61: Rethink the way you drink with Rachael Layton

[00:01] Sonya: Welcome to the Dear Menopause podcast, where we discuss the menopause transition to help make everyday life a little easier for women. Hi, I'm Sonya Lovell. I am a menopause campaigner, a podcast host, and a serious lover of books and dark chocolate. But today we are here to chat to Rachael Layton. Rachael is an alcohol coach, but she's not here to chat to convince you that you have to give up drinking alcohol. We're going to talk about the journey that Rachael went on that convinced her that she needed to change the relationship that she had with alcohol and now, as a result, is what she is helping other women do.

[00:46] Sonya: Rachael, thank you so much for joining me today.

[00:50] Rachael: Thanks for having me, Sonya.

[00:52] Sonya: Always a pleasure. I love having my guests on. Rachael, why don't we kick things off? Tell the beautiful ladies that are listening to us today who you are and a little bit about why you're here.

[01:03] Rachael: Okay, so, my name is Rachel Layton. I'm a midlife woman. I'm about to turn 55 this year. I don't feel 55. And in my forty s, I started to question my drinking. So I always thought of myself as a normal drinker in that sense. And I drank like everybody else, but it was starting to creep up on me. My tolerance was increasing. And I became concerned, I guess, because of the side effects of it. The older we get, the more we feel the effects of drinking. And then the greater your tolerance is, the more alcohol you're consuming, more in your body. Great effects. So the vicious cycle. So there were two things. COVID. I increased my drinking because of that. I wasn't a daily drinker by any means, but because of the stresses of COVID and working from home and doing all of those things, it was kind of like all bets were off. So I started to increase the number of days that I was drinking and that was starting to worry me. And then Perimenopause, I made the connection and it took me longer than it possibly should have to realize that every time I drank or the nights that I did drink, I would have that the side effects would be worse. And when I wasn't drinking or if I took a break, I wouldn't have as much of the effect of drinking that I did.

[02:36] Sonya: Before we jump in any further sorry, interrupting. Before we jump in any further, because you've mentioned it a couple of times now, let's dig into what those side effects actually were for you, that you were experiencing that were probably a little combination of Perimenopause and your drinking.

[02:53] Rachael: Yeah, and that's a difficult thing. And I think it's a difficult thing with Perimenopause anyway. You put a lot of things down to the fact that you're in Perimenopause. So the big things for me were sleep. So I'd be waking up at 03:00 in the morning not being able to get back to sleep, that whole insomnia thing. But that worry as well, that anxiety and then flat moods as well. So the effect on my mood and then the hot flushes as well. And that's when I realized the hot flushes would be worse. Definitely. The sleeping and the mood, I think they were the three key things.

[03:38] Sonya: And was your mood like, the day after? So kind of if you had a few drinks, let's say on a Tuesday night, you had that rubbish sleep on a Tuesday night, and then the Wednesday, you noticed that your mood was kind of a bit flat.

[03:50] Rachael: Yes, exactly. And I thought, oh, well, that's just hormonal fluctuations. But when I did decide to take a break from drinking, and when I did do some more research into it, I realized that that was just not perimenopause. They were also side effects of drinking and things that I had explained away by hormonal changes. I started to realize, hang on a minute, the drinking isn't helping this, and in fact, it's making it worse.

[04:24] Sonya: My personal experience and the experience that I've heard many times from women I've spoken to is it's that exacerbation of the perimenopausal symptoms that the alcohol causes. So I found personally, and maybe your experience was the same, that I'd have literally the first sip of my white wine, it was the worst for me. I would literally flush from head to toe almost immediately. And it took me a while to join those dots together as well and go, Hang on a second, I'm getting a hot flush and I'm drinking. Wonder if there's a correlation here. Yeah, so it's that you're having the perimenopause symptoms because you're in perimenopause, but then the alcohol is actually exacerbating those.

[05:11] Rachael: Yeah, I talk about it in terms of adding fuel to the fire, and I was quite surprised. Literally gave up drinking.

[05:17] Sonya: Yeah, exactly.

[05:19] Rachael: And when I stopped drinking, it was for a number of reasons, one of which was that but I didn't expect the lessening of the symptoms to be so great, basically. So I still had some hot flushes, don't get me wrong, mood fluctuation, but nothing like that. And also the sleep, the sleep was being able to sound like a baby being able to sleep through the night. Magic. And we all know what good sleep does in terms of the health benefits, mood benefits. So, yeah, it was amazing. So even now, I will talk to friends who are in this age group, and a lot of them, about that, about the menopause stuff, and they'll come back to me and say, hey, I've gone off the red wine, say, or I've taken a break during the week. So they haven't decided to stop altogether, but they've cut back and they've gone. You know what? My symptoms have just decreased. I'm like, yeah, it really does add fuel to the fire.

[06:24] Sonya: Yeah, absolutely. So you decided to take a break from drinking what did that look like for you? What was your process of taking a break?

[06:34] Rachael: Yeah, and when I say I took a break, it wasn't as easy as just waking up one day and deciding. It actually took me ages to come to that realization. So I talk about COVID and perimenopause being the two straws that broke the camel's back. And I was over 50 when I decided to take a break. But for a number of years, I had questioned and tried to cut back on my drinking and found it difficult, and I didn't know why. I was very disciplined in so many other ways of my life. Why didn't I? And so I did a lot of reading, a lot of delving into it, and I decided I couldn't say never because I just felt that that was too severe to give up drinking. That just didn't sit well with me. I didn't think I had a problem. I did think I had a problem. Sorry. I didn't think I'd hit rock bottom. So the messaging is, unless you've hit some sort of rock bottom, you've had this blown up your life. Basically, giving up drinking is too drastic. So that was always in my head. But trying to cut back was so difficult, and so I had this sort of I don't want to stop drinking altogether. So anyway, I did a lot of work and a lot of research and reading and listening to various podcasts. I thought, you know what, I'm going to take a three month break and see if it makes a difference, see how it impacts my sleep, my health, perimenopause, all those things. And I just didn't want to stay forever. And I did a lot of work on my mindset around drinking, and that's what I work with women. Now, on Alcohol Coach, I'm going to.

[08:22] Sonya: Ask you to just go back a step when you say that you did a lot of work on your mindset, what does that mean? Did you work with a coach? Did you work with someone else? Did you join a support group? Kind of. How did you work on that mindset side of things?

[08:36] Rachael: Yeah, I didn't. And that's why I became a coach, because I didn't realize there was such a thing as an alcohol coach. But what I did do was I read a lot and I listened to a lot of podcasts, and I started to delve into it. So the book that really changed things for me was called this Naked Mind by Annie Grace. And so that approach is different to this idea of using willpower and deprivation. So I looked at things like these really deep seated beliefs around drinking. Like drinking relieves my stress. So at the time, I had teenage kids, I had a busy job, I'd had lots of things that had happened in my life, and drinking had moved from being just a social thing to helping me relieve the stress, helping me to take the edge off, to unwind and even socialize. Socializing was very much around having drinks with going out to dinner with my partner or socializing with the girls. And so I had to what I call it, uncouple those beliefs. So I really believed you couldn't go on holidays or you couldn't celebrate or you couldn't destress without a drink. And then I started questioning it and going actually drinking is adding to my stress because of the waking up in the middle of the night, because of worrying about what it was doing to my health, because of those lower moods and lower energy. And so I started questioning all these things that I just believed were the benefits of drinking and I started to almost step back from it and be very objective about it and go hang on a minute. Is it really helping me to distress? Is it really helping me relax and unwind and socialize? And I think the thing with alcohol is that because it has that immediate effect and it does have that what I call the feeling. So you have glass of wine, but white wine was my drink of choice and you would feel that, but then the counter effects of that, it's very.

[10:58] Sonya: Short lived, isn't it? But I think there's perhaps a serotonin release involved in that and you do literally get that physical relaxation letting go. I totally relate that with that first mouthful of the first drink and it's quite an intense feeling. It's a good feeling, but it's an intense feeling and I think that because that is such a powerful release that you then don't put as much weight on how the second, third and fourth mouthfuls actually then make you feel. Does that make sense? What I'm saying? That initial instantaneous, oh my God, yes, I so needed this, then overwhelms the fact that actually you don't get that same impact with the next few mouthfuls.

[11:52] Rachael: No. And the way it works, and I won't go too much into the science of it, is because it is a depressant, alcohol is funny, it's a depressant and a stimulant, right? So it will have that depressant effect on you. So that 1st 20 minutes is when you're doing that and it takes the edge off. But after that it wears off because your body tries to counteract that. It's like when we're hot, we sweat, the body tries to get back to a state of balance, so we've depressed it artificially, so it pumps in or our body pumps into ourselves things like cortisol and stress hormones. And that's why you're waking up at 03:00 in the morning. And as you say, the second and third and fourth drink doesn't have the same effect as that first one. That first one wears off after 20 minutes, but we don't know because we just go to the second or the third or the whatever. And then it's only when that alcohol comes out of our system, but we've got all these other things coursing through our body trying to get us back to balance, and we're doing that vicious cycle all the time. And the other part of it, that serotonin that you were talking about it is that hit, that pleasure, hit, that feel good hit. That's why we keep going back to it, because we go, well, it works, but short term, unfortunately.

[13:12] Sonya: So you did your three months of taking a break, which was easier than saying, I'm doing this forever. How did you manage those three months? Because from what you're telling me, you weren't working with a coach or doing a program or anything at that point. You were just doing this by yourself. So did you introduce a replacement, something else to replace that drink, or did you kind of just go cold turkey? Like, what was your process?

[13:42] Rachael: Yeah, now that's a really good question. No, the process was that I did introduce other things and that's what I encourage other people who are thinking about doing this. Because if you're using alcohol in the way that I was to meet certain needs, if you take it out and you're not meeting those needs, for example, to destress, then it's not going to take you long to go, well, this sucks, have a drink, because I don't want to deal with stress. So. Yes, I definitely did. One of the big things for me was alcohol free drinks. So I wanted to feel because the other reason I would have a drink at the end of the day was a treat. It was like I'm treating myself to something nice, something adult. That was another belief I had to unpack and go, well, it's not really treating me that well if I'm getting those side effects.

[14:35] Sonya: But at the time, very one sided treat.

[14:38] Rachael: It is very one sided treat, but yeah, so I would get some alcohol free drinks and I tried various ones. I used to be a white wine drinker. I don't necessarily drink the alcohol free white wines, but there's some beautiful botanicals out there and some alcohol free type gins and even beer. I wasn't even a beer drinker, and so that was a bit of fun. I would try out different things. There's so many alcohol free drinks on the market now and it's just increasing. And I know you've spoken to Irene from Sam's drinks. She does great range. There's so many out there.

[15:19] Sonya: Yeah, that was so much easier for humans. I was going to say for women, but really it's made it easier for humans to either take a break or to actually facilitate that move away completely from drinking. And going back to what you were talking about with you felt like you were treating yourself. At the end of the day, it's a ritual, and it's a ritual that we need to continue. We just need to replace what is in the glass basically, so that you're still getting that same psychological benefit, I guess, from maintaining that ritual.

[15:55] Rachael: Absolutely. And it helps you with socializing because socializing was a big thing. I thought, well, what's going to happen when I go out? I don't want to be this person who's sitting on a glass of water and I don't want to be boring. I don't want to be that person who but when you're able to lots of places have alcohol free options now anyway. And if I'm going to somebody's place, I will take this amazing sparkling wine. So I'll take Champers, but it's alcohol free sparkling wine and there's some lovely ones of those. So I don't feel that I'm missing out at all. But some of the other things in terms of the stress, meditation is a good one. Journaling is good. I don't journal every day, but if I'm really stressed, that's one way that I do it. I've always exercised, but exercise is brilliant for that and just doing different things, being creative, I'm not very artistic, but I got into adult paint by numbers and it's very intricate. You have really small little spaces and you can do these great pitches and it takes ages. But I put on a podcast for myself, an alcohol free drink, and just do that for as little as 15 minutes, but you can do it for a couple of hours and something like that where I was getting that feel good, I was losing myself in the moment, destressing in a very natural way. And then I could do as little of it or as much of it as I wanted to, and I was starting to tune into it going, oh, all these other things I can do are destressing me. I don't need to drink because that was increasing my stress, to be honest. And when I was honest with myself about that, I'd start to realize, hang on a minute, I'm kidding myself if I think this is helping me destress.

[18:03] Sonya: Yeah, so true. So let's move into I want to take us to the part where you actually do move into making coaching other women or other people to become alcohol free as a career. But before we get there, I'd love to hear what you feel were, other than the whole stress management perspective, what other benefits you've experienced as a result of not drinking anymore?

[18:33] Rachael: I think it's so many benefits and some of them I talk about the benefits that I didn't even realize. So this confidence in terms of you don't need alcohol as a crutch to go out the socializing thing, I thought, Well, I could never do that. It's one of those things where once you do it, you go, well, if I can do this, I can do lots of other things. And because you've got more energy and more time, I'm doing more things. And I've found that women in midlife, we're looking for the well, what next, or what else can I add to my life? This is kind of a period where we can treat ourselves almost and be a bit more selfish, particularly women who've had children and been in that selfless period of their life. So I found, because I wasn't drinking, that I was able to go, well, what do I want to do? What's interesting to me, I've always liked travel, so obviously COVID put the kibosh on that a little bit, but traveling was great. And while I was drinking, that was good. But it actually restricted me in a lot of ways, because if you're not feeling great the next day after having a few drink, and when you go on holidays, you drink more.

[20:01] Sonya: You do it's where you do tend to you kind of like, even kick into drinking even more because you're well, I'm relaxed and I'm on holidays and there are no rules, and you're lying by the pool having a daiquiri at midday. And it does really create an environment where we often drink more. But you're right, when you realize how good you feel when you're not drinking, you realize, like, wow, I could have been doing so much more when I was on my holiday than just nursing a hangover by the pool.

[20:34] Rachael: Absolutely. And that's what I found. I was doing more things, I was getting involved in more stuff. So instead of taking away, which was one of my big fears, it was actually opening it up for other things, even fitness. And fitness has always been important to me, but I knew that it was taking its toll. I wasn't waking up the next day and going for a run or a walk or gym session or whatever after you've been drinking, it's so much harder and I could push through it. But yeah, so there were lots of benefits like that and it opened up so many things.

[21:13] Sonya: Awesome. So then the next step from that is, obviously you chose to make a career out of this. So talk us through that.

[21:21] Rachael: Yeah, as I said, when I went through it, I was doing a lot of breeding, I was doing a lot of work. And then I found out that there was this thing called alcohol coaches and I had never heard of an alcohol coach. And I was like, oh, I wish I had known I would have gone to somebody like that, because I worked out that it was probably five or six years that I had been going, how do I deal with this? I'm trying to cut back. It's not working. Why is it not working? And they say that that is quite common, to be around the six year mark that people start becoming aware of their drinking, start to want to pull back from it, but then they get into this stage where they're struggling with it. So, anyway, I trained this Naked Mind was a book that actually helped me shift my thinking. And I trained through them as an alcohol mindset. Coach. So I'm certified with them and now work one on one with women. Women over 40 I work with who are in the same place usually they are high achieving, goal oriented, and drinking just creeps up on them. And they use it in a similar way that I did in terms of stress relief. Sometimes it's boredom. They see it as a treat, all those things. And women in our age group, we are a group that is higher level. So you think that people who are drinking at higher levels are younger people, but younger people are actually drinking less and less?

[23:05] Sonya: They are. That's fascinating, isn't it?

[23:08] Rachael: Yeah. And it's at this age that women and it's probably because of the health stuff, menopause stuff, they're all suddenly going, oh, my gosh, maybe my drinking isn't doing me any favors. And it's when they start to try to stop or to cut back. I work with women to cut back and to stop. Yeah, it's not just to stop and.

[23:37] Sonya: How long so you say you work with women one on one. So how long is a general kind of coaching program take with you to kind of support a woman through those processes?

[23:51] Rachael: It really depends what stage they're at. Because when a lot of people come to me, they've been delving into this like I did and questioning it, reading stuff. So it depends what stage they're at. I say to women to dedicate at least six sessions to it because we've had decades of drinking. And it's not just our internal thoughts. It's also marketed to us.

[24:18] Sonya: It's a society pressure societal. Yeah, exactly. What's modeled to us from society advertising and is just rampant marketing. Yeah. It's something that is in your face every day. And it's such a big part of particularly here in Australia, our social lives.

[24:39] Rachael: Yeah, absolutely. I say to people one of the jokes that came out around COVID was when all of this is over, as in COVID, I don't know which meeting I'll go to first, Weight Watchers or Alcoholics Anonymous. And I was drinking at that time and I was like, yeah, I can relate to that. But it was funny because it was kind of getting too close to the bone.

[25:06] Sonya: Was very close to the bone.

[25:08] Rachael: Yeah, exactly. I say to people at least six sessions to try and because it is mindset, it's not a quick fix, it's a mindset shift. But generally when women come to me to talk to me, it brings up some of the other things. Because at midlife and you would know this in the work that you do, it is a crossroads time for a lot of women. And often that's why women's drinking increases at this time. You know, there's there's stuff going on in our lives. So it's we work through all of it because it doesn't happen in a vacuum. Does it, you know, it's all the.

[25:55] Sonya: Stuff that I don't nothing in a woman's life happens in a vacuum. You're right. We have to be so cognizant of the fact that and you touched on this earlier, that women are parents predominantly. Not all, but predominantly, a lot of women are parents, and the age of those children will be varying. There's still a lot of women in their midlife years that are just starting families or have very, very young families, or they're like us and have got the children that are older and you're still parenting them, but it's just a different phase. But then they're also holding down jobs. We're very likely to have returned to the workplace, be holding down a job. And there's the aging parent kind of factor starting to come in as well. And many women I am constantly surprised by how many of my clients in my gym who are all women, pretty much 40 plus how many of them are caring for aging parents on a daily basis. And they're also all those things holding down jobs. They've got kids or they've got grandkids. I've got a couple that are in their 50s, but they've got grandkids as well as the aging parents and holding down jobs. And I just go, we have so much on our plate. So much on our plate. And you're right. Nothing can happen in a vacuum. So it's great to hear that you do work on all that very holistic overview of a woman's life, because everything is intertwined and interconnected.

[27:20] Rachael: Absolutely. And it's important to understand that because it's not just swapping out. If it was as easy as swapping out, say, your wine with another alcohol free drink, then everyone would do it. But it's not that simple. And that's why we talk about mindset, because there's a whole lot going on. And it's the emotional. People have this psychological or emotional attachment to alcohol, and it's getting to the nub of that. Yeah. So it is very interesting and love working with women of this age, because I am a woman of this age, but women of this age are interesting.

[28:04] Sonya: We're awesome. And I think one of the things that you also touched on earlier is we are in this very blessed place of often being able to kind of take stock. It's like you do a little stock take of your life and go, okay, what's working for me? What's worked for me for the last 40 to 50 years? What hasn't? What do I want to change? Because if this truly is my midlife, then I've got another 40 to 50 years ahead of me. What do I want those years to look like? How do I want to show up in the world? How do I want to feel? How do I want to be able to function? What do I want to achieve? What sort of human do I want to be? And I feel like it's just this beautiful midpoint where we are gifted some space to make some decisions around how we move forward into that second half of our life. I was listening to a brilliant podcast during the week, which was Julia Louis Dreyfus and Jane Fonda. And, oh my gosh, it was the most amazing conversation between the two of them. Highly recommend. Everybody goes and listens to it on Julia Louis Dreyfus's new podcast, Wiser Than Me, I think it's called. So the concept is she's interviewing women that she believes are wiser than her so that she can gain knowledge and wisdom from them. So Jane Fonda was one of her first interviews. And Jane Fonda, they talk about this brilliant concept of where Jane Fonda talks about moving into her third act, which she said was from 60 onwards. And they equate it to it's actually an acting analogy. And I don't know a whole much about the acting world, but apparently the third act in acting is a particular period where you're, I suppose, pulling everything together. And anyway, she equates this to this third act and she just talks so succinctly about her life in these three specific acts. And she did exactly I think she called it a life review when I think she was 60 and she went, so what do I want the next 30 years to look like? I think she's 85 now, so she's well on her way towards that end of the third act. She's amazing. But yeah, just this whole concept of taking a life review or a stock take or whatever you want to call it, and going, right, so this is what I want for me moving forward from here. And I think that's what we get the opportunity to do here at a midpoint and maybe we can do it again in another 20 years.

[30:41] Rachael: Yeah, and it's interesting you should bring up Jane Fonda because she has recently, I think the last few years, decided not to drink anymore because she realized and she's such a healthy person anyway. But, yeah, I love the sound of that podcast because I love both of those women. Amazing. Yeah. But it's like I'm at the stage of my life where I see people having health issues and we want to do everything we can to preserve our mental and physical health, and I want to have the energy and I want to do things and it's almost a time of freedom as well. So I see it as this freedom and I don't want anything holding me back. So I flipped the switch on drinking. Really? I thought drinking was just a part of that and it was part of the fun and it was helping me. It was actually getting in my way. So moving it to the side has helped me get a bit more clarity around it and go, well, what do I really want for this next stage of my life? And I. Love that.

[31:46] Sonya: Awesome.

[31:46] Rachael: Able to do that.

[31:48] Sonya: So if there's a woman listening today and she's thinking some of this conversation is resonating with her and she's thinking, actually, you know what, there is actually something here for me. What would you recommend is the first kind of step that she would take towards making some changes?

[32:05] Rachael: Yeah, I think becoming educated about it. So starting to read things. Listen, there's plenty of podcasts out there on Instagram. There's a lot of people who post this type of content. I do a free newsletter every week. So happy to have people sign up for that. But just to get educated and to start questioning, because I never questioned it. That's what everyone did. I think you said that before. You just drink and start to become a bit mindful about your drinking and going, oh, if I'm using this as a treat, or if I'm using this to destress, is it really doing all.

[32:49] Sonya: Of that, doing those things?

[32:51] Rachael: That's quite powerful. Yes, very powerful.

[32:53] Sonya: Yeah. So bring in that curiosity. I think that's brilliant and yeah, great advice, Rachel. It's been wonderful to chat to you. I love stories where women have gone on their own little personal adventures and done the deep diving. And you did all of that by yourself, which I take my head off to you, is never easy and takes a lot of tenacity and confidence in yourself as well to be able to and now be in a place where you've flipped that completely to where you're helping other women. So love this story, Rachel. Why don't we finish up? Tell me what you are reading, listening to or watching right now that is bringing you joy.

[33:39] Rachael: I have just finished reading Kate Morton's latest book called Homecoming, and that was one of the books where you know how it's getting late at night and you've got to go to bed and you like, no, I'll read the next bit. I'll read the next bit. I knew I was close to the end and then I woke up early and it's like, I'll just read this bit. So it was one of those books and then when you finish, you're almost disappointed. So I would highly recommend that. But in terms of listening to and this goes back to your question about any tips for women. There's plenty of podcasts out there, too, around drinking and this Naked Mind, which is a book, but also there is a podcast, this Naked Mind. There's a lot of stories, personal stories, people being interviewed. And then if you want a couple of Australian ones there's, she's Sober Sydney is another podcast and they're fellow, this neighbor mind coaches like me and Last Drinks. Maz Compton often interviews people. So there's a few good podcasts out there too, with people that are interested in this topic.

[34:44] Sonya: Yeah, awesome. I'm familiar with one as well called Sober Awkward.

[34:48] Rachael: Yes. Sober awkward.

[34:50] Sonya: Sober Awkward. Yeah. They're two friends I Believe guy and a girl and, yeah, a very hilarious I think they're actually friends of a friend of mine, which was how I found out about them. But, yeah, I Believe got a very good podcast as well. So there is an incredible movement out there and it's great to come across so many like minded women that are a part of that. So, Rachel, thank you so much for your time today. I will link through in the Show Notes to your website, your Instagram, where everybody can contact you, and, of course, the different resources that we've talked about today. Thank you so much for your time.

[35:25] Rachael: Thank you.

[35:30] Sonya: Thank you for listening today. I am so grateful to have these conversations with incredible women and experts, and I'm grateful that you chose to hit play on this episode of Dear Menopause. If you have a minute of time today, please leave a rating or a review. I would love to hear from you because you are my biggest driver for doing this work. If this chat went way too fast for you and you want more, head over to Stellarwomen.com Au podcast for the Show Notes. And while you're there, take my Midlife quiz to see why it feels like Midlife is messing with your head.

[36:14] Rachael: You never mind.