Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - Sobriety and Social Media with Suzanne Warye

00:00:00.000 It's no secret that sobriety and sober curiosity have become big business.

00:00:17.680 The revenue in the non-alcoholic drinks market in the U.S. is projected to reach approximately

00:00:23.340 $526 billion in 2024.

00:00:29.320 Sobriety is also a real niche on both Instagram and TikTok.

00:00:35.280 Just to give you an example, the hashtag sober has 4.2 million Instagram posts,

00:00:41.720 the hashtag soberlife 2.5 million, and soberliving 1.2 million.

00:00:47.820 As we always say, there is an influencer for absolutely everything, and sobriety is no exception.

00:00:54.040 Two years ago, when I was working on the second season of this podcast, I interviewed a sobriety

00:00:59.800 influencer named Suzanne Ware-Eye. Suzanne started out on social media posting her workouts 0.98

00:01:06.020 and her outfits, and after she had a baby, she started posting about her postpartum depression.

00:01:12.200 Her audience really responded to that kind of honesty. And so when she decided to give up

00:01:17.360 alcohol, she thought she'd be honest about that too. And now that's the main focus of her platform,

00:01:22.920 my kind of suite. She's never looked back, and she's never been happier. When I first recorded

00:01:30.460 this episode, it was supposed to run in February, two years ago. It was January, and like a lot of

00:01:37.160 you, I was sober curious about a dry January. But I was planning on postponing that sober curiosity

00:01:43.500 for a little bit because I had big, big plans to go have a wild weekend in Fargo to see Elton John.

00:01:48.640 Well, most of you long-time listeners know what happened during that trip to Fargo.

00:01:54.280 I came back pregnant with my third baby.

00:01:57.900 So dry January turned into a dry nine months.

00:02:01.940 And then a damp breastfeeding period.

00:02:06.700 And then a celebratory haze of, 0.98

00:02:10.020 Woo-hoo! I'm gonna have all the margaritas because nobody owns my body anymore.

00:02:14.940 Now here we are.

00:02:16.420 Two years later, another January.

00:02:19.900 It is another chance to embrace the dry January phenomenon

00:02:23.580 where you give up drinking, where you take a break,

00:02:26.780 where you do a reset of your relationship with alcohol.

00:02:30.540 And frankly, that's something that I need.

00:02:33.980 I'm going to be brutally honest here.

00:02:36.060 I am a very social drinker.

00:02:38.280 I never drink alone at home.

00:02:40.380 I never drink alone, period.

00:02:42.240 But if I am at a party, I am popping them back.

00:02:45.800 I'm the first one at the karaoke machine, and I have to say that alcohol has gotten

00:02:51.240 a lot trickier for me. I no longer know exactly what's going to happen. I don't know if one drink

00:02:59.100 is going to make me tipsy or four drinks. It's a crapshoot every time because my body at 43

00:03:05.900 is a crapshoot every morning when I wake up. And my hangovers, my hangovers, my old lady hangovers

00:03:13.820 are something wicked. They are three days long. They're filled with hangxiety, which is a term

00:03:20.360 I just learned from the youngs. I get normal anxiety when I don't drink, but then when I drink,

00:03:26.040 I just, I'm anxious. I'm anxious and I feel like I'm crawling out of my skin the next morning

00:03:30.520 for days. It's terrible. Terrible. So, even though I love being a social drinker, I need a break.

00:03:40.640 I need a breather. And I went back to listen to this episode, which, like I said, we never ran

00:03:46.400 because Under the Influence was unceremoniously canceled. And every single thing we talked about

00:03:52.160 in this interview still holds up. Suzanne is an influencer with many talents, but what I find

00:03:59.080 most interesting about her is that she's managed to blend together an account filled with both style

00:04:03.960 and sobriety. And through her Instagram account and her podcast, The Sober Mom Life,

00:04:11.140 she's helped thousands of women through their sobriety journey.

00:04:14.840 Like I said, this conversation is from two years ago, two whole years. I actually say in it,

00:04:19.820 I think at one point, I'm 41 and I have two children. I sound less tired. I actually sound,

00:04:25.640 I think I do sound less tired in this episode. As someone who is trying to reset their relationship

00:04:31.740 with alcohol, as someone who has watched a lot of loved ones struggle with alcoholism,

00:04:37.160 I do think that Instagram can be a great place of community when you're trying to figure

00:04:41.200 out the rocky path of sobriety.

00:04:44.060 Now, without further ado, here's my conversation with Suzanne.

00:04:48.220 I actually stopped drinking in January 2020.

00:04:52.380 I just woke up after a party one morning and I said, I'm done.

00:04:57.640 I hadn't planned on saying I'm done.

00:04:59.620 i didn't hadn't really taken a deep look into my drinking before that um i just knew i no longer

00:05:11.220 wanted to feel the way i was feeling and so there had to be something else so i did stop and i had

00:05:16.940 no idea what that meant i was terrified um and so just i i did not share it right away because i

00:05:25.060 didn't I just didn't know I didn't know what I was doing um and then yeah as I dove into it and

00:05:32.100 started listening to audiobooks and all of the quitlet and the podcasts I realized that oh this

00:05:38.980 is a thing you can stop drinking you don't have to declare yourself an alcoholic you don't have to

00:05:44.380 be in a battle with booze every day um and no one was really again no one was talking about that and

00:05:52.300 And so then I started feeling restless again and I thought, OK, this is the sign that I need to talk about it and I need to just share my sobriety story.

00:06:03.660 And so I started doing that and it's it's really taken off.

00:06:08.280 I mean, it's really taken off.

00:06:10.120 It's from all of the things she posed are so they're so interesting to me as a woman, 41 years old and a mother of two kids.

00:06:21.460 the daughter of two alcoholics who i wouldn't consider myself an alcoholic but like when i do

00:06:28.120 drink i'm like i tie it on man like but you know what it's like when you creep into middle age

00:06:35.480 your hangovers last for three days oh yeah i brutal brutal brutal i'm a terrible parent the

00:06:43.840 next day and like so i'm also filled with anxiety because i am a person with anxiety and drinking

00:06:50.920 makes it worse. And so in the past year, I have been looking to Instagram more than anything else

00:07:00.320 to find ways of being in the world that don't involve alcohol. Because our society and culture

00:07:09.660 does not support ways of being in the world that do not involve alcohol. And your account is one

00:07:16.940 of those that's really really done it for me and inspired me to do this dry january oh wow

00:07:24.200 yeah thank you that's i mean that's amazing um i think you're so right that our world you

00:07:34.000 and i don't even think you realize this until you go without alcohol how much alcohol is everywhere

00:07:42.540 It's just it's pushed on us everywhere from the time where, you know, growing up, I grew up, my dad had alcohol issues and he then stopped drinking, which I was grateful for.

00:07:56.960 But you don't realize that growing up, it's like 21 is that deadline to celebrate with alcohol, even though I started celebrating with alcohol way before 21.

00:08:05.420 um but yeah it's treated like a reward a reward for adulthood a reward for getting through the

00:08:12.560 day with your kids a reward for literally everything um and I definitely fell into that

00:08:20.700 trap I was you know I was a party girl in my 20s oh same it was I was yeah so much fun

00:08:28.880 I know and that's the thing like I look back and I don't I don't regret those party girl days

00:08:34.920 because, I mean, come on, no responsibilities, so much fun. I mean, I could, the clubs, the

00:08:42.100 everything, it was so much fun. Yeah, exactly. The problem is then as I tried to kind of fit

00:08:49.160 alcohol into my mom life, as I got into my thirties and now at 41, I, I, I didn't see where

00:08:57.560 it fit. And I thought, oh, okay, I think this is probably something I've outgrown. And I was trying

00:09:03.660 to make it fit i was trying to figure out okay well you know maybe it fits here oh maybe it fits

00:09:08.880 on date night oh well maybe it fits on a you know party on a new year's eve party but you're right

00:09:14.620 like then you feel like shit the next day my kids are like what's going on um and so i just realized

00:09:24.460 it it just doesn't fit anymore it just doesn't work and so then really deciding just to cut it 0.96

00:09:31.820 out was insane and I didn't know how life would be. But now that I'm almost two years in and I

00:09:39.520 see, it's kind of like I'm like, you guys, I see what life is without alcohol. I want you to see

00:09:45.760 it too. And so that's kind of my platform is I'm not saying I judge moms who drink. I'm not saying

00:09:52.660 you shouldn't drink. I'm just giving another option of, okay, you see a lot of moms who drink 0.97

00:10:00.060 in your feed let me show you one who doesn't and let me just show you what it's like on this side

00:10:05.000 i want to dig into when wine culture became so intertwined with mom culture like when it became

00:10:15.780 i mean it really is it's like oh it's mom without my wine and all of that and i'm trying to pinpoint

00:10:21.620 that moment but have you noticed that too oh my goodness it's everywhere it is everywhere and it

00:10:28.700 makes sense so i mean when you think about where it's coming from and where it originated like i

00:10:34.420 don't think target decided to put wine mom on their teas for no reason like i do think big

00:10:41.000 alcohol needs more customers i think that they've targeted women now because their main customer

00:10:47.260 segment men older men are have died they're dying right and so it's just i mean that's just

00:10:54.660 advertising and marketing like they need more customers and so of course women now are the next

00:10:59.960 are the next target and moms and wine i mean it's they're so intertwined everywhere you look i just 0.88

00:11:10.780 saw i just saw a famous celebrity a reel and she's making a reel she's pouring wine into a mug

00:11:17.740 and then taping a little tea um thing so that it looks like there's tea in there and she's like no

00:11:23.940 one will know and i'm like man that is so dangerous and i know it's meant to be cute

00:11:31.800 um but it's just so dangerous in the palm of our hands we're looking at all these other moms and

00:11:38.840 if you look at one of their contact post five o'clock especially the stories because now you

00:11:42.960 have to broadcast your entire life yeah it's all news right it is it is it's normalizing

00:11:50.580 needing wine to cope with those crazy kids and i get it like i get it because we need something

00:11:59.680 exactly like i i understand having to cope with crazy kids my kids like i hide like i have very

00:12:07.780 i have a lot of strategies to cope with my crazy children um i am just trying to share that alcohol

00:12:15.000 does not help so what you think is helping coping with your kids is actually making it

00:12:22.380 so much harder and i don't think that that's common knowledge i don't think that i don't

00:12:28.480 think it is and i think that but i do i just am scrolling through instagram and i'm looking for

00:12:33.400 hashtag wine mom or just ask people like there's so many instagram accounts actually named wine

00:12:39.740 mom there's the oh my god running wine mom the wine mom enthusiast baby yoda wine mom oh wow

00:12:47.740 that's yeah that's very neat we're gonna take a quick break here be right back

00:12:53.600 okay for our audience who doesn't follow you what kind of things are you sharing on your account

00:13:12.800 i have a kind of married style with sobriety so my whole goal is to show that sobriety is not

00:13:19.620 boring sobriety is actually very cool i mean i don't know if i'm cool but sobriety is cool

00:13:24.800 so i just share that first of all you you don't have to be an alcoholic to quit drinking

00:13:32.060 and i don't even think that that's an important question to answer so whether or not you because

00:13:40.520 i do think that that's a big stumbling block for people when they think okay well only alcoholics

00:13:46.400 quit drinking i think it's a scale i think that there are people who are abusing alcohol in ways

00:13:52.240 that they shouldn't or that alcohol is making their life harder um that could benefit from a

00:13:59.280 life without alcohol and so that's what i'm just trying to show i'm trying to show that

00:14:03.100 it i don't want to say it's easier than it than you think but it's definitely more simple than you

00:14:11.220 think um living life without alcohol and you really don't know what it is until you live life

00:14:18.440 without alcohol when i think you've also like to just put it all out there you make living life

00:14:25.380 without alcohol look really pretty too and yeah you know in the way that i think the alcohol

00:14:32.020 industry has made life with alcohol looks fun um because we've lived in this world and i know this

00:14:39.940 You know, from growing up with two parents that, you know, were alcoholics and then in recovery and then in AA forever.

00:14:47.320 Always felt like this, like not drinking.

00:14:50.200 People who don't drink were like just people that hung out in church basements.

00:14:53.960 And it smelled weird down there.

00:14:56.220 Totally.

00:14:57.220 Bad coffee.

00:14:58.380 There's something wrong with you.

00:15:00.440 Yes.

00:15:01.160 As opposed to there's something really right with you.

00:15:03.800 And I think your account shows, oh, this can be pretty and fun and great.

00:15:09.940 in a way that I think the alcohol industry doesn't want us to see.

00:15:14.100 For sure. Yes, they definitely don't want you to see that. I think that the idea that

00:15:20.680 living a life without alcohol means that you are forever tied to alcohol and you are this sad sort

00:15:27.500 of, I don't know, that you're just, that you're constantly thinking about alcohol and you're,

00:15:36.300 it's just not that doesn't have to be the case in my case that is definitely not the case

00:15:41.760 living life without alcohol for me does mean more fun it means more freedom it means more joy

00:15:49.440 and so I am trying to show that it actually frees up my brain I'm no longer thinking about

00:15:57.240 okay should I have another drink should I drink tonight okay if I do drink tonight how much should

00:16:01.600 I have? Wait, is she having another one? Am I drinking more than she is? I mean, the space that

00:16:07.220 alcohol was taking in my brain when I was drinking it was just, it was exhausting. And so being able

00:16:16.360 to be free of that, I mean, I do think that that's why I have been able to create so much more and

00:16:23.940 just my life definitely is lighter without alcohol. I mean, it may not be as pretty as it

00:16:31.240 seems on Instagram because nothing is nothing nothing is but yeah I do want to show that it's

00:16:39.140 fun and it's actually more fun like I actually remember the times that I the fun times now

00:16:45.340 whereas like when I'm drinking I mean I for sure there were blackouts more than I can count but 0.99

00:16:51.700 there were also those like brownouts where I'm like I don't quite remember what did I say or 0.93

00:16:58.340 what did she say? I think it was fun. Now it actually is fun. And I remember the fun.

00:17:05.140 Yeah. Yeah. That's, I mean, and I also, and I love that kind of honesty too, because we're

00:17:09.580 supposed to love drinking and think it's the best in an escape, but then we're not supposed to talk 0.94

00:17:13.760 about the blackouts. And like, do I remember if I said something kind of bitchy to my friend last

00:17:18.320 night? Oh God. The shame of the, yeah. Yes. The shame of that morning after. I mean, I, I think

00:17:25.920 that's what made me finally say oh I'm I'm done like this is actually insane what I'm doing

00:17:33.300 I make I've I've been here too many times to feel like this again yeah and so yeah I I just decided

00:17:42.820 there has to be a different way and there is and it's amazing when I stopped drinking I didn't

00:17:47.820 think, you know, this would be forever. Like, the thing I did was I just poured myself into,

00:17:55.740 I read or I listened to This Naked Mind was huge for me by Annie Grace. And I just,

00:18:01.900 oh my gosh, it's like an un-brainwashing because we've all been just brainwashed into accepting

00:18:08.680 alcohol, into thinking that it's the answer to all these things when really, what is it? What

00:18:14.580 is it doing to us? And so I listened to that. I mean, I would be playing with my kids and be

00:18:20.480 listening to that. I knew that I needed to figure this out. I would be cleaning my kitchen and

00:18:26.480 listening to that. So I just poured myself into books and podcasts and then kind of way just led

00:18:33.260 on to way. And I still don't, I don't take it one day at a time because I'm not in a battle

00:18:39.580 with alcohol i'm not tempted i don't think oh this is going to be like this forever if you ask

00:18:45.940 me right now yes i want to feel like this forever um but i think that that does get a little bit

00:18:51.360 scary thinking about forever for anything um so but yeah it's yeah it's way better so how did

00:19:00.340 how did you how did the brands that you work with and your sponsors respond to

00:19:04.460 this switch when you started all of a sudden talking about sobriety yeah so actually

00:19:10.580 not at all like i have not seen i've seen definitely an increase in revenue based on

00:19:18.660 links because my reach is more once i started i had the sober mom life which was a separate

00:19:25.160 instagram account and then i decided to kind of marry the two into my kind of suite and rather

00:19:32.660 than the style and sobriety being separate, it was really important for me to tie them together

00:19:38.120 because I wanted to see that you could still be sober and be stylish and you could still be sober

00:19:43.800 and, you know, be cool. So yeah, the brands have not said anything. I mean, it definitely has not

00:19:53.260 deterred them. I've now gotten offers from brands, more like wellness brands, more non-alcoholic

00:20:01.040 brands. So I think this is, it does feel like the start of a movement of women, not me, but I am a

00:20:10.440 part of it, of women saying, especially moms saying, hold on, I think we've been tricked.

00:20:17.580 And so I think brands are beginning to catch on to that. Yeah. I mean, sobriety, I feel like it's

00:20:24.800 good for business? I think one of the questions I get asked the most is how sobriety affects my

00:20:33.720 social life and how that has worked. The interesting thing about getting sober and

00:20:40.880 stopping drinking alcohol in January 2020 is that my social life became just my kids and me

00:20:47.620 and my husband very quickly because of the pandemic. So it's an interesting thing to now

00:20:53.280 get back into socializing and being sober with other moms so far so good I think it's just like 0.86

00:21:00.980 with anything also that might have to be with doing 41 is that you kind of cut out the bullshit

00:21:05.620 and the people who aren't supportive um so yeah so far so good with the socializing I think that

00:21:15.360 you're probably if you decide to give up alcohol as a mom you might be inspiring other people that

00:21:20.540 you don't know and friends who don't talk about their drinking um yeah yeah no i totally agree

00:21:30.000 it is just it's something that i don't think that people talk about and not no no no because i think

00:21:36.000 it's full of shame i i do think there's a lot of shame there where that as soon as you start talking

00:21:42.600 about it that shame kind of evaporates and you realize you're definitely not the only one and

00:21:48.160 that the problem's not you the problem because the industry has created this it's pushed it on

00:21:53.520 us since we were children to be honest yes yeah the problem is never you i mean it's it's the

00:22:00.700 same thing with sugar it's the exact same thing if you eat enough sugar you will become addicted

00:22:05.680 and you will want more and no one ever blames the person with a sugar addiction like i'm addicted

00:22:13.460 to sugar and that's actually what i'm trying to quit now and no one's ever like oh man she's got

00:22:18.560 it yes she she is so weak no everyone fully realizes oh wow sugar's addicting it's bad for

00:22:27.240 us we're all trying to kick it and so i mean it's the exact same thing with alcohol what are you

00:22:32.860 doing to quit sugar i can't talk about god so i know no no no don't because and that's why my

00:22:39.480 sugar addiction got so bad because i was like well i'm no longer um drinking my sugar i might

00:22:44.560 as well eat it um which is fine and that was fine for then but now so i'm less i just listened to

00:22:50.980 um good sugar bad sugar by alan carr who he is also one of those kind of like this naked mind

00:22:59.500 where he kind of on untangles all the things that we've been taught about he has one for smoking and

00:23:05.980 alcohol and every all the addiction um yeah because i do think that it's something in our

00:23:13.120 brains that we we're associating it with pleasure um when really it just makes us miserable

00:23:19.060 that is all that we've got for today i am now on day five of dry january that's day five i quit i

00:23:27.540 did quit on new year's day a lot of people did not quit on new year's day because there was a lot of

00:23:30.880 hair of the dogging going on, I actually quit at six o'clock on New Year's Eve. And I'm going to

00:23:36.000 keep you updated. I'll let you know how it goes. This episode is the first in our series of January

00:23:41.480 renewal episodes. We talk a lot about the negative impact of influencers here. I talk a lot of trash

00:23:47.740 about trad wives. But this month, and only this month, I want us to focus on how we can use social 0.89

00:23:53.340 media for the things that we actually want to accomplish. We've got a lot of fun stuff. We've

00:23:57.400 got clutter influencers. We've got quitting sugar influencers. I'm not even going to tell you 1.00

00:24:02.360 because all of it's going to be a fun surprise. As a reminder, you can find all kinds of behind

00:24:06.880 the scenes content on our substack over the influence. If you pre-order my new novel,

00:24:11.960 The Sicilian Inheritance, you get a free lifetime subscription to that substack. Free lifetime

00:24:17.680 subscription. That could be worth hundreds of dollars, thousands of dollars if we keep doing

00:24:22.300 this together forever. If you love us, leave us a review, tell your friends. We'll see you

00:24:27.400 Loved being here with you today.

00:24:29.200 Talk soon.

00:24:57.400 Thank you.

Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - January 08, 2024

Sobriety and Social Media with Suzanne Warye

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