TSP 073: "The Herren Project" with Laurie McGarvey, from Alcoholic to Boston Marathon runner and fundraiser.TSP 073: "The Herren Project" with Laurie McGarvey, from Alcoholic to Boston Marathon runner and fundraiser.
The SHAIR Recovery Podcast
Laurie McGarvey shares how she moved from destructive drinking to committed sobriety, eventually running the Boston Marathon for The Herren Project. Her story covers family healing, spiritual growth, sponsorship, and her efforts to build wider recovery support in her community.
1:15:45•5 Jul 2016
From Vodka at Dawn to Boston Marathon: Laurie McGarvey’s Recovery Run
Episode Overview
- Making recovery the core daily routine, through prayer, pauses, and gratitude, helps keep negativity and ego in check.
- Building strong conscious contact with a higher power can act as the barrier between an alcoholic and the next drink.
- Honest step work with a trusted sponsor creates a foundation for long-term change and can ease deep-seated fear and shame.
- Helping others in recovery, especially through sponsorship and service, often brings healing and purpose to one’s own journey.
- Practical actions in risky moments – like removing alcohol from a hotel room – show how willingness and prayer can work together in real time.
“I’ve been able to help other women come out of this shame and embarrassment about being an alcoholic… They’re not bad people. We’re human.”
What remarkable journeys have people faced head-on against addiction? This conversation follows Laurie McGarvey, who went from morning vodka and blackout chaos to running the Boston Marathon for The Herren Project and founding Recovery Management Solutions. Laurie speaks frankly about alcoholism being at the centre of her routine for years, then turning recovery itself into her new daily structure.
She describes starting her mornings on her knees with the prayer “God’s will, not mine, be done today,” using walking gratitude lists instead of formal meditation, and noticing how quickly negativity creeps in when she drifts from that routine. You’ll hear how her first AA meeting came on Father’s Day, when her alcoholic dad quietly made one of the most loving moves of his life by taking her to a room he couldn’t yet embrace for himself.
Thirty days later he turned up at her door saying, “You’ve grown more in 30 days than I’ve grown in 30 years,” and got sober too. From there, early meetings, a tough fourth step, and guidance from her sponsor Nick gradually rebuilt her spiritual footing and self-respect. Laurie talks about travelling sober, including the moment in an Argentinian hotel when a fully stocked minibar and a single phone call became a practical test of powerlessness and prayer.
She explains how sponsoring other women, especially around shame, changed everything: “They’re not bad people. We’re human. And that’s what I really want women and young girls to know, that they don’t have to hurt from this. There is hope.” The episode also touches on her fundraising marathon for The Herren Project, her dream of a recovery centre offering emotional, spiritual and physical support, and her plans for community events like the ‘Sober Sneakers’ 5k.
If you’re wondering whether long-term sobriety can stay alive, messy and meaningful, this story might be the nudge you need to take your own next step.
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