Meredith Brierly - Clean Coaching Mama

In this episode of the Reframeable Podcast, Meredith Brierly shares her inspiring journey from a corporate advertising executive to a sober health coach. With 13 years of sobriety, she discusses the challenges and triumphs of her recovery journey, the importance of community support, and how she navigates sobriety as a parent. The conversation emphasizes that sobriety is not just about abstaining from alcohol but about embracing a healthier, more fulfilling life. 

Meredith is the founder of Clean Coaching Mama. Meredith's journey, from New York advertising executive to pediatric speech-language pathologist and now health coach, has inspired her passion for holistic wellness. As a mother, she's dedicated to helping families reduce toxic exposures and embrace practical, healthier lifestyle choices. 

Website: www.cleancoachingmama.com

IG: @Clean_Coaching_Mama

The Reframeable podcast is brought to you by the Reframe app. Reframe is the #1 app to help you cut back or quit drinking alcohol. It uses neuroscience to reframe your relationship with alcohol and unlock the healthiest, happiest you.

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Transcript

Meredith Brierly - Clean Coaching Mama

​[00:00:00]

Kevin: Welcome everyone to another episode of the re frameable podcast. The podcast that brings you people's stories and ideas about how we can work to reframe our relationship, not just with alcohol, but with stress, anxiety, relationships, enjoyment, and so much more. Because changing our relationship with alcohol is about so much more than changing the contents of our glass. This podcast is brought to you by the Reframe app. Reframe is the number one iOS and Android app to help you cut back or quit drinking alcohol. It uses neuroscience to reframe your relationship with alcohol and unlock the healthiest, happiest you.

My name is Kevin Bellack. I'm a certified professional recovery coach and the head of coaching at the Reframe app. 

Emma: And I'm Emma Simmons. I'm a Reframer, a certified life coach and Thrive coach with Reframe. And I'm from New Zealand, and today we are excited to welcome Meredith, the founder of Clean Coaching Mama.

Meredith's journey from New York advertising executive to pediatric speech language pathologist and now Health Coach has [00:01:00] inspired her passion for holistic wellness. As a mother, she's dedicated to helping families reduce toxic exposures and embrace practical, healthier lifestyle choices. Meredith joins us to share her insight on her sobriety and wellness journey.

Meredith, welcome. 

Meredith: Hello. I'm so glad to be here with you guys talking all things sobriety and wellness. My favorite topics. Ours too. Yes. 

Kevin: Yeah. Wide open too. Yeah. Covers a lot. Lots to cover. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, so I guess thanks for being on with us today. Sorry. Go ahead. 

Emma: Yeah, Jim and I are terrible at talking over top of, off.

Yeah. I'm terrible at talking over top of everyone. Sorry, 

Meredith: I have a 5-year-old. We're working on interrupting in this house all the time, so I'm right there.

Emma: I thought it would just jump right into it and kick off with what led you to sobriety. How did that come about? 

Meredith: I'll try to give you the con condensed version, right?

It's welcome to an hour, Ted Talk. So I've been [00:02:00] sober for, I celebrated 13 years in January, so I guess about 13 and a half years. Side note, my husband is actually 15 years sober, but this is my story. But we're very much a sober house and it's very much the foundation of our life in our family.

But in terms of what brought me there, I was one of these people that it wasn't like I started drinking and it just got bad fast. I really wasn't, I was very much a progressive progressive drinker. Always partied, but I was more focused on trying to get good grades and trying to get a good job. And like this plan, this vision I had, that I thought I had for my life in college in my early twenties, but I was still very anxiety prone, very fearful and just really like self-conscious.

And, some of that social anxiety started creeping in, but I'm an extrovert by nature. So it was like that duality. And I moved to New York after college and I say this drinking was fun for years. I had a great time. 20 something in New York City. It's [00:03:00] like literally so fun. I'm 45 now, so that was a long time ago.

Pre social media, thank goodness, pretty much. It just got it progressed and, we'll get into this probably a little bit more later, but at least for me, we tend to surround ourselves with people who drink like us, and it's hard to delineate college partying from like problematic drinking, right?

Or even honestly like that 20 something New Yorker like after work drinks, client drinks and entertaining lunches, all that with problem drinking. But I started just the blackouts started happening. Anxiety became a much bigger part of my story. I had to do presentations for work and I started getting panic attacks.

I started taking anxiety medicine. I'm very open about sharing that. Anxiety meds are a big part of my story and, I joke, joke, like a lot of the looking back jokes that it was such a blessing because it escalated my addiction [00:04:00] story much faster. And it didn't leave me like decades of wondering do I have a problem, do I not?

It became pretty freaking clear. But yeah, I was like that person taking, Klonopin with a therapist prescription. Eventually using Xanax as needed, all with therapists signing off on it, but drinking all the time. And, people like friends would, my family was down in North Carolina still, and I.

Friends we talk about and I'm sure you guys know that inner sort of the despair of what am I doing? Like not remembering nights, ending up staying places with people you don't know. Just all that stuff, right? And eventually getting in a relationship that was basically with another alcoholic as we sometimes do, and just a bunch of yeah, just drunken debauchery.

Like they say, you know that your standard's lower. Like you obviously we justify, we rationalize, we lie about how much we're drinking.

[00:05:00] We. Think that if we're not as bad as other people, we know we don't have a problem and all of that. But at the same time, my behavior got crazier. My standards were certainly diminishing, and I ended up getting fired for a, from a job I'd had for three months at fast Company, which is a really great business brand.

Because I was like a blazing idiot the whole time. I like showed up for a big meeting, after having a couple of vodka sodas. And at that point I was popping the Xanax, so I don't even remember the meeting. 

Emma: Wow. Taking 

Meredith: long lunches, calling in late. I joke that I had so many vet related, I had an English bulldog back then, but she had so many ailments that I had to deal with that would keep me home and, just stuff like that.

Got fired from the job, which the funny thing about it, and this is such a dinging red flag for me, that I obviously had an atypical relationship with alcohol. Had for years. But I remember being, having that conversation in the conference room and [00:06:00] literally they're like, do you want us to bel, we can expand upon it further, or, why it's not a good fit.

And I was like, Nope, I'm good. And all I thought was, I wanna go get a cocktail. And, I was like, all right, this is like divine intervention. I've been wanting to go to grad school. I wanted to get out of this corporate world because at the time I thought New York City was the problem. I thought the pace, the competition, the super high standards, the, my publishers, whatever.

I thought all of that was a problem, the relationship. So I was like, all right, onwards and upwards and started like looking into grad schools and I was thinking about like social work and, which is funny, the irony that I like wanted to help people when I was like completely falling apart.

As we often do. Yeah. Externalizing my inner spiral, but I ended up having a breakup, like an upteenth breakup with that relationship. And we lived together in a small apartment in Hoboken at the [00:07:00] time. And I came home to North Carolina, like I say, with my tail between my legs to regroup.

And I still thought, despite all of the, like really the wreckage of drinking that was going on I still thought that anxiety was the problem. So from that point, when I came home to North Carolina, it was about another eight months, eight to 10 months before I got sober. So I had a therapist suggest going, staying away from drinking.

And I was like, what are you talking about? That's not a problem. What do you mean? She's a lot of your stories seem to involve, drinking or like meeting somebody for drinks or, and she suggested that I was very offended and she eventually suggested I try going to recovery meetings.

I was again, very offended. My parents who I was living with, 30 years old, 31, wanted me to go to recovery meetings. They, and I finally did to appease [00:08:00] everybody, and I just wasn't convinced. I wasn't done. I wasn't, however we get sober, I feel absolutely certain, right? That we all have to have a point at which we're like, okay, I can't do this.

I'm, I get it right? It's, call it the gift of desperation. Call it our bottom, call it the point of surrender, whatever. And I just wasn't there. And people can't really convince you of that, I did 30 days at a treatment center, which, who would've thought I had so much ego and I was so distorted in my thinking of like how sick I was and how screwed up I had gotten at that point.

But yeah, I did 30 days in treatment center. I was fortunate enough to be able to do that. Because this was before I got married, before I had kids. I was in between, I was in this like pre-grad school phase and then after some attempts of trying to do controlled drinking myself, that didn't work for me.

Yeah, I finally was like, dramatic tears, long emails to all the girls I'd met in [00:09:00] recovery who were always there for me and so helpful, many of whom are still friends of mine, 14 years later. 

And I was like, that's it. Okay, I am really done this time. And then a long manifesto and then everything changed.

And that was January 13 and a half years ago. 

Emma: Wow. 

Meredith: And I've been in the recovery community since

Emma: yeah. Yeah. That's so awesome that you've spent what so awesome that it wasn't, the way you explained it wasn't a like on off switch. It wasn't like a, oh, I need to do this, I need to get sober.

Boom. Done. We're doing it, it was like a, there were nuggets of people being like, Hey, are you okay? I think you need help. And you were going no. I drink like everyone else. I'm fine. And it was like a gradual burn and a gradual increase until it got to the point where you yourself were like, oh shit, I gotta do something about this.

And then it worked and then it happened. I think that's a really great narrative to have that it does need to come from, yourself to make that [00:10:00] change. And then also knowing that you're still in the recovery community. Not still isn't a, in a bad way, still isn't a yes. It's awesome to, to keep building this community that we have.

Yeah. 

Meredith: Oh, that I wanna be in it. It's funny, like I, in fact, I was listening to another one of your podcasts, and I hear stories like this a lot and sober stories from people. I'm envious of people I suppose, who can just say yeah, I drank a little too much wine at night. And and I have people in my life who I'm very open about my story after this many years. And, when people talk about their drink, I'm like, for me it had to get pretty bad. But for some people it doesn't have to, I. It looks different for everybody. Yeah. 

Kevin: And you need for them to yeah. Oh, I just had be like, I 

Meredith: actually have to do something.

I'm 

Kevin: gonna stop. And they cut it off before it got to. Yeah. And some people 

Meredith: are like, I had too much. Yeah. I was just tired of being a little hungover and I'm a mom and I'm like, hat's off to you. That's great. 

Kevin: And I think that's, yeah. Yeah. I'm so 

Meredith: [00:11:00] glad you caught it early. Yeah. 

Kevin: Yeah. Because I think that needs to be shown more too.

Because a hundred percent I think, too much. It's like that black and white thinking. I talk about this all the time and I get annoyed with it, but it's like the black and white thinking that is, I get annoyed with of I have a problem where I don't, it's no it's called gray area drinking for a reason.

There's a lot of gray area drinking. 

Meredith: Yeah. 

Kevin: Yeah. Oh yeah. Whatever. It's

Meredith: these are all signs and it is most likely an elevator going down. 

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: It might stay on the same floor for 10 years. 

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: I like that. Yeah. 

Kevin: But we can, yeah, we can make that change at any point. It doesn't have to get to, oh, I have a problem, before we say, you know what I'm just not gonna drink as much, or I'm not gonna drink at all.

Meredith: Yeah. Yeah. It's a hard one, it's, 

Kevin: yeah. 

Meredith: Yeah. I feel like, 'cause I have, when people talk to me about it, I'm like, I can hear somebody's story and I can hear their drinking and I can hear the way they talk about it and the phrases they use. Yeah. And just what I know now I can almost, it's like you [00:12:00] spot it, you got it.

But I truly know, it's Hey, I am always here to help anybody, but I can't say when that is your time. If and when, and God willing, you get to a point where you wanna do, but as you guys know, when you live on the side of freedom and you live, in all of the freedom of sobriety, it's like you just want, there's nothing more painful than watching somebody who.

You can tell is fighting that they probably need to do something, right? But they're not ready yet. And it's just man, talk about instant gratitude.

Emma: I think that's one of the, I don't know I find it a really difficult part of coaching is that, is when you can see further down the track and you're like, okay, come on, pick up what I'm putting down.

Like we gotta do something about this. But but you do need to go. At that person's pace of when of their realization that come on, let's go, let's pick this up. We're gonna do something about this. But you've gotta wait for that, for the person to, for the client [00:13:00] to, to jump on board. And then once they do jump on board, how fun is it to be like me?

Off we go. 

Meredith: Fun. And that's what you said. It's so nice that this many years later I'm still involved in the recovery community and I wanted to jump in on that, because this is another thing I hear. It'll be like, gosh, you have to go to those meetings. Or you have to be in doing these things or what, and it's no, I truly want to like the things I do for my sober life and participating in life as a sober mom and being a part of that's such a gift.

I don't do it anymore because I have to. 

Kevin: I 

Meredith: truly want to, it's not it's like a sentence when we first are confronted. Having to get sober or look at our drinking. It feels like that. It certainly did to me. I was not somebody who thought sobriety sounded fun. So we're faced with, and then it's and that's one of my messages to people, is to just believe that sobriety can be fun.

Sober life can be, it's all that cheesy [00:14:00] stuff you hear, like beyond your wildest dreams, write down everything you thought, whatever ha and it'll all come true. And it's, but it is remarkable how true that's been for me. 

Emma: Yeah. 

Kevin: We don't believe it, right? Because for me, I drank 20 years people drink, much more than that too before they might start addressing it. I didn't know a different way. I started in college and my college binge drinking on weekends, became my, I started in a public accounting firm, big four and deadlines and weekend drinking, deadline drinking, it became, it was a similar drinking style.

I didn't see a different way. I didn't, I never did the, all the things without alcohol because it was always there at every event, at every little thing, and I didn't see a different Kevin doing [00:15:00] those things. So I was like, that was fun back then. If I take that one ingredient out, how is that gonna work? So it is proving to ourself and almost we have to trust people, I think to and I think that's one of the tips I will throw out is trust that I'm not full of shit.

Right? Trust that all these people aren't just lying to you. But it's it's not easy. It is finding out for yourself how that can work for you. Yeah, because everybody is different. Everybody is, you mentioned about still, almost getting to go to meetings and things like that still.

And it's like I started out with a therapist and I'm still with her I don't need to go to her and talk with her on a regular basis to not drink. 

I can stop and not drink, and be fine with that. But it helps, like it's a good check-in, it's a good way to work through other things and so on.

It's it's, it shifts from that. Oh, I have to do this to [00:16:00] start and to keep going into that. No, this is part of what I do now to help me stay on track. Right,

Emma: right. When I think about I've never been part of a team or a group really. But there are people out there who have like their social netball team.

You guys don't play netball in America. Social soccer team or social basketball team or social whatever team. And they stick with that team for years and years. And I. Your sobriety team or your sobriety community is like that. You get to go and hang out with people who you genuinely care about and genuinely have a good time chatting with.

So why would you think, oh, I'm only gonna do this for, only gonna go to meetings for six months, or, when can I stop going to meetings? Is a question that I get off and like, when will, almost, like, when will I be fixed or when will I be cured? And it's no, we're building, let's build this community.

Let's build this group of friends and this network that you genuinely want to be around and spend time with, [00:17:00] just like your social, I dunno, what clubs do you guys have over there? Netballs? What? The only thing that's coming to mind. 

Kevin: Yeah. I'm still stuck. Yeah. We're gonna, we're gonna stop here for a second.

And talk about netball. Okay. 

Emma: Netball. So netball is the 

Kevin: like NETI guess, right? 

Emma: N-E-T-N-E-T, yeah. Okay. Net netball. So it's like the national. Predominantly female sport, but we do now have men's netball teams. So like in New Zealand, the, when we were a kid growing up, if you were a boy, you played rugby.

If you were a girl, you played netball. It's a winter sport. It's played well. When you're a kid at primary school, it's played out on a asphalt turf, like a concrete turf outside. It's like basketball's little smaller. You don't bounce the ball. You don't run with the ball. As soon as you catch the ball, you've gotta plant your feet.

There are seven players on the court at one time. There's a hoop just like basketball, but there's no backboard. So when you're shooting, you can't rebound off the [00:18:00] backboard. That's a non-contact sport, but I have some significant scars on my knees that prove otherwise. 

Meredith: Oh my gosh, that's so interesting.

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: Anyway. Wow. 

Kevin: Yeah, I got up new on Zealand Culture 1 0 1. I was gonna say, I got up on the screen right now in Wikipedia, and I'm like, this looks like, yeah, basketball without a backboard. Oh 

Emma: yeah. But yeah, you, so you can't run with the ball, so as soon as you catch the ball, you gotta plant your feet and pass it.

Wow. Yeah. But holy moly. 

Meredith: Way to America yet, America. 

Emma: It must be. But yeah, it's big in New Zealand, Australia, South Africa. Do you play 

Kevin: basketball in New Zealand? 

Emma: We play basketball. Not well, but we do. I shouldn't say that, but it's not as big down here, so it's not as popular. I'm just making, 

Kevin: yeah, wasn't making an assumption that you didn't have basketball.

I just was curious if 

Emma: I guess like it's, you guys do basketball and football. We do netball and rugby. Yeah. Same but different kind of thing. You guys do baseball? We do cricket. Same. [00:19:00] Same but different. 

Meredith: I was thinking about when you were, I. Kevin, when you were saying, when you were sharing earlier that, it's funny, so as I said, I don't have experience in sobriety being married or being a parent because I got sober before either one, so I think about that challenge of the, we say like that, it's hard at first, right? Like the stuff you're supposed to do to help you get sober. Those actions and I think about that, the challenge of, like you were saying as a sober, having a birthday party or having, things that you think of.

'cause it's funny 'cause I can't imagine any of those involving drink. I think all this time to myself like, wow, I can't believe parents drink at stuff like this, but hello, I drank at everything I did before I got sober. But how hard that is because the balance of changing people, places and things, right?

And you can't, it, I was in another way, I was super lucky. There were many aspects of my story. Like I didn't get to have kids till I was older. Things that, like my parents were, older grandparents. Like [00:20:00] there are drawbacks of course, to however your story goes.

Yeah. But, I didn't have to change, like my whole life was rebuilt entirely. Different state, different career than marriage, than parent, in sobriety. So changing people, places and things and taking hard actions and like basically whether it's saying no to things, whether it's like friendships that weren't the best or wasn't too hard for me.

But I think for any of us, right? That's something that we have to look at. I think because I've seen time and time again. People not stay on the course they want. And even me, like one of the reasons I didn't stay sober for that is I stayed in that relationship, which I knew wasn't a good idea.

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: It's hard. It's it goes back to that we don't, it's not fun at first. It's hard. It's not that fun. But then it gets really good if we can just hang on. Yeah. And take some of those actions in the beginning. I dunno if that made sense, but I was just thinking about that when you 

Emma: Yeah, totally.

I think it's amazing. I actually dunno if I've met [00:21:00] anyone that got sober pre-kids. So this is oh wow. I dunno, almost mind blowing to me that you. Managed to do it before having kids because kids are such a, or parenting, the mommy, mommy wine club or the, it's a big, it's a big thing.

Meredith: Oh, big time. My dog is licking, sorry. 

Kevin: It's 

Emma: I've seen him like, walk in, lay down. 

Kevin: Yeah. 'cause I, and I mentioned this before probably on the podcast but I've mentioned this before about how like I would hear your story and or I would hear somebody else's, and I can think of a couple people early on who are like, oh, I'm so happy.

Like my like either. They didn't have kids yet, or they had a 1-year-old or whatever. My kids will never know, drinking me or they'll never know me with alcohol and all that. Because they got sober alcohol free before they would realize it. And I was like sitting there great.

I can't say that. That ship has sailed. My [00:22:00] daughter was like 11 when I was working on, when I say I started even though it started much before that with half-assed attempts. Yeah. Half-hearted, I'll say both half-hearted and half-assed. But I'm like, shit, I can't say that now.

I feel bad. And then I so I had to reframe it. Sorry. Yeah. To be like at least now she can see I. Yeah, the change she can see before, after, and I am very grateful for that. And I think that has, just me doing this and me doing it the way I have, it's impacted the way she looks at alcohol and the way she approaches these things.

Meredith: Yeah. 

Kevin: So I am grateful for that. I, early on I was like beating myself up because I'm like I felt lesser than these other people because the way they said it, but they didn't mean it that way. And, I'm not saying, nobody means it that way. Yeah. But I, in turn, we all, we always think about ourselves.

So I took it personally even though I wasn't even talking to somebody. It was like an Instagram reel I saw or something. It pre reels probably. And I took it personally [00:23:00] and that was, but I internalized that and, but then I had to figure it out for myself. I had to do the work and, sit there and talk to my therapist about it.

I just saw this week and then we talked about it and then, maybe I journaled about it another time I wrote some, just dump some thoughts down on it. And it's processing it.

Meredith: Yeah. 

Kevin: But, 

Meredith: It's like we have a way of turning anything into a way to beat ourselves up.

Yeah. And yeah, and like you, a hundred percent my, I, my biggest things are, their advantages to having, I was 37 and almost 40, like two months shy of 40 when I had my kids. That's not as old as it used to be. Like it's becoming more popular. 

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: But most of my preschool mom friends are like 10 years younger than I am.

Yeah. And like my grand, my kids' grandparents, we lost my dad last summer, my kids were four and seven. It's and I'm like but I didn't start that season of my life Yeah. Until I was older. And that's just part of, what goes with my story. And it's I love how you said it's like everything is an [00:24:00] opportunity to turn it around to self-reflection, right?

And growth for the better. 

Kevin: And there is no set way to do things. Even though we think there is we ha we have oh, we do this and this is how life goes. And it's no, there's no, there's no playbook, there's no, we can do whatever. We want just because it's this per, I'm doing something different than the norm or what it used to be, or whatever.

Yeah, totally. So what, 

Emma: yeah, I, yeah, I grew up in the. I dunno whether it was intent. Definitely wasn't intentional, but I grew up in that mindset of you go to university, you get a career, you get married, you get a house, you have kids, and then you have a happy life. Tried to do that. Didn't fit very well with me.

So I wasn't happy for many years until, I realized there are different ways of doing things. And that's something I'm big on teaching my kids of. You don't have to go to university if you don't want to. Sure. It's great, but if you wanna get it a trade, so long as you've got some kind of career and something that brings you joy and brings you income [00:25:00] would be ideal.

But you don't have to get married. You don't have to have kids. You don't necessarily have to buy a house. You could be a nomad and travel. You could have a motor home and, or like a bus and just, I don't know, let's find what brings you joy and create your life around that. Because this cookie cutter way of living isn't, 

Meredith: yeah.

Emma: Doesn't work. 

Meredith: And I think that, like for me at least, one of the things, one of those many, like multiple effect, ripple effect gifts of sobriety is being able to be so much more aware and intentional about my parenting. Like you said, so much of it has been obviously processing.

I joke that for addiction stories, my family was like pretty mainstream. I don't have a lot of addiction. Like my parents were, great. They really were, but there were a lot of emotional things that weren't really there. And that fed a lot of my wiring for. Anxiety and pressure, performance and expectations and fear of failure and all [00:26:00] those sorts of things that played into my substance abuse story. As a sober mom, and I get to be very intentional about, I actually prioritize my children's emotional health more than their, granted, they're not like in high school yet.

I was gonna say more than their school performance. Those preschool grades are tough, but, honestly, that's what I mean, that like for me, social, emotional health, emotional intelligence, healthy coping, yes. Resilience, the way that we have resilience, those sorts of things are more important to me as a parent than I would've probably ever thought had I not gone down this path of like recovery. 

Emma: Yeah. That's definitely something we're struggling with. My youngest, she's not struggling with but something we're we are navigating at the moment with my 10-year-old is some resilience. She's always been the good girl.

She's unintentionally we've got some good girl conditioning going on there. And now when people do the wrong thing at school, she's still at primary school. [00:27:00] She'll call them out on it and then she's getting picked on for being a tattle, being a, yeah, being a tattle towel or and she say, but I'm just trying to do the right thing.

I'm like, yeah, no, but sometimes it's okay to do the wrong thing. She got told off probably for the first time in her entire schooling career, she got told off for talking in class and she came home and she was in tears. She sobbed herself to sleep and we were like, babe. I don't care if you get told off for talking in class, like it's not the end of the world.

Yeah. Like it's fine. You've got friends. That's good. Yeah. So you know, rewiring that I always have to be good or I always have to do the right thing to build some resilience of it's okay to do the wrong thing. It's okay to get told off. It's not the end of the world. It's hard work though.

Building that resilience. Yeah, that, that's awesome. Any tips? 

Meredith: Yeah. I just think parents, like we have this innate and this is where my inner control freak comes in [00:28:00] because I am very much a recovering perfectionist and a recovering control freak. Every day is still working on it for years, obviously.

And nothing brought those out for me more than having kids. And it's so hard because it's on the one hand we want a. Our kids do great. We wanna protect them. We want them to not experience like, the horrific realities of the world or whatever. But it's the tough stuff is how they learn, right?

It's like how they grow. It's how they, so it's really freaking hard. I still struggle with not as much I'd say as I see a lot of people like the idea of, do I want my kids to be happy or do I want them to be strong? Do I want, it's not my job to be happy.

It's my job to teach them how to like, be good people who can hopefully navigate this world and for me, navigate it without drinking or pills. That's my biggest thing. You guys feel as a parent? Yeah, but my husband isn't, obviously we're genetic double hitters, so we're very aware of that, the genetic nature of [00:29:00] addiction tendencies and yeah, it's like just really trying to help them be comfortable, like you were saying with.

The uncomfortable stuff and embracing, I don't wanna say failure, but yeah, that's where we learn. We learn through our mistakes and I did not grow up with those messages I grew up with You do things the right way. 

Kevin: Yeah. 

Emma: Yeah. Always strive for a hundred percent. And if you get anything less than a hundred percent, then that's not good enough.

That's the conditioning I got. Yeah. Huge standards to live up to. Yeah. 

Kevin: Yeah. That's and yeah, and I try, and I'm big on this word maybe now 'cause it's when something doesn't go right and everybody's freaking out or I would do that before I still do it. Who am I kidding? But something goes wrong and my daughter might be like.

Oh, that's it. I'm not playing soccer next year. I'm done with this. I'm not gonna do it. And then maybe the coach doesn't, and this is just a simple example, but maybe the [00:30:00] coach says, okay, I'm not coming back next year and this happened. Ah, this is gonna be awful.

Who the hell's gonna come here? Who's gonna be the next coach and I'm not gonna play and blah, blah, blah. I'm like maybe it's good, maybe it's bad. Like you, we don't know. And just let's calm down and what can we can, what can we do now? Nothing. 'cause it's November or December. And guess what happened?

Somebody the new coach is, she's super excited about. So it's yeah, we don't know. And you know what, it could have went the other way too. And it could have been somebody you're like, oh, I don't wanna play for this person. But we just don't know. But we get ourselves so bent outta shape in advance.

Oh, definitely. That worrying about it and trying to get the right answer and trying to do the right thing, but we can't control it. And that's where, that's one of the things I'm trying to do myself. Yeah. And for her, it's like we can't control pretty much anything. Like I'll say like we, we try, we think we can, we think we control more than we actually do.

But yeah, all we can do is what can I [00:31:00] control today myself? And that can be, doing good in school or whatever. But it's not the end all be all either. Yeah. I'm going off tangent. That should be the word of 

Emma: your word of the year. Kiev for 2026 maybe. Maybe for 2026, maybe it'll be mine. Oh, maybe.

Kevin: Yeah. There you go. That's so true. It's already like right here, so Yeah. Maybe yeah, it's already one of the words that's tattooed on me to I have all kinds of reminders. 

Meredith: Yeah. It's like very, I joke though that I never thought I was a control freak. I had no idea, but it's think for me at least, I spent all of my time up here up here, but also ruminating on the past for whatever reason. Analyzing, beating myself up. Second guessing. 

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: Wishing things had gone or projecting about the future. That's how my mind even still, and it's gotten so much easier in time.

And with the repetition of different habits and actions and [00:32:00] practices and, recovery tools. But I still really struggle, like Kevin, what you were saying with comfort in the unknown. It has certainly gotten a lot easier, but it is not innately a comfortable place for me. And life is the unknown, right?

Health, our kids are future, how our kids are gonna turn out. Yeah. I truly believe that like I can do everything right. I know with a hundred percent certainty I can do everything that I think is right and either or both. My kids could totally derail and I have to be able to like.

Be okay with that uncertainty and know that I still need to work on keeping myself strong and sober through that. If that does come one day. And that more importantly, whatever that if scenario is that I'm so scared about. 'cause there can be a number of them. There are other people who have gone through it who will help me.

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: And only sobriety has given me that perspective and that also helps me 

Emma: a lot. I [00:33:00] think that's really interesting. I think a lot of women in particular, I can't speak for men, but I would, I think a lot of women have that kind of thought process, particularly in the afternoons of, or in the evenings, that witching hour where you are ruminating over the day that was, or future tripping about what's going to happen or excuse me.

Just recycling all those thoughts in our heads and that I know for me, that was a trigger for me to drink to wind that down and calm that down, calm down the future tripping and the ruminating and the going over everything over and over again. And that's that whole mummy wine club thing of, and the witching hour.

Yeah. There was a question here somewhere.

Kevin: I'll jump in while you're thinking of that though, and I'll speak for the men that we do it too. 

Emma: Okay, cool. Good. I guess the question is how do you, what do you, what kind of things do you suggest to women who are, or men, people who [00:34:00] are everyone who is, navigating that, that thought process of, or that, mummy wine club or that wind down, I need a glass of something to wind down.

Meredith: Yeah. And that's a really good question because while I, like I said, for me I was sober long before that world, but I see people who are struggling with it or hear from people who are struggling with it and know how prevalent that is. And I don't think. The suggestions are really any different than the what they were for me, even though I didn't have kids and I wasn't married, back then when I was struggling with those feelings or those thoughts or those cravings I.

First it's the people, places and things like, I'm sorry, but somebody who's trying to stay away from drinking who's in early sobriety has, and they really actually are trying not to drink, really has no business being around neighbors who are having wine and cheese. Like they just don't. Eventually that can be a safe place if you want it to be.

And those are real friendships and but not in the beginning when you're raw and you're struggling. So there's a little bit of that being smart about [00:35:00] what's good for your sobriety versus what isn't, what is leaning you towards a drink versus away. But also who you surround yourself with.

Like that community piece. Like you have to be able to. Get those thoughts out. Yes, journaling is great, but even connecting with another person on them, a text like, Hey, this is a time that I wanna drink, or, I wanna, play the drink through. I used to always, I used to have a note card in my wallet of I called it like my greatest hits, and it was like a short list of the hor horrific, embarrassing things that had happened or the sort of consequence lows or just idiotic moves of my last, year of drinking.

And it would be like, oh my gosh, that is a reality of when I drink. But the problem is, if that's only like a couple glasses of wine and nobody's really hurting, you're going to bed, you're getting up, you're taking care of your kids, okay, like how do you really feel? Are you feeling like crap? Are and again, that's where being honest with somebody has to come in.

I think that you need some kind of accountability and community. And that's certainly what I did. I [00:36:00] was famous for texting people after I drank. For a while. Yeah. Until I got sober. Yeah. Then I started being more honest about how I was really feeling in the moment. But the last thing I'll say on that is being smart about changing your routines.

So if that's taking a family walk, if that's, doing a workout, a easy light yoga workout if that's not cooking dinner, because cooking dinner is a trigger because for a lot of people 

Emma: it's, yeah. Understand.

Meredith: So it's like changing the routine to set yourself up for success. And that's the case for any wellness habit really.

Not just, do you know what I mean? It's like you have to be smart about how to set yourself up for success. Whatever that is. And that's definitely the case for that witching hour drink thing. And to trust that, like it will get better. Like what you said, Kevin, it's like whatever you're struggling with, you have to believe that all these thousands of [00:37:00] people who claim that they've been there and that what they experienced and how they got to the other side of it, that you're not unique, you're not different.

Yeah. And that will probably be true for you too, if you just trust. 

Kevin: Yeah. And like you said, be smart about it. When you were talking about like just, okay, maybe you have to disconnect from your regular friends or 

Meredith: for a little while, 

Kevin: whatever. Yeah. But being smart about it, because I remember early on, we were supposed to go out with a group of friends and I was just like, yeah, no, I'm not ready for that.

And then, but then one couple was like, Hey, do you wanna go out to this restaurant and the specific one, I was like, okay, I've never been there before, so I don't have any memories from it and i'm, we don't really hang out with this these two that much kids are going, I'm comfortable not drinking in that situation, but my wife knew what I was doing and I could pull the eject cord, if I needed it. And it was fine, but I, but it was like being, [00:38:00] and if it wasn't, I have to learn from that, right? And I have to be like, you know what, maybe I just don't go to those situations for a little bit. That doesn't mean I'm never gonna go to a restaurant again or a bar, right? But for now, I need to protect myself as best I can.

And that can mean and I think that's. One of the difficult things, again, it's like trusting other people, is we immediately go to worst case scenario. We immediately, we talk about the worry and the future tripping and all that. We immediately go to what? I'm never gonna go to a go out with friends again.

I'm never gonna go to a restaurant again. I'm never gonna go over to house again and stand on the back deck and while they, while we like hang out and talk. And it's no, I wasn't saying that. Yeah. But for now, maybe you don't. 

Meredith: I still remember, I always share this, like when I said early on in a recovery meeting so I'm supposed to not drink at my own wedding.

Like, how is that gonna happen? I was genuinely concerned with this. [00:39:00] And I remember somebody saying, are you engaged? I was single. It was like right now. And, today I just laugh about that because 

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: One of the things I love to share the most is the only thing I can't do is drink. I can do everything else.

Yeah. There were a lot of things I couldn't do in the end of my drinking because my world was so small and I couldn't I wouldn't have gone to a restaurant that didn't serve alcohol, even if it was like a Michelin star restaurant, and I'm a huge foodie, because why would I go somewhere that doesn't serve alcohol?

I couldn't have imagined like the, I couldn't imagine doing anything earlier in sobriety, without drinking, but it's like now anywhere traveling yeah, dinners, I remember going out to dinner in early sobriety and it was like, I was like, oh my gosh, this is weird. Don't people wonder why I'm not drinking?

Yeah. No, nobody and no doesn wonders. And that's the other thing that, this is a close to home, my heart topic, because I have friends who I see struggle with this [00:40:00] like this. When you try to. Live a happy sober life, close to partying, problem, drinking life like all the time. It's not a good mix.

Yeah. It's really not. And I used to think the whole world was either people who were sober who like had to be, or they were partying and drinking like I was and my friends. I didn't know that there's this whole world. I live in a huge neighborhood. We have a huge pool community. It's amazing how many people are not recovered alcoholics, but aren't getting wasted all the time.

Like I'm in a book club and everybody knows my story now. It's I'm totally open about it, but, and some of them will drink occasionally, if people are drinking or they'll have a drink or two. But like none of them, it's not the kind of book club where people are getting wasted.

I'm not gonna be in that kind of book club because I don't wanna be, yeah. But there are, it's amazing to me how much of the world is doing amazing, fun things without drinking. But when we first get sober, we don't know that exists. Yeah. Because we assume that like we [00:41:00] lived, everybody's drinking while they do it.

I took a drink to my vet, like literally a, that's one thing I've 

Emma: never done. Wow. Like vitamin in water and 

Meredith: vodka. Like literally like I needed to have a buzz to go to a vet appointment. Who? Why not? It made sense at the time. Yeah. It's just crazy.

Emma: Yeah. I am last year, oh gosh, a couple years ago now. No I don't. Anyway, recently I was down in Queenstown and New Zealand, which is known for its vineyards and its wineries where it husband's, work conference. And the actual like annual award ceremony was at a vineyard, which I surprisingly did.

Okay. I actually, I went and got the reframe brain tattooed on my wrist like the morning of the conference because I, or morning of the event to remind myself that I can be alcohol. I think I was four or five months sober then. Anyway, that's not the point of the story. But after that we went out with his work colleagues.

I went to this beautiful vineyard who did this, I don't know, 10 course Dega station, fancy, amazing. [00:42:00] Everything looked like a picture kind of food thing. And it came with a wine pairing with the 10 courses. And everyone did that, did the wine pairing. And I said to the waitress, oh, I'm actually alcohol free.

I'm sober. And she's oh, we have this amazing mocktail pairing that we can do for you. And they paired mocktails with the whole menu. And I was like this is the kind of thing we want restaurants doing because you don't need to pair alcohol with food. It can be mocktails. And sometimes it was like soda water with wine with, of course.

'cause they were like, this is a refreshing dish to refresh your pellet. And it was awesome. I was like, man, if more restaurants could do that, do it. There's such a push 

Meredith: now, which is a great thing. I'm sure you guys see this where you live, the mocktail movement. We have a an na champagne bar, I think like around here now that I actually haven't, there's, it's like I'm all for the sober curious movement, obviously. I think anybody who's evaluating their relationship with alcohol that's a good [00:43:00] thing because it's, the reality is it is a carcinogen, it's horrific for our health.

I laugh, I can say that now because it's like a non-issue, but I didn't have a problem for a long time, even though I knew that. It's the, so it's a great I say that sobriety has become like trendy, and I don't mean that in a bad way. I think there's, more celebrities are getting vocal about sobriety and the health impact.

The health factors are becoming much more, or, more in the media and people are realizing, right? So there's this whole like, push and I think it's great. I'm amazed at how many people have stopped who I know, who will tell me like, oh, I'm not drinking. Or I just don't like how it makes me feel.

Or I've started having, I'm in perimenopause and it's not great for my hormones. So I just, I don't really drink anymore. And I'm like, wow. But it's becoming such a, I think that's amazing that you had that experience at a vineyard. I love that. 

Emma: Yeah, I think there's definitely more of a health focus.

I think that was, that's what I'm seeing [00:44:00] from the outside world is that people are not necessarily giving up alcohol because they have a problem or they're an alcoholic. But there's more of this health focus of oh, I'm curious about how this is gonna impact my sport performance or my perimenopause or yeah, my general sleep or, anxiety that it's a car.

Anxiety. Huge one. Yeah. Yeah. Huge. There's just 

Kevin: more, the more and more information that comes out, right? That's one of my big pet peeves is like the nutrition labels, there's no nutrition label on alcohol. And interesting. Lemme see.

I got a. I got a bottle of water here. No, there's no nutrition label on this water, but I think there is on the pack that it came in. Yeah. And Wow. But there's nothing on a beer or something like that. And I think people like, even like something like that. And I know that's lobbying and everything that's keeping that off of it, but how is there or not?

We ingest it and there's my Celsius here. I'm not drinking the healthiest stuff here. Great example, kid and calories and all, I have all [00:45:00] the information here of what's in it and I, and they have to put that on there. And I think it's bullshit that alcohol doesn't have that on there.

And I do think people, I, and I said that once while ago on, when I was hosting on a thousand hours dry, and people were in the comments like, oh, it's not gonna make a difference. Nobody's gonna care. I'd still keep drinking. I'm like, yes you would. That's fine. But you know what? A lot of people would think differently about it if they had to sit there and see that, because we're so programmed, I think these days to look at those anyway.

Yeah. For better or for worse. Yeah. But things like that where just those changes sorry, yeah. Went off on a tangent there, but like those things, it's, but it's all the health information I think coming out and it's, yeah. I heard somebody book, I read, I can't remember where this was, alcohol deadens our taste buds, right?

And when we say we pair things with alcohol or I have to drink, yeah. It's oh, I have to have this swine with this food and things like that. They made a comparison of it doesn't [00:46:00] change The taste of the food. Milk and cookies, like that milk, when you dunk a cookie in it, it changes the food.

It makes it different when you don't have steak and red wine in your mouth at the same time. And I get, I'm, it's simplistic view and all of that, but does deaden your taste buds? They also talked about a study where all these foodies couldn't tell the difference between like boxed wine and, really supposedly good wine.

And that same group did a study on I think pate versus dog food and people couldn't tell the difference. 

Meredith: Oh, that's funny. 

Yeah. It's funny 'cause it's like in the restaurant industry I'm thinking of I. Because I'm, as I said, like especially when you're in New York for years and years, you just become like a food person.

Yeah. So I'm a major foodie, but it's funny you say this because I've laughed because I've been back to the city a couple, like four times I guess since I got sober and four or five times. And sometimes I've been to restaurants and I'm like, gosh, [00:47:00] this wasn't as good as I remembered. Or and I'll think to myself and I'm like, it's interesting is my, like my palate is different. Yeah. In sobriety. But also there's tremendous overlap in the restaurant. We know, we all know this and like substance abuse, the restaurant industry, it's all part of this like more. I don't know. I don't know. I think the health thing though, what you said really struck a chord back to that.

Yeah. I think that, I think people, it's amazing. It's one of those things where. It's amazing to me when people like, I was like going to the gym in my twenties. I tried to eat healthy. I, but when you don't wanna look at that, but it's like amazing how many people, I see this in moms groups all the time, like Facebook moms groups about anxiety.

The anxiety thing really is what it is. Some form of that, the moms struggles. And the first thing, honestly, if it's anxiety or depression, that somebody should be thinking about is, do I drink [00:48:00] regularly? Yeah. And because a lot of people are, and they're not even thinking that is affecting their mental health.

Get it Because, I didn't for 

Kevin: well, and I was gonna actually gonna ask that earlier. 'Cause you had talked about anxiety. I'm like, did you use alcohol to bring down your anxiety? Because that's, I would assume Yes.

Meredith: Oh. Yeah. 

Kevin: But I didn't wanna,

Meredith: It, oh gosh. Yeah. We say it's like you don't realize until you unpack it really in sobriety. But yes, I'm a social person and I'm extroverted, but for me, alcohol was definitely that ease of social anxiety. Because I always felt like everybody was smarter, everybody was prettier, everybody, all those thoughts and whether it was work events, whether it was just out with friends at bars.

Oh, yeah, a hundred percent. Even in college, I used it for anxiety. And then it's like crazy. I literally had people telling me and had therapists saying you can't drink with this. Or you like, [00:49:00] yeah, but how much do you drink? We try, I go out a couple drinks here and there, but that's like really serious to be mixing with benzos, like on a daily basis.

Like life changing. Really serious. 

Crazy, 

Kevin: but and I put up the Okay. Sign because I was like, okay, yeah, sure, doc. Yeah. Because that's, I think that's what we our immediate Yeah. Inclination is no, okay, of course I'm gonna drink. That's what I do. It's you lie 

Meredith: to ourselves even though,

like I low ball how much I drank. 

Oh, if I ever thought about it, I would get too freaked out or I would think that was just a bad day. It got a little bit crazy. 

Kevin: I don't drink every day, so 

Emma: it's fine. Just every day I am not hungover.

 So you, you got sober and that did that. Encouraged you to become like a health coach? 'cause you quite, you said you're a foodie and you're you're interested in health and wellness and food and nutrition. And did, was it the sobriety that led you down that path or were you always that way inclined?

Meredith: [00:50:00] I was always interested in that only to the point of following health trends and working out. But I loved my early spin classes in New York, my hot yoga classes and all that stuff. But I would say there was a couple things, sobriety was a key part of that progression, that sort of path.

But then I did this shift and did, pediatric speech therapy, so that started my awakening of wow, all these kids are having, food allergies or just like more and more stuff. It just seemed like I. I was hearing, just I did do the birth to five population early intervention.

It's what it's called here in the us. And yeah, I mean I was I guess I got married and so then I was thinking about having a, child, we were trying to have a kid and I was an older mom, so it was the combination of speech therapy and what I was seeing and thinking how much does diet, lifestyle, and environmental stuff impact any of these health issues?

[00:51:00] So it was then trying to get pregnant as an older mom and thinking yikes, I need to keep my, what can I, like learning about what we put on our skin matters and, the role of hormone disruptors learning about gut health, and then the third part of it was that my husband is nine years older than I am.

So he's 54, which we still like, can't believe, but, which I still can't believe I'm 45, but that's a whole other thing. And he has now granted he has the, we have two older boys too, but he's 54 with a 5-year-old. And he was like borderline pre-diabetic blood work when we met.

Wow. So that was the other sort of piece of it. It was like, wow, I have to start, like my eyes were first massively opened by diving into how much can I control my health, my baby's health, my likelihood of being able to breastfeed my baby's gut, my baby's immune system, like all of it, right? And then my husband being like, yikes, we need to work on this stuff some.

So [00:52:00] all of that sort of morphed into a laser focus on what I call controlling the controllables, but not in a crazy, rigid way. Because. I can't be, I'm just like not, I don't wanna live like that. And I think earlier in my journey, in fact when I was pregnant, when Parker, my oldest was a little guy, he's almost eight now, but I was in all these holistic moms groups and I was like, terrified.

I was like, oh my gosh, what if I get the wrong bassinet? Or what if I get the wrong crib sheet? And oh my gosh what does this certification mean? What does this certification mean? And it was like, calm down. That's like too much. I'm not gonna live like that. So I would say I eased up a bit.

Through the years since then. And then two years ago I stopped seeing speech therapy kids when I had Chase and then COVID I'd started back, but then COVID and that was hard with childcare. And then I was gonna revisit that when he starts kindergarten this coming fall, but just from a time standpoint.

But I ended up doing a health coaching certification [00:53:00] program two years ago because I was like, I'm gonna turn this into something and I'm not sure what I'm gonna do with it, but I love this and this is what I do for so many friends that I wanna do more with this. Yeah. So I did the health coaching and then I created Clean Coaching Mama.

And then I've been doing a bunch of stuff with that since. 

Emma: That's really 

Meredith: awesome. Variety is the foundation of that. Do you know what I mean? It really is because I wouldn't be able to live authentically, I wouldn't be able to be intentional in the way that I am. I wouldn't be able to dig deeper into.

What I need to work on, uncovering motive, any of that stuff. And then obviously if I was drinking and hungover, then it would all be a wash, but, so that's it in a nutshell. 

Emma: Yeah. Awesome. So what, you talked about like fads when you were in New York, like the, maybe not just New York, but what are some kind of fad diets or fad exercise, wellness things. Let's not call them diet, let's call them wellness. Things that [00:54:00] have, that you've seen come and go, that you've.

Maybe you've tried and haven't enjoyed? 

Meredith: Like back in my twenties and now granted this is before I got sober, I laugh about this, but like the Stouffer's Lean Cuisine meet frozen dinners or we, my, my roommates and I would make like dishes with laughing cow cheese, which is like horrifically processed fake cheese.

The whole like, carbs are the enemy, yeah. Which, granted I'm not, I'm very intentional about the carbs that I eat and cook with and, but I don't count track. Right now there's a huge push. Intermittent fasting is huge. Macro counting is huge. I guess I.

I, and obviously I grew up in the like fat free era, which I don't know if snackwell's made it over to New Zealand, but that was big here. I'm sure Kevin remembers. 

Kevin: Oh, yeah. 

Meredith: I went through like that phase, the whole fat free thing. And it's funny because I watch how my parents were influenced by all of these trends.

The years as well. But I've netted out on my personal philosophy and [00:55:00] how I, people will ask me, it's like they're so hung up on calorie counting or they're so hung up on macro tracking or, and I'm not a nutritionist, I'm not a dietician, I don't. That's not my wheelhouse to give specific advice, but I am very much of the mindset that whole real foods are our friend and limiting processed foods, limiting added sugar.

Now my kids eat Chick-fil-A way more than I'd like. They get, die filled freeze pops at the pool snack bar. I am not anybody who knows me or sees enough of my life, knows that I'm actually pretty moderate on some of this stuff, but also very intentional about how I grocery shop, how I cook, what I eat.

I believe that. And it's funny is this about sobriety? No, but is how I feel my energy level, my anxiety level, how optimal my hormones are all functioning. Is this all about my Yeah, it is. 'cause it's how I feel, right?

And it's about food as fuel. It's fueling my body with. The, with a lot of protein, a lot of fiber[00:56:00] do I get into tracking all of it?

No. But I do have like protein goals and fiber goals for my family. Do I obsess over them? No. But do I like to teach about them to my children? Yes. Yeah. So I think that's, right now, at this particular moment, I would say the intermittent fasting thing, I'm like, it works for some people.

I'm not personally a fan of it. It wouldn't work for my life. But yeah, 

Emma: I think the big thing, and you touched on it, is how does it make you feel? So you can be doing some kind of exercise plan or eating plan or food plan, or. How does it make you feel? Your body's gonna tell you whether it's good for you or not, right?

Yeah. Like we husband went down a rabbit hole at one point of plant-based, that we had to be a plant-based family and giving up all animal products and what have you, and some people can do that really well. But I struggle with anemia. I got so horrifically anemic that I ended up [00:57:00] having to go to the hospital and have iron infusions and it was like, okay, cool.

Some people can do this, but my body is telling me absolutely not. Yeah, we did that for a couple of months and then I realized that wasn't gonna work for me. Don't get me wrong, I probably could have figured out how to get more iron in my diet naturally, and yeah. And why not? But yeah, a steak is easier.

Kevin: You said some people. Yeah. And some people can do any diet or any way of eating and it that might work. Perfectly well for them, and that might be the thing they need. And it might be someone else's, cause of a whole host of issues, so yeah, there is no one way and yeah, intermittent fasting, I've tried that before.

It can work for some things. I liked it for various reasons when I did it longer because I did feel like more clearheaded I did feel good. 

Meredith: Yeah. 

Kevin: But I hear people who are looking to, cut back or stop drinking and [00:58:00] they're like, oh yeah, I'm gonna start doing intermittent fasting too.

I'm, oh gosh let's not do that. I try to avoid that because, that's all you need is to make your blood sugar swing all over the place when you're also trying to cut back on alcohol. And whether that's making you hangry or whether that's whatever you're just putting yourself at a disadvantage now.

Mm-hmm. I've asked some people this who have done that. Do you do that all the time? And they're like, and one person was like, yeah, I do that, that's what I do. And I've done for years. I'm like, okay, that's what you're used to.

But recognize that you might have some differences if you remove alcohol now and go, and kind of address that, but yeah, I like how you said our June challenge is the intentional June challenge. It's about being intentional, focusing on those habits, focusing on something small and all of that.

So you had mentioned that with, intentional with our choices in that, but I think knowing ourselves too. Yeah, like I, I shared this with a group where we were talking about doing a challenge, and I was like I [00:59:00] am what I'm not focusing on diet. I'm gonna I'm gonna say I'm gonna stay away from this and this, but my big change is I'm not gonna eat on the couch.

And yeah, that was my diet change, because I know if I'm at night and on the couch, I'm going to mindlessly eat if I Yeah. If I do that. So I'm like, that's the change I'm going to make. And I'm not allowed on the couch after 10 o'clock.

Emma: And I need to teach my kids that they're not allowed to eat on the couch.

Oh, 

Meredith: Yeah. And I think the other, like what you guys, what you were back to, the whole trends thing and kind of what you were saying as well, Kevin, is I think that like for me, it's helping people understand that I. Wellness is very it's all interrelated. And this is just my personal belief and my kind of passion I would say, but Right.

That ideally, like I don't wanna be like obsessing over everything I'm eating, but completely neglecting stress or movement. Like exercise, I'm a big believer in movement of some [01:00:00] kind. It doesn't need to be a certain kind, but whatever works for you. To, for optimal health. Obviously some people it's not gonna come as naturally, but ideally, the ideal, the painting, the ideal picture I guess so yeah, it's I think so many of us can get focused on what the trends are or like, I need to take all the right supplements or I need to, and it's okay.

But is there any reason to think if you feel like, especially if you're anxiety prone, what's the role of stress reduction? What are you actively doing for stress reduction? That's a big deal. That's something, especially as busy moms, I find I have found meditation practices to be truly life changing.

Absolutely. My life changing and I do not do them nearly as much as I want to. I can come up with every reason in every excuse in this in the book, literally. I actually did one before I joined you guys because it helps me to just center. So if you think I'm amped up, just be glad you didn't see without a meditation in No [01:01:00] but it's if you're, I don't know, and I think that's part of the holistic and the cleaner stuff too, is that I see people really agonizing over what to buy and this and that. And especially in the holistic moms groups who are obviously. From what they're saying, not necessarily having regular movement and definitely not rebalancing their life in a way that they can, whether it's asking for what you need, which again, I learned in recovery.

Being honest with yourself about how you're really doing. Again, learn that in recovery. Not beating yourself up about it. Learned it in recovery. But working on stress. I think that's the biggest one is that we all think like we have to eat, yes, food I think is obviously the most important variable, but stress is a huge risk factor for everything.

Emma: Everything. 

Meredith: And our society is not running in a way that supports stress man. It's just not, and it's not gonna be going, it's not gonna be changing anytime soon, I don't think. And I think that segues [01:02:00] into, I. Again, like what am I so passionate about trying? It's really hard though, to teach my kids to check into how they feel and how their body's doing, trying to model, breath work.

Easier said than done with a five and 7-year-old, but yeah. Do you know what I mean? Like even just planting seeds, it's yeah. Yeah. I don't know. That's a even you right there, but yeah. 

Kevin: Even you doing it like in an area of the house that they can see you doing something like that? Yeah.

If I have my headphones on and I'm sitting there with my eyes closed, just, you can see I'm breathing like. Oh, my daughter walks past, oh, dad's meditating right now. It 

Meredith: normalizes it. And it always, because I always say to people, think about how much you picked up on these sorts of things from your childhood, right?

Yeah. What and don't see what was modeled, what isn't, what was it explicitly taught versus implicitly absorbed, right? 

It's really powerful. And that's also setting ourselves up to be perfectionist and beat the crap out of ourselves. And I don't mean that at all.

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: But just awareness and [01:03:00] a little bit of intentionality goes a long way. 

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: That's my, 

Kevin: I think, even I remember saying to my daughter she kept asking me questions and all this, and I looked at her and I'm like, Avery, I don't know. I. I'm like, I don't know the answer. I'm trying to figure this out too.

Just 'cause I'm an adult doesn't mean I know how to do all these things. So just like saying things like that and because, I could see she was getting frustrated and I'm frustrated because I'm like, look, there's no playbook. We're all figuring it out as we go. And just because I'm an adult doesn't mean that I have the playbook and I did all the, all the answers. Yeah. Know all the answers. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah. I think even modeling that is helpful. 

Emma: Yeah.

Meredith, what kind of things do you do for self-care? What do you model to your kids, but also what do you do that they don't necessarily like? What feels good for you? It's funny, 

Meredith: I'm like, it's a full-time job. Ask [01:04:00] my husband. I'm just kidding. I'm lucky in that I love to exercise. It's not hard.

I actually have always enjoyed exercise and it's very much a part of my mental health and just my day, like I, I get in some kind of movement. The minimum would be like a 30 minute walk with my dog. Pretty much every day, so I'm really big on, as I'm getting older, especially doing more strength training and it just helps me feel stronger, really mentally, physically, spiritually, all of it.

What do I do that my kids see? I'm talk about how we eat, we really focus on food as fuel. But I also, this is the feeding therapist in me. I'm also like careful to not overfocus on it too much, and that's the duality, it's like trying to be quote, neutral about foods, but also 

So yeah, it's a balance of, intentionality versus letting things go. They, we talk about meditation with them. They see me meditate. They know I love tapping meditations. I've done some with my children [01:05:00] before. We are a part of it. We go to a church, we're involved in the, there, and they hear about our spiritual life.

We talk about the importance of community. They see me prioritizing that. They know that, I have my women's meeting. They always talk about my women's meeting. That's a women's recovery meeting. And I think I just, I try to think about like when I can, again, sometimes better than others, finding the teachable moments, right?

Like you were saying Kevin, to say, wow, sounds like we're doing swim team right now, for instance, which is a whole culture and world in and of itself. 

It's whoa. And. Yeah, like an exercise in when we try new things or go to a new school or we're actually going to a new school next year.

Both of our kids, that's even freaking me. Obviously I think I'm more nervous than they are, but, talking about things and normalizing, like you said, normalizing learning stuff, [01:06:00] making mistakes, being gentle with ourselves, taking things, asking. I'll say to my kids, this sounds like an example of how important is it really?

Because sometimes that's something I use as a repetitive phrase with them because I can think things are all really important, and so I've tried to teach that to my kids and it's my husband and I didn't get that message growing up, right? So it's like most things, and I say all the time, most things in life are fixable.

Some things aren't, but most things in life are fixable, so things like that, like trying to weave. At the end of the day, I'm a totally type a former New Yorker, control freak, recovered, alcoholic, yeah. Trying to do all of this very imperfectly. 

Emma: Yeah. I like how you say that. Imperfectly and trying and that's the thing.

'cause you are never gonna nail it a hundred percent of the time. And it's, yeah. Yeah. Doing what you can, when you can and reminding yourself that it's okay to not, it's okay to not meditate every [01:07:00] single day or it's, it's okay not to do a hour gym session every day. Sometimes your body just needs a walk.

Sometimes your body just needs some yoga. Sometimes your body just needs, I dunno what it is. Yeah. But yeah, not putting that pressure on you, on yourself to be. The perfect mom. I know. It's so 

Meredith: hard. It's yeah. And I'm a big fan of the repair conversation, which I think you guys hit on, but, which is just a parenting, but it's which I also didn't get growing up really, but it's the ability, like you said, to be infallible, to apologize when I don't handle 

Kevin: things well.

Meredith: To apologize when I lose my temper. When I use a loud voice, which doesn't happen that often, I'm more of a hothead than my husband is, and that's a beautiful gift, right? And that's teaching them healthy strategies, 

Emma: so . Awesome. 

Kevin: I think that's a good place to segue into our what did [01:08:00] you learn this week? Thanks Meredith, for joining us today. And now we'll just close it out with what did you learn this week? This could be completely off topic, not sobriety related at all. Just whatever. I was this, as Emma says, I was I was today 

Emma: years old.

Kevin: I was, thank you. I was today years old when I learned this. 

And it doesn't even have to be, I learned it, but a little nugget that we're doing this week. I guess mine is, my wife and daughter are out of town, which I know I hear this a lot. And this was huge for me. That was when that happened when I was drinking.

That was like a woo-hoo, what am I going to drink this weekend? And I would just be, I would just hang out, maybe do some stuff around the house, but it was a time to that I could just have no responsibilities and drink. And that was tough early on. And now I'm like, I look forward to it in a [01:09:00] different way.

I'm still like, all right, what can I do to relax and all of that. But last night I'm sitting there with the dog and I'm sitting there watching YouTube videos of random journaling. This guy talking about his journaling practice and it's a photographer, like very popular photographer. I think it's Peter McKinnon maybe.

But he went through this whole thing and he was going through the books he uses, which I have the same one, which is probably how it popped in my feed originally. But he's talking about his pens and like what everything he does. I'm sitting there last night on Amazon order. And it's June 1st tomorrow.

I gotta set up my journal for the new month. And so that's my, my fun weekend without my wife and daughter is going to be the fact that I have all of the markers and the pens that this guy recommended. Wow. And I'm going to be setting up my journal. So I [01:10:00] was today years old that I realized that fun.

I'll say it nicely to myself. Like fun can look like anything. That's funny. I'm having fun. I didn't say I was cool. 

Emma: I was just gonna say, how's 

Kevin: that? 

Emma: I was to 10 years old when I learned Kevin is a. Cool dead. 

Kevin: Kevin is a lame ass who's gonna journal on a Saturday night. But but no, actually I might go out by myself to a movie, which might, doesn't sound any better, but these are all the things that I want to do.

That's the thing. It's yeah, what do I want to do? I still have to figure out what I'm gonna order for dinner. So there's all these things that, you know I don't know what my nugget is there, but all I know is I'm excited about all my pens that I gotta try out. 'cause they came while I was right before the men's meeting started.

And I have not gotten a chance to. 

Meredith: Play around of 

Kevin: them. So 

Meredith: I like it. 

Kevin: Nice. 

Meredith: I like, it's so 

Kevin: lame. I, okay. [01:11:00] I'm the one that edits this. We may only have Emma and Meredith's nugget show up in this. You can't edit 

Emma: it out. Your nugget. 

Kevin: I'm gonna, I'm gonna re, I'm gonna rerecord it with something really cool and just put it in after the fact.

Emma: I don't have anything. Cool. Do you want me to go or you, Emma?

Yeah. Meredith, what's you want? Nugget? Do you have a nugget? 

Meredith: Yeah, 

Okay, so my nugget pales in comparison to that. 

Kevin: I set the bar low. 

Meredith: I don't even know why this popped into my head, but I think my, I was like, gosh, what even happened this week?

What did I even do? I can't even think. But I think my nugget is that, so you guys know I live in North Carolina now. I live in the Raleigh area and my nugget is that it can be cold and like 65 degrees. In North Carolina at the end of May when it's almost June, because I had never known that was possible.

And it was, my kids are doing swim team and they have time trials on Tuesday and I want them to go practice. Like we've had multiple practices canceled. 'cause we had rain and storms, but I'm not kidding. It was like [01:12:00] 65 degrees at the pool the other day. So that's not exciting at all. And I probably go with something better, but who knew it could be that cold in North Carolina in the summer.

And I was thinking about it because after this we are going to go to the pool and hope that it's warmer today and they can get a little swimming in so we can get ready. But Oh, I know. The nugget and the tie to recovery in that, that I had was that it's a reminder that I'm not in control. You can't control the weather.

Yeah. And I feel like I am constantly experiencing reminders of just how little I can control and getting more content with it. So 

Emma: that's 

Meredith: the blessing. 

Kevin: Love that. 

Emma: Yeah. It's why, I don't know. I'm learning American geography. It's been a crash course since joining Reframe for sure. But in my mind, the Carolinas it's like hot, always hot and sweaty and humid and Yeah, always hot.

Yeah. In my mind, but clearly 

Meredith: not as cold as northeast. Yeah. [01:13:00] You don't always get a snow, which is annoying, 

Kevin: but it's sunny and, yeah. I can't believe it 

Emma: snows in the Carolinas. 

Kevin: Sunny and 52 today here in Cleveland. 

Meredith: Oh, really? It's 52? 

Kevin: Yeah. 

Meredith: Oh wow. 

Kevin: It says 56. Feels like 52. I always go 

Meredith: deals with, oh, that's pretty cold.

So you would, that's obviously not swimming pool. 

Kevin: This is perfect. Kevin. Weather. 

Meredith: Yeah.

Kevin: I like it. No it's not for, 'cause my daughter is a lifeguard and she started a new place and they had adult swims this week. And I'm like, it's an outdoor pool, right? She's yeah. It was like, it's like fifties and sixties.

And she had to, is it heated? She had to, I, I'm assuming the pool is. But she had to go at six 15 in the morning and she came back at like after 11. And I'm like, was she blue? She was fine. She, I'm like, so how was it, how many people showed up? She's nobody showed up. Yeah. So I'm like you got paid to sit there and do absolutely nothing, but yeah, I'm like, that's what I said.

I'm like, is it outdoors or indoor? Because I'm like, people go and swimming in the pool. But yeah, apparently. 

Meredith: [01:14:00] Oh, they've had practice when it's been cold. Like my son, my little one got outta the water and started sobbing. Oh, he swam his little, like however many yards and got out. I was like, oh my gosh.

What happened? He was sobbing. Yeah. He's it's so cold. It's so cold. Oh, poor little dude. Anyway, it'll be hot before you know it here though, so we'll be good. Yeah. And then I'll 

Emma: be dying to get in the pool. Yeah. So my nugget of the week I guess it's still, I'm still ruminating about my recent trip to America.

Missing it, wishing I was back. I took my mom to Costco yesterday. We only have one Costco in New Zealand. It opened a couple years ago, maybe 20 minutes, half an hour drive from where I live. So I took my mom to Costco and all we needed was a couple of chickens for dinner and. A couple other little things.

Of course, we left with a $400 trolley full of everything. And then listening to Kevin's story about Amazon arriving overnight. Oh yeah. [01:15:00] My nugget is, my bank account is very thankful that we don't have Amazon and New Zealand and No. Lots of cost. No. You know that I we can get Amazon things, but it ships from Australia usually, and so it's like it takes a week.

Yeah. So we don't have Amazon, we don't have Walmart. We don't have Target. We, I didn't have one. Costco. Yeah. I thought they were like everywhere. Okay. 

Meredith: Wow. 

Emma: I bet they'll try. I think, yeah, I think, as I say that, I think I heard or read somewhere that they're building an Amazon warehouse out, out by Costco, not far from where I live.

So maybe it'll get. 

Kevin: It's coming 

Emma: theater. I don't for my bank account, I hope it doesn't come. 

Kevin: Yeah. Yeah. 

Emma: It's a slippery 

Meredith: slope. 

Kevin: It is. I know. And COVID like being at home and just ordering stuff and having it delivered, like that was the that's not when it started, but that was, yeah. That was when it really kicked up.

Especially like food delivery and all that. 

Emma: Yeah. We can get stuff delivered, like most shops will have an online [01:16:00] section and you can get things delivered, but it's very rarely overnight delivery. It'll be a good couple of days or a week. Yeah. Like I ordered protein powder on Friday and that still hasn't turned up.

And it's Sunday, but it is a long weekend. So for New Zealand.

Kevin: But yeah, thanks so much for joining us today and sharing your story and tips with us.

You went to let us know or, let people know where they can find you. And we'll put this in the show notes too. 

Meredith: Sure. Yeah, thank you so much for having me. This has been awesome. I've really enjoyed talking with you guys. You can check out my stuff on Instagram at Clean Coaching Mama.

Clean Coaching Mama. I also have a website www.cleancoachingmama.com. 

Emma: So Awesome. Thanks Meredith. Yeah, that's awesome. Clean Coaching Mama on Instagram. That's yeah. Easy to find. And if you type in Meredith Brierly as well, it's gonna pop 

Kevin: up.

Yeah. We'll give you a pass. It's early [01:17:00] in New Zealand. 

Emma: Ah, sorry. Crazy. This thing was filled with coffee and now it's empty and it's the, it's still not, 

Kevin: for those of you listening, that was like a 32 to 40 ounce. Yeah, Stanley looking jug of 

Emma: 1.7 liter. Let's not do ounces. Kevin, yeah. In my brain, no function. Good.

Kevin: On that note, thank you all for listening to another episode of the re frameable podcast, brought to you by the Reframe app. Reframe is the number one iOS and Android app to help you cut back or quit drinking alcohol. It uses neuroscience to reframe your relationship with alcohol and unlock the healthiest, happiest you if you're enjoying this podcast, please like, subscribe and share with those that you feel may benefit from it. I wanna thank you again for listening and be sure to come back again for another episode. Have a great day. 

Emma: Bye friends. Hi. That was a terrible bye, friends. 

Kevin: [01:18:00] Would you like to redo on it? 

Emma: Yeah. 3, 2, 1.

Oh wait, you No, I'll just do it. 

Kevin: Back for another episode. Have a great day. 

Emma: Bye friends. 

Meredith: Bye. 

Kevin: Better. That's, 

Meredith: oh, that's funny. Lemme stop.