Episode 167: Hello, My Name is Courtney Andersen, Part 3!
Welcome to SEASON FIVE!
We are back and ready to serve on the Sober Vibes podcast this season.
Courtney Andersen catches up on where she is currently in her life, where she has been, and where she is going!
This season, she is offering you a front-row seat to the evolution of my life and the blossoming of our Sober Vibes community.
Courtney is going to bring something fresh to the Sober Vibes family: mini-series pop-ups within the podcast and a revamped content strategy that's sure to hit home with both our longtime listeners and newcomers.
Episode 167: Hello, My Name is Courtney Andersen, Part 3!
Welcome to SEASON FIVE!
We are back and ready to serve on the Sober Vibes podcast this season.
Courtney Andersen catches up on where she is currently in her life, where she has been, and where she is going!
This season, she is offering you a front-row seat to the evolution of my life and the blossoming of our Sober Vibes community.
Courtney is going to bring something fresh to the Sober Vibes family: mini-series pop-ups within the podcast and a revamped content strategy that's sure to hit home with both our longtime listeners and newcomers.
Thank you so much for joining us. Hey, welcome to the Sober Vibes podcast. I am your host, courtney Anderson. You are listening to episode 167, and welcome to season five. Today, I'm going to share a little about my story. Hello, my name is Courtney Hart. I believe we're on part three or four at this part. I do this episode every second season, so I think this is season. I think this is. Hello, my Name is Courtney, part three, and it's just a reintroduction of where I'm currently at, because I did start this podcast back in 2020. And that was a long time ago. That was four years ago.
Speaker 1:
So a lot has changed and I'm a person who is continuously evolving, especially in my mom era. So, for those who have been waiting patiently for season five, here we are. Thank you for sticking with me as I took a break. I am not a person who can continuously talk all year round to each their own. I believe in breaks. I believe in protecting energy. I believe in being quiet for a little bit and just regrouping and moving forward. That way, when I do show up on the ones and twos, it's like that I want to be here and still continue to have this fun, instead of showing up where you're dreading it. And that's kind of how I was getting towards the end of season four, because I was in a major, major burnout, along with some other things that I will share with you. I had one listener who's a friend of mine and she reached out to me towards the end. She's like are you pregnant? I was like, no, I'm just really fucking burnt out. That one made me giggle. We are a one and done family. So for those of you who are new here, welcome. Make sure you subscribe so you never miss an episode going forward. And if you haven't yet, please rate, review the show. Okay, so if you're new here, here's a little bit of a backstory. If you're a continuous listener, here's just another little backstory of mine.
Speaker 1:
If you forgot, I started drinking at 19 years old, right From 19 to 29,. I was in this 10-year-long love affair. It was very intoxicating. It was very dysfunctional, all the things right. Yes, I did have a drinking problem. Yes, I identified as an alcoholic. I don't still continue to identify as an alcoholic because I'm no longer in that space. So it's important for me to identify of where I am now, and that is a female who doesn't drink alcohol. That's it. That's where I'm at. I'm a sober female. You know that one too. There we go.
Speaker 1:
So I didn't start off drinking where I was like, oh man, this is going to be a problem, right, it was very fun, it was very freeing, it, let me come out of my shell. It made me flirt with dudes, it made me feel like I could do anything right. And then, when I was about 25, it just eventually kept growing each year into something darker and darker and darker Blackouts, brownouts, waking up in jail, waking up in hospitals, waking up in dudes' beds that I didn't know their name but I could tell you what bar I met them at. All those things Until 25, that it was when I turned 25, then my hangovers started to be like death becomes her where it was panic attacks, anxiety attacks. It would take me a couple of days to recover from it.
Speaker 1:
So, from 25 to 29, because 29 is when I quit drinking. I was about six weeks shy of turning 30. I tried the moderation game, which we didn't know about. The moderation game, right, we didn't know about this phase back then and I try to put rules on it. You know, no shots, no Jameson, no cherry bombs yes, cherry bombs were big in my drinking days and you know you better make sure that you eat Even to going to taking a couple weeks off, never being like. I'm going to quit drinking, but not drinking, you know. Just to get past the last drinking episode of like, okay, I need a Tame it Pack. Right? And it wasn't until I was 29. It was my last night working in the bar and I had a. I had a doozy of a one. It wasn't the worst of the worst of my drinking episodes, but it was the morning that I woke up, realized I threatened my boyfriend's life who's now my husband, I don't know probably for like the fifth or sixth time. There was a handful of times that I threatened that man's life. We joke about it now, years later.
Speaker 1:
And then I lost my rescue cat, fiona, for the second time, which she's still with us to this day. You know it took me three days to find her. She wasn't an outdoor cat and when I found her it was like, okay, in those three days I said to the universe, if I find Fiona, I'm going to give this sober thing a go, this alcohol-free life, because again at 25, I had this feeling that there was going to be a day. I knew it, that there was going to be a day I had to live without alcohol. I knew it. I think we all know it. I think we all know it in our souls. We just have to figure out how to get there and how many times it's going to take, and to keep learning our lessons until we get to that point where so many have that point where they're just like I'm good and tired, and a lot of people almost feel like it's like a spiritual experience. And, honestly, there's been two, extremely, extremely, the two biggest spiritual experiences of my life One when I gave birth to the little dictator and two when I found Fiona. It was weird, man, everything around me got quiet. I couldn't even hear the traffic, the road we lived by. It was bizarre, but it happened, how it was supposed to happen.
Speaker 1:
So, moving on, I haven't had a drink since August 18th of 2012. And in my road to recovery, I have tried all the things. I've participated in 12-step programs, I have done therapy, I've hired my own coaching, I've dug into personal development. I have, you know, exercise and nutrition was part of my early recovery, a lot of it. And I did all the things because I don't believe that there's one way to recover. And then, eventually, sober Vibes started when I went back to AA in 2016 and participated in it for a summer and I sat and I listened to what the women were talking about and even to what I needed, and I needed more than what was out there at the present time, and that is when the start of Sober Vibes started.
Speaker 1:
So Sober Vibes has then branched off into this online community. It then branched off into my own coaching business and programs. Then there was National Sober Day. That came about and the Sober Vibes podcast when I branched out and started doing this in February of 2020, right before that world shut down and then my book my book that was published in August of 2023, which that book came out a couple of days before I turned 11. So if you haven't gotten the book, please do. Silver Vibes A Guide to Thriving your First Three Months Without Alcohol the link is in the show notes or you can catch it on Amazon or Barnes Noble. If you haven't left a review, for that, too, please leave a review, because, again, that helps other readers or people searching to get help. It helps people find that book.
Speaker 1:
So I've always wanted what has transpired right, but there was a time before I got sober that I would have never thought that this happened. Okay, and I believe in sobriety. That was just. It was. For me, it was having the clarity of being able to put forth that energy and wanting more empowerment in my own recovery to then manifest that into helping others, because I knew there were others like me who wanted the same thing. So that is what Sober Vibes has been created since 2016. It's been an expansion. It didn't happen overnight Since 2016,. It's been an expansion. You know it didn't happen overnight. It's taken many years to get to the point where it's at and I'm just very, so, very thankful of people who are followers on Instagram and my Facebook community, who are listening to, listen to the show. I really, really, really appreciate it because without you and people who have bought and supported my book and who have let me coach them one-on-one or been in my coaching program, the Sobriety Circle, so I really appreciate it when I'm at today and this is where the part three slash maybe four comes from of where I'm at today Like I said, since starting this podcast, a lot has changed in my life, and even just the last couple months of what has changed in my life has just, it's been good, right.
Speaker 1:
So where I'm at today is I became a mother in 2021. And my little dictator and I call him a dictator since the beginning and it's a joke. So I don't want anyone to take this serious, because these children do dictate our life. Okay, I mean I had my dad over for his birthday a couple weeks ago and I was like dictator and my dad was like don't call I mean Ed got like serious. He's like don't call my grandson, that he's the most precious thing ever. I was like dad, it's a joke. Ever. I was like Dad, it's a joke. Okay, so anyways, I'd got into his feelings. So little dictator. He was born in September of 2021, and he is the love of my life.
Speaker 1:
The transition of motherhood has been a a real one for me. I had him at 38. A month after he was born, I turned 39. So there was a big transition. And there was a big transition to I used to work outside of the home, and that really started in 2020, where I still bartended, and then come actually in the fall time because I was still doing one day a week for a girlfriend at her. She opened up a sandwich shop. So I was working still one day out of the week for her at the sandwich shop just to get out of the house. And then finally, at the end of December or at the end of 2023, I stopped because I was like I don't need to get out of the house Like you know the little dictators getting to the point like we started doing like music class and getting out in the pound and it was easier. I wasn't, I wasn't confined to a house of of sleep schedules and all that. So I finally stopped working for somebody else in the late. Somebody else in the late in the last of 2023.
Speaker 1:
So that was an identity shift completely being taken out on the traditional, you know, going to work for somebody else and doing that a couple of days a week, that and then me having to shift my identity around just being a, you know, entrepreneur, like I have to make this work right. And then I didn't have a safety net, because bartending and waiting tables was still a safety net for me in some financial aspects. So there was that there was becoming a mother, there was becoming a mommy, and then writing the book. I went through writing the book process when I got that book deal when he was about seven months old. Then, writing that and promoting that and 2023, you guys, I kicked that book tour in the nuts. There was, I think, like 60-something episodes I produced this past year of 2023. And then I did about I believe it was 50 podcast interviews. So there was a lot of talking. So by the end of the year I hit my wall and I definitely in the fall time hit a wall. But then by the end of the year I was like I'm exhausted. So those January episodes, that last month I was just ready for the podcast for that season to be done so I could take a break.
Speaker 1:
If you're an introvert or extrovert, if you're both, because I am both I was needing that introvertness just to be quiet and just to sit still and start taking care of me. Plus, in my journey of motherhood, I gained in my pregnancy 50 pounds. Before pregnancy, though, I was 20 pounds overweight for COVID. During the COVID years, I gained 20. So I've been carrying around 70 pounds. That's a lot. Well, no, I'm sorry, I've lost 20 after giving birth to CJ, but I've fluctuated with the same weight. So I was very overweight and if you've carried extra pounds and, yes, have been overweight where you've never been that heavy before in life, it doesn't feel good physically to you At least for me, that has been my experience. This is the heaviest I've ever been. So I just and I was not taking care of myself once I hit that burnout and I just kind of hit a wall.
Speaker 1:
Now, in the process of this, I started to have some intrusive thoughts that I have had since CJ was born that I thought were normal of the mommyhood experience. I've started seeing a therapist, a new one that specialized more to postpartum and motherhood. And if you've heard in the past couple of years since the dictator was born, I'm like it's not depression. I've said that out loud, right, I knew that there was something but I didn't know exactly what it was. But I was like it wasn't depression. I did have some post-COVID depression is a thing, yo, if you haven't had that like and you get covid and you get this depression after, like that is a thing now. But I'm like it's not that, it's not that. So I started seeing this therapist and, oh my goodness, she diagnosed me and you guys will not believe this with postpartum OCD, which, oh, oh my God, sheena Shea from Vanderpump Rules had this, and when this past season came on and she was talking about it, I was like, oh my God, somebody else has this. I didn't even know it was a thing, didn't even know that this was a thing, even know that this was a thing.
Speaker 1:
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Speaker 1:
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Speaker 1:
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Speaker 1:
So I started dealing with that and with my therapist, which I'm very happy, and I can report that, as I record this, I've done like a tremendous 180 with my thoughts because of the practices that I've been learning or whatnot. So like, if you're suffering from that, go definitely talk with a therapist. And, like I said, I never. I never thought it was a thing. I thought it was like postpartum depression, postpartum anxiety. So, and what she had told me she was like it sounded like you had it for a long time, and then it kind of got quiet and I, and then it kind of got quiet, and I will say it kind of got quiet when I was writing that book because I had something to distract me, right. And then, after that was over, it like it started to come back in the summer, late summer, early fall, and that's when I was like, why are these thoughts coming back? This is not a good time so, and then she was like and then these thoughts coming back, this is not a good time, so, and then she's like and then it seemed like it came back.
Speaker 1:
So I have worked on that and it was just very nice to start working on myself, taking care of myself, eating better, starting to exercise again right, and just focusing in on me and even to there's a point. I stopped taking one-on-one clients, you know, and no shade to anybody, I just had to focus on myself and I think that that is very healthy to do when you just have to take a step back after you've given and outputted so much energy into the world that you just need to take a pause. So I took a pause and I've been taking care of myself and, you know, enjoying more moments with the dictator, because I'm in a different headspace. I mean, there were some days I would just like start crying uncontrollably, not like uncontrollably where I couldn't stop, but just like start crying, in a sense of I would cry for like five, 10 minutes. I was a mess for a hot minute and I'm like what the fuck is happening here? So, moving on up, moving on up and forward, and my little dude's going to start going to preschool in the fall time. I signed him up for that and I'm very excited for him and I'm very excited too for myself to have two days of a little break. But he's growing up, so I've re-centered myself in the past couple of months of being present, because it's something too, and people who own their own business really do understand this or two.
Speaker 1:
When you're taking care of somebody else mom, or if you're taking care of a family member, it it's so becomes about where you do have to. A lot of focus goes in on the other person, right, and then it's like you lose sight of who you are and just the daily chores or the daily like to put in podcast notes and to speak, it just becomes too much and you're so very tired and it can start becoming very overwhelming. And then you get fucking resentful and for people like us who've had the drinking problem, resentfulness is not good, because resentfulness, I do believe, will lead you back to drinking or in another way of leading you to another type of behavior that is just going to be worse off for you, right. It's just going to hurt you, whether that's sex addiction, love addiction, shopping addiction, cocaine addiction, whatever it may be. So it could just go down the rabbit hole to something else is what I'm telling you. So it might not be going back to alcohol, but it could go to something else. So resentfulness is just not good. So that is why I have taken my break and you just got to know when to fold them at some point in life, just to step back to take care of you. So that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:
When you start taking care of yourself and are taking care of somebody else and not yourself, at the same time, it's like you become a shallow person. And that's honestly how I was feeling, like in the fall time. You know, and I do believe that you can live in a space right, like a lot of people, especially women, I have worked with, and this is the same thing. It's like I should be so grateful for the life that I'm living, but yet I still have these feelings. And then it's almost like you're dismissing how you feel, and I don't think that's right to do either. So like yes, even though last year it was like such a career and life high of launching my book and that being the first published book and you know all that jazz I was tired and I wasn't feeling my best in that sense, and it's okay to you know to live in that space. Both things can be true at the same time, so that's where I'm at. Both things can be true at the same time. So that's where I'm at, and it's actually too, because I've changed around my diet the past two and a half months at this point, and so what's happened is is I've gained a lot more clarity and especially, too, of putting a lot of my energy and focus into this podcast and bringing some new shit to you guys, and so I'm going to do a couple little like mini series.
Speaker 1:
First, I'm going to do some. You're going to see a new series. That's why I want you to make sure that you subscribe, because I'm not going to be posting all of this on social medias. Please don't keep, don't rely so much on my social medias, because I don't even know at this point with that algorithm what people see or whatnot. So I will release these new episodes that I add in with this separate series. You're still going to get the Thursday episodes, but I'm going to do six weeks of a Sober Tip Tuesday, and if you're on my email list, you've been seeing that I have been doing that in email formation, but I want to do it on the podcast, where it's a little bit longer of me talking about it and giving a little examples. I'm going to try to keep those under 10 minutes.
Speaker 1:
I'm going to start doing a little series where I hear from the listeners. So be on the lookout on that. If you want to come on the show, let me know. The only requirement minimum you have to reach is you have to be a year sober, okay. So if you want to be on the Sober Vibes podcast, please DM me on the Instagram or send me an email SoberVibes at emailcom. And I'm going to do that a little bit of a series. And then also, too, I am going to do because I wanted to do this last year, but by the time I took the break I didn't want to speak anymore. So I'm going to do a business series inside this podcast and you never know what might not or what more will pop up, okay. So I'm looking forward to season five.
Speaker 1:
I have a hyped new energy that I've been having for the last month about this podcast and like the creativity going, so I hope you're excited too, and too, if you're in a low spot right now, like I was, you know. I definitely believe that those low spots you learn a lot about yourself I truly do and you don't really see it until you get out of it and more of a clarity and the mental load where you look back and you're like shit, shit, shit, shit, because you don't realize how bad you felt until you start feeling so much better. Okay, like I was getting consistent migraines there for a couple months and then I hadn't had a migraine in seven weeks and I got one a week or two ago and I was like, oh, this is terrible. I had had consistent migraines where it was just like you just get used to feeling like shit and then when you're away from that feeling, it's like same thing that goes about with like drinking, right. When you're away from it for so long and then you go back to it, you're like fuck, this is terrible. So it's just added awareness. That's all A couple more different.
Speaker 1:
I'm going to do maybe a little bit more different topics. Not everybody who comes on is going to be sober. I definitely want to dig into some eating disorder issues and find therapists or specialists who talk about that, because there is a big, big correlation between eating disorders and alcohol use disorder, especially with women. So I'm just branching out, I'm expanding these wings and going to get creative with season five, because I really do want you to look at this episode or this podcast as like a hub to you being a sober person and the resources that you need to come here and grab it or listen to the episode. That's why I'm doing that sober tip Tuesday, because I want these to be short and bite-sized for you just to be like okay, because if you've had the problem over and over again, I want you to come back to that and listen, because sometimes it takes for people about seven to 10 times for them to hear the same thing before it actually clicks. You know what I mean. So that's what I got, that's where I am.
Speaker 1:
I appreciate you letting me take this episode to talk about myself and share that with you of just like a life update, cause I don't I don't feel like I give a lot of those life updates, but definitely, definitely wanted, wanted to share what had been going on because, at the end of the day, yes, I'm a sober person, right, but that does not mean that life just automatically is rainbows and butterflies for the rest of your days, choosing to live life without alcohol, right? So what has happened is there's been consistent years where it's like yep, doing great, doing great, and then there's years that knock you on your ass. And then there's life situations where it's like, you know, you have to rechange your identity, like I had a therapy session yesterday and we were talking about postpartum. I said at what point do I get out of this postpartum? Right, and she's like well, usually, like you know, after two years, and she's like, but then there's the whole transition to of, you know, women identifying more as mothers. What has happened to their bodies, all of that stuff, and I was like okay.
Speaker 1:
So what my point was was that, just because I'm sober, it doesn't mean, though, that I don't have challenging years. But what has happened is is where I'm at just because I've had challenging years, or just a challenging situation. You know a period of time that I went through being 11 and a half years sober. It's not. Alcohol for me, isn't an option anymore, whereas, like, just because I'm going through this, I don't want to numb out, because it's not going to do anything but make this whole situation worse. Right, and that's what happens in your sober life. You just adapt to dealing with things without alcohol, that's it. But it doesn't mean that every year, you know you're, like I said, you're going to be seeing like rainbows and butterflies and fucking scrunchies, like that's just not, because that's not life, right, you have your ups and downs. Life is a series of ups and downs, right, so, but for me it's. I will never go back to drinking because that isn't going to solve anything and I don't have another day one in me, and particularly I do not have a day one in me. Another day one in me with my little dictator, because he is wild. He is wild in the best possible way and he is a funny, curious, wild little dude. So, guys, he started making fun of me the other day where, like, I was laughing and then he started to like mimic me of how I was laughing, and then Matt started to make fun of me too, like it's two against one in this household. All right, I think that was a good episode.
Speaker 1:
Coming back, make sure, if you are listening to the Sober Vibes podcast and you want to share on your social tag me at Sober Vibes. All of my resources are down below in the show notes. I am taking on a limited amount of one-on-one clients. If one-on-one coaching is your jam, if not, and you are looking for coaching and want a group coaching experience, come join my sobriety circle, and that is $35 a month. For your first month, though, use code 2024 at checkout and it will save $10. You can cancel at any time. There's two meetings in there a week. It's a separate app Sober check-ins. It's great for accountability and support. We do a book club every two months.
Speaker 1:
I'm trying to think there's one I started doing in January of this year. I started doing one workshop a month and that is the only one that I record and save that you can listen to. I don't record the meetings. I just don't think that's fair. I think it's like you know, just for privacy reasons, it's like if you were at that meeting, you share and that was it. So my workshops are included. You get access to the workshops, so come and join and hang and then, as always, you can get my book, and all of my free resources are linked below. Make sure you check out the sponsors for season five. It is going to be a banger, all right you.
