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. So today I'm really excited to share a naked life story and I am here with Danielle Bell.

Do you know welcome Danielle. Thanks so much for being here.

Thank you for having me Annie.

Oh, it's so awesome.

So what I love to do is just kind of start at the beginning for you. So why don't you dive in.

Okay.

Well, I've, we'll start at the beginning. So I first started drinking probably around 19.

I didn't, you know, drink in high school or anything like that. I was actually kind of a goody to use amongst my friends. I remember getting upset at my still best friend for like taking a sip of apple, pucker at a party when we were 17.

I thought she must be some kind of raging alcoholic. And so they kind of teased me for that.

But around 1920, I was introduced to alcohol. And I would say, you know, I feel like I had a normal experience in my early 20s, you know, college era. I never really never occurred to me that I might have a problem or I was using alcohol in a way, you know, in any different way than anyone else.

I met around age 23 or 4. I met my now ex has been Brian. And I think around that time, my life was very hectic. I was just finishing up college. And I had signed the contract to join the Navy as a nurse.

And I was supposed to be moving to North Carolina within the year, pretty much of what I met him. So we got engaged very quickly. And I moved to North Carolina on my own in about 2011.

And the plan was for him to follow me within the year. And I think this is where this is where I kind of pinpoint the milestone of where my drinking went from fun friends weekend kind of been drinking. So like I was using it to help me cope.

My first week and my first week in North Carolina, I discovered two things that are very important that Walmart sells wine, not by wine anywhere, but a liquor store.

And get at least at that time. It's very accessible. And it was I could get a bottle of mosquito, which was very sweet and easy to drink. I've never had it before for less than $3.

So I thought that was the best thing. And I would stock up on it whenever I went to Walmart. And that's when I started this trend of drinking most most nights, even week nights. And I was by myself.

At the time, I kind of defined it as self care. You know, I was 24 or 25 living alone. It was it was very loansome there. I didn't have a lot of friends. I missed my fiance.

But about maybe nine, 10 months into that I did start to make friends there. And I did start going out at you know on the weekends. And of course, still my fiance wasn't there. And I that's when I started to have some behaviors where I was like, you know, this didn't it didn't feel congruent with the with the life I wanted to be living.

I was in acting very appropriate. I was living I was living this like single woman life, but I wasn't a single woman. So I just kind of chalked it up. So, you know, he's not here. I'm lonely. And I just kind of swept it under the rug. And then he moved down.

You know, within the first year or so he got there. And then that's when my drinking really I feel like took off. We were we it was standard for us to have wine every every night with dinner.

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