Be the Street Art with Alysse Bryson

In this powerful first interview, Melanie Vargas sits down with Alysse Bryson, Founder and CEO of The Sober Curator for a candid and deeply human conversation about recovery, reinvention, and the courage to live unapologetically.

Alysse shares her journey through long term sobriety, workaholism, and the moments that forced her to confront the life she had built to survive. From hitting rock bottom to facing emergency heart surgery, she reflects on the experiences that reshaped her identity and challenged everything she thought she knew about success, control, and worth.

With honesty, humor, and hard earned wisdom, Alysse opens up about the masks she had to shed and what it really means to come home to yourself. At the center of her story is a powerful reframe. Not to fit in or perform, but to “be the street art” and live visibly, creatively, and truthfully.

This conversation is raw, insightful, and at times unexpectedly funny. It is for anyone navigating change, healing from the past, or stepping into a more authentic version of themselves.

Because sometimes the most courageous thing we can do is stop performing and start living.

Find out more about the Alysse and the Sober Curator:

Sober Curator Website

Sober Curator YouTube Channel 

Sober Curator Podcast on Apple

If this conversation resonated, please follow, rate, and share it with someone who is doing their own inner work.

What’s In Your Neighborhood™ is a nonprofit focused on leaders developing their inner landscapes and building community dedicated to normalizing healing, reducing stigma, and expanding how we think about strength, leadership, and what it means to come home to ourselves.

To learn more, get involved, or support the mission, visit www.whatsinyourneighborhood.org.

Until next time, keep tending to your own neighborhood. It matters more than you know.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to What's in Your Neighborhood, Conversations for the Shame Shifter in all of Us. I'm Melanie Vargas. After decades in executive leadership and coaching high performers, I've learned the real work happens in the parts that we hide. Each episode, I sit with leaders, rebels, and real people who've taken off their masks to explore their inner landscape, shaping how we live and lead. If you're ready for more truth, courage, and authenticity, you're in the right place. So let's go there. What's in your neighborhood? Welcome and thank you for joining me on today's episode, What's in your neighborhood? I could not be more excited about today's guest. Today we're gonna explore Elise Bryson's emotional neighborhood. It's truly an honor to have you on the show, Elise. Our listeners are gonna understand very quickly why I'm so excited about the guest today. I'd love to introduce her properly. Elise is a strong woman in recovery, a media innovator, an unapologetic storyteller. With nearly 20 years of sobriety, she blends humor, honesty, and lived experience to inspire others to take bold action, align with their purpose, and serve with impact. She spent over a decade leading media brands, including her role as publisher of Seattle Met Magazine and director of business development at King Five Media Group, before taking on her current role as vice president of community development at Work P2P. In addition to her corporate work, Elise founded the Sober Curator, a top-ranked recovery lifestyle site that attracted over 1.1 million unique visitors worldwide and produces a podcast and weekly newsletter. She also co-hosts the Beats Working Show, where she explores stories of leadership, purpose, and community alongside her work for life with Libby Sungren. Known for her bold style, infectious energy, and willingness to get real, Elise is a dynamic force for change on both personal and professional stages. Welcome, Elise.

SPEAKER_03 2:06

Thanks, Melanie. That's so nice. To hear someone talking about me. That's nice. I'm really excited to be here.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Not nearly as excited as I am, and it is just truly an honor to finally be here with you. I'm feeling I'm such a newbie at podcasting, and you're like the pro. So I gotta say, I'm like a little bit nervous kicking us off and getting us started here.

SPEAKER_02 2:27

There's nothing to be nervous about because it's just two gals having a conversation right now.

SPEAKER_00 2:31

That is true. So and if we just think about it like that, it makes it so much easier.

SPEAKER_02 2:35

Well, you know, that's what I do. That's what I had to do at the beginning when I started doing interviews and interviewing people. I just had to just assume the only person listening was my mom. And then I found out that my mom wasn't even listening.

SPEAKER_03 2:48

So I was like, okay.

SPEAKER_00 2:50

That's hilarious. But I love that. Because our, you know, our moms are so non-judgmental and they think everything we do is wonderful.

unknown 2:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:58

And I should say my mom has listened to some things. She just doesn't listen to everything like I thought she did. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:03

Mm-hmm. So I'd love to start with just your story in general when you think about your emotional neighborhood, literal or metaphorical. What really comes to mind for you?

SPEAKER_02 3:13

Oh gosh. I love when you put it that way. I'm a very visual person. So I'm like, oh, is my neighborhood in the country? Because I'm I grew up in a small town halfway between Seattle and Portland. My parents still live there in my childhood home. You know, they've been there for over 50 years. And so that to me, when I think of home or I think of my neighborhood, that's the first thing that flashes in into my mind. But I haven't lived there in many decades now, and Seattle is my home. And then I don't know if you know this about me, but I am a street art hunter. I'm obsessed with street art. And wherever I go, whether it's local or traveling around the country, I'm always on the hunt for street art because it's taught me that, you know, you can find beauty no matter where you are, and you can see art in everything. And some people really don't like street art because they consider it vandalism. And I don't love all of it. Like there's some of the scary stuff, maybe. That's not necessarily on brand for me, but I love the colors, I love the vibrancy. I actually think it does a lot to enhance a neighborhood. If a lot of metropolitan areas started putting more street art in their gathering places, they would see that it's going to attract all the Instagrammers of the world, and then it's going to make the neighborhood more approachable. More people will want to come and it would kind of catch on from there. So if we think about that metaphorically, I feel like my role in the world, in my neighborhood, is to be the street art.

SPEAKER_00 4:46

I love that. Tell me a little bit more about what that means for you.

SPEAKER_02 4:52

Well, it wasn't always that way. You know, I was a young single mom, young single mom, and I had dropped out of college. I had gone to Seattle Pacific University for one year and dropped out. And I had a few odd jobs. I went to airline school back in the day when they had airline school. I worked for United Airlines for a little bit. Then I went and worked for ATT doing pagers. That's right, pagers. That's how old I am. Um and then I had my son, and I took the first year off. My parents pretty much let me like stay home and play with him like he was a doll, you know? And I would scrapbook and dress him up and take pictures and you know, do my home MTV video workouts or whatever. But then they were like, you gotta you have to adult now. Like you have a child, you have to adult now. And so I had a couple of odd jobs and I ended up falling into an advertising role at the local newspaper where I grew up. And when I was approached to do it, I was like, I don't know anything about advertising, I don't know anything about marketing, I don't even read the newspaper. Like, I am not the right person for you. And the gal that approached me was actually had the role, and she was leaving to go to a bigger newspaper, and she was like, Listen, you don't know any of those things. That's fine. You can learn it all. You have the natural ability, the gift of gab. You have a natural thing that when you walk into the room, people want to come talk to you. That's enough. Like the rest you can learn, and it's gonna make more money than you're making where I was working at the time. And I was like, Oh, you know, I'll try, I'll try anything once, and if I like it, I'll do it a hundred million more times. So I got a job there and I took to it, I was so natural. It was so natural for me to like go out to clients and listen to what they were trying to accomplish and then match it with the products that we offered, and then and then always try to squeeze a little bit more out of them, right? And so I just took to it just so naturally, and so I was there for, I don't know, eight, nine years. Uh, if you look at my resume on LinkedIn, you'll see I don't like to jump around a lot. Um, and it's also very public that I'm uh in recovery and sober now, but I was not at the time. And around the age 30, although I had done well professionally at this newspaper and financially had grown, I was pretty much still a hot mess express. We don't need to go into all those stories, but you know, when you hang out with sketchy people in sketchy places, sketchy things happen. And I was burning a lot of bridges in this very small town, and I woke up one day and I was like, I gotta get out of here. Like, I gotta get out of here. And the father of my child lived in Seattle, and so I was like, What? And my son was getting older, and he had a stepmom and he had a stepbrother, and I was like, I'll just move and be closer to them because I do need a support system, and I'll just go work at the Seattle Times. Like it'll just be that easy, right? Literally 30 days from that morning when I woke up, probably hungover, making that declaration. I was living in Seattle working at the Seattle Times. I was selling advertising specifically for the classified department and specifically for automotive. I was dealing with all the luxury automotive on the east side. Although I continued to excel in that role, my life was really, I mean, it was just a lot of smoke and mirrors, right? And it was really falling apart personally. Um, and probably about six months into being at the Seattle Times, it was before I turned 31, I kind of hit the proverbial rock bottom, if you will, and was forced to make some different choices. And in doing so, my life did not get immediately better at first, right? The first year was rough. And it was there I was about a year sober, and my job was fine. I was, you know, making good money, still single mom. I've been single the whole time. Um, and I was combing Craigslist just out of curiosity for jobs. I don't know why. Probably I was mad about something. And I saw that there was a listing for an account executive role at uh at a local life's the local lifestyle magazine. And I just like stopped because I was like, when I was younger, my bedroom walls were wallpapered with pages out of magazines, both editorial and advertising, like wallpapered, right? Like collage wallpapered. And I I don't know, it was a very dumb blonde moment, but I was like, wait a minute, wait, wait. I sell full pages in a newspaper, that's the same thing as selling full pages in a magazine, like da-da! Like, and I had never seen a city magazine, right? I grew up in a small town, so I thought magazines were only in New York or LA, and I was certainly not going to be able to go there. So I had just never put it in the possibility of options. And I applied for that job, like I don't even think I did a cover letter. I just was like, you know, just as fast as I could. And um they called me 20 minutes later after I hit send. And and they were at the very end of their interview cycle. Um, but if I could get in the next day, like they would squeeze me in because they liked my qualifications. And like I cleared my schedule. I can still remember the plaid suit I was wearing. It had shoulder pads, it was great. And I so I got the job, you know, and not to bury the headline, I got the job. And I was at the magazine for nearly a decade, and uh the first couple years stayed an account executive, and then I don't know, a couple years in, I very quickly moved into management, and by the time I was 35, I was the publisher of this big lifestyle city magazine. I was sober, I was living my best life, except it was, and I was having so much fun, still a single mom, but I had become a raging workaholic. A raging workaholic. And so where that ended was at 10 years sober, uh, at the age of 40, I had emergency heart surgery and I almost died. And it was a lot of things led up to that. Yes, my my history of drug and alcohol use definitely played in, bad eating habits definitely played in, genetics definitely played in. A soup being a workaholic definitely played in. Being in a very unhealthy, toxic work environment definitely played in. There were a lot of factors. You can't just point to one, it all just came to a head. And there is something about being rolled into heart surgery and not knowing if you're coming back out that really changes your perspective on life.

SPEAKER_01 11:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:29

Like it just does. I don't, it just does. And later that same week, my son, who was 18 at the time, got diagnosed with Crohn's disease, which is also not a curable disease. So, like all of a sudden, our little house of two plus a dog, it was like completely catastrophic. And um, and the months that followed off after that, things just kind of progressively kept getting worse. I tripped and got a concussion. The TV broke, like it was just all these things. And then my son had a major surgery and he was in Overlake Hospital for a week, and that I was still working from the hospital like a maniac off my laptop because the workaholism, despite the heart surgery where they told me you come back, you gotta work part-time. And I was like, Okay, is part-time 50 hours? Because that's what part-time is for me. And they're like, No, part-time, Elise, is like 25 hours. I was like, I can't do that. And so I couldn't, like my first day back, I worked 14 hours. I didn't have the off button anymore. When it came to work, didn't have it with alcohol. And we got home from my son being in the hospital, he got through the surgery fine, there were no complications. Thankfully, and 24 hours later, our four-year-old dog died. And you know, Melanie, it was something about the dog dying that brought everything to a stop.

SPEAKER_01 12:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:48

And, you know, that seems like really that over heart surgery or crazy like nope. Because it was something that was completely final. Like the dog's not coming back, and it was a freak accident. He ate a squeaker out of one of those chew toys. This is my P PSA to, you know, chew toys, be very careful. And we couldn't save him. And the primal cry that that came out of my body when I hung up with the vet when they had told us, you know, you need to come say your goodbyes, this is where it is. I've never experienced that before. And and that changed me. And so I left the job at the magazine. And I took a year off. And uh my son he had just started college and he also dropped out. And we just had to do a reset at home, you know, we had to do a reset and we had to really evaluate what was important to us. And so now I'm thinking, okay, well, my son's grown, so now I could go to LA, I could go to New York and work for one of the big magazines. Like, what if I could work for Vogue? It was very easily within my grasp. And I went and I did some interviews, but then I realized if I if I took any if I was offered any job, I would have to move. And the idea of leaving the Pacific Northwest, no. The idea of moving away from my parents that are aging, no. The idea of moving to a new town and re-networking all over again, no. That is a young person's game. I mean, I still network now, don't get me wrong, but like I have a very solid network, both local, regional, and national. Yeah. But I like the idea of going to a new town and starting that all over again, it's exhausting. It's exhausting. And I was like, nope, that's not it either. So, okay, I'm staying here. I'm not leaving, but there's not like another magazine I'm gonna go work at. So what am I gonna do? You know? So I looked at the tech sector and thought, well, maybe this is my opportunity to break into tech, you know. It wasn't, it wasn't. Tech is not ready for me, I don't think, as much as I'm not ready for it. But then an opportunity came up with King Five, the local NBC station. Um, and I had partnered with them at the magazine on a few things over the years, and I knew the director of sales, and I just really respected who she was as a woman professionally. And then when I got to know her, I obviously respected her as a woman personally too. But I just she I've had a handful of really incredible leaders that I have worked for over the years, and Jessica Hagging, shout out to you. You're definitely one of them. And so I started there as the director of business development, and I got to work in the advertising department. I also got to work in the marketing department, and I got to work on the local lifestyle shows. But everything I do is through the lens of how do we monetize it and how do we get results for clients in non-traditional ways. And um, I loved it. It was so much fun to work. It's it wasn't really any different than a magazine. It was just all now like in video form versus in a page form. So the deadlines were different and the prices were different, but um, a lot of the players and a lot of the types of ways that you navigate through that world were very similar, and I really enjoyed it. And that's where I was when the pandemic hit. Yeah. I think we all remember where we were when that pandemic hit, right? Like um, it's just one of those like moments in time where you don't forget. And so we all got moved to work from home. You know, the first couple of months, I don't really know. I like everybody else, I didn't know what was going on. I didn't know how long we're gonna be there. And because my son and I both have these health issues, and there was we didn't know so much, which I don't even know if we still do, but uh, we were being very careful. Yes, I was one of the people wiping down my groceries, right? Like we were not going anywhere, like we were being very, very, very, very careful. And so, you know, I was playing with Legos, I was diamond painting, I was I watched all of Netflix, but uh a couple months in, I was like, you know, I have been given this gift of time, and I had had this idea that I had never slowed my life down long enough to do. Maybe now's the time. Why don't you why don't I just try? Because I don't want to look back at this gift of time however long it it is or was going to be and think that I wasted it, right? So my third first thought was, I'm gonna write the book I always thought I wanted to write. But you know, okay, the book is still not done. There's several chapters, but it's still definitely not done. And there's not immediate gratification in a book because it's such a long process. So that was idea number one. It's still in the works. Idea number two was to start a lifestyle magazine like the one I ran in Seattle, but all of the content was through the lens of sobriety or recovery. But I had noticed over the last decade is that that that when I got sober, it was a very anonymous community. There were, you know, there were very limited books at Barnes and Noble. Podcasts weren't a thing, social media was just getting started. And so I didn't use any of the things that are available today because they weren't there. They literally weren't there. So as I've seen them come online, they're great. I've looked at some stuff, but they didn't really speak to me because a lot of it is targeted at people that are sober curious or early sobriety, which is great. If it had existed when I got sober, I probably would have consumed some, if not all, of it. But it didn't speak to me as a woman in long-term recovery. But I still, there are topics that I still love to talk about as a sober woman. And I love talking about sobriety in the workplace, rethinking drinking in the workplace, especially with people managers. Like, stop making all of your culture-building, team-building activities surrounding alcohol. Like, stop. Stop. You're you're offending a third of your workforce for whatever reason. Stop, you know. And so, and I'm not against alcohol. I can go out with people drinking, it's totally fine. I just can't consume it, right? It's like having an allergy or being gluten-free or dairy-free. Like, I can't have it, period. So, um, so that's when I decided to launch the sober curator. And I had taught myself WordPress, I had taught myself graphic design, I've never considered myself a writer, but I'm clearly a talker. So I was like, I'll just talk the way I'll just write the way that I talk, and it'll be fine, you know?

SPEAKER_01 19:18

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 19:18

But I also knew that if I was gonna make this ultimate archive, because I'm also obsessed with pop culture, I'm obsessed with lifestyle, because that's the genre I've been in for decades. And so I'm gonna need other people's opinion. I have great taste, but I'm not for everyone. I'm not everybody's cup of tea, right? And I'm gonna want people with different perspectives, different backgrounds, different cultures, different pathways to sobriety. If I'm going to make this ultimate archive for the community at large, it's got to be represented by the community at large. Oh, but I can't pay anyone because I'm bootstrapping the whole thing myself, and I don't really want to monetize it, and I don't want to pay people to use it. So it's pretty much just a big labor of love, is how it started. Now, five and a half years later, we've had over 50 contributors over the years. We currently have 30 active contributors. Most of them are in the United States. There are a couple in Canada, they are very nice, and there are. I love Canadians. The Canadians are so nice. They're amazing. And the ones in the UK have accents, so pretty much I give them anything they want. Love it. And there's one new gal in Portugal, and she's a hoot. But and we meet once a month online. It's a very, you know, it's not like we're meeting every week or anything. We meet once a week, uh, once a month online. Uh, we talk about, you know, collaborations with each other, the trends that we're seeing, and we just support each other as content creators. I prefer that over influencer. I don't really love the word influencer. Um, and we just are trying to show that sobriety is evolving and it's fun. Because I got so tired of people telling me, oh, you're sober. Your life must be so boring. And it's like, no, boring is what it was. It's very much not boring now. And so, yeah, we're having a blast. And it we've built, we've built quite an audience.

SPEAKER_00 21:07

What an incredible journey. I mean, I just had goosebumps listening to you, and there's so many parts of your story that really resonate very deeply with me. I mean, you know, I'm a fellow woman in recovery. Um, and I know so many of our listeners are gonna feel the same about your story. I was thinking about your comment about working with managers on the drinking in the workplace, and we know the r what the rise of addiction is looking like now. And so to play that role as a leader inside an organization is risky when you're encouraging that kind of behavior. It's not like it used to be. Addiction is getting worse and worse. So there's so many beautiful, valid things that you had to say. The other thing I was thinking as you were sharing is about the work addiction. Definitely I can relate to that as well. You've had so many resets, transitions where you've just completely restarted yourself with, and I know. Because I do so much work in that space around transition and how hard that is for people to be able to do some of the things that you've done like many, many times, make full transitions into new things or new completely transform yourself into a new area that you didn't know before. When you think about your identity and all the different roles you play, um, are there masks that you felt like you had to wear or shields that you had to put up when you were going through your career and your life? For me, work addiction was another mask. And there was so much underneath that. We could probably have an entire episode just on work addiction. Which are the ones that stand out for you that maybe even you still wear from time to time or pick up or that you'd like to share?

SPEAKER_02 22:44

Well, two come to mind right off the bat, because I think I will I will have them forever. I know. One is using humor to deflect, right? And using humor to keep everybody out here. And I have this ability within a very short period of time to make people feel so comfortable, think that we're now best friends and we're about to go get matching tattoos. It's just what happens. And I mean I mean it authentically. It's not a game, it's not a wreck. I it's just how I show up in the world. But I do that with so many people, and I know it's because I don't actually want to let anyone get too close, right? Now, I say that and I do really have like 20-something best, best, best friends. Like I do. I have an incredible village of very strong women that are rider dies, and I'm so forth fortunate for that. But I know I know that I do that. I know that I I because I don't if anybody gets too close, they might see who I really am, and then they won't like me, you know? Because of course I care what people think, of course there's codependency. Like, I'm sorry, if you have a pulse, you're dealing with that. And I grew up in a very simple home in a small town, right? Not a lot of money, still don't have a lot of money. Dropped out of college. That was another thing, is I'm not smart enough. I'm not smart enough to be in this room.

SPEAKER_01 24:12

Ditto.

SPEAKER_02 24:13

And I don't have the degrees, so tech world will never have me. I'll never even get past, you know, the hiring people because I don't have things on my resume. Even though I might have years of experience that they would benefit from, I don't have certain things, and I'm not gonna lie about it either. So there's that, and then it also spawned into keeping up with the Joneses. Worked a good lifestyle, and so that is an appearance, that is an aesthetic, and so and I have had the great fortune of rolling with incredible people, rubbing elbows with lots of people that are well off, celebrities, all those things. And so I always wanted to look the part, like look that I fit in. And I'm scrappy AF. You have to be if you're a single mom. You have to be. You don't have a choice. So I can make a little look like a lot, but I'm also incredibly compulsive and have had a shopping addiction on and off over the years, right? And so, uh and then when you're single, you don't have anyone to tell you to not do something because there's nobody holding you accountable, right? Your kids not certainly not gonna be like, I don't think we need any more gaming toys. Like that's not gonna happen. So, you know, those are things where it's uh there they are really just desperate moves to fit in that work for me a lot of the time. So then that that's where the facade comes in, is that they're always gonna work. And that's not true. Yeah, that's not true.

SPEAKER_00 25:36

Yeah. I mean, that was such an amazing presentation. I, you know, I usually have probing questions for those around like what's underneath it or what, and you just like went through the flow because you're very self-aware, as we are in recovery, to self-diagnose like what's underneath that and what's underneath that mask, and why am I wearing that mask, especially around what you were saying with keeping up with the Joneses and not feeling smart enough. Those are similar masks that I have that I put on from time to time. And the recognition of what's underneath it is such a valuable asset that you have. You have so many moments in your story, defining moments. When, you know, in in recovery, we call it moments of clarity. But even when you were talking about your dog dying, I just was so struck by that. If you think about authenticity and, you know, who you really are and who you want to be, um, and kind of coming home to yourself, what are the moments that stand out for you that really shifted you to get you to where you are today?

SPEAKER_02 26:40

That's a really great question. I'm glad you asked that question. I can say today, as a woman who recently turned 50 with a son who recently turned 29, I have never been as comfortable in as my own skin as I am in this moment. And that doesn't mean I'm totally comfortable, to be clear. But like I, you know, I being single forever, there's a lot of games, head games that come in there too. Because I can't tell you how many times people have been like, so why are you single? How am I supposed to answer that question? I don't I'm crazy. Like, what do you want? Well, like I don't know. Like, don't you think if I knew maybe I would do something about it? So um, so at a certain point I had to stop chasing that because that didn't work, because I ended up with a lot of what I didn't want, right? And I had to be like, no, you're the one person you're in a relationship with for the rest of your life is you. Fall in love with you first and only worry about that. And but I didn't make that decision until like probably a decade ago. So I chased a tail, so to speak, for a long time. And that kept me from really dealing dealing with the layers underneath. And I think it'll always be a process. There'll always be things I'm peeling back, but I also just care less about what other about other people think. I mean, some people I care what they think because I value them and I that and I trust their opinion and I know they want what's best for me. But most everybody else, I don't care. And I've always said this with the sober curator. People come on, they if they don't like it, it's it's not for you. It's not for you. Move along, thank you. Next, like I I can't I can't let myself be impacted by what other people think about me. And I also can't keep comparing my insides to other people's outsides.

SPEAKER_01 28:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:34

Right? So there's just a piece that has happened in the last couple of years of slowing down, being more intentional, saying no. Yeah, yeah. And sometimes I still say yes to things I don't want to do. I do that.

SPEAKER_01 28:55

Yeah, me too.

SPEAKER_02 28:57

And quite honestly, when I have plans and somebody cancels them, could not be happier. Like I'm like, oh my god, I love you. But no, like I think part of it's aging, sure. Part of it's aging, and I do think it's it is when you have defining moments like emergency heart surgery. I also had had cancer in 2018. And so when you have things like that, or when you see your child is very sick and you're and you realize that mortality is bound to happen, and you really start to value what you do have right now. And you know, I live in a community where we do it one day at a time. I have taken that a bit too literal because I'm like, who cares about saving for the future? I'm living today. So I'm not saying that's totally the way to go, but there is a lot of relief in in being in the moment and just fully being in the moment and not missing it by just staring at your screen the whole time.

SPEAKER_00 29:55

Yeah. Looking too far forward and too far back. Yeah. That when we're in the present moment, it's freeing. We can be an acceptance if we're here right now. I love that. Are there emotions or parts of you that really stand out from some of these pivotal experiences that you've had?

SPEAKER_02 30:15

Well, I do deal with diagnosed depression and PTSD. And right now I'm in a great place. Things are very boring and balanced, but I'm not always there, you know? And I didn't realize that I was dealing with these things prior to getting sober because I wasn't sober, so I didn't know because I was so heavily medicated. But around four or five years of in sobriety, that's when I realized I needed extra help more than just talk therapy, more than just other therap other tools I've used in recovery. I needed more help than that. I needed medications. And and the medications work great when you work with somebody who is a physician and you follow them as directed, right? Something about following the rules, you'll get the right results. But I can't tell you why. But sometimes the refilling of the pill boxes is a very overwhelming task to me. And I try to do them a month at a time because it's so overwhelming. And sometimes it'll be like, I just won't do it, and then I'll just go off my meds. And the first day I'll be fine, second day I'll be fine. And I'm not talking about just my mental health meds, I'm talking about my heart meds, I'm talking about all my meds, right?

SPEAKER_01 31:22

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 31:24

And then if I'm not paying attention two weeks and I'm like falling off like a ski ski, and I've done that more than once. It doesn't make sense, but I do do it. And I have a friend who texts me every day, and we have accountability if I've taken them or not. Like I've put all these things in to set myself up for success, but I still trip myself up. And I used to really have a lot of shame and guilt around the depression as if it was something I could control with just a little bit of willpower. And it's it's not that.

SPEAKER_00 31:55

Or a little bit more recovery, just do more of do a little bit more. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:00

Yeah, it's not that. It's not that.

SPEAKER_01 32:02

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 32:03

You know, I don't need to be sponsoring 15 women, you know. Like, I don't need to be going to eight meetings a day. Like everything needs to be in balance. I got sober because things were so out of balance. So everything needs to be in balance now. And it's hard to keep everything in balance at the same time. Currently, my crafting is a bit unbalanced. I am bedazzling anything that stands still for more than five minutes. I can't stop. I love it. Rhinestones and glue are making me very happy, right?

SPEAKER_01 32:33

I love it.

SPEAKER_02 32:34

And then that that will pass and there'll be something else. That obsession or that addiction is not hurting me right now. And also, some of you should probably buy stock in like Michael's and and stuff because I'm definitely supporting the economy.

SPEAKER_00 32:48

I feel that way about Nordstrom.com, actually.

SPEAKER_02 32:50

Oh, I love Nordstrom.

SPEAKER_00 32:52

I think the message you're sending here is so important. You know, I you probably agree with me, but I feel like as a fellow woman in long-term sobriety, we experienced a time when there was, I mean, even in the world, not just in recovery, that there's so much stigmatism around mental health. And then in recovery, it's kind of drilled into our head that we use recovery to solve stuff. And so I'm always so happy when somebody's willing to talk about their mental health journey and what they've done to get help. Uh, because it's so important. It's so important that we take care of ourselves in that way, including taking medication. And I have seen so many people suffer for way too long trying to do a bunch of stuff, um, whether it's in recovery or just read this other book or do more steps or go to more meetings to try to address mental health when you know we have chemical imbalances that have to be treated. So kudos to you for a your willingness to do that, and B, to talk about it so openly because we need to. That's how we start to break down that stigmatism to encourage people to get the help when they need to. I feel like we tough it out a little bit more than we need to.

SPEAKER_02 34:01

Yeah, I you know, I a year ago, was it a year ago, two years ago, whatever the time was, doesn't matter. I was at my 30th high school reunion. Okay. And this gal came up to me and she was like, you know, you really, you really put a lot of your life out there. I was like, Yeah, more than others, for sure. She's like, No, but like, you really put a lot out there. And it didn't sound like a compliment. Yeah. Right? Like, I wasn't picking up compliment vibes.

SPEAKER_01 34:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:26

And um, and I said, Yeah, I do. And possibly do I regret some of it? Maybe, I don't know, maybe I will in the future. There's a couple things that I've said where my mom actually did listen, and I was like, she probably should have heard that from me first, right? Like, I've definitely made mistakes at full speed, right? But the old Elise would have let that comment fester, right? But the Elise in that moment and the Elise today was you also don't know how many people have slid into my DMs and I've been able to help. Worth it. Worth it if it was only one.

SPEAKER_00 35:01

Yeah, and for sure. Look at people like Brene Brown that are famous for the work she's done around shame and vulnerability and how important it is that we do that.

SPEAKER_02 35:12

And then every time a woman?

SPEAKER_00 35:14

Yeah, she is a sober woman.

SPEAKER_02 35:16

Have you ever had anyone tell you that your voice sounds like her?

SPEAKER_00 35:19

I have had people tell me that. It totally does.

SPEAKER_02 35:22

I was sitting here going, oh my god, it's like I have my own little Brene Brown right here.

SPEAKER_00 35:25

Yeah, uh, it's the it's the fellow Texan. Um, I've lost I've lost a lot of my Texas twang, but I definitely have some of that in me, which I think is where that comes from. But I have had people say that. I take it as a big compliment. I do girl crush on her quite a bit, so is a I'm very flattered. But I just, wow, what an incredible journey you've had. I mean, you've just done so much in your life. And I knew that I was gonna love our conversation because it's just so easy to let it flow. I don't even really have to ask you anything. You just go through it. If you're thinking about key learnings from all these different experiences, because there's been so many. What have you learned the most about yourself? You talked about shame too, which is like that alone is such a um shame is not the yeah. I mean, it's not in the big book anywhere either, the word shame. You know, many of us suffer with that for so long, needlessly.

SPEAKER_02 36:18

I can sit here and tell you a list of all the things that were done to me or happened to me that wronged me. I also have a pretty big list of things that I've done that I'm very shameful over, right? Very shameful over. So there's a lot of work that has to be done around that. There was this little lady, Rita B, who was came into my life in my very early, early sobriety days, and she passed a couple years ago with 47 years sober. And she was kind of my rock. Now, she was also very cantankerous at times, to be clear. Like we did not always see eye to eye, but I loved her regardless. And there's so many things that she would say that she instilled in me that now today I use for myself and I use them for friends. And it was like, you know, one of them is I worried and I worried and I worried right up until the time it never happened. Right. And so it's like, why are we obsessing about things in the future that we have no control over? There's no point. That's wasted energy. So when I get caught up in that loop, I have to be like, nope, turn it off, right? Turn it off. So that's definitely one. Another one is, you know, trading what I want the most for what I want right now. That one's hard. That one's really, really, really hard. And so it's little things like that. It's the little habits, and I am not a disciplined person. I don't, I don't have like the whole morning routine or evening routine. Like I'm a little bit of a hot mess. Like I just kind of go through the world and it just all seems to work out. But I and and taking myself less serious. I've also learned that boundaries are important. Boundaries are really important. Yeah. I've dealt with a lot of narcissists in my life in various places. And I'm kind of a magnet for them because I'm easy prey in some ways. And learning to have boundaries and not be afraid to stand up for myself. That's been another big one. I don't do confrontation well. I can handle business confrontation because it's business. But personal confrontation is very hard for me. And I love to blame my parents for this because growing up, they never, ever, ever fought in front of us. We only knew they were mad at each other if they were in their room with the door shut, whispering, right? And you could feel that there was something. And I think that in that moment they thought they were doing right by us. I know they meant well. I know they didn't, but what happened is I never saw confrontation and I never saw the resolution of it, right? And so it's still today something that's really hard for me when it's a personal level. It's really hard for me because I care what people think. And I want to be everybody's favorite.

SPEAKER_01 39:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:10

I just do. Like I can't help it. I I want when people hear my name, be like, ah, I love that girl. Like that's what I'm pretty much all for, you know? But that's what I'm shooting for. But that's not realistic. It's not realistic. And so And but I also have a servant's heart, which I do, I get that from my parents, and I'm very blessed that I have gotten that from my parents because to this day, if somebody calls and is in need and help, I mean, they got the keys, they're on the way. Like they just go and they don't expect anything in return. And I got that from them. And as long as there's not anyone in my life taking advantage of that, it's actually a really great trait. I think I got way off from your original question, but no, it was perfect.

SPEAKER_00 39:53

I was thinking about what you said, I forget her name, your your mentor with 40 set. Yeah. Um, about our worries not coming true. And I read a study on this, so there's actual science to support this, that it's something like less than 10% of our fears actually uh come true. The other thing the study said is that the outcomes of the ones that actually did happen are far better um than we ever could have anticipated. So the thing that we're worrying about probably isn't gonna come true. Is that like 90% of the things that we worry about actually don't come true. Um, and so that is affirming, right? That we spend so much time in fear. Why fear that thing?

SPEAKER_02 40:40

This is definitely a gift of age. It might be a little bit of self-work for sure, but this is definitely a gift of age, is when you look back and you look at all the things that you thought you really wanted that you didn't get, thank God I didn't get those things. For sure. Because I got way better and I wouldn't have ever dreamed big enough. Yeah. Or I go to Facebook and I'm like, whoo, dodged a bullet with that guy, right? Thank God you don't get what you want. There's a reason for it. So instead of having a penny party, right? Yeah, like it's just not worth the energy because you don't know. You don't know. And I even had a really close friend the other day, you know, her her ex um, her ex-husband has started dating someone and has introduced them to their kids, and she's very upset about it. I'm like, yeah, but what happens if you end up really liking her and you guys become great co-parents? What about she's like, that's never gonna happen. I'm like besties with my with my son's stepmom. She's great. Like, I will say the one thing that that his dad had in common was knew how to pick a classy lady, knew how to pick a great gal, you know? So, like, you don't know, you just don't know.

SPEAKER_00 41:45

Yeah, it's so true. We we have no idea what the future is gonna hold, and we spend way too much work time either worrying about what's gonna happen or worry about what happened back there. So it's like back to your point about being in the present. And wear nice shoes. That's all you have to do. Be where your feet are and wear nice shoes. Shoes don't shoe sizes don't change. So it's like they don't change. They are the thing in the whole world.

SPEAKER_02 42:09

Well, when you're pregnant, they can change a little, but mostly outside of that, they stay the same. So that's a good and if you want to know where my investment is, some people have 401ks, I have a shoe closet.

SPEAKER_00 42:19

Me too. Me too. Although I had to get rid of the heels, but that's a whole other story.

SPEAKER_02 42:23

That's yeah, no, heels are over. It's fine.

SPEAKER_00 42:24

Yeah, it's fine. Um aside from that, because that alone is an insightful message to our listeners. Um, what are things that we didn't cover or any words of wisdom for our listeners based on your story that you want to make sure you hit on before we wrap up?

SPEAKER_02 42:43

I think if you're listening and you are sober, like I'm a big advocate of that getting sober matters if you need to, staying sober matters more. So, like, but it'll ebb and flow and it won't always be easy because your problems, you'll still have them, they'll just be classier, right? So keep going. Like, keep going. The better days are ahead, even when you're in the storm. For people that are not sober and don't need to be, be a good sober ally. Like, I have some of the best sober allies that are so supportive of me, and they also know they can have a drink in front of me and nothing bad's gonna happen. You know what I'm saying? And so be a good sober ally. Um, I think is really important because we s we all need to work together to chip away at this stigma. And there's like when we talk about inclusivity on other topics, let's just inclusivity for everything, for all 100%. I know it's not gonna ever happen, but can we just try, right?

SPEAKER_00 43:37

Can we just try? Absolutely. I think that is like a message that our listeners need to hear because for 30 years of working inside companies, once I fully came out about being in recovery, I was, or once people learned that I didn't drink, I was uninvited to stuff.

SPEAKER_02 43:54

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:55

And what's funny about that, if those people had any clue what I was like when I drank. They'd probably be including me on the invite, but we need to go to that stuff. You know, we can have a club soda in a lime and fit right in with all the drinkers. But I think there's an assumption.

SPEAKER_02 44:08

Yeah, well, there's an assumption, and to pret to also stand up for people that do that. I think they think they're doing right by us. Like they're doing us a favor. But I've also had it where it's like, okay, we have all these tickets to this wine gala out in Woodenville. Let's not give a ticket to Elise because she doesn't drink it would be a waste of a ticket. Excuse me? Right? So, so you're not doing us any favors. We're fine. We're adults. We can handle it. We've already been to hell. So we've got it. Right? We've got it. If you're uncomfortable, that's that's a you thing, and you need to look at that. So, you know, I think that the conversations are happening, and I definitely think alcohol is having cigarette cigarette moment that happened a decade ago, right? People still smoke, which means people are still gonna drink in the future, but it's gonna be less because more and more scientific evidence is coming out on what it does to your body, and people are starting to care more about their bodies, right? And more about their health, and that's factoring in. And so, but everybody's addicted to something. Yeah take their phone away and remove their TikTok and they'll freak out, right? It's true. Way too much. So the whole world is addicted now. The whole world is addicted, so we're all the same. So why can't we all just be inclusive?

SPEAKER_00 45:18

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Amazing.

SPEAKER_02 45:20

We don't like everybody, we but we do have to be respectful.

SPEAKER_00 45:22

Yes, for sure. That's a great message. There are just so many things that um that you share today that tie so nicely to what I'm trying to do with my podcast. Um, just I could go on and on and the messages that you sent and what you've been through and your story in general. I knew it was gonna be amazing. And I just want to thank you so much for your willingness to come on and share your story and be so vulnerable and open about everything. I know it sparked a lot for me and was very meaningful to me. And hopefully it sparked a little bit for you too, because I just appreciate you so much, and it was truly an honor. So thank you.

SPEAKER_02 45:58

Well, thank you. And I love again, because I'm so visual, I love thinking about my life or my emotions, like my neighborhood and what that looks like. And so I'm gonna take that with me for sure.

SPEAKER_00 46:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:11

For sure.

SPEAKER_00 46:12

I love the street art um story. That was that was really cool. So thank you so much, Elise, and we will definitely have fun putting all this together and putting it out there for our listeners because it's gonna be a great episode. So thanks again for your time. Oh, you're so welcome. Thank you for joining us today. As you head back in your day, we invite you to notice what's happening in your own neighborhood, at work, at home, or inside yourself. Change often starts close to home. And sometimes the smallest shift in awareness can create the biggest ripple. If something in today's conversation stayed with you, we'd love for you to carry it forward and share it with someone else who might need it too. And if you're finding value in these conversations, it would mean a lot to us if you subscribed and left a review. We're just getting started, and your support really helps us grow the community. Until next time, take care of yourself and each other.