Journey to the Sunnyside

maggie
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mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: [00:00:00] Maggie, thanks for coming on today.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Thanks. I'm so excited to be here. Sunnyside is one of my favorite platforms and I love your podcast. So it's kind of surreal.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: That's so awesome. I mean, obviously that's going to be music to my ears. So thank you for saying that. And so today we're going to get into some really specific things because you have a unique take on things. You have an approach around wellness. How it blends with fitness and mindset and can help you for breaking habits around excessive drinking But before we get into all of that, I want you to take us into your story about Where you started?

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: And where you ended up with maybe alcohol where it made you start to think about it and assess it And then you came up with your own ideas on how to address it And then I'd love to give you the stage a little bit to talk about what you do so that we can lead into this conversation around fitness and nutrition and mindset around alcohol.[00:01:00]

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Yeah, and when you even just ask me that, I get a smile on my face, even though to go back in time and tell the story is somewhat triggering. And I would say for listeners you know, we're going to be talking about the childhood of an alcoholic mother suicide and, and things like that. But. Over my experiences, especially the past five years, I've been able to come to terms with things and, and bring a smile to my own face for the gratitude of these lessons and these things that used to be so hurtful that led me to drinking. Now I'm, I'm at peace and I'm comfortable. And I actually really enjoy opening up and talking about these really low moments because had it not been for these really low moments, I wouldn't have learned to challenge my perspective on, on quote unquote addiction, alcoholism, what we now call alcohol use disorder. I would have never had those experiences that felt wrong in order [00:02:00] to look for the right. So, to literally

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: to dig into that. I want to dig into that before you move on because I think that's like such a really important point, if you don't mind. Sorry to,

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: sure. Yeah. Please interrupt.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: me. I am a chatty Kathy, so I will just keep talking. So please interrupt anytime.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: so I love that point that you're making about how you're viewing something that could be potentially viewed as negative or regretful or whatever it is, it, it depends on how you frame it and and what the circumstances are. But I think a lot of times I would find myself in regret, like, oh, I wish I would have done it this way, or I wish it hadn't happened that way.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: But then I realized. You, you got to put it in the positive. Like, I wouldn't have all these understandings. I wouldn't be where I am. I wouldn't be going where I want to go if none of that happened. And it sounds like you're going to tell us a little bit of a story around that. And I just wanted to point out before we moved on and maybe it didn't get addressed how important that mindset that [00:03:00] you just said is.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Yeah, and I kind of realized it in a little bit of an epiphany moment of all of those times that I would say, I wish I could have done different. I would give anything to go back in time and change X, Y, and Z. I kept hearing over and over again, be present, be present, be present. And it dawned on me that every time I was in my present moment thinking, I wish I could change something, it was living in the past. And we know the cliche, don't live in the past, live in the present. And it was like, that's what they're talking about.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: And so it's kind of about going into the past and finding that gratitude or that positive frame. Like you mentioned, that frees us from the shame, the regret, the what could have been, you can't ever change that.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: What you can do is accept it and, and figure out how to grow from it. And

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: I kind of get a little hokey. I say, like, figure out how to turn your trauma into a superpower.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: [00:04:00] I love that. That's a great one. And one of the things I was just thinking about the other morning in this regard, and I'm sorry to take this off, but, you know, when you get in those moments of regret or thinking, uh, in the past too much, it's really good to think to yourself, Is me dwelling on this serving me right now?

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: And also is it robbing me of joy of this moment? Because so many because we're taking even more away from ourselves when we go that deep, you know

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: and it doesn't feel like we're taking it away. We're like in the moment. We're like, this is what I should be focusing on. And it's just, it's wild when you kind of reach that other side and you're like, wow, it, I really was manifesting bad circumstances just by focusing on my regret or shame from the past.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: And, and I think my story really is an illustration of how just how much I was letting my past steal my present joy. Okay. And then things [00:05:00] eventually even happening in, uh, the past eight years that woke me up to like, if I want my life to be good now, I need to stop dwelling on what happened to me when I was five, when I was 12, when I was 18. Trauma isn't what happens to you. It's what happens inside of you. That's a great quote Mattei. And that dawned on me of like, you can never change what happened to you, but you can change the way you feel about what happened to you. And that's been the best journey of my alcohol freedom. I would say it's what gives me so much confidence and joy now is, is that I've been able to change my perspective of things.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: But

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: Start it

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: start at the i'm gonna take you i'm gonna try and be a good interviewer now because I was I

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: No, we were excited.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: I, I love you. I want to hear your story. So take us to the point where you think it's a good point that's very relevant to what you're talking about. And tell us a little bit about when things [00:06:00] started to change maybe for the negative and then the positive.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: And so I'm just going to let you lead it from there.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Yeah. So it, to go back, I really have to start when I was about four or five. My parents were, you know, I would say before age five, we were a Kodak picture perfect family. My dad was military. My mom was a very gifted special education teacher. She had awards. She had so many beautiful career accolades.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: She actually put herself through school with. My two older brothers and then me, my aunt tells a story of how she used to take me to class and getting her master's and all of these things. She was a very driven woman. But by the time I was five, my dad had been deploying a lot and, This was the age before WhatsApp or FaceTime or cell phone.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: So they were very disconnected. And my mom being on her own with three young kids she learned to use alcohol as a coping [00:07:00] mechanism. And now as an adult, I can even look back. It wasn't just what was happening in that time, but she had a lot of unprocessed trauma from her childhood. And, you know, When I was five, I just remember this feeling of disconnect from her.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: She was no longer that warm, nurturing presence. And I didn't have any idea what alcohol was, but I could just tell that she was a different person. It was as if her shell was there, but there was a missing soul or there was a different entity within her. It almost felt haunting.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: Hmm.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: when I was about six or seven, my middle brother, Eric, he told me. Mom is acting different because she's drinking alcohol. And I said, well, what's alcohol? And he said, well, you've seen that bottle and you know that she's different after she drinks it. She's just sad right now. And at that age, it's very difficult [00:08:00] for a child to comprehend that it's not our fault. It's what our parents are going through.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: So at that age, my brothers and I took it as what are we doing wrong? Why doesn't mom love us enough? Why, what are, what could we do to make her happy? And these are all very adult feelings and adult responsibilities. And, and so I grew up very quickly. And I grew up with this conditioned idea from her parents, her father, my grandfather

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: saying, addiction is a disease. It's a genetic disease and it's hereditary and you have this predisposition. So you really need to watch out. And, you know, learning that at seven years old, it just, it didn't feel right in my soul. I couldn't explain it, but it just didn't seem [00:09:00] right. But over time, you know, going to AA with her and, and even the Al Anon groups, this conditioned belief became so ingrained that I truly did believe I could never touch alcohol.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Look what it's done to our family. But then there was a turning point when I was 12. I was home alone with my brother Eric. And at that time, my mom lived with my grandparents. We were all in this house together, multi generations, but my grandparents were out. My mom at that time lost her teaching job.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: She was working at Walmart because of her alcoholism. And, uh, Eric and I were home alone when he took his life. He was very much the enabler. He was two years older than me. So a little bit more aware of my mom's drinking and he was definitely her emotional support and it just weighed on him so much that he made that permanent decision.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: And, and me being home alone with him, I was [00:10:00] left with a lot of guilt and shame. And there were years that went by afterwards where my mom's drinking. Was so deep that she would say things to me like I wish that you were the one that took your

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: life If I were to lose one child, I wish it would have been you.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Why Eric? What were you doing? Why weren't you with him? that was the feeling that I created from that trauma and that was what propelled me After six, seven of my very young years saying, I will never touch alcohol. I will never touch alcohol to then it kind of being a bright idea of here's my mom.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: She's able to escape her emotions. Maybe I'll try. And it was the perfect storm of being at the age as well of my peers in high school or middle school, even at that point. Being like, Hey, let's, let's try drinking. [00:11:00] And I remember the first time that I drank the first words out of my mouth when I felt that warm buzz was no wonder my mom is an alcoholic

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: Hmm.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: because it was the first time that I felt this alleviation of those painful. Internal feelings of regret, remorse, shame, guilt. It was the first time that I was able to think positively and like, Oh my gosh, I'm excited about what's going to happen tomorrow. And what's going to happen this week at school. And it was this eyeopening experience of like, wow, okay, this is the shit. And it's so sad to think about that.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: That's the environment. And that's the, the programming. That I endured to the point then that once I started drinking and and it really became a helpful tool I thought well my mom's an alcoholic I'm going to be an alcoholic look i'm kind [00:12:00] of already that way these thoughts were happening in high school early college years.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: I was getting to the point where I would choose to drink alcohol to numb the pain even if I had something important to work on because I would have this Hands in the air. What's the point of fighting this urge because I'm an alcoholic and I noticed that narrative being that self fulfilling prophecy and the idea that this is Is a forever issue made me think why should I even fight it? Why should I even try to fight this? Little did I know that it was just a very clever adaptation to abnormal circumstances. It's not normal to Feel those adult responsibilities as a young kid. It's not normal to go through that grief and trauma and then have It be hey, that's your responsibility. Where were you?

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: What's what were [00:13:00] you doing when eric did that that that's very abnormal

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: Yeah.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: But a normal response to that would be a human being searching for comfort searching for an ease to the pain and it took me a very long time to figure that out and I sacrificed a lot I've got two duis. I had dropped out of college eventually putting drinking on the on the front burner I kind of convinced myself that I was working and climbing the corporate ladder of the, the restaurant Hooters, which was very, you know, alcohol fueled service industries, lifestyle. And eventually it got to the point after nine years that my drinking had basically caused me to lose all credibility. They didn't trust me in leadership roles. They didn't trust me to go on openings any longer, open new stores. And I had to eventually step down and, and. [00:14:00] It was these things happening over and over again that led me to be like, okay, This isn't working and i'm becoming my mother and that was always My biggest fear it was when I start to really become my mom That's when i'm going to take this seriously and at that point two duis Losing jobs not finishing college.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: I was like, these are the same. These is this is the track record And that caused me to start to experiment with some dry Julys, dry January, sober Octobers, but it was always in this venture of like, I'm going to take 30 days off and I'll be cured and I'll be fine and I'll go back to it and It'll all be fine. And then something really, again, significant happened in my life. When I was 28 my dad who had been, you know, my rock through everything as hurtful, and I would say traumatizing as my mom [00:15:00] was, my dad was as supportive. And he was the one that really helped me eventually plant the seeds of like the things that dawned on me down the line.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: When I was 28, he passed away. He was hit in a motorcycle accident. And what we were saying earlier about being stuck in the past, stealing our joy of the now it dawned on me how many holidays I had with my dad, how many amazing moments that could have been with my dad that I ruined because I was so stuck in my grief of my brother, of my mom. And, After he passed away, I had no way to remedy that. I couldn't again, go back in time and say, I wish I could do Christmas different. I wish I could not ruin Thanksgiving that year that I was real drunk. And I said, life is fragile. I've already had these many, this many [00:16:00] opportunities to see that I've already seen how quickly somebody can be. Remove from our life. I never want to feel this again. I never want anybody in my life. That's here right now My husband my stepmom my oldest brother The people that I love my best friends if they were to die tomorrow I don't want anything to be the case of I wish I wasn't drunk with them the last time I saw them and That's a big one and it took about a year to really marinate and fester in there You And then I got so sick of my own BS that I was like, I'm going to try something different. And it's not going to be AA. It's not going to be reading Quitlet. It's not going to be reading about other people struggling with alcohol. It's going to be this approach with wellness. It's going to be this approach of if I didn't have this addiction gene that everybody tells me about, which has been disproven. [00:17:00] If I didn't have this, then who would I be? And I kind of just fumbled my way through in 2020, focusing on different things that we can get to. But eventually I started to study and say, well, why did this happen? How did I actually change myself? And through my studying, I've learned it's that I started to focus on the present moment. I started to focus on who would I be without alcohol? Who do I want to be? I realized I had always been thinking, who do I not want to be? I'm so sick of being this person. I'm so sick of living like this. Our mind is a magnet and will attract those things into our life. So I needed to start to magnetize, even if it felt fictitious at the moment, I needed to magnetize, I want to be healthy.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: I want to be fit. I want to be centered in my own gratitude for life. I want to look at all the good things and feel gratitude for those. I don't want to be. Living in the past anymore, [00:18:00] living in this hurt. And that was really the switch for me. And I compare it to a light switch. I had always felt like there was going to be something that happened in my life where I just didn't want alcohol anymore. And it took the work, but it was that light switch moment for me.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: Well, first of all, my heart goes out to you because, I mean, as a, as a little kid and a young adult, you had so many different things that you had to think about to unfortunately experience. And of course, not knowing how to handle with those, seeking whatever escape you can, you know, that's very understandable.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: And so first I want to say, you know, my heart goes out to you because I'm a tender guy, but, but the other, the other thing I, you know, that comes to mind is that. You got to this point, so you had a unique exposure to Alcoholics Anonymous, which is a great organization, but it's not for [00:19:00] everyone, and so you had this unique exposure to it throughout much of your life, and yet when you felt in a time that you needed to make a major change and get over your own bullshit, It's not somewhere you saw yourself going.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: And I'm just curious to know what drove that, what drove that decision?

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: It was an awareness that I had always identified since the time that I had started drinking, and even before then, I was afraid of being an alcoholic. Once I started to drink, having that conditioning, Hi, I'm Maggie, and I'm an alcoholic, it clicked to me that that was an identity. And, If that belief in the identity always kept me walking past the bar cart and being like, you shouldn't drink, but you're an [00:20:00] alcoholic.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: So why try to fight it? It clicked to me that that identity wasn't getting me anywhere and going into rooms. Like you said, it's a great organization and it works fantastic wonders for certain people. For me going into the rooms And talking about alcohol, going into the rooms and kind of counting our days. It dawned on me as an adult that that was giving as much power to alcohol or the absence of. And what I wanted to do was to take that power away and make alcohol irrelevant.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: Yes.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: I didn't want to want to drink, but I also didn't want to fear the exposure of alcohol, being around alcohol. And I don't know if this was just my mom's nature or if it was somewhat [00:21:00] of this subconscious programming from AA, probably a mixture of both, but I remember my mom being so afraid of seeing alcohol because she was either going to have to fight this urge with sheer willpower. In which I remember her being just a very hard person to be around There were times that I was like when she's sober She's actually worse than when she's drinking because her entire sober Life is I can't drink but god damn it. I want to drink and she was Even I would remember sometimes when she was drinking, she was nicer.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Like that, she was nicer than that person. And this is probably my own perspective, but I didn't want my sobriety to be basically worshiping. I abstain and I stay away from alcohol. I don't go places with [00:22:00] alcohol or else I'm going to cave. I didn't want that belief and I didn't want what I had seen my mom experience. Of either caving in every time she saw it because she was constantly talking about it with her a a group. She was constantly focusing on it as the problem and I didn't want to fear it. There's a lot of my, I guess I would say controversial thoughts around a, but I think that there's just certain types of. People that it doesn't work for there's people that I talk to all the time that say, as soon as they walk out of a room, they want to go get a drink and I think there's a site, a psychology process behind that of what we focus on and what we, what we give energy to grows. And I remember so many times my mom leaving AA and she would just stop by the liquor store and it'd be one of her worse or one of her worst drinking episodes and I

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: felt that same [00:23:00] way.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: yeah, yeah. The mind's going to want to rebel or what you focus on. I, I totally am not surprised by that. So give me an idea about, I want to talk about where, how you're working with people and some of your philosophies and strategies, but give me an idea about where you were with your drinking with the actual amount and frequency and where you are today.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Well, on a normal week, this sounds crazy. A normal week would be at least 60 units and I was a hard alcohol fan. I wanted to get the job done. I loved shots and I would have a shot with a double drink at the same time. During heavy drinking weeks, it would be upwards of a hundred units. I drank fast and I didn't throw up.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: So I thought I was, I, I literally had this thought of, I have an alcoholic liver. It can take anything like I'm my mom's child. So again, these thoughts drove even my [00:24:00] behavior in my drinking moments.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Um So, I thought I was a pro, and I took a lot of pride in it, in a very strange way as I look back, but I

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: some of that is just youth too, you know, like it's a

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: mixture of background and youth because I definitely was this I was a stupid frat guy. I'd say stupid things like that, too you know and we're also

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: trained by movies and all these other things to think that if we can conquer it that or not apply to the rules of like Getting drunk, throwing up or being hung over or somehow, uh, for men more masculine, you know, or so whatever it is.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: I mean, I think, I don't think that's too uncommon, I guess, as I'm relating to you in that way.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Yeah, and when we're young, the hangovers just don't set in, like, it's just not as bad. But, uh I mean, they got bad, but I definitely, you know, used [00:25:00] my party identity to make friends and have all of these different relationships. And, and I, it was a way that I could find that I attracted people into my life as I could buy them shots.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: So, it wasn't abnormal for me to drink hard alcohol in high amounts every day of the week. Now where I'm at is I, can decide to have a lapse in sobriety and I stop at two, three if I'm getting crazy because I remember the depression and the anxiety

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: afterwards. I remember how lethargic I'll be. I remember how I'll just not feel like doing anything the next day. As I reintroduced alcohol into my life, I realized I don't want it the same way. But I am finally able to control it. It's no longer, Oh, once I have one, I have to have 20.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: It's no longer I drink to get drunk. It's one is [00:26:00] satisfying. One is nice to have on my anniversary with my husband. That kind of approach was what really helped me break this conditioning of. You're an alcoholic once you have one you're gonna have to have a bunch you're gonna have to have a thousand You know the old adage so I really wanted to dispel that myth and I remember Reintroducing alcohol being around my husband and saying if the disease model is true as soon as I have this one I'm gonna spin into being a raging alcoholic again, and he said you've been doing all these healthy things That's not who you are anymore I had that one and I said, it's all right. And I came home and took off my makeup and went to bed, you know,

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: Yeah. I remember

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: whereas in the past,

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: a while and being like, this is it. You know, like

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: yeah,

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: when I was, cause you know, like to give you a little reference, like my goal was never to never drink again. My goal was to no [00:27:00] longer drink every single night in the week. Uh, why not every single night. And once I stopped doing that, you know, part of that included taking a long break.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: But when I did, I was like, What did I miss so much about this one little thing? So it had lost its appeal and it sounds like it did the same for you.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: yes. Yeah. And whatever you kind of did in that time off, it worked because I'm sure, or maybe I'm, I'm out in left field here, but I know that I had taken time off in the past, but it was kind of under this guise of. I'm counting down to when I can drink again and I'm not going to change how I drink. I'm just going to be better at it somehow. Whereas when I finally put my foot down and I said, no, I'm, I'm not going to drink until I figure my shit out. I'm not going to drink again until I create a new identity and have new interests and hobbies and things to look forward [00:28:00] to. So the alcohol just. doesn't feel the same. It wasn't until then that, like, I was able to really say, like, you mentioned, like, what's the big deal about this stuff?

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: Like, this isn't actually that fun.

maggie-jenson_1_01-29-2025_090621: But it's not just time that heals all, it's what you do with that time. Because I had spent those months before trying, just counting down the days, not doing anything except for removing alcohol. Whereas in my transformation, yes, I removed alcohol, but I wasn't focusing on the absence of alcohol. I was focusing on what do I add in? What do I love? What are the things that have been kind of on the back burner, my dreams, my hopes, my aspirations that every time I thought about them in the past, I would say, yeah, but that would take away from drinking time or that would be too expensive. I can't afford that because all my money is going to alcohol. I finally gave myself permission to dabble in those things.

mike-hardenbrook_1_01-29-2025_180622: Isn't it interesting how you start to make plans around alcohol, but when you remove that, you start to make [00:29:00] plans around things that you really want to do. If, if you're proactive. You can, like you said, if you just remove it, but it is so funny that you don't realize how many of your plans are made around alcohol when you normally drink.