SHAIR 192: Romance in Recovery with Nicole LynnSHAIR 192: Romance in Recovery with Nicole Lynn
The SHAIR Recovery Podcast
Nicole Lynn shares how her recovery, spiritual practice and self-care reshaped her approach to love, leading to a healthier relationship with another person in recovery. The conversation looks at identity, language and daily routines that help keep both romance and sobriety on solid ground.
1:38:37•16 Oct 2018
Romance in Recovery: Becoming the Person You Want to Be With
Episode Overview
- Putting simple self-care first – sleep, food, movement and a bit of spiritual time – makes a busy recovery life far more manageable.
- Asking a higher power for help with even small daily tasks builds a steady, practical spiritual connection.
- The language used about oneself (e.g. "chronic relapser" vs "in recovery") can shape identity and expectations.
- Relying on partners to fill emotional and spiritual voids tends to repeat painful patterns, even in sobriety.
- Focusing on becoming the kind of person you want to be with can open the way to healthier, more stable relationships in recovery.
“"Become the person you want to be with."”
Curious about how others navigate their sobriety journey? This conversation on The SHAIR Recovery Podcast centres on one big question many people whisper about in meetings: is it a good idea to be in a romantic relationship with someone who is also in recovery? Nicole Lynn shares her experience as an active recovering addict, engaged to another recovering addict, while raising four children, working full-time, and keeping her own programme front and centre.
Her story shows how jam-packed life can still work when recovery comes first. She talks through her simple daily routine of early mornings, meetings at lunch, and weekends filled with sponsorship and family time, all anchored in basic self-care: "On a basic level, it's eating, sleeping, active physical activity, of course spiritual practice." A big chunk of the chat looks at spiritual practice in real, everyday terms.
Nicole admits she’s not a hardcore meditator, but she leans heavily on constant prayer and a running conversation with her higher power: asking for help with everything from brushing her teeth to handling emotional chaos. When fear hits, her go-to is, "Anytime I'm scared because I don't know what's happening or I don't understand and I get fearful, I have to pray for trust." The heart of the episode is romance in recovery.
Nicole talks honestly about a long pattern of unhealthy relationships, the pain that came with them, and the moment she realised no partner could fill the hole that only a spiritual connection could. After a period of intentional singleness and deep spiritual work, she met her fiancé Steven, another person in recovery, and noticed how different it felt: gentle, steady, built on shared spiritual growth rather than drama.
The core message lands clearly: "Become the person you want to be with." If you’ve ever wondered whether love and recovery can really work together, this honest conversation might get you asking what kind of relationship you’re building with yourself first.
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