What is Gray Area Drinking? 

It describes the space where most drinkers live: a place between being able to ‘take or leave’ alcohol and hitting some kind of a ‘rock bottom’ where you are experiencing external consequences associated with being on the alcohol use disorder spectrum or identified as signs of alcoholism. 

In a world where everything seems to be black and white, where either you have a problem with drinking or you don’t, there are so many of us who try to moderate our drinking and struggle to do so. 

• You might not experience outward consequences from drinking, but struggle internally. 
• You have silent conversations with yourself about your own drinking. 
• You intend to have one glass of wine, but then find it easy to finish the whole bottle. 
• You stop drinking for days, weeks or months, but then start drinking again and find yourself back in the same place.

It’s a really confusing place to live when you realize that the way you drink isn’t helping you have the life you want but you live in a world where drinking is all around you. 

So how do you know if it’s time to make an “early exit” from the drinking life? 

And what does that even look like and feel like? 

Those are the questions we're digging into today with my guest, Jolene Park. 

Jolene is a functional nutritionist, a health coach, a TEDx speaker, a former gray area drinker and the creator of the gray area drinking recovery hub.

Jolene describes the term “gray area drinking” as the kind of drinking where there’s no rock bottom, but you drink as a way to manage anxiety and then regret how much and how often you drink. 

In this episode, we discuss:

• What gray area drinking is. How to determine if you’re a gray area drinker and what to do about it.
• Why so many of us use alcohol to downshift and calm down at the end of a busy, stressful day.
• Jolene’s personal alcohol and anxiety story and why she decided to make an early exit from the drinking life. 
• What drinking does to your body.
• How to eliminate alcohol and sugar cravings and reduce anxiety by using real food, high-quality nutrients and cutting-edge mind/body techniques.
• The functional impact of food, emotions, environment and movement in relation to our physical bodies.
• The importance of replenishing our neurotransmitters and nourishing our nervous systems in a comprehensive and consistent way.
• The missing pieces that have been overlooked in traditional recovery programs such as neurotransmitters (GABA, serotonin, dopamine), blood sugar imbalance, and nutrient deficiencies like B6 and zinc (pyroluria).
• Specific supplements that boost your GABA
• Holy basil
• Lemon balm
• Passion flower
•  Inositol
• L-theanine

About Jolene Park:

Jolene Park coaches high achieving professionals who want to eliminate alcohol and sugar cravings and reduce their anxiety by using real food, high-quality nutrients and cutting-edge mind/body techniques.

Shownotes: www.hellosomedaycoaching.com/25

Grab your  Free Sober Girls Guide To Quitting Drinking

Connect with Jolene Park

Visit Jolene’s Website: https://www.healthydiscoveries.com/ 

Follow Jolene on Instagram @jolene_park

Watch Jolene’s TEDx talk: https://www.healthydiscoveries.com/tedx-talk/ 

Listen to the Editing Our Drinking and Our Lives Podcast with Jolene Park & Aidan Donnelley Rowley

Connect with Casey McGuire Davidson

Website: www.hellosomedaycoaching.com

Instagram: Casey @ Hello Someday Coaching (@caseymdavidson)

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HelloSomeday 

Listen to more podcast episodes to drink less + live more.