Sarah's Top Five Quit Lit Books By Sarah Stewart
2. This Naked Mind: Control Alcohol: Find Freedom, Discover Happiness & Change Your Life by Annie Grace. Millions of people worry that drinking is affecting their health, yet are unwilling to seek change because of the stigma associated with alcoholism and recovery. They fear drinking less will be boring, difficult, and involve deprivation, and significant lifestyle changes. This book, without scare tactics, pain, or rules, gives you freedom from alcohol. By addressing causes rather than symptoms it is a permanent solution rather than a lifetime struggle. From the author: “ Welcome to a new, positive solution that gives you freedom in your relationship with alcohol. Allowing you to look at your drinking without fear. Empowering you with the tools that give you your power back, enabling you to decide what is right for you – without illogical cravings or irrepressible urges. Since This Naked Mind can remove the psychological desire for a drink, this allows you to drink less (or stop drinking) without pain, rules or missing out. Sounds hard to believe, but it is true. This incredible change can open the door to the life you have been waiting for.” 3. Quit Like A Woman: The Radical Choice to Not Drink in a Culture Obsessed with Alcohol by Holly Whitaker *The book that inspired Chrissy Teigen and Sex and The City's Miranda to quit drinking* We live in a world obsessed with drinking. We drink at baby showers and work events, brunch and book club, graduations, and funerals. Yet no one ever questions alcohol’s ubiquity—in fact, the only thing ever questioned is why someone doesn’t drink. As a society, we are obsessed with health and wellness, yet we uphold alcohol as some kind of magic elixir, though it is anything but. American author Holly Whitaker began her own journey to sobriety in 2012 after developing an alcohol dependency throughout her 20s. Although life-changing, her recovery unveiled the male-centric frameworks that exist within recovery programs and the patriarchal forces at play in the alcohol industry. Since then, Holly has gone on to create her own sobriety school, as well as detailing her battle with addiction in her debut book, Quit Like A Woman. Discussing recovery through a female lens,
Whether you’re wanting to stop drinking, starting to think about your relationship with alcohol or are in need of more alcohol-free inspiration, reading sobriety books (aka quit lit) is a great place to start. I've compiled a list of my favourite female-written books – from the ones which helped me get going, to the ones I return to when I'm struggling. Here's hoping that if you're looking to explore sobriety, they give you a helping hand too. 1. The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober by Catherine Gray This book changed my life, it resonated with me in a way that nothing has before, I honestly cannot sing its praises enough; reading it was like an epiphany moment and I just could not put it down. Two-thirds of The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober is about what comes after quitting, after day one. ‘What will life be like if I quit? How will I cope with anxiety, with New Year’s Eve, with a first kiss? Will it be worth the gargantuan lifestyle change?’ In this book Catherine Gray shows that sober life offers you so much more: rather than spending all day sleeping off your hangover, you can leap out of bed at seven and go for a run, join your friends for a brunch, take yourself to the spa or spend the afternoon shopping. You can still date, have fun and dance. You can go to parties and weddings. You can do anything a drunk person can do – with the added bonus that you are unlikely to make an idiot of yourself while you’re at it. From the author: “ The book is a tri-brid of self-help, a report and a memoir. It’s for the sober-curious, as well as the trying-to-be-sober and the already-sober. It’s for people who want to quit drinking for six months to save for a house deposit and clear up their skin, as well as those who want to quit for good. It’s rich with inspirational takeaway tips, shocking stats, illuminating science, never-read-before insights from experts, convincing research as to why sobriety is better, and diary excerpts from my life drinking vs. my life sober.” Her follow up, Sunshine Warm Sober: Unexpected Sober Joy that Lasts, written in Gray's eighth year of sobriety, builds on this beautifully and is an ode to the longer terms benefits of booze-free living.
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