Over The Influence: The Alcohol Free Podcast

This week we welcome the fantastic Todd Kinney on to the podcast all the way from Omaha, Nebraska in the US of A! Todd is an attorney by trade but since going AF has become a QuitLit author too with his book that may be already familiar to you, 'I Didn't Believe It Either'. For those of you who have come through Dry Jan and you're thinking "is that it?!" - take a listen to what Todd has to say, be...

In this episode we welcome our OTI Community's very own medical professional to the podcast, the fantastic Dr Helen! Now a decade into her sobriety, Helen is an AF veteran and is absolutely smashing life without alcohol. She joined the OTI Community in our earliest days as she says she finally found a group of people that didn't look at quitting alcohol as something to be ashamed of but instead it...

In this episode we welcome back the wonderful Aran to the pod! Aran is one of our lovely OTI Community members and he joined us just over a year ago when he went AF last Dry January. Since then, it's safe to say he has bedded himself into the community and has got everything he can out of alcohol free life.  If you think you might benefit from joining the community and would like to find out more,...

To those of you doing Dry January, we salute you! Keep up the great work. We are delighted to be joined this week by Professor David Nutt (Imperial College London), a Psychiatrist who researches the affects of drugs on the brain. The drug in question this week is of course alcohol. David has spent much of his career researching how alcohol impacts brain function and the dangers of drinking to exce...

Our old mate Craig Beck is back on the pod! He's back this Dry January to discuss with us why we shouldn't put a time frame on sobriety and if you're enjoying it, push on and enjoy each sober moment as it comes! Craig's book "Alcohol Lied To Me" and it's sequel "Alcohol Lied To Me... Again!", are essential quit lit reading. A lot of you out there will have already read them; anyone that hasn't, ma...

In this episode we catch up with friend of the podcast William Porter, the author of Alcohol Explained! William talks us through what happens to your body and brain when you decide to remove alcohol... And the reasons why it doesn't feel very good at first. He talks us through the science (both physiological and psychological) to give us an understanding of why we feel rubbish at first, but then a...

Happy New Year! It's the most wonderful time of the year - Dry Jan! To celebrate, we've invited on some members from our community here at Over The Influence to share their alcohol free tales after getting started on their journeys during January. Sobriety isn't a pipe dream - it's an achievable life choice and this lovely lot, are the proof in the pudding (or the podcast). Whether you're embarkin...

Ho-ho-ho, Merry Christmas!! As an extra special gift for you lovely lot today, we've got the one and only Ruth Jones on the podcast! She's a much-loved actress, writer, producer, novelist and you guessed it - she's one of the alcohol free gang. We're delighted that Ruth has joined us on the pod to spread some AF festive cheer and appreciate her taking the time to share her sobriety story with our...

This week we have the fantastic Dupe Witherick on the pod! Dupe is an accredited alcohol free & wellbeing coach and the author of "A Cocktail of Clarity". She is also a fellow AF podcaster so make sure you check out Thrive Alcohol Free! In this episode we chat to Dupe about what life was like before giving up alcohol and the remarkable improvement that she has felt since she removed it. With C...

In this episode we welcome Karl Considine onto the pod, founder of the AF bar Love From in Manchester! Karl is also the host of sobriety pod (big up the sobriety pods!) What Next. After kicking the booze himself, Karl saw that there was a massive gap in the market for somewhere that non-drinkers could go out and have a nice drink without being surrounded by alcohol. We had a wonderful time chattin...

In this episode we chat to two of our fantastic community members, Chris and Aran. One of our favourite things about the pod and the community is that you , our wonderful listeners, not only connect with us but with each other as well. Chris and Aran are a great example of that and we wanted to get them on the pod to discuss how removing alcohol hasn't diminished their social life as they suspecte...

This week we welcome Transformation Coach Marcus Jones onto the podcast, who shares his own sobriety story with us in the hope of helping other men who are currently in a similar situation to where he was pre-pandemic. Following the breakdown of his marriage, Marcus found that he turned to alcohol and substance abuse to help him cope. Far from giving him comfort though, he found that in the longte...

No guest this week because our Shaz is turning 50! Her and Ben are taking a moment to reflect on the last decade and how quitting the booze half way through her 40s changed the direction of travel for everything Sharon Hartley related. Enjoy your holiday Shaz, you flippin' deserve it!  --- Get In Touch: Of course, you can always get in touch with us (publicly or privately) on our socials - @alcoho...

In this episode we welcome back Andy Delderfield, the founder of Alcohol Free Runners and a member of our AF community.  Last time we had Andy on the pod, he was preparing to push himself to the brink by running a marathon in ice cold conditions. This time he's taking it easy, and will be running in the extreme heat instead. The reason he is doing this is to raise money for Prostate Cancer UK and...

In this episode we welcome Gayle Macdonald onto the pod, who is a transformational sobriety coach and author who is here to give her insight into alcohol free life. Having had various periods of sobriety before falling back into old habits, Gayle called it a day once and for all so that she could bring more structure to her family life. Her message is simple and highly effective: quit drinking, fe...

In this episode we chat to our fantastic community member Danielle, who joins Ben & Shaz on the pod fresh from the OTI Edale trip. It’s Danielle’s second outing on the OTI podcast and today she’s here to talk about the gut-brain connection and why it is so important to stay on top of your gut health. Of course, with this being an AF podcast, we had to ask about what alcohol does to the gut. It...

We are delighted to have the fantastic Helen Brown from the Effin Hormones podcast join us this week to discuss her reasons for ditching the booze.  While she was suffering from a variety of symptoms of the menopause, Helen decided she wasn't going to give into it. Instead, she did whatever she had to do to give her body the best fighting chance she could. This included an all round health kick, a...

In this episode we chat to our amazing community member Maz, who celebrated being two years alcohol free on the day we recorded! Maz has been an OTI Community member for a few years now and what an invaluable member she is. She is always active on the forum with a seemingly endless supply of wisdom and OTI is all the richer for having Maz as a part of it. During the episode, we discuss how her wor...

Our guest on this episode is the MP for Hyndburn & Haslingden, Sara Britcliffe. She was elected to the UK Parliament at the age of 24, making her the youngest Conservative Member of Parliament elected in the 2019 general election. Sara has joined us on the podcast not in her role as a politician, but as the daughter of her mother who battled with an addiction to alcohol when Sara was a child....

Our guest on this episode Austin Karr reached the end of his tether with drinking and decided that enough is enough. It wasn’t as simple as giving up the booze alone though - his issues with drinking were a symptom of something deeper. Before he could tackle drinking once and for all, he had to tackle his issues with himself head on.  Thanks to Austin for coming on the pod, his cool-headedness and...

In this episode we chat to Matt Evans from 'The Ultimate Birmingham Event' which is taking place at the ICC in May 2024. Matt talks to us about how he used to drink to mask his feelings of inadequacy about “who he wasn’t” - the guy with the expensive car, the six figure salary and how that led to him feeling like he wasn't enough for his family.  Now, he’s flipped that on it’s head and he doesn’t...

In this episode we chat to our lovely community member Graham, who is just down the road from Ben in Liverpool. Graham has been an OTI Community member for a year now - in fact he was actually with us in person on his one year AF anniversary during our Ben Nevis expedition! He shares with us how much he’s loving riding the wave of sobriety and how removing alcohol was the key to solving the puzzle...

This is a very special episode of Over The Influence... Because to celebrate Shaz's 5 years of sobriety, Ben secretly invited her daughter Ella on the podcast! Sharon has spoken about being an alcohol-free parent a lot on over the years... And has often reflected on how her drinking affected her relationships with her children. In this really honest episode, Ella talks about how she saw it from he...

The guest who's so nice, we've had her on twice! Of course we are talking about one and only Clare Pooley. She's the author who penned the essential quit lit read 'The Sober Diaries' and she's back to share some more AF wisdom with you, our wonderful listeners. In this episode, Clare tells us how once she had shaken off the booze, writing became her new addiction. We talk about how AF life can re-...

In this episode we chat to the wonderful Nicole, who joins us from sunny Brisbane! Nicole has been an OTI Community member for a few years now, and despite the challenges that geography and time zones can present, she's an incredibly active member of it - even flying over from Brisbane to Yorkshire for our Yorkshire Three Peaks event last year! We love this chat with Nicole because removing alcoho...