Deanna Bryant
I had no idea what gray area drinking was. So share your definition of what that is. Yeah,
Kari Schwear
It’s this wide spectrum that exists between somebody who is socially drinking and severely abusing. And with over 2 billion people that drink alcohol worldwide, about 50% of the population that consumes alcohol may be in this gray area. So it’s a huge number. It’s a huge number. And there is a deeper definition if you want to go a little bit deeper, which is the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism really has three categories for alcohol abuse disorder, mild, medium, and severe. So a gray area drinker would fall into mild and partly into the medium categories of alcohol abuse disorder, but not yet severely abusing. So one of the questions I get asked a lot too is what is the difference between a gray area drinker and somebody who would identify or call themselves an alcoholic? And it really is about the severity of the abuse for alcohol, and gray area drinkers are abusing alcohol, there’s no question. It’s just to the degree in which they are. And then some other commonalities characteristics of a gray area drinker typically never experienced a rock bottom in their life. They don’t have anything that’s causing them to be forced into change. That was me, for many years, and from the outside world appear to just be like anybody else that drinks, there is no big, you know, red flags popping up anywhere. It’s somebody who is secretly questioning the way that they’re drinking, know that they’re drinking more than they intend to from time to time, but aren’t necessarily at the point of severely abusing, or that would need what I would call recovery.
Deanna Bryant
I’m curious how it played out in your life. What did it look like?
Kari Schwear
Well, it started, honestly, when I was in my 30s. I was in the restaurant business for many years. And part of my job was what the last, the last quote unquote job that I had in a restaurant business was a food and beverage manager at a country club. And some of the restaurants I worked in prior work were well known and highly recognized restaurants, you know, in other words, they were higher class restaurants, so we start really good quality wine and food. And so, my love of wine was born through that experience. And part of my job as a food and beverage manager for this country club was to purchase the wine. So it was part of trying wines, pairing them with food. And it became very much of a romance for me. It was a novelty was part of the experience. I looked at myself, not having any sort of issue with wine at all. It was basically part of my job. And I really prided myself on being a wine connoisseur. But fast forward. You know, I was drinking after work, of course, everyone does, especially when you work in the restaurant business, and then I’d come home. And then, the nights that I was not working, I had a glass of wine or two. And my husband would start to say some things to me. And he was very highly sensitive. Because his mom, who’s no longer with us, was an alcoholic and also abused pain medication. So he was very, very aware of what a severe addiction looks like. And he said, Honey, you know, this is how things start. I’m really concerned. And I said, Don’t be everyone drinks in Europe, like what’s your problem? Get over it. Right? It was always my excuse, like, everyone in your does it like, what’s the big deal? We ended up moving from Pennsylvania to Richmond, Virginia, in 2011. And that move was amazing for our family and so many ways. But of course, with any move for any big life, you know, change comes stress comes something that you have to get used to, and I upgraded my kids, one of them being a junior in high school, he played varsity football back in Pennsylvania. Now I’m asking him to go to a new school. And so there was a lot of pressure and stress on the kids. There was for me finding a new job, which wasn’t a hard thing to do. But it was still finding a new job. And I found myself in a position after a few years of being here where I wasn’t very happy in my career. And at that point, is when my drinking started up ticking a little bit. And it was very, very much of a constant, everyday effort on my part of at least having a glass or two. And then sometimes it was three glasses. And on occasion, it was like skirt might as well have the whole bottle because, you know, there’s only a glass left at this point. And I’m going to come back to that remind me side note about a standard size drink because that’s kind of important. But you know, so my husband started saying some things again. And he wasn’t much of a drinker, really. I was, and then my neighborhood was a lot of young moms. And I was always looking to make new friends in the neighborhood. And my kids are older at this point, you know, they’re out of high school. And I’m like, Well, gosh, the way I could do that is to start a wine club in my neighborhood. So I did. And it took off. Imagine that. And by the time I was done running it after a couple of years, you know, we had over 100 members. So once a month, we got together, and I’m telling you, like a drunk fest, I really wanted it to be more of a wine tasting event. Just turned it in. Everybody was drinking at least one bottle of wine at the event, plus all the food. I mean, it was just, you know, calorie overload, everything overload. And the voices inside. We’re really starting to kick up. Like you’re drinking too much. You know how much is too much. I started Googling, you know, am I an alcoholic? I started having all those internal questions. And my husband actually laid off me because now he was starting to drink more because this was our friends. And this is what we did every weekend. Well, 2016 rolls around. I spent a whole day drinking at a friend’s house on the Fourth of July. started early, you know, vodka and tonics at the pool, vodka, and lemonade, I think it was. And by the end of that night, which was a Monday that year, I was pretty well toasted. And I came home, and my then 23-year-old son made comments like, Wow, mom, you’re really trashed. Like, you must have had a great time today. Like you’re super drunk. And I responded back with some very ugly words to him. Words that no mom would ever, ever want to say to their kid a lot, a lot of F-bombs, and a lot of just ugly things. Not even knowing what I said. The next night, he made a comment, like, Hey, how’d you do at work today? You were really trashed last night. You do okay today? And I was like, Yeah, I was fine. And I said, Yeah, I’m sorry about that. I probably drank a little too much because, Oh, you think? Do you know what you said to me? And my husband kicked him under the table and said, Nathan, don’t you dare tell her? He goes, I’m telling her, So he repeated back to me what I’d said and, gosh, Dena Adana at that moment, I knew that that was my enough. And I think we all have our own enough, it wasn’t a rock bottom, in some aspects of somebody might look at, I didn’t get a DUI, my husband wasn’t threatening to leave me or anything, but it was enough for me to go, I need to pay attention. So I went that traditional route of going to a when I say the traditional route is because that’s all I knew. And that’s what we expect if somebody has a drinking problem. The answer is Alcoholics Anonymous. Well, the program was great. A lot of great insights, a lot of great tools. The only problem was I didn’t identify as being an alcoholic. I didn’t identify with having this severe addiction. And I couldn’t put a name or understanding behind it. I had no idea. I just knew that everything in me was wrong. I’m a faith-based girl, and everything was screaming at me that this is not where I needed to be. So I left the program after about four months, and I worked with a coach. And that coach said to me three things after working with me for a little bit. He said, Carrie, I really think that someday you are going to be a coach yourself. You have what it takes. And I think you’re going to start your own business. And I think you’re going to share your story with the world. And I said, Dude, you’re smoking some serious crack because that’s never going to happen. Never, never, never No, no, in hell no, my ever tell anybody about my, my problem with drinking, like, are you crazy? Well, like all good coaches. He saw something that I couldn’t see. And fast forward. I didn’t even think about it, you know, forgot about what he said, we’re no longer working together. And I’m in church. And they were talking about starting small groups. And I said to my husband, I want to start a small group. This is like a year later in the summertime. And he said, great, Honey, what do you want to start a small group on? I said, Well, something with drinking. So the girl was super excited about the church, and she said, Well, the only thing is, you know, we have a recovery group. And I said, well, great, because I’m not recovering. I want to be more discovery. I want to talk about discovery. I wanted to talk about the lighter side of drinking. Well, right after that same time period, I heard on a podcast interview a guest talk about her gray area drinking story. And when she said the term gray area drinking, she described her story. I mean, she might as well have been saying, hey, Carrie, swear, I’m talking directly to you, girl, because her story was my story. And then it was like this aha moment. I was walking my dog. It was at 730 in the morning, right before I was going to work. I worked at a really great job at that point. I was with Porsche, and I loved my job, had no plans of ever leaving there. And I remember standing there in the street going, oh my gosh, that’s what I was. I was a gray area drinker. It was like this validation, this amazing aha moment of like, yes. I can’t even tell you to the core. I knew this was the truth for me. And I knew at that moment I had to tell others what gray area drinking was, which is why I was so excited to start something at the church. Well, the church gig didn’t work out. They didn’t like the idea. And they told me no, they told me it would be in competition with the recovery group. And I thought, wow, we are here to spread the life of Christ. And we got to worry about competition with the recovery group. Okay. So I left the church over it. My girlfriend called me later that day, that same day, and she said, what’s wrong? And I told her, and she said, I don’t know why you’re allowing that church to dictate what you want to do, just start something on your own. And I said, Yeah, show that church, I don’t need them. And that’s literally how this idea of me starting a great town came to be. And here we are three and a half years later. I’m going on 4 years, this September. And I’m pinching myself because I believe that God has really allowed me to go through all the stuff I went through in my life, which was quite the ordeal up to this point for me to be in this position where I am today. And I really do feel like I was called to spread this message.
Deanna Bryant
Tell me a little bit about how it was affecting your marriage. I know that he wasn’t very keen on you drinking. Like you were drinking to start with and then kind of joined in to tell me that experience.
Kari Schwear
There was one time, you know, I said he didn’t threaten to leave me. But that is when we start again was actually not very true. It was probably 2015. I had an all-out drunken stupor. And he did. He did say to me the next morning; if I don’t get my act together, he’s going to kick me out. And he was half kidding. But I think he was trying to lay the law down at that point, like, I’m really getting concerned. And, you know, I, again, I would binge drinker, somebody who’s going to drink a lot in a short amount of time. And so, on the weekends, that’s typically what happened. And I played all the games as most people do, you know, I didn’t drink during the week, I would take two weeks off and not have anything, you know, I did all those, those games that we play with ourselves. And after I quit drinking, he continued to drink. And he asked me, you know, are you okay? If I have a martini, or whatever, he was really into drinking martinis, craft beers, and so forth. And vodka, he really liked vodka. And I said, Yeah, sure. Like, it’s no problem. Well, this was before I worked with a coach. This is before I became a coach and learn the mindset tools and all the things that I know now. So I was not in a great place when I first quit drinking in regards to my mindset. So even though I told him it didn’t, it wouldn’t bother me. It really did. I actually resented him for it. And I thought you know what you asked me, you know, you were part of my reason for wanting to quit drinking. And yet you still want to drink when we’re with our friends. And it’s not making it easier for me. And that was, again, my own issues, my own expectations from him that weren’t being verbalized. And I think this is a lot of problems with couples is that there are expectations that aren’t being met. But it’s a lack of proper communication, and really, feeling safe with your partner, safe enough emotionally safe, where you can have those tougher conversations. So I ignored it, and ignoring things don’t work. So the resentment started building. Well, fast forward, this was you know, I quit drinking in 2016, and 2019, I’m now a coach, I’m running my business. And I’m learning all these tools. And I’m starting to really uplevel my personal development life for myself and with my clients. But you know, I had a pour a lot into myself. And I realized that I was still harboring a lot of this resentment. And I went to him one day, and I said, I don’t want to be married anymore. I’m not happy. I’m not attracted to. And I don’t want to strap in for another 30 years. That was our 30th wedding anniversary year, by the way. Wow. I said I can’t do this for another 30 years. I don’t want to do it. And he was devastated. What you and the listeners don’t know, is that my husband never was with anybody outside of me his entire life. I was his first everything. He had a girlfriend before me, but they weren’t very serious. And it was not a big deal. But you know, everything if you know what I mean? Like he was a virgin when we met, right? So I think there’s a different thing. He comes from Old School and has very good family values, and always had me up on a pedestal. And I always felt like I didn’t deserve to be there. And my past childhood, you know, I was going through a lot, a lot of trauma, a lot of sexual abuse, and just getting beaten up and physically abused, and so forth by other boyfriends, and I just never experienced anybody like Rob before. He’s just an amazing guy. So part of me was always feeling like I didn’t deserve him, which is part of this sick, you know, the trauma that I had to heal, that I was working through. So he said to me, I’ll do what I’ll do whatever it takes. And there was a lot of resentment that he wasn’t involved in my business as much as I wanted him to be. And there were, again, the expectations. So I told him where I was at, and we buckled our seatbelts. And we dove in to do this work together. And later that year, this all happened in the fall of 19. December 31, comes and he said, I just want you to know something. I said, What’s that? And he said, um, today’s the last day I’m going to drink alcohol. I said, Oh, dear God, please don’t quit because of me. I was like, I don’t want that responsibility. Like if you’re going to quit, I want you to quit because of you. And that’s the thing. You can’t want your partner to stop drinking. They have got to want it themselves. And he said to me, but I Do you want to, I want to because I realized there’s no amount of alcohol that is healthy. There is no benefit for me to continue drinking. And ironically, he was turning. I think there was a year he turned 50. And he said I want to enter my 50th year. The healthiest and happiest I can be. And I know alcohol is only going to diminish those efforts. So I’m going to quit. And I said, Okay. And that was that. He hasn’t looked back. It’s so funny. Neither one of us ever had like a relapse, you know, where people like, would go back and try it. I quit, never touched again. The same thing with him, he quit is never gone. He’s never looked back. And he’s made this conscious decision not to drink. And he didn’t really have a pro. He didn’t have any problem. He was very much of a social drinker. But yeah, so that’s where we are. Now we are in a great place. But Whoo, it was a little bit of a rough experience there. But I’m glad we went through it, just like everything in my life. I’m glad I experienced it. Because it’s one more added complexity layer of coaching that I get to now help my clients with, especially when they’re in a place, and their marriage and alcohol or any other type of things going on a gray area that they might have in their life is going on, I’m able to walk them through that same experience.
Deanna Bryant
So Kari, tell me how your relationship has changed. Since you guys have taken this road of no alcohol in your lives?
Kari Schwear
Oh, yeah, well, first of all, it’s brought so much clarity and confidence in both of us. It takes away the nonexistent inner self. When we’re together, in other words, you know, when when I’m drinking, or he was drinking, it’s not the real person, we become somebody so different, you know, there is such a thing as liquid courage. And sometimes in relationships, not in our case so much. But in some relationships, when there’s co enabling going on, it’s really about the glue that keeps them together. It’s the alcohol that becomes the attachment. And once you remove that is when the breakdown of the relationship can happen. Well, luckily for us, that was not the case. Although that is a common thing. And really, it’s now about honor, honoring each other for who we are, seeing each other for who we are, and getting raw and real and relevant with each other. And there were things about him that I did not know. One thing that I offer for my clients is a deep assessment based on their cognitive-behavioral and motivating traits. And so I had him do this, this scan so I can see his traits. And then, we did an overlay, and I had a facilitator. I normally facilitate this, but not for myself. So I had a facilitator talk to us about our differences and our similarities. And when we could see each other at such a level. That’s not obvious all the time. That really helped us both because what I learned about him is that he relies on having stability. That’s important to him. His values are off the freakin chart like his values are so high. And I’m, you know, wired completely different. I’m more of a rebel. I’m more chaotic. I have more energy. He’s more the calming, methodical kind of, you know, calming stabilizer. He is the workhorse, the steady Eddie. He is the rock. And once I could really see him for who he truly is at the core, and he could see me there was a respect level that was born, he made it a rule was right, we make a point to have a date night. And yes, that involves being intimate. We make we do that at least once a week. We make it a rule. We also, you know, hold hands every night before dinner and pray together. We also know have a rule of no phones at the dinner table. We spend at least half an hour after dinner just talking, so we spend a good quality hour every day together, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but you know, working and doing your thing. So we make intentional time. And we still enjoy doing our own thing. I mean, you know he plays golf. I don’t really like golf. I tried playing golf, and I realized I realized that throwing the club and cussing and then saying screw this pick Getting off the ball and throwing it onto the green isn’t exactly part of the rules for golf. So
Deanna Bryant
it isn’t. You might have to take some anger issue classes if you picked him up with golf.
Kari Schwear
So I realized early on, like, yeah, golf, probably not for me. So yeah, but he, you know, we do our things that, that really build us up and edify ourselves and for each other. We both have a pretty strong faith. So we rely on, we can’t do everything on our own. We have to, we have to rely on our faith a lot of times to see things through, but we’ve become partners, you know, we were always married. I mean, of course, we’re going on 33 years, here’s very shortly. And I think we’ve become 100% 100%. Of the partnership, where before, it might have felt more like, you know, 50/50 or 70/30 at times, and now we’re at 100/100. So it feels good.
Deanna Bryant
I say that marriages should be -it’s not a 50/50. It’s 100 and 100. And if it’s not, is just not going to make it. It sounds like what you’re saying is you guys are able to show up better for each other without all these added things.
Kari Schwear
Oh, yeah, absolutely.
Deanna Bryant
Now you say you’re not in recovery. You’re in discovery. And I’ve got to tell you a story from my experience that when I heard you say that, I thought, oh my gosh, because I came into AA about 11 years ago. And you know, I did the program. Yes, I had issues with the program. But you know, it was the only game on the block. And it has saved my life. But I didn’t deal with what the problem was behind my drinking because they say alcohol is yet but a symptom. So after that, for years, I relapsed. And the next time I came back, I hired someone to help me peel the layers of that onion away and get to, you know, it’s not just about me not drinking, because, you know, I watch people stop drinking. Then they start gaining weight, or they become workaholics, or they’ve been doing they start filling that hole, that hole with other things. So I wanted to get to the root cause and dig that stuff up. And I hear you saying you had a trauma background? And so did I. So what would you say about those things that cause us to gravitate?
Kari Schwear
Oh, it’s such a great question. And you bring up I mean, this, this is the key list. And I, as I said, I love AA, I respect AA. But sponsors are not trained, professionals. And there’s only so much you can do in regards to peeling back the layers of the onion. As you beautifully put, alcohol really is just a symptom of what’s going on, like a band-aid. We drink, we overeat, we choose to binge-watch NetFlix, we choose to watch pornography or gamble or fill in the blank behavior, whatever it is, because we’re either chasing a feeling or we are escaping a feeling. The feelings are what drive action. So those feelings are really stemming from what we’re thinking about. But we don’t know what we’re always thinking about. Our thoughts just come into our minds. Our thoughts are really coming from our lower unconscious brain, and the limiting beliefs and the things that are driving the show for us most of our life. So if you’ve experienced something as a child, for example, you know, where you had a classmate that you wanted to meet at the playground right after school, and they didn’t show up, you might interpret that as that you’re just not good enough for this friend. And then you might experience that again in another situation. And then you say, well see, there it is, again, I guess I’m just not likable, and people don’t like me, and I’m not good enough. And then you keep experiencing that I’m not good enough feeling over a period of time, and that becomes your living truth. That’s how limiting beliefs are formed. So from those limiting beliefs, which everyone, by the way, has the, I’m not good enough. We all have that that voice has been speaking to all of us. I don’t care who you are. You know that that is true. So if you have been living this lie because of what is considered good enough, there is no measuring stick that tells you what’s good enough and what’s not good enough. We’re all good enough. But somehow, we’ve created this measuring tool that doesn’t exist or what’s considered not good enough. So from that thought, or from the belief rather, you might have thoughts again, that I’m not good enough in your experience. in it, which can produce a situation like if you’re in a situation where you experience that, again, you’re going to feel in your body some sort of pain or some sort of discomfort. For, again, like, you know, whether it’s in your throat, or you have this pain in your belly, or there’s, literally there’s something going on that you want to escape that feeling, whether boredom or anger, or feeling depressed or sad or lonely, you know, whatever’s going on, which is driving the action of, well, let me reach for X, Y, or Z fill in the blank, our case a drink, and then that will help the situation. And that’s how habits are formed. Habits are always formed because there’s, there’s some sort of cue. There’s a trigger and a reward attachment to it, we form habits out of wanting to reward there’s always a reward from it, whether it’s a dopamine hit, or it’s an endorphin running through your body, or there’s some sort of even under stress, we have cortisol that’s released, a lot of this is happening in our nervous system, and with our hormones, and the things that are released in our transmitters in our brain, all this is happening simultaneously, which is causing a lot of our behaviors. So all of this, you know, we again, this, this is going back to some sort of limiting beliefs that you have that’s going on in your mind. And all of us have experienced some sort of trauma in our lifetime, whether it’s small t trauma, little T traumas, I call it, or big T trauma, we’ve all experienced something. And we internalize that is ours is our truth is our facts that we’ve been living on for all these years. And so again, that’s just part of it as a symptom of what’s really happening. My case, in your case, and in every single person’s case, is if we can go back to the root cause, the original root cause. And we can figure out what that is and start to rebuild that and change the patterns, we have to disrupt the way that we’ve been thinking, and this is something that’s now being taught on a regular basis, neuroplasticity is a real thing, it’s the opportunity for us to rewire the way that we think, and years ago. And again, I’m not knocking AA. I love AA. But AA was established in 1935. The Big Book was printed in 1939. And the bylaws have not changed, nor will they ever because it’s written as such. And since 1939, when the Big Book was written, there have been advances made on studies with how the brain works. And so, we’re in a much higher advancement now than we’ve ever been into understanding how the brain works. And understand that we have the opportunity to make a new decision and change our beliefs, impacts everything in our life, and we can end the suffering that we all have inside. And we can find that light that does exist, and you got to clean out the cobwebs to get there.
Deanna Bryant
My question to you is, if listeners are listening in, they’re going, you know, that’s me or thinking that that may be what I’m living with my spouse, what would you say to them?
Kari Schwear
Oh, such a good question, really, is to pay attention to what your inner voice is saying to you. As I mentioned, I had that inner voice chirping out of me for a couple of years before I finally got to my place of my own enough. And if you are starting to question and you’re wondering if you have a problem with your end game, you probably have a problem. Absolutely. Yeah. And there’s nothing wrong with being in the gray area. I really want to make sure that people understand that there are so many people that are in this gray area. And whether you’re in a deeper shade darker shade out of the gray area or not. If you’re curious about your relationship with alcohol, one way for you to know if you’re in the gray areas is I have a quiz that’s on one as well. They’re on both of my websites, but it’s on the mains. Another site gray area drinking calm. By the way, gray is spelled gray just so there’s no confusion. I know you can spell gray gr EY was gray grayer drink calm is one of my two websites, and there’s an interactive quiz on there that you can know if you’re a gray area drinker, which is really nice to know. Like, where do I fall? And it will tell you, are you in the are you a greater drinker? Kind of in a medium shade? Are you on the lighter side? Are you on the darker side? Or are you outside of the gray area? So that will be very helpful for some people that may want to know where do they stand. The second thing is, again, to pay attention to that voice and not Shoo it away; you may not have experienced something bad in your life. But the operative word here coming up is yet because eventually we’ll it will catch up to you that you will be in a situation where you’re forced to quit. And at that point, it’s no longer going to be a choice for you not to drink. The other big differentiator between a gray area drinker and somebody who’s severely abusing as a choice for gray area drinkers is a choice to drink. If you’re outside of the gray area, it becomes no longer a choice, meaning you must have a drink to get through the day or survive without having TTS and withdrawals. So it’s something to pay attention to you don’t want to get to that place. And, you know, again, there’s, and lastly, I’ll say, what holds people back. This is more so than any other reason. It is because of their social circle and their friends. They’re worried about what they’re going to do with themselves if they don’t drink what how are they going to have a social life as a big one. And I get it. I thought I thought my life was going to be over; I thought it was a death sentence. When I first went to a, you’re like you could never drink again. And I was like, oh my god, I might as well just, you know, put a bullet in my head because I thought my life was over. I mean, I know that’s dramatic. But literally, what I thought I was like burying a best friend, like, let me take my $100 bottle of kindness and was very up because let’s have a funeral because that’s how I felt. But I’ll never forget what somebody said to me. And I know the viewers can’t see me or the listeners. But imagine, you know, putting up your hands in front of you close range. And you all you’re worried about is like what you’re giving up, and you’re only giving up just a little bit like a couple of inches of something. But what you don’t understand is everything you’re gaining. And if you were to put your arms straight out as wide as you can go and beyond and beyond. That’s what you gain when you make the decision to remove alcohol from your life. And so, even though you might not be able to see it, just like that coach said to me, Carrie, I think you’re going to share your story with the world someday. And I said no way, Jose, he saw something that I didn’t see. And so, my hope for anyone listening is that you might not be able to see right now. But I promise you your life will drastically be different and improve if you even take it into consideration. And the last thing I’ll say, which is one of my biggest pieces of advice, especially when I’m first working with clients, is every day is about daily intentions. Daily intentions are your fuel that moves the needle forward. I used to always say when I first quit drinking before I even became a coach before I do the work I do. I’m today choosing not to drink, and tomorrow I’m choosing not to drink but past that. I don’t know. And to this day, Deana, I say the same thing. Today is Friday. I’m not going to drink my decision tomorrow. My intention for tomorrow is to not drink but Sunday. I don’t know. Maybe I will. It’s 99.9999% positively sure I’m probably not going to at this point on five and a half plus years in, but I don’t make those decisions. I can’t, and I think when you’re looking at something that is, you don’t know what the circumstances are going to bring like I don’t really care about past tomorrow. I just don’t. We might not even be here tomorrow. Like who cares? We have to stay in the present on some things, and goals are future-based. There’s something we can cross off the list intentions are the daily fuel that will get you there, the micro runs that provide momentum. So if you change your perspective on I’m choosing not to drink versus I can’t drink, which is empowering versus restrictive. And you apply those daily intentions. That’s a great first step.
Deanna Bryant
How empowering I choose not to drink, not that I can’t drink. I love that. Carrie, thanks so much for joining me today. Now, if somebody wanted to check out what your program was like, learn more about you. Would they go to https://www.grayareadrinking.com/?
Kari Schwear
So I have gray tonic https://www.graytonic.com/ that’s more my executive coaching. But I do have all my gray area drinking information on there as well. But gray area drinking.com is my website dedicated to gray area drinking and my signature program. It’s a group called Question the Drink for 30. Question the drink really is about that it’s not called quit the drink if you notice it’s called question the drink. It’s about questioning your relationship with alcohol question how alcohol is serving you? There’s a Facebook group that somebody can join. And the question a drink for 30 Group course it’s a group coaching program that’s 30 days long consists of weekly coaching calls with me or a support coach. And there are online modules and lessons that we go through. And I put everybody into a Voxer group, which is an app I use, and oh my gosh, everybody loves the boxer, and they become very tight and close. And it’s guaranteed that they will improve the relationship with alcohol and with themselves within the 30 days, so they get their money back, and I’ve never had anyone asked for the money back yet. So it’s a great program. It begins on the first of the month. It will start back up. By the time this airs, April 1 is when the next session will start.