I didn't wake up one day and decide to use after seven and a half years. The relapse started weeks — months — before the first drink or drug. I just called it a rough patch and looked away.

This one lives in the space before relapse: the quiet drift most of us miss until it's too late. I walk through 10 warning signs I wish I'd caught in myself, from pulling away from support to romanticizing the past to the slow fading of purpose. Not a checklist to scare you — a mirror.

I'm not here as an expert. I'm here as someone who relapsed, came back, and is grateful to be sober today. If one of these signs is flashing for you right now, you're not failing recovery. You caught it. That's a deposit.

If this helped, follow the show wherever you're listening and leave a rating — it's how the next person finds it.

Need help right now? This episode is brought to you in partnership with New Beginnings Recovery Home, an inpatient treatment centre near the Scarborough Bluffs. If you or someone you love is ready to reach out:

https://newbeginningsrecovery.ca — or call 1-888-639-6308.

Another Borrowed Wisdom episode — I read the highlight clips from a Bob talk that shifted something in me, and reflect on them one at a time.

This one lands hard on the stuff nobody tells you when you first put the drink down: that the real problem starts where the bottle ends. Bob talks about being restless, irritable and discontent as a little kid, long before he ever picked up. The "disease of more" that no amount of drinking, drugs, or even getting jacked at the gym could ever fill. And the scariest place I've ever been in my own recovery — the dry drunk. Sober, but not living.

We get into geographic escapes that don't work, the redwoods that topple when they grow alone, and why community is the thing that replaced the drink for me. It closes where it always seems to: everything you want is on the other side of the action you're avoiding.

Chapters below. This is lived experience and peer perspective — one addict sharing what's kept me sober one more day.

If this helped, follow Recovering Out Loud on whatever platform you're on and leave a rating — it's the thing that helps the next person find it. Recovery is simple. Not easy.

Need help? Visit https://newbeginningsrecovery.ca/

Everyone in recovery preaches gratitude. Almost nobody tells you it can feel completely fake when you're hurting.

In this solo episode I get into what gratitude actually is in recovery — the difference between the performative "#blessed" version and the real thing — why it's so hard early on and after a relapse, and how I practice it without lying to myself. I talk about grateful for the rock bottoms, the boring wins of sobriety, gratitude as an action instead of a feeling, and the traps to avoid (bypassing, comparison, forcing it).

This isn't "be positive and your problems disappear." It's a real look at gratitude as a tool — what it does, why it's hard, and how to actually use it.

What helped me might help you. Recovery is simple, not easy.

🎧 Follow Recovering Out Loud so you don't miss an episode. 📩 DM me on Instagram @recoveringoutloudpod — I answer every message.