Stop Drinking and Start Living- The Feminine Way

How to Support a Loved One Through Addiction (Without Losing Yourself) with Amber Hollingsworth

• Mary Wagstaff

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What happens when your sobriety collides with a loved one’s addiction? In this episode, I talk with addiction specialist Amber Hollingsworth about how to support someone struggling without enabling, the truth about boundaries, and how to protect your own wellbeing in the process.

What happens when I’m navigating my own sobriety while someone I love is still caught in addiction’s grip?

In this episode, I sit down with addiction specialist Amber Hollingsworth, founder of Put the Shovel Down, to talk about what it really looks like to support a loved one through addiction without losing yourself in the process.

Amber shares why the belief that “you can’t help until they want it” keeps families stuck, the powerful difference between boundaries and rules, and how anger and control can actually fuel addiction. With 20+ years of experience, she brings a compassionate, strength-based approach that focuses on what is working instead of only on the problems.

I also open up about my own experience discovering a partner’s hidden addiction—the betrayal, confusion, and self-doubt it created—and Amber breaks down the psychology behind denial and delusion so you can finally understand what’s really happening in your loved one’s mind.

✨ You’ll hear:

  • How to support loved ones without enabling
  • Why boundaries protect you (and why they’re not rules)
  • The sneaky ways anger and control can actually backfire
  • Why women in over-functioning roles often turn to substances as an escape valve
  • How reclaiming your feminine energy shifts the entire dynamic

If you’ve ever felt responsible for carrying the weight of someone else’s addiction, this conversation will give you the clarity and tools to protect your own wellbeing.

✨ Don’t miss the free resource in the show notes: 60 Seconds to Calm — the same quick practice I use to ground myself in moments of overwhelm.

About Amber Hollingsworth

Amber Hollingsworth is a Licensed Professional Counselor, Master Addiction Counselor, and the founder of the popular YouTube channel Put the Shovel Down. With over 20 years of experience, she specializes in helping families understand addiction, create effective boundaries, and support recovery without falling into enabling patterns. Her strength-based, practical approach empowers families to stop feeling helpless and start creating meaningful change.

Connect with Amber:

Find relief in less time than it takes to pour a drink. Click here to get your guide.

  • nervous system–calming phrases to instantly shift your perspective
  • A simple yet profound tool to use when you feel that "screw it" moment rising
  • A sneak peek into how The Sacred Pause Method helps you create freedom without deprivation

DISCLAIMER: This podcast and its contents are not a substitute for rehabilitation, medical treatment or advice. It is for educational and inspirational purposes. I am not a therapist or doctor. The views here are expressed a personal opinion and based on first hand experience. Please consult a doctor if your mental or physical health is at risk.

Mary Wagstaff:

Welcome to Stop Drinking and Start Living the Feminine Way. I'm your hostess, mary Wagstaff, holistic Alcohol Coach and Feminine Embodiment Guide, here to help you effortlessly release alcohol by reclaiming your feminine essence. Sobriety isn't just about quitting drinking. It's about removing the distortions that keep you disconnected, overwhelmed and stuck in cycles of numbing. Each week, I'll share powerful tools, new perspectives that transform, and deeply relatable stories to help you step into the power, pleasure and purpose that it is to be a woman. This is your next evolution of awakened empowerment. Welcome to the Feminine Way. Welcome back to the show. My beautiful listeners, thank you so much for being here. I hope that you are doing amazing and that today's episode can help you feel even better. Today's a really special episode. Actually. It really is one that is very personal and near and dear to my heart.

Mary Wagstaff:

Not only do I not do interviews often, but I don't typically talk to other professionals in the sphere of sobriety and addiction, but Amber Hollingsworth, who I interviewed on today's show, is a resource that I actually sought out. She has an amazing YouTube channel called Put the Shovel Down, and we talk all about it on the show, and her expertise, in addition to helping people through their sobriety recovery journeys is really helping loved ones and family members on the other side of addiction, and the reason I think this is so important to talk about is because you might be that person. I am that person. Oftentimes, if we have been in a relationship to alcohol or to any other substance, chances are that we know someone else that also is, and there are varying degrees of addiction and recovery and sobriety and the whole gamut right. There isn't a one-size-fits-all thing. So when we get, we know what has worked for us through the journey of sobriety, but we are also probably dealing with other people in our lives, loved ones, that have addictions as well, and so it's really important, when you get to that place, to know how to A protect your own sobriety, but also how to interact with people that you love that may not be in the same place as you are, and to keep an open mind that, if you are this person who may be in the place of a deeper place of addiction right now, that there may be loved ones in your life that you are impacting, and so this doesn't come with any shame or with any judgment, but from a place of the willingness to really open your mind and really open your heart and to see beyond what the limitations of our own personal experience can be, and that's a really hard thing to do.

Mary Wagstaff:

But the way that we make any change whether it's in a relationship with ourselves, with habits is we have to generate more awareness. We have to see the story from a new perspective, because if we only ever see it from the narrow confines of our own limited perspective, then we can't ever create something new. So I share a lot of personal information in this podcast and I really hope this serves. I would love to have a conversation with you about this, so feel free to email me. Let me know what you took away from the show. All of the information is in the show notes.

Mary Wagstaff:

So Amber Hollingsworth has spent the last 15 years committed to helping families recover their loved ones from addiction and, after working in inpatient for almost 10 years, she became disillusioned with the factory-like process used to deal with mental health and addiction issues. So in this way and we talk about this on the show we are coming at this from more of a strength-based perspective versus. This is a declaration of being broken, that we all can become addicted, no matter who we are, and that when we look at what's working, who we are and what strengths we do have, that we can lean on those to find solutions, versus just always focusing on the problem. So please check out her YouTube channel, put the Shovel Down. It is chock full of resources, it's extremely impressive and I've spent many hours there getting support for myself and I hope that this serves have a beautiful day. So Amber has this amazing YouTube channel, amongst other things, called Put Down the Shovel Put the Shovel Down, sorry. So tell us about that, tell us what you do and all all of the things.

Amber Hollingsworth:

All right, Well, by trade.

Amber Hollingsworth:

I guess I am a licensed mental health counselor and a master addiction counselor, and so I've been helping people overcome addiction for more than 20 years now a long time. I feel really old when I say that and I started the YouTube channel back in 2016,. Really got into it in 2018. Like, I really really started doing it, trying to help not just reach people who have addictions, but specifically trying to reach people who have loved ones who have addictions, because I would constantly be getting calls. You know, like I want my loved one to come see you but I don't even know how to get them in there. Or you know they don't think they have a problem or they don't want to get help. And I spent a lot of time coaching families on you know how to interact with someone who has an addiction and what's helpful and what's not, and so often families are the ones looking for help and everywhere they go, people just kind of give them the message of

Amber Hollingsworth:

well, there's nothing you can do and you just have to wait until they decide they want it for themselves and maybe they'll hit a bottom and figure it out. And for a lot of people that's just not, that's not an acceptable answer. If that's your kid or your partner or your, you know, like that whole, just cross my fingers and hope for the best. Just you know there's gotta be something else, and so a lot of what I do on YouTube is helping families figure that out.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And then what happens from from after YouTube?

Amber Hollingsworth:

like people find you and how else do they engage with you. Well, I don't do counseling anymore because of YouTube, because these days we talk to people all over the world and mostly it's consultations. So we do a lot of consultations with family members. We have some online courses, like. We have an online course called the Invisible.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Intervention which teaches family members how to get through to someone, and I still do some recovery coaching, but it's a strengths-based perspective. So it's like looking at what's right with you, not just what's wrong with you, and kind of how to redirect your energy in a way that works for you.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, I love that, and that's my mission over here too is to really every single client that I work with in the our, for the first question I always ask them is what's working and what are you celebrating? And that's why I asked you to, because if we're focused on the positive, then everything else from there can be like, oh, there's a new perspective here. Right, there's, there's openness for a new perspective. So, yeah, I'm so impressed with your YouTube channel. It's something that I've thought about for many years and I'm like, oh my gosh, it seems so daunting, but thank you so much for the work you do. So, moving on, this is actually how I first found Amber, before there was even this question of a potential collaboration with her coming on the show, and the reason I said yes to having Amber on the show was to support you all, to support the listeners here more, because it is something that I don't coach on regularly Now, of course, I do coach on a woman's mindset and, if her partner is still drinking, how she can show up for herself around that, but I do believe there is a spectrum of addiction, use and dependency, and it is just not something I talk about a lot, and not only is it A important, if the individual has had their own addiction, their own relationship with alcohol or any other substances, that they need to have that perspective too, because the way that they showed up to release alcohol is going to might be very different from the way that, say, their partner is doing it.

Mary Wagstaff:

So I'll just kind of briefly give this little scenario is that this was a dynamic happening in my own personal relationship where my partner and I had partied together, we drank together and really it's been an alcohol-free home and a substance-free home, since I've not been drinking With like the occasional, like. I kind of knew he had had a couple of moments with alcohol, but I came to find out actually this just happened a few months ago and it's still been pretty rocky, kind of rocked my nervous system that he had been using a substance called Kratom or some people call it Kratom for the last six years and I knew about this on and off, but I didn't know the extent of it and I knew that there was like this major detox happening. But it came to a head and there was, like you know, lying and deceit. You know what fell is like deceit and it's so. It's something you can take very, very personally, and there was a lot of I'm sure you have the words for it a lot of denial on the other end of it and a lot of like this is my life. It's not illegal, it's like it was very delusional, almost felt like he had like died in a way the, the, the. It was very experience the way he was communicating with me.

Mary Wagstaff:

So I went down a little rabbit hole of support and you really were the one that I found many, many of your videos so so helpful. So, yeah, can you maybe just talk a little bit to the audience If someone right now is in that space, like they're, they're working on their own, even if it's not sobriety, but they're working on just their own life, being the best version of themselves, and they, you know, they're interacting or finding even that state specifically with someone that's, you know, in the state of denial.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Right. Well, if you're, if you're in recovery, recovery yourself or figuring it out yourself, whatever you're at with that, it may seem like, well, you've already figured all that out, so you would know exactly what to do. But that's not always the case, because you can run into a couple of extra roadblocks if you're in recovery.

Amber Hollingsworth:

One is the people in your life can feel like oh, just because you did it doesn't mean you should push that on us so they can have like a resistance to hearing what you have to say because you're in recovery and that's frustrating. The other thing is is because you've been there, you know what you're looking at and so you're even more worried and you want them to figure it out and you realize how much better you feel. So there's even more pressure to get through to this person and pull them over to your, your side of the street or your side. You know your way of thinking and so there's a pressure about that. But in my experience, whether you're in recovery or not, you have all the same reactions when you have a loved one struggling.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yes.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Very instinctual and everything you know kind of goes out of the window. You're scared, You're watching your loved one, like, run towards this cliff and destroy their life oftentimes destroying yours with them and there's a panic that sets in.

Mary Wagstaff:

Well, and I think what was even more upsetting was this kind of lap, this lapse of reality where, you know, we've had tons, tons of conversations about alcohol and how we're so glad we're on the other side of it, and the distortions and the delusions. And you know, I would say, like I was I always say I was, I was addicted to alcohol and I'm not addicted to alcohol anymore. It's like completely irrelevant in my life. It's like being a vegan or something. If I, you know people like I just don't want it. And so we've had so many of those conversations and to hear this, yeah, this like denial and this real absence of reality present. Can you talk a little bit about what's happening there in that mindset, because that wasn't anything that I ever experienced and typically I don't experience with my clients, because they're already coming here, they've already accepted that they want to change.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Well, I think when you, the further someone is in an addiction, the more like delusional they get it's the best way I know how to describe it and that happens for several reasons. A couple are just basic meaning they're interacting with the world in one of two states. They're either intoxicated changes how you filter the universe or they're in withdrawal, which? Also filters, how you're taking in information.

Amber Hollingsworth:

So the way you're perceiving things around you is altered all the time. So you've got that layer happening, which is big. But you also have another layer of you're. You're in this when you're struggling addiction. You're in this constant state of planning, scheming, using, hiding it, hiding the paraphernalia, and it eats up all of your mental space pretty much and simultaneously you have a lot of shame and guilt. You're making all these promises to yourself, you're breaking all these promises to yourself and you start to do these other psychological defense mechanisms to protect against the shame and the guilt, which is you get very focused on like resentment, self-pity or everything else Everyone else is doing wrong.

Amber Hollingsworth:

So it's like a separate kind of self-medicating Mm. Hmm, since the Medicaid, one thing, but then I'm mad at myself for doing that. So then I'm psychologically getting deeper and deeper and deeper into these defense mechanisms as a way of not seeing what's really going on in my own life. So when you're dealing with someone in the state, you'll know you are because you have this instinct. You want to grab them by the shoulders and just shake them. When you have that feeling, then you know that's what you're dealing with, because you're like, are we looking at the same picture? And it's just, it's kind of maddening.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, it was really like, like I said, it really felt like he had died in some way, like the way that he was communicating with me and what, and I'm I'm planning on doing another episode more about the current state, like to what happened, and and a little bit about kratom um itself, because I think that, even though this is a show about alcohol, it's a weird thing that's out there and it's a very unassuming and I think that it's an escalating addiction very quickly that a lot of people don't know about and it's very seems very innocent. So what then? Well, yeah, so I want to come back to this.

Mary Wagstaff:

So there was a lot of deflection on how not necessarily I was the problem, but kind of justifying the use by me stressing him out or my emotional weight on him, right, which was even more like hello, right, like you can handle this, like what am I? You know? So then then there's this, also this guilt on me too, thinking you know like, wow, I mean, who am I? What am I doing? I'm here, I am coaching people, trying to help them, and how you know, am I really impacting this person in this way? Where can I be on my own page and then not showing up for and I'm talking a lot about this on the show now not showing up for my own emotional needs, kind of self-abandoning, and really there was some guilt and blame inside of that as well. So what would you say from that place then? Is the first step for the loved one to do?

Amber Hollingsworth:

well, I think a first step is to sort of take a breath and back up and try to step back in. If you don't have any education on it, just get some education. Listen to a podcast and watch a youtube video, get a book and so you can wrap your head around what's going on. That's going to help you interact with whatever's happening more strategically instead of just emotionally being pulled in, because it's real easy to get in what I call like firefighter mode, which is just dealing with the current crisis of today, and while all that's happening, you're just building more and more frustration, you're exhausting yourself, you're putting your own needs on the back burner.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Usually, if you're dealing with someone who has an addiction, you're taking on way more than your fair share of responsibilities and other things are happening. Addiction you're taking on way more than your fair share of responsibilities and other things are happening, and so you get caught up just living moment by moment and you have to sort of back up, almost like detach from yourself and look at it from up here to get your head around. Let me just back up and look at this whole puzzle instead of just this one little piece today and this little piece tonight and that kind of thing yeah it's really easy to and I hope it's okay that I'm kind of using this example of my own life to exemplify this, because it makes sense to me.

Mary Wagstaff:

You know, you start to play the tape backwards, actually, of like all of this. You know, because and this is the other thing I'm very intuitive, like I had. There was so many times where I blatantly asked the question because this guy was like the Hulk, literally. I'm like how are you doing that right now? It didn't even make sense, like like a beast mode and just all the signs, all the questions all of the year. And you're like, oh my gosh. And so you just start to that starts to escalate in, and so you just start to that starts to escalate in. You know your own emotions too. So this was the first thing I did.

Mary Wagstaff:

I really the state of delusion was what I needed to be validated in, and that was what your videos really helped with that. There there is this process that addicts will go through the denial, the delusion and all that. So I was like, okay, this is normal, it's not me, it's. This is the process. And then I actually and this is what I do for anything, even if it's for myself I'm like, let's get some more information so I can have a new perspective. And then I took it the step back so that I could take myself out of the equation and like, literally not make me part of it at all, cause I'm not the one taking the stuff, I'm not the one lying, I'm not the one doing any of it.

Mary Wagstaff:

So, getting that neutral perspective, and then I phoned a friend this is like my new thing let's phone a friend, cause there's a lot of shame too around that, especially people that know me, know him, know our situation, where you're like. So I had, I felt like I also was very alone, like who can I talk to? That's not gonna judge the situation or hold it against me, but I I did phone a friend and it was good to find someone that felt neutral and I obviously that's why you, your services, exist too, because it's a neutral perspective but that felt really good to just to have be able to share, to get it out, because it was something that I was holding on to by myself for the last six years, you know. So, after the perspective, then what? What happens after that?

Amber Hollingsworth:

Well then I think you have to get a strategy on how you're going to interact in this situation. For most people, the strategy, you know the first thing, is I want to get my loved one out of denial and get them help. That's usually the first thought. Well, actually, let me back up. The first thought is I need to get them to get help and we skip a step, and that step is to figure out where is my loved one in their stages of change. That's the fancy way of saying it, and because once you can figure that out, then we can go back and match our strategies, our interactions with that person, based on their stage of change.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Like, for example, a big mistake people make is if you're dealing with someone who's completely in denial they don't think they have a problem at all and you're talking to them about going to treatment, they're looking at you like you're crazy, lunatic, you're overreacting, and then that destroys your credibility in their eyes. So anything, any opinion you have, anything you have to say, any recommendation, is just automatically just sort of brushed off, as in they just stop listening to you because they think you don't know what you're talking about. They don't think you see the picture very accurately when you're. Usually what's happening is trying to rush the person to figure it out, because you can see it coming for a million miles away and you're like, danger, danger, you know, and you're like, no, this is happening. Your alarms are going off.

Amber Hollingsworth:

But if they're in denial, then your, then your immediate strategies all have to be about how do I get them to start seeing this as a problem. Maybe they're seeing it as a problem, but they don't think it's that big of a problem. You know what do I do? It's sort of looking at where are they at in their stages, not where I want them to be, but where are they really? Your strategy? To that On our channel we talk a lot about, I say you know, I want to get people five steps ahead and once we understand where you are, I can tell you what's going to happen tomorrow and what's going to happen next week and the next week, and we can be two weeks down the road instead of just putting out the fire today. Where are we at? Where are we going to be? What are we going? Grounded?

Mary Wagstaff:

or I work this like okay, I have my hand on this instead of not controlling it, but more like okay, I got a plan, yeah, yeah, that there is, and that's what I tell people too, even for them personally, like there is a process, right, and it's a learning process too. So, even though you're doing it from the other side of the table, the other perspective that, yeah, that it can be one step at a time and you don't have to, like you said, you don't have to be putting out fires. Talk to me a little bit about personal, about self-care for the family, for the loved one, about in like, boundary setting, because that's something that was really important for me and is still. I'm still kind of getting clarity about something. I've been talking a lot more to the people on my, on the podcast here too, because it's really important to know where what is a non-negotiable for us, so that we can then know how to proceed without letting that some that experience completely take over our, our whole life I feel like it's.

Amber Hollingsworth:

It's really almost like two separate things. They're connected but, they're. They're separate. There's self-care and there's boundaries so I think we'll try to take them one at a time, when you have a loved one who's struggling, you get obsessed with fixing that problem. The same way that person is obsessed about, whatever it is they're addicted to.

Amber Hollingsworth:

And then you're in this parallel process. You know they're chasing their addiction and you're chasing them. And it can get to the point where it's just 24-7 takes over everything Mentally. You stop. You know going out with friends. And it can get to the point where it's just 24-7 takes over everything mentally. You stop going out with friends, you stop doing all of your hobbies and interests and activities.

Amber Hollingsworth:

You wake up in the morning. You're checking the bank accounts to see if they've spent money, like every waking second eventually turns into trying to figure out what they're doing today. How do I stop it? Are they lying to me, proving that you know what? You know all this stuff and you have to purposefully decide to take a break from that. You have to, like, turn that off and it's not saying I'm not going to worry about this, but you have to take a break from it. I call it. You know, when you have a front row seat, and especially if the person lives with you, you'll definitely end up in this state. You have to purposefully, even though your instincts don't want to maybe go to yoga class, they may not want to go hang out with friends or want to do the things that keep you centered. You've got to do it.

Amber Hollingsworth:

You've got to like give yourself a break from thinking about it, because you'll just spin out of control and you have to get back to what do I do to? Take care of myself, Not just, like you know, usually when I hear self-care, I think like get a pedicure or something, but that's not what I mean. It's more like keeping yourself grounded, you know do you exercise?

Amber Hollingsworth:

Do you have spiritual activities? Do you have other social friends that fill you up? Do you have passions? It's about reconnecting to those, even though your instincts are trying to shut that down.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, yeah, and everything that you know I teach my clients on how, to you know, release alcohol is a lot of emotional processing and emotional management.

Mary Wagstaff:

So from that perspective, it's it's processing emotions and From that perspective it's processing emotions. And for me, it's knowing that I can separate myself from the equation and be in this neutral witness place, but I can also be in the witnessing of my own experience and not denying myself that too. So that was very important for me and still is very important for me and still is. Because if, yeah, like you were saying, if you're in that front row seat, then things just get compounded and you're in this constant spiral. So when you do take that step away, it's like, oh, life opens up again, because really, in the end, you need to have that perspective that there is more of life, too, than just this one thing, although it hurts really bad, like there's other things going on and you have a child and you have a job and you have all these things that also require your attention and your care and your being healthy. So, yeah, super important, okay, and then what about boundaries? The boundaries.

Amber Hollingsworth:

I feel like boundaries are so big. I know it's its own episode. The place that I always start from is helping people understand what a boundary is. A boundary is not a rule. This is where we get it wrong. We want to set these rules and we call them boundaries. Like, for example, a rule might be you can't have drugs in this house, you can't do X, Y or Z, whatever. That's a rule you're setting and the reason it's a rule and not a boundary, is because you can't really enforce it.

Mary Wagstaff:

Boundaries are rules you set for yourself not for someone else that you can control An action or behavior. You can control that. You can control An action or behavior you can control that.

Amber Hollingsworth:

You can control Right. It's what you're going to do and not do not what another person is going to do or not do. The way I like to remember it is it's like it's okay to build a fence around your backyard, but your neighbors get real mad if you try to build a fence around their backyard.

Mary Wagstaff:

Right Right, backyard, Right Right and and so a boundary is about like if someone's treating me badly, I'm going to leave the room.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Or if maybe I have a loved one who always calls me intoxicated after, if I answer after six o'clock, they're always intoxicated. A boundary would be, I'm just not going to take their phone call after a certain o'clock Not.

Amber Hollingsworth:

I'm going to answer the phone and tell them why they shouldn't call me after certain o'clock. Not, I'm going to answer the phone and tell them why they shouldn't call me after a certain o'clock and give them a big lecture and then tell them not to do it. And then they do it the next day and I pick up the phone and then I tell them again. That's what most people think of when they're thinking of boundary, they're really thinking of.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Let me tell this person this is a rule that I want you to follow. But the boundary really is a rule for yourself.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, and I think it's so. It really, when you put it in that terms, it really is so simple, because that's what we're talking about on the show all of the time is what is within your control. We have all of these expectations and you know ways that we think the world should be, all of these ways that are out of our control, but essentially we ways that we think the world should be. All of these ways are out of our control, but essentially, we think we're setting these boundaries, but we're just creating rules that are going to be broken and there's nothing we can do about it. Right, and that's really what the basis is of so much suffering in our own personal lives in general, regardless of addiction or the reason that people do drink in the first place, is it's like life broke my rule.

Mary Wagstaff:

I was just I don't know if you're familiar with Michael Singer. He wrote the Untethered Soul. It's amazing. He has a podcast, he does these lectures, but he's like, life is always going to bump up against you, but it's you, and then everything that's not you, right, like? So everything's not us, and we really have to get super clear about what is in within our control, which is our own thinking, our own emotions and our own behavior, and so that's really the place that we're taking boundaries from. I love that and something that I feel like, since I've been exploring these a little bit more like deeper, for where I am now too, because I think our boundaries change too growing and evolving and having different roles in our lives is thinking about my personal values is a really good way for me to kind of know my own boundaries and then like also not be breaking my own boundaries. That's a really good place to start.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Right, right. So give us an example, Mary, of a boundary you might set for yourself.

Mary Wagstaff:

Oh, that's so good. Well, something that I've been working on is my sleep hygiene, so something that happens in this house. I have a nine-year-old and you know we love our bedtime routine. It's really important for him. Matthew kind of gets him up and out the door, especially during school time, and I typically do bedtime. But I can't be. I'm not going to bed at 10 o'clock, so it's not a rule. I mean it's hard with kids, right, it is kind of a rule. But even with Matthew too, I'm like nine o'clock. I'm not available after nine o'clock because that's when I will be in bed. But I'm not saying anything about like there's no consequences or punishment be in bed. But I'm not saying anything about like there's no consequences or punishment. But Emmett loves for me to tuck him in. So if he doesn't get start mobilizing between like seven and eight, which I'm available for him to do the whole thing, then he misses his window of opportunity for me to tuck him in, like I'm just going to be.

Amber Hollingsworth:

I'm going to be in bed. So good, right, like, I'm available for tuck-ins anytime between this time and this time. Yep, and that's different than saying you have to be in bed at this time. Yeah, and that's the difference. And I feel like that's where people get the most frustrated, because they think they're setting healthy boundaries, but they're really trying to control someone else's behavior and, of course, that never works. So you feel like someone's crossing my boundaries all the time. Well, you're really the only one that can cross your own boundaries. Yeah, it's true, it's your fence. You open the gate or not open the gate, you know?

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, I love that. I love thinking about it's like my fence of my queendom, like this is how I. You know how I want to structure it and what works really well, especially because kids. You know how I want to structure it and what works really well, especially because kids, you know we do have to guide them a little bit, as I make sure this is a little tangent, but I make sure that I'm actually available and present for him, so, like that there's story time or whatever it is, but he really really loves it and it does work when I'm available and present and I'm like, okay, this is the window that starts now and let him know because he's not paying attention to time. It's been very motivating for him because he wants those snuggles and the back rubs and the thing so Right.

Amber Hollingsworth:

It's more of a positive reinforcement from a parenting perspective, yes, and less like a controlling mechanism.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, absolutely so, there's. There's boundaries and what happens if you know, something I see happen and this is kind of maybe less. You know, there's, like we said, there's a spectrum of use and dependency. So it's like what is the impact of this other person, of this other person drinking? So say, this other person is you know they're drinking out in the like we'll just use alcohol as an example. They're drinking out in the open.

Mary Wagstaff:

You're not drinking, they're not blowing money, they're not necessarily doing a lot of like negative behavior, but it still is to a point that when you interact with that person it's annoying, like you're there. You know they're not even necessarily intoxicating. I mean some, you know, we, I know with one drink, people can act different, they change. They aren't the same present person, right? So what is your take on that? On, you know work, maybe it's not as extreme where there's this like kind of intervention moment needed, but you, you're growing, you're evolving and you're still in relationship with this other person that is still engaging in the way that you maybe both once engaged together right.

Amber Hollingsworth:

I think that that's it's. It's really hard to get through to someone who's in that state, because you're probably the only one that notices it, like if you're the partner and they live with you because no one else is going to see anything about their behaviors being a problem. And so if you approach it like you're drinking too much or you shouldn't be drinking every day again, you're going to lose credibility with a person that's functioning the way you're describing, because I'm picturing in my head like a high-functioning person. They go to work, they pay their bills.

Amber Hollingsworth:

They go to soccer practice, they do all the things, but they're still drinking at night and that maybe changes them. Maybe they just come home and they have drinks and then they just go to sleep. So it feels like you're by yourself all the time. Or maybe they drink and they get kind of obnoxious and they think they're funny. And you don't think they're funny. It doesn't even have to be like they turn into a monster, right, and it's really hard to get through to that other person.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Um, if they don't have any other, like if the world isn't giving back anywhere else other than you, that's the fastest way to get in what I call like the villain role, the bad guy role. It's like then it's like well, you're the only one that has a problem with it and you know, I pay the bills, I do this, I do that. What are you talking about? That's how they're going to see it. The best way to interact with that, if you're at that level, is to do more of a positive reinforcement thing, like what you were saying. Like if they come home and they're not drinking, say, you don't even have to like necessarily speak to the fact that they're drinking or not drinking, because that can make someone defensive, but you can say like if they came home and you had a really great dinner, you can even say the next thing man, I, I really enjoyed being with you. I felt like we had a great conversation.

Amber Hollingsworth:

If they love affection and they're sober, you know, be affectionate, be flirty, hold their hand or what you know so it's more of a positive reinforcement and if you're trying to get them to see that maybe it is more of a problem, what you can do I hate to say this, but you can almost like I don't know what I want to say, but I want to say like set them up for failure not in a bad way but like say, hey, can you help me with X, Y or Z when you get home today?

Amber Hollingsworth:

Right, and now you realize that they may not do that. But once they realize that they're not functioning and holding up their responsibilities at home at the end of the day, their family responsibilities that'll start to get their attention a lot more. Like if you say, hey, can you do this and that, and then they're not able to do that, or they say they will, but then they don't. If that happens over the course of several times, that's going to force them to see the issue, versus you trying to take up all the slack and then tell them that there's a problem.

Mary Wagstaff:

Right, yeah, yeah, oh yeah, I love that. Can I count?

Amber Hollingsworth:

on you for this. I'm going to go do this. Can I count on you for that Right? And then that makes them have to see the discrepancy between their functioning level, what they think they should do and what they're actually doing, versus you fixing it all for them, doing it all for them and then being mad at them for it. Right.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yes, yeah. And then just and also yeah, not doing it right, not necessarily picking up the slack, so that that gap can be there.

Amber Hollingsworth:

So they can see. That's, that's more of what I would call like a natural consequence. It's like the information that comes from the world and not from you. You, you want to be to and this isn't 100% possible, but to the best that you can. You want to let the world be the bad guy and you be the good guy.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Give them information and then you can respond with empathy. People figure it out so much faster. That's a formula that really helps people figure things out.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah Well, and I think that's a little bit thank you for that out. Yeah Well, and I think that's a little bit Thank you for that. And I love the idea of the positive reinforcement, of not making it about alcohol or drug use but just pulling out like why it's better when you're both sober, when you're both totally available. And you know, I one of the things that I think is interesting is people talk about alcohol socially even being a connect, a catalyst for connection. And you know, I have my own beliefs and it's like, really, though there it's not an authentic moment. You know, there's part of you that is not fully present with that because there's some sort of inhibition. So, kind of pulling that out like this authentic, like oh, we're able to really connect in this way that I felt like we hadn't before.

Amber Hollingsworth:

So, yeah, I think that's a really, that's really awesome, that's about the things that are going well or not well, and not even connected to the substance.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yes, let them connect that dot.

Amber Hollingsworth:

They know if they were sober or not.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yes.

Amber Hollingsworth:

It was so great because you didn't drink yesterday. Because as soon as you say that, that feels antagonistic to them and then they feel immediately defensive and if they didn't do so great, they'll connect the dot about whether it was related to their drinking.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yes, absolutely Don't connect it for them, let them connect that.

Amber Hollingsworth:

You put the two dots on the paper and they let them connect it.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yes, yeah, absolutely, because I mean, I truly believe that, even though someone might be in denial in their own experience, I think that every person that is using to an extent that other people are noticing, I believe, does have a whisper inside of them that it's not working.

Amber Hollingsworth:

I mean, I really do, I totally agree with you, and when you're giving me these scenarios, I'm assuming that this person, this other person, has some level of problem.

Mary Wagstaff:

And the reason.

Amber Hollingsworth:

I guess I'm assuming that is because, in my experience of working with people who have addictions, when they're in recovery they usually don't mind it, like, let's say, somebody's quit drinking. They usually don't mind if their spouse drinks occasionally. Like it doesn't even bother them and they're happy for their spouse to order a glass of whatever at dinner. Maybe not in the first few weeks they get sober but like after you know they're stable, they don't mind it.

Amber Hollingsworth:

What they do mind is if it's happening all the time or if the person's getting sloppy. So when I find one of my clients in recovery is getting really frustrated with their partner, it's not because their partner have one drink or two drinks. They really, they really don't usually have an issue with that it's. It's because their partner's doing what it is automatically. Yeah, it's it's a habitual thing for sure. Yeah, I'm assuming in these scenarios that there's a bit of a problem there, not just.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, well, yeah.

Mary Wagstaff:

And that's kind of like the empowered sobriety that I work with with my clients is typically they. It's really about them and the experience and the results they want, even if it's their partner, if it's social, if it's whatever. And sometimes things do change naturally, Like you stop hanging out with certain groups of people naturally, just because you're like, oh, there wasn't that depth of connection or I go different places. Now, when it's your spouse, it's a little different scenario because there is a more of a commitment. You know there's a lot of things entangled in that and so we really work on OK. I mean, this just happened. Where I had a client go out was like the first time on a date night, and the husband ordered a glass of wine and she didn't, it was like a big breakthrough moment for her. Now, if they never could have any experiences where he wasn't drinking and she, you know, or where he was always drinking and she wasn't, now that could potentially be problematic.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Oh yeah, that's different, right you?

Mary Wagstaff:

know like if there's never like a special occasion where it's like we can both be sober together, it's like, okay, well, why? But no, it's really about this empowered sobriety that these are the results I want and they have nothing to do really with anyone else. But yeah, it can be annoying, frankly. So, yes, I think it is more of the scenario that I'm presenting to you is definitely more of a habitual.

Amber Hollingsworth:

You can't connect to someone who's intoxicated when you're not intoxicated.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah.

Amber Hollingsworth:

You really are on two different wavelengths. And it won't bother you if it's every now and then. But if it's like my person is always intoxicated and I'm not, it's like now we really are kind of misaligned. Yeah, exactly.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, and what I found too that's so fascinating is when people do stay in their own lane and in their own experience that literally probably like 99% of the time, it does impact the other person, the spouse and the relationship, because a lot of times people are drinking together Sometimes that's how they form their relationship to begin with, where the other person always stops.

Mary Wagstaff:

Usually there's a little bit of this defense moment where their use can kind of peak on the spouse level, like they're like oh, like I'll show them I can still handle this, and then they want to kind of join the party because they see all of the benefits of it and where there's a deeper potential for a deeper connection.

Mary Wagstaff:

So I always just say, like you're changing the rules of the game a little bit of how you guys used to interact, so just give it time. There's a transitionary period and like let it, you know, like this, just stay positive and create your boundaries for yourself. So so I feel like that natural consequences is I don't know how much you work with attachment styles in your work at all Seems a little bit like that too, where, if one person because I've been talking a lot about attachment styles and just thinking about it in my life. If one person disengages from that push-pull of anxious attachment and avoidant attachment which is the dynamic in my household and steps into that secure attached place, then the other person's just kind of left with their own immature behavior.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Right, it's like if someone's yelling and then you don't yell back, they kind of notice that they're yelling so much quicker, right, right. They're like, oh, I feel kind of silly, whereas if you engage with it then it's, you know, it just escalates and escalates.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, absolutely so. Can you talk a little bit? I mean, do you find that there is any one attachment style that is more problematic for addiction than another? Is that correlated at all?

Amber Hollingsworth:

I talk about attachment styles a lot in relationships to substances. I mean in relationships to relationships. But I'm trying to think if there's one attachment style that's more prone to substances, yeah, I mean, I would say any of the ones that aren't the secure one. If I had to guess, I don't know what the? Research says Right, Because either end of that spectrum, you know, but for two opposite kinds of reasons usually.

Mary Wagstaff:

Right.

Amber Hollingsworth:

But still would be more prone. A secure attachment protects you from developing addictions. I do know that.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yes, yes.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Well, that's what neurochemistry that protects you.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, and that's what I've been talking about so much lately. It's like if you are in an unbothered, secure, attached, calm space and it doesn't mean you don't ever have emotions that are bigger but if you know, if you have that capacity to hold them with these tools, then there's really no need for drinking. I mean like, yes, alcohol is an addictive chemical, but it just becomes so much less of appealing and a requirement because you're like I can handle this, because you feel so much more regulated.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Yeah, you don't need an external regulation nearly as much.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, absolutely. And I just kind of want to come back to this because I feel like a lot of what we talked about from really extreme, like you know, people in denial, kind of in a delusional state from the person on the other side, when you aren't the one pushing, when you're not the one pursuing, when you're not the one saying you, you, you, you need to do this pushing. When you're not the one pursuing, when you're not the one saying you, you, you, you need to do this, then what happens when you take that step back is the person can't, you're not. The problem now, right from another perspective, and that's where those natural consequences come in. So I think for the whole spectrum, whether, no matter what end of the spectrum the addiction is at, when you don't make it necessarily about you and your relationships and how could you do this to me, and this is what you always do when you're drinking or you didn't do this then there's only that now that person can't project onto you, they can only reflect onto themselves more.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Well said, that's exactly right. Yeah, okay, they don't get to focus on you as the problem right, yes. It's the way I envision it is. It's like if this person is running to the cliff and there's big spikes at the bottom, you're standing in front waving your arms and yelling and screaming don't, danger, don't? I just think. Who's this crazy person here? Step out of the way. They'll probably notice that there's a cliff and some spikes there.

Mary Wagstaff:

Right, I love that. Yeah, it's so good, and that takes a lot of self-discipline or not even discipline, but reflection and awareness and the ability to maybe be wrong, the ability to open your mind to something new. I know I've had to do that for myself Like what don't I know, and how can this benefit me in other areas of my life? Right, because it's always an impact. So I could talk to you forever, but I had this question down about the difference between compassion and enabling, and I'm sure a lot of people have heard the term enabling.

Mary Wagstaff:

But one of the things and maybe I can make it a little bit more specific too is a lot of people who do couples that do like drink together, which was something that Matthew and I did. It was a big part of our relationship. We had decided to not quit together because we were it was like easy to enable. We were enabling each other for drinking and partying and all the things. So I guess those are two questions what do you think about the idea of like quitting together as a couple and what are the benefits or problems with that, because I have my own theories about it. Um, yeah, and then I guess maybe there's a question about enabling.

Amber Hollingsworth:

I love the idea of it, I'm just not sure how it works out very practically in real life, like it sounds good on the surface, like you know if you and your bestie go on a diet or something it sounds like oh, we'll be here to support each other.

Amber Hollingsworth:

But the problem with it is is that you're both very vulnerable at that point and you're both kind of weak to it, and so it doesn't take. As soon as one person falls, the other person's going down Right. So when you're early in it, you need to attach yourself to someone who's further down the road than you are, so that there's a stability there. You know, because it doesn't as soon as one, you're each just waiting for the other one to say hey, you want to get a drink?

Amber Hollingsworth:

And as soon as it said, it's on you know you don't have enough strength recovery strength, yet to support each other.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah yeah. It's like you don't take financial advice from someone that's broke you know, right yeah.

Mary Wagstaff:

And you have your own brain, you know. That's why I say is like you have two different brains, you know. Right, yeah, and you have your own brain, you know you. This is why I say is like you have two different brains. You know, you're gonna you're gonna have different beliefs, different traumas, different triggers, and you gotta figure that out yourself. You know, because you're in your own body. So what? What do you see if, so say, someone's not drinking or or I mean, I guess, even if they are. But how can someone really support their partner the most through the lens of compassion versus enabling? And how do you see partners enabling in a way that's just not, you know, that's not useful view enabling pretty different than what most addiction counselors usually.

Amber Hollingsworth:

When people think enabling, they think, um, giving someone money, letting someone live in your house, um, basically it's like I'm supporting them and I'm helping their addiction continue. But I personally feel like the most enabling thing you can do is play the villain. And here's why I think that If you give someone $20, they may go buy whatever with it, okay.

Mary Wagstaff:

But then it's gone.

Amber Hollingsworth:

$20 is gone in five minutes. If you yell and scream and act like a maniac, they will use that as an emotional reason to keep using for 10 or 15 years against you. I mean, they hold it against you forever and so it's like I don't want to give them the emotional currency to keep using. Now, if you're making things super easy for them, meaning cleaning up the messes they're making, if you're bailing them out of jail and paying for their lawyers and calling their teachers and asking for one more chance and taking care of their kids when they're supposed to take care of their kids, you know you're doing all that stuff then you're protecting them from the natural consequences and then you're going to be mad because they're going to be in denial. But it's only the natural consequences that can get them out of denial.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Yeah, not only is that problematic, but while that's happening, you're going to be more and more resentful that you're doing that, and then you're going to be interacting with them in a real negative way. And so now we have the opposite formula.

Amber Hollingsworth:

You're not letting the world show them what's happening, but you're showing them that you're mad and angry and controlling, and so that's what gives them the skewed view that you're the problem, not the addiction. So you want to reverse that. I'm not as hardcore about don't give them money or don't do this nice thing for them. If you got to hold back one thing, hold back being the villain, because that I promise you keeps them stuck longer than the other stuff. Yes, so you'll know the difference. In enabling, I call it helping versus enabling Helping.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Anytime you help anyone with anything, you leave with a really good feeling about it. You feel great for the day.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah.

Amber Hollingsworth:

When you are doing something for someone else and you leave feeling resentful. Now you know you're in the enabling category because you're doing something you don't want to be doing.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah.

Amber Hollingsworth:

You haven't had to do it. Yes, if you're trying to figure out, am I being helpful? Or am I enabling? Just take a minute, check in with yourself and ask how do I feel about this? Yeah, If you feel good about it, then you're fine If you don't feel good about it, then you're in trouble.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, and that is something that we talk about all the time here is our own bodies, our intuition, especially as women. You know I'm obviously geared more towards women here, and this perspective, amber, is so powerful for everything else that I'm talking about on the show too, which is about our own, and I'm just going to say this here for my, for the audience, is like feminine reclamation and how I believe that a lot of ways that we've lost some of the pleasure of being a woman has been through, you know, this kind of we've been carrying this giant mental load, and this is why a lot of my clients are drinking, because they're not only they're caring for the household, but they're also out in the workplace. And we want to have equality and we want to be able to have all those things. But some of the innate ways that women function is through pleasure, through receiving, through creativity, and when you start micromanaging, especially like your male counterpart, and you become the villain and you're doing all the things and then resentful for it later, well, that never gives them an opportunity to rise to the occasion and have that natural consequence.

Mary Wagstaff:

And this is just so important in the conversation with my people, because this is a big reason that they're drinking because they're over-functioning, they're overwhelmed and they're under-pleasured. And so if we can get to that place, regardless of if their counterparts are drinking or whether or not alcohol is in the situation, then the need for alcohol to find relief becomes less. So we have to look at the circumstances. Like I said earlier, where are you in control or where are you trying to control what's not yours to begin with? Right? So whether or not they have an addiction, it's such a great point and where I'm really taking a lot of my content and my people is to this place of being in the receptive mode and, in your pleasure, can allow someone else to meet you where maybe you didn't make space for.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Especially if your partner is a man men want to be in here. So if you're always the hero, the effeminate energy, you're not giving them the chance to be the hero.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yes.

Amber Hollingsworth:

And then you're feeling resentful, they're feeling resentful and, yeah, I love what you're talking about. I don't talk a lot about it on my channel, but, um, it is an interest area of mine yeah, absolutely I feel I say all the time like we ruined it for ourselves. You know, we're trying to do it all. It's our fault, I blame. I blame us. Well, yeah, and I we're trying to do it all, it's our fault.

Mary Wagstaff:

I blame us. Well, yeah, and I think we're in a beautiful, beautiful space where we can kind of see it. We don't have to go backwards. It's like, yes, we have access to so much, but what have we? You know, I always say we, in the fight to prove what we weren't, we lost, what we were Right.

Mary Wagstaff:

I get chills, you know, and so it's like it's okay to love being in the caring role, in the nurturing role, but you want to be nurtured too. And that's the place where I think we've just like kind of had our dukes up in, like you know, an earlier feminist movement, like having to fight our way to the top, and I just don't think and it's, and I think it has ruined a lot of that masculine, feminine dynamic and the um, it's been demasculating for a lot of men who now don't even know how to lead. And this is a movement, and then they're turning to substances. So it's all interwoven, right, I could talk to you forever. Your work is amazing, can you? Oh, I did want to ask you about the title of your show, if we can kind of end on that note and what, what, where that came from, and yeah, Well, when I first started my YouTube channel, I was calling it like something basic, like addiction recovery resources I think, and I was having trouble building a YouTube audience.

Amber Hollingsworth:

This wasn't really the reason. But I was talking to my sister, who's super techie and she said, well, you know, some people might not subscribe to it because it's called that. You know, they may not want that on their profiles or whatever. So she said, call it something that's like people in that space would kind of understand, but other people wouldn't even like if they saw that they wouldn't even know anything. So there was a kid when I first started counseling and he used to always say you hit your bottom when you put your shovel down. So put the shovel down as a reference to you. Don't have to hit bottom, you don't have to burn all your bridges you don't have to ruin your whole life and lose everything.

Amber Hollingsworth:

To walk away from this oh, I love that when to put the shovel down, and a big part of our goal on the channel is helping people and families do that before they lose everything.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yep.

Amber Hollingsworth:

And waiting until all that horrible stuff happens.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, that's such a great note to end on, because I always tell people I did an episode recently like what rock bottom is, and it's like it could be right now for you. You know what I mean. Like I understand that there is this idea of like kind of losing everything and all these other consequences that you have to rebuild, but they're, you know, just breaking your own heart, being disappointed in yourself every day, could be your rock bottom. So, ladies, it's okay, you can put the shovel down. There's someone, a friend of mine, used to tell me guilt is like a bag of bricks. All you have to do is set it down, and I think it's a similar concept. So, amber, just tell everyone where they can find you. We'll obviously put it all in the show notes and any other messages. You have to sign everyone off.

Amber Hollingsworth:

The best place to find me is on YouTube. The channel is called Put the Shovel Down. I am on all the other social medias, but my main platform is YouTube. There's more than a thousand videos on there. Whether you're looking for resources for yourself in the journey of overcoming addiction or helping someone else, there's playlists for every angle you want to look at this issue from.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah.

Amber Hollingsworth:

Like free, it's easy to access, so I think that's the best places.

Mary Wagstaff:

Yeah, awesome, yeah, amazing, amazing resources. That really helped me and if you're open-minded enough, you could look at what it is like from another perspective to be in relationship with someone who is, you know, drinking to an extent that doesn't feel good anymore and that, I think, could give you a lot if you're willing to look in that area. That takes a big leap of I don't know bravery for some people. So, amber, thank you so much for all the work you do. I know it's life-changing and the impact is like you will never know the ripple effect of it. So thank you for being here. It was really nice to share with you today. Thank you for having me and thank you for all the great work you're doing. Okay, thank you. Bye, everyone.

Mary Wagstaff:

Hey, so before you go, I've got something for you that works faster than pouring a drink and it actually gives you your power back. It's called 60 Seconds to Calm, and inside I share six quick, in the moment phrases to help you end the mental tug of war, soothe any emotion or urge and come back to yourself without overthinking. So, whether your habit is wine scrolling or snapping, this is going to get you back in your body in under a minute and it's all free and it works. I also added, for being such an amazing listener to the show, a couple of surprise bonuses. So grab it right here with the link in the show notes, or head over to marywagstaffcoachcom.