As part of an Add 2, Subtract 2 Summer Challenge with my INSIDER Membership I completed one of my subtraction tasks. Subtracting everything for one day a month. What I mean by that is having no expectations, to do lists, plans, or chores for one day each month of the summer. A “Do Nothing Day”. 

I understand many people would not need a “challenge” to take a day off, but I do. I am a high achieving, over functioning, extroverted, people pleaser and it is not in my nature to give myself a break. Ironically, I have to be challenged to do it. I have to give myself some sort of competition to sit still.  

It started on Saturday night when I went to the gym. This used to be a sad thing for me, in early sobriety. The gym is very empty on Saturday nights. I assume because people have friends, plans and better things to do. In my early sobriety, I had few friends, no plans, and nothing better to do. I sometimes felt sorry for myself for...

Some of my best memories are from some of my biggest drinking moments. 

It’s been helpful to think that my drinking was bad, unhealthy and alcohol took me away from myself. And now that I’ve removed alcohol, I am happy, healthy, free, and all is well. 

Although this is 100% true, it is not the whole truth. 

It is a story that I have been telling myself for years. I had to tell myself this story to get to the place I am at now, which is 5 years sober, happy, and free. 

I could only see it in the solid black and white until now. Any kind of nostalgic thinking or romantic longing about alcohol in my past was too risky. If I idealized the past for too long, I might spiral and land upside down with a bottle in my hand and wine on my lips, once again. 

I quit drinking so many times before I quit drinking. 

With alcohol, decidedly no longer an option for me, I had to march to the drum with a single beat.  The rhythm...

When I was just starting out on my sober journey I had this voice in my head, Let’s call that voice by name, the Wine Witch. She tried to sabotage me every step of the way. 

When I would see some progress (maybe 4 days alcohol free) she would start screaming at me:

 “What are you going to do?

Not drink?

Like really not drink?

Like not even drink when you get to Paris?

Come on!” 

Then the real me would hear that Wine Witch. I would think about sitting at one of those black and white striped woven wicker bistro chairs outside a Parisian cafe, surrounded by women in black berets, leaving red lipstick marks on their long skinny cigarettes, little fluffy dogs on the ground next to their high heeled feet, sipping a strong afternoon red or a crisp bubbly champagne from the region. Women living the dream just being fabulous and sitting and sipping from sun up until sundown. Did I want to be part of that? Yes I did. Could I imagine sitting...

Memorial Day 2017 was my rock bottom. Not to be confused with the Day I finally stopped drinking. That would come ½ year or more later. 

Memorial Day Weekend has been an evolution in my sobriety and overall personal growth. 

You can read more about Memorial Day’s past here, here, here, and here.

I started my weekend this year by listening to Jenna Kutcher’s Goal Digger podcast titled “Should I Scale Bigger or Shut it Down? An Inside Look at my Daily Debate”, a recommendation from my friend Deb from Alcohol Tipping Point.

I was in a season of taking a social media break and scaling back my clients, as I worked to create and launch new programs, rebrand my logo + website, and make new connections in new ways. 

There is a balance of ambition and contentment in my job as an entrepreneur.  It was hard for me to stop the hustle of sales and it’s been hard to see less traffic on my website with less...

My Social Media Experiment was to stop using Instagram and Facebook for business for 7 weeks.

What happened was not what I expected. 

For the record, I think it's great to take break from things. All things. Change is necessary from all things to grow and evolve. If you unplug for anything you might feel better after a reset. This is not only for people that struggle with addiction, unless we all struggle with addiction, which is more likely true.

It is a sign of progress and awakening, not failure, to take a break. That elusive state of balance isn't something that is achieved for long if ever. If we are growing and evolving we are always teetering. Even on a balance beam, it takes some wobbling, to stay upright. There is nothing wrong with this. This is what it is to be human. This article will not wrap up in a tidy bow why social media is good or bad. For me, it is neither. It is both. I don't know enough about the introduction of the hot AI topic to comment. This is...

This weekend was my first born daughter’s high school graduation.

My sobriety made everything so much better.

In some ways it felt like a stress test:

Host a party for 50 people.

Pray for good weather.

Say hello.

Say goodbye.

Introduce people to each other.

Lose sleep for 3 nights in a row.

Get the cake out at the right time.

Whoops you’re too late.

Host my family for 6 days.

There’s light bulbs out in the basement.

We need more coffee.

Host a houseful of in laws for a day.

The kids like root beer and Cherry 7 Up.

Get it.

Oh we already had it.

Father in law, Pops likes Diet Pepsi.

Bottles, not cans.

The kid is gluten free.

Remember both corn and flour tortillas.

Get the surprises for Lily out.

Do it now.

No wait.

Don’t do it.

Do it now.

Is everyone here?

Stay calm.

Don’t get sucked into other people’s emotions or stories.

Don’t control what you don’t control.

Woah a blast from the past comes out of nowhere.

I have feelings about that.

I am in a season of extreme emotions right now. 

My oldest daughter is graduating high school in just a few weeks. She will be moving 6 hours away to go to school (MIZ-ZOU!) in early August. I feel like we are still connected via umbilical cord, so as much as I want her to spread her wings and fly…I also want to swaddle her in a blanket and hold her in my arms from now until the end of time. 

Saturday was her last prom. I watched her in her gorgeous gown donning fancy hair and flawless make up. I was absolutely stunned by her beauty, maturity, and confidence. I am so proud of the woman she has become. She is better than my wildest dreams. We all know I have too high expectations for everything. Lily is everything and then some. 

Since birth she has flipped me upside down and shook me around until I was dizzy. Somehow, in between cleaning up after her, and keeping her safe and fed, she grew into her own being. She is so much more than even I...

The spring sun is here! I want to go outside! I love to go outside. I am an outdoorsy person. I believe in the benefits of sunlight and movement to set my circadian rhythm, lift my mood, and give me a good dose of feel good chemicals. 

Yet, even so…somehow it’s been a challenge to get off the couch. My winter workout routine was going to the gym and then sitting in the sauna. Mostly, in the evenings. The weather went from the 40’s to the 80’s as it does in the midwest and although it is a welcome change I have had a hard time adjusting. At the same time, my daughter has started evening soccer games and I want to attend them. All this has added up to me doing very little and then berating myself for not doing enough.

I am an all or nothing type of person which can be a real gift, and also a real curse, at times. I feel like I have to commit to a 8 month marathon training plan in my mind before I even take a walk around the block. Being a...

I am a COUNTRY girl. 

Born in small town Wisconsin. 

My first drink was a cheap beer. 

Busch Lite. 

In my coming of age, I partied and chased boys in barns and fields.

I rode around in pickup trucks.

I love country music. I love to sing about getting day drunk with a cold beer in my hand, and needing my whiskey glasses to navigate my latest heartache. 

I have fond memories of you and me going fishing in the dark with friends in low places, if you know what I mean. Some of it makes me cringe and plenty of it makes me smile.

When I was visiting Savannah, Georgia a drag queen sang Reba McEntire’s Fancy, and I nearly lost my mind. All I wanna do is boot, scoot, boogie. 

When I first quit alcohol, I didn’t know how to reconcile my love for country music and drinking songs with my new found sobriety. 

My identity was shifting from rowdy party girl to healthy sober coach. 

What would I do with my...

The details are very foggy, but I have a drunken Easter story. 

For the life of me, I can’t think about why I would have been without plans or my family on Easter, but one year it happened. Maybe I chose it? I have no idea. I really can’t remember. My whole life at that time was a bit of a fog.  

What I do know is that I was grieving the loss of my good friend, who was diagnosed with cancer and passed away two months later, leaving his wife and 5 kids. My other friend, his wife, was now a widow. She asked me to do his eulogy. She said I was the only one that could speak her words. My heart and hers were completely broken. I stayed very close to her during this time. I wanted to be a real support person to her. 

We were both drinking a lot, which wasn’t necessarily new to us, but we had new meaning to do it with our freshly shattered hearts. I thought being in the depths of despair alongside her was the best support I could...