Thriving Alcohol-Free with Mocktail Mom

EP 97 Creating The Life You Want, Alcohol-Free With Jodi Clark

• Deb, Mocktail Mom • Season 1 • Episode 97

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In this episode, I sit down with the incredible Jodi Clark, founder of Sober Flourish and a total rockstar in the alcohol-free coaching world, to get real about life after ditching the drink. We dive into that “always thinking about drinking” phase, the quirky stuff that happens as the noise finally quiets, and yes, the rollercoaster of going alcohol-free (and what to do when a spicy margarita still calls your name!).

Jodi also shares how she’s crafted her dream life since quitting drinking—visualizing her future self down to what she’s wearing and how she shows up each day. And, for those who’ve ever wrestled with the sweet tooth that sneaks up post-booze, she gets into it all. Plus, we talk about showing up for yourself, the power of future self-work, and, of course, what she’s drinking these days (spoiler: there’s a lot of tea!).

Whether you’re here for the laughs, the real talk, or a little inspiration, Jodi’s journey is full of moments that might just resonate with yours. Get ready to feel empowered to create your own version of flourishing, one decision at a time!


Get in touch with Jodi!
Website | Instagram
Sign up for her 100 Days To Flourish challenge!

Registration is now open for The Mocktail Summit (January 14-16)!

Order a copy of The Happiest Hour: Delicious Mocktails for a Fabulous Moms' Night In

A huge thank you to the sponsor of the Thriving Alcohol-Free podcast!
Giesen 0% Wines

You are loved. Big Time Cheers!

Deb:

Buckle up, friends, and welcome to the Thriving Alcohol-Free Podcast. I'm your host, deb, otherwise known as Mocktail Mom, a retired wine drinker that finally got sick and tired of spinning on life's broken record called Detox to Retox. Let this podcast be an encouragement to you. If alcohol is maybe a form of self-care for you, where you find yourself dragging through the day waiting to pour another glass, I am excited to share with you the fun of discovering new things to drink when you aren't drinking and the joy of waking up each day without a hangover. It is an honor to serve as your sober fun guide, so sit back and relax or keep doing whatever it is you're doing. This show is produced for you with love from the great state of Kentucky. Thanks so much for being here and big time cheers, okay, hey, friends, welcome back to Thriving Alcohol Free. I am Deb Mocktail Mom, your host, and I am so excited.

Deb:

Across the pond today, our guest is Jodi Clark. Her Instagram handle is Sober Flourish. If you're not following her, please follow along. Jodi and I have never met. We follow each other on Instagram and I am so happy to connect with you today. I cannot wait to hear your story of becoming alcohol-free and all that you're doing. You're a sober coach and a mentor and I love how you show up on Instagram, so thank you for all that you do, thank you for having me, thank you, thank you. I'm excited. Oh, it's so nice to meet you and it's so fun because I can see right now it's dark where you are, we're in different time zones and we were just laughing off camera of just all the tech challenges. So we're recording today on Zoom. I don't normally use Zoom for my podcast, but we're going to just test it out today and I'm sure everything will go great. Zoom works good. We're going to roll with it. We're going to roll with it. Yes, we're going to help the boys, your sons, behave themselves right.

Jodi:

If the door bursts open, it'll either be one of two boys or one of the dogs.

Deb:

That's hilarious, and my dog's asleep underneath the table. Okay, yes, how old are your boys?

Jodi:

So I have Ollie, that is seven.

Deb:

And then I just turned 17. So it's nice to have that. Different stages that they're in right, or are you finding it not tonight? I?

Jodi:

think now the younger one is older, it's better. I think when my eldest was the same age that Ollie is now, he used to just look up and think, well, what does he do? What's the point? He's a big move. He's loud, he's very annoying, yeah, and as they've got older, but he's probably still very loud and very annoying, but he's a lot more of him now he can be, he can be loud with him.

Deb:

Yeah, he can follow right along. Yes, yeah, yeah, okay. So how did you get into this space? How did you start sharing on Instagram? And I would love to hear your story of breaking up with alcohol.

Jodi:

Okay, so I started sharing my alcohol-free journey on Instagram on a day one of a 100-day alcohol-free challenge and I did that just to kind of hold myself accountable and I just started sharing I don't know oversharing emotion, things that I was going through, things that I was nervous about, and then those sober first started trickling in and I was sharing kind of how I'd overcome them and how I felt after them and the kind of sober glimmers that I was facing.

Jodi:

And during that time I started to kind of get messages from other ladies sharing their experiences and sort of saying, oh gosh, I'm really nervous about this too. Can you give me some tips? I know she'd just been to your first party or whatever it might be, and kind of in doing that I started to feel like this little fire being lit in me because I really enjoyed that sentiment of helping other people. I wasn't anywhere helping other people, I wasn't anywhere. I mean, we're talking that first initial 100-day period. So I never kind of proclaimed to be a specialist in that field or anything like that. It's just girls sharing, helping each other out, and as kind of time went on I realized I'd really got a passion for it. But equally it's also a bit of a. Personally, I feel that you have to be careful when you're helping other people when they're alcohol free, because it's a spectrum right. Everybody has an opinion on kind of how they want to choose to label themselves um, based on on how much they drink and whether they're dependent etc. Etc. But I think it can be a bit of a minefield. And personally I think that you have to be careful when you're supporting other women, because we're not all necessarily coming at it from the same starting point. So for myself, I wanted to try and get to a point where I felt comfortable and qualified and in a good, safe space to be able to even just refer other people if I needed to, and do that from a place of from an educated place, should I say so.

Jodi:

I thought out a qualification to become a coach, predominantly a positive psychology coach, but specializing in alcohol free, and there's an intensive part of that that goes through how to, how to kind of when you're going through your clarity calls or discovery calls when you're working with clients, how to kind of score that. You're going through your clarity calls or discovery calls when you're working with clients, how to kind of score that and have that conversation that. Look, I work with middle lane, gray area, drinking women. However, I feel that maybe it may be a little bit more serious on your part. This is what I recommend. And then obviously, once you've sought out help elsewhere, then obviously you can come back and we can pick that back up again. But I wanted to try and make sure that I was qualified and that I could do it from a moral perspective. So I qualified as a sobriety coach alcohol-free coach in March this year, I think it was.

Deb:

May this year, really Just March. Oh, wow, wow, congratulations.

Jodi:

It still feels very, very new, but I absolutely love it. I really really do so started sharing on Instagram every single day, like I say, and I've done that for just over two years now. So I'm two years and three months alcohol free. I've been a sober coach, um for well since I qualified, since since May. So again, it's still, it still new, it's still very much my baby. It's just, yeah, it's a huge, huge passion of mine.

Deb:

Amazing. Okay, how was it for you coming to a place of becoming alcohol-free? I mean, because your transformation, just physically, your transformation is amazing. I mean you don't even look like the same person from before, when you were drinking. Just from what I've seen on Instagram, it's incredible. Yeah, I don't feel like the same person from before, when you were drinking. Just from what I've seen on Instagram it's incredible.

Jodi:

Yeah, I don't feel like the same person and I kind of again been through that transformation. Now. It was hard work and I think sometimes when I share that there was before and after photos I get a lot of messages from people that sort of say oh, did you just stop drinking? The weight fell off you. And I know that people want to hear yes, of course I did. That's exactly what happened, because I wanted to hear that. Right, I was in that place where I wanted to lose weight. I wanted to hear there was a golden pill, there was something that I could do really, really quickly that was going to make the weight fall off.

Jodi:

But ultimately, what? What happened for me was just in removing alcohol. It enabled me to be consistent. I'd always had a weight goal in mind. I mean, again, as men and women we generally do, don't we? And I would be really good Monday to Friday from a diet perspective, but then as soon as it would get to the weekend, I would just go hell for leather.

Jodi:

On the red wine, that was my drink of choice as well, so obviously highly calor, calorific. But I would also eat a load of crap as well when I had a drink, and so when I stopped drinking, it just enabled me to be consistent. So I was showing up for myself, I was able to go to the gym, I was making better choices, I was sleeping better, so that I wasn't as triggered and my cravings weren't as high, and I was hydrating myself. I was making sure that I was moving my body. And yeah, I mean, it did take a long time, don't get me wrong. It didn't fall off and I had lost. To be fair, I'd lost I don't know what the conversion will be but two stone before I'd stopped drinking. I went on to lose another three stone, maybe four stone, I can't remember the actual number, but in total it's six stone I ended up. So it's a lot of, I think, kilograms, I think it's, I don't know, do you?

Deb:

measure anything else by stones, or is it just a person's weight? Is it just weight? So it's not like this bag of potatoes is three stones. You wouldn't say that at a grocery store. No, no, it's just person's weight. It's like a mystery to me what five stone is. I'm going to have to look that up.

Jodi:

Let's look it up.

Deb:

So you lost five stone, six stone. Yes, it's look it up. So you lost five stone, six stone.

Jodi:

Yes, it's a lot. I need to work it out because it's going to frustrate me.

Deb:

But let's Google it right now. What is? Please hold everyone, how many pounds? I feel like we should have Joe Rogan here and be like you know. He asked his guy, his Jamie guy, who's like his Jamie, what is that? How many pounds? Is six stone, 84 pounds? Yeah, that's a lot. It's a lot, yes, and the translation of that is it's a lot, yeah.

Jodi:

It's just a lot, but it yeah. So that was. It's a big transformation. It has seeped into every area of my life. Deb, Honestly, there there is nothing. There isn't a part of my life that hasn't improved since I stopped drinking. I got a promotion at work. I was showing up for myself, I was be, I became more confident, I was pushing myself at my comfort zone. I mean, I launched a business. For god's sake that that is something that I just was kind of beyond my wildest dreams.

Jodi:

I wanted to have to be coming alcohol free, and it can be quite hard to find all the resources that you want in those early stages when you don't actually know what it is you're looking for or what's going to work for you. I had this kind of idea that what if I can put something together that enables people to be able to have one application, one place for them to come where? They've got resources? They've got um trackers, they've got um chat forums, community, all sorts. What if I can do that?

Jodi:

So people have got something at their um what's the word I'm looking for? And fingertips at their fingertips. Yeah, without having to go through all the pain that I did trying to find all the bits and bobs that suited me, so that's what I went on to do. So in January, I registered Sober Flourish as a business and launched the alcohol-free program for women. At the moment, it's 100 Days to Flourish, which is what I initially set myself, with a 100-day goal to take alcohol, and yeah, so that's coming up to its first year birthday, which is awesome.

Deb:

Yay, happy birthday. Happy birthday to Sober Flourish. Yes, that's incredible. How did you feel? Did you feel completely overwhelmed that 100 days, like the sound of that, like I know I tried to do like well, that's how I the last challenge I did was I wanted to take like a month off is basically what I wanted to do. Did it feel like a lot to say, wow, a hundred days?

Jodi:

oh my gosh yeah, and I think that setting that big goal bigger goal than a month was actually what made this become a more solid decision. Because I was shit at taking a break from alcohol. I was rubbish. I would set myself a dry January and I would make maybe two weeks, three weeks. I was just shocking at it. I was rubbish. I would set myself a dry January and I would make maybe two weeks, three weeks. I was just shocking at it.

Jodi:

I loved a drink. I absolutely loved a drink. I'll never deny it Same when I smoked. It's really bad for me, but I loved it. I absolutely loved it. It stopped because it was awful for me, anyway.

Jodi:

So I set myself this 100 day challenge because I thought this is big enough to scare me and I've got to take it seriously. So in those first days, in that first month, I completely immersed myself in Quillette. I had a variety podcast in my ears every single day, sometimes two. I would get out, I would go for a walk to try and distract myself. I would listen to the science behind it. I would listen to the implications and the impact sorry on our brains. I completely brainwashed myself and I remember 30 days into that 100 days, I'd done enough that I knew I wasn't going to go back, and the thought of forever still made the hair stand up on the back of my neck and I wouldn't say it out loud. But I remember messaging somebody and saying to them on that day 30, I just know something has clicked. So to go from it being so ingrained in every area of my life, it was something that my husband and I did for fun, to bond.

Deb:

Yeah, yeah.

Jodi:

To talk, to share everything. I mean. I met the guy when I was 15 years old. I was on the streets at youth club drinking cider at that point, so our entire friendship and relationship. I'd always been a drinker and I wasn't a light drinker either. I was a heavy drinker. I wasn't somebody after one. I would think nothing of sitting and drinking a bottle of red wine, bottling a half of red wine and that would be once I'd convinced Elle to go to bed so I could sit and have my me time, eating crisps, watching Netflix.

Jodi:

I love you crisps, it's so ingrained in my life. Yeah, get to that 30-day point and then think, oh, now I'm done, something had really shifted. So yeah, so I was a typical binge drinker middle lane, gray area, whatever you want to call it but I did vary. It's not right for me to say I just drank at a weekend, because sometimes if I was stressed or I was pissed off or I had an awful week or life was hard we've done two rounds of IVF things. Life deals some shit hands sometimes, doesn't it? I would drink every day for a couple of weeks and then Dale would say maybe we need to knock it on the head a little bit and wind it in. It would be wrong for me to say I was just a weekend drinker, but it varies. It varies or varied, should I say?

Deb:

Yeah, yeah, okay. I absolutely love what you said, that you brainwashed yourself. Yes, right, because everything has to shift and we have to just wash that over ourselves, pour it over ourselves, all of it the Quit Lit, the Sober Podcast, the Sober Scrolling. I kind of window shopped sobriety for a long time on my Instagram before I stopped drinking. It was like I would watch these people like you and watch other people who are, watch other accounts who's not drinking, and get encouraged by that.

Jodi:

Yeah, I used to find myself on these breaks that I'd set myself, and again, it wouldn't just be around dry January or sober October. It would be critical breaks to lose weight, because I knew the only time I could lose a few pounds was when I took a couple of weeks off the booze. It was the only time I could do it. So I was doing Instagram and I would follow all these sobriety accounts and then, all of a sudden, I don't follow them all again. I don't want to see you on my feed. Enough of this. Yeah, no, no, no, remove, remove, remove.

Jodi:

That was, that was a different vision of me. That wasn't me today. Um, and then I would. I would kind of unfollow them all again. But do you not think that you've got to be ready, because I work with a lot of women that I can say to them what you need to submerge yourself in all of this information? You have to listen, you have to educate yourself, et cetera. That's where the goal is at. But if they're not ready, why are they going to do that?

Jodi:

Because all they're focusing on is just not drinking. They're not ready to make that lifelong change because they can't commit to that, and that's okay. But there's different stages. People are always at different stages. I find, and I can always I say always. I'm not a witch, but I feel like I can generally tell when somebody is ready and it's going to click because they are completely invested. Give me all the information and they'll message and they'll be. It's everything they can think of, exactly like it was for me.

Deb:

Yeah, yeah, so engaged Like you can't. You can't not think about it. It's all you're thinking about. Okay? As you guys know, I love Giesen 0% wines. Their Sauvignon Blanc is my go-to on a regular basis. They recently launched a delicious sparkling fruit 0%, which is quickly becoming a fan favorite. I am so proud to have Giesen as the exclusive non-alcoholic wine sponsor of the Thriving Alcohol-Free Podcast.

Deb:

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Deb:

Give Giesen a try and let me know how much you love it. And if you want to meet their winemaker, go back to episode 33 of the podcast, where Duncan Shouler joined me to share about the Giesen story. It's so interesting. Do you find now, like in the beginning, like when I stopped drinking, it was all I was thinking about and I was thinking about my wine. Still, I was still thinking about drinking. Do you find now that it's not that you have to like focus so hard on your sobriety or focus so hard on not drinking, now that you're furthering, now that you're two years plus in?

Jodi:

I think about it. Yeah, same, it's so weird. I hate to kind of sound like, oh, it's so peachy over here, but I never thought that I would get to the point where it wasn't on my mind. I never, ever thought because it was all I thought about. Yep, it's just again. It just goes to show, doesn't it, that it was at the forefront of our mind so much because it always had been at the forefront of our mind and we surrounded ourselves potentially with people that drank a lot. Everything we watched, we would mix in circles where it's what people would talk about, and when you don't do it, you kind of when you've mastered the skill of quieting in that noise and closing off those old neural pathways and you create new ones, it just quietens and it goes away. And I almost find and again I sound a little bit crazy when I say it the last time I remember feeling a little bit triggered when we were away in April this year and we went to a restaurant in Centre Parcs and it was a Mexican and I used to love a spicy margarita.

Jodi:

Everybody had got spicy margaritas and you could hear them all ordering it and of course, my ears plucked up. But I remember hearing this conversation happening in my head that I wasn't privy to. It was bizarre, the most weirdest moment. So I'm having a conversation with the kids and I can hear this thing playing off in my head and it was kind of like my subconscious sort of having this well, we don't do that anymore. Yeah, but how great would it be. Well, we don't do that anymore. And it was very weird. Since then I've not felt a single thing and it was almost like the door had been shut in that weird little situation that was happening that I wasn't even aware of, and it sounds not saying it out loud, but, yeah, I can kind of reframe it and reprogram it and it's gone. I don't hear the noise anymore.

Deb:

Yeah, I got chills when you said that. Really, I mean yeah, just yes, and reprogram it and the door is closed. It's closed, yeah, and we don't do that anymore. I'm not a drinker, I don't drink, I just don't drink. And good thing, you can have a spicy margarita now without the alcohol. There's lots of alcohol options.

Jodi:

I was looking through your book and also looking through your Instagram as well, that you've got some mean recipes on there for spicy margaritas't. I haven't really dabbled in the whole kind of mocktail of mindful cocktail arena really at all since I stopped drinking other than I drink.

Deb:

What do you drink typically now? What do you drink now?

Jodi:

um, we like, uh, we like an alcohol-free fizz. Uh-huh, generally, purely because that's something that Dale will drink too. What's an alcohol-free fizz? What is it like? A ready to go, like a and sparkling wine, okay I'm on all kinds of terms today yeah, so an alcohol-free, um sparkling wine and my red wine. I was a red wine girl completely, but again, I was their full-bodied red wine. So where there's so many red wines out there, they're too watery for me yeah, yeah, yeah, so, yeah, so yeah, stay with the fizzies stay with the fizz.

Jodi:

Stay with the fizz, um. But again I I was the sort of person that had to stay away from the alcohol-free options at the beginning because I found them really triggering. Yeah, and I've got lots of women in the group where some could not have survived their initial 100 days without alcohol-free options. They could not have done it because they rely on it. So I work with a lady at the moment and she'll often come on her coaching call and she'll have a glass of something non-alcoholic and she's just got in from work and that is what is working for her, whereas I couldn't do that.

Jodi:

There's a brand over here. You might have it there. It's called Trip. It's a CBD drink in a can and I would have that in a wine glass. But I found the alcohol-free versions too triggering because I know why I was doing it. I was trying to replicate the buzz that I used to get from booze. I knew I needed to stay away from it. So I would get annoyed with an alcohol-free drink because it wasn't giving me that funny sensation in my legs or whatever it was that I thought I was the only pleasure for before and I'd get pissed off with it. So I just thought I need to stay away because you're still trying to reach for that buzz. You haven't quite got to that point where you can do that yet, and I wasn't willing to risk my sobriety, so I just ditched it. And now I just live for tea, typically.

Deb:

Live for tea. Yes, british tea, that is it, that is it, can't go wrong. The black tea, do you put milk with it? Yeah, very nice. Okay, very nice. Yes, removing alcohol just definitely brings consistency in all areas of our life. Right, all areas, yeah, a hundred percent.

Jodi:

It's crept into everything. Like I say, work professionally from a fitness and health perspective. I mean, I'm in the gym now very early, five days a week. I couldn't have done that before, but I also didn't treat myself as a priority. I couldn't have done that before, but I also didn't treat myself as a priority. I didn't love myself enough and like myself enough to prioritize myself. That was how I'd managed to get so overweight, that's how I'd managed to have alcohol so much on a pedestal because I wasn't prioritizing my health and fitness.

Jodi:

Well, I was for days of the week, but it was pretty much pointless yeah.

Deb:

How do you feel like alcohol impacted, like perimenopause and hormones and just life as a woman?

Jodi:

For me personally, I think I'm only just starting to go into perimenopause now, so I'm coming up to 42 this year. Okay, there are a lot of symptoms that I've kind of only really become familiar with since menopause has become such a loud topic over here in the UK and hopefully everywhere else as well. For sure, we obviously just had menopause month as well, which has really helped. But a lot of the women in my program are of an age where they are in perimenopause and they there's usually kind of two spec, two ends of it, two ends of the spectrum, where either they've got severe perimenopausal symptoms and they've stopped drinking and those symptoms have lessened and they're actually nowhere near as bad as they were. So when they've removed the alcohol, the headaches have stopped, they're sleeping better, they get this.

Jodi:

There's a one lady that said that she had really bad night sweats, which she thought was menopause, but but actually when she stopped drinking they went away completely, really, really. And then the other end of the spectrum is that they have these perimenopausal symptoms and they stop drinking and the perimenopausal symptoms are still there. But then they're in a position to be able to go and see their doctor and say I don't drink, now take me seriously. So I think what we know. Obviously alcohol is not a great combination for our hormones, but I know I'm there at the moment but I haven't had the kind of yes, you are perimenopausal.

Deb:

I'm like, I'm past it, I'm through, I'm done. I'm post-menopausal. Yes, so you said last month was menopause month or whatever. I'm like, my whole, my whole life is menopause, menopause year. My, my Instagram account is sponsored by menopause because I have hot flashes while I'm making drinks. I mean, it's just the craziest thing, yeah, okay. So how would you recommend for somebody to show up for their future self, like really embracing the possibility of what could be for them?

Jodi:

This is something that I share regularly because it's something that I had to do for me. I was massively overweight from where I wanted to be. I was so far away from this version of myself that I had, but I knew that I had to dig deep. I had to dig deep. I had to visualize her. I had to visualize what she was wearing, how she spoke to people, what she did for a living, how she showed up at home, what kind of mother she was, and I had to try and embrace that and start showing up as that version of myself, of my future self, to kind of get there. And I genuinely think that that really really helped me, that kind of mindset shift. So I do a lot of that work with my clients as well, that kind of future self-work and really visualizing how do you feel on those days, what do you smell like, what perfume are you wearing?

Deb:

It's incredible, isn't it, how powerful just visualizing I mean athletes do that right. They just sit there and they go through their routine a gymnast, you know, they just go through it in their mind. How powerful our mind is just to visualize that future self.

Jodi:

Yeah, and I do it now. I do it now because I'm not a saint. I mean, god, I'm alcohol free and I've lost some weight and I'm achieving a lot of my goals, etc. But there's always cracks, right there's we're human absolutely absolutely my vices is chocolate.

Jodi:

I have become an absolute nightmare with sugar. I never, ever had a dessert, never. I would always have either cheese and biscuits. Okay, glass of wine, because I would rather use the calories on wine since I stopped drinking. And this is very, very common, isn't it, for people that stop drinking. This sweet tooth has come from nowhere and I think it happens at different points for people. Some people it's straight away. For me wasn't straight away at all. It was when stress hit the fan when I saw yeah, it was.

Jodi:

It was when I launched sober flourish and I started to get quite stressed. I found that my stress trigger um, sorry, my sugar trigger is stressed completely. So now again, relating to the future self, I have to think to myself is this what she does? Is this going to get you closer? Because obviously you have these goals, and the next time the goals might get a little bit bigger. So I'm thinking of that future version of myself now and she's pulling me along. So when I'm thinking, right, okay, well, I'll have a packet of crisps or I'll have that chocolate bar, even though I know it's over my calories because I am on it. I have got other weight loss goals and what fitness goals at the moment, I have to think, no, it's going to get you further away from your goals. So stop it, fatty, stop it?

Deb:

Is that your nickname for yourself, fatty? Yes.

Jodi:

Fatty. No, yeah, I have to have a way with myself, still now, because your goals change, don't they? You don't go away.

Deb:

They grow, they change. You grow, yep exactly. Do you have an accountability partner who holds you to, who helps you stay accountable? Me, yeah, yeah, yeah, looking yourself in the mirror.

Jodi:

I have to, I have to. I've had, I've been through a series of kind of one-to-one coaches in the past et cetera. But yeah, I think he, I think you know, you know, when you've kind of gone off track yourself, you beat yourself up about it, don't you? You don't need somebody else breathing time, isn't that true?

Deb:

Yeah, you're like you're screaming at yourself Fatty, fatty. I need to nickname myself that. Maybe that will help me visualize myself how I want to be.

Jodi:

That's the thing, and I think, because it's been a while now, I have to just keep reminding myself and it's not necessarily just about the future version of myself, it's thinking about do you want to go back there to that person that couldn't even look in the mirror at herself? I couldn't even hold a gaze in the mirror. And again, I often talk to the ladies in the group about when I would do my mascara. I would look around my face. Really, I was doing it, yeah, because I just wasn't used to kind of connecting with myself in the mirror, because I didn't like that version of myself, and this isn't a pity party. No, I didn't like that version of myself, and this isn't a pity party. No, I didn't like myself. So it's important for me to now look back and think you don't want to go back there. Yeah, because that version of yourself wasn't the true you and we don't want to go back there.

Deb:

We me and myself.

Deb:

Yes, I mean, I say the same thing. I say we and I'm like me and my 12 personalities, we don't want to go back there. Yes, the best, best thing ever, all versions are alcohol free now at this point. Yeah, all versions of myself. Yeah, okay. So I know you mentioned, you know that in the beginning, alcohol free options were a trigger for you. Now they're not so much. No, god, yeah, now they're not, and I know that for many people, many people, it's a trigger. For me it was like like the gal you mentioned in your membership who, like it, was the bumper rails for me of my sobriety, like kept me on track. So when you go out and about, are there certain things that you do drink or like that you like to, to order, like the party animal that I am?

Jodi:

yes, when you go out to the pubs, when you're running around town with your boys, a little bit of time, yes, um, when I go out, my annual trip out to the pub, um yeah, if they've got a decent variety, I'll always have an alcohol. I'm not again, I don't it's okay.

Deb:

Yeah, I was just curious.

Jodi:

Yeah, just curious, I just don't hear, unless you're in the cities, which I am not. I live in the middle of nowhere. Do you're in the cities, which I am not? I live in the middle of nowhere, do you? Yes, by the river, in the middle of nowhere. It's not literally by the river, it's about half a mile away, but we have one village pub that still serves one alcohol-free lager, so I'd rather not buy personally. Yeah, yeah.

Deb:

Balloons oh, why are we having balloons? This is hilarious. On Zoom, we now have balloons, not If balloons. Oh, why are we having balloons? This is hilarious. On Zoom, we now have balloons. Jodi's having a party. We are celebrating her one year Sober Flourish anniversary. So the balloons just showed up on Zoom.

Jodi:

Yes, it can be very awkward when you're doing one-to-one coaching and you're in a very serious moment and all of a sudden, fireworks start going off behind you. I haven't worked out how to turn them off yet.

Deb:

I have no idea what Zoom is doing. That is hilarious. Okay, before we go, I do want would you give a plug for the coaching that you offer and the programs that you have? I'd love for everybody to know about what you have going on.

Jodi:

Oh, is it that time already? Yes, okay. So I offer one-to-one alcohol-free coaching and I have my Sober Flourish 100 Days to Flourish program and I run them on a monthly version every sober october, every dry january, and I am also a business mentor, so I will be launching that side of things very soon. Really, oh, that's exciting. Yeah, it's something I've done in the corporate world for the last 20 odd years um, helping people with the kind of their online presence and building their brand, launching their business and bringing it to life Sometimes just bringing those ideas to life and actually getting it off the ground. So, yeah, it's something I'm super, super passionate about. So, yeah, these two things work quite well together. When you're looking at a professional woman that wants to ditch the booze and she's got some business ideas, things go really really well.

Deb:

Yeah, it's like the sky's the limit. There's no holding her back. Okay, we'll have all that in the show notes. So if anybody wants to jump into, maybe your dry January, that would be awesome. Thank you so much for being here. So great to meet you. You too, thank you so much for having me. Oh, my gosh, thank you Big time. Cheers to you for tuning in to the Thriving Alcohol-Free Podcast. I hope you will take something from today's episode and make one small change that will help you to thrive and have fun in life without alcohol. If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support the podcast, please share it with others, post about it on social, send up a flare or leave a rating and a review. I am cheering for you as you discover the world of non-alcoholic drinks and as you journey towards authentic freedom. See you in the next episode.