Whether you are newly sober, or have been living without alcohol for some time, you deserve a big humungous pat on...
Mrs D’s Blog
Here Lotta Dann writes on topics inspired by discussions taking place within the Living Sober community, and on themes that arise for her as she moves through her own sober lifestyle. Guest posts from other writers in recovery also feature on this page. Don’t forget – you can speak directly with others who are looking at the role alcohol plays in their lives on this site! Simply join our community and visit the Members Feed.
"Many people in early recovery find they lack a “volume knob” for emotions and this can feel out of...
What makes a weekend away special? For me, it used to be the 'special' booze I'd drink non-stop.
We are currently experiencing some technical issues which is preventing some members from logging in and access the Members...
The lady at the supermarket was very cheerful as she asked me this question. She was dressed smartly, standing...
This guest post comes from Amy, a sober hero who lost her home in the terrible floods caused by...
It's hard sometimes to convince other people that we have a problem with booze. They might see us have...
Getting sober and living sober are two very different things. One is a short(ish) term project that is hard work...
ELEVEN YEARS AGO. It’s a Monday afternoon. Nothing out of the ordinary is going on. My husband will be...
I talk about this often, how I had to do a lot of really hard work retraining my brain...
I went out with a bunch of girlfriends recently. A big group of us hitting the town for dinner...
It was midnight at the party and someone said "I'm putting the jug on, does anyone want a hot...
This guest post comes from member @djstarheart. It was written as an update in the Members Feed and resonated...
This guest post comes from sober hero Matt Calman (@emjaycee), author of The Longest Day. ========= I was just...
This guest post comes from the lovely and very wise Suzy Morrison who works in the addiction sector and...
The end of the year can be a tricky time of year for us sober people. There are many...
I remember just before I hit 90 days sober being asked if I’d ever drink again. I remember saying...
This poem was sent in by the lovely Finn Devlin. She says she wrote it for everyone who is...
I've been to many parties as a sober person and generally I don't have a problem with them (unless...
Tēnā koutou! Ko Leah Rothman tōku ingoa, E mahi ana ahau ki New Zealand Drug Foundation. Tēnā koutou, tēnā...
I am about to celebrate 11 years of sobriety (yay me!) and just yesterday I wrote in the Members...
This guest post comes from our lovely community member Matt (@emjaycee). =========== I left my job as a journalist...
It's very hard to explain the intensity of a drinking dream to someone who isn't sober. It's one of those...
Republishing this powerful post. ======== Welcome to a very special day - the first day of the rest of...
I think a big part of the reason I've never picked up a drink since I made the decision...
A lot of the time I'm just chugging on in my sober life feeling fair-to-middling. Worrying about my studies,...
The lovely Jean McCarthy has written another book, and we are so fortunate she is sharing an excerpt with...
I didn't feel disconnected from myself when I was drinking. I thought I was in touch with how I...
Sometimes my recovery is extremely ugly. Sometimes my recovery involves tears, yelling, feeling low or inadequate, self-destructive thoughts, grumpiness, a...
I love that most nights I sleep very deeply for many hours. Such a change from when I had...
The below interview is with Karen Nimmo, Clinical Psychologist and author. I reached out to her after noticing that...
While different countries are at various stages of the Covid-19 pandemic, here in New Zealand we are experiencing an...
This guest post was written as an update in the Members Feed by member @dirb, and I thought it...
This guest posts comes from Tom aka @behind-the-sofa, a long-time member of this site and sober hero now working...
We have been publishing these New Year's rituals for the past few years. They're a lovely way to formally...
Earlier this year the independent evaluation company, Cogo, were engaged by the New Zealand Drug Foundation, who manage Living...
This guest post comes from journalist Guyon Espiner who recently released a brilliant documentary about his relationship with alcohol,...
After publishing my list of 13 things I have discovered in sobriety, I asked members of our community here...
Negative emotions suck and cause discomfort, but sitting with them and feeling them 100% in the raw helps immensley...
This guest post comes from one of our beloved community members, @hammer123, who often shares thoughts from his "big...
That's our biggest fear when we quit drinking isn't it ... that other people are going to think we...
I love our Living Sober community. I just love it. There is so much warmth and kindness going on in...
Today I am 10 years sober! Here's what I have learned during all the years of my hard fought...
Let's talk about 'the voice'. No, not the TV show - the one in your head trying to convince...
This Guest Post was written by member @bluzooma in the Members Feed the other day and it was so...
No-one would choose the conditions of a pandemic lockdown to help with getting sober, but in some ways finding...
We are so fortunate in today's world that we can do all manner of research, investigation and exploration from...
This guest post comes from member @esmeralda. She actually submitted it for the recent 'Anonymous Confessional' post, but only...
I wanted to do a follow-up to our recent 'Anonymous Confessional', a post that discusses in more detail how...
There’s a well-worn saying in recovery which is ‘you’re only as sick as your secrets’. Another one is, ‘Our...
Boozing is living a wild, crazy, blurry, detached and numbed-out life that is sometimes fun and sometimes sad and...
This guest post comes from Claire Hatwell, sober hero and author of the book My Not So Secret Recovery....
Someone wrote in the Members Feed recently; "this sober lark is just the best thing ever". These sorts of...
This is a re-post of a fabulous guest piece my friend @sueK wrote back in 2014. It is full...
We currently are running a survey to find out what visitors to Living Sober site think about our site....
This guest post comes from Tommy, a 27-year-old working in communications while training to become a counsellor. ========= Last...
This guest post comes from Mark Goodson, author of the blog 'The Miracle of the Mundane" (great title, great...
Oh how I love waking up on a Saturday or Sunday with no hangover. How much do I love...
Make no bones about it. This is what getting sober is all about. When you quit drinking and commit...
Little by little. Little movements towards change. First time 5pm rolls by and you don't pour yourself a drink....
(This is a post from 2018 that is worth republishing because of the powerful message it contains for some...
I was interviewed by a journalist a few years back (you can read the article here) and I was...
Sober Hindsight is one of my favorite things about living alcohol-free. Sober Hindsight is something you only really experience when...
I was watching a movie the other day and it showed a woman having a flashback to her childhood where...
I'm not sure that you can just stop drinking alcohol and make no other changes or do no other...
For some reason these three simple words often make me teary. If you can say this to yourself -...
One of our members (@kate1975) recently celebrated her two-year soberversary and shared with us a list she had written...
I think one thing that really helps in early sobriety is to bring a healthy level of curious, upbeat...
If someone was to ask me what I think the main thing you have to learn when you get...
This post comes from lovely long-time member @hammer123. He wrote it as an update in the Members Feed and...
When we take alcohol away.. one of the biggest things to get used to is all the free time...
When we take alcohol away we start to feel everything really strongly. There's no getting away from that. Alcohol...
One of the big jobs we have to do when getting sober is to turn around all the hard-wired...
One of the very hardest things for me in getting sober was the massive shift I had to do...
You have to want to change in order to change. I could type a million words about why I...
You feel utterly weird when you first quit drinking. I certainly did. I felt like a sober alien who...
I've been saying for many years that anyone who digs deep to get rid of alcohol and learn to...
One of the biggest things we have to get used to when quitting alcohol is mixing with other people...
Mrs D's advice for getting sober and beating those alcohol cravings, urges and triggers. "The good news is that...
As we all know we live in a booze soaked world and nowhere is this more apparent than online....
Early sobriety is hard. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying. It's a rollercoaster of moods, cravings, social events,...
Visualisation was a really powerful tool for me early on. It was one of my main strategies for dealing with...
Have you ever thought about the fact that alcohol is the only drug that we get treated like a...
I'm quite ballsy when I'm out about taking ownership of my drinks. When I’m at someone’s house or out...
This Guest Post comes from member @soberbutterfly who wrote it as an update in the Members Feed. It was...
This guest post comes to us from the legendary Jean McCarthy, host of The Bubble Hour podcast and author...
Someone was trying to tell me the other day that ‘sober’ is a negative word with staid and boring...
Cravings are arseholes. They hit and they can be so powerful and they suck. Often they come on the...
I know the process of quitting alcohol is incredibly complex and different for everyone, but here are four steps...
I can vividly remember the morning of my last hangover, standing in the kitchen with my throbbing head, messy...
I had one of those classic ‘couldn’t do this if I was still boozing’ parenting moments the other day....
That's where most of my boozing went on in the latter years. Behind closed doors, in my house, on...
Soberversaries are a mixed bag. Mostly they're quietly fabulous and amazing and lovely. But they can also be quite...
This piece was first written as an update in the Members Feed by @māorigirlsober on her 80th sober day....
One of my biggest fears when I stopped drinking was how other people would take the new sober me....
I knew after I stopped drinking that if I was going to be genuinely at peace with being sober,...
People often ask me, how did I do it? How did I quit and stay quit? Here's my answer....
