vol 302. “I am Alcoholic” with Christina B.

vol 302. “I am Alcoholic” with Christina B.

What remarkable journeys have people faced head-on against addiction? Christina B’s story shows how messy, funny, painful and hopeful that road can be. Christina introduces herself simply: “I am alcoholic,” but quickly explains why she prefers alcoholic as an adjective, not a label that defines her whole identity.

Across 14+ years of sobriety, she talks about being the kid who was bullied and lonely, the teenager chasing popularity with warm vodka from a McDonald’s cup, and the adult who hid her drinking behind a heavy marijuana habit. Her route into recovery is anything but straightforward. Terrified of AA and convinced that “being alcoholic was bad, so I wasn’t going to do that,” she first lands in Marijuana Anonymous.

There, she finds language for what she was living: highly functional on the outside, eaten up by self-hatred and dependence on weed inside. She describes trying to quit by “tricking” herself into writing a memoir in 30 days, only to find she couldn’t stop using even for that. A brutal night where she wakes up bruised on a beer-soaked mattress becomes her turning point.

From there, Christina leans into Ma and then AA, talking honestly about meetings, sponsorship, prayer, and what she calls the “no matter what club”. She’s blunt about early sobriety: “I feel raw and slick, the opposite of healed,” but also about the gifts—true creativity, spiritual connection, and a life that’s bigger than substances. She also shares how Ma and AA can work together, including using Ma’s Life with Hope and its workbook with sponsees who struggle particularly with weed.

If you’ve ever wondered whether your bottom is “too high”, or feared losing your creativity or spirituality without substances, this conversation might feel like someone finally saying what you’ve been thinking—so what if this story could be part of your turning point too?