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Hi, everyone. I'm Stephanie Wilder-Taylor, and this is Drunkish, the podcast, but you knew that. The goal of this podcast is to have fun conversations about sobriety without preaching, just real. Please go rate and review if you have a minute or five. Today, I'm really excited. I have a comedian, Zach Noe Towers. He has a special on YouTube called Twink Death, which is really funny. He's on Jeff Lewis's radio show once a week. He tours all over the place. He opens for huge, big name comedians, but most importantly, he is here and we got into it, all of it. So let's go. hey zach welcome to drunkish i'm so happy that you agreed to do this you're so funny

oh my god thank you what a great start toss a little compliment my way yeah i saw rosebud uh did the pod and any i am a follower of rosebud to the ends of the earth so i'm like you know if she's if she's in the stephanie crew get me in

there too oh yeah yeah rosebud um rosebud gave me a blurb for my book for my memoir about getting

sober drunk oh my god wait how is the book is the book out yeah it's been out for a couple years oh my god okay I'll have to I will look for it because I love reading about people I love reading memoirs especially but like for it to be like a sober thing like that's exciting I tried to

be one of the few people that was writing a memoir about getting sober about you know what can be a dark topic as you know but with jokes yeah why do we have to be so fucking serious I mean I have

found that because alcoholics and drug addicts have seen the worst of human nature and their human nature, like oftentimes, like they are the best, like crowd, like not saying a crowd, but like I speak at recovery meetings and like, I held dark ass jokes about like almost having died or whatever. And they can laugh because they're like, same girl, same girl plus worse,

you know. Right. Exactly. So I did the math, uh, based on your social media and I'm, I'm, you have over like 10, over 10 and a half years of sobriety. I have definitely over 10. Oh,

maybe it is to over 10 and a half. It seems like November. Yes. November, um, 27th, 27th, 2015. Wow. Okay. I did my research. Yeah. You're a little, you're an internet stalker girl who can like be like, I met a guy in a red shirt at Trader Joe's and you're like, I'll find him.

Well, you made a post about somehow I saw a post about you, you know, your sobriety date. And I read the post and it was from last year where you were talking about how your sobriety date is even bigger to you than your birthday. And I really related to that. 1 million percent is your birthday. How long have you been sober? If I may ask 17 years. Okay. And then when's your belly

button birthday? July 5th coming up. Oh my gosh. Okay. Okay. So I'm that's exciting. Actually. I like it the way I have it because my, my natal birthday is like six weeks before my sober birthday. So the natal birthday feels like.

a wind up and I'm like oh my god my silver birthday is coming up like let's go um but yeah it's like we had very little to do with our birth dates like our natal birth dates but like my sobriety date is something I hold on to with pride especially I don't know how you feel I felt hitting the 10-year mark but it did feel like oh this is real like this is actually like a portion of my life, you know? Yeah. I really agree with that. When I first got sober

and I want to hear about yours, I just remember thinking like 10 years seemed absolutely insane. Like I would have to be very old when I got to be 10 years sober to me. I remember being 11 days sober and meeting somebody, a guy who had nine months. And I was like, Whoa, how does that even

crazy nine months that's insane bonkers I a baby I could have had a baby I could have made a human being in the time you have not put a drink to your lips I am one of those people too who like I don't know why because now thinking of this sentence it really doesn't make sense to me but I'm one of those people who heard the phrase um you never have to drink or use again and it changed my brain chemistry. I had never thought that that was on the table. Drinking and drugging was so part of my lifestyle. And it was so part of everyone I hung out with lifestyle that to me, we were the cool kids. We were living life. We were doing it. And alcohol and drugs were just one of the many benefits, you know, like to me, it felt like, Oh, I'm about to lose like a badge of honor. Like I, like it didn't make sense. And then when someone was like, you never have to

drink or do drugs again, I was like, that's crazy. That's crazy. Were you doing standup when you got

sober? Yeah, I was probably not well, um, because I've been doing standup like 15 years and I've been sober 10. So the first five were very much me, like, you know, a shot before my set, a beer during my set sometimes more if there was a green room with like high quality alcohol I was hitting it hard I definitely remember going up on stage and being very drunk but like always skating by like people were rebooking me probably because I was like a 26 year old gay slut and like they were like he was fun like he was unhinged but he was fun and um yeah so I definitely like I used to think that drugs and alcohol made me like calm in my body and like more in tune with the room little did i know it was absolutely doing the opposite it was putting up a wall between me and the room it was me on my journey them on theirs and so when i got sober it was very uncomfortable being on stage at first but then i was like oh i'm picking up on this girl's side eye when i say this one thing and so i get to zoom in on her but i never even noticed there was a girl sitting in that chair when I was drunk, you know? Yeah. Yeah. It's funny because I had

this similar, I mean, I did stand up for a lot of years and I loved, I had it down to a science. I was like, I have one drink for, you know, at some point it was a glass of wine and a half of Xanax. And I was like, that puts me in my body, calm, able to do, able to quiet some of the voices that are like, I don't know how this set's going to go. I don't know how this audience, I was like, it's cool. It's cool. Whatever it happens. Um, even if I bomb, but of course, sometimes I would miss that Mark and have like two glasses of wine and then be, and then sometimes I got the feedback that I was a little off or a little slurry or a little whatever. Yeah. But that first time doing

standup without anything was like, Oh yeah. I'm actually one of the first times I did stand up after getting sober new sobriety was it was the first like i i was part of a pilot episode of an mtv show about this show called brouhaha which was a very popular show on the east side it was in the backyard of this like house in in los felis uh they had like free beer and it was a drinking game and the comics didn't know the rules so like you were unknowingly breaking rules the audience was like, Oh, drinking and stuff. So I got booked as one of the comics on the pilot episode for MTV's version of this. And I was like, I can't drink. And they were like, okay, we'll put you up first and we'll have someone drink beef instead of you. We shot this pilot in San Diego. It was outdoors at a brewery or like a beer garden for nine in front of 900 people. And I was shaking. like I was so scared I didn't have my tool to be comfortable I I didn't know how the crowd was going to react I made a joke

about being sober and how I'm a loser for it or whatever, that went over well. And it wound up being a great set. And it's just like, yeah. So that first time on stage, it's just like,

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Sweets reduced after 20 gigs. So it sounds like you loved drinking and using and thought it was part of your identity. So can you tell me what led to you quitting? Yeah, I did think it was

part of my identity. I'm definitely one of those people who like when I was young, I saw my like my male family members, like uncles and people like that. They were like Irish Catholic when they got a little loose, like after a couple like brown liquors and stuff, they got a little bit more friendly a little bit more fun a little bit less threatening and like the fact that I couldn't have it made me want it even more so like alcohol is very much like this like okay it's like fun it's silly it's off limits um in movies and tv it's sexy you know so like when I had my first drink in high school like my first drunk rather and then like you said earlier the voices quieted like being a scared, you know, gay kid in the Midwest. Like I was so on edge the whole time. And that went away and it really did drop my shoulders down. Um, it, it gave me the courage to like, go to the parties, to talk to the boys, to be silly. I thought it made me funnier. It just, it was like, it was magic. My, my drinking also follows that path, magic, medicine, misery. and like it was being magic that those first I don't know five to ten years you know and then it was like oh I need this to go into the bar because I feel uncomfortable in my own skin and my body's adjusted to this and now this is the new normal but um it happened slowly right like as someone said like I don't know why I'm an alcoholic I it must be that at some point I drank too much too often. And I do think about that, how our lives are so delicately on the path that they're on. And it's like, maybe if I had had a near-death experience when I was in high school driving around drunk, I may have been scared straight. But that didn't happen. I was touched by an angel until the day I got sober. I should be dead. I'm sure you maybe feel the same several times over, like rationally speaking, I should not be alive. And like, it just became part of my lifestyle because there were no massive consequences. I'm realizing now the longer I stay sober, the consequence was missing out on a lot of potential for how I could have been living my life. I know we don't regret the past or wish to shut the door on it. But I think about how greatly my life has improved in 10 years and how it's aligning with the hopes and dreams of little Zach, the version of me that had never experienced drugs and alcohol and just had these kind of like pure dreams. Like I think the consequence wasn't losing my leg in a motorcycle accident or killing a family on the highway. It was veering so far off path that I had to claw my way back. And like

that's still I got off pretty easy you know and and I will say now like I am deeply grateful for being an alcoholic because it's led me to recovery it's led me to rooms of recovery it's led me to so many of my best purist relationships and like it's given me God which I grew up Catholic. I never had a God. Like I was so vehemently against anything that sounded like God or, you know, had a mouthpiece for God. And like, yes, it's been a bumpy road, but like, damn, things have been good for a bit now. And I think they're going to keep getting better.

I want to go back to, you were saying growing up as a gay kid in the Midwest, I feel like a lot of us, I'll say, I'm not gay, but I have other things, you know, other

childhood trauma stuff that I feel like when I drank, it just made me feel less different, less like people were going to figure out that I'm not lovable, whatever that thing is. And then if you start at a young enough age, cause I was 14 when I started drinking and you don't have consequences, which I also didn't really have in high school, except horrible hangovers, you know, waking up with regret, but also everybody, all my other friends were doing it too. So, um, it took me until I was 42 to get sober just because of what you're saying, just no real consequences. And for so long, I felt like, well, this helps me. This helps me be braver. This, you know, the first time I did stand up, I had had, I had like six rum and Cokes at an open mic night. There's no way I could have done that. No way. I was so scared. Right. So at, for a long time, it's a tool, right. To feel good. And maybe, maybe, um, I don't know if you were out in high school, I'd love to know like what that was like. Was that, was, did you need

the alcohol for that? You know, I had a soft coming out at 16. I was obviously gay. Like looking back, I was obviously gay. I literally took ballet and stuff like that. And like, i oh this is crazy i haven't had long hair since like high school and so i had like long swishy hair and i like dressed cute and like but i didn't get bullied really badly it was like underclassmen who didn't know who i was might like toss a f slur at me occasionally but like i started the gay straight alliance in my high school as a straight person like it was like not as bad as other kids had it like because i'm from st louis missouri not like rural missouri but um it's like it's in in some it's tool it was a tool and I think about how it was kind of like like a one one size fits all tool like he's I don't know about you like I didn't grow up with like therapy really on the table I think I went to see a child therapist when my parents got divorced for like one and a half sessions you know like but it felt very foreign felt very weird my parents weren't really about mental health but because it wasn't a thing in the 90s I don't think to really like dive into okay like how are you coping with this one bully or like how are you feeling about being out at school like it was like good luck kid you know and so drugs and alcohol were the the tool it's like you know taking aspirin for fever aches body pain you know headache. It's just like, okay, this is, this is it. You know, I'll just do more of it or less of it. And yeah. And that, and that's the point where it was magic. Cause I was like, oh, and I look cool when I'm doing it. Like I'm a rebel. I'm like a bad kid. Like I'm straying away from like the young life Christian friends. Like I'm going to go drink with my musical theater friends, you know, it's like smoke a cigarette but not inhale it and everything and like it like led to community like being this is the other funny thing like drunks really do show up for you like show up for other drunks like they will they will puke and rally they will cover for you at work they will because they know what that life is like you know i i wouldn't trade them for my support system now but like it is it is a community alcoholism there is a community there and I think it just gets to the point where those hangovers last longer the emotional hangovers last longer you know um people are maybe drinking less than the people used to in college or whatever you know what I mean? Like your community kind of thins out. Um, and I did forget how we got to me saying this, but you said something about what was like being gay in high school, I think

to just piggyback on your word. Are you bringing up tools? It was alcohol was the tool. It made me feel calm. It made me feel funny. It made me feel sexy. All my first sexual experiences were with drunk straight guys you know in the end of high school beginning of college college is when I officially like came out and there was like a big community and it was very I've made friends very quickly and blah blah blah but um yeah in high school it was beer was in the driver's seat and alcohol was the thing that could like rip it out rip the steering wheel out of fear's hands

and the thing about drinking is that like let's say you go to college you're meeting lots of other gay people you but yet you still have to use the alcohol even because there's you don't just go like oh I guess I don't need this anymore it's cool now no you just use it more that's the thing it's progressive as we know. But like for me, I kept thinking, well, once I'm not stressed out about whatever the thing is that's happening in my life, then I'll naturally drink less. Every single time it just got, it just escalated. Whatever the, until the next thing happened, you know, there was a period of time where I wasn't drinking as much when I was younger, but that's because I was then in like an eating disorder. But like I look back and I go, oh, so you were just doing something

else. Well, and this is like the whack-a-mole of it all. And it's something I'm still experiencing 10 years sober. I catch myself in these like food blackouts where I'm just eating. I actually do not feel good in my stomach, but the pizza is still there. The ranch is still there. My mind goes into the fuck it's category. And then I'm like, okay, well, I did that. Let's also do a brownie sundae. Oh, I don't have brownies. I'll find myself walking to seven 11 to get brownies and ice. It's like that like disease still wants me dead. It still wants me like exhausted by carnal pleasures. And it wants me distracted. And it still wants me to be like, you're not comfortable. I know it would make you comfortable for a little bit. What if we lose ourselves in dominoes. Um, and it's just, yeah, it's so, it's so interesting. Cause in that way, it's like, wow, I, I guess I, it'll never end, but that's why I thank God for sobriety. I'm, I'm picking up tools still. Like, I don't know about you. I don't drink that much water. And like, I, I know that water will make my life better. I resist it. I'm like diet Coke, a Celsius, a Red Bull, maybe that'll give you a little tingle you know and uh so it's just like this thing of oh I'm I'm gonna be playing this game uh uh seven trash cans six lids maybe till I die but like hopefully I stay in my recovery program I stay surrounded by winners I give myself more evidence that eating salad is more satisfying than eating fries like that. And so I'm using food stuff, but I'm so sorry. You just said food eating disorder. And I think I like latched onto it, but it's like, you know, um, uh, cake, cash, cock, uh, cake, cash, cock. Like, I'm like, those are my, my things. I'm like, well, is there a boy who likes me? No, you're less than you're, you're pitiful you're ugly you're evil you know lose some weight fatty you know like and then it's like oh this isn't working maybe i'll eat the whole cake that my friend left here

after her birthday you know it's just like our brains my daughter brought home a like a half a cake from and yeah i'm with 17 years sober my daughter brought home half a cake from something she was like i had like one one piece of it there but they didn't they were going on a trip the next day. So she brought it home and it sat on our stove and I just kept going back to it and opening it up. And like, I'm just going to have one bite. And then I'd be like, I'm just going to have a sliver. I'm just going to have one piece of it and couldn't stop until it was gone. Yeah. You're

like, let's get, well, let's get it the fuck out of here. Let's just eat it. Cause then in my head, I'm like, well, one bad night is better than three bad days. And like, I'm not going to throw it in the trash can. Like I know my disease well enough for that. I'm like, okay, let's talk about this. Cause it's, you're right. I'm not going to spray it with Windex. Like I'm just not going to do it. I'm also probably not going to ask a friend to come over and help me. So it's just like my best solution is like scarf it now, go to bed, wake up brand new day, start over. But isn't that funny too? Because it's like, we could have had a sliver for five days in theory. Like there is a world in which, and that's not that bad. A sliver of cake is like not that bad, but I think the disease kicks in and they're like, you know, it's better than a sliver. You dumb bitch five slivers

right now. Yeah. Well, I have to do everything. I've, I mean, I've talked about this before on this podcast, but, um, before I got sober, I remember getting a prescription for Vicodin for a breakthrough migraine pain. And I somehow got a hundred of them and I had to take, I mean, I would you know it start out take a couple oh I have Vicodin take a couple then it's like oh well now I don't feel that as much so let me take a couple more and like I could be

through that in a week also did you also think did you also go like is it is a headache coming on yes is it okay better is it really gone too like yeah let's let's really put it to bed I get it I get it it's I it's it's a bummer that we can't be trusted with our with ourselves

Um, but it's so much better than it was, you know? So, so when, okay. So when it started to become misery, I love your, I love your thing. Magic medicine, misery, when it entered the misery portion, what was that like? I mean, was it, were you waking up with horrible hangovers? Were you doing things that you kind of regret, but not getting a DUI? Like what was life?

Yeah, it was all the things, um, that you just mentioned. And I basically woke up on my 30th birthday and was so depressed because not only was I in a stranger's bed, covered in DNA, probably dehydrated, head pounding, already late for work, probably have to call out, you know, a job that I didn't like, living three people in a two bedroom. and I was so depressed for the younger version of myself who like did not need any of the things I thought I needed mere hours ago.

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excluded from price guarantee. Physical pain, mental pain, emotional pain, spiritual pain, what I now would identify as spiritual pain. And I just had to have this come to Jesus moment where I was just like, I don't have a dimmer switch when it comes to this. Like I cannot drink a glass of wine. I don't have any interest in a glass of wine. I want to split a bottle. Then I want to go to liquor. Then I want to do some Coke. And then I want to have sex with a stranger who thinks I'm super hot. Like, and if I don't get all those things, I'm depressed. I'm lowering the standards for those things. I'm just scratching at an itch that will not go away. and alcohol and drugs i finally identified as a hurdle that i was putting in front of myself and i because up until this point i'd done all the i think classic bartering that we uh are want to do where it's like okay no dry month no alcohol for the month i'd make it it would be the best month ever but day 31 uh head in a toilet throwing up from too much Franzia. And it's like, I, I didn't, it's so crazy looking back and being like, I didn't even realize that like, it was a great month, not drinking because I celebrated by getting drunk and being like, Oh, okay. It's not a problem. Life is not that bad. I was being dramatic and then reset, you know? So like the, the misery of it all is just so scary because it's so funny you you said you're having comedians on to be funny i feel like i haven't said anything

funny this whole entire podcast so funny first of all yeah let me give you that validation that we all need you're so you're very very funny i don't i didn't mean like just make a lot of hard jokes about it i just totally a little light-hearted yeah well and also that obviously

i blame everything on my disease too my disease in the back in the back heckling me like you're

boring her. Um, but boring. Well, okay. You know what my brain goes? You already told that story before. Stop, stop interjecting. Oh my God. No, I get that too. And of course, like one listener

will leave one review. Like she talks about herself too much. And out of a hundred reviews, you'll, you'll memorize that one. But, um, so the misery of it all was, I did not trust the words that came out of my own mouth. And that was so depressing. So scary. Also, I was dealing with depression and anxiety, which runs in my family, but I wasn't medicated for it. I was too scared to find a therapist because I was like, that costs too much money. I can't afford it. I don't want to be dependent on a pill. How scary? What if I run out of the pills? Anxiety, anxiety, but like the, the idea that I would wake up in the morning, be like, okay, I work my serving shift.

shift after that I get off at 2 p.m. I'll go home I'll work out and then I'll write or whatever the thing was the productive thing that my path was calling me to do I'll prep for the show tonight I'll write some new jokes whatever it was but then towards the end of the shift my co-worker goes do you want to have our shift drink because our our place let you have a free drink after this shift and okay as in West Hollywood it's a diner it's cute there's gay guys there have a drink well do you want to go to Trunks? It's a dive bar, you know, you know, half a mile away. We just go one, it's a happy hour. It's two for one. Like just, you'll be home by like dinner time and then cut to, you know, sticky and Van Nuys in a stranger's, in a stranger's bed, looking for a piece of mail to find out their name, where I am. And like, I didn't do the thing I was dead set on doing. and so it's like who who changed the plan and it's like oh the the the disease did the the part of me that succumbs to that the part of me that believes that voice that like yolo this is what life is about making out with a guy in an alley like this is living like yeah you know it's cunning baffling powerful is something you know that's sad and it's just like I so many mornings woke up regretful so many mornings woke up not remembering what I did so many mornings waking up wondering if I still had friends and like again because the consequences kind of ended there besides maybe wasted potential I just kept getting over them until it was finally too much and I think it was honestly, thank God for turning 30. Cause I was like, there's something, a voice that another voice that came in and said, it's not cute anymore. It's not cute. Like what you're doing. It's not cute. It's not, it's not what would make little Zach proud. It's not something to brag about at, at a function, you know, start showing up, like, let's get, let's get real. So what'd you do? Um, so at this point I had like rage quit my serving job. Cause I obviously thought I was the smartest person in the room and I you're speaking my yeah I I feel every word of

that I've quit so many waiting tables jobs yeah and I thought I was the smartest and was like they don't know how to run this I yeah no one ever wanted to make me a manager of anything but I knew

better than everybody had to run a restaurant of course and god forbid a customer gave me any sort of sass towards the end oh baby i will ruin the rest of this meal and i'll you know i'll make you pay for this which it's just like and i also think i've been serving i've been like in customer service for too long and it's like you hit i think you hit you have a life expectancy in in that field where i just couldn't i couldn't bend over anymore i was just it was a storm you know when i was i

waited tables till I was 28. I got my first, like I got a TV writing job at 28. But prior to that, I'd only waited, I'd waited tables for over 10 years, like since I was 16. And the last six weeks I got fired from three serving jobs within six weeks. And then I was like, I got to do something else. Cause no one will hire me. Who's going to hire me. I have no references at this point yeah it was bad you're like can i send you my script i got fired from the last one in one

night the first night it was an irish pub and yeah anyway anyway like this is you're gross this is bad how stupid so you had rage quit your job my serving job i posted on facebook um i needed work and three people reached out to give me work i since i in the year coming uh found out that they were all in a recovery program which i thought was beautiful because like i didn't really have anything to do with recovery i kind of thought those were losers i thought those were you know people who lived under bridges with you know brown paper bags and um one of them let me clean his airbnb property and he would just listen to me tell my little sad stories and he took me to my first meeting uh meet a recovery meeting and um it was big and loud and filled with a mix of people I, of course, latched on to the like, the like, the rougher looking people and been like, well, this isn't me. Obviously, this is not me. I shouldn't be here. Thank you for being me. But no. But then this the speaker at this recovery meeting, really, he made me laugh and he made me cry. And it gave me like just enough faith to like go check out another recovery meeting. And that was the beginning of it. Like I thank God for recovery in L.A. too, because there's recovery meetings all over of different different plans or what.

whatever different like groups, different sects of recovery. Um, S E C T S. Um, and I, yeah, I made, I made recovery meetings a big part of my, I still go to like a meeting every day for the most part. Like, wow. It's like how I start my day. It's like when I'm really happy, I go to a meeting when I'm really sad. I go to a meeting when I'm feeling regular, I go to a meeting. I'm really stressed in this today. And I almost, my disease of course is like, we'll skip the meeting and like go for a walk instead which wouldn't have been the worst thing but like I was like no no no no no no no I like I know better than to listen to that voice and so it was like yeah it was a slow slow thing and the only thing I did perfect the whole time since you know November 27th 2015 besides not drink and do drugs is uh I've made my bed every day and it's like an esteemable act, you know, they say, and it's like, it's, this is bringing it back to what I just said. Self-esteem is built on doing the things you say you're going to do when you say you're going to do them. And that was not how I was living. I was not doing the things I said I was going to do period sometimes, but I especially wasn't doing them when I said I was going to do them. Like I, my word meant nothing to others, but not even to me, you know? And like, when I tell myself you are making your goddamn bed you dumb little bitch um which is like you know that tough love voice but said with love I make hotel beds now like I can't it's go it's a compulsion there is no reason I can't do it zero reason and not made exquisitely I'm not tucking and folding and what I'm pulling, I'm, I'm aligning, I'm pillows. That's all. And that's all it needs to be. You know what I mean? It's like showing who's, who's, who's, who's boss me. I am. And

you're going to make the bed. I love everything you just said. I was wondering, like, what would you say to people? Because I, I feel like you and I have a lot in common that rebellious thinking the, I don't want to go to these meetings. These people are all going to be losers. Like they couldn't handle it. They couldn't make it work. Yes. They couldn't handle it. Yeah. Go on. Yeah. I mean, it really is, as they say, for me, it was last house on the block. I don't want any part of this. I don't want to, I don't want to hear the, these slogans are just like, make my skin crawl. Like, Oh, I don't want God. Yeah. Yeah. I don't want to be like these people. So, and also in my mind for, for quite a while, and I would constantly share about this, I'd be like, I mean, I'm just not convinced it's not a cult, you know? So that was in my head. So what would you say to people? I mean, I know what I would say to people, but what would you say to people that are like, I don't want, like people have an image that they go, well, there's a lot of have tos and there's a lot of group think, and there's a lot of, and I don't, that's not for me.

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um i would say well first of all addressing the cult thing the easiest thing you can tell people is like well we don't have a leader and we literally all talk shit about ourselves and the the and the program itself all the time so like immediately not a cult um also zero obligation um also the only requirement is a desire to stop drinking you literally don't even have to stop drinking sit your ass in the back row listen if something really offends you leave you we all still have free will, but what I will say is. my, our best thinking got us to where we were. That was us. That was us doing our best. So I would, I guess, dare people to put their ego aside and be open to the fact that millions of people of different walks of life, of different economic backgrounds, of different ethnicities, of different sexual orientations have found a magic sauce in this program so maybe give it this the other thing too it's like it's like the person who goes like oh meditation i meditated for a week straight it does not work blah blah blah it's like well that's you didn't do it right like it's a practice you just keep doing you know what i mean it's like if you're gonna go to one meeting and say well they they mentioned fallen women and how dare they speak disparagingly about it's like yeah no I do hear you I do hear you but if you talk to another woman in that meeting who maybe has some time she could probably give you a very easy workaround to that moment you know like so it's just like it's that thing of like whatever you're looking for you're gonna find and so like when I was first going in there, I was like, okay, I'm looking to prove that these are losers and that they are, uh, that they're losers and that this is God, like this is religious. And pretty quickly you hear a speaker who goes, I won my first Emmy when I was, you know, when I was still drinking and use, and I know we're supposed to speak vaguely, but like, they'll say something like, you know, and you recognize them, maybe they're an actor or something. And you're like, I won my first thing when I was drunk and I didn't work for 10 years. I got sober and I won 10 more things. And I was living in such lack because I only thought I was worth this one thing. And so they're speaking broadly, but you're like, oh, okay, wait, they're not all losers. Or it's like a girl who like was sexually assaulted a bunch as a, as a teen and basically sex trafficked. And like, now she runs a, you know, a company or a charity

that like helps women do this and she takes meetings to women who have lived this I'm like oh my god these people are high performing these people are smart these people are like doing great things and thank god I saw that because I saw I saw that the people were cooler than I thought they were before I was um relieved of the burden of god um and so I saw okay oh even if i'm not an alcoholic which i don't think i am i think i just like i was just in my 20s i drank a lot and who doesn't like cool people all do these are this thing is making people better versions of themselves so i think part of me was like give it its fair shot and that's what i would say to anyone else like hopefully you're given the gift of desperation they say or like you are stubborn enough to know that alcohol is no longer the solution so maybe you don't land in the popular recovery program. Maybe you land in a different program or a farm reduction program, or maybe you stop drinking and you never go to a meeting and you never drink again. Like maybe you go for 10 years and you decide to drink again and you live a great life. I've learned all of that is speculation. The only thing I can control is where my feet are right now. And right now it feels good to go to a meeting and show other people that we're not all crazy losers, that we're like getting better, that there's a lot to be had. I'm still scratching the surface of this program. I couldn't, I couldn't tell you. I don't think I know even 10% of the program. And I don't know how we feel about talking about the program. I haven't saying the words because like, I like, don't know what the rule is about talking about recovery programs? I think this works because

people that need to know what we're talking about, I think know what we're talking about. Okay. Okay. Good. My feeling too, is that, I mean, I just came into it with so much, you know, you know what they say, rejection with a before investigation, you know, right. Contempt prior to investigation. Yeah. I had a lot of what I thought it was going to be. And I was really ready for everybody. Well, and this, I talked about this in my book, but many years before I got sober, I went with a friend to a meeting to support him because, you know, he had a really bad problem. Then I sat in the back and I took the, are you, uh, do you have a drinking problem quiz? And according to them, Oh, it was a very bad problem. I answered yes. It is so funny. It is so crazy. It's very rigid. It's a very rigid test. I was like, OK, I mean, if. by the letter of the law, I guess I have to answer yes, but there was a lot of extenuating circumstances like, come on. So according to them, I answered like 20 out of 22 questions. Yes. And they're like, Oh, you definitely have a problem. And I was like, to a hospital, but it was another like 10 years before I quit drinking. But I just remember thinking like, okay I'm gonna I don't have any better ideas so I'm gonna go to a meeting I can't think of another way to do this um and then I thought oh this is like a cult these people all really want me to join up you know and I remember the feeling of kind of disappointment when I was like but when I don't go to a meeting how come nobody like calls me and like tries to find out where I am like nobody seemed to care and then that was another little resentment I had I was like some cult you guys are i'm about to leave does anyone care that's an alcoholic nobody's following me out to my car going you must stay for the end of the meeting i was like these people are not into it enough apparently so then i had to like decide for myself like okay no i i think i really do want this help i i do want the support and i realized oh i have to be the one that reaches out oh I have to join up oh I have to call people or they will forget it nobody's interested in pressuring you because all of us elkies are like interested in ourselves and it just it doesn't

work I will say in my experience and from what I've seen you it really has to be that you want it or part of you wants it or part of you is at least willing to give it a very fair shot because yeah I don't know in in yeah in my experience it's like it's paid me back tenfold to the point where I remember distinctly scrounging for quarters to bring a dollar to the meeting and like this is not me gloating or anything like that I fully give like five dollars and a part of that's inflation but like it's more representative of the fact that like I have the money to give and I know it's because of my sobriety and this program and that whereas you are not not required nor expected to give a dime I want to I want my meeting that I go to all the time to thrive and I want there to be funds there to give away big books to people who are super skeptical like i want like and if it's like one of those things like we didn't make rent we're passing the basket i'll toss in 20 because i'm just like this is worth every penny because they don't even they don't even demand it and you know what i mean it's like it recover this recovery program that we're in is like truly and i should i hope there's a documentary about it at some point it's like I think one of the most beautiful things to exist on the planet just like we're all servants okay good that sound like a cult but we're all like you know self-supporting we we all wear special outfits yes we all drink sweet sweet juice every day I mean the coffee in in recovery rooms will put hair on every part of your body but like that's it that even got me there at first it was this miss penny at my regular meeting made this fucking rocket fuel coffee with like um french vanilla coffee mate and that sugar and caffeine at 7 30 a.m got my ass and when i didn't have a car i was walking you know like a mile and a half or whatever to this meeting at 7 a.m. to get this like this like this go-go juice you know and like listen and like yeah it's just

like it's magical I think so tell me about before we go like so life now so you're a touring comedian

yeah touring comedian um you have a special out yeah oh my god I have a special out called twink death it's on youtube I talk about sobriety a little bit because obviously it's a big part of my life I think the second hour that I'm working on too will also have like a sobriety chunk because it really is important and I think it's fun that like if you watch the special I am quite quote unquote dirty I'm a little blue in a sex forward sort of way like I'm not like violent or like aggro it's like very just like like Nikki Glaser-esque like yes sex and dating and I think it is important for people to see that like oh you can be very out of pocket even as a completely sober person like i do think i have found my genuine voice um whether or not the masses love it

Like, I think the people who like it really do enjoy it. And so I will always be, oh my God, I hope I'm always sober. I never, I never want to lose the feeling I have most days. Um, but yeah, I always talk about sobriety a little bit, but yeah, I'm a touring comic. I do my own hour on the road. Um, I open for people like Fortune Feimster and Taylor Tomlinson. Um, I write, I'm on like a SiriusXM morning show, usually once a week, uh, Jeff Lewis live. He's like a Bravo celebrity. Of course. Yeah. and um and then i do all sorts of rant like i want to act i want to be in front of the camera like it's that thing too if it's like little zach like thought i was going to be on a billboard for like a cw show like you know hot teens in the wilderness but like obviously i that door is closed but like i'm doing like things that are adjacent to that and like i really do genuinely love my life and like my problems are quite luxury problems today you know and i'm holding space always for that to change. And I'm, you know, deeply rooted in gratitude for what I have today, you know, cause it's, you don't always wake up with the things you went to bed with. And so it's just like, yeah, like let's be as happy as we can be with what we've got. And what I've got is because

of sobriety. What an amazing way to end it. Thank you so much for being on the show and I wish you all the success and I'll see everybody next week. Bye.

This is Danielle Fischel, Ryder Strong, and Will Friedel from Podmeets World.

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Did you mess with my phone? Why is my connection suddenly good? We're trying T-Mobile. We switched to T-Mobile? No, we're doing a 30-day free trial. So we're paying for two phone plans?

I said it's free. We keep our phone and carrier. You download the T-Life app, and we just get to take advantage of their 5G network, some of their best benefits, perks, freebies, everything. And before you ask, they didn't ask for a credit card, credit check, don't worry.

So you did mess with my phone.

Well, yes, so you can help me make the decision to switch to America's best network. All right, but no one messed with the thermostat.

Test drive the best benefits in wireless and America's best network. Free for 30 days. Start your trial at T-Mobile.com or on the T-Life app.