 Hi there, this is James Swannick and you're listening to the alcohol-free lifestyle podcast where you learn how to take back control over alcohol and live a life of health wealth love and happiness We've got another reader question here on the alcohol-free lifestyle podcast. This question comes from Matt Proud And Matt is in the 30-day no alcohol challenge Facebook group and he posted this question inside of that group Man asks James a lot of the positive habits and methods for quitting drinking are based around things That you can control in your own life sleep diet Exercise etc. My experience with two little kids is that when they come into your life? They take away some of that control disrupting your sleep Interrupting your routines and adding an extra element of stress in balancing everything Often the sheer shock of fatherhood Motherhood alone can be a trigger for some people to use alcohol to cope Do you have any specific guidance or tactics? Targeted at new parents or is the advice and methods still the same? Matt, thank you so much for your question. I am actually pretty well versed to speak on this because I have a partner and she has a six-year-old son and I guess you could say I've been a de facto father now for some months living in the same home And all of a sudden parenthood has been thrust upon me or rather I've chosen to step into to parenthood and so it's amazing how Distracting a six-year-old can be when you have a home office, especially with COVID-19 lockdown quarantine going on and There's no office to go to even if I did have an office. I don't really have an office I always work from home anyway, but when you're sharing a home and all of a sudden now There is a partner and there is a child and the child wants to play with you and wants him to tackle you and Or wants you to tackle him rather and kick the football and do all these kind of things While you're trying to put out the alcohol free lifestyle podcast and run the project 90 program and run this one he's blue-eyed blocking glasses business and Coaching business and do all these other things It can get a little bit stressful and hectic. So Matt, I totally get you Here's the thing you ask the question do I have specific guidance or tactics Around quitting drinking or around alcohol use targeted at new parents or is the advice and methods still the same? It's not a sexy answer. The answer is the advice and methods really are still the same There's always going to be distraction. There's always going to be stress There's always going to be anxiety and even if you have the most perfect family life where Your partner and your children Uh Don't distract you and your child falls asleep on cue and never screams and doesn't throw toys out of the pram and Always says always does what you ask them to do even if you have that perfect life scenario You will you will still find things to be stressed and anxious about it might not be With family might not be with the kids It might be with something that's going on with work It might be something to do with your health. It might be something to do with the state of the world's economy or Whatever triggers you I know the like relationship with your mom like a whole bunch of stuff Anything and everything there's always going to be excuses or reasons For you to justify having a drink to relieve yourself of stress and anxiety And here's the thing if you are looking at alcohol to relieve you of stress and anxiety Whether it comes from kids or family or or elsewhere Then You still haven't quite got it and that's okay because societal conditioning Uh has had you believe your entire adult life that alcohol is something desirable and something that relieves Your stress is something that you drink to celebrate and it's preposterous When you wake up and realize that you've been in a matrix the whole time Because alcohol actually keeps you more stressed and more anxious It borrows joy from tomorrow and creates Temporary and illusionary feelings of relief or joy or pleasure But it's not it's keeping you stuck in a vicious vicious cycle. It's actually perpetuating your stress and anxiety Lots of different ways to reduce stress and anxiety to handle stress and anxiety notice I'm not saying eliminate stress and anxiety because Speaking from my own experience. I don't think it's possible for us to completely eliminate stress and anxiety Unless you're a buddhist monk and you've been meditating for 20 something years. I as I understand it. They have eliminated it I have not But I've reduced it Many ways to do that including breathing exercise writing things that you're grateful for Even just identifying that you are stressed and anxious. So rather than saying i'm stressed and anxious Just even stopping going. Oh, i'm feeling stressed and anxious is enough for you to separate from that stress and anxiety And the stress and anxiety therefore starts to subside I'll say that again just in case Um, I didn't explain it particularly well Even the fact that you just stop for a second and go wow, I am feeling or i'm noticing stress and anxiety Is So much more powerful for you to reduce your stress and anxiety than if you just say i'm stressed i'm anxious And you're associating yourself with that pain and that suffering So it's observing how you are feeling rather than associating how you're feeling it's observing it's like oh i'm feeling anger in this moment as opposed to i'm angry It's noticing or i'm feeling uh irritated I'm feeling really irritated by my kids Right now as opposed to i'm so irritated by my kids and family right now Even if you're just inserting the words i feel in front of it is a level of self-awareness that That that almost like gives you a little time out from those from those feelings. It's just stopping and observing Rather than saying i'm angry you're saying i'm feeling anger rather than saying i Um pissed off i'm irritated. It's oh i'm noticing that i'm feeling pissed off and irritated that Simple little distinction there that simple little separation that simple little addition of the words like i'm noticing that i'm feeling that i'm experiencing that will Reduce your feelings of stress and anxiety will reduce your cravings to have a glass Have alcohol will reduce your um Yeah, your need to to seek this temporary relief with a glass of attractively packaged poison um Now Matt was asking the question around alcohol if you if he had asked me a question about specific guidance targeted at new parents about how to Reduce your stress and anxiety that didn't involve alcohol. Well, I would give probably a different answer Uh, and we'll leave that for the relationship podcast And at a later date, but in specifically relating to quitting drinking There's always going to be reasons excuses. There's always going to be kids or wives or husbands or injuries or You know disappointments or all these kind of things are going to come up and they're always Going to cause us to feel something Right, it's never going to end. It's always going to be coming and like I said before even if we if we You know, you have the perfect wife and the perfect children and all the perfect husband and perfect kids perfect family life There's still going to be all these other issues that are coming up. So and it's the same methodology for dealing with family Uh issues or dealing with your alcohol cravings if it's triggered by family and dealing with alcohol cravings if it's triggered by something else Um, I hope that was helpful matt. I like to breathe. I like to get up I like to do something else drink a glass of water. Just do anything else Other than reach for the for the glass of alcohol breathing I think is the easiest quickest most effective way to do it because you can sit there and you can breathe in 30 seconds later You feel completely different Big breath in big breath out. I did this in a recent episode and when I was answering another another listeners question And uh, you know not to bang on about it, but Literally just moving getting up and moving writing something down big glass of water, uh, and then also just disassociating yourself from the uh anger or the sadness and just noticing that you're feeling anger or you're feeling sadness or you're feeling or you're noticing stress and anxiety that is A super super super effective way of reducing those cravings and ensuring that you don't drink So matt, I hope that was helpful Uh, congratulations on having two little kids. That sounds amazing Um, they're disrupting your sleep interrupting your routines and adding an extra element of stress and balancing everything. Yeah, I feel you Uh, I feel you Uh Why don't I get a guest on who specializes in family and communication and and things like that in a future episode? Would you like that? Let me know Uh, send me a dm on instagram at james swanick. You can email me at james at james swanick.com Would you please leave a review? In itunes if you're listening on itunes the um the show is available on spotify and on the itunes You can watch the video version of this on youtube um Yeah, living a review actually really helps promote the show in the itunes rankings And that means we can get more listeners and potentially help more people with these type of things um, so you writing a review as you uh, directly helping someone else to Completely transform their life and heal their relationships and their health. So Um, may I request that you leave a review? I would so appreciate that. I'll give you a big shout out when I see your review Uh, thank you so much for listening Send in more of your questions and we'll keep doing this. I'd love some feedback and I will catch you on the next one Thank you so much for listening. I have some free stuff for you If you go to james swanick.com forward slash guide I will send you my formula for reducing or quitting alcohol If you'd like to watch the video versions of these episodes Then you can watch them at my youtube channel, which is at james swanick If you'd like to send me a direct message on instagram You can do so at james swanick if you would like to try a three day challenge a free three day challenge You can go to james swanick.com forward slash three day challenge If you would like to try the 30 day no alcohol challenge You can go to 30 day no alcohol challenge If you would like to schedule a 15 minute exploratory call with one of my coaches to see how we may be able to Help you in your alcohol free journey. You can go to james swanick.com forward slash schedule And my request is if indeed you enjoyed this episode or you have enjoyed the podcast Would you please go ahead and rate the show in itunes? And would you please write a review a review might just be a sentence saying great. Listen. Hey, this was fantastic Oh, I really enjoyed this whenever you give a rating whenever you write a review It surges our podcast up in the rankings enabling more people to see it and hear it and potentially Inspiring someone out there to reduce or quit alcohol and potentially transform their life So yes while it does help me to get ratings and to get reviews You will actually be directly contributing to helping someone's life by having them discover this podcast So if you are open to inspiring others and to helping me in the process Would you please go ahead and give this episode a ranking and would you please write a review? Thank you so much for listening and I will catch you on the next one