Eire craved support in her sobriety journey, but what she found was a very non-inclusive, judgmental space. She then dedicated herself to lowering the barrier to entry for others seeking a life free from alcohol.

Ever think there's a connection between putting together IKEA furniture and getting sober?   The steps to sobriety is much like the methodical assembly of those Scandinavian flat-pack puzzles. Each piece, much like each day in sobriety, is a step in the right direction, building a stronger, more resilient self. The way you tackle those flat-pack puzzles reflects how you approach life's challenges.  What works for one person might not work for you.

This podcast is here to guide you through that assembly process, in a way that's both informative and entertaining. Welcome to Flat-Pack Sober!

Have you ever felt lost and judged on your path to sobriety? In this episode, Eire Fullam, the amazing mind behind "Drink Sober, Not Boring.", will share her sober journey and how she built a welcoming space for people on their own sobriety paths.

She goes all in on her sober journey – the ups, the downs, and those moments of doubt everyone faces. She shared what worked for her, from finding new hobbies to rocking a sober social life. We also talked about the amazing community she built and how "Drink Sober, Not Boring" is changing the game. It's proving that ditching alcohol doesn't mean ditching fun!

She also sheds light on the need for more inclusive resources that reflect everyone's unique journey, discussing strides in breaking down gender biases and celebrating women's progress in recovery—while noting the absence of men.

This episode is a must-listen for anyone who wants a fresh look at living an awesome life without alcohol. Her story will inspire you to chase your own sober life without judgment.

This is how Eire built the sober life she wanted. If Eire's story resonates with you or you're on a similar path, remember that you're not alone. There's a whole community out there ready to support you. Until next time, keep building your life, one sober piece at a time.

Connect with Eire beyond the show! Follow her journey on social media for more insights and inspiration:

• Instagram
• Facebook
• LinkedIn

Transcript

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 0:00

Hey there, sober Superstars. Welcome to Flat Pack Sober, your catalogue of tips, tricks and tactics to design your alcohol-free life. Now, I am a very lucky guy I have to start by saying that and one of the greatest privileges of my life is that a lot of people tell me their story, not simply on this podcast, but a lot of the one-to-one work that I do with people. It is about understanding where they came from, the story that they're telling themselves and maybe reinterpreting that and telling themselves a slightly different story. And I mentioned this to say that, in essence, I hear a lot of stories and the person I'm interviewing today one of the most interesting ones I've heard in ages. So as soon as I heard it, I thought, right, we need to do a podcast recording. Is that right?

Eire Fullam: 0:53

Yeah, that's pretty much exactly how it went, yep.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 0:56

Oh right, well, let's get into it. So before we get too into that, into that that very juicy story um, do you, do you ever visit ikea? Do you shop there at all?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 1:10

uh, I'm a more buy things pre-made kind of gal oh, okay, right, we might be getting manuals or people telling me what to do we we might have already kind of like half answered this question then. So if I was going to make you do some flat pack furniture though if I was going to make you assemble it yourself what would be your approach?

Eire Fullam: 1:32

To pick the simplest, easiest item. Ok, the least amount of steps.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 1:37

Yeah, yeah. So start with the basics. Yeah, that's a really good answer that nobody's ever given me before. I don't know why nobody has thought of that, but is that how you approach life then? Is that kind of like where you're at when you want to learn something, do you just start at the bottom and work your way up?

Eire Fullam: 1:56

Uh, I was told early in my career, you can only eat an elephant one bite at a time. And that is something I've taken into every aspect of my life, not just work but motherhood and self-growth and all of that. I think you're doing yourself a disservice if you don't go through the entire process, all of those steps, and, like the IKEA furniture, if you skip a step you might get pretty far and then realize everything's backwards, yes, so I see I've had that answer quite a lot that I got halfway through and realized that I'd missed something vital.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 2:29

That's the kind of because that and I know people are like that they get stuck in. That's kind of like more the dynamo. But are you kind of maybe more reflective? Do you think about stuff, get the information, absorb it and then get started? Is that sort of more your approach?

Eire Fullam: 2:43

No, I live in the arena. I'm covered in blood all the time.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 2:48

Oh, we've gone to Bernie Brown already, or is that a quote from the original?

Eire Fullam: 2:53

Actually, I was just speaking from my heart, but that's probably subconsciously where I got that analogy and I'm not ashamed to say it, because there's a lot of people who are outside of the arena and judging the ones inside, and I just think that there's no space for that yes, yes, yeah, no, I I totally agree with you.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 3:12

Um, you know, if you're sitting in the stands, you're more than welcome to throw whatever you like. I, I don't care. It is only people who are out there getting punched in the face. Whose opinions?

Eire Fullam: 3:23

you'll never be criticized by somebody doing more than you, so that is something that, every time someone criticizes me, I'm just like, oh, pity, pity yeah, yeah, I mean it's.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 3:36

It's hard though, isn't it? Because, like, part of me knows that the, the, that criticism, it's a good thing, um, and part of me knows that if I hadn't have put that post up, it wouldn't have got criticized. So it's progress, but it's difficult, you know, because we do. We are feeling beings, aren't we? We have egos, and it's not that great. How do you handle it?

Eire Fullam: 4:01

I was going to say addicts are probably the only people on the planet that are continuously rigorously honest, and that means putting I mean most addicts that I know share the worst moments of their lives with strangers, continuously in an effort to save someone's life. And I think when you're that vulnerable and you've been doing it for a while, things kind of just bounce off you. I mean, once you've told everybody your deepest, darkest secrets, what harm can they really do to you?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 4:33

You've kind of taken the power away. Yeah, that's actually a very good point. I like that and I always kind of go back to when I first first uh applied to train at the easy way clinics and I'm having this interview which sort of like amounts to basically being a job interview, and I start going on about how much cocaine I've done and it's like, yeah, exactly, that's kind of like this out-of-body moment that you don't. You're to be fair, that's the first job interview I ever led with.

Eire Fullam: 5:07

That's so funny. I made like an off color cocaine joke at my new job and it's. It's funny because it's ridiculous, and it's funny because it's not me, you know, but they don't really know me that well and I immediately was like shit, shit. They might not understand, that was a complete joke, but if they stick around long enough, they'll understand.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 5:30

Whoops, not on the podcast at the moment, right, so anyway, look, you've already got me distracted. This is going to be all over the place. This episode, never mind, never mind, yeah, tell everybody who you are. Yeah, what is this story that I keep alluding at?

Eire Fullam: 5:45

Okay, so I am the person behind the page Drink Sober Not Boring on Instagram. I created my own podcast in July of this year called the Drink Sober Not Boring Podcast. My story it depends on how much time you have. I could make it very succinct or I could bring us home tonight, but I'm going to-'m going to go for it, okay. Well, let me start by saying my birth is where my life started, like most people. But my life story started when I was three weeks old and my dad was having grand mal seizures from going into withdrawals from alcoholism. My mother is an immigrant from Ireland. She didn't know anybody and she still took me and found a safe place and told my dad like basically essentially, in no less words, cut the shit or we're not coming back. So my dad proud, proud of him to this day, what he did, he did get help that day and he never drank again.

Eire Fullam: 6:42

Now we fast forward to my parents in a probably lower to middle-class situation and my dad going through the as we all know, or most of us know, the beginning um years of sobriety or like the cleanup you know, and my parents didn't have a lot of money. I remember our houses in foreclosure at one point and Parents didn't have a lot of money. I remember our house was in foreclosure at one point and, all to say, my dad had to go to AA every day to stay sober. And to me that was normal life. It was go to daycare, come home, go to a meeting with dad, go to bed. And through spending years and years of my life in AA, I started picking up things. I knew the serenity prayer before I did the Pledge of Allegiance, and if you're American you are forced to say the Pledge of Allegiance every day at the beginning of school from four. So that means that I had been cognizantly remembering it prior to four. And I remember being a little girl and asking my dad very wise, open-ended questions that the person who I thought was the smartest in the world never couldn't answer a question for me. But he couldn't answer the question of why do you go to a place every day where you get all of this help for your problem that almost killed you, and then you don't share that information with anybody? Not only do you not share it, but you actively hide the fact that you're doing it. And we can fast forward to the point where, when I finally got sober.

Eire Fullam: 8:10

Aa was the only way, and I remember being 25 and being pissed, pissed that I had grown up in the AA culture and that now I was here, I was supposed to perpetuate a different reality. Number one I was supposed to know I was an alcoholic, so not become one, duh. That didn't work. So I was forced to go to AA by a judge in 2018. And at that point, what do you do?

Eire Fullam: 8:34

So I went and I will say there are plenty of great things about it, but essentially I found a very non-inclusive, misogynistic, very non-inclusive, misogynistic, judgmental space, and I knew I had to stay sober and I knew I couldn't do it alone. So there I was, just kind of floating in the ether and I had been a bartender for 10 years. So naturally I decided let me just make some stuff, it's COVID, I don't have nothing to do. That led to hey, let me just post it, let me just create an account. And I found the kindest corner of the internet, the sober community. Back then it was very small. It was a lot smaller and there was a lot less grandiose kind of ideas, but it was a space that was open to your recovery, your way. That was open to your recovery your way. There was no judgment. There was no. You go back out, you relapse, you die. You die because that's what you get in AA and I didn't know where I was going to go with this and to this day I still don't. But I know that I'm running with this because I don't want there ever to be a person like me who got sober at 25, pretty much lost everything and had nowhere to turn. It's hard enough to get sober. Then you add on to the top the part that you're young and you don't have a lot of friends that even think about not drinking on a Friday night. All that compiled together, I was like either you're part of the problem or you're part of the solution. So here came Drinks Over, not Boring.

Eire Fullam: 10:02

I'm continuously racking my brain on how I can help those in sobriety, help those who are curious about sobriety. Pretty much my goal in its entirety is to lower the barrier of entry to sobriety. I think it's so high and there's so much black and white. You can't ever do something. Blah, blah, blah. I think because of that and I really know because of that a lot of people don't ever do something. Blah, blah, blah. I think because of that and I really know because of that a lot of people don't ever start. It's so intimidating just to start, which sucks, because the magic happens in the middle and if you never start, then there's no magic. So that's me in a nutshell. I could elaborate on a lot of different things, but that's essentially a bird's eye view of how I got here yeah, oh no, I have a feeling we're going to elaborate well where do we start?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 10:52

I promise no so I mean, I love that idea and I think there's that you kind of said you, you don't still haven't quite figured out where it's going, but you're gonna run with it. So, like point one, are you enjoying running? And two, uh, you know, is that really just kind of like? Is that sobriety in general? You know that we don't actually know where it's going to take us, but so long as we're enjoying going there, who cares?

Eire Fullam: 11:24

Of course, number one. We all know the quote, especially if you're American. It's on every sign, in every house. It's not about the destination, it's about the journey, and I think, no matter how corny that is, majority of our lives is the journey. And if you're not enjoying it, then what the hell are you doing?

Eire Fullam: 11:41

I mean, I think during COVID a lot of us kind of were shaken up and forced to look at our lives in a very subjective and emotional way, and thankfully a lot of people said this isn't me, I don't know why I turned into this person the drinker, the abuser, the binge watcher, the overeater, whatever. We were all forced to kind of look at our shit. And what a blessing that was. In the same way, it was a curse, because if I had to be, I'm a single mom, I have a four-year-old son and I've been in recovery since right before I got pregnant. So my life's been a whirlwind for a really long time. Um, if, if we were in that space still, there wouldn't be much room for growth. So I don't know.

Eire Fullam: 12:30

In saying that, I mean I could talk for hours about kind of how the world's evolved in the last few years and how everyone's a lot more open. But I think that that's one of the things that we all inherently feel. I don't think I even have to say it. I think we all know COVID kind of flipped us on our asses in the worst and the best way all the time. But am I having fun? Yeah, it's really fun to talk to people every day about what made them who they are and to see constant transformations of rock bottom to success in whatever version of life that they want it to be. I mean, I'm I would say my goal is more to be fulfilled, and I am magnetically drawn to this work and I am consistently fulfilled and trying to help more, so that leads to being happy. But I think that's a very simple way of of putting it. I feel like I'm living my purpose for once yeah, I do.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 13:29

There's a, there's a strong element of service for want of a better word but you, you want, you want to share what you have with other people is. Is that a fairly good way of putting it?

Eire Fullam: 13:41

I've always just wanted to be the person that I needed in early sobriety, so I just show up as the person, and that's different every day, right, Like some days. I'll just put a quote that really resonates with me, that I've, you know, always had in the back of my head, or um I I spent I don't even know how much time money ordering and reviewing these non-alcoholic beverages when there was really no one around to care. And I still have all that information. And it's like I have all this information and no one else has to try all 18 red de-alcoholized wines. I can tell them what's up. You know, it's one of those things where it's like I have the info, I'm going to share it Like I'm not going to hoard it. And I think the info I'm gonna share it like I'm not gonna hoard it, and I think I'm just trying to encourage other people to share whatever it is for them that worked.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 14:30

I think that's the only way to authentically grow in this journey is to be true to who and what your sobriety journey looks like, not trying to mimic someone else's yeah, yeah, and so I think the kind of the desire to to make life easier for other people and to help other people, that's something that I get when I talk to people, and it doesn't really matter what tradition they recovered in, that that tends to be quite, quite common. But do you think there are too many people who are a little bit kind of dogmatic?

Eire Fullam: 15:10

they're a little bit fixed in their ideas about sobriety you're asking me this question when you know my answer already.

Eire Fullam: 15:17

Yeah, yeah, yeah but I I mean genuinely yes, I do, yes I do, yeah, I do. And I want to preface this by saying if you're in the recovery space and you're trying to help others, no judgment. This way, I think we're all working from our traumas. We're all working from places of deep, deep hurt, and I know that I acted in ways when I was in my addiction that I thought were very helpful and I I said things that I thought were very accurate and I look back on it now and I just when you know better, you do better. So before I start off on this crusade of mine about the dogmatic kind of arena of recovery, I want to make it clear that I'd rather have this than no talk of recovery at all. There's no way for us to evolve or grow if we just kind of shut it. We cancel all the people. I'm canceling AA, canceling it Done. I think, like everything, there's great things about it. There's not great things about it.

Eire Fullam: 16:20

Let's start by the fact that when you get sober, there's one book they give you. It's start by the fact that, when you get sober, there's one book they give you. It's written by a man about a man. There's only one chapter that includes women at all and it's called for the wives and it's about how to tell your wife that you're an addict. Women weren't allowed to be addicts because they weren't allowed to drink to excess, because they weren't allowed to do shit. This was in the early 90s. Up until like 1960 they weren't letting women into a. Until about 1980 they weren't letting women into a even the swiss before that yeah, but the their, their thought was okay.

Eire Fullam: 16:54

Well, you're being crazy time for a mental hospital, you're being irrational time for a mental hospital. Um, and that was for mental health as well. I I on the same vein was like, if you're not easy to control, goodbye, whatever that may be. Because of um, and we've had this eruption of women in recovery and we've got this eruption of women in just life of being like no, I want a child, I don't need a man. If I want to buy a house, I can do it before I'm married and those things are exceptionally hard. I'm a mom who does not have any child or father figure in my child's life, but it's the hardest, best thing I've ever done and I think a lot of women are making those decisions and making those sacrifices for the good of humanity.

Eire Fullam: 17:41

Essentially Now, because everything's so dogmatic. In general, there's not a lot of men in the sobriety space, and that's unfortunate because three times men are three times more likely to be addicted to alcohol and they're I think they drink three times more than women as well so, fairly sure, when I was on my podcast I I pointed out that, statistically, if we were in a bar, I would have drunk three drinks and you would have drunk one drink.

Eire Fullam: 18:08

And you said I would have drank you under the table, but we're not going there. I'm so competitive I don't drink anymore. But I'm so competitive you will not beat me in an imaginary drinking competition. I refuse my whiskey.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 18:24

Forefathers would be so mad at me yeah, I love that you're not even beating me in an imaginary drinking competition but I can't even see.

Eire Fullam: 18:33

I have control issues too.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 18:35

I can't even let you win that but I think I, I think what what you're you're saying is is is right. You know, there are so many amazing women doing doing amazing things, yes, in the alcohol space, and we could talk about the rest of society, but, um, let's talk about sobriety for now. Um, but you know, it's the one area of life where blokes just seem to be sat on their hands. We're're not doing anything about it and, like, I guess, I know a lot of guys who've stopped drinking, using AA, and they think it's fine, but it might be time for a bit of a refresh. I don't know.

Eire Fullam: 19:21

Of course they think it was fine. It was created for them. It was created for white men in their middle age. Like they're the only people that are going to think it was fine it was created for them. It was created for white men in their middle age. Like they're the only people that are going to think it's fine it was created for them. You know what I mean. When I went to AA, it was like I had to mold myself. I had to read a book that was about men and and insert she into it every time I read it, because they couldn't just publish a fucking. Sorry for cursing, but like, really, I'm trying to save my own life here and you're not even giving me a resource that I can relate to. Is this real life?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 19:50

yeah, yeah, but for my money it sort of seems to be. There is this kind of like um, everybody praises the past and the people who did it before. They're great people. We can't criticise them. They can't have done anything wrong, and it's sort of like almost setting it up as some kind of venerable religious text that cannot be edited.

Eire Fullam: 20:21

You, you're not a fan of that as an idea no, there's something that I was gonna say is one second. Um, I think his name's bill white, but I'm not sure. The guy who started the aa book like wrote it almost all of his revelations came from a month-long trip. You tell anybody in AA that they will lose their fucking shit, but it's true. He wrote most of that book when he was on plant medicine. So for you to come in here and tell me that I can't do it when it was literally created out of it Is absurd. There's a we could use the world and nature to heal ourselves, or we could do it the hard way, and I don't know why the, the path of most resistance is like the path that we think is the best way to go.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 21:16

It shouldn't be this hard you know, I don't know, is there something uh kind of like from this protestant work ethic sort of point of view that that, like we, we distrust things that are a bit too easy? You know, it's not, it's not hard, it's not.

Eire Fullam: 21:31

You haven't really done it we don't get the gratification, it's ego. We don't get to check the box in our planner or whatever. Um, and we all go through a lot of similar experiences in life. So I can understand trying to differentiate yours, but in doing that you're manufacturing it and okay. Well, if we're going to the point now where you're just telling a story like a fictional book, then I have to go. I have things to do and people to help book. Then I have to go. I have things to do and people to help. So I just there's just an insane amount of vulnerability and recovery and I. It's. It's what makes it work. One thing I can say about AA I don't believe in having to go to a room every day and talk about my worst memories, but I can tell you there's a lot of power in sitting in a room and sharing my worst memories.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 22:29

Yeah, yeah, I mean, do you think that has a kind of therapeutic value? Oh, 100%.

Eire Fullam: 22:36

I mean most alcoholics think that they're unique in their addiction. It's one of the most common thoughts. And when you sit in one of those rooms and you hear a really effed up story that mimics one of your effed up stories and nobody is throwing tomatoes at the lady or, you know, telling her she has to leave because she's disgraceful, I remember my sponsor telling me when I first got sober there's nothing you can tell me that's going to shock me. And I had been my whole life. Like being dramatic was my thing, like don't, don't give me a challenge, I will shock you. And she, she was right, you know I'd tell her these crazy stories and she would just be like, okay, what do we do now? Like very calm, and I never understood that until I got very common, very steady in my own sobriety. Is that you kind of, like I said, you take your own power back from those stories that once kind of paralyzed you by um, living, owning it yeah, I mean, I think there's something sort of therapeutic about kind of just it is therapy, right?

Eire Fullam: 23:41

what's therapy? Sitting in a room talking to one person? It's the same, isn't it? Isn't it actually almost a carbon copy of therapy?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 23:48

Well, it depends what you mean by therapy, but certainly in terms of kind of like, vocalizing your story, oh therapy, yeah, getting it out of your head, absolutely, and I think there's genuine value in that. But I think there's something slightly different about that idea of realizing that you are like everybody else. That's not quite the kind of community bit about connection, is it? And it's not quite the therapy bit about living your story.

Eire Fullam: 24:18

It's about, yeah, self-awareness, I don't know yeah yeah, I think it does have a lot, takes a lot to like. There's nobody in the world that will ever know your entire story. You're the only one that will ever know your entire story and there are people that know 23% of it and they're blown away and deeply moved. So when you're thinking about your life, don't oversimplify it. Don't don't magnify the negatives and shrink the amazing positive things you've done. We all have a habit of doing that and it just leads us to the cycle of kind of like, always trying to be better than some imaginary line that we it's just like. Can we all give up now? I want everyone to just be okay with being themselves and if, if you don't like me, you can turn off the tv or you can walk out of the room. There's no need. You don't need to announce your you're leaving.

Eire Fullam: 25:15

I think there's a lot of people that think, like I will see. America is so ridiculous. I'll see something that's like you know, um, this football player is leaving this team and they'll be on Facebook and there'll be 3,000 comments and there'll be people on there who are like we never liked you anyways, you both. And it's like this guy is making millions of dollars he's never going to see this and you're spending 20 minutes typing in all caps about how much you hate this stranger Like. Can we just step back for a minute?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 25:49

yeah, I think that would probably. That would probably help. Um, I guess there's this tension, isn't there? Because part of what I I think we need to do is show people that sober is a better way of living. But then, if we kind of simplify that, the message then becomes get sober and everything will be fine. And that is, of course, not the truth. So how do you navigate that tension?

Eire Fullam: 26:23

Someone asked me. They asked I don't know what, how they phrase it, but it was basically like, how do you find out what work you're supposed to do in sobriety? And I said you can't avoid it. There is something about God, or the universe, or your path or whatever, that will keep showing you until you accept it. Now, what I mean by this is when I got sober and I didn't know what to believe in. I didn't really believe in God, because he'd left me, is what I thought. I didn't really believe in the universe, because why would there be a universe where they created poison and people like got addicted to it? So I was very, I was very lost when it came to that. I just lost my whole train of thought. Hold on one second. What was I saying? Is it a brain fire?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 27:10

yeah, so do, do we? Uh, how do we navigate that, that tension and make sure that we we don't oversimplify things just to make sobriety?

Eire Fullam: 27:19

really good. So my, I, I was having these little micro, almost simulation moments where it was like oh, that's weird, like noticing things about other people and alcohol and overdoing it that I had never noticed before. And now I've worked in a bar for 10 years. I spent 70 hours a week in a bar, so there's not many things that don't like my sponsor said, not much shocks me, and I remember having a couple of those like microchasm moments. People would reach out to me and tell me like you know, just a simple way of supporting your sobriety. But then there started being these weird camouflaged moments where I couldn't deny that I was in this, I was in the right place at the right time, but something was pushing me somewhere else. So I was sitting at this red light in the middle of the day and I think I was probably about a year sober at this point and I was just thinking like what I was going to do later that week and I wasn't even thinking about being a sober alcoholic or anything. You know, as time goes on, you don't think about it as much.

Eire Fullam: 28:19

And I look over to my right and there's another car parked in the same spot waiting for the light to turn red. They're going straight. I'm taking a left and I see this guy like fumbling in his passenger seat. Now, just out of sheer, sheer nosiness, I just keep watching, because what else am I gonna do? You know, there's a red light. This is my entertainment. So I see him grab a um handle of vodka out of the passenger side floor, he proceeds to open it and then I watch him pour it into this huge mug in his lap.

Eire Fullam: 28:51

2 pm in the day, no reason why I should have been parked next to this car where I was. I never pay attention to people, other people, like when I'm living my life, it was just all of these things. And I remember looking at the guy and he was why could I see him pouring into this cup? It was like I was at the right angle at the right time. And I remember looking up and going what the F word to God, because I was like I see you telling me something, but I just I'm not understanding what you're telling me, not understanding what you're telling me. And I went home and I told my mom and my mom's like maybe it's because you're supposed to help people, you know. And at that point I was exhausted from my own journey. I was like I don't want to help people, I just want to live. You know, I'd spent the last eight years trying to just survive and I was finally doing okay and God was like no, no, no, no, keep going. And I thank God for that moment today. But I remember when it happened I didn't understand it, but I knew there was more behind it and I think everybody, everyone I've spoken to nobody's curated the way that their recovery or the way that their service has gone.

Eire Fullam: 29:59

There's just a way about when you do the right thing at the right time, you end up in the right places with the right people. You continuously show up for yourself and others and it gets momentum. You start to trust your intuition. You know when something's a bad idea or a good idea. You know when something's worth your effort. It all comes from the intense and painful self-awareness that you get in sobriety and you can't run at all. You're forced to acknowledge your feelings and in that you're able to make sense of them because you're not numbing them anymore. So that's what the tension is for me. I think a lot of people will say, oh, I don't get signs, I don't know they're denying the signs because I did the exact. I did not want to see the signs, so I kept making excuses for them, to the point where God literally was like there's a man pouring vodka in a cup next to you, driving a car. Are you paying attention now, ira? Yeah well.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 30:51

I mean, I don't think it's difficult to deny that the world is full of people that need our help and, yes, as a dramatic illustration of that, yeah, it's very true. But you mentioned self-awareness and I think that's what comes across very strongly. For me, it's not simply the event, it's reflecting on the event and working out how that fits within your life. So is that a gift that you've got from getting sober or is that the thing that keeps you sober?

Eire Fullam: 31:29

I think, if you're lucky enough, if you were born into a world that wasn't in war, or you were in an abusive house, if you were able to live in otherwise um, in a not in survival mode right, if you were able to, some people can't be happy because they can't feed themselves, and that's a whole different thing. So talking about for me, I believe I can look back. I've done a lot of inner child work and I can look back and I can talk to that girl and I know why that girl drank from the very beginning. At this point, um, and I I believe that our intuition is always there and we have have it as kids. We push it away when we get older because it doesn't fit in or whatever, and I think when you get sober, you're just kind of bringing it back to the surface.

Eire Fullam: 32:11

I don't believe, I don't know what I believe, but I find it hard to believe that all of these feelings and memories are just random and not correlated to some kind of bigger purpose. And I think when you look at the history of people and how their lives worked out, you look at anybody's story in the middle and you can be like, oh yes, you're really struggling. Obviously you don't see why. You read anyone's memoir and you're like, oh, that's why that happened to them, because you can see the whole thing. So it's like I believe it's always in there. I don't think that I got this from sobriety. I think I allowed myself to be okay with accepting the thoughts that come into my head without questioning myself and belittling myself. It came from a lot of self-compassion. I don't call myself an idiot anymore.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 33:01

Yeah, no, I'm a big fan of self-compassion as well. I think that's that's so important. But it's like. It's like it was always there but we tried to drown it with vodka and um, now we've stopped doing that. It's kind of come back. It would be a fair sum up.

Eire Fullam: 33:18

I mean for me. I don't. I can't speak on anybody else's journey, but I do know there was a time in my life where I was confident in who I was and and that was because I believed I had control over what I felt and I was able to be a part of my own journey. And there was a part where that was not cool or not accepted or I thought it was not serving me and I kind of pushed it away. And, um, by the nature of the substance, you do forget and there are whole treats I have that I forgot in sobriety. You can't the same thing. Same way, you can't hide from your healing. You can't hide from who you are.

Eire Fullam: 33:59

I don't believe every thought I have anymore. I'm able to observe the thoughts I have and, oh, interesting that I would think that instead of saying wow, you're an idiot, you don't know anything, um, the things that I used to say to myself, I wouldn't say to a stranger on the street. I wouldn't say to my worst enemy Um, there's a quote that I've been. It's my background on my phone and I've been living by it for about a month. It's the words you speak become the house you live in.

Eire Fullam: 34:32

And for me. As somebody who speaks a lot, I have to be very cognizant about the things that I'm saying to myself, because I don't filter myself at all, which is awesome for other people, but when you do something that is inherently dumb, like drop a fork on your foot or something my go-to used to be to belittle myself, these days I'm a lot more lax and I give myself a lot more grace. I have been through the fucking ringer. The fact that I'm still here in itself is an accomplishment, and I think a lot of us are afraid to acknowledge that, because it's scary to admit that maybe we were at one point closer to death than than we should have been, and to be just truly alive is a gift amongst all gifts that I am so grateful I had a chance to do again.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 35:20

Second chance yeah, and I think you're so right about language how important it is. You know whether you sort of think of it in terms of well, if you keep saying that it's going to happen. You know whether you believe in manifestation or pure bad luck, whatever, that you really realize that if you said to your child every day that they were stupid, they would grow up thinking they were stupid. Yet we're quite happy to say to ourselves every day that we're stupid.

Eire Fullam: 35:56

And then we wonder why we feel stupid. Yeah, yeah, the world is hard enough on us. I often tell people, when I talk to regular people, like at work, and think people aren't sober, and they'll tell me about X, Y and Z problem in their life. I used to try to solve it for them because I just I'm not trying to be annoying. I know it's annoying that I do it, but I I'm very deeply feeling and if there's a problem and I think I can help, I'm almost immediately in it with you in the trenches. I'm almost immediately in it with you in the trenches. But there is a lot of grace in just like letting it sit.

Eire Fullam: 36:32

And that took me a long time to kind of ask people hey, do you want me to help you with this or do you just want me to listen? Because most people they know what they're supposed to do. You know they're not dumb. And I'm not saying if you don't know what to do, you're dumb. I'm just saying we often ask for advice when we want validation for our bad choices and if we don't like the advice, we just don't listen to it. And if we do like it then we use it and if we don't like it, we go find somebody else and ask again. So I mean, humans are funny that way.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 37:06

Oh they are indeed. I mean, look, I mean I was very, very guilty of it. My wife said she wanted help so I'd put up some shelves, and what she actually meant was she wanted a hug, right.

Eire Fullam: 37:18

Oh, and you know what A hug is so much faster and easier and cheaper to do, so it's like win-win right.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 37:28

Well, I Flat pack furniture.

Eire Fullam: 37:30

I was going to say no IKEA for you.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 37:33

Oh, but I do love buildings. Anyway, shut up Duncan.

Eire Fullam: 37:37

Do you guys have Argos over there?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 37:40

Do we have Argos? Well, we have something called Argos, although I believe that is actually just Greek for shop, so it could be a different thing.

Eire Fullam: 37:51

Oh, when I go to Ireland there's like this big department store that only has like this book and you go there.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 37:56

Yeah, the shiny book of dreams. Yeah, we have that, yeah.

Eire Fullam: 38:00

I used to spend four weeks when I was in Ireland, but we didn't have cable and I would just be circling things that I wanted one day in that big book. Like that was my childhood. Um, sorry, that was a random, random thought that just came in my head. What?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 38:13

were you saying we like random, we like a tangent, don't we? So, um, uh look, have you, have you ever been to Ikea? Did we establish that you're not a fan of flat pack?

Eire Fullam: 38:25

so I'm guessing probably not no, well, it's not that I've definitely put things together in my in my life, but I will say 50 of that has either been put together backwards, upside down, or totally disregarded in a closet somewhere, half put together, yeah. So I'm very much like this has taken up too much of my life and I'm not doing it anymore and I'm done and I'm gonna just put it away. And I'm very much like this has taken up too much of my life and I'm not doing it anymore and I'm done and I'm gonna just put it away and I'm moving on.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 38:51

That's self-awareness, isn't it? That's self-awareness, um, to know that it's not your kind of thing, and self-compassion to not give yourself a hard time over it, right and I don't, and I don't look at directions, I don't care about them.

Eire Fullam: 39:03

My mom's my mom and my dad are always like well, if you just read the directions and I'm like you know what I don't like to, so you know it's like, am I gonna read the directions and be annoyed and pissed for 30 minutes and still mess it up, or am I just gonna try? It doesn't work. Whatever life isn't that serious. Nothing that you're building from ikea is that serious oh, now, that's that.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 39:25

That's a good point. Yes, yes, uh, nobody, nobody is really gonna get in that much trouble. If your bookshelf falls down, it's uh you're, um, it's your, it's your own.

Eire Fullam: 39:36

It's your own goal, it's your own. You know, for some people it may be a success for them if they build a shelf. For other people, like me, it might be a success if I get it up on the wall. That's the same thing with sobriety. We all started at different places. Our goals are different.

Eire Fullam: 39:53

I think the most important thing is to set goals that are achievable. And if that means a goal of I'm not going to drink tonight, or I'm not going to um, go to the Christmas party, where everyone gets wasted this year, I'm going to stay home and read a book, all of those things are choices that we make that kind of validate our own self-worth and self-trust. But you have to start building on it. And if you say, okay, well, you know what I'm going to do, I'm not going to drink for six months, and then, and if you say, okay, well, you know what I'm going to do, I'm not going to drink for six months, and then you never stop drinking, because that's like a big task and it's like your goal is great, but if you don't ever even start it, I mean it's pretty pointless.

Eire Fullam: 40:38

So these like 30-day alcohol-free challenges kind of bug me because I remember in my addiction 30 days I couldn't be sober for two days and I probably would have tried one of those just because I love to be competitive, if I thought it was possible at all. So I've been creating a seven day sober challenge in the last couple of days where I just I want people to dip their toe into sobriety and and, like I said, the magic's in the middle. You won't get after seven days, but you will. You'll have a clarity that you've probably not had in a while and the ability to make the decision from there if you want to continue yeah, and I think that there's something important about a week.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 41:20

You know because there are various people who talk about it it's quantifiable, it's manageable yeah, but the various people talk about the concept.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 41:28

It's manageable, it's quantifiable and it's manageable, yeah, but the various people talk about the concept of your life is lived in weeks, because if you pick a day, it's not necessary. Your Sunday is going to be very different from your Tuesday, which is going to be very different from your Friday and your Saturday. You know, because days they vary depending what's going on. But if you pick a week, things will in in your week, but that week is probably going to be fairly typical of what your year is like, right, right? So if you, if you've managed a week, then you've managed quite a lot of, uh, a lot of what your life is made up of yeah, I'll actually really like the thought of that.

Eire Fullam: 42:01

And when you say that, it's kind of like wow, that's deep and that's that's kind of. I think we like to compartmentalize things so much. When you look at a week, every day symbolizes something different for everybody and I could see how we could simplify a lot our life into that box, if you will. Um, and what a great life that we live in. We can have seven different days of the week to change our lives, like we have seven chances. You can be a different person on on monday, you, you can.

Eire Fullam: 42:38

That's deep I know I didn't I didn't mean for it to be deep. The filter wasn't there, it just flew right out oh cool.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 42:45

well lucky, I recorded this. You can listen back and see it off yourself. Okay, so back to IKEA the meatballs. You've never had the IKEA meatballs, I'm guessing.

Eire Fullam: 42:57

Wait, they sell food. They sell food. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Okay. No, I'm totally lost. It's the furniture store, right?

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 43:11

It's a furniture store. Right, it's a furniture store, but they're, they're like huge. They're like the size of um american air force near me. So I've never been and they have they. They always have a cafe because they're that big. You can't get around them without lunch and, um, it's kind of like the meatballs they're, I think that I think they taste horrible but everybody kind of eats them because they're there. You've got to eat the meatballs. They taste bad but you've got to do it, and I always use that to kind of link into the idea of being sober. What is the one thing that nobody really wants to do around? Sobriety, but everybody should do the thing that they don't like but they should do.

Eire Fullam: 43:43

Tell your friends. Okay, a lot of people assume that they'll be judged and they won't have any support in their sobriety, without ever even introducing the idea, not knowing that jessica, mike and becky might feel the exact same way, but they're still drinking because they don't want to. It's a perpetuated reality that I believe. For me, the reason why Alcoholics Anonymous didn't work for me and one of the many reasons is because I had been so loud in my addiction. I had been so well known for being drunk that the only way that I was going to be able to be sober is if everybody knew. Because if everyone didn't know, then I would go into one of my favorite places and they would put a shot in the bar because that was normal. So for me, telling the world was basically like not a safety blanket, but it was an acknowledgement of the truth. Like I'm very much quitting right now, you can't tell 2000 of your closest Facebook friends that you're not drinking and then post a video taking shots. So it was like a what I call a sober insurance policy, and God knew that I needed one because I'd relapsed eight times.

Eire Fullam: 44:58

So when I celebrated 60 days of sobriety, I got really sick that day and I ended up going to the hospital a few days later and they said don't know, ma'am, I know you said you, you, um, weren't pregnant, but you definitely are. And I remember laughing and being like you know, fair enough, because I had relapsed a lot and I think that was God's or whoever's last kind of like throwing this at the wall and seeing if it sticks. You know it was. It was. You can't drink because you just really messed up and you lost everything.

Eire Fullam: 45:29

But also you can't drink because there's another person inside of you that doesn't have a choice. So for other people, you don't have to get pregnant to have a, you know, an insurance policy. But telling a few of your best friends, number one, they're not going to be this. Most of them, if you have a problem with alcohol, they've probably thought it, they'll probably be relieved, they'll probably be open to helping you. I say this is somebody who thought I was the queen of the party and everyone was going to hate me. So tell somebody.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 45:59

Kind of hoping they're not listening now. But um, a few of my good friends still drink far too much, still have a bit of an issue with it. But you know we try and do our best, don't we?

Eire Fullam: 46:11

Hey, we've talked about this before, but I'll say it on your podcast. We've said it on mine Alcohol was created to do exactly what it's doing. It's working as intended. There's nothing wrong with you for becoming addicted to an addictive substance.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 46:34

That is like feeding you carcinogens and saying oh my god, you got cancer. What the hell like? No, no, they're the weird ones. You're not addicted to an addictive substance. That's weird, I think. I think you're absolutely right. It doesn't really matter who you are, what your upbringing was, what your family life is. If you pour enough vodka down somebody's throat, they're going to end up with a problem and for a lot of people it's so far past their mental awareness.

Eire Fullam: 46:54

It's genetic it for for me, yeah, I did have a problem and and did I have a lot of tools I should have used? Yeah, but for the fact that when my dad stopped drinking alcohol, he had grand mal seizures every day for two weeks. That's not a normal withdrawal symptom. That's a body that's relying on alcohol. So, as much as I can talk myself into sobriety, I have to give myself the grace to know that I was given a shit stack of cards when it comes to these genetics with alcoholism. Shit stack of cards when it comes to these genetics with alcoholism. And that makes my sobriety journey even more important and even more, um, not important, but like remarkable. You know you, we have. If it's programmed into your brain and your body and you're able to overcome it, good for you, like seriously yeah, yeah, I think everybody is clapping.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 47:48

Now I can, I can. I can hear the listeners wild. Yeah, they're kind of screaming and throwing their pants um. I should translate because that I mean. Oh no, like the moment's gone, look let it go I think that's probably a good place to uh shut up, duncan, but just before I let you go, where can people find out more about what you do?

Eire Fullam: 48:12

okay, you can find me on drink sober not boring on spotify that is the podcast or drink sober not boring on instagram. We also have a podcast page, dsnb drink sober not boring pod at Instagramcom and I will be launching my website again shortly, but Instagram is probably the best place to find me. My inbox is always open If you need to talk, vent, you want to know where to go, if you are interested in possibly taking a break from alcohol. If you even think about taking a break from alcohol, you're already 100 stronger than most people in the world, so give yourself a pat in the back yeah, that's one of my favorites.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 48:53

If you're thinking about it, then, uh, you know now is the right time to do it. So, uh, so get on with it. I'll put all of the links in the show notes, so, uh, so people can hook up with you. But thank you so much for your time and sharing your story and your. You know your perspective and your experience.

Eire Fullam: 49:08

Thank you it's been a blast and I'm going to have to check off some ikea stuff on my list. I did not know it'd be that much of a big deal in my life, but I'll get back to you on the meatballs perfect right.

Duncan Bhaskaran Brown: 49:19

Fantastic. Have a great day.