Thriving Alcohol-Free with Mocktail Mom

EP 89 Sober Milestones & Holiday Tips with Barbara Williams

Deb, Mocktail Mom Season 1 Episode 89

Send me a text message about the show!

If you don’t feel like you have a rock-bottom moment in your sobriety journey, you are not alone! On this episode of Thriving Alcohol-Free, I’m sitting down with the amazing Barbara Williams, the heart behind Sober In Colour on Instagram! Barbara opens up about her journey from heavy drinking in her 30s to fully embracing sobriety on February 7th, 2021. Although she never had a single rock-bottom moment, she describes having many “pebble-bottom moments” that built up over time, finally forcing her to make a change. 

As a certified lifestyle and alcohol freedom coach, Barbara shares some golden nuggets from her work with clients. We dive into the importance of supportive communities like Bee Sober and swap tips for navigating the holiday season alcohol-free (it’s totally doable!). We even take a fun stroll down memory lane, chatting about how we first connected on Instagram and celebrating all the highs of alcohol-free living.

You’re going to love this chat—grab your favorite mocktail and join us for some inspiration, laughter, and all the feels! Tune in now! 


Get in touch with Barbara!
Website | Instagram | TikTok

Order a copy of The Happiest Hour: Delicious Mocktails for a Fabulous Moms' Night In

A huge thank you to the sponsors of the Thriving Alcohol-Free podcast!
Sunnyside | Giesen 0% Wines

You are loved. Big Time Cheers!

Deb:

Buckle up, friends, and welcome to the Thriving Alcohol-Free Podcast. I'm your host, deb, otherwise known as Mocktail Mom, a retired wine drinker that finally got sick and tired of spinning on life's broken record called Detox to Retox. Let this podcast be an encouragement to you. If alcohol is maybe a form of self-care for you, where you find yourself dragging through the day waiting to pour another glass, I am excited to share with you the fun of discovering new things to drink when you aren't drinking and the joy of waking up each day without a hangover. It is an honor to serve as your sober, fun guide, so sit back and relax or keep doing whatever it is you're doing. This show is produced for you with love from the great state of Kentucky. Thanks so much for being here and big time cheers. Okay, hey, friends, it's Deb. Welcome back to Thriving Alcohol Free. I am so happy that you're here today and I cannot wait for you guys to meet my.

Deb:

I feel like she's like my old pal from Instagram, Barbara Williams. Her Instagram handle is sober, underscore in underscore colour, and it's C-O-L-o-u-r. Make sure you are following her. She's amazing. Her instagram account is so encouraging and she and I actually met really early on. Barbara.

Barbara:

We met 2021, right, yeah, yeah you were one of the first people that I followed on instagram, deb, that's so funny, that's so funny.

Deb:

Yeah, we were both new in our alcohol-free journey, so you're like what? Two months after me, are you february 7th, is that right? Yeah, february 7th, yeah, 2021. So coming up on four years, or your three and a half years can you believe that?

Barbara:

I can't believe, I cannot believe it. I'm amazed every day. Yeah, I'm so amazed, it's so amazing. I never thought I'd be I don't know the three if I thought three and a half years ago, you'll be sober in three and a half years? Absolutely not, no way.

Deb:

Same same. Okay, and for all the listeners, I don't know if you can tell, but Barbara is not from you know, louisiana or Texas she's dialing in today.

Deb:

ladies and gentlemen from the UK. As a matter of fact, she's from Cambridge originally and lives near Sheffield. If you know anything about England, go and speak with a British accent. I would love to the entire time we talk Today. I will not ask you any words that I've heard on Ted Lasso. When Barbara and I did we did an Instagram together, I guess it was like three years ago. At this point it was early. Two and a half years ago, early in our alcohol-free journeys, we did a little tasting of some products together on Instagram Live and I don't know how. I was like oh, barbara might know what this word means. Well, apparently it's like a really bad word, so I will not repeat it and embarrass you. But your face. I wish I could scroll back 800 posts and see your face when I asked you, because you were like why are you asking me this on an Instagram live while my family is watching?

Barbara:

I didn't realize I was bursting. I know it was so funny. That was hilarious. Now you've mentioned that I'm going to scroll back and I'm going to watch my face again.

Deb:

You just about died. It was like you just got hung right up on me like goodbye, thank you, this was really fun, all right, so welcome everybody. I'm so excited for today because, really, like I just love your energy, barbara you are. Your nickname is B. Does everybody call you B?

Barbara:

Yeah, a lot of people call me B.

Deb:

Yeah.

Barbara:

I sign off as B, but it's just easier to the one syllable. One letter is quicker than Barbara.

Deb:

That's why I started using Deb. Well, I mean, I go by Deb or Debbie, but my family, most of my family, calls me Debbie, like my sisters. My parents called me Debbie, but when I started doing Instagram, you know you have to keep everything so short, so I just was like it's, you know, I'm Deb, it's just one less thing for you know, one less second there. Okay, Super excited. Would you mind sharing? Do you mind sharing a little bit about your journey of getting to this place of being alcohol free for three and a half years? How'd you? How'd you get on this path?

Barbara:

oh gosh, yeah, no, no problem, and thank you for having me. I haven't mentioned, I really I I'm so happy to see you I'm so happy to see you.

Barbara:

We have been friends for such a long time. My friend across across the pond, yes, I call you across the pond. We call each other, yeah, um, so my story, yeah, so I guess my journey ended on the 7th of February 2021 and the adventure started. That's what I like to say. It really did start after that, but up until then I was to get to that point.

Barbara:

I would say in my teens I wasn't a heavy drinker. I wasn't sitting on parks drinking drink inside. A lot of people have mentioned in their stories I know everyone's story is different. I kind of missed the teen.

Barbara:

I had my daughter when I was 17 for starters, so I was an early mum, a teen mum, and I started to go out and raving more so than going in pubs and stuff. So alcohol wasn't my drug of choice at that time. So when I was 20, I started going out. I mean, I was going out when I had my daughter, but I started going out more sort of 19, 20, all through my 20s were more ravey and then, when it came to raving and dancing, so it was more drinking water, I wasn't drinking alcohol that much. If I did drink, I wasn't getting drunk.

Barbara:

It was around, I think 10 years later around in my 30s, when sex in the city was on. This is this is my recollection how I recall that time it was. In in my 30s, sex in the city was on the tv. Cosmopolitans were fashionable to drink the ladette culture in the uk, which were do you know about the ladette culture there? No, ladette, so it's lads, lads meaning men, okay, and guys and women, uh, the ladettes. So ladette meaning um, that the women could drink men under the table, so drink as much as men, oh, okay. So it became kind of like an equal opportunities Women can drink far more than men.

Deb:

Yeah, we're going to prove them. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Barbara:

So, yeah, that was in full swing. And yeah, there was a lot of celebrity chefs or TV chefs started to emerge on the TV, at TVs how many TVs have we got on the television? And yeah, it was going out for dinner and then having wine with your dinner, having sex in a city party. Just alcohol started to creep in, creep in slowly, slowly. And then I started drinking more at the weekends, although sex in the city was on a Wednesday. So we did used to drink on a Wednesday quite a bit.

Barbara:

And then I started to drink at home and then I felt that I was the most drunk person in the room. I was always the one getting the shots. You know, I was always that. That one, not actually, no, not always. So there was always, there was a couple of us, but it just seemed to be me most of the time. You know, towards the end it was more like saying to myself that I'm not going to drink, I'm going to remember to go to bed, I'm going to remember to go to bed and not remember going to bed or not going to drink until the. I just say it was a long weekend of drinking, not drinking until the next weekend Monday, tuesday comes along and I was drinking again, having a bottle of wine at home and walking around to the shop at whatever time you know, in the dark, which I wouldn't normally do if I was sober. Walked around the shop in the dark particularly yeah, not remember going to the shop in the morning.

Deb:

Yeah, you're like oh well, there's another bottle of wine here. Yeah, yeah, surprise, surprise.

Barbara:

All those things were happening. I call that. Well, all those things were not a rock bottom. They're like loads of pebble bottoms. They're just lots and lots of little things happening. One of my Sex and the City nights I was around my friend's house and I woke up the next morning in my own bed. I drove myself home and didn't realize the car was in the drive.

Deb:

Oh, wow.

Barbara:

Yeah, I know, I mean that's an awful thing to yeah, awful thing to have to remember. It's not an awful, it is an awful thing, but it's. You know, it is a memory, it's something that happened. That's one of my pebble bottoms. It's one of my pebble bottoms, I've never heard that terminology pebble bottom.

Deb:

I love that, because I didn't have a rock bottom, I think. I made it up. I love it. Barbara, you need to. Yeah, that's a. Really it's so so many of us that's how we got here was just a bunch of pebbles on the bottom, you know.

Barbara:

Yeah.

Deb:

Pebble bottom.

Barbara:

Yeah, because that rock bottom moment, I don't know. Maybe people think that, oh, I don't need. Well, even I used to think that. I mean, I Googled am I an alcoholic before?

Deb:

I stopped. I Googled it all the time.

Barbara:

How much am I supposed to? I mean, I knew I was drinking, drinking too much, too much, you know, lying on the doctor's form and it says how many.

Barbara:

I loved. I loved it when I went to the doctors and they said I didn't drink any, any form like that. I'm like, oh, photograph, no-transcript. It was more of a noticing moment where, well, we had, on our second lockdown, we went to go into the shop for essential items, or even when the shops are shut. I mean, we went, me being me and my husband we went to the shop and I've got a picture of it still on my bar where we made that drink that time, just full of booze. It was ridiculous. It's just like, well, we thought we beat the system, we've got all this booze, we don't care. Um, so it was more that I was noticing that it had increased. Yeah, it was more that. And on the day before I gave up drinking, um, just to mention that, I never thought that I had hangovers. I would get up in the morning sometimes, yeah, I would feel groggy, but I wouldn't. I maybe because I was literally in that constant state of groggy yep you know, in that constant fog.

Barbara:

Yeah, I never thought I had hangovers. So the day before I, the day before the 7th, so on the 6th of February, it was a Sunday and it was. We were in lockdown, it was raining. What else is there to do but open a bottle? And it was. I think it was about 11 o'clock in the morning and I started drinking and I do vaguely remember well, I probably did say it, because I said it every time I drank. Right, I'm not going to drink too much this time. I know I'm going to remember um, going to bed just going to have a glass yeah, yeah, um, that was 11 o'clock.

Barbara:

Just gonna have a glass. Yeah, yeah, um, that was 11 o'clock and I vaguely remember my husband me going around the house trying to find alcohol, because alan, my husband, had hidden all the alcohol in the house. Not all this that gone by then the load that we had before, that, most of that had gone gone, but up until that point the year before that. So in 2020, I did do a seven week stint of being sober in. It was sober october. So I didn't do that. The rebellion, the rebellious side of me, I I did November and I did it.

Deb:

Barbara's own. No alcohol November everybody. She's starting a new thing.

Barbara:

And I did it for charity. I did do it for charity. I think people sponsored me thinking there's absolutely no way she's going to do that. She's like no way, yeah. They're like we'll put's. Like no way, yeah. Do you understand?

Deb:

Yeah, we'll put money on that, yeah, yeah.

Barbara:

And so I did a month, and I did do the month, and then I didn't start again until three weeks later.

Deb:

Okay.

Barbara:

So that that Christmas, um, new year in between me stopping on the seventh week, we went to Manchester. We had a weekend in Manchester and I said to myself I wasn't going to drink, but I did order a glass of wine and that sat there for until the end of the meal and then I drank that glass of wine and then I think that period from then to stopping it was just like a subconscious. I knew I was going to give up at some point and I just went for it at that point. Actually that might have been the year before because we would have been in lockdown. That might have been the year before. But anyway, up until then I was just like, yeah, up until I think it would have been the year before because we would have been in lockdown and we wouldn't be in Manchester. So I've got my years mixed up. So that was 2019. Yeah, that happened. So a year and a bit of escalating drinking to the day of Alan. Yeah, me hunting around the house looking for it, yeah, and he's like nope, there's none.

Barbara:

Yeah, wow, wow.

Deb:

Yeah, Could never have imagined right Three and a half years ago yeah.

Deb:

Okay, some of you know that I accidentally stopped drinking when I did a challenge to take a month off from alcohol my BFF Chardonnay. And now I live an alcohol-free lifestyle and I absolutely love it. But I also realized that's not for everybody. Originally my goal was just to moderate. I wanted to learn how to moderate. So you might be thinking I would love to cut back a bit, but I am not ready to quit cold turkey, so you don't have to. I have a little tip for you. It's called Sunnyside. It's the number one alcohol moderation app in the United States and maybe it would be a fit for you if you're looking for no pressure, just support and tools to help you actually drink less. With Sunnyside, you set your own pace, track your drinks and connect with a community of people who get it. You pick a plan that fits your goals and the best part, 96% of people who use Sunnyside drink less after just 90 days. That's huge. So if you're ready to cut back your drinking without feeling overwhelmed, maybe give Sunnyside a shot. Visit the link in the show notes to get a free 15-day trial and check out Sunnyside for yourself.

Deb:

As you guys know, I love Giesen's 0% Wines. Their 7am blog is my go-to on a regular basis, but they recently launched a delicious sparkling brute 0%, which is quickly becoming a fan favorite. I am so proud to have Giesen as the exclusive non-alcoholic wine sponsor of the Thriving Alcohol-Free Podcast. Giesen's 0% Wines are created through the magic of advanced spinning cone technology to remove the alcohol from their full-leaded wines. The award-winning winemaker Duncan Shuler and his team have done wonders in Marlborough, new Zealand, by creating an entire family of 0% wines with all the flavor and deliciousness you expect from traditional quote full-leaded wine. Their non-alcoholic wines maintain the aroma and the body to create a low-calorie wine that never contains more than 0.5 ABV. Globally available, look for Giesen 0% wines wherever you shop for your non-alcoholic options. Their family of alcohol-free wines include the most effervescent member of the family, the Sparkling Brut 0%, which is absolutely delicious for any celebration. My personal favorite although I do love them all is the Sauvignon Blanc, coming in at only 100 calories for the entire bottle. And, not to be missed, the other members of their 0% family the Riesling, the Premium Red Blend, the Rosé, the Pinot Gris. With Giesen's 0% wines, there's a de-alcoholized wine for everyone and every occasion. Give Giesen a try and let me know how much you love it. And if you want to meet their winemaker, go back to episode 33 of the podcast, where Duncan Shuler joined me to share about the Giesen story.

Deb:

So what has I feel like? This is such a funny, like what's changed? What's so what's changed? I mean basically everything right. Are you a sober coach now? Did you just get certified? Did I see that on Instagram?

Barbara:

I am, yeah, I um. I trained with Andy Ramage um the Arete way last year, so yes, I am coaching.

Deb:

Wonderful Good.

Barbara:

Lifestyle and alcohol freedom coach. I'm doing that. Um, I'm still working. I've got my other job, um as well, and yeah, I love doing that, and there's loads of different things that I want to do. You know about Be Sober as well. So I'm still an ambassador for Be Sober Good good. So I'm still doing that Not so many events, but still in the because they're my family, my sober family. I started off with them and I just love Alex and Lisa and the Be Sober family. But, yeah, I'm doing that still. Still coaching, yeah, I do enjoy doing that and helping anyone who wants to be sober.

Deb:

Do you find that most people are they sober, curious when they're coming to you, or are they like new on their alcohol free journey? Or do you feel like I know for me for years, I mean I was I was like you Googling am I an alcoholic? Is this too many drinks? You know I was sober scrolling, you know I was like curious, you know so. Is that mostly where women are coming to you from that place?

Barbara:

Yeah, mostly. Mostly people who have tried a few times to be sober, because both people have come to me either through I haven't advertised too much, you know through Instagram, but they know that I'm sober. They've been trying a little bit. Or one lady actually came for me through a podcast that I did Really and she resonated with the podcast that I did and, yeah, she found me that way. So that was you know another way. But mostly people who have been trying for a bit yeah, sober, curious? No, not so much. But people who have been trying a while Done something else yeah, sober, curious no, not so much but people who've been trying a while Done something else.

Deb:

Yeah, yeah, so, yeah. So anybody, if you're resonating what, what Barbara is sharing and you love her energy, reach out to her. I haven't personally coached with her, but I just love you. I mean, I really like, I feel like if we were in the same neighborhood or, you know, lived near each other, we would. I'd be coming to the Be Sober events with you and just I feel like we'd be fast.

Barbara:

And I'd be sitting in your bar all the time. I'd be raising your fridges. You've still got loads of fridges.

Deb:

I still have my little refrigerators, my Jack and Diane. Yes, I still have them, they're filled. You know I have so many ready to drinks in there and seltzers I'm so lazy Like that's what I drink so often, and non-alcoholic wines is what I drink most of the time.

Deb:

So ironically yeah, and you and I are both speakers at the Sober Summit, which, by the time this podcast comes out I don't I think it'll be after actually the Sober Summit happens in September. But people can go on. We'll leave the link down below. They can go back, I think, and still be able to listen to like your presentation and stuff and the other presenters. I think there's like what 15 or 18?, 20, 24.

Barbara:

Is it 24? What do I know? Oh yeah, right, there's eight every day. Right, there's three days, yeah.

Deb:

Yeah, so, okay. So I was going to ask you just about like holidays and maybe like tips and tricks as we come into the, you know, into the holidays. Like is there any tips that you give to people for staying on their sober journey? Oh for Christmas holidays.

Barbara:

I yeah, you mean for Christmas holidays, not holidays as in going on. Uh, yeah, Like not a vacation.

Deb:

Yes, not a vacation.

Barbara:

Vacation, yeah, vacation. So for Christmas, let me think back to my um Christmas, my first Christmas. So I would have been about nine months sober. So just okay, general tip, I would have had every alcohol-free type of drink in the house, knowing that if I saw someone with a glass of red wine. This happened to me when I went to a party someone's house party quite early on I had this like a little what do they call them? I keep losing all the words coming out of my head, deb.

Deb:

This would be like a mad. Do you guys have mad libs in England? Like it's like a fill in the blank right, so you can just start this. We can just fill it in with a word, so go ahead, keep talking, we'll fill it in.

Barbara:

So there's a bag that you put, a cooler bag and I would have beers, lagers in there, white wine, red, you know all different types of drinks that if I wanted to have. Okay, however, I was feeling, however, um yeah, so to have definitely have lots of of alcohol-free drinks Keeping busy. That is one thing that my kitchen's never been so clean.

Deb:

Really Okay, so you started cleaning Really.

Barbara:

Yeah, even if it's, you know, on Christmas Day, like cleaning up and getting people there. Although I tend not to pour alcoholic drinks, I don't do that, not because I think I might have a sip of it, I just think I just don't do it. It's not, I don't.

Deb:

Just a boundary.

Barbara:

Yeah, people pour my drinks and I just don't yeah, it's a boundary and buying them as well If we're out for dinner and stuff like that and that's not on my bill. Thank you very much.

Barbara:

Yep, yep that's not on my bill. Thank you very much. Yep, yep, that's good, yeah, yeah, staying busy and just keeping doing what you have been doing, um, all that time. You know some sometimes, um, during the holidays, you might think, oh, I'm on holiday so I won't go for my walk. Oh, I won't go to the gym, I don't do this and still read books and still do your podcasts, this and still read books and still do your podcasts.

Deb:

Just stay in the, stay in the game. Stay on track with what you're doing, what's you know what's?

Barbara:

yeah, yeah.

Deb:

In life. Yeah, I think that tip on staying busy because I know in the very beginning I was so bored in the evenings I mean I was like I wasn't, you know, buzzed and zipping around in my house, so I needed something to do.

Barbara:

Yeah, in the evenings, um, I don't know, maybe it's um the time of year that, uh, I mean you can do it in the summer as well, when the when the nights are um shorter, darker. Earlier I was, I was going to bed, maybe not going to sleep, but I was having my book, my podcast curtain, shut dim light on and going to bed quite early. I'm just thinking on Christmas time. If you've got family around, you don't probably know.

Deb:

I'm going to bed at 4.30. No, but yes, I agree with you. Definitely, in the beginning I was going to bed earlier because I was like for need for me. I was like I got to get. I got to get myself in bed because otherwise, if everybody else goes to bed, I'm going to be like, oh, it's just me and I'm going to find something in this house to drink. I will find something, you know. So, yeah, getting to bed was helpful for sure.

Barbara:

Yeah, I didn't have. I mean, it's just me and my well, not just, but it's me and my husband in the house. His drinking has cut down since I stopped drinking. He hasn't stopped drinking and he's had stints of sobriety. At the beginning of the year he did 122 days, something like that 21 days. So yeah, that was amazing. I loved that period. It was great.

Deb:

Yeah, it was really nice, yeah.

Barbara:

But yeah, alcohol wasn't in the house unless he was drinking it. There wasn't any kind of leftover bits.

Deb:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We don't have any wine left in my house. We do still have. Like there is like if my brother-in-law comes over, he'll have like an old-fashioned or whatever, like I mean, I live in bourbon country, so we still have bourbon and stuff like that, but that's not tempting for me In the very beginning.

Deb:

I was like I got to get to bed or I probably will go get into that stuff, but I got rid of the wine. I did get rid of all the wine. I poured it out down the sink and that was painful to do because I was like it was saying goodbye to an old friend, but I had to get rid of the wine. There's no full-leaded wine in my house, or who knows what would happen if it's a bad day. It's like it doesn't need to be here.

Barbara:

And my husband's kind of accidentally sober.

Deb:

I mean he hasn't had a drink the whole time. I haven't had a drink, really it's like, but he could take it or leave it completely Like couldn't care less it doesn't like the older and iced team were out and he's not like sitting there thinking I could be having a gin and tonic, like doesn't even yeah, doesn't phase them where yeah, it was not.

Barbara:

It was not my experience.

Deb:

Yeah yeah, oh, that's, that's great. Yeah, not funny, so random, yeah, but like, if you ask him if he's sober, he probably he would be. Like I don't, I don't, I just don't drink, he doesn't even care. Yeah, um, okay, do you have any favorite? Um alcohol-free options? Or what are you drinking when you're not drinking?

Barbara:

my go-to is no Noseco. Oh yeah, I do like a Noseco. It's readily available over here for starters. So if I didn't have order something in from Amazon or anywhere, if I didn't order something in, my go-to would be Noseco. I sometimes, especially in the early days, I put in a squeeze of lemon or tonic water just to give it a little bit of a tart. I heard your last guest, jocelyne.

Deb:

Oh yeah, jocelyne, she's wonderful yeah yeah, yeah, vinegar in some drinks.

Barbara:

So yeah, I'm going to try that.

Deb:

It gives it a little bite.

Barbara:

Yeah, want to try that. It gives it a little bite. Yeah, I did make a note and wanted to tell you about a mocktail that I had on holiday in where was I in spain? Uh, gran canaria, earlier this year okay, let's hear it. It's um satsumas. I use fresh satsumas when I did mine, so it's satsumas blended. Maybe they use satsuma juice or juice from a tin and juice them down. But yeah that with tonic water and chili pepper.

Deb:

Oh, give it a little spice. Huh yeah, I feel so ignorant right now, but I'm like what is a satsuma? Is that like an orange? What is that?

Barbara:

Yeah, it's clementine oh a clementine, okay, okay. Sorry, I was like, okay, satsuma.

Deb:

And I'm thinking what is a satsuma?

Barbara:

Okay, a clementine. Yeah, you can just say clementine juice.

Deb:

Okay, yeah, nice.

Barbara:

And loads of ice. And what is that chili that is? I'll think of the name when I'm off, um speaking to you, probably, and I'll text it to you. Oh, what is the name of that chili sauce? That's um tahini seasoning. No, it's basically a food chili sauce. I've tried it with um other, like hot pepper sauce, and it was. It was quite similar as well, but that was one of the best ones I've had.

Deb:

It was very nice, okay, okay, clementine and about how much clementine juice and how much clementine juice and how much tonic water. Do you know, or you just kind of?

Barbara:

eyeball you measure. Yeah, I just make I measure with my heart.

Deb:

Very nice. That's the best kind of mocktail. Yes, I love it. So, yes, just give it a try, taste and see how you like it. And yeah, a little more tonic water. You can add a little more clementine or satsuma. That's yeah for me.

Barbara:

So so that would be because clementines are around in Christmas at Christmas for us. So I'll try that and I'll send it to you on Instagram. Please do Shoot me a.

Deb:

DM on the gram gram. Yes, okay, I want to make sure everybody's following you. If they're not, I love what you shared about loads of pebble bottoms. I think that is going to resonate with a lot of our listeners, because I know many of us have had just days and days and days of pebble bottoms and they add up. They add up and it's like, okay, enough is enough and I just if you can become sober, if I can become sober, both of us looking back when we were the day before we stopped drinking, like never in a million years We've ever imagined ourselves here, never, absolutely not If somebody's listening, there is hope.

Deb:

There is hope. And if Barbara which I'm sure she has resonated with you, but if she's resonated with you as a coach, please reach out to her. You guys, she is the most lovely person. Follow her on Instagram sober underscore in underscore color C-O-L-O-U-R and follow along. I'm so happy we got to do this today, thank you, thank you, I just love you oh thanks, Deb.

Barbara:

Oh, I love you too. Thank you so much for having me. Oh, no, really too.

Deb:

Yeah, I mean really.

Barbara:

It's been great Talk and talk and talk and talk.

Deb:

This could be. We could have a whole, like we could do a little live show. That would be really fun.

Barbara:

So I know that your nickname is Buzz.

Deb:

Yes, my nickname is Buzz and I'm Bea and you're Bea and you and I Instagram Live we did together, which was not even planned. This brand asked us to use their brand on the little Instagram Live they did, so they sent you. It's called Buzz Bees, which is wonderful. I love their tonic waters. They actually just came out with ginger beer. They just came out. I love ginger.

Barbara:

That's one of my favorite drinks. When I'm in a pub and they haven't got any alcohol-free drinks or they've only got a lager, I go for ginger ale, ginger beer yeah, I love ginger beer.

Deb:

So good, so good. So, yeah, Buzz Bees. So you and I did that and you're Nick or not Nickname, but like some people call you B and people there are people in my life who still call me Buzz. I mean I'll get a voicemail from one of my campers like hey, Buzz, it's Tamara and um, but so I was a camp counselor and Debra in Hebrew means honeybee, and so the kids call me Buzz. That's how we got to the nickname Buzz. It has nothing to do with drinking. Yeah, I wasn't.

Barbara:

Oh cool, Maybe later on. I've still got one of your t-shirts as well. They wash very well and I've worn it loads. Oh good, the authentic freedom one.

Deb:

I've got a happy camper, as you said that it reminded me and I think it says authentic freedom on there, yeah, and I love that you are an alcohol freedom coach, because that's what we're free from. We are free from alcohol. It has no power over us. So, love you, my friend.

Barbara:

Oh, love you too, Deb.

Deb:

Big time cheers to you for tuning into the Thriving Alcohol-Free Podcast. I hope you will take something from today's episode and make one small change that will help you to thrive and have fun in life without alcohol. If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support the podcast, please share it with others, post about it on social, send up a flare or leave a rating and a review. I am cheering for you as you discover the world of non-alcoholic drinks and as you journey towards authentic freedom. See you in the next episode.