I am live. Hey there, my dear witches. Welcome back to the sober witch life: Sunshine’s guide to a magical recovery. And today we’re talking about, I think the last episode that I did, we talked about staying sober in the holidays. And so when I was sitting there and reflecting about what to talk about today, we’re going to talk about relapses during the holiday winter holiday season because the reality is, yes, sometimes it can be challenging to stay on this path, which means a relapse can happen. And so we’re going to talk about that today. You know, when I think back about my journey, I ended up first dancing around the concept and the topic of sobriety after the holidays, right? And I don’t even recall or remember what it was like the holiday before I decided to get sober, I would imagine, not very pleasant at the time; the gentleman that I was dating, you know, rest in peace, Keith struggled through the holidays, so they were always kind of a little bit tough for us. We fought a little bit more. He got a little bit darker. And yeah, often, we would turn to alcohol to deal with that.

You know, there’s something that he and I did very well together: drink, though it was destroying us both. But it was January. It was the first of January that I’d committed to initially starting to toy with this concept of not drinking, no longer having alcohol, alcohol being a part of my life. So, I didn’t have my relapses during the holiday season. And you know, even what I would have shared in the last episode, I did get sober, so I stepped into my, like, full recovery on October 9, right before the holiday season started, right? I think the holiday season starts with Halloween, and so I was really concerned about that, like, you know, staying sober and things of that nature. But I didn’t personally experience a relapse to alcohol. But I do have a lot of other addictions, right? I have an addictive personality. I think many of us, you know, identify as an addict or dance around that addict space or anything of that nature. You know, you know, have addiction in our life. Have more than one. And so I have often stated, you know, I’m a recovering alcoholic, workaholic, perfectionist, and control freak. What I don’t often share as well that I am I struggle with food addiction, shopping addiction on top of that control, and perfectionism. And so food is one of those that I tend to find I relapse on the most, right? You know, the reality is, and I’ve talked with my therapist about this, when I was in therapy, you have to eat, and so it’s really easy to justify, you know, kind of what we start consuming, or anything of that nature. And though I don’t binge eat as much as I once did when I was a lot younger right, my disordered eating isn’t so much into that space. I will still eat things that I know my body doesn’t like, and it’s just, I don’t even know why it happens, you know, I’ve sat in it, and I should say, I do know of it, and I’ll share a little bit as to, as to why it happens. But, yeah, it’s wild like it’s a, it’s a relapse that I have. And this year, you know, it started, I did, you know, it started around the beginning of November and continued right past Thanksgiving.

And, I look back at it and it’s like, I justify it in the same way that I would have, like, an alcoholic drink or a beverage, like, Oh, it’s just one, right? It’s just one, and then one becomes two, and then, you know, weeks go by and, you know, I hit, like, for me, it’s all of this, like, gluttonous food. This very, I should say, glutinous food, like the bread, the pastries, the pasta and the things like that. And yet, I started with a simple little pastry at the beginning of November, and around Thanksgiving, it ended up being stuffing and macaroni and cheese and rolls. And, you know, I know I’m really into it. When I find myself only wanting to eat bread, it’s fucking nuts. So that’s one of them. Shopping is another one. And I will tell you, this holiday season, any holiday season, it’s tough, right? I have a bit of a shopping addiction, which can often be, like, Black Friday sales for my business. Like, oh, I need that. Oh, I need this, like, really trying to justify this. And it’s also gifts for others, right? Like, I love gifting people things I really do. It brings me a lot of joy to be able to, like, kind of. I, you know, it just does. And you know, I will, I will literally shop early, right, to get it all done so that I don’t have the stress of doing it later. And then I’ll keep buying them things, you know, and justifying it. And you know, as I said, the control, the perfectionism, I’ve worked really hard on this one for a long time, probably since my 20s, you know. And sometimes it’s easier than it is others. But like right now, I don’t have a tree or any type of Christmas decorations really up, you know. And somatically in my body, that feels a bit uncomfortable, but not as bad as it once used to. And I’ve just started to write down some things kind of and tackle the planning for Yule, which is pretty much seven days, six days from now, you know. And if I were to look back at the old me like many, many moons ago, maybe even just in early recovery, I probably would have been very buttoned up, so to speak, in this regard, because it was a way of, I don’t know, giving me some sense of, I don’t, you know, the sense of control gives you a sense of, like, disillusioned you know, role in your life, I don’t know how else to explain that. And, I imagined food was, was probably my first addiction. And I said, I do think I know what happened. And I have this really vague memory once upon a time; I don’t, I think it was maybe year two or three in my recovery, I did all of these, like childhood regression sessions.

I would kind of had somebody ask me a bunch of questions. I’d put myself into a deep trance, and I would be questions related to my childhood in various stages of my childhood, and one of them that came up as I was sitting and prepping the notes today was this memory of equating food to love, right? Like the way I was shown love as a child was through food, right? And because I don’t think we quite understand, you know that a roof over our head and things of that nature offer also a reflection of love. But I have these memories of a child being, you know, younger and upset and hurt, or, you know, whatever it is, and food being the answer, right? And as I said, my, my turn is these really soft, tasty, glutinous things, right? Um, the breads, the cakes, the cookies, pastries, even like from a pasta perspective. And these are often I find things that are really easy to consume as well. And so when it comes to the holiday season and where I’m like, over extending myself, planning too many commitments, or anything of that nature, these tend to be easy solutions for food, yet they really don’t nourish my body. In the past, it was also like food, and eating was a way to kind of avoid interactions at family gatherings, you know. And I look back as a child, you could eat it, you could talk about it. Who made it? What was it like? All that kind of stuff, you know. And it wasn’t frowned upon to go back for more. And it was like this numbing agent to, like ground myself in these environments that were very uncomfortable for myself, right? So, just as as I was an adult, and I did it with alcohol, I’ve done it for much of my life through food at these holiday gatherings and shopping, you know, there’s this expectation of gift giving over the holidays, and I just can’t quite come to terms with it, because me, personally, I prefer experiences like I prefer somebody asking me out to lunch, to dinner to coffee. I prefer somebody coming over and just sitting and hanging out with me. But yet, there’s this expectation of gift giving. And as I said, I love to give gifts. I really do. So there’s this like dopamine of thinking, Oh, I can’t wait till they opened it. Oh, it’s going to be the best gift ever. Oh, they’re going to love it, right? Gross, right? And you know the control and the perfectionism. Where did this come from? You know, there was a lot of family dynamics. You know, I grew up walking on eggshells around my father, and, you know, things had to go as planned for him. And I realized now that my mother and a lot of her own kind of like OCD tendencies were to make sure that he wasn’t upset, which then, you know, rolled down to us children. So I’ve spent much of my adult life working on these things, but like from the holiday, when we think about things that could potentially trigger and lead us toward a relapse, they’re all these expectations, right? There are all of these like these family dynamics that come into play. There are even just these ways that we’re going about, like protecting ourselves or our energetics. And I look back and even now, right?

You know, as I said, I kind of relapsed on the food piece. How do I get back into my recovery after a relapse? Is like I have to forgive myself first. I’m a human being having a human experience, right? And I try to lean into some kind of ritual that I can connect to, like leaning back into something. So why am I sharing all of this with you? Is because the holidays can often suck. They really can, you know, think about it all the way from Halloween to New Year’s Eve. There are societal expectations, there are family dynamics, there are things that we may situations energetically, that we may find that we need to, like, protect ourselves from, and we don’t know how right. And these pressures and these expectations are are, are often us, but because they’ve been set by society and our family, right? Think about this as we go all the way back to Halloween, right? You know, the kids must go out trick or cheating. They have to get a costume, they have to do this. They’ve got to show up for school, all of these things. They just start like all of these little nitpicks, right? And then we go into like, oh, well, you shouldn’t be eating all of their candies. You gotta get rid of their candy. Their candy isn’t good. And, you know? And then we get into who’s going to host Thanksgiving and who’s cooking what? And I don’t like that, and they suck at making this. And I want this for Christmas. I don’t want anything for Christmas. I’m so sad You didn’t get me anything for Christmas, and we’ve got to drive four hours to see who I haven’t, you know, like, talk to them in two years, and I’m not doing that again this New Year’s Eve, right? All of these pressures, all of these expectations, and then you add in the fact that we are moving into, you know, we’ve basically since, I mean, you know, since fall, right? But we’ve been moving into the darkest, longest nights of the year, and they’re a recipe for a relapse, my dear friends, they are a recipe. As a matter of facts, relapse rates can increase by 150% during the holiday, and that peak is between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Alcohol related fatalities, on average, are about 36 per day, which is so fucking sad. But during Christmas, it goes from 36 up to, I believe it’s 45 and New Year’s, it’s from 36 up to 54 which is fucking wild, right? They happen. Relapses happen, and some, sometimes often, a relapse is the first step towards weeks, months, and sometimes even years of continuing in our addiction spiral. But it doesn’t have to be that way. You can strengthen yourself and see whatever you’re going through, even if it is a relapse, as a way to strengthen your own recovery journey. And the number one thing that I encourage you to do is practice forgiveness. If it happens, turn towards forgiveness for yourself. You’re human. You’re human being, you’re not perfect. It doesn’t exist. Perfection does not exist. And if you experience those feelings of guilt and shame for experiencing or going through a relapse, don’t linger in them too long. It’s okay that they happen, right? But they are low vibrational emotions that are not serving you. Guilt and shame tend to keep our low, our vibrations incredibly low, which can then lead us into depression, which can then lead us to keep relapsing over and over again. Forgive yourself, forgive yourself for being a human and making a mistake. That’s all it was. And once you’ve done that, reflect upon the triggers or whatever would have gotten you there. Maybe you can take a moment to journal about it, write it down, right, take a look and see how were you caring for yourself during that time? You know, I myself when the relapses started, I had been, Oh, God. I don’t even know how many events I’d had up until that point, right, basically, from the beginning of September all the way until the middle of November. It was, it was a lot, you know, and I look back at what I could have done differently, and, you know, I could have stopped other work if I knew I had those events to be a commitment towards, or I could have bowed out of those events, you know, and I literally, because of this, I have decided to bow out of events for next year because I don’t want to find myself. Back in the same spot, right? Meaning I change something so that I don’t find myself back there. Sure, I may have an event come up that I decide to do. But as far as the schedule that I’d kept every single Sunday and multiple two day, or, I should say, four day shows, you know at least one every month, if not two, I’m just not doing it again. And then create a relapse prevention plan, right?

I think the number one thing that that can include is setting boundaries for gathering and saying no to events that you don’t want to go to. It is so true. You don’t have to. I know so many of us feel an obligation. Like, oh, we have to. We have to. We can’t say no. But trust me, you do not have to go to any, to everything, and you do not have to go to anything. When you’re asked, no, is an acceptable answer, and when they ask, why, just say, Because I said so, because I don’t want to you owe them no explanation, right? Let some of your sober friends know, or maybe the folks that you know don’t drink that support you in recovery that you’re going to be texting or calling them when things get tough, and then make a commitment to attend extra support meetings or check ins during the holidays. In case you didn’t know, I do host a weekly recovery circle for witches every single Sober Witch Life mobile app, and it’ll give you the details on it at the end of the day, I’d encourage you, if you find yourself in a relapse, to go through these things, forgive yourself. Reflect upon what it is that brought you into that relapse in the first place, create a prevention plan to make sure that you don’t do it again. But most importantly here after that, forgiveness is recommit to your sobriety. Every minute is a new minute. Every day is a new day, and anytime you can recommit to your journey. One of the ways that I know I really love to kind of do that and to like help ground myself, is I will use the witches serenity prayer, right? I’ll use that prayer, just in case you’ve never heard it before. Let me go ahead and share that with you, because I think it’s incredibly beautiful. You can use the general, the regular, which I have done many, many times, but the witch, serenity prayer, Oh Divine universe, grant me the power of water to accept with ease and grace when I cannot change. The power of fire to invoke courage, to change the things that I can the power of air for clarity, the note of the difference between the two of those and the power of Earth to ground me in my highest vibrational path. You can recommit to your recovery journey at any time, my dear, any fucking time you get to make that choice.

That being said, if you do need some extra help and support, as I mentioned, you can always join the weekly recovery circle. You can always reach out to me directly, that being said. Much love from me to all of you during this holiday season and any others to come. You got this, I promise.