gAy A: The Queer Sober Hero Show

The AI Interview – Answering Big Questions About Queer Sobriety with Phil B

• Steve Bennet-Martin • Season 2 • Episode 48

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Super Sober Heroes, we're back for Part 2 with Phil B, co-founder of Here Queer Sober! 🎉 And this time, we’re shaking things up—AI is asking the questions!

Phil and I tackle some of the biggest misconceptions and deeper truths about queer sobriety, including:
✨ Can queer and sober people actually have fun? (Spoiler: YES.)
✨ What’s it like dating and navigating relationships in sobriety?
✨ How do chosen families evolve in recovery?
✨ What’s one piece of wisdom we wish we knew in our first year?
✨ How to respond when someone says, ‘I can’t imagine being queer and sober.’

Plus, we chat more about the first-ever Hear Queer Sober Conference coming September 27-29, 2024, in NYC—and how you can be part of it! 🌈✨

Resources & Links:

📍 Register for the Here Queer Sober Conference:
➡️ Find the link pinned in the Here Queer Sober Facebook Group
📧 Email Phil at philip@hearqueersober.org

📢 Want to lead a workshop or panel?
🎤 DM me on Instagram @gAyApodcast

📍 Follow Phil & Here Queer Sober:
📲 Instagram: @herequeersober

🎧 Listen now & join the conversation! And as always—stay sober, friends. 💖✨

Support the show

Steve (2):

Welcome, Super Sober Heroes, to another episode of Gay A, the Queer Sober Hero Show. It's your host, Steve, here, with 1, 346 days of sobriety still, because if you listened to last week's episode, you already know this, but my buddy Phil and I are going to be interviewed by AI today. Welcome back again, Phil.

Phil:

Hey, Steve. It's good to be here as always.

Steve (2):

Yes, and so I believe that this was inspired around or shortly after I did my episode where I interviewed myself with AI,

Phil:

Yeah, that's exactly how this little brainchild of mine came to be.

Steve (2):

Yeah, I love the idea, though, because even when I did that format in the episode, which I'll link back to the show notes for if people missed it. So they want to see what I'm talking about. It was really creepy, but it still was me answering or having a I answer the same questions that I asked my guests each week. So I love the idea of letting them pick some new questions. I sent over the list before. Do you have one that stood out to you where you're like, Oh, that's a really good question or one you want to start with?

Phil:

Give me a second. Cause honestly, it was a lot.

Steve (2):

I sent you a whole block of texts moments before we hit record.

Phil:

Cause actually I have one that popped out for

Steve (2):

me that I'll ask for you that I like is what would you say are some misconceptions about queer sober life that you wish more people understood who aren't Sober queers.

Phil:

So I think the biggest misconception that I've experienced is that people think that all I do is get up, go to work, go to a meeting, go home, climb into bed, alone, cry myself to sleep, rinse and repeat. That is the furthest thing from the truth. I get up, I hit the gym, I have a fantastic day. Sometimes I hit a meeting, sometimes I get together with friends and go do something. Actually, just before we got on Zoom, I had a group of sober folks that were talking about going to Mini golf on Wednesday and I was actually looking at my calendar going, I actually could do that. So the biggest common misconception that I've experienced is that people think that just because I'm gay and sober means that I don't have a life. I do. I told the listeners, in the last episode, I just threw myself a fabulous 42nd birthday party that had about 55 people There were three very different aspects of my life all converged in that room. There were folks from my church. There were folks from graduate school. There were folks from my recovery meetings. And honestly, I had a bit of anxiety about it, but they all just got along. It was the weirdest thing. So the biggest misconception is that sober gays don't know how to have fun.

Steve (2):

Yes.

Phil:

A sober jumped out of a plane last April.

Steve (2):

Yeah.

Phil:

Yeah, just because I'm sober does not mean that I don't know how to have fun.

Steve (2):

Yeah. And I'll add on to that because I understand the fun thing and I definitely get that and I've gotten that a lot and it made sense almost at first when I was more of A gamer, people are like, oh, you're a homebody. That makes sense. Or even now when I do fitness, if I do something during the day that's physical, like when I do my Spartan race, they're like, that's sober and gay. It makes sense. But it almost seems like what the gay and sober people get most confused when I go out and do things at night. And it doesn't even mean bar, but it seems like people assume that I can even live a full, happy life and sobriety during the day, but then I turn into a pumpkin or a bumpkin at night and just curl up and wilt like at midnight. And so that's when people are shocked is when they see me out like at a bar at a club or at an event where I'm out dancing, they're like, how are you doing that? And you're sober. And that's what I find is the biggest misconception that a lot of people have that we can't be around alcohol, which I couldn't at first, but after a while you Have the tools, you'll learn how to function as a person again in society. So it helps.

Phil:

Yeah, exactly. You're down in Sarasota, Florida, and you've got all the major cities of Florida to pop into and whatnot, so there's a lot more nightlife down there.

Steve:

Yeah.

Phil:

And honestly, Steve, you and I are already talking because I'm going to be in Florida next month.

Steve (2):

Yeah.

Phil:

So we're probably going to go out dancing.

Steve (2):

Yes. I definitely love going out. But anything that we do in our sobriety, I just love challenging those expectations that people have. I know that a lot of the expectations, even that we have, like when we first got sober,

Steve:

Yeah.

Steve (2):

What's that been like for you especially now that you have your own place to share with?

Phil:

So I'm pretty sure I said it on the 1st episode that I was on way back when but I can't say for certain right now. But when I'm in meetings, and I managed to share my full story. There's usually a line in that I went from running the best little whorehouse in northern Rockland County to live in a monastery.

Steve:

Yeah.

Phil:

Because prior to sobriety, prior to recovery, My ex and I were big meth addicts, and there's a lot of sex on meth, it is what it is. And like you said, I had to untangle all of that, and now that I'm back living on my own. When I want to scratch that itch, I do. When I don't. It's a lot easier to have my own place, and be like, hey, come on over. all transparency listeners, part of the appeal of this particular apartment building is the fact that one of my favorite fuck buddies lives three floors down.

Steve (2):

There you go.

Steve:

All

Steve (2):

right. And another question here that I enjoyed, but I'm going to add a little spice to is what's one piece of wisdom you'd pass on to someone in their first year of sobriety that you didn't hear or learn?

Phil:

that I didn't

Steve (2):

It's something that you've learned out in the real world since getting sober that you wish someone like would tell you in your first year in the rooms.

Phil:

That's a deep one I'm trying to think back to six years ago when I was a year sober and still trying to figure it all out. I wasn't a creeped out asshole. I was just a normal asshole.

Steve (2):

I thought of one as I was reading. But even then half the time we hear something, someone says that we think they said it. They've heard it at another meeting. I've been to enough meetings to learn that they heard it in a meeting. Last year when I was reading the courage to be disliked they talked about a parable of 10 people in a room seven are gonna ignore you no matter what you do, one's gonna hate you no matter what you do and two or three gonna love you but pay attention to the people that you're vibing with the people that love you not the person who hates you or the people who are ignoring you that's been a visual just remembering that in room there's always gonna be that two or three it gives me hope where if I'm not vibing with one of the first couple people that I meet oh those are the seven that I'm not gonna vibe with but I just gotta find the people that I will and stick with those I'm sure there's a version of that in 12 step work but that was just a way it was put that really resonated with me

Phil:

Yeah no And that's fantastic advice, and I really think that people that are not in recovery that are not sober.

Steve:

Yeah.

Phil:

The normies, the muggles, if you're a Harry Potter person. I think they need that advice too. Because everybody's got a degree of they're gonna love me, they're gonna hate me. Why is he ignoring me? All of that. So that's some fantastic advice. Actually, you know what, totally thought of my answer to this question. And it was actually my godfather and uncle, one person, two titles in my life. He literally just looked at me and said, Don't let the bastards get you down. He originally said it in Latin, and I looked at him and said It's been a while. So can I get a translation? And it was like, don't let the bastards get you down. And whether that's the bastards of Uncle Sam, cause it's tax season or the bastards of like your boss, because you didn't get that promotion or that pay raise, or the bastard, that you did a job interview with and they didn't offer you the job, listeners seriously. Don't let the bastards get you down, and because this is a gay podcast, don't ever let anybody, dim that flame, a community have struggled for so long, and the fight's gearing back up right now. So don't ever let anybody dull your flame.

Steve (2):

Yeah. And I love that. A lot of people will find this podcast early on in their recovery, but people have never really found it when they're sober, but just discovering their queer as much as people know that they're gay because they find it me like searching, but so if someone is already familiar with the concept of chosen family, how has that meant to you changed in your life? Applying the whole concept from our community of Chosen Family, how has that meaning evolved for you in your recovery?

Phil:

I love the Chosen Family, but I also acknowledge that within the LGBT community, I am a different kind of unicorn.

Steve:

And

Phil:

I say that because yeah, when I came out at 19, my parents tossed me out of the house. But after six weeks, my mother threatened to divorce my father if he didn't go and find me. And I was back home. And I share that because that's just part of my personal history. I fully acknowledge that there are a lot of folks in the community that didn't have that sort of dynamic with their biological families and whatnot. The chosen family for me is such an important thing because We accept each other for 100 percent of who we are, not because, oh, that's my brother. I have to love him and not, oh, he's got a big bank account. He'll take care of me. He's a good person. He's had a similar struggle. I can turn to him when I'm struggling. Or even if he doesn't have the same struggle, he's still a good listener. He's kind. He's caring. He actually gives a shit about me because so many of us deal with that feeling of feeling like shit and nobody cares about us. one of the most common things I heard in my first year in the rooms. Was inevitably it came from some random person that had multiple decades. They go, if nobody has told you today, I love you. Guess what? Somebody just did. I love every single person in this room. And actually, honestly, I heard that more in not LGBT specific meetings. Yeah. so the chosen family is so important to me, because On the greater scale of things, I come from a relatively small family, and a lot of my relatives have already passed on. Chosen Family for me is a bit different, because there are people here now in 2025. recent years my church community is, people ask me why I started going back to church and I started going back to church after my parents died. For me, it's a connection to my parents, even though my parents never stepped foot in the state of Minnesota, there's a commonality. In our church, that people get me there, I've got a really healthy relationship with my aunt, who is back in New Jersey. And when I'm annoyed and frustrated with her. I talk about it with somebody at my church here in Minneapolis because they get it, the easiest way that I generally explain it is different family trees, but we're all in the same orchard, so chosen family is such an important thing because family is where you get unconditional love. Sometimes we're lucky and it's there. And even though we're lucky and it's there, we still need to add on to it.

Steve (2):

Yeah, I loved In Sobriety, whether it was in gay meetings, or just meetings that are just meetings. But it was like hearing that thing about loving me until I love myself and like experiencing over the years the concept of found family. Both. in the rooms and out in the rooms now that I'm able to have deeper connections as a sober person than I did during my addiction. During my active addiction, I was convinced chosen family meant it's just like your real family. They'll leave you when things get hard. And I didn't know that the whole chosen family meant it could actually be, like, they'll actually stay with you and support you and build you up because I didn't have that even in my active addiction like with my gay community because I would isolate when I would drink so it's been cool learning that in sobriety.

Phil:

What's your go to response when somebody says, I can't imagine being queer and sober?

Steve (2):

I people don't generally put it together, but it's basically whether they said it like being gay or queer, or whether it was being sober, it'd be like, I can't imagine not. I can't imagine my life today if I was drinking because I would be dead. I would be like in the ground. it would have been game over and it will be game over again. So I just don't do that. But also I would never want to be straight. I know that this isn't a choice because this is how I was born. But if I could choose it, I wouldn't choose to be anything other than who I am today. So I wouldn't like both of those like straight or drinking Steve. No, thank you. I don't want that.

Phil:

Yeah.

Steve (2):

What about you?

Phil:

actually, I love it. Even though I'm out here two years, my New York mouth was like, as soon as I read it, I'm like, you don't have to imagine it because it's my life.

Steve:

Yeah.

Phil:

That kind of like smart, witty response. And my life today is so much better than I ever thought it would be. So I hope that the listeners Realize that just keep moving in the right direction and your life will continue to get better sometimes quickly sometimes all the time Steve, it's great to see you and thanks for having me.

Steve (2):

I'll add all your ads in the show notes. So listeners, make sure you connect with Phil and join us at Hear Queer Sober in September. What dates again?

Phil:

September 27th, 28th, 29th, New York City, Marriott Marquis, a prime location.

Steve (2):

It's gonna be a party, I'll see you all there.

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