Latest / Empower Your Menopause / Episode 8: Alcohol During Menopause - Friend or Foe? With Special Guest Holly Walsh

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Episode 8: Alcohol During Menopause - Friend or Foe? With Special Guest Holly Walsh · Empower Your Menopause

• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to another episode of Empower Your Menopause with myself, James Ellis and Julian Medesi from Fabulous Beyond 40.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: Now those of you who are listening won't be able to see this.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, if you're watching on YouTube, you will be able to see that we've actually got an extra person with us today.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: There's a little square adjacent to the one that I'm in, and we'll introduce Holly in a second.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Wanted to talk a little bit about the subject first that we want to discuss and go through in this episode.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: This is probably the number one thing that I am asked about when it comes to menopause and perimenopause, but also the number one thing people don't really want to talk about.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Because today we're going to talk about alcohol and the effects it has.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: And obviously, that can be a challenging conversation.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: I know that myself because I go through periods of being alcohol free.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: Quite often, when you are alcohol-free for a while, the first thing that people will ask you is why.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: And that why carries a lot of connotations, whether you're a man or a woman, and whatever stage of life you're in, people are curious, and they're curious for many many reasons.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: The first reason is probably a little bit of gossip, they want to know if you have a problem or not.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: The second reason is usually that they're asking because they're curious themselves about going alcohol free, and so that is why today, as part of this conversation, we brought in the lovely Holly Walsh from Hello You Coaching.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: Holly is an alcohol-free coach, so we're going to talk a little bit about Holly's journey.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Holly's in our, let's say, target age group.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, she's a very busy woman, she's a mum with two kids.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: She's trying to launch three or four businesses all at the same time, so she's not without all her stresses, and she used to be, and Holly, I hope you don't mind me using this phrase, a little bit of a Ladette.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that is the term you could use, in that she uh enjoyed celebrating uh life with occasionally some some alcohol choices.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: So we'll talk a little bit to Holly first of all, um, about her journey.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: But just before we start on that, I think we want to just make it really clear here that yeah, none of the three of us are the booze police.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: There's absolutely no judgment in this call.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: What we'd like to do is empower you a little bit with what alcohol does to your body at this time in life, both the positives and the negatives, and then hopefully give you some techniques and strategies.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: If you decide after hearing that that you would either like to cut down or stop, Holly is probably best informed on ways to make that happen because she's got alcohol um free qualifications within her coaching thing.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: So, Holly, why don't you just tell us a little bit about yourself to start off?
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: Because that was rather a long introduction.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: I've talked for too long.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: Let's have you uh tell us tell us a little bit about yourself.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um well, thank you so much for having me on.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_02: It's a pleasure to be here with you too.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_02: I love what you do, and you're right, I am unfortunately in the category beyond 40, but I will also accept in the fabulous category too.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, you are right, James.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_02: I was a lad at you know, I I was a teenager in 90s Britain, and you know, getting drunk was a rite of passage, we all did it.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then fast forward, and I became a huge victim of mummy wine culture, you know.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I certainly felt encouraged to drink at home alone with the kids, you know.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_02: I had posters around my house and coasters on the table, and everything said, you know, it's not drinking alone if the kids are in the bath.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, the messaging was quite clear to my uh generation, you know, you should be drinking at home when you are with the children and it will make everything better.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and sadly, um I you know, I was a massive victim of all the marketing, and I just found myself drinking every single weekend.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_02: It would be been a classic grey area drinker, we call it in coaching or you know, middle aimed drinker.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: It's not full alcohol dependency, but huge capacity to drink um on a binge level every weekend.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I would say after the birth of my son when I was 36, I noticed that my tolerance decreased significantly.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_02: I was diagnosed with Hashimoto's and um I just found that the hangovers were getting more and more complicated.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_02: I started to feel anxious, paranoid, insecure, um, started a lot of hating on myself, and it got worse and worse, and um as I approached 40 I started to get extremely drunk on extremely little alcohol, but I was still trying to knock it back and keep up with all the girls.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I fell over and broke my ankle on my husband's 40th because of Prosecco.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I broke my arm on New Year's Eve in 21 because of Prosecco.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I was just becoming a complete liability, um, you know, and endangering my myself on a physical level.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and obviously being extremely sick the day after, and then gorging on crap processed food for days after that, and I just got in a really bad cycle of feeling totally sick and tired all the time.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: So was there a was the w can you tell us what it was like what made you decide to to go AF?
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, it sounds like you had some pretty bad experiences there.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: And then how do you actually go about it?
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's one of the questions a lot of people will wonder.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: What what do you do when you decide to stop drinking?
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_02: I think for me, being in AE on New Year's Day in 2022 with a broken arm, well, it was actually my arm and wrists that were broken, and being alongside many other women there with broken limbs because of alcohol.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_02: I and you know, knowing the pressure the NHS is under, and I just sort of felt such shame, and I thought, you know, I'm 42, this is just not acceptable anymore.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_02: You know, none of you know, none of my friends are going to hospital with these regular injuries.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_02: There's something wrong with me, and I believed there was something wrong with me.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_02: So when I first tried to stop drinking, I went about it the wrong way.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_02: I thought I was the problem, not alcohol.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_02: So I could manage to white knuckle four to six week periods, but then when I drank again, I just became so drunk so quickly, and I was becoming a liability and an embarrassment.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_02: And my husband had done the stints of being alcohol free, and I was watching him be consistent and showing up as a great parent every Sunday morning, you know, with our little boy, and I just thought life isn't too short, I don't want to miss out, I don't want to feel like rubbish anymore.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I was considering going on a higher dose of my antidepressants, and I thought I'll depressant and I'm thinking about going up with my antidepressants.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I'm I'm not stupid, and I was like, I'm behaving like an idiot here.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not joining up the dots.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so it was New Year's Eve 2023.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_02: No, New Year's Eve 2022 that I then had my last session, getting drunk at home with the family, lots of red wine, and then New Year's Day 23.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_02: I woke up and I was like, I've got to find people out there like me.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_02: There's got to be somebody like me who it not a, you know, alcoholic, which I hate that term anyway, but I felt like nobody understood there was nobody like me out there, so I just reached out, found some online communities, online support, grey area drinkers, women my age, normal women like me who just went out drinking with their friends, but just couldn't deal with the hangovers.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: Julie, what's your experience of alcohol at this stage and and what's your take on women 14 above drinking?
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: I wonder if you could speak a little bit to some of the some of the health effects that it might have.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um as much as we like to think that alcohol is our friend when it comes to relaxing, um it it really isn't.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um as Holly was saying, it's a depressant.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: It interferes with our brain function, um, it interferes with our digestion.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: Especially at this age when we're trying to lose weight and we tend to to pack it on, alcohol is not only going to add a lot of empty calories, but our body sees it as a toxin, so it's going to want to get rid of it as quickly as possible.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: So it does that while putting other processes, shall we say, on hold.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and it it's it it has a it has a huge impact.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I and I can speak from that personally as well, because I live in Italy, I live right between Prosecco and Francia Corta regions and right next to Amarone and Lugana, and so wine here is like it's part of the culture, it's an important part of the culture.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: But one of the things I learned, especially coming from the US, when when you pour a glass of wine in the US, it's poured to the brim of the glass.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: When you pour a glass of wine in Italy, it's poured maybe a few ounces because you sip on it with your meal, you enjoy it for a toast, you enjoy it to complement the food.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_01: In some cases, supposedly to help digest the food.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, they drink Lambrusco in the Emilia Romagna region because the food is heavier and fat.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: So they have all of these cultural reasons for having having the wine, but drunkenness is not acceptable here it culturally.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so I went from a very drinking culture and a drinking family to coming here and realizing, oh, first of all, it's not cool, and second of all, just like you, Holly, I I suffered some really bad hangovers and just thought I'm getting too old for this.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'm losing so many days of my life and it's not worth it.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm not alcohol free.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: I go through periods of being alcohol free, but now we can have one glass, one Italian pour, as we say, or or maybe two on a big weekend, and be perfectly happy with that.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: And plenty of times when we just find it's not necessary.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: And culturally, people will go out for a peritivo here and not even have alcohol.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_01: They'll have coffee or a soft drink of some kind, and nobody thinks anything of it.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_01: But it you're right, James, when you were saying it it does beg the question about when people ask.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: I think sometimes they're trying to justify their own behaviors by trying to figure out why you won't have some or come on, it's just a glass or whatever.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: But Holly, my my question for you is you talk about like the gray area and middle lane drinkers.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: Can you expand on that a little bit?
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: About the types of drinkers that you that you see?
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so by gray area or middle lane, it could be depending on your level of tolerance, it could be say a mum that after work sits at home and has a bottle every night and then at the weekend might have two bottles with her friends on a Saturday night.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um that's what we s would say is like middle lane.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_02: Obviously, when you look at it units-wise, it's incredibly high.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um so you know, all it is is for me, for my coaching purposes, we wouldn't uh I'm not qualified to teach somebody who's alcohol dependent.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um but we have got quite a complex um assessment that we go through because of course there can be people who drink a bottle of wine every night who are alcohol dependent and who would feel terrible if they suddenly stopped drinking.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it just depends on your level of tolerance.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_02: It's very, very tricky.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um But it's uh I'm really glad that you've pointed out the cultural difference between um the US and the UK and places like Italy.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um you know, unfortunately we have abused alcohol in this country.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, we've had it marketed uh in such a uh ridiculous way so that we think that we are so cool and that it's so completely acceptable and brilliant to get really, really drunk.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, it's got to the point where e alcohol is being a bit demonised by some people.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_02: And uh I believe they're trying to pass a law at the moment to uh to say on the side of um wine it's a carcinogen.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_02: Which of course it is, it's a class one carcinogen, it's the same as Osbastos.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I believe that was meant to pass and happen in Ireland, but the kickback from many European countries, including Italy, was like, well, but you can't do that.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_02: We've you know, this is my family's vineyard that's centuries old.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_02: We're not gonna start saying this is a car carcinogen yet.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_02: It it probably you know, probably you know, you can digest it if you just have like a fluid ounce every day with your meal.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I don't know, but yeah, it's it's it's just such a controversial topic.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_02: And um also want to add that whenever you say to somebody, Well, I don't drink anymore, you are immediately holding a mirror up to them, and your statement, I don't drink anymore, to them, they hear it as a question, Why do you drink?
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_02: It's crazy.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's really interesting.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: I I I think it's interesting as well what you're saying about obviously.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: We're I'm a little bit older than you, but we're not that far away from each other age-wise.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: And I also grew up in the 90s, and it was incredible just how much here in the UK drinking was celebrated in the 90s.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: I still think, pardon the pun, there's a hangover from that nearly 30 years later, but certainly in the in the 1990s, you know, if you're a guy, and I know that we're talking about women here, but I think the culture was very similar because there was that whole thing of lads, boys, and laudettes, girls having a similar outlook on life.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: You were actively encouraged to go and drink 10 pints down the pub rather than going and spending, you know, 10 minutes at the gym, even you.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: That that was kind of the culture, it was celebrated by everybody, wasn't it?
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I wonder if you could tell us a little bit from your own experience, Holly, whether you think that that has started to change uh a little bit.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: Now we live close to each other, we've actually got an alcohol-free beer shop and kombucha shop close to us called close to the pair of us called the Functional Drinks Club.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I think maybe sober curiosity, particularly amongst the age group that we speak to, women 14 above, is increasing somewhat.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, you're you're the coach.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: What do you see?
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: Do you see that that's happening?
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely, and I think it's tied in with perimenopause and menopause.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_02: I think we just everybody I know will say, I just feel dreadful the day after I have a drink, and uh I say, yeah, it's because it's poison and you're trying to process it.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_02: And what more can I say apart from that?
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_02: And they're like, but I just don't understand why.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, because it's a poison trying to process it.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_02: But I just don't yeah, I people people are really confused why they're not enjoying it anymore.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_02: People have been so conditioned to believe that alcohol is good for you that we are genuinely confused and not understanding and not listening to our bodies.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, our my generation's terrible at listening to their bodies.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_02: Um you know, if it feels bad, stop doing it.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_02: You know, you know, they don't feel like they have a choice.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, everyone's got parents, you know, my age, and we all go to their houses and they all drink a lot of alcohol.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_02: You know, they all definitely believe that alcohol is good for you.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_02: They will tell you till the cows come home that red wine is good for you, and you know, they're even more indoctrinated than my generation.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_02: But I think our generation difference is that we've been encouraged to drink alone and that it's okay to drink alone, and especially women.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas that didn't happen to my parents' generation and the generation beneath us, my daughter's generation, she's 20, they're cottoned onto it.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, she says to me, Who would why would anyone sit at home on their own and drink a bottle of wine?
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_02: That's weird.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_02: And I say to her, because we were told it would help us to relax and that it would be the right thing to do, and she's so smart, she'll say, Well, surely it'd be better to go to the gym.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, Listen, Nadia, nobody went to the gym in the 90s.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_02: Were there even gyms except bodybuilder gyms in the 90s?
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_02: I I don't know.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's worth talking um there, given that you know you you mentioned what you see a lot is women who've stayed at home and and and probably ended up drinking at home alone.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: That there are differences in the way that women process alcohol anyway.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: So less water in the blood of a woman, therefore alcohol stays around longer.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's fewer enzymes than men have, those enzymes that actually help process alcohol.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: The effect of not being of your body prioritizing detoxifying alcohol over detoxifying other things that might be a challenge to your hormonal journey, like spent hormones and things like that.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: Smaller body size is another thing as well.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: You know, without wishing to generalise, men tend to be taller, tend to be bigger, tend to be bulkier, and therefore the effects of drinking the same amount are really exacerbated amongst women at a time when there are lots and lots of things showing us that health-wise it can actually be much more dangerous for women than it can be for men.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: And just one of the stats I was looking at the other day, you know, I was surprised that you said well, I wasn't surprised that you said it, I probably would have been surprised if I did a bit of research the other day, that emergency room or AE as we call it here in the UK visits amongst women due to alcohol are on a massive increase, and that kind of justifies what you were saying before about going to the to to AE with your broken wrist and arm and seeing that there were lots of other women there who were who'd got alcohol-related issues that had led them to the emergency room, and it's it's it's quite an astounding fact, really, I think.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, how much time do drunk people take up in AE?
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_02: Probably what 90%, I'd imagine?
• 20:03
  unknown: Yeah.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_02: A lot.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_02: A lot.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_02: And also, just to add to what you were saying, James, um, I know that there's been quite a lot more research on women's brains in perimenopause and menopause.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_02: And like the the fact is our brains do actually shrink.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's horrendous and it's awful.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_02: And um, I've heard there's some research that says, you know, our poor brains are trying to kind of keep up with what we used to be like.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_02: And the last thing you want to do is pour alcohol into that.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_02: And I started to notice that I felt almost really stupid, and like my cognitive function just didn't come back for days and days, even after the hangover was gone.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_02: I just feel stupid.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_02: I couldn't really have in-depth conversations, I struggled to concentrate driving, and I was like, I felt kind of paralyzed mentally.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it was it was strange.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: I've got a list here of the body-wide negative effects that alcohol can have on women at all women, but particularly at this age.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just gonna go through them one by one because that spe the first one actually speaks exactly to what you're just saying, that anything above moderate or above consumption of alcohol for women can have really neurodegenerative effects, so it can increase the effect that alcohol has on the brain or the toxicity that alcohol has on the brain, and therefore, as a woman in perimenopause and menopause, due to estrogen falling, you're more likely to suffer cognitive issues anyway, throwing alcohol, so you're layering upon layer.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yep, so that is number one.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: Number two, one I think many people miss out on your risk of breast cancer massively increases during the menopause transition.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: Alcohol has been linked to lots and lots of different kinds of cancer.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: One of the main ones being breast cancer, the other one being digestive cancers.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: So so huge.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: Hot flushes, you know.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: Hot flushes, effectively, your body not being able to thermoregulate, or that's a posh word for manage its own temperature.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: Throwing alcohol, which has dampens down your thermoregulatory effects, so it stops you from and therefore hot flushes are exacerbated as well.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: And you know the list tends to go on and on and on, doesn't it?
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: Julie spoke about increased weight gain before.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: Weaker bones is another thing.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: 50% of women over 50 will have a fracture due to falling estrogen levels.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_00: Alcohol directly reduces your bone mineral density, so you're adding another issue on to already exacerbating issues.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: And it seems to me as though, and perhaps Julie, you can speak to this a little bit, that by having particularly moderate to high levels of alcohol in our life, as a woman over 40, you are just layering symptoms on top of already existing symptoms that you would have without the whole and increasing your risk really to all these various conditions that that you could be susceptible to.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, and I think one of the biggest ones we haven't mentioned yet is disrupted sleep, because alcohol-induced sleep is a drug-induced sleep.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: So your body doesn't go through its natural sleep stages, and even though it may make you drowsy, so maybe you fall asleep more easily, it doesn't help you cycle your sleep.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: And when we're already dealing with other health issues, sleep is one of the most important things for us, not only to rest and repair our body, but also to help us de-stress and store memories.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: And again, we go back to that cognitive function.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: So sleep is is really pivotal, and also for weight management.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: And at a time when sleep is already disrupted by night sweats and you know potentially hot flushes or cold flushes, adding on to that with alcohol is not going to help, certainly.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I've found that very much to be true.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: If I have even a small glass of red wine, I know I won't sleep.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: I just know I won't sleep.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: And the interesting thing is deal with it anymore.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: Once again, that conditioning.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: We're told, man or woman, that oh, you can't get to sleep.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: Have a drink, that'll help you get to sleep.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean the truth is that it probably does aid you getting to sleep, but you're absolutely right.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: Your sleep cycle then is hugely disrupted, isn't it?
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_00: To to the point that you know, after a certain number of drinks, REM sleep, dream sleep, the the bit that is your brain reigniting and processing everything that's happened during the day just stops happening altogether.
• 25:01
  unknown: Yeah.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there was a sleep doctor.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_01: And I can I can sorry, go ahead, Holly.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_02: I was gonna there was a sleep doctor, uh, then he was saying that if you're gonna have a glass of wine and you want to have a good night's sleep that night, you're best off having the wine at 9 a.m.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_02: So your body's got time to process it before you go to bed.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_00: True.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: So we've spoken a little bit then about you know the cultural challenges that that women face at this time in life.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: We've spoken about of just a few.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: We've touched the tip of the iceberg about the health implications that it can have, that alcohol can have, anything above moderate consumption can have for women in perimenopause and menopause.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: Holly, you're the alcohol-free coach.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: I wonder if you could talk to us a little bit about how you would go through the process of coaching somebody who might want to either cut down or quit.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_00: And if you've got any tips or techniques that you might be able to share for people.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, sure thing.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_02: So the main thing is that you just can't white knuckle it.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of people believe that they can just do a stint of sobriety without doing any kind of work on themselves, that they'll somehow suddenly not want to get hammered anymore, or that suddenly they'll be able to moderate.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um it doesn't work like that.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_02: You know, alcohol cannot be underestimated, its level of potency.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_02: It's a highly addictive drug, and you know you can probably stop taking heroin for a month, but you'll go back to it.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_02: If you don't do the work, you'll start drinking again.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_02: So the focus of alcohol-free coaching is all about changing your mindset and your belief systems about the alcohol itself.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: So we all believe alcohol will make us sleep better, rest better, cope with stress, enhance social situations.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um, there's a there's a million and one things we both perceive alcohol to have uh, you know, benefits for us.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_02: So coaching does some deep work, and what we do is we address each of those perceived benefits, we explore them.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_02: As a coach, I'll use quite you know powerful proven questions that really work to help you dig really deep and allow you to really, really change your mindset when it comes to how you feel about the alcohol.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_02: So you'll won't do any white knuckling at all, you won't crave it in the sense that you won't feel like you really, really need to have a drink.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_02: And if you do feel like you need to have a drink, what you can do is drink an alcohol-free alternative because whatever your favourite tipple is, there will be an alcohol-free of alternative available.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_02: And it they're really, really useful in the first few weeks of giving up.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_02: So you're still keeping the habit, so you're kind of giving that neural pathway that's so strongly built up a little bit of satisfaction, but you're not having the poison that comes with the drink.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_02: So you've got the habit still.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_02: So you have your alcohol-free prosecco, your alcohol-free beers, um, and then when you do have a craving, you just have to try and sit there, and there's a lot of meditation, a lot of mindfulness, a lot of deep inner work, and you have to try and really lean into that craving.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_02: What are you really craving?
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of the time, what you'll be craving is getting out of your own head, getting out of your thoughts, or wanting to feel connected with people that you know there's usually a set of uh reasons that we have the cravings, and there's a coach you just kind of guide people and try and let them work out well what does this really mean?
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_02: And it just takes practice and repetition and time, everybody can get there.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_02: Honestly, I believe everybody can get there.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_02: It doesn't matter where you're at.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_02: If I can do it, I know other people can do it.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_00: Brilliant.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, Holly, so we're coming to the end of our sort of like 30-minute time limit here.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_00: So if people want to find out more about you and your work, where can they find you?
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, I'm Hello Holly Coaching on Instagram, and hello hollycoaching.com is my web page.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_02: You'll find me there.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: And am I right in thinking you've got a a a document that you can share with people that is fifty fifty things to do?
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_02: Instead of hitting the bar.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, brilliant.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, okay.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_02: So anyone that wants that can just drop me a message through my site or drop me a message on Insta, I'll share that with them happily.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: Fabulous.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, well, thank you for coming and joining us, Holy.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's been a fascinating conversation.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: Julie, have you got anything that you want to finish off with before we head off?
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm just really interested.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: I love what you do, I think it's amazing, and uh I can't wait to to download your document.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_02: Super, brilliant, thank you.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks for having me.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: Fabulous.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, but speak to you next time, everybody.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_00: This has been James and Julie with our good friend Holly Walsh.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: And just a quick reminder to keep feeling fabulous beyond 40, and we'll speak to you next time.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_00: Take care.