Recovery Elevator

Today we are asking for your help from the drunkest county in America to keep this project going.
Did you all know that the Recovery Elevator podcast is recorded and broadcasted to the world from the drunkest county in America? That would be Gallatin County, where I am sitting right now.
https://www.givebiggv.org/organizations/cafe-re-inc 
That's right. According to a recent CDC study, 26.8% of people who live in Gallatin County drink excessively, making it the drunkest county in the U.S.
When I first started the Recovery Elevator podcast in 2015, almost all of the top five drunkest counties in America were in Wisconsin. So step aside, Wisconsinites, because we've got the crown now. And it's more like a crown of thorns.
I find it ironic — eerily coincidental — that one of the top sobriety podcasts that focuses on alcohol is broadcast to you from the drunkest county. And did you know there are 3,244 counties in America?
If you're tuning in from the drunkest county in America, or really anywhere in the world, we've got your back, and you're not alone.
I'm going to switch gears slightly.
Recovery Elevator has a nonprofit called Café RE, and do you know how many times I've asked for donations on this podcast? That would be zero. Well, maybe the second or third time, but I rarely ask. In the drunkest county in America, there's an incredible event taking place today called Give Big, which is geared towards raising money for all the nonprofits in this county. We need your help to balance the scales in the drunkest county in America, and all your donations are fee-free if you donate today.
There's a link in the show notes to make a donation — thank you, Robyn. You can also Google "Gallatin Valley Give Big" and search for Café RE.
https://www.givebiggv.org/organizations/cafe-re-inc
And if you're in the Bozeman area, Recovery Elevator is doing a live podcast recording today at 1 pm at 2000 N. 7th Street in Bozeman, at a place called Recovery Point. We've got a panel lined up, and that episode comes out Monday, May 11th. There's also going to be an open mic, a hot dog cart, and more. Come on out — we'd love to meet you.
One more thing before we depart. Life is complicated, but it's also not at all. What are we doing here at Recovery Elevator? I heard a Toltec shaman once say there is nothing to learn, except how to unlearn. We are coming back together to find our people. To find our tribe.
A Lakota chief once said the answer to all our problems can be found by looking towards nature. When bison — American buffalo — sense a blizzard coming, they don't run to the hills. They come together, shoulder to shoulder, and walk through the storm.
We are doing the same thing. A drinking problem wants you alone, in a dark room, with liquid poison sloshing in a bottle. But as you already know, that's a one-way street to nowhere good. At first you tried to figure it out alone — that didn't work — and now you're returning to the pack, to the community, to the village. You're unlearning the idea that we have to be self-sufficient and have everything figured out on our own.
So life is complicated, but again, it's not. You can't do life — or an alcohol-free life — alone. Can't be done, shouldn't be done, and it's no fun.
Keep showing up, keep tuning in, keep listening, and share this podcast with a friend you think is struggling.
Here I am, alone in my basement in the drunkest county in America, talking into a microphone — and somehow, you're on the other side of it. That's the miracle of the present day. Community doesn't always look like a meeting room or a church basement anymore. It looks like earbuds on a morning commute, a podcast player at 2 am when you can't sleep, a stranger's voice telling you it can be done. That's what we're building here. But we can't keep building it without you. If this podcast or Café RE has ever meant anything to you, today is the day to give back. The link is in the show notes — donate to Café RE through Give Big Gallatin Valley, fee-free, today only. Help us keep the lights on in the drunkest county in America, so nobody out there has to stay in the dark alone.
 
https://www.givebiggv.org/organizations/cafe-re-inc

Today we have Chris. He is 55 years old, from Madison, WI, and he took his last drink of alcohol on April 7th, 2015.
 
This episode is brought to you by:
 
Sign up and get 10% off: Better Help
Café RE – THE social app for sober people
Bozeman 2026 – August 12th-16th, 2026
 
[02:02] Thoughts from Paul:
 
Paul recently gave an opening talk at a fundraising gala for Yellowstone Alliance Adventures. This is the venue where the annual Bozeman retreat is held. He shared with the guests that he holds an annual sober retreat there but initially hadn't rehearsed sharing that he was also sober. After a few moments of silence, mid-talk, Paul shared that he is also in recovery.
 
Paul says he knows he didn't have to share that part, but when he did, it felt good to be up there in front of a crowd as his authentic self. In a world that can very fake and shallow, people are craving authenticity. Paul wants to go places where he can be himself.
 
Listeners, where can you show up as yourself in your life? What curtains, walls, or barriers are you hiding behind where you think people don't want to see you? While it isn't easy to show up as your authentic self, you will be rewarded by doing so.
 
We are here; we are whole.
 
[07:03] Paul introduces Chris:
 
Chris is 55 years old, works in IT by day, has three kids across two marriages and for fun he likes to make music, create games, and enjoys working on art.
 
Chris' parents divorced when he was young due to his father's drinking. Because there was so much going on at home, Chris says he focused much of his attention on school, sports, drama and choir to remain out of the house. He shares that he only drank one time in high school and got caught and ended up with some consequences.
 
Once in college, Chris had the freedom to drinking and other drugs pretty heavily right away. Early on, he got kicked out of a bar. During is freshman year, depression kicked in and he had a suicide attempt. Chris says drinking was never good for him. He never felt like it was solving any problems, but he was entranced by it.
 
Chris never really saw his drinking as a problem and surrounded himself by people that drank like he did. He enjoyed playing in bands and going to bars. Over the next 15 years he began to get away from the drugs but found his alcohol use increasing to compensate. By his mid-30's, Chris says it was just him in his basement pretending to record music or write a book, but the reality was it was just him down there drinking.
 
At this point in time, Chris knew he had to try and control his drinking but was unable to do so. His second marriage was to someone who drank more than he did, which he assumed meant she wouldn't hassle him about what he was doing.  
 
Chris says there wasn't a definitive moment that led him to quit, it was more a gradual decent. He lost his job because he wasn't very present, he got a DUI and then got a divorce, all within six months' time. He had court ordered sobriety and white knuckled it for a while but ultimately planned his relapse which led to him drinking all hours of the day and realizing alcohol wasn't working anymore.
 
Chris reflects that this realization was a good thing. He tried a lot of different things in the beginning: AA, SMART recovery, podcasts, Quitlit – anything to fill the void he initially felt by not drinking. He was always willing to try different things and acknowledges that some things come and go. He joined Café RE for a songwriting course as he was approaching 10 years sober. Chris knows that staying strong in his recovery daily is what will keep him from relapsing.
 
Chris is grateful for his sobriety as he has navigated some difficult things over the last several years. He is glad he no longer uses alcohol as a crutch to make it through life. When times are tough, he leans more into more meetings or talking to friends.
 
Recovery Elevator
You took the elevator down
You got to take the stairs back up
We can do this
I love you guys
 
RE Instagram
Sobriety Tracker iTunes 
RE YouTube

Today we have Aimee. She is 51 years old, from Minneapolis, MN and took her last drink on March 20th, 2022.
 
This episode is brought to you by:
 
Sign up and get 10% off: Better Help
Café RE – THE social app for sober people
 
[02:39] Thoughts from Paul:
 
AA has been the most popular and widely recognized program to treat alcohol addiction for more than 50 years. And that has pleased Big Alcohol because it has the word "anonymous" in it. Big Alcohol knows they are selling an addictive drug, and it is a gift to them that when people figure out that alcohol lies to them about their product, calming them down or enhancing their lives, they won't say anything.
 
Paul isn't dogging AA but recognizes that the anonymous part had kept the stigma of addiction going. Paul shares and excerpt from As Bill Sees It from Bill W., the founder of AA.
 
The way he reads it, he doesn't think that Bill W. ever intended the anonymity component to be a curtain of shame. It is just in reference to what is said in the meetings, stays in the meetings.
 
Gone are the days of keeping it a secret. In the last four years Big Alcohol has lost $830 billion in revenue. We have to keep talking about this. As Bill W. says, it's a tragedy that drinking has been marketed as good for us, but we're starting to get it right.
 
[08:16] Paul introduces Aimee:
 
Aimee lives in Minneapolis, MN, works for a large medical device company, is married and has two adult children. For fun Aimee enjoys traveling now that she is in recovery and has been dabbling with art.
.
Aimee's father was in recovery from alcohol around the time that she was 12 and she remembers the impact seeing him there had on her. Her parents were divorced and she and her mom had a strained relationship. Aimee ended up moving to Minneapolis from Texas to live with her dad and had struggles with bullying in school. Drinking became a way to feel like she belonged in a group.
 
When Aimee was in her early 20s, her father lost his mother and was very depressed. Aimee feels like she was parenting her dad at that time while she was also getting married and having her own kids. Their children were very active with sports and weekends while the kids were playing, the parents were partying.
 
Aimee thinks her drinking became a problem around 2018. In 2019, her father passed away. Shortly after he passed, she thought she would quit drinking for a year in remembrance of him. Aimee wasn't sure she could do it, but if she could do it, it would prove to herself that she didn't have a problem.
 
Without community or AA, Aimee stayed sober for about 15 months. She wasn't interested in AA and didn't have any other resources. Aimee started drinking again and would have multiple stops and starts until 2022 when her husband was about to have open heart surgery.
 
Knowing the level of care she needed to provide after the surgery, Aimee began seeking other resources to assist with recovery. She hadn't told anyone about her quitting, not even her husband. But she found community and listening to others share helped her feel less alone. There were a lot of things happening within her family that could have made her want to throw in the towel, but being part of the Café RE community helped her. 
 
Aimee says the first year in recovery had her feeling the pink cloud a bit, but years two and three were a little more challenging. However, she is now going back to school since her kids are now adults, and planning travel. Two things she knows she wouldn't be able to do if she was still drinking.
 
Aimee's parting piece of guidance: just don't quit quitting. You don't have to hold onto shame.
 
Recovery Elevator
You took the elevator down
You got to take the stairs back up
We can do this
I love you guys
 
RE Instagram
Sobriety Tracker iTunes 
RE YouTube

Today we have Ron. He is 67 years old from Milwaukee, WI and he took his last drink of alcohol on February 19th, 2026.
 
This episode is brought to you by:
 
Sign up and get 10% off: Better Help
Sober Link sign up and claim your $100 enrollment bonus
 
[02:57] Thoughts from Paul:
 
The village, the community, the tribe, has been completely destroyed in the last couple hundred years, and this messes with us big time. Okay, the opposite of addiction is connection, but what exactly are we connecting to?
 
The big one here is yourself. If you're disconnected within, everything in your outside world will be fractured also. The next big one is when you connect with others. But even after that, probably the biggest connection is the one with nature.
 
There's no coincidence as our war against nature intensifies, so do ailments such as addictions, chronic pain, depression, and anxiety disorders. We are being called home, and it's a beautiful thing. So how do you build this connection with nature or the natural world?
I've got good news for you. You are the natural world. So, this separation is false from the first place, and it's a mind-created fiction. So go outside, read a book outside, download the Merlin Bird app, and learn the birds that call your neighborhood home.
[08:04] Paul introduces Ron:
 
Ron is 67 and lives in Milwaukee, WI. He is the president of a large restaurant company. He has been married to his wife for 12 years, has two grown children, five grandchildren and two dogs. For fun Ron enjoys travelling, reading, golf and time with family.
 
Ron says he first drank when he was a teenager, but it was very occasional. He says that most of his adult life, he did not have an unhealthy relationship with alcohol until he was around 52 years old.
 
In 2010, Ron was going through a divorce and opened a sports bar. He spent a lot of time there buying and drinking shots while interacting with customers. Ron says going from a non-drinker to a daily drinker happened very quickly.
 
Ron's drinking went unexamined. He was professional, he was doing well and it wasn't impacting his work. He was working out, running marathons, everything on the outside looked functional. Around 2012, Ron realized he was having too many hangovers and tried many forms of moderation for eight years.
 
In 2020, Ron decided to quit and did it for 13 months. Although he was mindful during this time, Ron says he was a dry drunk and didn't have the layers of tools that he would need to maintain sobriety. Alcohol was continuously around and he became tired of being the only person who did not drink. It only took two weeks for Ron to end up right back where he was.
 
Ron and his wife began golfing and drinking a lot during the pandemic. His wife went from being a moderate drinker to being a heavy drinker. In 2024, Ron began to notice she was having a challenging relationship with alcohol too.
 
Ron's wife's drinking habits were different than his, but they began having some issues communicating and connecting. He started talking to her about moderation, but those efforts didn't work for her. She decided to check into a 30-day inpatient program and within three days, Ron says he saw his wife come back spiritually. It was then that Ron knew he had to quit with her.
 
Ron's last drink was the day before his wife got home from rehab. This time he is using more resources and has additional accountability with his wife. He began reading and listening to podcasts and by the time she got home he was ready. Ron and his wife have started going to counseling and are doing the work together and individually. Included in their recovery is attending AA, SMART recovery and Café RE. Ron realizes how important community is on the recovery journey.
 
Ron's parting piece of guidance: lean into people.
 
Recovery Elevator
We took the elevator down,
We got to take the stairs back up.
We can do this.
 
RE Instagram
Sobriety Tracker iTunes 
RE YouTube
Café RE

Today we have Lidia. She is 41 years old from Seattle, WA and she took her last drink of alcohol on August 31st, 2025.
 
This episode is brought to you by:
 
Sign up and get 10% off: Better Help
 
[01:40] Thoughts from Paul:
 
Some of you may have seen the title of today's episode which is The Best Way to Feel Better. And that's why you're tuning in – to feel better. Maybe you're in early sobriety and you're not feeling good.
 
Paul shares with us how the best way of feeling better has taken place in his life. It comes when he may be having a bad day but has an interview with a new guest scheduled. There have been a few times where he was hoping that they wouldn't show but has discovered that within the first few minutes of talking with them – he feels better.
 
The best way to feel better is to talk to another human being. Talk to someone you trust, maybe make an unplanned visit to a friend's house. There is a reason they call it the 10,000-pound phone. Because the mind (or addiction) wants you alone. Just knowing this makes it easier to pick up the phone.
 
[06:09] Paul introduces Lidia:
 
Lidia is 41 years old, and lives outside of Seattle with her husband, their daughter and their dog. For fun, Lidia enjoys hiking, puppy yoga, her daughter's Girl Scouts and the local community theater.
 
Lidia was born in Warsaw, Poland to young parents and says alcohol was a big part of the culture. She recalls having her first drink to celebrate her second or third birthday. When she was six, she and her mom immigrated to the US. Her mother worked a lot, which left Lidia to fend for herself a good bit.
 
During her teen years, Lidia would attend summer camps where it was easy to find older kids to buy her alcohol. The closest relationship she had was with  
 
Throughout the teen years and college, Lidia says she was good at drinking and wore it as a badge of honor. After reaching adulthood, the drinking was a daily occurrence finding any excuse to drink whether at home or out with friends. Alcohol was correlated with fun at this time in her life.
 
Lidia met her husband when she was 27. They were both members of a rock-climbing community and became climbing partners. It wasn't long after meeting that they ended up married and having their daughter. This was the first time that her relationship with alcohol was threatened because she felt they needed to be more responsible with a child.
 
Lidia used alcohol to cope with postpartum depression. The first red flag first showed when she realized she was drinking and driving with her daughter. Lidia didn't know much about recovery or how to support herself through it, so she was full of shame and guilt. Eventually she told her husband and ended up enrolling in an IOP, attending AA and got sober for four years.
 
Because Lidia had quit for her daughter and not herself, she began to have resentments and felt like she wasn't having any fun. Since she related fun with alcohol, she went back to drinking. It was then that others were watching her and she assured them she was fine. Lidia began trying to hide her drinking because she didn't want to feel the judgment.
 
Last summer, Lidia was told by her husband that she would lose her family if she continued drinking like she was. They chose a quit date of September 1st and for motivation, Lidia registered for an RE trip to Costa Rica which was five months away.
 
The first 30 days went well for Lidia. The pink cloud arrived and she started feeling better physically. Month two found her crashing a bit and she began learning how to slow down. Going forward, Lidia is looking forward to spending more time with her daughter and the Girl Scout troop, getting involved in the local community theater and celebrating all of her wins, big and small.
 
Recovery Elevator
We took the elevator down; we've got to take the stairs back up.
We can do this.
I love you guys.
 
 
RE Instagram
Sobriety Tracker iTunes 
RE YouTube
Café RE