The Courage to Change: A Recovery Podcast

Chris Howe endured 17 long years of addiction to alcohol and drugs while working as a firefighter. He was different from everyone else in the department. He was smaller, tattooed and spent his time away from the job with alcoholics, addicts and criminals.  This double life filled him with self hatred and secrets. He’d been effected deeply by childhood sexual trauma and PTSD on the job and had no p...

Casey McGuire Davidson grew up moving around the globe with parents that worked as US diplomats. While it provided some amazing experiences it also planted the seed that she needed to be constantly performing at a high level. Being the child of important people made it feel like she couldn’t mess up.   As an adult she led a high achieving life in the corporate world and the hypervigilance from chi...

In this Q and A episode Ashley answers the listener question from a teacher wanting to know how to help their addicted students.  They are trying to find ways they can create a safe space for the students to talk openly about the challenges they are facing and want to know how they can help. Ashley Loeb Blassingame has been clean and sober for 16 years, she's a drug and alcohol counselor, interven...

Person Irresponsible, or PI as most people call her, describes herself as having been “fat, funny, forty-something, and in her fourth year of recovery when she felt an unfathomable urge to walk across America”. Previously she had hiked from the sofa to the fridge and back and considered camping to be a loathsome pursuit. She was also a confirmed nicotine addict and had never even considered climbi...

Elizabeth Sockolov is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, a member of Psi Chi, The International Honor Society of Psychology, and the founder of One Mind Therapy.  Elizabeth’s journey started eleven years ago when she got into recovery from addiction. Like so many, she used drugs as a means to deal with her anxiety. Then everything changed when she discovered meditation. It became the cure t...

In this Q and A episode Ashley answers the question "Why am I addicted to my phone?". It seems like everyone has a complicated relationship with their phone and its addictive nature. Ashley talks about what is happening in the brain and what you can do to curb your attachment to your device. Ashley Loeb Blassingame has been clean and sober for 16 years, she's a drug and alcohol counselor, interven...

Andrea Ashley is a former CPA turned podcast host & producer. She grew up outside of Philadelphia in an alcoholic household. Andrea turned to drugs and alcohol herself at the age of 12. After years in and out of rehabs and boarding schools, she was granted the gift of sobriety at the age of 19 and celebrated 13 years of continuous sobriety in September 2021. In 2018 and after 9 years of sobriety,...

Parham Nematollah grew up in Iran during the Iran-Iraq war where he lived through frequent bombings that sent his whole family fleeing for safety.  They eventually made it to the US, but he then spent his childhood moving back and forth from the US to Iran. At age 9 he moved back to Iran and spent the better part of a year learning how to read and write in a new language.  At 16 he moved back to t...

In this Q and A episode Ashley answers the listener question "How do I get my husband to commit to going to treatment?" Her partner has had several relapses and she can't convince him to get help. Ashley discusses how to let the crisis arrive, interventions and self work that can be extremely helpful in encouraging a loved one to get help. Ashley Loeb Blassingame has been clean and sober for 16 ye...

Andy grew up searching for a place to fit in and find acceptance. As a Minister’s son, kids were often brought to his house against their will in order for his morality to rub off on them. In high school he found a new persona when he got blackout drunk at a college party. Suddenly people were talking about how funny he was when he was drunk, how he was just like Will Ferrell, and he liked the att...

Roland Williams is an interventionist, author, trainer, counselor and consultant specializing in addiction related issues. He is one of the first Licensed Advanced Addictions Counselors in the state of California.  He is a motivational speaker who conducts seminars, workshops, keynote presentations, as well as staff training, skills building and program development worldwide. Roland is the Founder...

In this Q and A episode Ashley talks with producer Scott Drochelman about the reasons that people relapse. Hear Ashley's relapse stories and what factors put people at risk.  Ashley Loeb Blassingame has been clean and sober for 16 years, she's a drug and alcohol counselor, interventionist, and the co-founder of a telehealth company called Lionrock Recovery that provides substance use disorder trea...

Lynsie was a high achiever from a young age. Starting dance, gymnastics and singing classes at age three. She joined the pageant circuit at 12 and immediately had success. The achievement of it all brought peace to her turbulent home with an alcoholic father.  She eventually found the success she was looking for when she became Miss Teen Arizona, but it led to a strange splitting of herself. In on...

Wes Geer is a professional guitar player, songwriter, recording artist, and producer, who signed his first record deal to Jive Records with the band he founded, (Hed) P.E.. Wes toured the world for nearly a decade, and the band sold over 1 million records worldwide. Their music was on high rotation on MTV, radio stations, as well as having numerous placements in popular feature films, TV, and vide...

In this Q and A episode Ashley talks with producer Scott Drochelman about how to maintain hope when you've been trying to help for a long time. You might not feel like there is much more you can do. You might find it difficult to remain connected. Ashley provides practical ideas on how to approach this complicated situation without enabling. Ashley Loeb Blassingame has been clean and sober for 16...

Benjamin Heldfond grew up in San Francisco where he lived through a high conflict divorce. He internalized the breakup as a signal that he was bad. The experience was like Miracle Grow for his growing drinking and heroin addiction which eventually led to a flatline overdose that saw him clinically dead. But even that didn’t lead to his sobriety. Ben eventually entered treatment, found help and 6 y...

Dr. John Umhau is a board certified  addiction medicine specialist who directs AlcoholRecoveryMedicine.com and provides telemedicine treatment for people with alcohol use disorder. For over 20 years Dr. Umhau was a senior clinical investigator at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institutes of Health, (NIH).  As a Commander in the United States Public Health Se...

Ashley Loeb Blassingame has been clean and sober for 16 years, she's a drug and alcohol counselor, interventionist, and the co-founder of a telehealth company called Lionrock Recovery that provides substance use disorder treatment. In this Q and A episode she talks with producer Scott Drochelman about how to wade into the sober dating world with intention and authenticity while avoiding some of th...

After Will's mom passed away in 2017, a lifetime of suppressed memories and events came flooding back in.  What felt like a normal childhood with humble beginnings began to change. Suddenly he was seeing everything iin vivid detail, defending his mother during an attempted sexual assault, witnessing russian roulette at the kitchen table or being around for a long list of traumatic events. Will tur...

Pej was born in Germany but raised in Salt Lake City where he always felt different due to his skin color and nationality. In his youth he was bullied and encountered verbal, physical, and mental abuse within his home. Pej began experimenting with alcohol at six years old and experienced his first black out at the age of twelve. At seventeen Pej was hung over, driving his friends to school when he...

Ashley Loeb Blassingame has been clean and sober for 16 years, she's a drug and alcohol counselor, interventionist, and the co-founder of a telehealth company called Lionrock Recovery that provides substance use disorder treatment. In this Q and A session she talks with producer Scott Drochelman about the challenges in caring for a loved one who is addicted to something. Folks are asked to lead wi...

Michelle’s passion for maternal mental health emerged after becoming a mother. Alcohol became a coping tool, eventually resulting in severe alcohol use disorder.  As an educated professional working in the addiction field, she never imagined she would find herself struggling to find a healthy relationship with alcohol.  Sitting on the bathroom floor, bawling her eyes out, she had a moment where sh...

Dr. Michele Perron is a Clinical Supervisor, a private international addiction coach, counselor, speaker, and the author of “Tools for Life". She has worked in the field of addiction for over 15 years. Her experience includes working with groups and individuals in the critical stages of detox to high intensity inpatient, intensive outpatient, outpatient, extended care, after care, adolescent care,...

Ashley Loeb Blassingame has been clean and sober for 16 years, she's a drug and alcohol counselor, interventionist, and the co-founder of a telehealth company called Lionrock Recovery that provides substance use disorder treatment. In this Q and A session she talks with producer Scott Drochelman about the moment she realized she was addicted, how to recognize the signs, and your first steps if you...

Mescal was born in England and moved to Santa Monica at age 8 in the height of the Dogtown Era. Mescal grew up surrounded by skate and surf culture and also gang and drug culture. All this leading to him becoming, as he describes it, “a troubled, poor, latchkey kid of the 80s” Mescal got sober in his twenties but 18 years later found his sobriety threatened when past trauma and unresolved mental h...