You're listening to this naked mind is Annie Grace and welcome to this Naked Mind podcast and I'm here with

Ali. How are you, Ali? I'm great, thanks Annie. Thanks for having me.

Oh, it's so good to have you. So why don't you sort of take us back to the beginning in your relationship with alcohol? Where did it all start for you? Well, it was a long time.

Started in my teens.

I was brought up in the 80s,

so sort of, yeah, probably 13, 14, fitting in with the kids at school.

The main thing, I guess I started first with smoking cigarettes because alcohol I mean when you're at school you can't really you know just nip out and drink some beers so I guess it started with smoking which was just terrible

because I'm a had childhood asthma really badly so you know there's that fitting in so after that I

my dad owned a tavern which would think oh yeah awesome I didn't really I sort of

learned how to roll cigarettes and experiment with alcohol, alcohol,

um, pretty, you know, vomiting and stuff,

go hand in hand with drinking and trying to smoke at a young age,

but continue to, you know, like most some people would give it away because it tasted horrible or it gives your head spins or it makes you feel sick, but no good old alley just pushed through that.

Continue down the cigarette and then I moved to a little town quite a fair way away from home. I was 16 when I left home. And yeah, that's kind of like the alcohol for me then was like a massive friend and crutch to have the confidence to

just to live really. I was really shy and anxious and didn't have much self-esteem or

self-worth so alcohol was you know you held on to that beer for dear life to talk to anybody and

and in those days, you know, in Australia, you start drinking the legal age is 18.

So I didn't look 18. I looked about 15, but you know, in a small town they were just like hey love what do you want to drink and it was just like oh I'll have a beer thanks.

So yeah I've sort of stayed up in a small town and really didn't fit in anywhere.

So I ended up coming back down to Perth and then living with a girlfriend from school.

And again, I think we're all would have been about 17 and

same sort of thing we'd go to nightclubs without a it just wasn't even a question of showing idea and again I didn't look my age. I had an older brother so he was sort of my

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