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Speaker 4Today, I want to talk about the personality change that happens when you get sober. So, welcome back, everybody. Recovering Out Loud, Anthony, alcoholic addict. I think I'm this sort of person. When I'm using and I'm drinking out there, I am, alcohol and drugs gave me a personality. It took away my fear. It took away my emotions. I always talk about this, but I felt more confident when I would walk into a room and I was high or drunk. I felt like I could connect with the people in the room. I could open up more. I could tell funnier jokes. I could dance. I could, I just fit in. Nobody was laughing at me or looking at me or wondering about me. No one was talking about me. All these things, these thoughts in my head would shut off when I would use and drink. And so, there's a personality change that I'm chasing here when I'm using. I don't like sitting with myself sober. So, I use these substances, coke, alcohol, meth, to fit in, to feel a part of, to feel connection. As we know, the opposite of addiction is connection. Now, when I come into recovery, I need to learn who the fuck I am, first of all. And then I need to love that true self. I need to understand all the inadequacies, all the twerps, the things that I do, the idiosyncrasies, the little things that drive me, the things that bother me and so that I can sit with them and be comfortable, be okay in my own skin without needing to take a drink. I can build a life so big I don't need to escape from. That's what I'm going to talk about in today's episode, is this personality change that's sobriety. Sobriety takes away, it take away from me and what I replaced it with. Why getting sober? Why getting sober made me feel like a worse version of myself at first. Getting through that hump, that hard beginning spot. Most people expect sobriety to make them feel more like themselves. I'm going to unpeel the layers of the onion to realize who I am. And I'm going to get sober. I'm going to be more calm. I'm going to be more free. I'm going to be more confident. The real version, finally. What actually happens and what nobody really warns you about is that the first thing sobriety did was introduce me to all of this identity that I didn't recognize, I was uncomfortable with. Because let's be honest, the moment you start using or drinking in a problematic matter, abusing, whatever, you're in that cycle of addiction. The moment we start to get into that, we stop aging. We stop growing emotionally. We stay stagnant and we stop growing. We stop developing as adults. That's why a lot of people, you'll hear them say when they come in, I'm, two years old because it feels like that. It feels like I'm a child when I first come in, my emotions are raw. I want to cry all the time. I'm, I'm really concerned and worried about what people are thinking of me too much. So the fact that I isolate and I get myself away from situations, I'd say no to things because I'm uncomfortable in my own skin. And I don't know how to behave without a drink in my hand or a drug in my body. So this version of myself that I didn't recognize, he had opinions, he was uncomfortable. He was uncomfortable in rooms, a lot of rooms. He didn't laugh at things that weren't funny. He took up space in a way drinking me never did. I took up a lot of space. I was, I felt like a burden a lot of the times when I was first coming in and not in a way that people always liked, right? You, when you act more like yourself, you pull in more the true version of yourself. You pull in more people and, but you're going to push away a lot of people. There's going to be a lot of people that are uncomfortable with your type of personality and your people that eventually find you. I always say this, but if you stay sober long enough, you're going to find a group of people that are right for you, that fit your mold, that are like your personality for who you are. When I'm drinking and using, I can be a chameleon, man. I fit into any room. I fit into any group I feel a part of, of anything because I don't have morals or boundaries or none of that matters. I just say yes to things and I want you to like me, so I'll do whatever it takes for you to like me. I present my stage character. So I spent months thinking that something had gone wrong when I first got sober. Because I didn't like this version of myself. I did not recognize this version of myself. Nothing had gone wrong. What I thought my personality, what I thought was my personality, it wasn't. And this episode is about how, what I found underneath and how I found it and what it cost me to find it. So again, this episode is as with all my episodes, it's lived experience. I'm not preaching from a mountain top. I'm not telling anyone this is how they should recover. Recovery is a very personal journey. This is just my personal experience. So take what you like and leave the rest. Look for the similarities in my story, my experience and not the differences. Look for the similarities. That'll help you a lot in all recovery spaces. So this episode is for two groups, the newly sober who are starting to notice their real personality and don't like what they're seeing. And that's okay. I didn't like what I was seeing at first. It's ugly. It's uncomfortable. I was covering it with drugs and alcohol for a long time. Now I got to put up with me. Oh my God. I was escaping this guy for so long. You know, Alan Watts always says that is that addicts and alcoholics use and drink to escape themselves, not to escape the world, but to escape themselves. That hits me when I hear that. So first group is the newly sober, like I said, and then the second group of people is the long-term sober, especially the dry drunks who never clocked this because they white knuckled past it or they just ignored it or they're not aware. The promise here is that this is going to be reflection first, then practical. So it's not a framework, not a method. It's what I actually do. And if you don't know me quickly, I'll tell you, I had seven and a half years. I've been in recovery since 2015. I had seven and a half years and I relapsed on secrets and ADHD medication and steroids. And I'm back now. I came back into recovery in 2025 of January. I have about a year and a half now, and I do this stuff because I like doing it. It keeps me sober and I know God knows I'm always looking for more recovery information. So hopefully this episode helps you understand the personality change that comes with getting sober. That also comes with drinking and drugging and how to find that true self and love that true self, because that's the ultimate goal in life here. How do I love myself, find my true self and love my true self? So we've all probably had this feeling where you're out at a social event, you're in a room full of people. Maybe you're not friends with everybody there and you feel uncomfortable. Those thoughts are of people are looking at me. People are judging me. People are making me feel uncomfortable. I don't like this. And this is sort of when we have the realization that, wow, I have a lot of opinions. I have a lot of things that I don't like about myself. There's a lot of anger coming up. And in early recovery, if you don't have that time gap between when the thought comes and when the action comes, you're going to make a lot of mistakes. You're going to piss a lot of people off because you're going to share some opinions that people would rather not hear. You're going to freak out and act on anger and other defects of character when you wish you had it. You wish you had stayed silent instead. This is where meditation comes in. And allows us to realize those emotions and thoughts coming up before we act on them. So there's been times in my recovery where I've literally caught myself in mid performance. The laugh was already out of my brain registered. It wasn't funny. I'm just people pleasing. I'm wanting to fit in. I'm dishonest. I'm I just I want you to like me. There's a split second of dual awareness here where you're knowing you're doing it and you're unable to stop it. Has anyone ever had that where you're getting angry at your wife or your husband and you see yourself getting angry, you're feeling this anger come out and you'd rather not be doing this, but you're doing it anyways. Because it's just that quick second where it just comes out and you're acting on your defective character. It's the vertigo of losing your own opinion in real time. You're just people pleasing. You're fitting in. Then what happens is a couple of weeks go by and you can't stop noticing the pattern. I start to notice this pattern. I'm getting really angry at people that are not following the social rule. For me, I'm feeling like when somebody doesn't hold the elevator or respect the space at home in my in my building, it really bothers me. I really want to say something. When the guy is riding his bike on the sidewalk, that really pisses me off and it doesn't piss anyone else off. Before those things used to not bother me at all, now they're bothering me. This isn't new behavior. It has always been there. Sobriety just gave you enough bandwidth to catch it, to realize it, to be aware of it. What's actually happening here? When you picture yourself at the most comfortable, most social, most at ease in a group, what was actually happening in your body in those few moments? When you're the most comfortable, you're the most at ease. You're the most social. You just feel like you don't have to perform. You just fit in. Things are easy. You can let out your personality and be vulnerable. What's happening to your body in those moments? Were you confident or were you anesthetized? Were you numbed? Were you numbing? Alcohol does not make you more confident. It turns down the volume on the part of your brain that's scanning the room for threats. So drugs and alcohol are turning down that part of my brain that are looking for threats, looking for fear. or the fear or the anxiety that people are thinking about me. It just turns down the volume. your knob and that's why for a long time it worked because i could go anywhere and have fun and everywhere was fun because i didn't care that's also why it makes it it's so hard when you come into like when you're in active addiction at the end it's so hard to for me i couldn't picture leaving my house without having a drink or a bag on me that was it i couldn't leave the house there was no purpose for me to go out into the world unless i had drugs or alcohol my safety my my safe substance my emotional manipulator if you will so there's hyper vigilance vigilance which is the low constant low awareness low level awareness of whether the room is happy with you whether you said the right thing whether the vibe shifted alcohol quiets all of that that that hyper awareness that hyper self-consciousness that i always talk about it's like i'm always thinking about how i'm acting and i'm very careful and it's a very exhausting place to be to be in this sort of state where you're just constantly thinking of what others are thinking of you instead of just being present in the moment when it's quiet you feel free you feel like yourself but that's your nervous system on pause not your personality on display alcohol pauses my nervous system drugs pause my nervous system then there's something that's a called a fawn response so we have fight flight freeze and fawn fawn is the one that a lot of people don't talk about it's this sort of in meshment to the the threat so i'm i i was i had a fawn response to drugs for a long time they were like my best friend i was attached to them at the hip they were my god my higher power fawning is when your your nervous system's survival strategy is to make the threat comfortable agree with it appease it make it happy so it doesn't hurt you we do this with drugs a lot i i want to make the threat comfortable i'm agreeing with it this isn't that bad it's not that bad i like this we're friends this is a good thing drugs aren't that bad for me just to justify and keep using so i'm not sitting here and saying that everyone who people has trauma i'm saying that this is a concept that helped me understand my own pattern take it or leave it like the rest of this podcast the question it forced me to ask though was my agreeableness a choice or was it a strategy i had been running so long it feel stopped feeling like a strategy so was i agreeing was i choosing to be an agreeable person or was it a strategy i'd been running for so long it stopped feeling like a strategy then there's the codependency piece of this melody b talks about it great book codependent no more uncomfortable read because i was on most pages it was me she was talking about me the specific thing that hit for me was a lot of what looks like caring about other people is actually managing your own anxiety about whether they're okay with you so a lot and read that again a lot of what looks like caring about other people is actually managing my own anxiety about whether they're okay with me the checking in that really isn't about them the right thing is about keeping the peace that's actually about keeping yourself safe so to connect it all together alcohol plus a fawn response nervous system a lifetime of people pleasing equals a combination that looks from the outside like a great personality wow he's a great guy he always agrees with everything i say he laughs at all my jokes it's i'm easy going low drama agreeable but then you take the alcohol or drugs away and the hyper vigilance doesn't go away it gets louder because the medicine is gone and now you've got no volume knob so all this stuff i'm constantly thinking about what other people are thinking of me i'm constantly thinking about how i'm did i just say something stupid why did i say that i'm repeating that last joke i said in my head that wasn't funny and it didn't land the way i thought it landed now i'm thinking about this the whole dinner and everyone else nobody else is thinking about it or i'm thinking about the next day or two days or three days it's exhausting so this is why i'm thinking about it the next day or two days or early sobriety can feel like you got worse at being a person you didn't get worse the anesthesia wore off the medicine wore off the drug stopped working because he stopped using them the work was always going to be here you just couldn't feel it before so the identity crisis that nobody names this is a new territory it's what separates a dry drunk from somebody actually recovering the question underneath all this is if i'm not an easygoing person if i'm not the easygoing one who am i if this wasn't really me what is that question sounds philosophical and it doesn't feel philosophical when you're living it but think about it for a moment like who am i without alcohol and drugs who am i without the substance in my body to protect me from my brain my emotions my thoughts my uncomfortableness my defects of character whatever they may be it feels like standing in a room you've lived in for years and not recognizing any of the furniture you like what's going on here this is all new to me i don't get it what drinking gave you that sobriety takes back permission permission to be loose to be loud to not monitor yourself to be you the drink wasn't the thing you were addicted to the permission was the relief of not having to be so careful all the time you can just take your bra off take your shoes off relax a little breathe that exhale that's what alcohol and drugs did for me man just a to be myself allowed me to not monitor anything to not be aware and this is why it's so hard when we come into recovery because how do i do that without substances how do i accept myself 100 fully as i am in this moment without numbing without escaping sobriety asks you to source that permission internally and it's hard this is an inside job there's nothing out there that's no amount of jobs or financial security that's going to fix this it's an inside job it has to be done from within with recovery coping mechanisms and tools and repeated repeated behaviors and practice it's hard work but it's so worth it because then i can go into any room and be confident i can be comfortable i can be myself i can enjoy any scenario because i can let loose and not monitor how i'm interacting in the world how i'm presenting i don't care and it doesn't just go away but the voice gets quieter and quieter when i say something that i'm like oh that wasn't that funny why did i say that i don't beat myself up about it i just let it go nobody's thinking about it and if they are it's their problem not mine let it go so the dry drunk connection here this is exactly where a lot of people get stuck abstinent technically but still managing the room still performing the easygoing version this is exhausting to not do it without with without substances still laughing at things that weren't funny i want to do it without substances i want to do it without substances i want to do it without substances i want to do it without substances i want to fit in i want to manage my stage character to the world without drugs and alcohol it's exhausting eventually i'm going to be i'm going to be miserable and then i'm going to relapse sobriety without identity work is just white knuckling and better skin that's it with better skin you know you look better and now you're just white knuckling through events through the world you can be seven years sober and still people pleasing i was it's dishonesty at the end of the day because i just want to fit in i don't want you to judge me i want you to like me and i'm going to put on this stage character this mask i'm going to wear this mask here i'm going to wear that mask there so that i can fit into every room and that you will like me the disorientation is normal okay the version of you that's emerging in sobriety is not finished it's not fully formed it takes time you're going to say things that don't sound like you because you don't know yet what that sounds like you don't know what you sound like you don't know what what you know you're still unpeeling the layers of the onion that you packed on using drugs and alcohol for so long it's a lot of work it's difficult that's not a problem it's that's the process here you don't find yourself in sobriety you build yourself slowly with a lot of awkward trial runs at first so you're peeling back the layers of the onion but you're also building new skills and new you're learning about how you what bothers you and what doesn't bother you and what pisses you off and what drives you and what you actually care about what you actually like you might learn that you actually never liked being in a bar at all and it was just the alcohol that was making you feel connected you might learn that you never like a certain type of music or concerts because it was just alcohol that was keeping you comfortable lubricated socially so the grief that nobody warns you about is that drunk you was well liked genuinely not performing actually well like people like the drunk version of you at least they did for me easy going fun available down for anything nothing bothered me the one who made every table feel easy i was the glue of the conversation or so i thought i was you know towards the end you become much more quiet and in your head when you're using too much coke you don't want to talk or do anything it becomes very uncomfortable and then you're always paranoid and thinking about things but in the beginning it worked so sober you is more specific more honest less available more likely to say i'd actually rather not do that you have boundaries now you have moral guidelines not everyone who liked drinking you so not everyone that liked the drinking version of you like sober you as much that's why i say you always get new friends you're gonna lose some friends in sobriety because the only thing holding you together was that bag the only thing that holding you together was that bag the only thing that holding you together was the picture of beer the social fallout is some friendships were built on drinking they don't fit you anymore not because anyone is bad but because the thing that made you so compatible was part partly that you never pushed back you were easy going you were just went with the flow and you didn't care about anything but now those things bother you it bothers you when somebody makes a slight at you or comments on you or makes you feel less than before it didn't i didn't mind red flags about people that pissed me off in the past don't piss me off anymore because i'm i'm drunk and i'm high and i don't care about these little things that bother me the friend who who's used to agreeing with everything is going to notice that when you stop. The friction is real. So the friend who's used to you agreeing with everything, being that person, is going to notice when you stop. And that's friction. It's going to push people away. Some people will adjust. Some people won't. That's information, not failure. Just move on. Get new friends. You probably didn't have anything in common with them anyways. So my first round of this, my first seven and a half years, it took me a while to get to this. But I was performing towards the end when I relapsed. I wasn't being honest with people. And this is why I say honesty is so important. The dishonesty took me out. Let's be honest. The secrets took me out. The people pleasing didn't go away. It just got, I got better at hiding it under sobriety language. So I got better at, I'm good. I'm in recovery. I'm working on it. All technically true, but none of it honest. Part of what the relapse cost me was the clarity about what I had been avoiding for the last year in my seven years. I want to ask you something. When you picture the most likable version of yourself, is that version sober? If the answer is no, that's not a reason. That's the exact thing worth sitting with. I need to sit with that. The grief of losing the drinking version of yourself is real. It's hard. It's difficult. It's uncomfortable. You're allowed to grieve it. You're allowed to sit with it and be uncomfortable and be sad. You just don't have to go back to it. Recognize that this is temporary. This too shall pass. I'm going to find a version of myself that I like the true version of myself. And I'm going to become version 2.0 in sobriety. That's what I've, come to. I've become a new version through each relapse and each learning curve and each instance in sobriety. Every time I go to a social event sober, I learn more about myself. It's true. I learn about the real me, what drives me, what motivates me, what I need to work on, what bothers me and why does this bother me? Is this a me problem or society problem? And it's almost always a me problem. It's, I got to work on this. I don't need to change anybody, nor can I. So what I actually do is I pause before agreeing with people. The automatic yes used to be before my brain registered the question. I would just agree. I would just be whatever you wanted me to be. I'm that guy. Yeah, sure. Whatever. What I do now is let me think about it. Can I come back to you? Or sometimes just leaving the silence, using silence as a tool, being okay and comfortable in the silence, being myself, just being able to just sit and allow the silence to, to be exactly as it is in that moment. This matters because the automatic yes, the automatic people pleasing was doing a lot of the work to prevent me from finding out what I actually wanted. So I'm going to round it out with the honest hard part here. It's the highest risk, highest reward. If you're not in it today, cut this and save it. The thing that nobody says out loud. If you can agree, if you can be agreeable when you're under the influence and that's anesthetized, you are drunk. Hi, that's not agreeableness. That's a coping mechanism wearing a personality's clothes. The real me, the one sobriety is still introducing me to is harder to be around in some ways. If there's more friction, there's more opinions, there's more boundary height holding less available. Not everyone's going to like me and or like you, and that's okay. You're going to find your people. The more you be authentic, be yourself. The meeting yourself piece is getting sober is supposed to be the gift. And it is. But the part of the gift is a reckoning. You'll, you find out which relationships were built on the performance. You find out which ones hold when the performance stops, who my true friends are and who aren't people that are sticking with me and people who are fair weather friends or fast, you know, bar friends, drinking buddies, the relationships that survive are better. They're stronger, but the ones that don't are still losses. It feels like a loss and that's tough and that's okay. So this, all this to be said that this is not an episode. Where I tell you, it gets easier and everyone loves the real you. Maybe they do. Maybe they don't. Maybe some do. Maybe some don't. What I can tell you is that the version of me that's showing up now today, the one with opinions and pauses and the occasional, no, that's the version that's actually here. The other ones were just passing through. So this is the true version that's here. Now, the other ones were just passing through where they were masks. If sober feels harder to live in right now, then the different versions of me that's showing up now, they're drinking you. You're not broken. This is a part of the process. It's hard. No, if it wasn't hard, we wouldn't have rehabs. We wouldn't need recovery rooms. People would just stop on their own will and they'd be comfortable in their own skin right away. They wouldn't need therapy. You're just unmedicated for the first time in your life. And that's uncomfortable before it's liberating. The agreeableness you're losing wasn't your personality. It was your armor. It was your onion, your layer of the onion that protected you. Taking it off is supposed to feel exposed. You're supposed to feel vulnerable. That's how you know it's working. I'm still working on this. I'm still finding out about myself. I'm still learning about this process. It's hard. It's simple, but it's not easy, right? So when I, like I said before, when I go out today, I'm learning about myself every single time. I'm learning about people I want to hang out with, the kind of people. This is my friend group today. My friend group today is people that are working on themselves, plain and simple. I want to hang out with people that are working on themselves. That's it. Please like, subscribe, comment. Follow the podcast. Send it to a friend. Thank you. If no one's told you this yet today, I love you. Recovery is simple, not easy.
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