Steve welcomes his GSM bestie Ben to share his experience, strength, and hope while celebrating living a queer and sober life today.
Topics discussed include:
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Steve welcomes his GSM bestie Ben to share his experience, strength, and hope while celebrating living a queer and sober life today.
Topics discussed include:
Listening in December '23? Donate to Transanta - learn more here: https://www.transanta.com/ or on IG @transanta
Follow Ben @beneis1 on IG, and follow us too @gayapodcast. Head over to the Patreon page to hear our post-show and more exclusive content, and give Steve the greatest holiday gift of all: a 5-star review on whatever podcast platform you are using right now!
Listeners, I NEED YOUR HELP! This podcast is growing rapidly, and I want to make sure we can all grow together, so take this survey and let me know what I'm doing right and where I should focus my attentions going forward to provide the best podcast for YOU possible! CLICK HERE!
Hi everyone, and welcome to Gay A, a podcast about sobriety for the queer community and our allies. I'm your host, Steve Bennett Martin, I'm an alcoholic and addict, and I am grateful for finally being my own boss. As of this recording, I am 923 days sober. And today we're welcoming a guest to share their experience, wisdom, and hope with you. I am so excited to finally have him on. I've intended for this for years now. And so welcome Ben.
Ben:Hello. Hello. Yeah. So nice to be here. Thank you for having me.
Steve:My pleasure. And for those who aren't already lucky enough to know you, why don't you introduce yourself to our listeners?
Ben:Okay, my name is Ben E. Pronouns are he, him. I am my substance of choice is, is cannabis, but really all the things, alcohol benzos, painkillers, coke, you name it. Yeah. And I have. Three years and seven months, I think, of sobriety from all the things. And I am New York based, and I'm 26 years old.
Steve:For all of that, and congratulations on the three years and seven ish months.
Ben:Thank you.
Steve:And what would you say is your favorite part of being sober today?
Ben:Sober today. Okay. So I am a graduate student in clinical psychology. And today we were talking about anxiety disorders. And I was like, Oh, hey, no her. But I was thinking about cycles of avoidance that perpetuate anxiety. And I was thinking about how back in my using days, I would smoke or drink or do whatever it was. So that I wouldn't feel anxious, and obviously that wouldn't work, and so then I would smoke or drink or whatever it was, so that I would feel less anxious, and none of it worked, and in sobriety I learned that if you just don't do anything at all, the feelings will pass, almost all the time. Yeah. I never got to know that. Because I always smoked or drank or did whatever else and now I know that and that is huge and I'm so lucky today to know that
Steve:that's beautiful and I can relate to that so much because especially those first couple years was just me being like how do I survive in this world without running away to alcohol or drugs or whatever it was I was running away from like to to run away from but just how do I live so that is huge and what would you say is your favorite part of being queer today?
Ben:Literally everything. I'm the type of person where being gay is my identity and I guess my favorite part of being queer today specifically is the queer family that is born out of shared identity regardless of whether or not you are one of those girls who has like You're six cis white gay friends and you always go to Provincetown together, or if you're someone who has, you know, a few friends on the internet or anywhere in between, I think that queer people have this power of forming connection over shared identity that is really beautiful and I'm very fortunate to have my own queer network and queer community that just is. Makes me feel good. Yeah,
Steve:community is so important, especially queer community. I know that I've had a great one online through the podcast and things like that for so long, but I'm starting to find one locally and it's been beautiful. So why don't we dive into the nitty gritty and why don't you share with us a little bit about what your journey with addiction was
Ben:like? Okay. So I was born an addict, like for sure. I remember when I was like four or five years old, I was already like, Sneaking candy at school and playing computer games on those big Macs back when they were sort of oval shaped more than my parents would have liked so something was up. We were different. And then in high school, I felt different. I went to a small all boys school and I immediately felt like an outsider and I started dealing with a lot of negative emotions and anxiety. And for a few reasons, I found drugs and alcohol and doing a whole lot of them as a way where I could get attention as a way where I could feel like I fit in and as a way where I could push aside some of the negative things that I was feeling and that worked. Great. That was awesome. I was like, Oh, perfect. Who knew? People knew. And so that devolved. And I would do a lot of risky things. You know, I'm a bit of a slimmer guy and I was even slimmer back then. And I have no idea how my body tolerated all of the weird and unpleasant things that I was doing to it with drugs and alcohol, but I'm fortunate to tell the tale. In high school, it got just a lot more chronic where I was smoking four times a day. And. I faked a need for benzos just to get benzos and then I would do them all in, like, 3 days and just wait the extra 27 days out. Or I would mix this and that and things that you're not supposed to mix because you're not supposed to mix them. So that continued every day for almost 4 years. You know, I'm 26 now, so I graduated college, like, 4 years ago, which was The pandemic and I moved back home with my parents and I was. Immensely miserable. I had no money for no reason. Because fortunately, my needs were being taken care of by my parents. And no one was going out and doing anything. No reason for me to be broke. No reason for me to be feeling this terrible. Like, we were all feeling bad, but I was feeling real bad. And I sort of had this enough is enough moment that I don't know how I got to it. I don't know what made that time so different from other times when I had said enough is enough, and nothing had changed. Maybe it was the isolation, maybe it was being surrounded by family. Maybe it was just the weirdness of the world that we had begun to live in, or my own burgeoning adulthood. But something gave this time a little bit more oomph, and so I got sober. And I have not looked back since. And that is a blessing and a miracle.
Steve:Yeah, it is such a miracle. I love that enough is enough. And how that worked for you. I know that especially getting sober relatively young, not that there's any sort of age requirement to get sober. But I mean, you made the realization pretty early. What was early recovery like, especially being younger and possibly having more expectations socially
Ben:about that? Yeah, definitely. I hated that. The fact that I was 22 and like, I was supposed to be going harder than I had ever gone before, which would have taken a lot because I was already going quite hard. But the fact that I was now going to spend the rest of my 20s, if I was lucky, abstaining from alcohol and drugs and reorienting my relationship with social spaces, my relationship with my friends, my relationship with sex and relationships. I did not want to do that, but I also knew that it was the only way to stay alive emotionally and spiritually, if not physically, so I realized that I needed to make the best of what I had, and I adopted this experience. Stance that I don't know. First of all, it was the beginning of the pandemic. No one was going anywhere. So it's not like I was like, fuck, my friends are out at the club and, I'm too scared because I don't want to drink. No, no one was going anywhere. So that helped a little bit. But as people start going places again and seeing each other again. And I was still within my 1st year of recovery when that started happening. I had this mindset that I've heard a lot of other people share about, like, well, I can do everything they can do minus the drugs and alcohol. And to some extent that is True, and that's a wonderful thing, that I can enjoy bars and clubs and sex and lots of sex and have all of those experiences while not simultaneously ruining my life, and to it, on another token, that was a challenge that I didn't need to put myself through, and that is definitely not something that I would tell newcomers, like, don't worry, just go out to the club and don't drink and you'll be fine, It's a test that I think can be threatening to your sobriety and to your healing. And I still do love going out and doing all the things that I used to do except for the, passing out or, stumbling or, waking up. No idea where I was but that's because I enjoy that stuff, not because I feel like I want to prove to myself and also to other people that I can.
Steve:Yeah, I can really feel that. And I know that you mentioned, with things like sex, so oftentimes are related and intertwined so much with our other habits that we were feeding beforehand that it's hard to adjust to sex in recovery. What was that shift like for you?
Ben:Yes, ma'am. It was tough. I was single and I was sort of in a place where I was already figuring out that oh, sex actually has a lot of intricacies behind it for a lot of people. Sex is really complicated and everything that someone is working on or struggling with in life comes out in their sex life. And I was already sort of having that, and then I was like, ah, shit, well now I can't numb myself and just be an object, and that's a bummer, and I had to come to terms with really facing all of these ideas that I'd already recognized. I had experienced some traumatic events related to sex not too long before I got sober. So I was sort of piecing all of that together at the same time and piecing together coming into adulthood and what adulthood looks like for me having sex. And I'm still doing all of that. And I think I probably will be for the rest of my life because sex is tricky and fun and great. But tricky.
Steve:Yeah, that was certainly, it was our topic episode last week, and, the thing about sex though, is, it is tricky. And I fell in love with you right away at GSM, the first time we met, with just how open and free you were about everything, not just sexually, but just being so authentically you, at like, what I consider a younger age, that I was just like, wow, this is the beauty of things that recovery can do. And then seeing you a year later, and just even the way that you held yourself differently sexually and seeing how not only do we get to grow during that first year of recovery, but we keep on growing. What has your journey like, I would say, after your first year into your second and third year now?
Ben:Sure. In relation to sex, cause I'll talk about sex all day and all night long. Or more generally cause I know we don't want to oversaturate the audience with that stuff. But listeners, feel free to ask me whatever, whenever. I think in general, I will say transitioning from not being in my first year aligned well with growing up in life. And growing up sexually. And I really enjoyed the feeling of being coddled as a newcomer and being told that, you know, meetings are all about me and, oh, well, if a newcomer wants to speak, if Ben wants to talk, he should go first. I loved that. Give me attention. Give me validation. Tell me that I'm special and important.
Steve:That's my kryptonite. Yeah, yeah, it's great.
Ben:Really can't recommend enough, but Taking responsibility for my life and for my recovery is necessary for me in order to progress further, and so that transition from being like, okay, no, we're, we're really still sober. I still have to. Get up every day and not smoke or drink, even though it's not this new cool thing that I'm getting a lot of praise for all the time, I still gotta do it. It's no less important than it was on day one. And I think that was a lot more empowering than I thought it would be. I thought this burden of maturation and adulthood would sort of feel like the party's over. And I think that I've now Come to understand a lot more of myself because I've taken a lot more responsibility for myself and these feelings of needing to be coddled and needing to be told I'm special impeded my own development of my sense of self worth. So, in a way, it's kind of a stretch, but work with me in a way that transition away from being the newcomer, though, of course, I'm still a newcomer in some many respects. That transition away from the first year, I guess, was me learning how to develop my own sense of self, which is lovely. It's great. I love myself. So I'm glad I got to know him.
Steve:I, I love you too and I love seeing you grow. I know that, yeah, very much the first year of recovery and like my first couple of big social experiences like GSM were kind of about learning what I could do and kind of pushing that to the limits of like, Oh, I can do these amazing, wonderful things. That are wild in recovery and be sober and enjoy it. And I think like the second like year in that second conference was like, just cause I can do all of these things doesn't mean I need to or that I want to or that that's what will be the best experience for me. And I feel like you had a very similar journey with that.
Ben:Correct, because it, and I think there's nothing wrong with that, or nothing that I really regret for the most part but I think it's important to explore what's your sober life can look like, and then determine what you want it to look like. It can be tricky, and it can be triggering, and I don't recommend Exploring too, too much. Because you might find yourself in a sticky situation, but I think it's an understandable process of rediscovering what your sober self is to try a lot of things and see what doesn't really work and what does, whether that's talking about like, Oh, I need to have sex with people. I know versus I need to have sex with people. I don't know whether that's talking about like, I really benefit from 12 step meetings, or I benefit from smart recovery or another type of recovery program. Or if it's talking about, okay, like exercise is how I'm going to get that dopamine rush, which I never considered. But some people do,
Steve:I'm like three weeks into it and I highly
Ben:recommend it. Exercise never. But that's cool. and it's great to figure out what works for you, and it doesn't mean that necessarily you're doing recovery wrong, or you're failing to miss the target. I think it just means that. You're actually able to find what makes you tick, and what makes you happy.
Steve:Yeah, that's so important. I know that many of us, I've heard it before in certain rooms, that you almost stop maturing at the moment that those drugs or alcohol or those escape methods are introduced into our lives. So of course, when we're back with that juvenile mindset of like, I never knew what I liked, what I didn't like, and that can, go to things in my day to day life as well as, you know, what I want from my life has changed and grown in the past couple years in ways I never would have imagined before recovery my life has grown.
Ben:I think that's so important. What you just said about stunting your growth and I know it's not like. You know, we talk about that a lot, certainly, but I think as queer people, it's so important because, for me at least, I started using drugs right as I started to try to put together my sexual orientation, and therefore I did not. And then, even when I came out and I started having sex with men and having relationships with men, I didn't have a clear understanding of what my identity meant to me. At all. I knew that I liked that, and that's what I wanted to do, but it really took sobriety for me to come into the queer growth and queer self conceptualization that I am now building, because queer people, I think, are already at a bit of a time lag disadvantage, when most of the time we are not taught what a healthy relationship looks like for the people that we want to be in relationships with. Or we are not taught healthy role models. We are not taught to be sexually or emotionally expressive in the ways that we want to. So when you push that developmental delay even further, there's a lot more catching up to do. Yeah,
there
Steve:certainly is. I mean, I remember my high school education sex classes, which were very, I use the word sex air quotes was like the one gay week was we watched a 45 minute documentary about how AIDS exists and that's what every gay person gets and then you die and that's what being gay is. And they were like, all right, that's the end. Any questions? Good. No one's gay. Let's move
Ben:on. Great. So that sounds informative and lovely, but there may be more. Yeah. And
Steve:and I was married when I got sober, and even being married, I had to relearn, there were certain things about our relationship that have evolved where I was like, oh, communication, and talking about your feelings is important and helpful. And it's just, it's things that I wasn't doing before.
Ben:Yeah. And just confronting, those things, those demons that we take on as queer people who grow up thinking that we can't be queer, or that society will look down on us. or any type of deviance, anything like that. We are able to confront those head on in sobriety, and that sucks ass, but it's so important.
Steve:It is very important. And if someone was listening in their early recovery, what kind of advice would you give
Ben:them? Okay, none of this, this is all just based on personal experience, and none of this should be taken as directive in any way. I'm not all those disclaimers that people make. I'm not a doctor. I'm not a lawyer. So one don't quit before the miracle happens, which is my biggest. Sort of mantra, even though the miracles have happened, they continue to happen. And I think early in recovery you know, there's this saying in 12 step of, of substance being magic, then medicine, then misery. And I think that early in recovery, it goes in reverse where it's misery first, and then you start to heal, and then you start to experience that magic. And the misery is terrible. It's so bad. It's awful. I wouldn't wish it on, like, almost anyone. And so that can paint a different picture of what you think your sobriety is going to look like than what it will look like. And these miracles, these moments of medicine and magic, start to seep in only when you keep going. But you can't stop and think that they wouldn't have happened, because you wouldn't know. So I would have no idea all of the wonderful things that have happened to me would have happened to me. Unless I got sober and got to experience them for myself. And it, every day, on average, gets easier. So just pushing through a day that can be like, terrible! You're like, oh my god, like, I wanna die, this is the worst. Just push through it, cause the next few days will be a little better. And that doesn't mean in like, six days you won't have a huge dip where you're like, fuck this. You probably will. But even that day, if you push through, then the next day might be a little better. And soon it's going to get a whole lot better. Yeah, it
Steve:does get a whole lot better. And what is something you're looking forward to in your recovery?
Ben:you know, I have some amount of time, but I still haven't started sponsoring for various reasons. I think I'm a bad luck charm for sponsors, where they meet me and they relapse or decide that they don't want to sponsor anyone or ever do the steps. But right now we're doing good. we've got to keep her on our hands and so I am hoping to start sponsoring in the new year and I'm so excited for that not only as a way to be of service, but as a way for me to keep learning again, that same theme we were talking about of transitioning from being sort of the newcomer and the one who's coddled to the one who's providing support to others and all the self discovery that can happen in that. I can't wait for these new opportunities that will come for me to enhance my understanding of my addiction and my recovery when I try my best to be a guide for someone else. So that's gonna be great.
Steve:Yeah, it certainly will. I can relate to that journey with sponsoring so much because it took a while. I was ready to be like, okay, I'm just not meant to have a sponsy right now. But I was leaving that right now because I know better than to say ever. I've learned that in recovery. But I was like, now's not the time. And then all of a sudden someone asked and it just was the right time. And it's been beautiful. They're they are now at like step four and just starting that work. And it definitely changes the way that I see it because it's also expands your understanding and you have to explain things differently because I can't do what worked for me, like won't necessarily work for every person that I work with. So I could be like, well, this worksheet worked for me. And they could be like, well, that worksheet is garbage. What else do you got? And trying to figure it out and meet it halfway has been really eye opening and
Ben:enhancing. Exactly. I, like I mentioned before, I love myself, my ego runs strong, and I think that I'm right all the time, and I think that I know the best way of doing things, and I continuously hope for opportunities to prove myself wrong, because I want to learn, and I think that sponsorship helps you to learn.
Steve:Yeah, that is so important. Yeah, I'm in this like new phase of really loving myself in a way I haven't in a while, which is both great. But I also have to like understand that there is also that point where, it goes from just a healthy amount of love to like, okay, leave some love for other
Ben:people. Correct. And I think that that balance is something that you can find in sobriety. I think that addiction often paints things in black and white. And I grew up around a lot of arrogant people. And I thought that In order to not be arrogant, I had to hate myself. Yeah. And so now I've learned that there's a middle ground.
Steve:There certainly is, and even as I'm saying what I just said out loud, and listening back to what I said, I was like, no, because since I've been loving myself more, I've also had more love in my life for other people. Like, I'm texting more friends and people in my life saying I love you, or just touching base with them now, that I love myself more than I did before, so maybe it isn't selfish.
Ben:Maybe, or maybe it's just good for everyone around you. Yeah, just love yourself,
Steve:everyone who's listening right now. That's our advice. Mm hmm. It's
Ben:super easy. Just do it. Just
Steve:do it. Excellent. And any final drops of wisdom for
Ben:our listeners? Final drops of wisdom. Oh, okay. Actually, I have something. I have something that I like a lot which maybe goes back to our initial conversation about anxiety and about me trying to control my anxiety over and over again by doing things as opposed to doing nothing and learning that actually letting those feelings pass is the best way for me to deal with them and to process them. And so I've found that my addiction and my anxiety and my recovery journey is a lot of finger traps. You know those finger traps that you play with as a kid, where like you put your pointer finger on each hand in one end? That was in
Steve:the new Jennifer Lawrence movie on Netflix, they had a little bit with that, that was very funny and inappropriate.
Ben:Excellent. It really, yeah, lends itself well to innuendo. However, You put your fingers in and you can't get them out. Oh, no, you are trapped and you can't control it, but you try. So you tug and you tug and you tug to try to get your fingers out. And then if you're lucky enough, there will be someone next to you who's done this before. Who tells you the secret, which is that you have to stop tugging and you have to let go and release in order to get your fingers out. And I think that that is the key to that was the key to my recovery and continues to be the key to my spiritual growth, is that I contin continue to push and try to control everyone around me. Try to control whether it's my using or now in recovery, trying to control. I guess the way that I feel about myself or the thing about myself or the things that happen in front of me and I learned that I can only get through them when I stop pushing so hard. That's beautiful. Yeah, that's, that's what I hope to live up to because I'm not great at it. But it's better than the alternative. No, you,
Steve:you are just a sage of wisdom. I would say, especially for people that are younger in recovery and wondering like, well, am I young enough to get sober? what kind of advice would you have for those
Ben:people? Oh my gosh. Okay. Things are a lot more fun than you think they will be. I have a great time in life. Honestly, I was always someone who really, I'm very, very extroverted, and I love going out and doing things and doing places where there are substances and hanging out with people who do substances. And that's fine and good, and the only things that I'm missing right now are the hangovers and the feelings of desperation and the cravings for more. Everything else is still here. I have all the fun that one could imagine one has, I would say, within reason. But I'm able to go through that clear headed. I'm able to make decisions that are a lot better for myself. And actually, I can still be messy if I want to be, but I'm choosing to be rather than just getting messy. Nothing is really preventing me from making all the choices that I want to make. I can just do so knowing that they're the choices that I want to make, and it can feel like a curse to feel like I wasn't supposed to grow up this early, I was supposed to fuck around, and I was supposed to be sloppy, and I was supposed to figure things out later in life, and it can also feel like the biggest blessing in the entire world that I have this much of my life left to enjoy for what it is. Yeah, when you turn around
Steve:like that and you have all of this time ahead of you, I mean, I'm saying like Ben E for president for like 2050 or whatever, math works out.
Ben:There's way too much out there about me. I've thought about this plenty, because again, no lack of love for myself.
Steve:Well, look at our current political situation, is there anything off limits that would stop you from being elected or having the country love you if you spin it the right way?
Ben:You know, you're not
Steve:wrong. I'm not wrong, unfortunately. Maybe not. But yeah, I think anything's possible for you'll, I, I know for a fact you're gonna achieve great things, so I can't wait to be there and be one of your cheerleaders in the background.
Ben:I feel exactly the same way about you, and I'm thrilled to be on the journey with you.
Steve:Excellent. And how would our listeners reach out and find you if they wanted to
Ben:connect? Okay. My Instagram. Is Ben, B E N, E I S, one. And, that's about it! I don't really use much else. So, you'll find me there.
Steve:It's alright, you use it enough, I love following you there for sure too.
Ben:Thank you. and I will say, if you go visit my Instagram page, you can see I'm trying to raise money right now for an organization called Trans Santa that basically coordinates holiday gifts and essential needs for trans youth and young adults oftentimes who do not otherwise have access. To either it could be gender affirming items. It can be basic household needs, or it can be something that will just make their life a little bit brighter. So I'm collecting money for that, and I'm also trying to direct people to donate directly to their organization to cover operating costs for the amazing work that they do and that's at. T R A N S A N T A, Transanta, fabulous organization really encourage everyone to check it out. I've been doing this for a few years now, and it always brings a lot of joy to me and seems to bring a lot of joy to the people who we serve.
Steve:Yeah. Excellent. I will definitely put that in the show notes as well then. Thank you. All right. Well, stick around Ben for the post show, but in the meantime, we'll say goodbye to our listeners for now. Bye,
Ben:listeners.
Steve:Love you. Yes. And while you're following Ben on the socials, follow us while you're at it at Gay A Podcast. And for more time with Ben and I, head on over to the Patreon page, where we'll spin the post show topic wheel and have some fun. Be sure to follow us wherever you're listening right now, too, so you can get these new episodes every Thursday. Until next time, stay sober, friends. Woohoo.