022 - Holidays & Sobriety

Welcome to the Pure Desire podcast where we partner with you to bring hope and freedom on your journey to purity. Hey there. I'm your host, Trevor Windsor. And we're so thankful you're taking time out of your day to hang out with us. I am here as always with my co host, Nick Stumbo.

Go Hawks.

And we have a very special guest Today, our founder, Dr. Ted Roberts. Ted, welcome back to the podcast.

Hey, great to be with you guys.

Good to have you, Ted.

Thanks.

We are happy to have you back with us to talk really about the season of relapse, or better known as the holiday season. And we're going to see today as we talk that the holiday season can be a consistent trigger for men and women out there. And today we really just want to spend time with Ted and talk about ways to set yourself up for success over the holidays. And Ted, you're going to help us talk through that. Are you ready?

Yeah, I'm ready.

Alrighty. Well, let's just start with this. Ted, you've got referred to this season as a season of relapse. Why do you call the holiday season the season of relapse?

Well, actually, I call it a limbic holiday. Christmas is a particular limbic holiday. I've been counseling people for 30 years. I remember the first couple years, I couldn't figure out what was going on at Christmas. There was just massive relapse and I never could put the pieces together until I asked this guy one question. I said, when you're with mom and dad and you relapse, how old do you feel? And he said, I feel like a five year old. Bingo. I got it. What has happened is limbic system is triggering and he's starting to get the relapse sequence taking place. I realize he was emotionally trapped in the past. He was trapped in his family of origins while it was taking place. That's why he's relapsing. He's going back to his old coping mechanisms and just acting out by medicating his pain with him.

Yeah, so it sounds like it's related.

To family big time family of origin.

So let's dive into that family of origin a little bit. Ted, why is it, you know, when people travel home, I mean, they're in their 30s, 40s, 50s. Why is it so easy to fall back into those patterns when, I mean, clearly we're older, we've accomplished things, I mean, our lives are different, but when we're home, we can rewrite back in it. So why is it so easy to fall back into that old way of thinking.

Well, it's all predicated on your limbic system, which is really what scripture calls your heart. It's your subcortical areas in your brain that determine your will, your emotions, and the long range decision you're going to make. In other words, we'll argue about the facts, but we'll die for what we believe. Basic beliefs are determined in your limbic system. And they discovered that 85% of your decisions are on the unconscious level. You're not even aware of it. And that's set. By the time you're six years of age, your limbic system is fully programmed. Pardon me? Your limbic system is fully programmed by six years of age. Dr. Casalino's research shows us that our sense of shame is programmed by two years of age. So your family of origin gives you the window through which you look out at your world. You carry your family and your brain for the rest of your life, apart from the ministry of the Holy Spirit. And that's why it's so important to have your limbic system renewed by the grace of God.

So it sounds like you're saying that for many people when they go back home or get around their family of origin, they maybe don't realize this is happening. It's just a natural limbic response. Is that right?

Yeah, exactly. The limbic system will respond with fight, flight, or freeze so frequently. Your family of origin. For mine, it was fight because our family just argued and screamed at each other all the time. Back home I'd really trigger and I'd be reactive and I just go outside and pound something. I'd just be so angry. Yeah, because one of my stepfathers was screaming at me or trying to punch me out and I. Back home, what happens? Your limbic system doesn't have any time frame on it. It's not any historical. All of a sudden you feel like a five year old and right back there again you start reacting. Hmm.

It's interesting because I've been kind of diving into this just personally, just the whole idea of family of origin issues. And I recently wrote a blog on this and that kind of helped me all put it out there. And one of the things that I've come to realize is that my family. So I'll kind of tell the story. We just got done seeing a movie and my family loves movies. We're all about movies. So every time we drive home from the movie, we just tear the movie apart. We're just critical and we just, you know, we dissect it. And talk about how the story could be better, which characters are written wrong, how the directing went either well or wrong. And I realized, we recently went and saw this movie and I sat in the car and I just thought to myself, I really don't want to be critical right now. And I felt this conviction like, what's going on here? And I've kind of been pressing into that. And what I'm realizing is that my family are critical thinkers. And there's a fine line between being a critical thinker and being someone who's just critical. And so what I'm seeing though is that that's the culture I was raised in. And so I find myself being critical about how my wife folds my clothes and puts them in. Into the dresser, which is ridiculous.

Time out. Your wife folds your clothes, believe it or not.

You should not be.

You should be so grateful for that. I cannot believe you're critical. This is the thing.

I understand it's ridiculous. You know what I mean? I come home and just. My natural instinct is to just.

Yeah.

And so it's just interesting that we have that stuff and we don't even think about it until someone tells us. We realize you were raised in a culture that, that created you. I mean, it's who you are and it's where you come from.

Right.

And so it's just so interesting. And that's just been my experience with family of origin.

Yeah. And you can't, you don't have any choice about what family origin is. You can say, I don't want that family with this one.

Right.

So that's basically built in your way of perceiving reality until you recognize that you can't change it.

Yeah.

Yeah. You know, Ted, for some of our listeners, this might be kind of a revolutionary idea that they're realizing, wow, when I'm with mom or dad or when I go back to my home, when I'm with extended family, there is a part of me that like reverts or I become a different person. And this is eye opening to them. And so they're probably asking the next phase of that question. Well, if I become aware that it's happening, what do I do about it? Like, is this just inevitable? Am I going to revert back to feeling like I'm the five year old kid or what steps can I take to deal with those family of origin issues?

Well, every time I counsel someone, they always come in and they always tell me I came from a great Christian home. My first question is, well, then why are we meeting? If you came from a great Christian home. So in seven pillars, pillar two, there's page 164, there's a trauma test that you need to take. What I do is take that test and you score more than seven, then you need to go to a counselor or someone that really understands trauma, helps you get in touch with that. And once you understand what you're dealing with, then you can start changing. And so frequently what I'll do is have a client write a letter to their parents or to their dad or to their mom. And I ask them to have three things. First of all, tell them what you're thankful for and point out those areas where you felt that he wounded you, and then say, can we have an adult relationship? I forgive you. Let's go from there on. That's critical. Sometimes the parents will not respond a positive way. So I have to say, I'll write a letter for you. You need six months of separation from your family of origin. No letters, no emails, no nothing. And that really brings them right down to the core issue of what they're really struggling with. Right. Then we can deal with it. Then we start dealing with it.

Yeah. Ted, you know my story that when I walked into your office, you said that exact same thing to me, that, well, you've got a family of origin issue and probably a father wound. And I said, no way, I've got to go. Great family and great dad, and they're all believers. He's a pastor. We have a great relationship. But it took some time for me to get beyond that idea that I was looking to blame dad and just have an honest assessment of what had I learned as a little kid that maybe even not purposefully done to me, but because my dad is a broken, sinful human being like every father in the world has ever been. There were ways that his brokenness impacted me and created faulty thinking. And so to address that was so eye opening of how, boy, when I'm around him, I can feel a lot of those same things. And so I can just attest to our listeners that that process of facing those things with your parents, though, at times can be hard. And there have been ways my dad has expressed, boy, this is hard to work through, or it's difficult to hear. But we continue to have even now, seven years later. In fact, just recently, we were on a hunting trip together and had some fantastic conversations with my dad really being open to. To seeing himself, to see the ways that he'd maybe treated me or ways that I had interpreted his actions that really Is, I think, maturing our relationship and helping us relate not just as father to son, but as friend to friend.

Yeah.

Adulter peers. Yeah. We're equals. And so maybe that encouragement to listeners, becoming aware of this and just changing it probably won't happen overnight. That, as Ted says, there's a process of other people, a counselor, helping you through this journey and becoming aware of, boy, how do I react? What are the things that make me react? And when we do, the encouragement that I would give is, it can really not only create greater life for yourself, but it can create a real change in the relationship you have with your parents.

Very much so. I remember one hand guy wrote a letter, gave to his dad. His dad, they went out to coffee, sitting, reading in Starbucks. His dad looks up with tears streaming down his face. He's like, I wrote this letter to my dad.

Wow.

Change your whole relationship. Yeah, about half the time, it totally transforms the other half time, parents don't want to deal with it.

Yeah.

Then you need to say, okay, you're not safe. You need to draw a strong line. Just don't go to their place for Christmas. Stay away. It'll keep you a lot saner.

Yeah.

It's interesting, though, because when you figure out family of origin stuff, there is that balance between, you know, am I blaming my family for what I struggle with, or is it just. Is it my problems that are manifesting in certain ways because of the culture that I was raised in? And so that's just something that, I mean, I think is important to dive into, especially when you're thinking of holidays and all this family of origin stuff is to make sure you're owning your own stuff. Like, just because, you know, just because my dad is a critical thinker doesn't mean that my sin manifesting as being critical is his fault, because it's not. It's my fault. It's my. You know, it's my sin manifesting in that way because of the culture I was raised in.

The way I like to put it is, you're not blaming mom and dad. What you want to do is reclaim what hell stole from you. In other words, in those wounds, you think it's easy to be a parent till you become one and you realize there are no perfect parents and you screw your kids up big time. Remember my daughter went through the healing classes we had in our church? She called me up, she said, dad, we need to go out for breakfast. I went, oh, I'm in trouble. And she sat down, she said, dad, I felt like the only way I could be with you is I had to do what you wanted to do. That was the furthest thing from my heart. I'd never been around a girl. I'd never, never raised a daughter. So I want to do something fun. I think, well, let's go play ball. She didn't want to play ball, but I didn't ask her. I just did it. I thought that was what she wanted. So I sat there and wept at that breakfast. Yeah. It's a major turning point in our relationship.

Yeah.

I didn't mean to do anything wrong. Just the enemy came in and took it. Right. And we want to take it back from him. That's what we want to do.

But your relationship is different now today because of that.

Totally. But she's preaching and it's really scary to see herself in female form. Oh, she's really good.

That's awesome.

So it's great.

So as we're approaching the holidays, because I think that especially in the American culture, the holidays become a lot about family. And that's why we're kind of talking about family of origin. But really what we find out is that you get so stressed and so worked up that you go spend time with family and then you go home and then danger, danger, you run into relapse and you run into all these old coping habits. So really the question is, how do we come more self aware of those hot spots and those danger zones in our life?

Well, that's what I suggest you take in pillar seven. Lesson two. There's a trauma test, scored more than seven. It means you got some family origin issues, means you need to start dealing with it. And when you're married, you'll find out right away what the family origin issues are because your wife will see something. You're triggering you away. You go away. You go. Bingo. It's not about your wife, it's about your past. Yeah. She became a lightning rod for all your past. So you got to start dealing with it. So if you're married, you have an ideal way to find out about your family mortgage issue. Just ask your wife. She'll tell you about it. Yeah, big time. Yeah.

You know, that is a great point that if you want someone to be honest with you, ask your spouse, because they see. I know I saw it in my wife, but she definitely saw it in me. That when we would get around each other's families, it's like this other side of them comes out. And because you're around them all the time, you see it and you're like, who are you? Why are you acting that way? And they don't see it, though. And I wouldn't see it because to us, it's comfortable. It's how we acted around our family. And so I know you said it kind of jokingly, Ted, but I would encourage, if you have that kind of relationship with your spouse right now, to say, hey, when I get around my dad, when I'm with my parents, when I'm at my family reunion, how do I act differently? What do I do? Because they'll go, well, you start to act like you're really funny and you make jokes about everything. And it's. I was like, oh, really? I wonder why I do that. If you can put those pieces together of why I'm doing that, maybe where it came from, that's the self awareness you need to begin to react differently.

Well, I think it's being honest with yourself and with other people in a tool that we've talked about, we've had here on the podcast, as well as the faster scale. And so if you're in groups or are familiar with the faster scale, that's definitely a huge self awareness tool that you can make sure, like every day, I mean, Brian Roberts has been telling me this for weeks and months now, is to do the faster scale once a day. Check in where you're at and where you've been. Because when you find yourself getting down further and further down, you realize, okay, this has been a process throughout the week. I see what's kind of leading up to this. And that's the same thing I would say to anybody who, if, you know, you have a family gathering that's coming up and, you know that's a danger zone for you and it's a tough spot, pay attention to what's going on leading up to that week and start using the faster scale and maybe use it with your spouse as well, just to make sure that you guys are on the same page.

If you do that, you'll discover the four year ago, you'll start sliding down the faster scale. It'll be an indication of what's coming. Yeah, you're consciously preparing for the conflict.

Yeah, it's so fun. It's just so funny. Because family, it's like the American dream is to spend time with your family.

At home and, well, but they're the people that drove you crazy to begin with. The in laws and outlaws go right back to craziness.

Yeah. So now that we're getting a good understanding here of why the season can be so Challenging. And maybe people are listening. You know, this podcast is going to be on in the holiday season here, and they're realizing, man, I'm already going through some of those steps because I'm going to go see my family. So what are some ways that men and women can prepare for this season? What are ways they can prepare for health?

One of the things I always ask the couple to do when they're going to see their family of origin is develop an escape plan.

In other words, you mean how to get out of there.

Yes. How to get. I'm serious.

Where the exits are.

Exactly. I'm being serious. Say, okay, now we're going to have a trigger word that you and I know. Husband and wife. When I'm getting overload and craziness is starting to. I just say this trigger word and you and I are leaving. And if you have to find a hotel that you stay at, don't stay with your parents, because you have to confront this issue and start bringing healing to the family of origin. If you stay around and try to fight it out, you're going to get in trouble. Yeah. So have an escape plan delineated. Exactly what you're going to do. Talk it through before you go, and have a trigger words you share. So if you're getting out of there, you're going out there. Plan to get out of there if you have to.

So we're not talking about having conversations in the driveway before you walk in. You're talking about the week before that happens. You're having conversations.

Yeah. That means you need to be understanding why you're getting triggered, what's going to set you up? And what does mom do that drives you nuts? What does dad do that drives you nuts? And if it starts happening, call him on it. And if it doesn't work, get out of there.

It's my younger brothers that. That caused me to.

Well, I think it's helpful for couples to see they can be creative with this, that maybe their need to take a break happens before they need to, you know, go stay at a hotel that they might recognize. Okay, here's something my mom does that triggers me, and when I'm really starting to feel triggered, I'm gonna ask you, my spouse, I'm saying, hey, would you like to take a walk later? And it doesn't have to disrupt the family or be all about, well, I need to take a break. I'm out of here. But that's a cue to my wife to say, I'm gonna need a breather pretty quick. And I'm gonna leave the room and could you help cover why that is? And then you can process. You can kind of regain some mental stability and return to the family situation. Because I think for many people, if there is a level of health in their family relationship, they're not gonna need to think about leaving the home, but more just how to not go down that same reactive trail.

What I did is I stayed in the worst case, and we need to go there. We have to go there. We'll go there, and then we can find lesser responses that are appropriate.

Yeah, that's good.

You're delineating. But you've got to tell them, let's. This, we got to deal with this. Because if we don't deal with this, we're going to. We're going to pass this on to our kids.

Yeah.

We got to confront it. Yeah. Okay.

Make sure we're not just going down that same old path.

Right. So let, let's press into that whole marriage aspect of all this. So for our married couples that are listening, that know that this season can be a struggle and can be a difficulty for each other, how do they best support each other in creating a plan to staying sexually and emotionally healthy in the holiday season?

First of all, you have to build margins in your. In your life. So I don't know why, if you can't keep adding, we're going here and there and there, and all of a sudden you go crazy. And the family has to come. Your family has to come first. Yeah. Doesn't matter what your family of origin habits are, your family has to come first. In our relationship, we tell our kids, you tell us what you want to do. If you want to be with the other family, that's fine. You want to be with us, that's okay. We're not telling what day we have to be there. You've got to put your family first. If you don't pardon me, you're going to get in trouble.

Yeah.

The old, old requirements will come on you and you'll start being overloaded. You're going to act weird, and you go weird. So put your family first and stay with the basics. Your kids are more important and your relationship is top priority. Your family of origin should not come before your family does. If it does, it's going to get weird.

My wife the other day just told me, you know, she sees how busy it's getting, you know, as December starting and Thanksgiving is ending. And she said, I feel like we've been around your family and my family a lot. Can we just get away, Just us? And it hit me. It hit me like, okay, then I need to prioritize my wife and our time together and our time with our son just to go out and do something unrelated to family, just so that we're pouring into each other.

That's building margins. That's really important. Yeah, it's really important because what happens is you have your family origins putting these requirements on you, and you get overloaded and you get weird.

Yeah.

Your family has to come first, period. And I feel guilty about it at all.

Yeah, I remember we had a similar conversation. Our struggles would tend to happen on our summer vacation because we'd have this poll to try to see both families. They're in the same area. And we had a clarifying time where we just had to pause and say, what do we want our vacation to look like? What do we want to do with our kids for their experience? And we realized, well, here's a couple of things we want to do. And in a loving, gracious way, we would go to our families and say, hey, on such and such day, our family is going to do, you know, X because it's something important to us, and we'd love it if you came.

With us and don't feel guilty about it.

And if you don't want to go, that's fine. This is a part of our family vacation, and it just eliminated this pull of, like, well, let's see what everyone wants to do. Let's make everyone happy. Let's include everyone, because you could never make everyone happy. And then we'd all feel mad at each other. And when we just kind of drew and that. That wasn't every day, but it kind of created some benchmarks where we knew our kids were going to love vacation because we were going to do X, Y and Z and then fill in the gaps. If we went and did what Grandma and grandpa wanted, were available to them, we could handle that a lot better because we built in those things that were important to us.

Yeah. You made this statement, your family has to come first. It's extremely important. And you didn't feel guilty about it.

And, gosh, that is so hard. We just had our first kid, and I'm telling you, he's only 10 months old, but I am telling you right now, as soon as you have a kid. And it's not the pressure. It's not that the pressure is actually there, but I just started to feel this immense new load of pressure to now be around family just because grandbaby well, grandparents, listen.

Grandkids are God's reward for not killing your kids. It's just. It makes you weird when you're a grandparent. You just have to be with them. Yeah, I remember we had our daughter over and she told a story. Our granddaughter had been with us and she. She came back home with her daughter and our daughter, pardon me, I'll get a straight hair. And she started doing something. She said, we don't do that in this house. She said, well, we get to do a grandma's house. She did something again. She said, we don't do that in this house. She said, we'll do it at grandma's house. And finally she said, well, where did we get this house? Yeah, concrete thing.

We need to get a house like grandma's.

Yeah, that's right.

Seriously. But it just is weird. I mean, you, you know, especially, and that's just something I'm learning on a practical level, is that everything changes. You know, everything changes when you have kids. And so it's just definitely more of a struggle and that to Maine to remain healthy and you got to continue to strive more and more and more. And that's what I'm seeing by screwing up and realizing, okay, I need to make some changes and then moving forward with my wife.

We have to see it from a grandparents perspective. Your grandkids are their legacy. I mean, they're everything to you and it's really important. That's why your parents can get pretty weird around you when you have a kid. Yeah, you got to say no, our family comes first. Grandma, you can stand right over here. Our family comes first.

From now on, I'm going to say, ted told me that you're being weird.

Knock it off.

Don't listen to this podcast. Well, Ted, it's not only the family of origin issues that make the holidays a challenge, but there are many other factors. It can be additional time off work. It can be different schedules. And for many of our listeners that are in a group somewhere over the holiday season, they usually end up having a group that they miss because they're out of town or the group just gets canceled because many other people are out of town. And so it's a pretty common thing for people to kind of fall out of the routine, at least in going to group, because maybe there's no group for a week or two. So over that season, what can men and women in a pure desire group do to maintain community?

It's pretty obvious you need to make the three calls men are meeting or not. You've got to make those three calls. You got to stay connected. If you don't, you're going to get isolated, you're going to get set up for addiction again. You gotta make the calls.

Yeah, I find that it's important in looking ahead because I know what my schedule is going to be like. I can predict with some accuracy on a trip to see my family, where do I have a break, where is there some downtime? And just plan ahead and even commit to my group to say, hey, at such and such time, I'm going to call so and so and, and now you've got a game plan to stay connected versus well, I'll try to make some calls on my trip. Well, I find if I do that, that never happens.

Yeah. If you don't change your lifestyle, you'll end up the same old places you started before you bring it back there. In addiction, you've got to make the call. It's not an option.

Well, and I would encourage people in groups also to think about their commitment to change that week, that if they know, okay, between now and when I see my group again, I'm going to be with family, I'm going to be on this trip. What are my danger zones and make my commitment to change about those, to say, hey, when I'm home, I know I'm going to be challenged by this trigger. Here's my plan, how to respond to it, and here's who I'm calling to tell them how it's going to and to be very specific about their challenges.

Right. And the call should not be just how are the Hawks doing? Should you be doing the check in? You should be doing wireless, low, slow, mo, faster scale, double bind your commitment to change. Each week you gotta delineate that. If you don't, the calls are a waste of time. You're just exchanging fluffy information.

Yeah.

You know, and something that I didn't set out. You know, I didn't think it was gonna work when I initially did it, but when we would take a break in group, I'd find myself really evaluating thus far in the process. So I mean, you know, when you get to Christmas and we've been going for six months is to look back into my workbook because I don't go back every single week and look at all what I've written, you know, because I'm still working on what's going on this week. And so for me it was just kind of the self evaluation thing and I got to learn myself again to go back and be like, okay, six months ago, I thought this about myself and I saw these as my struggles. And then now, holy cow, like, look at where I'm at, you know, and look at how much more self awareness is coming or how much more in denial I can be, you know? But I just. I found that, you know, it just gives you a little bit of that. That space to go back and kind of rehash some of that stuff and look at it.

Yeah, well, your wife will tell you how much denial you're in.

She seems to be a nice gauge.

Of what's going on. What's great is when you go back as a co leader or a leader of a group and you read where you were when you started, you go, my gosh, you've come a long way. It's one of the beauties about teaching a group. You learn stuff you couldn't learn otherwise because you were in such denial initially. You're back there and you're seeing it again from a whole new perspective.

Yeah.

Really? That's why it takes three to five years to get free. Yeah.

That's cool.

Okay.

Okay. So, Ted, we have really appreciated you just hanging out with us and having this conversation. And we're gonna end the podcast, really, as we do every episode, is to just ask you, really, what are your final encouragements or tips for anybody out there who understands the holidays are stressful and crazy and know that, you know, hot spots and danger zones are around? What just tips or encouragements would you give to them?

Well, first of all, understand when you're back with your family of origin, you're going to be back in that old situation again. Drove you crazy to begin with. It's really important not to be triggered by that and understand what the triggers are. And also to have margins. And if you're married, your family has to come first. Absolutely has to come first. And do not, under any circumstances, feel guilty about it, because this is what God called you to do. Love your wife with all your heart. Because when you get the other end God's only had, Christ is going to ask you one question. Where's your wife? And is she more beautiful than dad gave to you? Where are your kids? Those are the only two questions he's going to ask you. Everything else doesn't matter how many sales you made. If you're a pastor, how big the church got as far as your family at. That's what counts.

That's great.

Yeah, I appreciate that, Ted. I think my encouragement would be when people look at their holidays, I'd Say have a plan.

Yeah.

Don't just assume that because I'm healthier, I'm making progress in group holidays will be easier because you'll end up right back in some of those old thought patterns and they'll catch you off guard. So take some time. And that might mean taking 15 minutes just to sit by yourself and try to think ahead through your trip or the vacation, the time with your family. Say, where am I likely to either be alone and isolated where I'm not usually, or to be triggered or to get into that fight and to think about how am I going to face that situation in a healthy way because I'm not the person I used to be. But if I don't have a plan, I might find I go back and I am the person I used to be because I fall right back into the old habit.

And make sure that you talk through the plan with your wife. Yeah, that's crucial.

And your group, if possible.

And the only thing I would offer is just to maintain community outside of your family of origin. I mean, I think that if you, especially if you're in a group and you spend time over the holidays with those, you know, those guys or those gals, they're going to call you on your stuff, they're going to, they know you. I mean, they're going to see what's going on in your life. And so to continue to maintain community, because I think that the tendency is that I can just kind of stiff arm everyone else and just let family in. But we're seeing that family can be.

This crazy thing to begin with.

Exactly. So just to continue maintaining community with the brothers and sisters in Christ that you have around you.

Well, people sometimes think of it, it's, I'm on a break, you know, I'm on a break from work and from normal life. And unfortunately they take a break from group thinking that that's a healthy thing. When really the group is part of what is creating the health. And to take a break from that community is a very dangerous thing.

Especially true if you're a single person. Single person really have a high level relapse. And vacation, I mean, vacations are at Christmas time.

Yeah.

So if you're single, it's really important to stay tight with your group because.

You can't take a vacation from recovery.

No, that's right.

So just thinking of what about Bob? Vacation from your problems. You can't, you can't take a vacation.

They follow you home. In fact, they're waiting there for you.

I've got a few clients like that. They're waiting for me when I get home. Yeah.

Well, Ted, thanks so much for giving us all that. You're awesome. We appreciate you, man.

Yeah, me too. You guys are awesome.

Thanks. Well, if you're listening and you've never thought about how difficult the holiday season really is, we hope that our conversation today just gives you some insight. Because maintaining sobriety over the holidays is very possible and it will require self awareness, courage, and most importantly, it requires the grace and power of Jesus Christ. So don't allow your circumstances to push you into relapse and just reclaim the season for Christ.

Awesome.

And thank you for listening to the Pure Desire Podcast. If you like what you're hearing and want to keep up with the podcast, please subscribe. You can also rate and review our podcast and let us know how we're doing. For more information, check out our website, PureDesire.org and you can follow us on social media. Your DesirePDMI once again, that's Earedesire PDMI. We'll see you next time. Thanks for listening to the Pure Desire Podcast. For more information, check out our website, www.puredesire.org. check in each week for new content on the podcast and we pray that it will help you find hope and freedom on your journey.

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