The Committee in Our Head: The Image Maker pt. 1 🏳️🌈 A Queer Recovery Podcast 🎙️The Committee in Our Head: The Image Maker pt. 1 🏳️🌈 A Queer Recovery Podcast 🎙️
At The CCC
Anthony and Lewis chat about the “image manager” inside us, contrasting looking recovered with actually being honest in queer sobriety. Through humour, research and personal stories, they question when recovery is genuine and when it’s just reputation management.
43:57•25 Aug 2026
The Committee in Our Head: Sobriety vs. Image Management at The CCC
Episode Overview
- The “image manager” is the part of us focused on looking okay rather than being okay, often at the cost of genuine vulnerability.
- Recovery can be distorted by self-deceptive enhancement, and attending more meetings is linked with less of this kind of self-deception.
- Queer people may arrive in recovery already used to concealing parts of themselves, which can make honest sharing feel risky but important.
- True amends focus on owning one’s part without lengthy justification, rather than turning apologies into self-defence.
- Service and polished sharing can sometimes become public relations; real recovery involves private honesty, rest, and support as well.
“You can’t save your ass and your face at the same time.”
How do people find strength in their journey to sobriety? This chat from At The CCC pulls back the curtain on “the committee in our heads” and zooms in on one particular member: the image manager. You’ll hear Anthony and Lewis, both queer people in recovery, laugh, tease and get real about that part of us that cares less about being okay and more about *looking* okay.
As Anthony puts it, it’s the voice that thinks, “I’m going to do this, this, this, and this, and they’re going to see me like that,” only to realise, usually the hard way, that “I’m not in control of what somebody else sees.” They share early recovery stories about trying to appear polished in meetings, putting on an enigmatic or glamorous persona, and then slowly realising that the performance doesn’t match the inner reality.
Lewis recalls painful mornings after drinking where friends would list his behaviour from the night before, shattering the charming image he’d held onto. One standout moment comes when they joke that the image manager is the part of us that forgets “you can’t save your ass and your face at the same time.” The conversation also touches on queer-specific image management: changing voices, monitoring mannerisms, or wanting to be known as something other than “the gay” person in a space.
They reference research on self-deception in recovery and sexual orientation concealment, but keep things grounded with humour, church stories, drag tales, and plenty of meeting-room examples. There’s a playful game, “Recovery or public relations?”, where they test scenarios like posting sobriety dates online or giving advice you don’t follow yourself. Underneath the laughs is a gentle challenge: are you actually getting honest, or just managing your reputation?
If you’ve ever worked harder to look recovered than to *be* recovered, this episode might get you thinking about which voice in your head is really running the show.
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