like, hey, you have this isn't your choices. But I feel like if you would have known different tools, you would have applied them in these situations.

And I think the shame element, I'm picking up that a lot from you of preventing you from asking for help. I don't know if you have any thoughts on that. No, I completely agree. I still, I would like to think that I would have taken help back then. I just don't know with the type of person I was. trying to be so independent, like, I got it, and I don't care, and what's it matter. And, you know, I certainly, after my parents died, I had that very big, like, what's it matter? Everybody dies anyway, so who cares?

I'm going to live how I want to live. And I'd live that way for a while. But the longer it goes on, it's like, but this isn't serving me. This isn't fun, right? It's really, I mean, it's fun in the moment. You think it's fun, but it's not. And it's not a good way to live. And I carried so much anger.

at the world, you know, what I thought at the time, the world at large, right? Like, I'm, I should be owed something for what I've gone through. And I carried a chip on my shoulder. And it came out, like, even the night of my dad's funeral, I went out and got hammered with my friends. And the bartender, like, I don't know, turned his back on me when I was trying to order a beer, something. And I, like, lost it. And I cursed him out, stormed out of the bar, slammed my hand into the place. punched the playglass window by the front door, spider webbed it, cut my hand up,

take the tie off that I wore to my dad's funeral to wrap around my hand. And again, though, no consequences. My friend was able to talk to bartender out of calling the cops, and I gave him $500 to pay for the window, and we went to another bar. Like, sometimes I wonder, would I have actually been better off if something did happen? Obviously, I didn't want to, the amount of times I drove drunk and stuff like that, no. But what if they called the cops that day, right? And I got arrested for something.

Would that have like snapped me out of stuff? Would it force me to like look at things? I don't know. I just don't know with the kind of person I was then, right? I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. That's an interesting perspective too because I,

a lot of people share too that on the podcast they get their first DUI and like they get off pretty easy, right? Or they kind of skated by. And I always wonder like what if we did get held accountable earlier on? you know, in the process. But honestly, it's, it's so interesting, but here's sort of my quick thoughts on it. Denial is denial. And to get that wall to kind of come down to see that there's a problem because a lot of times we could play it off as the one-off or because what's going on in our life, you know? So it's an interesting thing that we'll never know the answer to, but

if that denial is like just ran so deep with us that there's not really a lot going on. I mean, and you're talking here about, like, not really experiencing the consequences. John, I'm feeling hearing this that you're experiencing a lot of consequences. It just might not look like that from the outside or be sort of an external force. I think between your ears, I think between your ears, you're really in a tough place. It's mental torment. Yes, that was my consequences. That was all the stuff that I carried with me and I hid and I had to deal with in the quiet moments.

and that I masked with more drinking and drug use as I went over, got older, to try and give the illusion that I was happy or fun or, you know, that I wasn't the person that I was really struggling with in the shadows when the doors were closed. And it was hard. I was able to, you know, after that, just more of the same, like a repetitive thing for a while. So I was able to start writing the ship. It wasn't something intentional. It was very selfish.

I saw a picture of myself in my upper 20s, and I saw how heavy I had gotten. I didn't recognize what I was looking at in the picture. I literally thought I was looking at my dad, and I'm like 28 years old, and I'm 205 pounds, and I graduated high school at like 140, right? And I'm a small guy. I'm like 5, 7, 5, 8. And that kind of spree. me to just be like, I don't want to be like this.

Through that, I end up finding MMA and changed my life, gave me something to be passionate about, something that was healthy. Now, through things that have happened to me from that point until even very recently, I have realized looking back at things that some of the darkest moments of my life were when I did not have something of interest, especially like a physical activity or a sport, something challenging, something that was mine that I got to look for this all this other time. I didn't have anything. As soon as I got into this, things started to change.

And I started to smoke a little less weed. I started to drink a little less because I wanted to be healthy and I wanted to pursue this physical activity. So much so that I quit my job. and I went and worked for these guys that owned the gym because I'm like, this changed my life and I want to help others. Long story short, unfortunately it didn't work. The job itself was very difficult and it took my passion away from it and I had to walk

away after like a little over a year. And I went into a little spiral, got depressed, smoked weed again, drank, didn't drink with my friend. And some fortunate things happened where I was able to take advantage of them and finally leave New York, right? So I'm 31 and I, and I'm like, I'm out. I'm gone. And I moved down to Charlotte, North Carolina. And I know that we're the same person wherever we go, right?

I get it. But there was something about that where I was able to leave part of me up there. And it took a while. It took some trials and some, you know, some effort. But I started to be a little more authentic to things that I wanted to. to do with my life and be a little better. Still smoke pot all the time. I wasn't drinking as much because I didn't have,

I moved here. I didn't know a single soul, right? So I wasn't being social. And that's another thing that I look back. And we kind of touched on that in the beginning in like the high school. I just wanted to be around people and do things. In my last, in my current attempt at sobriety, I've been able to look back at a lot of the stuff that I did.

and when I did it and why and what was my environment at the time i again up until now would never have admitted that i had a problem with drinking because i never had i didn't have to drink daily i could go days or weeks without drinking i didn't get the shakes right like these things that i've heard right i didn't have withdrawal symptoms i could literally open up a bottle of wine at home pour a glass, have dinner, put the bottle of wine away, and it would sit there so long it would go bad and have to dump it out. But if there was one person around me in my house, if I went out with somebody, I drank faster and more every time. You know, it was something about being social, being around people. And I really think that this goes back to all of that stuff, that grief and that trauma that I was piling down into me that when I

I was around people, I felt I had to drink to be somewhat happy. And I may not have always been, but I thought I was, right? I thought I had to be that person around people. And so I drank more and more in all of these periods of my life, there's people around when I'm drinking a lot, not drinking a lot alone. Now, I smoke pot alone. I love that. That was my thing. Luckily, I was able to quit that around in my mid-30s. I started to realize how dependent I was on it to do basic day-to-day functional stuff. And I got tired of that. But after the pot was gone, and all the hard drugs had been in the past, all I had left

was social drinking. And so there were times where I gravitated towards it and reaching out to people, hey, you want to go out, you want to do something because I didn't want to sit around and be alone. But I wanted to go somewhere where we could drink, right, and do that. Yeah. And that was all in Charlotte. So this was kind of a reboot for you, sort of a restart of things to,

go down there. I mean, but why Charlotte of all places? Was there a job or something? No, no job. I, uh, it was warm. I needed to get out of New York. I was tired of the winters, right? Um, I, I visited here. It looked, it just looked nice, right? I just kind of felt something when I came and visited. Um, it had that big, pity feel, but also a small town feel like, and there's jobs, right? I lived in all these upstate New York cities. There's no jobs, right? Not unless you're a, teacher or like a doctor like there's not a lot a lot of those counties suffer up there and that's what just what I wanted to do and so you know I started experimenting with some things and like veganism and like I became a vegan for a year and then I'm moving to paleo and I'm trying website

design and I'm building recipes and I'm trying to be a food blogger and I'm like doing a bunch of different things that feel good and I finally quit the weed I'm still social smoking and my life starts to come a little bit better I'm still not getting help though right I'm still masking all of this stuff. And towards the end of my 30s, I finally, I move into IT. I get a job. I'm like moving my way up a little bit. I even dabbled in like Buddhism for a little bit. I did some reading. And that's kind of triggered a little something in me to have some self-reflection. It kind of unlocked a little empathy in me for myself and others. And I was able to recognize my anger. And I was, you know, I didn't get it completely under control. But just acknowledging it at first helped.

Yeah. And so around this time, like I'm feeling more confident. I understand a lot of it is looking back was false confidence, right? But, you know, I start to finally have a little bit of success with dating in my upper 30s. The previous 20 years, nothing. No girlfriends. Just couldn't do it. Anxious attachments, insecurities, didn't know how to date, didn't know how to forge connections.

got a lot of first dates, not many second dates or anything after. But in my late 30s, I finally start to go down this road. And I'm finding, I don't know if it was me or I don't know what, but all of a sudden there's a couple that are lasting over a couple months. And after through this five year period, there's like four somewhat long term relationships, at least long term to me, right, after nothing. Yeah, yeah.

But I look back on it now and I see that there was this cycle. And I would be confident. I would meet somebody. We would drink on the first date. We would like each other. We would continue to hang out. And we and mostly me would drink a lot during this relationship. And then the relationship would end.

I would stop drinking. I would go into a depressive episode of isolation and put on weight. eventually I would snap out of it. I would lose the weight, get back into the gym, build my confidence up, meet somebody else, start drinking. Same thing. Over and over and over. Didn't pick up on it until now. And again, the drinking, to mask who I was, to try and come across as interesting, maybe to like myself, I don't know.

But it meant I was never really showing up authentically. And I never fixed any of these other things. So I had a lot of communication challenges and struggles. I had struggles with change. I had struggles with not being in control of my environment. And, of course, all of these things lead to a failed relationship. After the last one of this cycle, I started to make some changes. So I stopped drinking because we drank so much.

And like, I have to, I just did it for health reasons. Again, still didn't recognize. that I had a problem, didn't recognize any of this stuff. So I quit drinking for like four months. I finally get into some quality therapy at this time, somebody who's challenging me. And I get out of my house. I'm working from home.

I'm trying to work out in my garage. I can't do any of this stuff. I join a gym. And so now I'm around people. And I have a passion again. And so things start to get really good for me in my life. And this is four months of not drinking. At this point, I think, okay, I can start socially drinking again.

I want to be able to, it's March in Charlotte, it's getting nice out. I want to sit on a patio and have a drink. And so I start adding one or two drinks in on the weekend. And I started to realize like how bad they made me feel just on a physical element, just one drink. And I would feel, I would lose energy. My head would get a little foggy. I have little twinges of anxiety. And so I tried a couple things over several weekends.

And towards the end of it, I was like, no, it's the alcohol. It's not what I'm drinking. It's the alcohol. And so that was the first time I really ever started to put two and two together on how it was at least making me not feel good. So I stopped drinking. At that point, I barked it on my calendar, May 17th. And I was kind of proud of that. But I didn't, like, proclaim that I was done.

I just marked it down. And I started watching. And as the number grew, I felt good. And I really dug into myself that summer with therapy, with being sober, with hitting the gym. And I'm trying to learn how to date, right? I'm listening to like women dating coaches, like not men because, you know, men, right? And everything's making sense. And I'm starting to start, I'm feeling really good about myself for much more genuinely than I ever had before.

And so, and I'm sober. And I'm sober for the longest time of my life. I feel so good. And then I met somebody. And I thought, this is it. This is what all this work was for. Right. and we just fall madly in love.

And everything aligned, values, et cetera, right, hobbies, interest, attraction, everything's there. And I was open and honest in the beginning and said, I don't drink. I don't drink because I don't like how it makes me feel. And I have some boundaries in terms of what I can handle in a relationship, in terms of the partner drinking. And I was open and honest about my drug use, said, I'm done with that. I don't care if it's even weed. I'm done with it. That stuff is in my past.

I don't want to see it and I don't want to be around it. We agree on everything. We start dating. This turned out to be a pretty big challenge. I had never gone into a relationship, sober, ever. There were some things that were hidden from me that started to come out. I mean, I've heard it on your podcast. People that have sat here have tried to hide it from people they've met.

And you can't. You can only hide it for so long, right? So some things started to come out, and I'm trying to navigate this. being a sober person with somebody who I madly fell in love with, and I'm seeing some things that are very hard for me to handle. There are some conversations, and I met with, I don't want to be this way, I don't like it, I hate it,

and I'm trying to be supportive. I've learned some things that, you know, people have to change for themselves. You can't do it for other people, and I want them to change for themselves like I did. But over time, the narrative kind of started to switch to, like, why do you have a problem with this? I'm not hurting you.

I like to have fun. I don't want to live a boring life. And then it eventually turned into, well, if you love me, you'd love all of me. And I'm really struggling internally at this point because I'm sober. And I'm battling that in these newfound values of mine. But on the other side of my head, I'm dealing with all the abandonment issues that I had, the anxious attachments, the insecurities. And I started to think that maybe I was the problem because I was always.

the problem in every other relationship. And I made a really, really bad decision that if I had a drink, that maybe I would be able to handle this, that maybe I would be fun, that maybe this isn't that big of a deal. And so after 268 days, I ordered a glass of wine,

and I was very, I was not happy about it, but I did it. I didn't like it. it. I felt shame and guilt that I broke my streak, but it wasn't enough to stop. I, over time, the frequency increased, the quantity increased. I started to feel really, I started to feel really bad. I had a lot of anxiety. I had a lot. My depression started to return. I stopped taking care of myself. I started skipping the gym, this thing that was so important to me, where people were reaching out to me and saying like,

hey, where are you? I was such a fixture at this place. And I would lie and say, oh, I'm sorry, I'm busy. I'll be back soon. I started to hide all of this from everybody. I even hit it for my therapist, who I'm seeing on a weekly basis.

And it wasn't worth it because nothing in the relationship changed. It got worse. I start arguing. We start arguing more when we drink. And I couldn't bring myself to stand up for myself. I couldn't bring myself to walk away. Decades of searching for love and was just, it was greater, right? And I didn't want, I had all these abandonment issues and I didn't want to go back to being alone.

And to be fair, I loved this person outside of these moments. But in my gut, I knew that this wasn't right. And I let something slip in therapy one day. I was trying to hide it. And I said, and I don't remember exactly what I said, but my therapist goes, sounds like you already know. and I stopped talking for a minute, which is a lot for me. And that was the kick I needed. Not long after that, I was in a position that was,

kind of shouldn't have been in. It was a very unique situation. I feel like something put me there. But I saw what I needed to see to know that there was no change. And I woke up. And I literally woke up at that time. I had had drinks that day and I woke up, snapped out of it, pulled my head out of the sand, stopped lying to myself.

And that's the last day that I've had a drink. And it felt so good to finally stop. And I drew a line in the sand finally and knowing full well what the outcome was going to be, drew a line in the sand and we went our separate ways. It's been seven and a half months since I've had that drink. I have not thought about drinking once. I've learned so much from that. So in this relationship,

I finally had like this controlled experiment where I started sober, started drinking, and then ended sober. And I can look back now and see exactly how I changed. And the only thing that changed was me drinking. And I can see exactly what it did to me mentally and physically and emotionally. And I took that and I started to look back to the rest of my life.

And I started to pinpoint all of these things. And what was I doing at the time? What drugs was I doing? What drinking was I doing? And I finally, after all that time, recognized how bad it was. And that I, yes, I had a problem. Right? And it was so good to admit it.

So good to recognize it. It was like freedom, you know, and I just, and now I am proclaim, like I said before, I never proclaimed that I was done drinking. Now I am proclaiming. I am done. Like, I, yeah, I can't fathom drinking again. And I know it's still early, right? But it just feels so right. Yeah. Great job, John, seven and a half months, man. That's incredible, dude. I mean, it sounds like you just hearing sort of you wrap up that story and that relationship and with drinking, you know, with your partner there. You chose yourself, man.

You know, I mean, you chose yourself in all of this. So I know people listening can't see this. But it says, not for me, not today. I found out what I'm worth. And this is my badge of honor. And I wanted to get that on me for so long. and then I felt like I couldn't when I was in this relationship. And it was afterwards, I was like, you know, I had found my worth before, but I

undersold it. And I will never do that again. And this is just a constant reminder to me to remember exactly what I'm worth. And yeah, I'm back to being, it was hard. It was very hard. It unlocked a lot of repressed grief and trauma from my past. And I finally have been starting to address that. I started to wonder what I am I getting paid back for the way I treated people in my life.

And so I actually kind of went on a little make amends apology to her. I finally have been acknowledging and addressing how I lived. And I reached out to people I hadn't talked to in years. In one case, somebody who I hadn't talked to in 12 years. And he would email me every single year to let him me know that he was still thinking about me. And I would always ignore him. and I finally reached out to all these people and admitted that I knew what I did. Sorry for pushing you away.

Sorry for running away. Sorry for how I showed up in a relationship. You know, all of this stuff. Every single person was grateful and receptive to hear from me. And that was such an emotional burden to finally get off of my shoulders that I had been carrying around for so long. Yeah. Yeah, man. What a, what a story, dude.

I mean, what a story. even with all the ups and downs of it too like just really beautiful man that where you're at now and seven and a half months dude some people might be at this for seven and a half years before they understand how everything unraveled and you have a you know good understanding i'm sure there's more to be discovered but but there's definitely a solid foundation there and getting help and sounds like you were seeing a therapist and maybe you still are and yeah that's so good dude what i know you shared a little bit earlier, too, you know, kind of what inspired you to share, you know, the story with your parents, too, about we can never get more time and you never know when the last

opportunity with somebody will be. What's your overall inspiration to kind of, in one way or another, come out of nowhere, send an email to share your story, share some of it with me, jump on here, not knowing how it would go. What's the overarching inspiration to put yourself out there on that level? somebody who was big into isolation, shame ran the show and guilt, it seems like, for a long time. I mean, you have flipped this script completely. Like, what's behind that? A lot. I think that I told you before, I came from really good people and a good home. And I knew that there was this really good person inside of me that I kept buried. And finally, letting him out and being proud of him and being proud of myself.

Just kind of like with the MMA, when I changed my life, I wanted to start helping other people. And this is this is one of those things. I've struggled a little bit as I've gotten older with like I'm reading a lot of philosophy books and things like that. Like, what's my purpose? How do I live a fulfilled life? I don't have those answers yet, but I need to start trying, right? I've lived for myself and been selfish a long time. I don't know. This has been something that's important to me, finally realizing how much time I lost to it. This is an opportunity to start to give back. I don't know where I'm going to go from here, be involved in a community.

I don't know, but I had to start. It's funny because I told one of my friends that I was going to come on here. And then I was like, well, I never hit rock bottom, but I thought I'd share because maybe somebody out there was, it's similar. Two days later, they were talking to one of their friends who told them they were thinking about going to AA, but they didn't think they belonged there because this thing didn't happen, this big thing didn't happen to them. And then my friend told them about me and why I was coming on here. And it's like that, right? Those things. And so I hope that person's listening.

Because if you're thinking about it, go. If anybody out there is questioning your relationship with drugs, alcohol, toxic relationship, whatever it is. If you've even gotten to the point where you're questioning it, you probably already know. AA is not going to make you sign in and check what your rock bottom was and send you away if it's not on the list, right? None of these sober communities are going to, are going to like turn you away, join them. Reach out to Brad's communities.

AA, refuge recovery, myself, all the other people on the podcast. Like, everybody is so willing and open to listen. And that's all, you know, I talk a lot, but I will just listen. like I'm happy to. And so I'm trying to find some ways to give back. And if my horrible, sad stories and my tears hits one person, then it'll be, it'll completely be worth sharing a lot of this embarrassing stuff that I still hold some shame and regret over.

Yeah, mission accomplished there. It's helped me, man. You know, so hopefully, you know, the goal is to help more people, but that job is already done. Really appreciate you, John. Yeah. I appreciate you, man. Yeah.

Come on here and, you know, put it all out there to help the next person, you know, because there's definitely relatable. There's a lot of people to listen to the show who maybe don't identify with the Hollywood movies and the way that things are shaped up. But this is what you went through and what you talk about. It's a lot worse, man, than those other rock bottoms, dude. I mean, this is sort of that internal prison that you live in of not knowing where you stand, living a life of lack of fulfillment, not having a direction or purpose.

All of these things are just really difficult to live with. And I'm so glad that you're turning this around and trying to find your way out there to give back to others, listen, help, say it's okay. It's just such a beautiful way to end things, man. Any closing thoughts? No. I mean, I think I think I've, I could go on and on. We don't have the time.

But no, man, I appreciate you. I appreciate you. I appreciate you acknowledging my story. There were multiple times after I reach out to you. I was like, I don't know if I should do this. I even reached out to one of your past guests and he was like, dude, go, you're going to be great. Do it. You know, because I'm like seven and a half months isn't that long.

But to try to talk myself out of something and didn't. So, yeah, thank you. Thank you for all your work and all the stuff you have out there. It's been very helpful to me. Yeah, of course, John. Yeah. And I mean, every day counts, man. Every day counts for something.

I think people can't talk themselves out of it. Like, is my story worthy? Is my time long enough? And I mean, I'll just draw back on the lesson I learned from you is you don't get any more time. None of us know what's next, you know? So every day's a win, man. Every day, sober day plugged in. Like, that's a huge win.

Proud of you, dude. Thank you so much. Thank you. I really appreciate it. Well, there it is another incredible episode here on the podcast. so much to take away from John's story, an emotional story. John being seven and a half months, I'm so proud of him for where he's at. And some people too that feel like they don't have this big rock bottom that makes the paper question their worthiness to maybe even be part of the sober

community or alcohol-free community. And I just want to let you know if that's your story. Like, I mean, you belong here. John belongs here. His story belongs on the podcast, everything he's overcome and worked through. And a lot of the things he was sharing. too. I mean, it hits really hard. It hits really hard. And I think for John, I'm only guessing here is that there's some things in life that you can't go back and undo when you start to see things differently and more clearly through a sober lens, a sober way of life. And there's a lot of things while we're going through it that we don't always recognize. So I want to give a huge shout out to John. I'll drop his contact information down below in the show notes. Send him a message. Tell him, thank you

for jumping on here and sharing his story. And I'll see you. on the next one.