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Jul 6
  • Written By Ashley Jo Brewer

    • #110 – Alison Haase

    #110 - Alison Haase

    Alison’s Story

    Alison is an author, athlete, and recovery advocate. Her success comes from rising above the ashes and pitfalls of addictions which included drugs, alcohol, work, food, and people pleasing. This inspired her to take hold of her own journey and quit using external validation to fill her deep wounded soul. Using fitness, 12 steps, community, hard work, and accountability as her catalysts for change, she has since maintained nearly two decades of sobriety. Alison wrote her first book, ‘The Addict in Aisle 7’, to shine a light on the stigma that is both addiction and recovery, and to help women quit shaming themselves and step into their fullest potential.

    Connect with Alison Haase

    Connect with Us at The Courage to Change

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    Episode Transcript

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Coming up on this episode of the Courage to Change.

    Alison Haase:

    And after school they would pick me up and then him and I wouldn’t get an after-school snack, but we’d go to Little Caesars and he’d get a pizza and crazy bread. And so it was literally like feed Matt, deprive Alison. And so I started to view food as good or bad, or reward punishment.

    Alison Haase:

    So that kicked in the secret eating. And, of course, I’m coming downstairs at night and going in the fridge and eating as fast as I can, not even chewing. And so that started the binging, but because fat wasn’t an option, I found bulimia pretty early.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Hello, beautiful people. Welcome to the Courage to Change: A Recovery Podcast. My name is Ashley Leob Blassingame and I am your host. Today, we have Alison Haase. Alison is an author, athlete and recovery advocate. Her success comes from rising above the ashes and pitfalls of addiction, which include drugs, alcohol, work, food, and people pleasing.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    This inspired her to take hold of her own journey and quit using external validation to fill her deep wounded soul using fitness, 12 steps, community, hard work and accountability as her catalyst for change. She has since maintained nearly two decades of sobriety.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Alison wrote her first book, The Addict in Aisle 7 in which she wrote to shine a light on the stigma that is both addiction and recovery and to help women quit shaming themselves and step into their fullest potential. Woo, woo, Alison in the house. Alison we had so much fun with this. So relatable our stories and Alison has a long history with disordered eating and eating recovery.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And we talked about that and I don’t even remember what we laughed about. We laughed about so many things, but she is phenomenal. And almost two decades sober, she’s done so much internal work and discovery, which you can tell from talking to her. And she also gave a lot with regard to food. She gave a lot of very specific points around things she does and does not do with food that have helped her along the way.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I really think that it’s sometimes when you’re struggling, it’s important to have specific skills takeaways that you can get from some of these episodes. And she really talks about what are the specific things that she did to maintain or get her recovery. And I thought that was incredibly useful. Hopefully, that will be useful to you. So my friends, if this is your first time on the podcast, welcome.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    If you are returning, thank you for being here. I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I did. All right. Episode 110. Let’s do this. You are listening to the Courage to Change: A Recovery Podcast. We’re a community of recovering people who have overcome the odds and found the courage to change.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Each week we share stories of recovery from substance abuse, eating disorders, grief and loss, childhood trauma, and other life-changing experiences. Come join us no matter where you are on your recovery journey. Well, welcome to the courage to change. Thank you for being here.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. I’m stoked. I am seriously, so stoked.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Awesome. Oh, before I forget, we start Season 3 episodes with a picture, a photo from your childhood. A hair photo. Now, I’m assuming you’re the one with the mullet.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. Come on. Yes.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    We’re just here and making sure. Otherwise it doesn’t make sense. Tell me about this picture and you with the mullet.

    Alison Haase:

    Oh, my God. I’m the worst at ages. I don’t even know my own age, but I feel like I had to have been between six and eight there, maybe. Does that look right? I’m not a mom yet so I really don’t know. You can walk and talk and but I can do that to me.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    You’re between four and six.

    Alison Haase:

    All right. There we go. So drop it down a little bit. Four and six. It’s funny. So I had this, and I fought it my whole life, but I have curly hair. So I’ve always had curly hair, but no one ever taught me how to do anything with it nor did the woman who did my hair, obviously. Thanks, mom. Know how to do anything with it. So I got that, that hat, shapeless mullet.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    It’s a real mullet.

    Alison Haase:

    It’s a real mullet.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    There’s definitely-

    Alison Haase:

    Maybe they were trying to get it to hide under my riding helmet because I was a horseback rider. So I’ll give her that. So the bangs just where the visor went in the front of the helmet. And they needed a net because it just was there as the helmet.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    There you go. Business in the front, party in the back all day long. Awesome. And is that your father?

    Alison Haase:

    Grandpa.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Grandpa.

    Alison Haase:

    Grandpa and my little brother.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And the two doggies. Awesome. And so you grew up in Maryland. Did you grow up in Baltimore?

    Alison Haase:

    Around. We say Baltimore. If you don’t know the state, you just said what people could recognize. So suburb of.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Okay. Cool. So a big part of your story is that you’ve always been into horseback riding. You had your second horse by the time you were 11 and that’s been a big part of your story even through sobriety. When did you start using and did that affect your horseback riding?

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. I credit horses with saving my life. I know some people don’t consider it a sport, but it is. And it’s also I was responsible for something else besides me. So in a lot of ways, and of course this is hindsight, I wouldn’t have had this language, but they were my higher power. They were bigger than me. And so I started riding when I was three. That was my sport full time by nine.

    Alison Haase:

    And then like you just said, a second horse by 11. And then I started using shortly after that, but I never stopped showing up for them. And so my using was under the radar largely because I never stopped showing up for them. And they carried me into getting sober in college and it was them or not them. Keep using and lose them or keep them and stop using. And thank God that was an easy decision for me. So I kept riding.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    So there’s a young boys treatment program where part of the program is that they give every boy, and that the parents know this, every boy who comes into the program and it’s long-term six months, what have you, they get an AKC registered lab, I think it is, a yellow lab, every single one.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And they take that dog home with them. And part of that treatment, part of their actual treatment all of them is to care for this dog, to give it everything it needs. It is that kid’s responsibility. And it is almost like a center focal point of the program. I mean, you literally live with this dog. It’s part of what you’re doing.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. That’s brilliant.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And what you’re talking about reminds me of that, as a center point. The ability for a child to feel that connection, that lack of judgment and that level of responsibility I can see how that would be life changing.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. You just nailed it with the lack of judgment. I didn’t feel unconditionally supported anywhere else in my life. And so when I showed up at the bar, no matter what they were going to be there and they were going to be okay with whatever condition I showed up in, which is usually shit.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Totally.

    Alison Haase:

    And then I had to take care of them. So dogs for sure are cheaper than horses. So I think that’s a really smart way to go. Bravo.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Everyone gets a horse. I mean, everyone getting a dog, it was like, wow, that is intense. But when you think it through what that provides, in early sobriety my dog was everything for me. And I remember being in the midst of the worst depressions and he was the only reason I got out of bed because he had to go out for a walk. I knew that if I couldn’t show up for my dog, basically-

    Alison Haase:

    Game over.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    … game over. I love that. So you start your first addiction, which I completely relate to is all things to do with food in our body. And I can imagine that horseback riding, the weight and you as the person riding and all of that would play a role in that. How did your eating disorder form?

    Alison Haase:

    Now, this is all me looking back and me, my version of the truth, reality, jury is out.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    So you release any liability [crosstalk 00:09:34].

    Alison Haase:

    That knows me. So I remember having the model of a body is your worth. And the smaller the body, the better. And the more you do with body, the better. So I witnessed this and looking back, I’ve never been fat. It just isn’t true. But as we all know in the moment we feel differently and feeling is fact.

    Alison Haase:

    So I remember always feeling bigger and too big and watching someone and people only ever talk about bodies and try and shape bodies and I started to model that behavior myself. And I remember being fed differently than my brother.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Yeah. That’s interesting. What’s that about?

    Alison Haase:

    I don’t know if it was a protective-

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    What would that look like?

    Alison Haase:

    So I would get peas and rice and he would get mac and cheese out of the box.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    So your mother would literally provide and it wasn’t a preference thing. They would literally provide-

    Alison Haase:

    No, I want mac and cheese. Are you kidding? Come on. Load me up. I don’t need anything else.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I don’t want to judge you on your… You want to go ham on peas maybe [crosstalk 00:10:50].

    Alison Haase:

    Now, yes. But then, no. And after school they would pick me up and then him, and I wouldn’t get an after-school snack, but we’d go to Little Caesars and he’d get a pizza and crazy bread. And so it was literally feed Matt, deprive Allison. And so I started to view food as good or bad, or reward punishment.

    Alison Haase:

    So that kicked in the secret eating. And of course, I’m coming downstairs at night and going in the fridge and eating as fast as I can, not even chewing. And so that started the binging, but because that wasn’t an option, I found bulimia pretty early. And it took all forms. It could have been starving all day and then eating all night.

    Alison Haase:

    It could have been laxatives, diet pills, exercise, actual purging, and then drugs and alcohol honestly saved me from my eating disorder and kind of stalled it for a while because I didn’t give a shit. I just get high and be whatever. Don’t care about this that I have going on, don’t care what I eat, don’t care about anything actually.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    100%. I relate to that so much where it was I really believe that when I’m high on drugs, I’m like, oh, I don’t have to be fat and I don’t have to care. Wonderful. This works. And if I am fat, I don’t care. Probably I wasn’t fat, but I was going bald. So it’s some trade-off. We can overcome. So when you were 16, you snorted heroin for the first time. How did that go and how did you find heroin?

    Alison Haase:

    So it went really well.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Okay. That’s the best response.

    Alison Haase:

    So it’s one of the things and we all, I mean, I’ll just stick with me, but I’m never going to do that. I’m never going to do that.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Where will I ever find it?

    Alison Haase:

    But as I scaled in my youth, the people I found got worse and worse and older and older. So they had a longer reach to things that I wouldn’t otherwise even know existed. And I had already been doing oxy and things like that, but they’re expensive. And so I remember dating a guy who was older and because they were expensive, he was getting heroin.

    Alison Haase:

    And so I vaguely remember him telling me about it and that I didn’t have to do it, but that if I wanted to, it would be fine. And I would feel okay. All I cared about was how am I going to feel the next day? And can I get to the barn? Honestly, that was like, am I going to be hung over? Are people going to know? Because we were going out to a party. I’m pretty sure his parents were at this party probably knowing me.

    Alison Haase:

    And so eventually, I’m snorting heroin and it was the best night of my life. Because that level of care that I had not managed yet to find release from was it. I numbed out. And that was how I like to use. Because I knew if I got too happy, I was going to slide back down into the pit of despair for the rest of my life and die that way. So I really liked to just not feel at all.

    Alison Haase:

    And because I’m extremely feelings oriented now, I strove for nothingness and dope did that for me instantly. And then I didn’t use for very long, thank God. I got very sick many times, that doesn’t matter. It’s like, I’m never doing that again until a few hours from now. Just that hitting the lack of feeling. I was like, okay. Here we go. This is it.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Nothingness. Heroin has a special way of taking it all away. I never really was able to manage, and this is just classic Ashley, to figure out the place where you could still function and talk to anyone. So that’s impressive. Definitely skipped that level of things was full no drool, the whole thing. But I hear that people can walk while they do it.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. Only in the beginning though. I missed that mark very soon after that. And that’s why I didn’t drink because I could never not throw up in a trash can. And so if I did drink, I would just get a little trash can and carry it around with me because I knew I was going to throw up and I didn’t want to not drink. So I just carried the trash can around.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I mean, that makes complete sense to me.

    Alison Haase:

    Efficiency.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Yeah. Efficiency.

    Alison Haase:

    I want you to know I’m here, but this is the condition. So I’m just hanging out with my trash can.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I wore diapers when I started peeing myself. I was like we have a problem. Just problem solving. And then the dating of the older guy piece, I have that all throughout my story. I think there’s this formula for young women that it’s overachiever and body image, eating, finds drugs and sexuality dates older guys, uses hard drugs. I feel like it’s a-

    Alison Haase:

    What’s the problem?

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Yeah. Also amazing. I meet so many people where it’s literally our story of how, and I think we’re young girls, we need to find drugs. There’s older guys that are interested in us. Why would we say no?

    Alison Haase:

    Why? What’s wrong with this picture? You can’t give me what I need.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And all the validation in the world the younger guys don’t understand this guy is like, winning. Never mind the fact that we’re very interested in a barely pubescent or whatever, but we don’t care. So you are dating this guy. Then you go to college or does he stay?

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. So I went to college and he stayed. How old was he? He was out of school already by several years. And so I went up, I came up to Pennsylvania to go to school and he stayed home. And I think we tried to date for a minute and it just fizzled out. And he started hanging out with one of my former friends because he wasn’t really waiting for me. So I went to school without him.

    Alison Haase:

    And then I got sober in November of my first semester. So I commuted for a couple inviting community. I commuted for drugs for the first couple of months. So I’d go back and forth to get what I needed because no one was doing what I was doing where I went. So I was like, all right, so I have a car, so I’m going to drive home and then I’ll come back. It was a two-hour drive.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Did it surprise you that no one else was doing… When you showed up to college, were you like, oh, where are the heroin parties? Were you really surprised?

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. That was my first, maybe this isn’t normal. And I didn’t care that it wasn’t normal, but it was my first, because people are literally smoking pot for the first time and drinking beer. And I’m like, what the hell have you been doing with your life? Get it together. Let me go snort something in the bathroom. I’ll be right back. And when I come back, let me know if you’re interested.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Oh, my God. And also you ended up in the same place too so it’s not like you can even say, oh, wasted time. You’re like, no, I literally, you didn’t do anything. I was doing heroin. We are in the same place. You f’ed up.

    Alison Haase:

    Yes, exactly. You f’ed up. You’ve been missing out here big time.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    So you get sober in a way that’s actually relatively painless, so to speak. No real trauma. You skipped a lot of trauma, which is fantastic. How did that come about? What was the situation where you got sober?

    Alison Haase:

    Literally, I went home one weekend and good old Ames I had a conversation. I left the box up and my dad found the box. So I had shit on me and he called me out and I wouldn’t give it to him. And it took me years in recovery to let go of the shame of not having a guns a blazing fallout, dramatic ending. Because I didn’t go to rehab. I never got arrested. I wasn’t old enough to lose stuff per se. But I didn’t have the story that we hear. Which now I really try and emphasize because I’m like, you don’t need to have that.

    Alison Haase:

    I’m so grateful now that I’m clean slated. I’ve literally lived my entire adult life sober without this decorated shit resume that only we in 12 step recovery or any kind of recovery think is cool or funny. No one else thinks this is funny.

    Alison Haase:

    And so it took a long time, but quite literally left the house, trash bag full of clothes, different older guy I was dating. No, this was an ex, but whatever. He picks me up, eventually ended up back at school. I don’t have any of my stuff. Dad calls the dorm and he’s like, drug counseling or bye horses. And I’m like, not a problem. I will go to whoever whenever you want.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And when you say bye horses, you mean?

    Alison Haase:

    Bye. Good-bye [crosstalk 00:20:19]. And I had two at the time and they were near school. And that was my life. That was my entire life. So thank God. Because I know a lot of people had baseball or I don’t know, something and that’s not enough. And so not saying that other people with horses in their lives got sober, but I said, higher power. They were bigger than me.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Baseball doesn’t rely on you for sustenance. Interesting to see that dynamic.

    Alison Haase:

    And it’s a living being like you already said. That connectedness, it’s a spiritual connection. Lack of judgment. That was my safe haven.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Right. Then you go to drug counseling. What does that look like?

    Alison Haase:

    So this was the first time I met a breathing, living female, super sexy, savvy, alcoholic in recovery. I never had heard of an alcoholic who called themselves that and wasn’t drinking. Because I really thought bag of booze under a bridge, trench coat, no teeth. I’m like, not me. Clearly [crosstalk 00:21:28] this woman. I’m lacking a few things. And this woman just totally shared herself as this recovering alcoholic and did the questions.

    Alison Haase:

    I’m puking in the trash can and wearing my beanie in the summer. And just can’t have eye contact, eyes are pinned out, but I’m fine. I just like to get high sometimes. She’s like, well, heroin, isn’t really a sometimes and this is not normal. And so I’m a rule follower and I’m also a people pleaser. And so I saw this woman and I was like, I’m probably going to just do what she says.

    Alison Haase:

    So I saw her, I feel in October or something. And so I put together a few weeks of just dry time, just not using. Did all the same things, just didn’t do it with substance. And I felt better enough physically that I was like, this could work because I was so sick all the time. And I didn’t realize how awful that was until I wasn’t sick all of a sudden. So that was hugely motivating to me. And I remember my first meeting was Halloween. So I go dressed as a slutty cowgirl-

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Obviously, what else are you going to do?

    Alison Haase:

    … to my first AA meeting. I’m 18 years old. My hair is super long at the time, just the whole thing. And I just remember plastic chairs, awful lighting, smoking in the back room and I felt just a roll piece of meat in this room. And I couldn’t have felt more awkward.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    You were dressed as a cowgirl.

    Alison Haase:

    Slightly brought that on myself. When I see young women today I’m like, hold on honey. Let’s revamp this. Please wear, cover. We’re not all well here. So I got my first chip and I said who I was and I was horrified. I was just horrified. The guy sharing was this older Black dude with a million years and I had nothing in common with him.

    Alison Haase:

    And I was like, I’m out. So I drank for 10 days straight, don’t remember a thing. And then I came back to her and because I had that enough time physically not sick, but I was like, I want that back. And so November 11th of 2003 is my standing sobriety date.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    After that 10 days on November 11th, what did you do in order to get rid of all the substances? What was the shift?

    Alison Haase:

    Well, she slightly conned me into introducing me to a young college boy who needed help. So part of it was intensive outpatient therapy three times a week and she had to go back to meetings. And so I had a car at the time. Didn’t want to go. She said, there’s a guy, he’s handsome. He looks like he needs some help. I’m like, great. What’s the address? So I swatted him right away. And he’s sober too to this day, which is amazing.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    That’s awesome.

    Alison Haase:

    And people didn’t believe us, but never once did we kiss, did we cross that boundary because we knew we would die if we didn’t keep it separate. And so he wanted to go to meetings, didn’t have his car. So I’m like, well, I’m going to take you and save you and fix you.

    Alison Haase:

    And them I’m like, I’m not going to sit in the car while you’re in this meeting. So that’s how I started going. And there were enough young people. I did a lot of NA at the time too because there were more young people in NA than there were in AA at the time and it didn’t matter. I qualify for all of them literally, but-

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Same.

    Alison Haase:

    … there was stuff going on. We went to the beach, we went to conventions, we went to the diner, we smoked all the cigarettes and ate all the shit. And we had parties. We had black tie parties. We had Easter parties.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    So fun.

    Alison Haase:

    We learned how to live again. It was an amazing time and I just learned that my life wasn’t over because even though I had no life, I was convinced I would be boring and miserable and life would be over. And total opposite. I was exhausted. I started going to raves when I got sober and just had a blast. We literally did. I just said yes to everything. We just did everything. And simultaneously I was building a foundation.

    Alison Haase:

    I did all the things they say to do, home group, sponsors, step work, be of service. And I did that for a few years and then, well, my eating disorder came back and I also swapped out my alcoholism for workaholism. I didn’t go to meetings probably for I want to say two or three years, enough time that I got pretty crazy.

    Alison Haase:

    And my eating disorder came back full force, but I didn’t drink or drug. But I have enough substance to pick up that I don’t really need those things to get out of myself. And I was dating another older guy who wasn’t very nice. I met him in the rooms and he had nice curves and he hugs me and I was like, all I need, right?

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    He is my ideal mate.

    Alison Haase:

    He is my ideal mate. I don’t know anything about him and I had no money. And he did. So I was like this will work.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    This will do.

    Alison Haase:

    This will do. So that was the beginning of my sobriety and then a little hiatus. And then ultimately I came back, but I’ll pause so I don’t get too far ahead.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Oh, no. I got sober at 19 and I love, I just relate so much to what you’re talking about because I think, first of all, I was like, my life is over. I’m going to be boring and not cool and lame. But like you described, my life was not cool, fun but I was so concerned about it. I mean, I was really. And it was a real barrier to entry for me except that my life wasn’t super cool and fun. So I’m not sure where I came up with that, but I’ve never partied as hard as I did in early [inaudible 00:27:29]. We f’ing partied.

    Alison Haase:

    I know. I didn’t sleep.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Oh, my God. I mean, we would go to acupuncture, all the young people’s conferences all over the country and raves in Vegas. Just so much-

    Alison Haase:

    It’s amazing.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    It was so fun. And, I mean, people thought we were drinking.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. We fit right in.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    We were just fine. At a certain point of sleep loss, you start to act drunk.

    Alison Haase:

    You act like it anyway.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    You start to sleep with people the same way you would if you were drunk.

    Alison Haase:

    Worse.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Yeah. We got worse. Exactly. So the eating disorder piece that comes back. And that is so my story where it’s that eating disorder because you make your drug addiction and your alcoholism big enough to overshadow it. So you’re like, oh, it’s gone. You don’t have to deal with it. And then you deal with that and here it is and it is f’ing gnarly.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    How did it come back? What did it look like when it came back for you in terms of… Because you said you mentioned bulimia and all the ways. I don’t think everybody knows that bulimia can be, sorry, exercise bulimia. There’s different types of bulimia. Bulimia does not just mean throwing up. What did it look like when it came back for you?

    Alison Haase:

    So initially it was early sobriety. It was all of a sudden I had this preoccupation with body again. And I was aware that I had a body and that seemed like the easiest thing to control as opposed to just handling my feelings, which were insane. The anxiety, the inability to sleep, just that unnerved role nerve feeling at all times. And so it started very, very benign, started to go running, started to lift.

    Alison Haase:

    I am a fitness freak so my disease, there’s a delicate balance between what’s healthy and what’s disease. And I’ve heard your many podcasts. So I know we talk about disease is just my thinking. And then it was skip a meal here or there. So I did have a long anorexic phase and I think it got worse when I left AA for the few years that I did, of course.

    Alison Haase:

    And the other thing I will say, and the reason why food recovery is so much harder and I’m not putting down drugs or alcohol, but you literally can live life without drugs or alcohol, without using them, without ever seeing them again, without ever being around them. You cannot avoid food. It is a non-negotiable part of life. And if you eat, if you take care of yourself, depending on whatever, you eat multiple times a day.

    Alison Haase:

    You play with the substance multiple times a day. Oh, and by the way, you have a body and you must walk around in this body all the time. So if you’re jacked up about it, guess what? There you go, here you are. So I had a long restrictive phase and, again, it started really just I didn’t eat breakfast one day. And then I started to get addicted to the hunger because it was a controlled variable. And then it was, I’m going to save some money because that’s how time I eat every meal out.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Throw in some, it’s good economics. And it’s how do we not.

    Alison Haase:

    I’m going to keep smoking and getting my Dunkin Donuts, extra-large coffee every morning, but I will not pack my food. So I just won’t eat.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Your lack of breakfast is funding your Dunkin Donuts. It’s really it’s an ecosystem.

    Alison Haase:

    Yes. And then somebody said something one day. So if we go back to body is worth, it was my holy grail. And it was somebody noticed, and this is one. So I actually was a professional horse trainer and horseback rider with a huge business out of college. I graduated college and then had my own business for eight years. So I took it quite seriously. And so with one of my clients and nail in the coffin, I was just, great.

    Alison Haase:

    So thinner is better. I was already physically fit from the horses and I did all the manual labor for a while until I could afford to pay someone, but then I added the gym. And then I added it more. And at first it was like, I’m going to be stronger to ride better, which is a real thing, but then disease took over. And I got my third major, but probably eighth concussion.

    Alison Haase:

    I was snowboarding, did a flipped, fell in the back of my head. I still hold it. And right at this time I’m not going to meetings and active in my recovery. I’m just active and being an asshole and not drinking. And so I get this concussion and it knocked me on my ass. And I remember I knew it was bad, but I’m like, muscle through it because I do that with everything.

    Alison Haase:

    And I remember going the next morning to the barn and I was like, this isn’t going to work today. And so I called someone to come take care of the horses and I canceled all my lessons and I just went home and was in and out. And then one of my clients was like, you really need to go see a doctor. Your eyes are weird. You’re weird. You need to go to a doctor and so I did. And I will never forget sitting in this woman’s chair and I didn’t care that I wasn’t going to be able to talk again, do math again.

    Alison Haase:

    I didn’t care about anything except that I was going to get fat because she said, you cannot ride. You can’t do anything physical. You can maybe sit in a chair and teach for an hour or two a day. But any activity you do is going to push blood through your brain and then demote your healing. Your brain is bruised right now. Part of my restricting was being busy.

    Alison Haase:

    Literally I would not eat at all and then eat dinner and I would eat whatever I wanted, literally, like a garbage disposal. And then I was basically full all the next day until dinner. And that’s just all I did. One meal a day. And I knew I was like, know I’m hungry and I’m not going to be able to avoid this. And that’s when my bulimia, it just switched overnight.

    Alison Haase:

    And I also went back to meetings then too. But at that point I was so enmeshed in my disease that it wasn’t enough. And so I remember going back to AA and not only feeling like a fraud, not really a fraud, but I’m the only one here that does this and can’t talk about it.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    That is fake news.

    Alison Haase:

    Yes it is. And today when I share my story, I plant that seed for other people. I’m like, I’m not going to go on about it, but literally I would die in a plastic chair in alcoholics anonymous if I didn’t seek out food recovery. So if you want to talk to me about that and there’s always people, let me know. No one talks about this and I can’t stop. I couldn’t stop.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Were you actively throwing up while you had this killing from the concussion?

    Alison Haase:

    I don’t know actually. I also, courtesy of the concussion, don’t remember shit. So I don’t know. I don’t know. But I do know that when I recovered enough it’s like I couldn’t starve anymore. It’s like my body and brain were like, we don’t do this now. It’s inconceivable to me how I did that. I don’t know how.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Stay tuned to hear more in just a moment.

    Christiana:

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    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I literally don’t understand how people starve with themselves. So I’ve done a couple of fasts, which I can’t believe that I’ve done them. And they’ve been supervised and whatever, but there’s just restriction is not a thing about me. But you know what’s interesting is that the people I meet who are restrictors, they tend to be restrictors of all things.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And they tend to be joy restrictors, and pleasure restrictors, and it’s really a mental and I’m gluttonous in everything. It’s a total more and more of just all of it. I always thought, oh, you’re just more disciplined or you can just do something differently. And I think it’s a real personality, it’s a thread that goes through your life of kind of how you view scarcity or abundance. Just time, whether or not there’s enough for you.

    Alison Haase:

    It’s a mindset. Absolutely.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    How long did it take to recover from your concussion?

    Alison Haase:

    I mean, in a lot of, honestly, years because I didn’t totally sit it out. And they were like, don’t exercise or ride. So I was like, great. So it was winter. So I would literally power hike with my horses by hand. So I’m leading them because they’ve got to stay fit too. And so I power hike through the woods with boots in the snow. So don’t exercise or ride. So this doesn’t count, right?

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Yeah. Real sedentary.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. Real sedentary. So I did that for a while for years because then I was in my bulimia. So I’m not nourishing myself. And at the crux of my bulimia, I was throwing up involuntarily while talking to people. That’s how often I was purging. And I remember I had this 10 to 20 mile radius of drive-throughs and convenience food places that I would drive through. And I would just eat and purge while driving.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    How does it work if you’re throwing up while having a conversation? How did you-

    Alison Haase:

    I mean, it would just come up and I would just like, oh. I wouldn’t projectile into their face. That would be amazing.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Can you walk me through.

    Alison Haase:

    Hold on a second. It was more just like when you know you have that.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Yes. I was like, wait, how did you have friends?

    Alison Haase:

    Well, what can you say? I have a great smile.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    So basically you’re projectile vomiting on all your friends. They’re be like, don’t talk to her.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. Be careful. Wear a mask. Wear a mask. They’d fit in perfect.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    There you go. And you’re going to meetings at this point.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I think this is the story of a lot of people and a lot of women in particular where we are attending meetings and suffering in our eating disorder, but it’s an outside issue so we’re not talking about it. But it’s our alcoholism. It’s part of the disease, the mentality. How did you seek help for that? What was the catalyst for that change?

    Alison Haase:

    The sponsor I got when I came back from my hiatus was no longer bulimic. She wasn’t using any kind of recovery anymore, but she just wasn’t binging and purging anymore. And so she gave me hope and she also walked me through the big book, which was very helpful to see my shit on paper. But I can’t describe it aside from purging was taken from me, partly by her ask and help.

    Alison Haase:

    And a lot of this stuff is behavior modification. I know it sounds so simple and almost dumb because we’re talking about addiction, but for me and my food recovery so much is a behavior change and modification. So I literally had to stop purging. You have to stop purging. So I would talk about it. I would sit on my hands. I would cry. Because it was how do I not throw up? It was what I did. It’s just what I did.

    Alison Haase:

    And I would pace in the driveway and I honest to God have no idea the last time I purged, which is a miracle. It just was no longer an option anymore. And I wish that’s how all of it went, but that’s just not what happens. But that’s a good start. That is a good start. And over the years, I went to different nutritionists and I am a very active member of OA today.

    Alison Haase:

    But a lot of my food stuff is more like, I’m bad if I eat that versus I have a physical allergy. Because I do have that too, but not as much as I’m bad if I eat that or I’m going to get fat if I eat that. And so I did a lot of therapy with different women, eating disorder specialist, and just nutritionist to help me normalize my relationship with food. Just eat normal meals at normal times. And I would starve-

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Do you have alcoholic foods?

    Alison Haase:

    Dessert and honestly today dessert, which is interesting because I’m in a really interesting phase and I listened to that sugar addiction podcast of yours with Michael and I was almost like, you shouldn’t listen to it, but I’m like, I want to learn. I want to hear all the things.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Oh, that was me interviewing him. I’m like, why am I doing this to myself?

    Alison Haase:

    You’re like, I changed my mind.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I’m like, are you sure what the research says?

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. And so dessert for sure. I haven’t had dessert in about almost four years, just shy of four years.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    So I’m assuming dessert is sugar because if you had a piece of watermelon as your dessert-

    Alison Haase:

    Correct. So sugar processed desserts like cake, cookies, brownies. I don’t want a cookie. I don’t see why anyone would want one cookie. Just give me the apron and then leave that there.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I don’t even want the cookie. Don’t cook that shit. Give me the f’ing cookie dough.

    Alison Haase:

    Yes. Even better.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    You know what I mean?

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. The jar. And a spatula up in my mouth.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    A spatula. Exactly.

    Alison Haase:

    So process desserts. And that’s not true in the beginning. The beginning, everything. I was allergic to everything and a lot of it was fear. I was just terrified to eat food. So I would step my toe into OA over the years. I was introduced my first year of recovery. It wasn’t news to anyone that this was a thing in my life, but I would just look around and I’m don’t belong here.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Yeah. Me too.

    Alison Haase:

    And there is a sense of shame when you’ve already admitted you’re an alcoholic, you’re a drug addict, your life is over, you’re a child, you’re not even old enough to drink, and now I’m supposed to go to Overeaters Anonymous.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    The worst name on the planet.

    Alison Haase:

    Hello. Right? No one wants to say that.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I’m an overeater. Please, I’d rather say I cut my tongue for fun. I still stand by my belief that we should call it something else. Anything else.

    Alison Haase:

    Oh, yeah. I know.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Do I want to go to fat anonymous? No, I don’t.

    Alison Haase:

    So I was introduced to OA early and then I even created an anorexics and bulimics anonymous meeting because I knew I needed help, but I couldn’t admit defeat all at the same time. So it was-

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    It’s a lot.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. It was just a lot. And I wasn’t done. I just wasn’t done. I didn’t have a strong enough third step and belief in something bigger than me that cared about me, that I deserve freedom from that too. And so my recovery, I guess my disease just got less over time. It was not drinking or drugging where I just got sober. And I hate to make it sound so easy, but compared to what I’ve experienced with food, it really was.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Hands down.

    Alison Haase:

    And over the years, I’ve dabbled with fitness stuff.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Doubled. Listen to you. Doubled. I’ve dabbled with fitness stuff. Pretty sure I’ve dabbled with fitness stuff. You were in a bodybuilding competition. Not doubling.

    Alison Haase:

    Just a few. I have trophies I’m looking at actually. So I sold my horse business. I quit riding, which is obviously from what I’ve shared, wait, what, how did that happen? And basically I turned my passion and my love into a have to and a means of making money. And I lost my passion. And it’s a hard business. It’s a grind. The people are f’ing nuts and just me, I’m there, right? Me included.

    Alison Haase:

    And I hated it. And I was getting hurt. It just wasn’t fun anymore. And I wasn’t a millionaire. So there were really no compelling arguments to keep going. And I’m so grateful I was brave enough to hang up my boots literally and try something else. I had no idea what to do. I just knew I couldn’t do that anymore.

    Alison Haase:

    So I sold my business. I walked away. I quit riding. I haven’t ridden at all in a long time and I don’t miss it either, which is amazing. But I credit them with my life. I credit them with my life and I get the chills just thinking about what they’ve done for me, but I felt indebted to keep doing it because I was gifted.

    Alison Haase:

    I was really good at it. I was a great rider and if I know how to do something, I have the ability to teach it. And so I felt like I had to do it because I was good at it. And then it’s like, no, you’re also miserable. So I went from horses to car sales and bodybuilding.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    The natural progression, right?

    Alison Haase:

    The natural progression for a recovering alcoholic, psycho with her body. It’s bulimic. And so I excelled.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    While in OA?

    Alison Haase:

    No, before OA.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Oh, before.

    Alison Haase:

    And so I was great. I was a really good bodybuilder because there was a piece of paper and I just followed the paper and I never strayed, not for a second. I literally at the diet, the training. I got into steroids because I’m sorry, I’m going to win. And oh, I need to look that by when? Oh, how do we make that happen faster?

    Alison Haase:

    And I know there’s a lot of controversy about that, but for me, it was 100% to change my physical body, And it didn’t do anything to my mind except drive my obsession with my body. And the unfortunate thing about that is that’s not real. So your results are not real, but your disease loves to this results.

    Alison Haase:

    And I can remember I’ve never gotten more attention for my body, which was perfect breeding grounds to continue such harmful behavior spiritually, emotionally, and physically, and now talk about all at in AA, right? I have sponsees, I’m doing the deal, and I just look more ripped every day. And I was obsessed with myself.

    Alison Haase:

    When I talk about no God in my life because I was it. This body I’m building was my God. And I thought I had it made. I thought I had it made and I was dating a guy only slightly older, but he and I did the dance for five plus years. I don’t know if he’s alive. I’m assuming he’s alive, but really bad junkie. Was sober when I met him, relapsed pretty soon after that. And I just I’m an Al-Anon too, so that’s another podcast.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Relatable.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. So he was into it. And so it was just this enmeshed gross thing that I just kept building on. And then he and I eventually broke up. I won a show and it was a slow implosion to the end. And it emphasized the restrictive and then the bingeing, because you were encouraged to go eat.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Right. In between shows or whatever, right?

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. Oh my God. I would hoard food like a Holocaust survivor. I would go into any store, it’s not real food. The shit that lives on the shelf, that is not real food. I would salivate and almost cry because I was just so hungry and I just started buying it. I’m like I’m going to eat it on April 19th or whatever the day after the show.

    Alison Haase:

    And I literally took coolers of this shit to the show with me, so the second I was done. And onstage, that’s all I was thinking about. I was like, you know what, I hope I get second so I can eat sooner. It was insane. And just talk about a rat race. I literally was hustling for my body.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Do they pay you?

    Alison Haase:

    No. I mean, not what I was doing. Eventually, but that’s not where people make money. It’s all in sponsorship and stuff like that. So no, you don’t pay to suffer. You just suffer because you like to suffer.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I wanted to make sure the economics were there, but apparently not.

    Alison Haase:

    No, not at all. And so I learned a lot. I give it a credit with that. I learned a whole lot about mind and muscle connection and all that and food and all that, but that’s not good for me. Someone might pick up on that. So eventually my last show, which I didn’t know it was going to be my last show, was the day I was leaving Pennsylvania to move back to Maryland, which I said I would never do, but my mom has MS, and I felt a really strong pull to come home and be near to her.

    Alison Haase:

    And so my last day in Pennsylvania was my last show at the school I graduated from. So it was this really stars aligned, cosmic experience that I didn’t know I was having. And so I did that show, and had I won the show, I would have continued for my pro card, but I got fourth. So I didn’t.

    Alison Haase:

    And I just think God was looking out for me because had I continued to go that route, I have no idea where I would be right now. But I did it. And so I moved back and I kept hustling. Even in between shows, it’s a hustle because you’re so afraid to lose what you have, God forbid, and it’s not sustainable. That is not a sustainable lifestyle for me. And I moved back to Maryland. It was the perfect storm. It was I had been gone for 12 plus years. I didn’t know anybody anymore.

    Alison Haase:

    So the people who were condoning my behavior were gone. I was all alone. I’m single. I started a new career. Everything was different. And it was the gig was up. There I was, and I was like, I can’t keep doing this. My voice was changing. People love my voice and I really don’t know if this is my voice or courtesy of steroids five, six years ago. You’re welcome. I really don’t know. I can’t scream. So God forbid something happens-

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    You can’t scream.

    Alison Haase:

    No. I sound like a prepubescent boy squeaking, literally.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Okay. Do it.

    Alison Haase:

    I can’t.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    That’s the lowest.

    Alison Haase:

    Yes. I’ve never screamed on cue. That was good. Thank you. I’m not doing that again. So that happened, but that was happening at random with no precursor. So I’d be mid-conversation. So I don’t throw up anymore. I squeak instead. And so I’m just like, there we go. And people are like, “Are you smoking again?” And I’m like, “No. Just doing steroids.” You can feel it. You can feel it. And I was practically sterile. And so I was a slow coming off, and it was like basically going through puberty again at 30.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Oh, God.

    Alison Haase:

    Awful.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    It sounds terrible.

    Alison Haase:

    So you’re aware of it intellectually, but emotionally, there’s nothing you can do. So I was like I’m in hell. This is hell. And so I’m immersed in AA. As soon as I got here, I got a women’s home group and I was new here.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Please help.

    Alison Haase:

    Please help.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Send help.

    Alison Haase:

    Send help. And then that’s when I started to be willing to change. And also the players were gone. So there were women around me now who weren’t afraid to hurt my feelings and call me out. And so I let go of the substances, and that’s when I started through the steps again, me and my ego. I’m like I have 12 years sober. I’m not doing that again. Do you know who I am? They’re like, “We’re looking at you. Let’s go back to step zero.”

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Yeah. We see you and all your glory. Sit down and shut the f up.

    Alison Haase:

    Shut the f up. We do not want you have. Trust me. Only you do, my sweet friends.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    The promises are not yet true.

    Alison Haase:

    Keep reading. Keep reading. Go back. So I met the right people at the right time and I just thank God, I had a foundation of recovery. So I knew what to do, even though it was a mess. I was still coming and I was like, I don’t know. And so I finally just got sick and tired of being sick and tired. And I SOSed someone that had that had long-term sobriety and abstinence, which I don’t like that word.

    Alison Haase:

    It sounds very confining to me. I honestly identify as being sober from food today. That feels true for me. But I reached out within a year of being home. Because now I’m doing the diets. Whole30 and paleo. And I did the badass whatever Christmas Abbott. I don’t know if who she is. She’s the hottest cross fitter ever. And she has the badass body diet. So I did that.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I try not to look at that stuff.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. Fair.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    It doesn’t help my self-esteem.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. Fair. But I’m like, I want what she has. And meanwhile, totally ignoring everything inside. All outside. And I eventually just admitted defeat and I did this four day emotional rehab basically for food addicts and it was psychodrama and it was amazing.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Where’d you go?

    Alison Haase:

    It was literally local to us. We brought someone up from Choices in Florida, Beth trainer. And she’s no joke, man. And I was the lead the whole week until the last day. Of course, I am, right? Until last day. And then they were like, your turn. I’m like, I’m fine though. I don’t even know why I’m here. And what was revealed to me is that I didn’t…

    Alison Haase:

    And so here’s part of the problem for me, what I’ve discovered is that because I’ve been in recovery for so long, I f’ing cheat because I know. I’ve done enough work steps that I know what’s wrong with me. So I skipped steps one, two, and three, and I just go to analysis and then I’m sorry. And I just say my core operating mode is I’m not enough and don’t think I’m worth it and I’m going to be alone.

    Alison Haase:

    But I don’t get in there. And I don’t pause because I don’t want to feel this way. I’m obsessed with feeling better. So I just want to step it away. And so the work with her, what was revealed to me is that the reason I feel that way is because at two weeks old, my mom went back to work. And so I constantly had to prove that I was enough and I constantly had to prove that I was worth loving and love was shown to me by stuff and body validation.

    Alison Haase:

    And so I picked these loser ass men until now, because they wouldn’t hurt me as bad when it didn’t work out, right? And the food was just my means to deal with life on life’s terms. We always say it’s not about the food, which it is and it isn’t. You can’t get sober from drinking, drinking, just like you can’t get sober from food, eating.

    Alison Haase:

    But that was in June of 2017. I did that stint. And then I started with Overeaters Anonymous as soon as I was out, and I just, well, it’s not been a linear ride since then. But I’ve been sober from myself basically. Really, that is what the f it is, sober from myself since then.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    It’s the best description.

    Alison Haase:

    I like it actually.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I have to work really hard to be sober from myself. I was reading your blog and you wrote a book about your story and you talk in your blog, and I just really loved this because I relate to it so much. You wrote a blog about how there was the obsession about getting the story out and is it going to be enough, and making it into something, right?

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And just that intensity of always needing to be moving, and I’m vibrating. I just cannot stop moving. And you talked about in your blog post about how letting go of that, letting it be what it was going to be. And also coming back to this idea, which is something that I have had to work on a lot, which is that your body has done so much for you.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And that is something that was taught to me. Think about all the things that your body has done for you, has shown up for you, has signaled to you. And that was just a really mind blowing thing for me to hear. I had never seen my body as my partner. I had seen my body as the villain, as the thing working against me my whole life.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah, the problem.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    The problem.

    Alison Haase:

    You’re the reason my life is f’ed up.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Exactly. And it was just the worst thing that ever happened to me, and that plague almost. And then the shift in perspective like, look what you’ve put your body through and how it showed up for you and how it et cetera, et cetera. So I wanted to touch on that about how the combination of that realization around the book and then your body, how those two things related to one another.

    Alison Haase:

    I needed you to say that today. Even though I may have said that, I needed to hear it, which is the beauty of writing because, again, we have a body. It’s a non-negotiable. I have this body. And while I’m so much kinder to her today, I still forget that she’s on my side. And I like to call her that because we’re one. She’s my girl. This is how we’re experiencing life together.

    Alison Haase:

    And so when you said that, I immediately thought back, well, one, I think of the f’ed up way I’ve been thinking lately about how I need to change my body again. And after bodybuilding, I got into endurance sports and obstacle course racing. So in 2019 in the fall, I won a ultra-obstacle course race. And I remember the morning of that. And so anyone who doesn’t know, that’s 31 miles, 70 obstacles, 10,000 feet of elevation. No big deal.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Oh my God.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. Crazy. So I remember in the morning comparing my body to everyone.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Wait. You ran 31 miles?

    Alison Haase:

    Yes.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Sorry.

    Alison Haase:

    No. That’s okay. Nine and a half hours I was out there doing the deal.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Just running.

    Alison Haase:

    Just running. Hanging out with Allison. I don’t know if I’m ever going to do that again. But I remember that morning crying and comparing my body outsides to outsides. And like, I can’t do this. Look at them. Look at me. I don’t even know what I look like. I will never know what I look like. I’m so skewed.

    Alison Haase:

    But then, so I win, and I didn’t know that the whole time. I just kept going and I never saw another woman. And I just thought like, I don’t know where these bitches are, but I’m going to keep going because it’s getting cold. It was snowing. It was crazy. And so I remember I was done and I was in the shower and I just started hysterically crying, apologizing to my body because I’m like, look what we just did.

    Alison Haase:

    Look what you just did. And I have shit on you my entire life. I am so sorry. And to be honest, that’s so far off track. I think what you asked me, because I was so captivated by what you said. I was like, oh my God, I need to remember that. So can you ask me whatever the hell you were asking again?

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Sorry. I’m trying to get better and more clear with my question, because I do that tangent-

    Alison Haase:

    No. I heard what you said and just brain just grabbed.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I mean, everything in our life brings up our body because that’s who we are. But I used to think that if I got a B, that was because I was fat. And if I was skinny, I would’ve gotten an A. But how does the book and needing to get your story out and the obsession around and the concern around that and kind of, how did that relate to your body? How did that bring you back to your body? Can you break down?

    Alison Haase:

    Oh my gosh. So it’s interesting. People are like, “How’d you do it?” I’m like, “Just start writing.” I don’t know what else to tell you. Literally, you just start writing. I wrote my book in a year or less, and I didn’t know why at the time, other than ego, right? Somebody interviewed me for their book. It’s called The Heart of Recovery. And I’m in there. And he was like, “Your story is pretty amazing.

    Alison Haase:

    You should write a book. Let me know if you need help.” I’m like, bitch please. I got it. And so I wrote my own book. And I found it really cathartic and I really do feel, and I know I used this word before, but indebted to let other women and men know that it’s okay. You are not broken.

    Alison Haase:

    There is nothing wrong with you, whether you’re sober and suffering or not. But I also wrote it because the general public could afford to learn why some people don’t eat bread at dinner or why some people pack their food to go to the party. Because I look normal. When people are like, “You’re an Overeaters Anonymous. You don’t look like you should be an Overeaters Anonymous.” Hopefully, if I’m working the program.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    That’s part of the point, right?

    Alison Haase:

    So what does that mean? And we’re so obsessed with if you don’t have a certain makeup that you’re okay. And for me, I’m like, the better I look, probably the worst I’m doing, if you want to know the truth. So I felt compelled to send the message. It’s not about that. And it was interesting writing it because then I read it after, and I’m like, I had a period where I, and I’ve already used this word again too, but I felt like a fraud because my eating practices are so different than they were when I wrote that book.

    Alison Haase:

    And I got started. And I think that is the blessing and curse for me a food recovery, because alcoholism and drug addiction is no use ever. Period. That’s very easy to understand, but food is very gray. And God to me, blessed me with this because I struggle so hard in the gray. I am such a black and white person. It’s f’ing yes or no. Now or never. What don’t you understand about that?

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    So I was laughing when you were like, I was introduced OA my first year. I was introduced to away my first year. I literally would joke that oh, this is my quarterly OA meeting for 10 years or whatever before I would come back. And the part of food in OA was the part that was so difficult for me.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And I would try all these food plans that didn’t work for me, but they worked for her, and I want to look like her. So I’m going to try her food plan, but then her food plan is not my food plan. And also when skinny bitches would come into OA, I was like, get your f’ing ass out of here.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. What are you doing here? You don’t know.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    You don’t know. I would be like, what, how? The skinniest people in the room who were suffering taught me the most about eating because they would describe it, and the only difference was, for whatever reason, their body just didn’t do the same thing. And I was like, oh wow, you are suffering the way I’m suffering. And I thought that if you just take the body fat away. I didn’t get it. I didn’t get that you could have my problem too.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    It was really eye opening. And OA, that gray is just so… That’s why I really liked coming to terms with alcoholic foods for me, because that I don’t have a problem over eating lettuce. You know what I mean? That’s not what’s happening. So when I could get clear about look, this food, this ingredient is the thing that makes me a lunatic and I’m eating other foods, because it wasn’t all food.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    It wasn’t every food. Some people it is, but for me it’s not. But that was putting it into black and white. I was just desperate for black and white, and that’s helped me. But I actually love that your food plan is different than it was when you wrote your book. And I think it’s actually I wish you could include it in your book because it’s such an important point about supporting people in eating disorder recovery, which is don’t f’ing bring up that their food was different six months ago than it is now.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    They know that. They think about that every single day. Just support whatever the food is today. Obviously, if it that’s part of the recovery, people don’t understand. I mean, in my life, I’ve had so many different food plans. You can’t keep up. I think from the outside it looks like, well, this is just another iteration of some crazy food plan you’re doing.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    And that piece when you’re talking about how to support people when they’re packing their own food. I mean, I get that a lot with my family. I think it’s actually really fantastic that your food has changed since then, because that’s actually part of supporting people in food recovery is that flexibility and not forcing them to feel like they shouldn’t have to change their food.

    Alison Haase:

    Right. And that’s why I identify better with sobriety from myself, but eating and body because my disease loves rigidity. My food addiction loves rigidity. I was a bodybuilder. I can prep food. I can pack food. I can follow a piece of paper all day long, but God forbid, I have to go out and focus on the people and not the thing I’m eating and be a little bit flexible and that’s life, right?

    Alison Haase:

    Food recovery is life. Life is great. Food recovery for me is great. And so I was not progressing from a spiritually and emotionally connected, loving place by being rigid with my food, because I was constantly obsessed with starting over, doing it right. I ate a little extra. That means I’m failed. I relapsed. Or I ate that and I wasn’t… And it was like this has to be portable and sustainable for life.

    Alison Haase:

    I’m very clear on that. And I know it’s going to be a lot of time, but f that. I got it. This is forever. I had to figure this out. I’ve seen what I look right when it’s not working out. I know how absent I am from my life, sober or not, when I’m in the food. I look like I’m listening to you. I promise I’m not. I am not a worker amongst workers. I am not extending the principles. I can’t.

    Alison Haase:

    And so my food and my recovery has gotten very flexible. And so I wrote the book and then I published the book and I was rereading it. And I was like, oh God. But I also extend that compassion. You start where you need to start. I had to start with a very clear list of behaviors and foods. That’s step zero/1.

    Alison Haase:

    You’ve got to get real clear, like you said, about what your foods are and what you do. And for me, again, like I said, it’s behavior modification with food. A lot of it. It’s step work, but you’ve got it in certain new behaviors. So for me, it was always the end of the day. I knew if I started eating midday, game over. So I just waited. I was really disciplined. I was disciplined about waiting to binge.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I mean, you get it where you get it.

    Alison Haase:

    That’s how I would come down after a hard day. That’s how I would decompress. That’s how I would not feel. And it’s a celebratory tool. It’s a punishing tool. It was everything. It’s what you do. So over the years, it’s a relearning and unlearning. My food plan at the beginning was very generic. I am a huge advocate of seeing a professional for your food because no one body is the same.

    Alison Haase:

    I pursue athletics somewhat seriously at times. And some people don’t do anything. We have very different needs. We’re different ages with different hormones. And for me, my point of a food plan is to learn how to live life in between the meals. So if I’m sitting there thinking about what I’m going to eat, I think, like you said, that’s all I f’ing think about.

    Alison Haase:

    I can’t remember how long it took to recover from my concussion, but I can probably remember what I ate on January 17th of 1986. And it’s true, sadly that I’m like, oh I remember that because I ate… But that’s how my brain is wired. And so for me, it was unlearning behaviors and starting really easy.

    Alison Haase:

    For me, so coming out of bodybuilding, I ate six meals a day, which my sponsor showed me that that’s just more time thinking about food. So then I got to four meals a day, which I am today. And in the beginning, it was just real generic measurements. A weight scale for me, but everything else was just generic.

    Alison Haase:

    Don’t worry about what it is. Just have one of that. And it was I never ate. And for a while, I was I gluten-free. I was everything free for a while. Sugar-free, like what Michael was talking about, read the labels. And it’s real depressing when you start and horrifying because there’s sugar in everything.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Oh my God, yeah.

    Alison Haase:

    But over time as my athletics pursued, because a part of me didn’t pursue recovery sooner because I thought that that would be taken from me. I genuinely love moving my body. I genuinely love doing things that are ridiculously stupidly hard and not enjoyable for most humans. And I thrive in those environments. I’m like, let’s go. And I love shaping my body. I love it all.

    Alison Haase:

    And so for me, the recovery piece is not changing my training plan based on how I feel. Not adding or subtracting food or training based on how I feel. And so I have a professional trainer and I have a professional nutrition, and the combination is that’s part of my support team, an extension of OA.

    Alison Haase:

    And so in the beginning, it was just really generic, but eventually, I had to find a different way of eating to support the level of activity that I was doing. And so I got into macros, which if I was scared to do at first, because I thought it would make me too obsessive because macros are as precise as it gets. But I have found I’ve been doing it for almost two years now, that it’s awesome.

    Alison Haase:

    I just love it. And my menu has expanded. So I’ve gotten more rigid in how I calculate my food, but more flexible in what I eat. And I literally eat anything except those processed sugary desserts, baked goods, shit like that. But I do eat sugar now. I eat jelly. I eat what fruit. I don’t scan the ingredients as thoroughly. And I don’t have a reaction.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    As long as it fits your macros, you don’t find that you have a reaction to the sugar. Interesting.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. But I will say I spent years in recovery building that foundation, and then got a sponsor who was real flexible. And I was like, you’re terrifying, but I want what you have. And she’s been so loving. That’s what I need in my recovery. And that’s why I do sobriety from food. I need love in place of rigidity. And you’ve got to be honest with yourself. If I’m fisting nuts, something’s off.

    Alison Haase:

    But it’s a little here or there or whatever. I’m sorry. That’s going to happen. I plan to be here for a while. So that shit is just going to happen. I’ve got to figure it out and how to be okay with it and love myself for me. That’s just for me. And lately, I’ve been in this dance with, and so I didn’t diet for the first forever because I only ever dieted. And I died last summer for the first time.

    Alison Haase:

    And I saw a new side of my disease in recovery that I hadn’t. A refocus on body. I got to the place where I didn’t love how I looked or felt but I was unwilling to go backward. And I was unwilling to sacrifice the freedom I had gotten in my recovery. But I got to a place. So I won that ultra. A month later, I broke my leg. I had surgery. I have a playmate screws in my ankle.

    Alison Haase:

    I couldn’t walk for three months. Then COVID came. So the hustle with the book has coincided with also this element of physically, I was disabled. Literally couldn’t do anything, which thank God for recovery. I actually didn’t lose my mind. Because for me, my meditation is always in movement and I’m like, well, that’s not f’ing happening. I am on a scooter and crawling up the stairs.

    Alison Haase:

    And I was next to my kitchen all day and it’s I didn’t think about food once. I wanted to restrict naturally because I’m not doing anything. So I doubled down with my professionals, and they were like, this is when you need to keep eating. You need to heal. And I did what they said. And I was just like, I’m going to trust that everybody in the universe wants what’s right for me.

    Alison Haase:

    And I’m going to heal. And I didn’t binge. I didn’t purge. I didn’t starve. I didn’t do anything. And I just think what a testament to my recovery. And I didn’t lose my mind not exercising. So that’s where I really also knew my relationship with training is training. I’m not doing it as a reward or a punishment.

    Alison Haase:

    And I was okay. And it was like I got a new perspective on body, and nourishment, and the steps, and then I was released from jail and then COVID happens, right? And so now races and competition are taken away. My book is out there. And so initially, I thought I had to promote my book because why would you publish a book and not? So that’s part number one, right?

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Yeah. That makes sense.

    Alison Haase:

    But then there’s also this part of where my eating disorder and alcoholism was, it’s I’m not enough if I don’t achieve this. So if I’m not the next Glennon Doyle, I didn’t do anything with my f’ing life. But then I started to be reconnected with what happened with the horses. I love riding. It is really cathartic. I know I’m a good rider, and part of me feels like I have to do it.

    Alison Haase:

    But then I was like, wait a second. If this isn’t bringing me joy, I don’t have to do it. And so I was hustling hard for my book, freaking Instagram. I hate Instagram. I don’t know why, I can’t not suddenly have food pictures and abs. I don’t know how that happens. I’m like, no, just give me names of holier than Thao goodness. I don’t need Mac and cheese and then a six pack. How does this happen.

    Alison Haase:

    So anyway, I had a good run with it. And not saying I’m giving up. I’m here, I’m talking, and I love this, but I needed to slow down a little bit and back off and get back into me and my body and why am I doing this? I died last summer and I lost weight that most people would say, I didn’t need to lose, but I also have learned it’s our body. We’re allowed to do whatever we want with it.

    Alison Haase:

    And I’m in a place of awareness, but also respect to God wants me to feel good about myself. So if I do this safely and it doesn’t distract or detract from how I am in my everyday life, it’s okay. Just know there will probably be consequences. I’m more obsessed. I am more distracted. If there’s a takeaway, it’s I spent years building a foundation before I started dabbling in anything else bod wise.

    Alison Haase:

    Dieting I think is fine as long as… Well, of course it’s fine. It is just fine. But for me, it’s fine as long as it doesn’t rob me of my connection and take me away from my life. And I’m still working my way back because I lost more weight than I needed. It’s just happened. And then the demon was back. This feels good. Loose pants. Don’t look sexy. Feel f’ing awesome. And it just was like it started to grab me again.

    Alison Haase:

    But what I will say is because I had such a strong foundation of doing the next thing right with my body and food, that I never strayed from my food plan. I never changed my training. I never stopped with my support team. And there’s a lot to be said for that with food recovery. No matter what, I don’t skip a meal or add a meal. No matter what, I don’t, whatever.

    Alison Haase:

    And me personally, I plan my meals a week ahead because it’s just easier for me. I plan things I want to eat and look forward to. Then I have my groceries. It’s done. I can prep my food. Fine. The whole point again for me, is to stop thinking about food and body so I can live in between those meals. And so that’s a practice that I have. And so I listened to that damn sugar addiction podcast and I was like, I wonder. And I’m not blaming you and Dr. Collins, as I know you wouldn’t take that on anyway.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    No. It’s all you.

    Alison Haase:

    But I did start doing some research. And then I was like, hold on. This is my disease grabbing onto the next sexy thing because living in the gray f’ing sucks right now. COVID, I don’t have a competition, I slowed down with my book stuff. Who am I? Because if I’m not pursuing, I’m not. I’m just not.

    Alison Haase:

    And so the book has been even more of a testament to recovery because I’ve been able to kind of let go and then I’ll get a message from somebody like, “My client has this in their hands and is crying because they didn’t think anybody else felt this way.” And I’m like, that was why I wrote it. That is why I wrote it, not to be Glennon Doyle, because there’s only one of her, but to help someone.

    Alison Haase:

    You are not alone. And I say the F word enough that people are like, “All right. She gets it.” It’s not holier than Thao. I’m saying to them. And I also wanted to write it from the perspective of we are always recovering. I have not figured this out. So I got grabbed by the podcast and I was like, no, I actually am not white knuckling my food.

    Alison Haase:

    I’m okay. My food is okay. But then I start to get psychoanalytical about, what, am I gassier than normal? Am I bloated? Or am I full? So literally today I was about to pay someone $700 for the low-FODMAP diet, which after years of working so hard to eat more flexibly, is not how I want to go. Now, I’m willing to do what I need to do for my health, but thank God, my recovery voice is stronger to be like, you’re just uncomfortable.

    Alison Haase:

    And that seems the next right thing disguised as a healthy motive and less my goddamn sponsor. She’s always like, “What are your intentions?” I’m like, bitch, to lose 10 pounds. And it’s like, is that what God wants? Is that part of recovery? And that’s a hard part of recovery, but that is recovery.

    Alison Haase:

    The great thing about the man I have in my life today, who’s younger than me by just a little, but oh my God, right? Just he is not swayed by my emotional fraught appeal or my body changing. He’s here for me. I’m not a dud. I’m aware of that. But he didn’t say one thing when I lost weight.

    Alison Haase:

    He didn’t get more excited. In fact, I’m pretty sure he was like, didn’t notice. But what a blessing. He eats whatever he wants. If he’s full, he stops. If it doesn’t taste good, he throws it away. Not my language. If you’ve started eating, you finish eating, you finished all of what you’re eating.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    You don’t like it, [inaudible 01:22:24].

    Alison Haase:

    Do that. Eat more and eat all of that. But he supports me. He supports me and he just wants me to be happy. So you want a pizza today? Fine. You’re going to eat celery. Fine. Just let me know what we’re doing. And he’s here for me, and I know my recovery attracted him.

    Alison Haase:

    So his whole body thing is between me and God. And I’m allowed to change it if I don’t like it, but it’s no longer a response to it’ll make my life better or I’m enough if. I’m awesome and my body is awesome. I can have both. It’s no longer, I’m awesome because, or only if my body is awesome.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Right. Learning to see your body in a whole, as a co-conspirator in your happiness.

    Alison Haase:

    Your friend.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I like that you call her. You separate because it’s harder to hurt somebody else in for our case. If we identified ourselves, especially as caretakers, it’s harder to hurt someone else. And if we separate, then that’s an injury. I like that. For people who maybe don’t know much about eating disorders, how does someone…

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I want to wrap up with a takeaway and the takeaway being, if someone heard this and they’re like, well, I don’t know if food is a problem. It might be a problem. If they’re curious about it, how would someone go about figuring out if they have a food problem?

    Alison Haase:

    Oh, geez. In my experience, no one comes to OA on a field trip. And I’m not saying go to an Overeaters Anonymous meeting, but I’ve typically not met people questioning their food or relationship if there isn’t something to question. So if you’re in that space, find a community. Find some kind of support.

    Alison Haase:

    So tell someone. It could be a 12-step group. I know you guys have different groups. It could be there’s so many local hospitals and outpatients. Google, right? Where do I go if I’m struggling with food.

    Alison Haase:

    What I wouldn’t do is read a book and then do a diet because that is only addressing the symptom potentially and not the reason why, which is why recovery is behavioral and not topical. Diets are great, but they don’t address why you’re trying to change your body or you’re struggling. So I always say, share with someone and then find a group. Find a community.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Awesome. Can you tell us the name of your book and where people can find your book?

    Alison Haase:

    Sure. So it’s called The Addict In Aisle 7, and it is on Amazon, and it’s got a pretty little butterfly about the shopping cart going down the aisle.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    I love that.

    Alison Haase:

    And it’s also on Kindle

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Okay. So people can download it in Kindle.

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Okay. So on Amazon. And then do you have a website that you want to tell us?

    Alison Haase:

    Yeah. So my blog, which I haven’t written a blog in a while, but there’s lots of goodies. Iseektruths.com. Well, if you Google my name, you’re going to see butt shots for bodybuilding, horses, and then my blog. So you’ll get it all. You’ll see it all. I’ve lived a lot of lives.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Sounds like the full package.

    Alison Haase:

    Full package.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Alison, you’re fantastic.

    Alison Haase:

    Thank you.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    Thank you so much for being here. I really appreciate you.

    Alison Haase:

    Thank you, Ashley. This was so fun. Thank you.

    Ashley Loeb Blassingame:

    This podcast is sponsored by lionrock.life. Lionrock.life is a recovery community offering free online support group meetings, useful recovery information and entertainment. Visit www.lionrock.life to view the meetings schedule and find additional resources. Find the joy in recovery at lionrock.life.

    Ashley Jo Brewer

    Ashley Avatar

    Ashley Jo is one of the producers of The Courage to Change: A Recovery Podcast team. With over a decade of experience working with C-level executives and directing corporate training events, she brings extensive production experience to Lionrock. In early 2020, she made a significant career change and stepped into the realm of podcasting.

    Her recovery experience includes substance abuse, codependency, grief and loss, and sexual assault and trauma. Ashley Jo enjoys supporting others in recovery by connecting with people and being a leader. She shared her story in Season 3, Episode 92 of The Courage to Change.