Episode 54: The Things We Hide Because We Are Ashamed w/Danielle Elliott Smith

The Heart of the Episode:

What happens when the thing you're struggling with becomes the thing you're most determined to hide?

Host Elisha Light Angel sits down with podcast host, speaker, storyteller, and former TV news anchor Danielle Elliott Smith for a candid conversation about alcohol, perfectionism, shame, emotional suppression, recovery, and the healing power of human connection.
Danielle never expected alcohol to become part of her story. As the adult child of alcoholics, she believed she would never struggle with drinking herself. But in her 40s, amid trauma, stress, perfectionism, and a lifetime of hiding her struggles, alcohol gradually became a way to quiet what she didn't know how to hold.

What began as reaching for a glass of wine to relax eventually became something Danielle was thinking about, relying on, hiding, and struggling to control. The more judged she felt, the more secretive her drinking became—and the more isolated she became inside what she calls a “secret spiral.”

Together, Elisha and Danielle explore why our emotions eventually find somewhere to go, how shame can keep people trapped in destructive patterns, and why healing isn't always about finding the right path. Sometimes it's about finding your path—the combination of community, compassion, self-awareness, accountability, movement, spirituality, creativity, or support that helps you continue choosing yourself.

A Question to Carry With You:
What are you hiding because of shame—and what might change if you no longer had to carry it alone?

AI Summary w/Visuals:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1m48lC6G5F8GAPo61EsFkG-GDBAe-SDB4/view?usp=sharing

Time Stamps:
00:00 - Introduction & The Power of Sitting in the Dark with Others
03:46 - Bottling Up Emotions: How Perfectionism Led to Alcohol Dependency in Her 40s
06:58 - Redefining the Relationship with Alcohol & Spotting Systemic Warning Signs
09:49 - The Tipping Point: Facing Shame, Family Impact, and Choosing Treatment
12:04 - Deconstructing Social Pressures Around Drinking & Self-Care Myths
15:33 - Group Mentality, Alcohol Normalization, and Intentional Living
17:39 - The Reality of Selective Numbing and Reclaiming Your Senses
19:25 - Navigating Treatment, Internal Readiness, and Sustaining Long-Term Sobriety
23:08 - Service to Others as a Vessel for Healing and Day-Counting Milestones
26:07 - Accountability, Social Stigma, and Rejecting Sobriety Shame
32:17 - Food Noise, Bulimia, and Exploring Tools for Emotional Self-Regulation
37:32 - Being "Beautifully Broken" and Embracing Yearly Intentional Themes
40:29 - Setting Table Boundaries, Overcoming Savior Complex, and Choosing Your Circle
45:27 - Where to Connect with Danielle & Final Wisdom on Storytelling and Hope


Links to find Danielle on the internet:
https://www.danielleelliottsmith.com/ - Danielle Elliott Smith
https://www.ReDefiningSober.com - ReDefining Sober
https://www.HopeComestoVisit.com - Hope Comes to Visit
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/daniellesmithtv - @DanielleSmithTV
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/hopecomestovisit - @HopeComesToVisit
TikTok, Twitter, Threads - @DanielleSmithTV
https://www.tiktok.com/@daniellesmithtv
https://www.threads.com/@daniellesmithtv
https://x.com/daniellesmithtv


Link to Transcript of Show:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XXkFcI9aCvW3Ygw4WK-I6rrz5RSru0h1/view?usp=sharing

Apply to be on the Show:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdo3jzeiCYLsDQMnfZbar8GlhJOjWGAFLtMlsZI2L8XwZ_IMw/viewform?usp=sharing

Find Elisha Elsewhere on the web:
https://linktr.ee/elishalightangel

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

SPEAKER_00 0:00

The more my family started to say, Do you always have to have three glasses of wine? I thought, well, the last time I checked, I turned 21 a very long time ago. So everyone can leave me alone. But the more I felt judged, the more I hid it. And the more I hid it, the more I drank. And that's one of those secret spirals that a lot of people don't recognize are happening.

SPEAKER_01 0:43

By day, I'm a massage therapist, currently a podcaster, but like you, I live in a human body and I have a plethora of human life experiences. And here's where I like to talk about not just my own experiences, but get to hear about other people's experiences so that we can share in some of our commonalities. And today I have a special guest that I met online, and she also is kind of in the same arena of trying to bring life stories and bring hope to people through some of these stories. Her name is Danielle Elliott Smith, and she also has a podcast, and she talks about meaningful connection with honest conversations and shared human experiences. The podcast is Hope Comes to Visit, and she is a speaker, a storyteller, a podcast host, an advocate, and passionate about what she does and bringing these breakthroughs to people through stories. And her past includes being a TV news anchor, so she's really good at interviewing and being on camera. And we are going to get into some of her story and how she has come to being the light that she is currently in this world. So please join me in welcoming Danielle. Thank you. What a beautiful introduction. Thank you so much for having me, Alicia. I appreciate it. You're welcome. I'm glad to have you on my podcast, and I'm really excited to hear some of your story and um what you do because your podcast sounds like something that I would enjoy listening to because I like to listen to people's stories and hear what they've been through.

SPEAKER_00 2:34

I think that we, you know, you and I are on similar paths. We uh I truly believe that everyone has a story of hope that can inspire someone else. And it may be they're the first person in their family that went to college. It may be that they've experienced loss that can walk beside someone else. I the way I look at compassion, you know, compassion isn't so much, oh my gosh, you're sitting in the dark. I'm gonna run in here and I'm gonna turn on all the lights and I'm gonna help you stand. It's how can I come in and sit in the dark with you? And to me, every single story of hope that we share allows someone at home to sit and think, oh my gosh, I'm listening to someone else tell my story. I'm hearing my story come out of someone else's mouth. And when that happens, then we feel a little bit less alone because frequently the experiences we have in our lives isolate us. Whether it's grief or loss or some type of trauma, we think we might be the only ones experiencing that. We often isolate and feel really alone, but knowing that someone else has walked before us gives us the opportunity to think, maybe I can.

SPEAKER_01 3:48

You just hit the nail on the head, that isolation factor. I think that we have all experienced at one point or another, especially in in and around some of those negative emotions that maybe we were told that we shouldn't feel, we shouldn't express or put out there. And for guys, they should just toughen up and not have any of it. So it becomes toxic to our entire inner world, which then spreads to the outer world because we can't express to me, like for my podcast, it's all about this human need, but that having that compassion, having um those stories, like you said, that oh, somebody else has also lived through this. I'm not the only person.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

My experience is that that our emotions come out somehow, right? So if we bottle up the hurt and the trauma and the sadness, it could come out as anger at some point. It could come out at someone else, it could come out as sickness in our body, right? It's it's going to come out somehow, and maybe we bottle it up for years. For me, bottling up so much of my like I'm a recovering perfectionist, right? I'm a recovering people pleaser. So spending my entire life saying, like, we're gonna make this perfect, I'm gonna get straight A's, I'm gonna do this, I'm never, I'm never gonna let everyone, anyone know that, that I'm struggling. It was not until my 40s that I struggled with alcohol. And at that point in time, I was dealing with some traumatic events, and I just found myself saying, Oh my gosh, somebody pour me a glass of wine. I just need to calm down. I just need to relax. Somebody pour me a glass of wine. And I come from a family of alcoholics. I'm the adult child of alcoholics. So to me, I was never going to struggle with alcohol. But all of that bottled in started to come out that way. And the more my family started to say, Do you always have to have three glasses of wine? I thought, well, the last time I checked, I turned 21 a very long time ago. So everyone can leave me alone. But the more I felt judged, the more I hid it. And the more I hid it, the more I drank. And that's one of those secret spirals that a lot of people don't recognize are happening because I'm hiding it. So I'm no longer paying attention to am I having one? Am I having three? I'm just sneaking away to get some. I'm paying really close attention to what everyone else is doing because I'm feeling so judged. And then the amount I'm drinking just continues to increase. And my trauma and my stress and my perfectionism and my hiding of my emotions manifested for me in a drinking problem.

SPEAKER_01 6:36

Wow. I don't you're the first person I've heard that has had an issue later on in life and wasn't like in their 20s, had the first sip of alcohol, and it just changed their entire world, which is the typical story. Right. I hear from people that um fall into having problems putting down the bottle of whatever they like to drink.

SPEAKER_00 6:58

So I've worked with people in recovery or people who are wanting to stop, or people who are wanting to. So one of the things I do now is I coach women who want to redefine their relationship with alcohol because one of the things that I recognize through this whole process is I remember the first moment that I was talking to a girlfriend and I was in my late 30s. And so you can think that my mind had started to shift a little bit. And she said to me, in my year before I turn 40, I am breaking the entire year up into six week pockets so that I can change a number of habits leading towards my 40th birthday. And one of those was, I'm not going to drink. And I said, Why? And she said, you know, I recognize that I'm probably drinking a little too much. And so I want to get control of it before someone else tells me I have to stop. And I thought, huh, that's interesting. I don't want to do that. And yet, probably five years later, I found myself Googling, why can't I stop? And the first thing Google populated for me was drinking. Because to me, an alcoholic was someone who drank every day. And I didn't drink every day. But my problem was once I started, I didn't stop. And what people don't recognize is that's a problem too. Anytime you say to yourself, I wonder if I'm fill in the blank, shopping too much, staying up too late, not exercising enough, eating the wrong foods, drinking too much, whatever your indulgence may be, is the second you start to ask yourself that, that's your system giving you that warning. And the answer is always yes. The question is, what are you going to do about it? I had that window of opportunity to say, okay, clearly I need to make some changes. But because Google populated drinking for me right away, I did the mental gymnastics to say, see, everybody, everybody just occasionally drinks too much. Everybody occasionally just can't stop drinking because I didn't want to stop. And that was the mental gymnastics, like I said, that I was trying to do because I didn't want to stop. I was becoming reliant on it. But once it became a problem, and and I know this from working with other people, the challenge is that there is no one who wants to stop more than the person who is struggling. However, when you reach that place, it's not as simple as, okay, just don't stop. You can tell someone who doesn't have a problem to stop, and they say, sure, no problem. If you said to me, okay, Dionyol, stop drinking orange juice, I'd say, okay. Orange juice isn't a problem for me. I don't think about it. But alcohol was something I was thinking about and I was relying on, and it was changing my system. So the more you said, hey, don't, the more I thought, oh no, no, I need to.

SPEAKER_01 9:51

So at this point, you're already thinking about it. So what actually catapulted the change for you to take the steps to begin stopping?

SPEAKER_00 10:02

That was a that's a good question. So um it's it was a process for me. Um there were there was some drama in my family. I was married at the time. Um, my ex-husband is now a very good friend of mine. Like we we divorced and and stayed very good friends. I actually did a podcast episode on that because people always say, like, you guys are really good friends. I got married in November and my ex-husband came to the wedding, right? My my current husband mentioned him in the vows because Jeff is part of our family. Uh but Jeff was super frustrated. Like, just stop. Why don't you just stop? I'm not drinking. Why don't you just stop drinking? And it isn't as simple as that. Um, for me, it was a series of my kids getting upset and the what tipped me because I was a blackout drinker, and there is so much shame associated with alcohol. Uh, and I didn't want to seek help because I was determined that it was a willpower thing, and why can't I stop? It's not a willpower thing. It is something that for me, I have learned, requires community, requires compassion, requires connection with other people. And there was a tipping point where I drank again when I said that I wouldn't. And there was a text between my kids that said, Too bad mom likes wine more than she likes us. And there was a piece of my heart that broke. And I it I always try to explain. I simultaneously felt as though my heart was breaking, I'd been kicked in the gut, and all of the air had been let out of me at the same time. I did choose to go to treatment. That was something that I needed to do. I have been sober since I went to treatment. When I came back at my six-month mark, because I was bound and determined to do everything I can to remove as much of the shame and judgment from making the choice to stop drinking, because that is what keeps people from either seeking the help or making the choices. The number of people that I've spoken to who say, So, what do you do in a situation where like I don't even really like to drink that much? And yet people are constantly saying to me, like, how come you're not having a drink? How come like, why aren't you drinking? What are you pregnant? And it's there is so much socialized pressure because we treat alcohol as a form of self-care. And it's not. So when I'm coaching people, um, I coach women specifically in one of three categories. In the first place, they're first starting to say, huh, I wonder if I'm drinking too much. What does it look to what does it look like to to redefine that relationship? How can I start to make different choices that puts alcohol in a different category in my life? The second is, all right, I really need to stop. What does that look like? What does it look like to make alcohol an outsider in my life? And the third is, okay, I've I've removed alcohol, but how do I thrive without alcohol in a society that is constantly saying you're stressed, you're angry, you're sad, you deserve it, grab a grab a drink. So I think that there isn't one way. There is your way. And I want people to feel empowered to make these choices in their lives and recognize that while AA or a 12-step program might be the right choice for you, while religion or meditation or yoga or joining a community might be the choice for you, it isn't the only choice. Maybe it's a conglomeration of all of those things. I want to remove the shame and the judgment that says, I'll help you, I can help you, you're not alone.

SPEAKER_01 13:59

Wow, that's really fascinating. Something that stuck out because you're talking about how when people have anything that takes control of them, you're thinking about it, and you have that shame aspect. So I um, you know, I drank most much more in my 20s, um, but it's always been a social thing to me. It's never, I have never once been compelled to drink on my own. Um, and of course I've learned that I have really low tolerance because I was always accidentally drunk. It was everything's fine, and now the room is spinning. There was never an in-between for me. And so at this point in life, I literally just don't want it. But mine has to do with more listening to my body and and whatnot. So um going to a party where people are drinking, you know, I'm always observing, and I'm like, wow, everybody, I like I have a group of um lady friends, most of them are like 50s, 60s, and we just hang out, but a lot of them, not all of them, but most of them are really love their wine. I mean, in our group chats, they're always making different jokes about needing wine or sneaking wine in places. And what you said just made me think like, how many of these people that are giving you these suggestions, oh, it's okay to have a drink, whatever, you deserve it. How many of them are also having issues with the alcohol that they're not admitting to themselves? And so it becomes a normalized thing. Um, too.

SPEAKER_00 15:33

So there is my experience is that there is sort of a group mentality, right? When I was first recognizing that I had a problem, I was validated and empowered by every t-shirt, every mug, every meme that said, like a coffee mug that said, shh, this isn't coffee, right? Or uh I went to my son went to a tournament at Cooperstown baseball when he was 12 years old and I was starting to drink too much. And there was a t-shirt in the Cooperstown baseball shop that said had a wine glass tipping and it said, going, going, going, going, gone. And I thought, ah, like it, I'm surrounded. It's everywhere. Like there's alcohol jokes everywhere. If I at the time had jumped on Facebook and said, guys, I've had the most stressful week, what should I do to calm myself down? It would take a hot second for someone to say, sister, pour yourself a glass of wine and get in a hot bath, right? Because we do treat alcohol like it's a form of self-care. And the truth of the matter is it's not. Do I think that everybody needs to stop drinking? Of course not, right? Enjoy. What I would suggest people do is that they be intentional. So rather than saying, I deserve it, I earned it, life is hard, I need this to calm down, less of a need and more of a want. Because one of the things I recognized in me is that I needed it. Like I would reach a point where I would try to say, okay, Danielle, only get yourself a glass of wine if you're really thinking this will complement my meal. Or I would really like to have a nice glass of wine and a really beautiful glass while I'm having a drink, while I'm hanging out with friends. I would have more of a, I need the feeling. I need to and I started to crave that feeling. I wanted to crave the lack of feeling and emotion. When you stop drinking, and I will tell you that I initially I mentioned I wasn't drinking every day, and then I was. So when I stopped drinking, I within about two weeks, I recognized that all of my senses were coming back. I thought, has the sky always been this blue? Is this what food tastes like? Did you do you see those squirrels over there? Because we don't get to selectively numb. While I was having a glass of wine to calm down because I was stressed or because I was anxious or because I was upset, I was also numbing all of my senses. Everything had kind of a gauze on it. So colors were not as bright. I wasn't hearing as well. I definitely wasn't remembering things as well. My kids were constantly saying, as I already told you. Right. And the difficult challenge for many people who have been numbing with any type of substance is that we then have to face our emotions. And I think this was a little something you and I were talking about before we jumped on. That when we go through things, we have these life experiences that are traumatic, that are challenging, that are hard. But life doesn't stop lifeing. And as much as I would love to say, people who have experienced hard things, we deserve a break. I would love to say, we're exempt, but we're not. No matter how hard things have been, whether it's through loss or addiction or some type of trauma, life is still gonna happen. We're still gonna get flat tires, we're still gonna lose jobs, we're still gonna lose people we love. But we have to find other ways to deal with it, and we have to recognize our emotions because otherwise they will still come out another way.

SPEAKER_01 19:26

So um when you were in the treatment program, did they give you tools to help you deal with the underlying emotions that were causing you to uh need the alcohol?

SPEAKER_00 19:39

Yes, there was some of that. Uh, you know, so it's treatment is interesting. Um, there is good treatment and there is bad treatment. There is um I I tiptoe around this a little bit because there are some places that are more of a cattle call that just like shuffle people in and shuffle people out. Um, unfortunately, treatment is quite expensive in many places. Some cut some insurance covers, some doesn't in others. To me, the key in any type of treatment, because the recidivism rate for treatment is very high. And by that I mean many, many, many people go to treatment and need to go again, or stop drinking and then start again, and then stop drinking and start again. The key uh there's there's two pieces to it. One is that the individual is deciding to go, that it isn't them being forced, meaning no one has said, if you don't go, I'm kicking you out. Um, no one has said this is the last straw, it's an or else. That individual has to say, I no longer want to live like this. And there is a very thin line between I don't want to live and I don't want to live like this. And frequently those lines are blurred, especially when we're drinking. Remember that alcohol is a depressant, right? So a lot of times we'll say, like, I just can't live like this anymore, right? I said it many, many times. And that is sometimes taken as a suicidal ideation. And for me, it was not suicidal ideation, it was just a desperation to stop living in this horrible cycle of, oh my gosh, I drank too much. I wake up at 3:30 in the morning and I think, I can't believe I did it again. I'm never doing it again. Tomorrow I'm not drinking. And then I would wake up the next morning and I would say, I'm not drinking, I'm not drinking, I'm not drinking. And then I would hit my witching hour and I would think, I mean, Danielle, you're strong enough, right? You can you can have one. And it was an internal battle until I realized that I had to be the one to make the changes. And one of the things that makes this Difference when someone is moving into a place is I mentioned before, it doesn't have to be a 12-step program, it might be a 12-step program. What makes the difference is when someone recognizes that it isn't about being fixed or graduating, it's figuring out what does work for them, whether it is 12-step or prayer or meditation or community and sticking with that. So the second you start to say, I'm good, I'm great, like I got this, you recognize that as a flag. The second I start to say, I'm good, I don't need, fill in the blank. Whether that is the 12-step program that's been working for you, or the prayer or the meditation, or the friends, or the exercise, whatever it is that has been helping you to feel the best version of you, the second you abandon that, that's when you're in danger of going back to the things that triggered you and the things that made you feel calm and relaxed before.

SPEAKER_01 22:59

So, what was it for you, or I guess not even just one thing, it could have been several different things that helped you to get through some of those times?

SPEAKER_00 23:09

One of the biggest things for me, the uh the first couple weeks that I was in treatment, a woman took me aside and she said, Your what's going to help you in this is helping others. Your gift in this is going to be showing up for other people. And I found that the second I started to feel, oh my gosh, I want to drink, the first thing I would do is text other people and say, Hey, how are you doing? Because the second someone else responded to me, I was focused on them and not on me. Oh that was that was for me, right? And and there are other components. There is yoga, there is meditation, but I have worked in some level of service to others since I've been sober, like I'm coming up on seven years. And the initially I was part of a 12-step program, it ended up not being the right path for me. And what I want to say about that is that's okay. Right. There are some people who are very, very strict in their in their sobriety that to them the only way is this one way. I have found that there is a lot of judgment and shame in saying that there is only one way. So for me, it's very important to say there's always a way. And it does not include shame or judgment. Um, I don't ever want anyone to feel bad about relapsing or making decisions for them. I want people to feel like making good decisions and choosing the path that is healthiest for them is the right thing. And how can I help them do that? Because for me, continuing like one of the things that worked for me was I counted how many days I had sober. On Mother's Day, I had 2,500 days sober. And when I was first counting, there were people who were very critical of that. Stop counting how many days and start, you know, focusing on the quality of your sobriety. And I thought, okay, well, again, I need to do what's working for me. I want to empower people to do what's working for them in choosing these healthy, happy decisions in their life.

SPEAKER_01 25:30

I really like that. I've seen people count days, you know, now that we have social media and some people are more willing to share some of their journeys than others. And um, like right now, I have a Facebook friend that's been quitting alcohol and they're, I don't know, close to 200 days or something. But they'll notice every every now and again I'm this many number of days. And I notice they'll post um that a lot when they're also adding into the post, I really wanted to go drink. Um, and it's really hard, but instead I took myself to the gym.

SPEAKER_00 26:07

There is an accountability there, right? So there is the accountability to say it out loud and to receive validation from other people who may have been struggling, and that is where we're we're walking alongside each other. That's a piece of the community that I that I was talking about, recognizing that there are other people that are doing the same thing that have been there. Because the truth of the matter is you don't get to 200 without getting without doing 12, right? So it's there is this piece that that we build on what works for us, and it makes my heart so happy to see people doing it whatever way works for them. And some people, when I do talk about redefining sober, like for some people, I talk about not drinking to anyone who will listen. Not because I think other people should not drink, but because I want people to know it's okay if you choose not to drink. Because so much of society says, What do you mean you don't drink? Years ago, I went on a date and I ordered club soda and lime, and the guy looked at me and said, You don't drink. And I said, I don't. He goes, My grandfather told me never to trust anyone who doesn't drink. And I think if I didn't order tomatoes on my sandwich, nobody would say, You don't eat tomatoes, as though I'm committing some type of fundamental crime, right? My grandfather told me never to trust anyone who doesn't eat tomatoes. Nobody says that, right? But the second you don't drink, and part of that is because there are a lot of people who need other people around them to drink in order to feel justified in their own drinking, right? Drink, don't drink. But I don't think we should be pressuring other people. I want everyone to feel okay. I was in a networking meeting this week and I mentioned the coaching that I do, but I also mentioned them coming up on Seven Years Sober. And three different women came up to me afterwards and said, I'm sober too, but I've never announced it in a meeting of regular people before. And I said, I the day I came out of treatment, I was in a gas station. And the guy in the gas station said, Dang, I haven't seen you in a while. And I said, Yeah, I was in rehab. And he was like, Okay. I wanted to practice saying out loud, I'm owning this, I'm not going to be ashamed of it. I will not be ashamed of the fact that I stopped drinking because I wasn't good at it. And it's okay. If I go on vacation, I will go up to the pool bar and say, What are my non-alcoholic options? I would love for there to be amazing non-alcoholic options everywhere I go. And in the past year and a half, especially, there are far more robust options of beers and wines and mocktails. But initially it was club soda and lime, and they're gonna serve it to you in a red plastic cup. And so you feel like you're sitting at the kitty table.

SPEAKER_01 29:04

It's interesting. So I'm pretty sure people have said some of the same stuff to me, and I've just for the longest time, I'm like free-spirited, bohemian, hippie-ish kind of personality. Um I'm not super crunchy, but I'm kind of crunchy. And so for years, I'm just like, I'll go to the I go to the restaurant, I order water, no ice with about two to four lemons. And it sounds a little boozy, a little picky, but I do it every time and I send it back if it doesn't have ice. And people sometimes think it's weird I'm not getting a drink. I go to parties and I always, you know, not always, occasionally I feel like having a drink, but I let my body tell me if it's okay. Um, and so by by my body telling me if I go and I touch a bottle and I feel a repulsiveness inside, I don't drink. If I feel this like okayness, then I'll have a drink. But people have told me, oh, you don't you don't want to drink, or this one's really good, or this. And it doesn't hit the same when alcohol hasn't been an issue. And through this conversation, I'm realizing that because I'm like, oh, people have said that to me, but I kind of just like brush it off, like, oh well, right.

SPEAKER_00 30:27

That's you don't internalize it because it hasn't been a struggle for you. Yeah. But when it's something that you have wanted or something, imagine if it picture it this way. Imagine if someone asked you that question and there was a spotlight on you, because that's what it feels like. It feels like when someone says, Lisha, do you want a drink? And you say, No, I'm good. And then there's instantly a spotlight on you, and they say, Are you sure? Right? That's what it feels like to someone who has struggled. Because it feels like the entire room has turned to you and is saying, Why? Do you have a problem with it? Is there is there a reason you don't want to drink? And and a lot of that that that's an internal issue, right? Like that's something we struggle with because A, sometimes we want it. Right. Even at seven years, if I like I was recently, I had a couple of like traumatic situations in the past year where I wanted it more than I had. And I was honest about it. I'm be in my Instagram story saying, All right, guys, like I've reached a point after six plus years where I don't think about it a whole lot. I don't notice it as much. And all of a sudden, I'm noticing it. Every TV show, they're stressed, they're drinking, they're pouring huge glasses of wine, they and I'm traveling and I'm thinking, why does everybody else get to have uh a glass of champagne? And it's right there, right in my face. But I'm honest about it. I'm honest about it. And typically people say, Thank you for mentioning that, because sometimes at four years or 14 years, it just hits you, much the way grief does, right? Grief comes in a wave, sometimes it laps around your ankles and sometimes it bowls over. And recovery is the same way.

SPEAKER_01 32:19

That makes sense. Yeah, like um, anytime I have a conversation with somebody that's had alcohol as a problem, my problem's been food. And I was bulimic for 17 years.

SPEAKER_00 32:30

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 32:30

And it was definitely on and off. There's times like where it's worse, and then you know, like, yeah, I'm getting better, I'm not doing this as much. Like, I'm I'm managing my emotions, but anytime there would be like, you know, and I had maybe a couple years, I'm like really proud of myself. I haven't done any of this, and all of a sudden, something happens in my life that causes a huge emotional upheaval. And all of a sudden, I can't control, like I'm feeling a compulsion to binge, and then there's like this guilt that goes around. Oh my god, I just ate like 4,000 calories in one sitting, and I've got to get it out of me. And and then the getting like that purging effect, all the emotions that were negative for a little while, you know, 10, 15, 20 or 10.

SPEAKER_00 33:20

What do you do when you feel that way, right? Because I I know that for alcohol, like most cravings last two to three minutes, like in actuality, science-wise. So if you can move a muscle, change a thought, if you can say to yourself, okay, I'm sitting in this, if you sit in it, you you will actually act on it. If you instead say, I'm gonna turn on Netflix, I'm gonna go for a walk, I'm gonna pet the dog, I'm gonna call a friend, I'm gonna start coloring, I'm gonna do something, I'm gonna actually move to get out of this thought process. It doesn't last that long. What do you do when you have that trigger?

SPEAKER_01 34:00

So currently it's not an issue. Like um, I've done a lot of work over the years, and my most recent the past couple years, I practiced like intermittent fasting, longer fasting, and I have found that that's actually helped for me to shut off the food noise and to shut off the desire to binge. Um so I wouldn't recommend it for somebody that maybe has an issue with anorexia. Your your mindset is different than where mine is. But for me, fasting has been a really huge game changer. And I had already stopped my cycle of bulimia way before getting to this fasting part and trying to focus on healthy food. But there's always those times where there's always going to be something that's gonna cause an emotional upheaval, you know, whether that's some kind of grief that I'm going through for a loss of a friend, a loved one, um a piece of my identity, or whatever other a million things that we could lose and feel grief over in life. Um, for me, it's really been learning how to love myself over the years because when I was young, I hated myself. Like I looked in the mirror, and the person that I saw, I was like, who would love you? Like, God, the stories that the dysmorphia, the like the body dysmorphia, the the the body that I have now is bigger than it ever was then, and yet I feel smaller than I did when I was smaller. And and it's all about like what's going on in my head. It's absolutely wild how different it can be. And because I've observed the changes in my own life, then I know that it's possible for people to shift their neurology to heal from the spaces they are in and come to a completely different place. But it's not, like you said, an overnight thing. Like this can take years, it's those moments where you're doing something else. So, right now, if I get emotional or something, um, it's a lot more internal and I can't shut my brain off. This is my my my brain goes non-stop. So you're saying, oh, your craving lasts for two or three minutes, no ma'am. Um, my craving will last all day if I don't.

SPEAKER_00 36:23

Really?

SPEAKER_01 36:23

Yeah, it doesn't matter what I do to try and get over it. Um, so for me, I like to go internal and meditate. I like some breath work. Uh, those really help me to move energy. If I'm feeling really emotional and I know stuff, I'll put music on and I'll dance and get it out of my body. I find that to be um a really good way to just move all of the emotions through me because so does that actually interrupt the thought process? Um no, but I've had energy work from other people that's kind of helped. So um I've noticed that too. I'm like, oh, I'm probably getting stuff like stuck in the the auric field that's causing my mind to go. Because then I'll have somebody like, oh, yeah, I I'm sensing however they sense it, and do the energy work, and then I'm like, huh. All of a sudden I just feel like my mind has eased up. And I'm currently going through a course doing really high frequency energy work, and so even through that, I can um put some frequencies on and literally feel in a mind change within five minutes or less.

SPEAKER_00 37:32

Good for you. See, what you're talking about illustrates something that I have said for a very long time. I would rather sit in a room full of people who are beautifully broken in some capacity, people who have been through something and and had to do the work, right? Because the people who are beautifully broken are more patient, they're more self-aware, they are more tolerant of others. And the reason is because we've had to fight to be here. Like we've had to actively choose this life and this body and this mind. And we've had to say, I want this, how do I make it better? How do I improve? How do I help others? And I I like to think like we're putting the pieces back together, but we're always leaving a little bit of space so that the light can get in.

SPEAKER_01 38:22

I like that, yeah. Little pieces to let the light get in. Then one day you become the light.

SPEAKER_00 38:29

Uh, you know what? I I I'd like to think so. I choose a word of the year every year. My word last year was light, and it's amazing how much it continued to show up for me. It just every time I choose a word, it just shows up.

SPEAKER_01 38:45

That's cool. I also pick a word. Do you every year is my theme? I start with my birthday though, which is which in all fairness is only two weeks before the new year, but it's my personal new year.

SPEAKER_00 38:56

I do the same thing. I'm just two and a half weeks after the new year. I'm January 21st.

SPEAKER_01 39:01

That's awesome. Yeah. So like this year, my mine is celebration. I don't feel like I take enough time to celebrate little wins and little things in life. So I'm really trying to be more cognizant of celebrating little things in life. Um, but one thing that was hard for two years in a row was consistency because I have a hard time with consistency. And I finally proved, I was like, hey, I think I'm finally getting some of this consistency stuff down. Maybe not in every aspect.

SPEAKER_00 39:32

If you're like, I can let it go now.

SPEAKER_01 39:34

Yeah. I proved to myself that I have the ability to be consistent, to where the story in my life before that was like, well, I'm not consistent in anything. Sorry, don't count on me for that.

SPEAKER_00 39:46

Great for you. I chose audacity this year. Um and not just from a obnoxious standpoint, audacity in that I want to have the audacity to believe in myself in ways that I haven't before. Um, I think that we I want to have the audacity to see myself the way the people closest to me see me. Um because I think that we often hide ourselves and don't step into the light that we have. And this year I'm I'm stepping in.

SPEAKER_01 40:31

I would say there's a whole journey of challenges of stepping into the light too. Um a lot of people are not embracing their light. And so when you get there, like the crowd of people that you have to hang out with that are there is a lot smaller. And and the more that you heal and just like shine that light, this is my experience, then the smaller and smaller the crowd gets, or the less relatable you feel to other people in that way, because for me, I feel like I'm constantly watching other people struggle all of the time. And of course, it pulls on my heart strings, like I just want to help every single person. Not that I I have the capability, but I have to remind myself my job is to just to love myself to self-care and to be the lighthouse that comes from being that. So it gives permission to other people and their process and journey to get there for themselves.

SPEAKER_00 41:41

What you're talking about is choosing who sits at your table, right? The the older you get, the wiser you get. There's a there's a reason that's true, right? Um, because you start to recognize that you can and should set boundaries. So I've reached a point where I recognize I could choose who sits at my table. It does not mean that I do not want you to eat. It just means that I don't necessarily want you to eat at my table, which means I'm not going to give you some of the energy I have previously been giving you. Like you, I want to help everybody. Um, I've worked with one of my therapists. I have a savior complex. I have absolutely fallen into the I'll help, I'll help, I'll help to my own detriment, right? And so now I am more deliberate about how I help and what I do and where I put my energy. It doesn't mean that my heart is any smaller, it just means I'm more specific about where I'm putting my energy, and I also am very specific about putting in where I get out. Um and by that I mean I used to get really, really disappointed when I would treat people a certain way and they did not reciprocate. And at the time, my ex-husband would say, Danielle, your expectations of people are just too high. And in the past two years, I have learned that my expectations are not too high. I just need to choose the right people. So it's I am I am okay having high expectations. I just need to make sure that those are the people that I have at my table. And if I think that's good good to go by.

SPEAKER_01 43:36

And uh, like you said, you know, I'm I'm realizing this as I get older. I am getting pickier about who I hang out with. I mean, one, uh, I think post 40 a lot of the FOMO has worn off.

SPEAKER_00 43:50

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 43:50

But now I'm realizing I'm 45 right now, and so I went through a few years and I'm like, oh, I don't have the fear missing out. I don't care if I go. To this event or that event or whatever. Like, I've done all these things and had all these experiences. And now I'm like, it's a different level of fear of missing out. Like, oh no, I better get every bucket light list item done as soon as possible because I don't know when my last day is gonna be. And so I have to get all of these experiences. That's where I'm at right now.

SPEAKER_00 44:23

I I completely agree. I'm I'm 53 and I want life. Like I have like my heart is bigger and more full. And I I have always loved really, really hard. And now I just make sure that that loving hard isn't spread out. It's it's going to people who really appreciate it. People who love back and who love me as hard as I love. And that has made my life richer and more full and more beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 45:01

Yes, I love that. I could really talk to you for all day.

SPEAKER_00 45:06

I feel like you could too.

SPEAKER_01 45:07

We could keep going. But we are coming to the end of our time. Okay. So um for our listeners, if you can tell them where they could find you on the internet if they want to listen to your podcast or follow you, or even if they're having um some alcohol issues and feel resonant with you and want some help.

SPEAKER_00 45:27

Absolutely. There's there's a few options. Now, um, my website that has my full name is where you can find everything. And so that's Danielle Elliot Smith. And the one thing I would say about Elliot is it's two L's and two T's. So it's E-L-L-I-O-T. Danielle and Smith are spelled pretty traditionally. From there, you can go to Redefining Sober, which you can also find redefiningsober.com as a separate entity. And hope comes to visit is the podcast. I will also mention that in June, um, I have an app launching for Redefining Sober, which mirrors the coaching, but it is me with uh me with some AI magic mixed in that you can take that redefining sober path on your own and then decide you'd like coaching with me separately, or you can just try to go down that path with some assistance to see what it looks like to reimagine, redefine your relationship with alcohol on your own. But like I said, it's Danielle Elliott Smith. And then all of my socials are Danielle Smith TV, and that's Instagram and Twitter, yes, I still call it Twitter, and threads and TikTok. It's all the same. So thank you so much for having me.

SPEAKER_01 46:40

You're welcome. And I'll put it links down in the show notes or description. So if you're listening and you want an easy click, just go there. One last question for you. Yes. If you could leave the listeners with any bit of wisdom from your life, be it something we tapped on or didn't tap on, what would that be?

SPEAKER_00 47:00

I would say that it's important. There's a couple of things. One, it's important to find your people, right? Um, at this stage, I recognize that we get to get to set our own table and we get to bring the appropriate people into our life. But seek out the people who share your stories because those will be the people who light the way for you. And then that also gives you the same opportunity to light the way for other people who are coming in to walk beside you and to come up behind you. People who you might not even know are affected by how you've hurt, how you've struggled, and how you've risen again. Um, I've found that our stories are so powerful. I sometimes say I'm a I'm a professional storyteller and a professional empath, but it gives me chills to talk to people and to hear their stories and to recognize those small moments of hope. I've been on both sides, hopeless and so hopeful. And I know that hope is defined by where we are at any given moment in our life. And I hope, pun intended, that that by connecting with each other and recognizing connection and compassion and and community that that we can continue to touch each other's lives. And I'm so grateful that you allowed me to spend time with you.

SPEAKER_01 48:33

That was a really good bit of wisdom, and I hope it resonates with some people out there. Thank you for being willing to come on the podcast and share a piece of yourself. To the listeners, if you were inspired by this episode, please share with anyone else that you think might also be inspired or need to hear some of the words today. And as you embrace your humanness, be kind, be you, and remember everything is part of the journey.