This is Annie Grace and you're listening to this naked mind podcast where without judgment,

pain or rules, we explore the role of alcohol in our lives and culture.

Hi, this is Annie Grace and welcome to this naked mind podcast and I'm here with Leah. Welcome. How are you?

Good. Thank you so much. Very excited to be here.

So awesome. So yeah, I'm so excited for this too. So why don't you tell me kind of weird all started for you like where you know your relationship with alcohol began?

Yeah, so first I want to say during my childhood, alcohol wasn't very present. My parents, I knew they drank, but I never, there was never alcohol at the dinner table.

I never noticed that they were drunk ever so wasn't really present in my childhood.

I had my first drink when I was 13. I was a freshman in high school and I'll never forget it. It was great. I like I felt I, I just like tell it made me feel just giggly and happy.

So it was a good experience my first time.

Drinking escalated probably myself more year. I found myself seeking out the parties, trying to find events on the weekends that included alcohol.

It really escalated to where my conscious, my conscious was getting to me.

I was finding myself.

I had a lot of situations that I wasn't comfortable with. So I made a conscious decision to stop drinking my sophomore year. I attended a youth group mission church or a mission with my church.

I came home after that and just feeling like I'm not going to drink. I don't like the way I feel afterwards.

I was like, it wasn't met very welcoming with my peers, I believe.

Kind of like, oh, we'll see how long this last type of thing.

And this was sophomore year in high school. Yes.

Yeah, cool.

And so I was still going to parties, but I was very awkward socially. So I always felt very uncomfortable.

I didn't last very long, so to speak.

And then I continued drinking throughout high school.

Graduated high school, I go to college and my main focus in college is just party.

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