344: Travel With the Sober Single Mum
344: Travel With the Sober Single Mum

Soberful

Host Veronica Valli talks with sober single mum and traveller Lauren Burnison about going from chaotic substance-fuelled adventures to alcohol-free journeys with her young daughter. The conversation touches on cultural drinking norms, rock bottom in South Korea, sober travel communities and trusting intuition on the road.

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36:14•8 Apr 2026

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Travel, Risk and Sobriety: Life as a Sober Single Mum on the Road

Episode Overview

Stopping alcohol abroad can begin with very small goals, like deciding not to drink for just one weekend.
Connection with another sober person, even by chance, can make early sobriety feel less isolating.
Alcohol-free travel can be exciting and adventurous, offering activities that feel “life-affirming” rather than focused on drinking.
Learning to trust bodily signals and intuition can help with safety and decision-making, especially when travelling solo with a child.
Challenging trips and hard experiences can make everyday life feel more manageable and build confidence in sober living.

“Most people, given the opportunity, will help you.”

How do people cope with the challenges of staying sober when life is anything but simple? This conversation follows Lauren Burnison, a sober single mum from Northern Ireland, whose love of travel once went hand in hand with alcohol and drugs – and now goes hand in hand with sobriety, adventure and a four-year-old in tow.

Hosted by recovery coach Veronica Valli, the chat starts with Lauren’s early drinking in a culture where getting drunk felt normal, then moves into her chaotic twenties: cheap cocaine in Argentina, risky trips to South Africa, and a final spiral with blackout drinking in South Korea. Terrified by where alcohol was taking her, she decided to stop, and on a long Korean bus ride met Sam, another sober person, which helped her take those shaky first steps into alcohol-free life.

From there, you’ll hear how Lauren swapped binges for buses and bars for bike rides, travelling up the East Coast of South Korea, learning Korean and later building an alcohol-free travel business, We Love Lucid. Her trips focus on connection, shared experience and “cool, life-affirming, invigorating stuff with a bunch of sober people” rather than sitting around “sharing woes”.

Now travelling Europe in a tiny camper with her daughter, Lauren speaks honestly about fear, solo safety as a woman, and how sobriety has sharpened her intuition: sometimes leaving a guest house on a “full-body feeling” with no explanation. She shares big-picture lessons too, including her belief that “most people, given the opportunity, will help you.” This one’s for anyone who loves travel, craves freedom, or wonders if life can stay exciting without alcohol.

It might leave you asking: what kind of adventure would you choose, if booze wasn’t running the show?

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