Sobriety Unlocked: Getting HOL + WELL with Amy Willis Season 3 Ep. 28

Ready to discover the unexpected joys of a booze-free life?  Meet Amy Willis, a powerhouse Holistic Sober Coach, alcohol culture consultant, and LGBTQ+ advocate, on the latest LAF Life Podcast! Amy reveals her biggest surprise benefit of sobriety, shares how she’s transforming beliefs about alcohol that could help you quit for good, and how she’s creating alcohol-free workplaces with her company HOL + WELL.  Don’t miss this eye-opening convo!

To find out more about Amy and her coaching business HOL + WELL
Follow her on Instagram: @msamycwillis
JOIN her Facebook Group: HOL + WELL Sober Collective
Find her on LinkedIn: Amy C. Willis, MA, RHC, CLC
or Checkout Amy's Website: holandwell.com
Amy has been kind enough to offer our listeners a 10% discount on Coaching services by using  discount code: LAF10

Article Reference in this episode:
Alcohol Raises Heart Disease Risk, Particularly Among Women
https://www.acc.org/About-ACC/Press-Releases/2024/03/28/11/58/alcohol-raises-heart-disease-risk-particularly-among-women#:~:text=Young%20to%20middle%2Daged%20women,of%20Cardiology's%20Annual%20Scientific%20Session.

**Please remember to: Like, Subscribe and leave us a 5-star rating or review. If you enjoyed this episode SHARE it with a friend.
Facebook @ https://www.facebook.com/groups/laflife
Instagram @ https://www.instagram.com/laflifepodcast
Website: https://www.laflifepodcast.com/
Be a guest on our show: https://forms.gle/GE9YJdq4J5Zb6NVC6
Email us: laflifepodcast@gmail.com

Connect with your podcasters. We'd love to hear from you!
Tracey: https://www.instagram.com/tnd1274/
Kelly: https://www.instagram.com/pamperedkel/
Lindsey: https://www.instagram.com/hariklindsey/

**Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this episode are not professional or medical opinions. If you are struggling with an addiction please contact a medical professional for help.

Music provided by Premium Beats: https://www.premiumbeat.com
Song: Rise and Thrive
Artist: Young Presidents

Resources:
Wellness Togethe...

Transcript

Kelly: 0:02

Welcome to the LAF life podcast, a lifestyle podcast based on living alcohol free and a booze soaked world. My name is Kelly Evans and together with my friends, Tracey Djordjevic, and Lindsey Harik. We share uncensored. Unscripted real conversations about what our lives have been like since we ditched alcohol and how we got here by sharing our individual stories. We'll show you that there isn't just one way to do this, no matter where you are on your journey from sober, curious to years in recovery and everyone in between, you are welcome here, no judgment and a ton of support.

Lindsey: 0:40

Hey everybody, it's Tuesday and that means another episode of the LAF Life podcast. If you just hit play, don't go anywhere because we have an awesome guest for you today. So it's June and I want to just start out by saying happy pride month, everybody. What an awesome way to celebrate diversity and be inclusive and let's just be nice. Okay. Like people are people and human beings are human beings and let's just nice to everybody. I can't wait to introduce our very special guest today. We are joined by Amy Willis, and she is a holistic sober coach for women and LGBTQ plus folks who want better booze free lives. Hi, Amy!

Amy: 1:24

Hi, guys! I'm so excited to be here, and I love the pride message right off the top.

Lindsey: 1:29

Thank you. I feel like it's just so important. I was stalking you a little bit on social. And you've been working in the recovery space since 2019. And sober since 2016. That's You've got some years behind you.

Amy: 1:45

Yeah, so I'll be celebrating eight sober years in August, which time flies. And my company actually just celebrated its fifth birthday yesterday. So

Tracey: 1:57

yeah, congrats. I saw that on social media. That's awesome. Yeah. Thank you.

Lindsey: 2:02

I'm going to talk about your company in a little bit because I was telling Tracy before we hit record about your work as being an alcohol culture consultant. I was like, this blows my mind. I have to talk to her about this. I need her to talk to the people about this. But what we usually do when we start out on a podcast is we go back to the beginning. So I want you to talk a little bit about your struggle with alcohol addiction. What did that look like for you? And how did it impact your life?

Amy: 2:31

Yeah, that's a great question. So I think like many of us, I started drinking in my teens and I started drinking with friends and peers and it started out. Socially and experimentally. But what I can recognize now in reflecting back on my life is when I started drinking, I was also going through a really traumatic upheaval within my family of origin within our home. And a lot of what was happening was completely out of my control. And frankly, I didn't have a lot of healthy coping strategies. We didn't have a lot of healthy conversations in our home. And so what was happening to and around us, we weren't talking about, we weren't processing and we weren't dealing with as a unit or as individuals. So when I started drinking at that same time, it immediately presented itself as escape. And relief from everything that was happening in my life that I couldn't find relief from in any other way. I also grew up in a home where my dad struggled with alcohol addiction. So alcohol was always present and very normalized within my family unit. And I didn't. Even really realize until I got older and started paying attention to how other friends, parents consumed alcohol or not, that the way my dad consumed alcohol was not healthy or regular. It was obviously quite excessive. And that was baked into the environment. So it was there. There was also addiction already running in the family. So I didn't really realize until many years later that I was already primed for addiction in a lot of ways. Relatively early on in my drinking days, I started developing some pretty red flag drinking behavior. Like I was hiding it. I was drinking alone within a year of starting to drink. Those things developed pretty rapidly for me. And because alcohol and addiction are progressive, I was drinking more and more both in frequency and in volume and that just continued on it. It became something that was baked into every aspect of my life. And it largely got to the point where, if I couldn't drink at the thing, whatever the thing was, I didn't really want to go, I didn't really want to do it. And I also, integrated alcohol into things that don't need alcohol, like going to the movies or I practice a lot of yoga and I'm now a yoga teacher at the time I wasn't, but I went to two really beautiful yoga festivals. I went to Wanderlust in Montreal or near Montreal many years ago, and I was drunk the entire time. And it's those kinds of things where you don't need to be drunk at a really beautiful, really spiritual experience, like a yoga festival. And things progressed as they do. Externally things looked, despite what I just said about being drunk at a yoga festival, for the most part, things looked like they were fine. My career was progressing. I had relationships, I traveled, I had a very full life. I had great friends. But where I really started to notice that my own addiction was really negatively impacting me was around my mood and mental health. Obviously now that I haven't been drinking for many years, I have a very clear sense of what my mental health and mood baseline is. But at the time I, I didn't have that clarity because I'd been drinking for such a long time and alcohol is a depressant and it was very regular. It was a very regular and common experience for me to wake up after a night of heavy drinking, feeling very indifferent about whether or not I wanted to live. And now I can recognize how dark a place that is for me, knowing what I know now. And I spent a lot of time and space in that darkness and it really started to weigh heavily on me, obviously. So I would say, that's like how it started, how it ended. And in terms of, when I started to question my own drinking.

Lindsey: 6:47

Yeah. Talk to us about that.

Amy: 6:49

Yeah. So as I mentioned, like my father struggled with alcohol addiction and he unexpectedly passed as a result of his drinking

Lindsey: 6:59

Oh my God.

Amy: 7:00

Yeah. And he and I had a very close, but very complicated relationship. And, in my family, it was he and I who struggled with addiction and nobody else. After he passed away, not immediately, my addiction got a lot worse after he passed away because it was a lot to deal with as you would expect.

Lindsey: 7:19

For sure.

Amy: 7:20

Yeah. These questions started popping into my head. I was just like, is this it? Is this my whole life? Is this all there is like drinking excessively blacking out, being hung over, feeling pretty low and in a dark place and then rinse and repeat over and over. Something somewhere along the way just kept poking me and being like, is this it? Because this all there is for you. I didn't know the answer and I didn't know what there could be that wasn't that, but I knew that there had to be something else. And I had this Instinctual knowing that I was supposed to be doing something different than what I was doing. And I didn't know what it was I didn't know how to get there, but I knew that addiction couldn't be the end of me. That is when I started to look differently at my relationship with alcohol. And also my dad had passed away. I literally had the blueprint of what my life would look like if I kept going. Not to sound dramatic about it, but I didn't want to die. I didn't want to die early. I didn't want to cut my life short because I was refusing to change.

Tracey: 8:28

Did anybody question your drinking, Amy? Or was anybody else wondering if you had a problem or if there was something wrong?

Amy: 8:37

A few different family members commented over the years about it. But what's interesting and because, the external looked good,

Tracey: 8:47

for sure.

Lindsey: 8:48

Yeah. You know, in my drinking days, I completed an undergraduate degree, I completed a master's degree. I traveled the world. I interned at the UN, like all kinds of things that look really great. And I think there's so much misinformation about addiction and we have very antiquated understandings of what it looks like. So if we see someone who, externally it looks like they're thriving, we might not say Oh, we might want to look at that. Cause I don't have a DUI and I didn't go to rehab and I didn't lose my job. But I think, we know that problematic relationships with substances take all kinds of shapes and forms and it isn't necessarily the most obvious folks who are struggling, right?

Tracey: 9:33

I think it's interesting what you said about your dad and his relationship with alcohol because my dad was an alcoholic as well. And I would say the same, growing up, we didn't know he was an alcoholic. I think We didn't see him as an alcoholic. He was a weekend binge drinker because he was a long haul truck driver. So he couldn't drink during the week and he didn't, he was very disciplined that way, but he would come home and pretty much drink from the time he walked in the door to the time he had to go back out the door. And it wasn't until he stopped driving truck and he became an alcoholic. Every day drinker drinking vodka in the morning and his coffee that we realized that he had a drinking problem, but in reality, he always had a drinking problem, again, a drinking problem or problematic drinking looks different for everybody. So just because he was binging on the weekends and he could function during the week without it doesn't mean he didn't have a problem because when he did start drinking. He didn't really stop, right? It was that could never just have one. And obviously that's why when he stopped driving truck his drinking then progressed and grew into an everyday habit. But the reality is he was always an alcoholic and always had that problem. So I can totally relate to what you were saying there with your dad as well, because I definitely had that growing up too.

Amy: 10:55

Yeah. And that's hard. And I'm sorry that was part of your experience. Cause it's hard.

Lindsey: 11:01

I was listening to another podcast and one of the topics that came up was Your beliefs around alcohol, alcohol and addiction really stems from what you believe alcohol is doing for you. For me, when I was drinking, I thought that was my relief, my escape, right? Like I believed you needed it to celebrate I believed that in order to get through a divorce. I needed to have my wine every weekend to just numb out, reset, and relax. Amy, do you think if somebody works on their beliefs about alcohol, that could maybe change their relationship with it?

Amy: 11:39

Yes, a thousand percent. Yes. And a big part of the work that I do with clients is around mindset and beliefs because our beliefs shape. Our actions, they shape our choices, they shape largely our external experiences. And using what you just said, Lindsay, about like believing that this was a tool to relax or a way to wind down. If you believe that to be true and you really value your ability to relax and wind down. Then the thought of taking alcohol out of the equation is going to threaten those things that you really value, right?

Lindsey: 12:18

It's going to trigger you and cause anxiety.

Amy: 12:21

Yeah, exactly. Or, and I just mentioned I just taught a masterclass and it was on sober socializing building confidence in sobriety and creating boundaries that support you. we kicked off day one with beliefs about alcohol because so many people have such a strong belief and association that alcohol equals fun.

Lindsey: 12:42

Exactly. To socialize it's needed and, we all like socializing, particularly with the summer coming up there's so many opportunities to, go to a patio, go to a beach vacations, barbecues, all of that. And, we have that association of alcohol being intermingled and all those things. If we believe that alcohol is the facilitator of fun, and that we can't have fun without it, taking it out of the equation it's gonna make it very unappealing and it's gonna make it exactly feel like you're not gonna have a good time. And there's nothing objectively true about that. Fun is a choice. We can all have fun exactly at any time doing whatever we're doing, and it has nothing to do with alcohol. But if we believe that alcohol makes it fun and we can't have fun without alcohol, then that's gonna be our reality. It's like alcohol is say a steak or something a meat eater is going to be like steak. I love it. Can't wait to have it. So juicy, but a vegan who believes differently about animal cruelty and eating meat is going to look at that steak and be totally repulsed by it and isn't going to want to touch it. So I really like that you do and touch on this in your coaching, because I think if we can work on Our beliefs and change the narrative in our mind. I think that's the key to changing our relationship with alcohol. And this is for people who are like the middle path drinkers. I didn't have an issue where I was like a compulsive drinker and I couldn't control myself. I wasn't somebody that drank every single day and had to, and went through withdrawal if I didn't have it. I think that's a little bit. Of a different kind but I think for the majority of people if we can work on the beliefs about the substance because really, when I used to binge drink and blackout and say stupid shit. Was that really fun? Because I believed I had fun with alcohol, but when I was crying in the middle of the dance floor at my sister's wedding, was that fun? When I fell and broke my collarbone and had to have surgery to repair it because I was so drunk on wine at home, was that fun? I think if you're Getting injured and your relationships are strained and you're waking up hungover and you believe you need alcohol for fun, I challenge people to really question that belief, right? And it sounds like you're working on that.

Amy: 15:03

Yeah, absolutely. I have these questions and they're like really quick. So maybe I'll share them here, but okay. Anytime you're investigating your beliefs ask is it true? Like objectively true? What a group of people looking at this question all answered in the same way. So is it objectively true? What evidence do you have of it being true? What would be possible if it weren't true? And there's another one, but we'll just leave it at that. To actually just take that stuff apart, because the thing about beliefs is. Sometimes they feel like they're facts because they're so deeply rooted and they've been there for a long time and we've invested a lot in them. But in a lot of cases we inherit beliefs from our caregivers. We believe what they believed to be true and they inherited from their caregivers. So I think taking some time to actually investigate is this true? Is this true for me? What would be possible if something else were true? Does this belief actually serve me? I think that can be really helpful. Even just putting the whole conversation about Alcohol to the side for a second what do we believe to be true about ourselves? Do we believe ourselves that, we can create change if we want, do we believe a different version of our lives is possible? Do we believe we have the capacity to create something different? I think the beliefs pieces is really foundational in any kind of change that you're hoping to make in your life.

Lindsey: 16:36

I love that. It is so well said and you articulate it so well. And I love that you're coaching. That's the foundation. Great.

Tracey: 16:45

I think it's just simple questions to Lindsay's point, asking yourself, was that really fun, I know for myself, I made many decisions when I was drinking that were not good for me that I know if I wasn't drinking, I would have never made. So I think that's a question too. If you weren't drinking, would you have done that? Yes. If you weren't drinking, would you have made that decision? Because to me, I always say you need at least one person in your life. That's going to call you out on your shit and ask you the hard questions. And to me, sometimes those are the hard questions that are really going to make people dig down to themselves and, push themselves to answer questions that make them feel uncomfortable. That they wouldn't otherwise answer if someone wasn't pushing them. Going with the whole beliefs. way of thinking is amazing. I agree with Lindsay. I think that's a great concept and a great foundation for what you're doing when you're working with people and coaching them.

Lindsey: 17:44

Amy, you mentioned this a little bit about summer coming up when we were talking previously here, and I wanted just to ask you a question pick your brain for some advice. Let's maybe talk a little bit about someone going into their first sober summer. What are some little tidbits or little nuggets that you can offer someone who's less than confident about, enjoying summer or summer? Staying sober for the summer when, just like you said, there's so many opportunities to drink. Patio season, people are on vacation, we're going to the lake, there are outdoor concerts and venues and festivals and alcohol is everywhere. What can you tell people? What advice can you give them to help them stay on track with their sobriety journey?

Amy: 18:31

Yeah, I think that's a great question. I would say, setting ourselves up for success is really essential. And there are lots of ways that we can do that. I think what I see and certainly a mistake I made when I got sober is I didn't have a plan. I didn't have anything in place. I was just like, okay I'm not drinking. So I'm just going to show up and do all the same things and just hope for the best and hope is awesome, but it's not a strategy. Yeah, I would say being super intentional. Before even getting to all the things, when an invite or opportunity for something social. Comes into your orbit before you answer, just pause and check in with yourself. Do you want to go do you want to hang out with these people? Do you want to actually do this thing? Do you have the energy for it? How is your stress level? Where is your capacity right now? So for me, knowing what I know about myself, if somebody asks me to do something on a Friday evening at, I don't know, anything after really seven o'clock, My capacity after the full work week is like relatively low, so I'm probably a no on that. Yeah. Even if it sounds like a great time, and so the reason for that is because when we put ourselves in situations where our capacity is low, maybe we're stressed, maybe we're anxious. Maybe we're really tired. We're not going to be making the best decisions that are most supportive of us. So I would say before you actually get to anything, check in with yourself. Do you want to go, do you want to be with these people? Do you want to do the thing? And if it's a hell yes, on all fronts, then yes, that's a go ahead, I would say. And if it's not a hell yes, then maybe you pass on that one. For the stuff that you do decide to go to, I would say bring a friend, bring a partner, bring somebody for built in accountability. That can be really helpful. I would also say, have an idea of when you want to go And when you want to leave giving yourself full permission to leave the second you want to, and that might be five minutes after you get there. If you're like, not my vibe, that's okay. I think sometimes we overstay. And then again, we like get to a place where, and this is true for me, I'm tired. I'm over it. I'm people though. And like when we're in that all the time. Yeah, exactly. I don't know if that's like a people pleasing thing or no, hard

Lindsey: 20:56

times saying no and no boundaries. Yeah.

Amy: 20:59

Yeah. So it's just have a sense, just like map it out for yourself. I would also say. Check in with yourself intermittently. How are you feeling? Are you enjoying your time? Are you enjoying your company? I would also say plan to bring something to drink that you enjoy drinking. Don't hope that the host is going to have something enjoyable for you because if you're in a social situation and everybody around you is drinking what you used to drink and you have a glass of. tap water in your hand. It's not, it's not going to be as enjoyable. It might feel tempting. And so just like plan, something that you actually really enjoy. So that might be like an alcohol free drink, or it might be your favorite bubbly water or an infused tea or whatever it is, but just something that you enjoy. Consuming that you can have in your hand so that you don't need to rely on somebody else. And, you aren't then just stuck with water. And I would also just say lastly, just remembering that fun is a choice. Going back to the mindset piece. Love it. If you have already decided that it's not gonna be fun because you're not drinking, I promise you're gonna have a terrible time. But if you go in and, it doesn't even have to be going in with the attitude that I'm going to have the best time of my life. Maybe it's more neutral. Maybe it's, I'm really open to having a good time tonight or I'm really open to seeing how this all unfolds. I can guarantee you're going to have a better time if you approach it that way. And mentally set yourself up in that way.

Lindsey: 22:35

I love that. Those are some really tangible ways that, someone can protect their decision to ditch booze. And also PSA, you're not responsible to make everybody feel comfortable around you. When you've always been drinking and you're hanging out with a group of people that you've always been drinking with, you have to realize that you're the one that's making the decision now to be different, right? And that decision doesn't have to make everybody around you feel good. It actually might, be like a mirror. Cause, I used to find, and maybe this was your experience too, I used to find that when I said, no thanks, people then would be like, oh, and then they would start to tell me I only drink, on Saturday nights and I'm like I didn't question that. I didn't ask you that and I don't need to know about it. That's cool. You do you, but I think we start to then become mirrors to people somehow. And they start to project their relationship onto you. And then, you might feel like, oh my gosh, I'm uncomfortable and I'm making them feel uncomfortable. I feel I'm so far into it now and outside of the jar that I can now read the label and be like, Oh, I get it. I have the confidence and practice. I think we talked about that on another podcast, practice the saying the no, and then you build confidence. Right.

Amy: 23:50

Yes. Yeah. And I would also say for folks have some responses in your back pocket. Don't be in the moment in real time, trying to figure out how you want to communicate that you're not drinking, just like a few things in your back pocket. And again, you don't need to over explain it. You don't need to explain anything to anybody. It can be as simple as I'm not drinking or no, thanks. I'm good with what I have. But have them in your back pocket, practice them out loud. Practice them in front of the mirror, if that helps because, by the time you've said it 20 times, you're going to feel a lot better about saying it compared to the first or second. And you can do that. You can practice anytime. Yeah. So practicing. Yes.

Tracey: 24:31

I think that advice that you started with there, Amy, is good for anybody in any situation. We should all be doing that self analysis before we decide to do anything. Like when I think about, situations even now for myself, and sometimes the things you commit to, I know that there was a point for me where I just really had to do that re evaluation of, Is this where I want to go? Is this the people I want to spend my time with? And I think even after drinking or not, you should be asking yourself those questions when you commit to social situations, right?

Amy: 25:06

Yeah. Yeah. And I don't know if this actually I do know, I think it's probably part of like our conditioning as girls and women is to say yes. And to be accommodating and to make other people feel comfortable and make them feel good. Yeah. Yeah. And and I think that also goes hand in hand with changing your relationship to alcohol. There's just so much, whether it's like externally communicated pressure or not it's all there. And so I think actually just stepping into our power and being like, actually, no, I don't want to go to that thing. And no, I don't want to drink. I think there's good. Yeah. Yeah. And it's bold and it's powerful and it's awesome. And counterculture and anyway, that could be a whole other podcast episode.

Lindsey: 25:54

Totally agree with you. It's that confidence piece, right? That confidence piece that you start to build over time. Totally. I wanted to ask you a really important question. Because I feel like you with your coaching and everything, you're going to probably have some observations on this. As your experience struggling with addiction and someone who identifies as queer, and you're working a lot with women and the LGBTQ plus community, which is amazing. I wanted to know, what are your observations within these groups, women, LGBTQ are the rates of substance use higher?

Amy: 26:35

Yeah, so definitely within the queer community and by a pretty significant margin. Within the queer community, there's a lot of diversity. So if we were looking even more specifically, like we see amongst trans folks, higher rates of mental health issues, higher rates of addiction, higher rates of suicidal ideation and all of it. Yeah. I think it's very interesting. Obviously as a woman and as a queer woman and as a sober woman and somebody who struggled with addiction, that is my own lived experience. What I can say for sure is the queer community, particularly at this time of year. So keep your eyes peeled for it, you'll see it. The queer community is very much targeted by alcohol companies. Because as a group, as a collective, there are higher rates of substance use issues. And so there is a lot more money at this time of year, especially for alcohol companies to make a lot more money because they make the most money off the heaviest drinkers. Yeah. And there is a lot of very specific targeting of the queer community. If you go to any pride celebrations, count the number of alcohol companies who are there as sponsors. I was Yeah. And they positioned themselves as allies and as like supporters of the community and it's just like you were, you wouldn't be here because what you're actually doing is peddling a very addictive, very poisonous, toxic substance to folks who are already struggling with it. And alcohol companies in. Different ways, but in the same kind of predatory, manipulative way also target women. So women, historically it used to be illegal for women to drink in public. It used to be illegal for women to be in bars and all of that kind of thing. Even though that was rooted in. Sexism and misogyny. It was actually a protective factor for women around drinking, which is good. But because of that leg in women buying alcohol and women consuming alcohol, the alcohol industry I think in the 60s, maybe essentially tagged women as an emerging market and started to really target and go after women as, a brand new market that could be exploited. We see this. In, companies using feminized language in their marketing or positioning alcohol consumption as like a feminist act or creating new products that are targeted specifically towards women. So when you see a beer company that then makes like a cooler, that's pink.

Lindsey: 29:16

What about like skinny girl margaritas? I'm like, yeah.

Amy: 29:21

Yeah, all that bullshit. All of that. Yeah. Yeah. We see that and it's all done very intentionally and it's all done to make money off of us, which also harms us. And. All just, for the sake of making more money and increasing profits. one of the things that I talk about, like I do a lot of education yes, I love that, conversations like these are articles or social media or whatever. Women, metabolize alcohol differently and all of that kind of thing. So there are physiological differences, but some of the other, key pieces don't get a lot of airtime. For example, the relationship between alcohol and breast cancer is not one that we talk about a lot, but outside of genetic and hereditary factors, alcohol is the leading. Risk factor for breast cancer and women. And most women do not know this. And we also have awareness studies that show us that about 20 to 30 percent of women are aware of the relationship between alcohol and breast cancer, which means that high percentage of women don't know about that relationship. And earlier this year, there was a pretty large study that revealed the relationship specifically amongst women between alcohol consumption and heart disease risk. That is also very significant. The numbers were staggering that came out of that study. If you would like, I can send you that study. If you want to put it into your show, read it themselves, but like really concerning. So women who were engaging in binge drinking, for example, and binge drinking in that study was defined as three standard drinks per day. Okay. Increased women's risk of developing heart disease by 65%. Wow. These are not small numbers, and these are not conversations that we as women are having around alcohol and alcohol is everywhere and it's socially encouraged. My goal is to make the information like accurate evidence based information as available as alcohol itself is so that people can make informed decisions. Educated decisions. And if they're choosing to drink, they are choosing to drink fully knowing and being empowered with all the information. That feels so important.

Lindsey: 31:36

Everything you just said gave me chills. I get so riled up about it.

Amy: 31:41

Me too. And you should, because it's an issue of consent, right? Like, how are we engaging with this thing that we don't fully understand and know all the risks and harms that go along with it, right? It's a health equity issue. I happen to have a research based master's degree, so I can read those studies and understand it, but most people don't have that level of education, and you shouldn't need that to understand what you're putting in your body.

Lindsey: 32:08

That's amazing. Oh, sorry, Trace. My excitement. I just cut you right off. I was like,

Tracey: 32:13

It's okay. I was just going to say, I think it's interesting what you're saying because we just did an episode and I'm learning more about this myself and taking a course because I'm in that stage of life, but we just did an episode about menopause and alcohol. Yeah. And I feel like those two things, what you were just talking about are probably directly linked. Yes, because our risk of heart disease goes up in menopause and so does breast cancer, right? All those things are at higher risk when we go through perimenopause and menopause and then put drinking on top of that. I think that's probably. I'm not sure if there was age ranges in those studies, but if you looked at the age range, I would almost guarantee that those women are in that phase of life and that age bracket.

Amy: 33:02

Yeah.

Tracey: 33:03

So it's very scary. It's very scary for women for sure.

Amy: 33:06

It is. And we need to be talking about it. It's vital, right? It's vital. We're not talking about some tiny risk for some weird, obscure substance that sometimes we consume. It's alcohol is everywhere, and we're encouraged to drink it, and it's paired with everything. Tracey where we live in Ontario I'm not sure if you've been keeping up with this, but alcohol is going to be in convenience stores in September.

Tracey: 33:29

Yes.

Amy: 33:30

No.

Tracey: 33:31

Yeah. Yeah.

Lindsey: 33:32

No. Let's make it easier. Let's go buy bread. And also let's get some booze. I don't know.

Amy: 33:37

Totally. Totally.

Tracey: 33:39

And we have so many more important issues and that's what they decided to. I know. I know. Focus their attention on, which is very sad. Yeah, it is. And it is counter to, when we're thinking about reducing alcohol consumption and harms, we know that accessibility is a key piece to that. So moving in the opposite direction and making it easier to get and during COVID in Ontario, they introduced two new policies, one that allowed you to purchase alcohol with takeout food orders and two to get alcohol through Uber. And both of those changes were made in the name of supporting small businesses and small businesses. I hear you. It was a hard time we could have gotten more creative in a less harmful way. And those policies have not been changed back and they won't be because no, of course not. It's huge money. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So anyway I also get very hot under the collar about all of this. It makes me very upset.

Lindsey: 34:43

Quick question, Amy, before I switch gears what are your thoughts on moderation?

Amy: 34:48

What are my thoughts on moderation? I would say For folks who have struggled with addiction or substance use issues or, trying to limit their intake and not finding success with that. I have not yet come across anyone who has really struggled and then moved into a place where they're able to moderate with success. Also, generally speaking. The way alcohol functions in our bodies doesn't really lend itself easily to moderation because, we develop a tolerance to it and then we want more of it. So over time, that generally moves in one direction. I would say, for folks who have never struggled with it and some people are primed for addiction and others are not. Sure. Yeah. Like maybe a glass of wine a month or, very occasionally. Great. No problem. From a risk perspective, the risk is very low. All alcohol carries some level of risk, but truly, if you're having a single glass of something every once in a while, you're probably okay. So if that's what we're talking about in terms of moderation. Sure. Sure. I think some people can do that. For the folks who have struggled with addiction, I haven't really seen it take shape

Lindsey: 36:06

successfully. Yeah. I feel like it gives you a past still like for me, I could never just have one glass of wine. I could. But I always wanted more, and I would drink more. And if I wasn't drinking, I wasn't thinking about it. So I feel like for those people in the middle, moderation is hey, it's you're telling yourself, it's still okay, a little bit. But then I made a real and I was like, Okay, let's just break this down. So if Like you said, alcohol is a group one carcinogen, right? And so is nuclear radiation, and so is asbestos. But we're not like, let's just moderate our exposure to asbestos and nuclear radiation. Let's just try that out and see how that goes. No. We want to eliminate all that. But like, why did we do this with alcohol? Okay, I can have a little bit, I just think I was never able to do that. I know Kelly wasn't able to do that successfully. And then it's added stress. Like you say, you're only going to have one or two drinks, but then you go beyond that. And then you're like, like I said this, but of course, every time I break this promise to myself, and now it's just that added stress of I can't moderate what's wrong with me. Oh my God, I can't just drink normally. So I just think eliminate.

Amy: 37:24

Yeah. And for anybody who perhaps has struggled with drinking and they're really wanting to moderate, I guess I would just ask why, so what is it? What is the tie that still connects you to alcohol? What is it that you're seeking? And if it truly is about that, one single drink every once in a while, which. It's never been doing for you. And that's the thing. Yeah. So what are you hoping to get out of that experience that you feel you can't have if alcohol is without it. Is alcohol actually delivering on that experience for you? So really what is it doing? Do you need it? What is the pull to still want to do all the work to moderate? Cause it's a lot of mental load to be like, I can only have one or I have to limit myself or only then, or only at this time. It's exhausting. It's exhausting.

Lindsey: 38:17

It is exhausting. A willpower thing like when you're trying to adjust your eating habits to I think that's tied back to the belief thing like what do you believe about it because are you gritting your teeth and trying to use a willpower to only have that one drink and moderate, or really go back and look at what do you believe you're getting from alcohol by having just the one like what's the perceived benefits. Right.

Amy: 38:41

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, just dig in a little for anybody who's I really want to do that. Dig into that. And see what you find, right? Yeah. No judgment. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But just get curious about it and actually figure out does this goal of moderation align with my other goals? Yeah.

Tracey: 38:58

If you're trying to moderate, and you're feeling like it's more work, or it's more about restraining yourself, and there's still that desire in your mind, because this happened to me, I could just have one drink, but I would always mentally want more. So if you're moderating, and in your mind, you're always thinking about that one more that should probably be a pretty big red flag that you shouldn't be moderating. When you lose that restraint and it's likely to happen. It's just falling off the wagon with an eating program too. It's okay I can introduce back sugar because I haven't had it for so long. you have that 1 dessert. How long is it going to be till you're having dessert regularly or those cookies or that chocolate? I think for some people, it's just got to be an all or nothing. Agreed.

Amy: 39:44

Yeah.

Lindsey: 39:45

I wanted to switch gears a little bit here, Amy. I have a last point that I want to touch on before I ask you where our listeners can find you. You also state that you're an alcohol culture consultant and educator with your company and you support organizations and companies in creating alcohol free workspaces. I'm sorry, what? This is amazing. This is the first that I've ever heard of somebody doing this. And I think this is really important. So you're disrupting normative alcohol culture and reducing harms that are caused by it. So I've got a question for you. How can you tell if your workplace is alcohol safe or not?

Amy: 40:27

Yeah, that's a great question. I actually have a quiz on my website for organizations to assess what their alcohol practices look like. Normative alcohol culture is a term that I actually created so that we can talk about all the ways that we think about and talk about and engage with alcohol. alcohol has gone through. a process that has made it increasingly normalized in our world. So we no longer question it. We no longer question if it's actually working for us, if it's in service to us. I think that this is also true in corporate and organizational environments. Because so many people are in corporate or organizational environments, I think organizations are so well situated to create A ripple effect around alcohol and how alcohol exists within their organization. So some things that an organization could look at if they were interested in creating a more alcohol safe environment are you as an organization gifting alcohol to employees? Are you regularly hosting events, mandatory or not in places like wineries or bars is it an expectation that any kind of client interactions or any kind of client entertaining involved drinking one good one that folks might not think to look at, but our mental health and alcohol related. Claims that are going through your insurance or benefits packages increasing are breast cancer claims increasing. Cause we know that all of that,

Lindsey: 42:06

you're blowing my mind. You're blowing my mind. Yeah. Lots and lots of organizations have bars built into their offices. There is an expectation. Of alcohol consumption during office hours in your office site. Those are the types of things. If you were interested in creating a more alcohol safe environment those are the types of things that you could be looking at to get a little bit more information. About what the alcohol culture is within your organization. I think it's really important to acknowledge that there are lots of reasons that folks don't drink. For myself, it's because I struggled with addiction and also I'm now so clear about what alcohol is and I just have no interest in putting it in my body. But there are lots of reasons that people don't and, for Organizations that are global in nature, they likely have employees from all different cultures, countries, religions may or may not engage with alcohol in the ways that we do. People don't drink for, cultural and religious reasons, people don't drink for health reasons, pregnancy, whatever it is. Not only from a perspective of increasing. Employee and organizational wellbeing and reducing harm, but also increasing inclusion where, nobody is feeling like they're missing out on something because they don't drink or feeling like opportunities for networking and advancement aren't available to them because they don't participate in alcohol culture. There really are. Really important pieces to look at when it comes to alcohol and organizational spaces. I would also say in Canada, we have an organization called the Canadian Center on Substance Use and Addiction, and they provide a lot of really helpful and insightful data and reports for us. We know that alcohol costs all of us a lot of money in terms of the burden it bears on our health care system, on our legal system, and on, finance essentially. So we know that alcohol costs organizations and all of us Billions of dollars every single year. When you're talking to organizations and companies who are interested in preserving the bottom line, take a look at what your organization is doing with alcohol. Do you have a regular budget line for alcohol in your organization? And then how does that then impact things like absenteeism, presenteeism, productivity, all the things. It's really interesting work and not a lot of people are doing it, but I think it's really, you are, Yeah,

Amy: 44:55

I'm trying. Yeah.

Lindsey: 44:56

Oh my gosh. I've never heard of anybody tackling alcohol. And being alcohol free from this angle. And I think this is so needed. Yeah, it really blew my mind. Some of your posts on social media.

Tracey: 45:08

It's very interesting. I just want to speak to it from a flip perspective because I've had this happen in my own organization where I think it goes back to there's a sense of fear of taking it away from employees.

Amy: 45:23

Yeah.

Tracey: 45:23

As it's a benefit, right? That they're offering these things at events and whatnot, because I had a situation where I was putting on a team builder event for my team. And one of the very first questions I was asked was, they're going to be wine there. I really think that there was some members of my team because it was voluntary, right? It was after hours. So it was voluntary. It wasn't mandatory that they attend that there was probably people that wouldn't go if there wasn't going to be wine there.

Amy: 45:54

Yeah,

Tracey: 45:54

so I think there's a lot of pressure from the flip side sometimes in organizations to have those offerings based on what we believe is so accepted and normal in society.

Amy: 46:09

Yeah. Yeah.

Lindsey: 46:11

Then I would say you'd have to question your organizational culture, your vision, your mission and all of that and take a look at that, right? Because if you're an organization that values health and wellbeing for your staff instead of wine, maybe, invest those funds into gym memberships, that's actually going to be an actual benefit. That's just my opinion.

Amy: 46:32

Yeah, no. And I think that's legit. And I agree the corporate environment and organizational environment is very much an extension of the world we live in and the normalization of alcohol everywhere. It's not even necessarily about saying we're never going to purchase alcohol or make it available, but maybe it's, instead of going to that winery for the holiday party, maybe you do choose something that, maybe there's alcohol there. Maybe there isn't, but something that feels more inclusive to folks that give everybody an option to participate. And maybe, you do also look at so like the work that I do, there's the education piece. There's also because I'm a coach, there's the coaching. So actually sitting down with, C level executives and talking to them about the education piece, but also talking to them and getting them on board with the shifts and the changes. Then actually looking at policy within that organization. So change like this isn't just about taking the alcohol away. It's about. Shifting awareness, shifting education, changing policy, and actually creating an environment where alcohol or like drinking in response to stress or coping because of a high stress work environment isn't as needed because we've changed the environment.

Lindsey: 47:53

I love that. For anybody listening that wants to have some one on one coaching with you or do anything with their organization or workplace, where can people find you on social media and where can they find you online like a website?

Amy: 48:10

Yeah, so my website is HOL and well. com and I'll spell that out because it's not what you think. It's H. O. L. A. N. D. W. E. L. dot com. So that's my company I'm pretty active on Instagram so you can also find me there. My handle is at Ms. So Ms. Amy C. Willis, which is my name. Either of those are a great way to connect with me.

Lindsey: 48:34

I just absolutely love today's conversation, Amy, and I'm so glad that we connected and that you came on and talked about all the things because, man, I just feel like some of the things you're offering. I've already looked at your website. It's just so on point and listeners go and follow Amy on social media. Follow her on Instagram. She's amazing. I have one last question, Amy, to close us out here. What was your biggest surprise benefit of getting sober?

Amy: 49:02

Yeah, I love that question. I would say the level of confidence that I have. Built it's interesting because today in my master class, it was all about confidence building and I talk about my own experiences with getting sober and how sobriety is a perfect container to build confidence because in my definition of confidence. It's the willingness to try not necessarily being attached to the outcome, but actually just trying something new and in doing so you learn some new skills, you learn something about yourself, you build your competence, which then reinforces your confidence and it just becomes this cycle. And I can't think of. Anything better than sobriety that invites you to try new things repeatedly and continue to show up without actually knowing how it's all going to shake out. Yeah, I would say the confidence I never would have guessed that getting sober would have enabled me to become the most confident version of myself.

Lindsey: 50:03

I freaking love

Amy: 50:04

that. Yeah.

Lindsey: 50:06

I just fricking love that. Yeah. That is on point, Amy. That is on point. You're so awesome, Amy. Oh my God. I'm so glad we connected. And I'm so glad that our listeners are able to just experience this, like the vibe here or, Trace, did you have any last thoughts? I just wanted to say thank you so much. What you're doing is amazing. I love your approach and I think that if any of our listeners want to reach out, that you're definitely someone who can help them out. And yeah, I love the whole corporate thing too. Something I've never heard of either. Love that you're tackling from that perspective. Because to me, The more angles we can tackle this at the better, right? So that's awesome. Thank you so much for joining us. It's been such a pleasure to meet you and I'm so happy you could come on and share your story with our listeners.

Amy: 50:56

Thank you for having me. This has been great and I hope it reaches folks and it is of service. They need to hear your message. I think it's so important. All right, everybody. Oh, you're so welcome. That is a wrap on today's episode, go and follow Amy Willis on Instagram. Don't forget to check out her company whole and well, spelled H O L and W E L L. We'll see you back here next Tuesday with a brand new episode. And until then, you guys know what to do. Keep laughing.

Kelly: 51:31

Thank you for listening. Please give us a five star rating like and subscribe, share on social media and tell your friends. We love getting your feedback and ideas of what you'd like to hear on upcoming episodes of the LAF life podcast. If you yourself are living alcohol free and want to share your story here, please reach out.