Tamara Mello is back (again… third? fourth? who’s counting), and I’m thrilled because she just hit three years sober with a January 2 sobriety date — which makes this time of year feel extra real. We talk about why “just moderate” can feel like a full-time job, why taking drinking off the table can weirdly bring relief, and how the holidays can either break you… or show you what you’re made of. Plus: sober parties, social anxiety, accidentally sipping the wrong drink, and why drunk people get louder while everyone gets less interesting.

Find Tamara's Etsy shop here: HERE

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I'm taking one more week off for the holidays but next week I'll be back with all new episodes! This is a great interview with Kathleen Wilhoite — actress, musician, writer, teacher, and one of the most honest, hilarious, and compelling people I’ve met. We talked about getting fired from a movie before even filming (swizzle sticks in a jean jacket were involved), and finding herself again through songwriting, teaching, and recovery. We also get into what long-term sobriety actually looks like — spoiler: it’s not always serene yoga mornings and green juice. It’s messy, hard, beautiful, and sometimes involves yelling into the void (and then calling your sponsor). I can’t wait for you to hear it.

Please go here to watch on YouTube: 

To follow Kathleen on Insta: @RealKathleenW

My insta: @SWilderTaylor

Tamara Mello came back a few days later to get a little more into dealing with a diagnosis of bipolar disorder along with her sobriety. It was a great discussion and worth bringing back especially right now around the holidays.

We're going back to the beginning with a fan favorite, my friend, Tamara Mello. Tamara is an actress (She's All That, Popular etc.), a mom and a jewelry designer (Grey By Tamara Mello on Etsy) and she's getting real on coming up on 3 years sober. 

This week I’m catching up with Tara Motter, and it really does feel like a girlfriend hang… except with microphones and considerably more accountability. We talk about the whole “cool wine mom” era (oops), the way drinking can turn into your entire personality, and Tara’s truly iconic alter ego, T-Rex. Tara also tells the story of the night she hit bottom—yes, there was a taxi situation, yes, there was jail—and how she rebuilt from there with meetings, honesty, and a plan that actually worked. Funny, real, and weirdly hopeful.  

You can find Tara on her TikTok,
Her IG @RecoveringFromSomething or her Substack which is Recovering From Something

You can watch this episode HERE

If you’ve ever wondered whether “drinking is just part of my personality” is a solid life plan, this episode is for you. I’m joined by the hilarious and brutally honest Sean Daniels, a theater director who managed to get fired from his dream job for day drinking, then turned his mess into an Off-Broadway play and a whole nonprofit, the Recovery Arts Project. We talk relapse (so much more common than people admit), brain chemistry, secret Mormon drinking, and why nobody brings you a casserole when you go to rehab. Come for the drunk stories, stay for the hope.

If you’ve ever Googled “Am I an alcoholic?” at midnight (hi, welcome), you’re going to love this week’s conversation with the author of The Sober Diaries, Clare Pooley. We get into her days as “Sober Mummy,” why she once hid red wine in a coffee mug, the absolute hellscape of dancing in heels sober, and how quitting drinking somehow also led both of us straight into the arms of sugar. Clare’s stories are sharp, hilarious, and painfully relatable. Grab your fancy sneakers and join us.

Clare can be found at her website ClarePooley.com and you can find her books everywhere.

If you’ve ever taken an “Am I an alcoholic?” quiz and argued with every single question… you’re going to love this one. Writer and mom of two Dana Bowman joins me to talk about growing up with a “dry drunk” dad, becoming the straight-A, teacher-of-the-year perfectionist, and then secretly drinking her face off on the couch. We laugh about wine-mom culture, hiding bottles in boots, and that first meeting where a guy with a spiderweb head tattoo basically saved her life. We also hit relapse, menopause, sugar binges, and her new book on sober menopause. 

Check out Dana's website

Watch the episode here

This week I sit down with Lisa Smith — author of Girl Walks Out of a Bar and co-host of Sober Living. Lisa and I get into everything from her New York lawyer days (including the part where she fully expected to die at 40) to the weekend routines she hid behind while her drinking spiraled. We talk about early sobriety, inpatient treatment, why some friendships shift and others surprise you, and the strange magic of a recovery community that somehow knows all your secrets before you tell them. 

Find Lisa at LisaSmithAdvisory.com 

This is the episode so nice I'm airing it twice!

Comedian and longtime podcaster Greg Fitzsimmons joins me for a candid, hilarious, and deeply honest conversation about his decades-long journey without alcohol—and why he never calls himself “sober.”

From getting drunk behind the bleachers at 13 to quitting after bombing a stand-up set in Boston, Greg opens up about addiction in his Irish Catholic family, dealing with anger, parenting in the age of weed vapes, and how comedy became his salvation. He also talks about his use of mushrooms for healing, his one-night relapse, and why AA wasn’t the right fit for him—even if its ideas stuck.
This episode is for anyone who’s ever felt like they didn’t fit into the “sober” box but knew they needed to make a change. 

For Greg's podcasts go to Fitzdog Radio or Childish and check out gregfitzsimmons.com for tour dates and everything else.

Watch Greg on YouTube

I’m joined by the brilliant and hilarious Anna David, who’s (almost) at 25 years sober and has the receipts. We get into the infamous “Fix” headline fiasco, why community laughter can be medicine, and how she accidentally checked into the other Promises—think broken hoop, not Malibu tennis courts. Anna talks getting sober at 30, the power of 12-step, and how EMDR rewired her life. We also compare notes on early motherhood being… let’s say “not a spa day,” and celebrate her new gig co-hosting Sober Living and running Legacy Launchpad Publishing. 

Follow Anna on everything @AnnaBDavid

And find her website at AnnaDavid.com

Watch the episode on YouTube 

In this conversation with Rosebud Baker, we trace a line from grief to grace: a political-family childhood near D.C., the loss of her little sister, finding alcohol, and then finding a room where people spoke her language. We talk about the slow work of sitting with feelings, Al-Anon, the beginnings of stand-up and writing, sobriety since 2006, pregnancy loss, IVF, becoming a mom, and the memoir she’s written along the way, Fully Baked. It’s a hopeful map for anyone who needs community, laughter, and permission to start again.  

This week I sit down with Jonathan Todd Schwartz, who went from daily sports bets and a secret coke spiral to embezzeling money from his high profile musician clients like  Alanis Morissette. We talk parenting while living a double life, the polygraph that blew everything up, and how it all changed. It's riveting from start to finish.

You can follow Jonathan on IG: @therealjonathanschwartz

You can watch the episode here

This week on Drunk-ish, I sit down with my friend Kate Anthony—author, divorce coach, and host of The Divorce Survival Guide Podcast. Kate opens up about how playdates with wine turned into nightly drinking, the shame spirals at 3am (“Holy fuck, I can’t believe I drove”  ), and the moment she realized alcohol was the problem, not her. We talk parenting, hitting that “I’m done” wall, what finally helped her quit, and how sobriety gave her the love, career, and life she never thought possible. Funny, heartfelt, and completely relatable, this conversation is one you don’t want to miss.

Find out all the info on Kate at her website KateAnthony.com

Her book is The D Word: Making the Ultimate Decision About Your Marriage
Her podcast is The Divorce Survival Guide

Watch this episode on YouTube

This week on Drunk-ish I sit down with Brenda Wilhelmson, author of Diary of an Alcoholic Housewife. Brenda opens up about juggling motherhood, her years of trying to “look perfect on the outside” while feeling wrecked on the inside, and the rocky starts that came before lasting sobriety. We talk about vodka martinis with dissertation-writing cousins, accidentally lighting her hair on fire at an office Christmas party, and the judgment moms face when they admit they’re struggling. Brenda shares how she finally found recovery, what helped her stick with it, and how her life has changed today. 

Imagine getting sober before you could drive. That’s my guest this week, Robin Reiser, who checked into rehab at sixteen and never looked back. Well… not willingly, anyway. Robin tells me about being busted by her parents after they found her diary (rookie mistake), what it felt like to think alcohol was her best friend, and the surprisingly relatable “not today” trick she still uses to quiet that little voice saying, “Maybe you could handle it now.” We swap stories, laugh about our old drunk logic, and get real about parenting sober.

Robin's IG @RobinReiser
Medium.com/@RobinReiser

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Imagine getting sober before you could drive. That’s my guest this week, Robin Reiser, who checked into rehab at sixteen and never looked back. Well… not willingly, anyway. Robin tells me about being busted by her parents after they found her diary (rookie mistake), what it felt like to think alcohol was her best friend, and the surprisingly relatable “not today” trick she still uses to quiet that little voice saying, “Maybe you could handle it now.” We swap stories, laugh about our old drunk logic, and get real about parenting sober.

Robin's IG @RobinReiser
Medium.com/@RobinReiser

Follow Drunk-ish on YouTube 

Please like and follow on Apple!

Richard Taite is back for part two, and this time we go deep into what parents really need to know about kids and drugs today. Richard explains how fentanyl shows up in everything from fake Percocet to weed, and how to have the hard conversations with our kids. We also talk about parenting through addiction, whether sending a teen to rehab for weed is overkill, and why he believes early, honest talks can save lives. And because it’s Richard, we still manage to laugh while comparing rehab to choosing between the Four Seasons and Motel 6  .

Richard Taite might be the only guy who can tell me about running into Charlie Sheen in a crack-fueled hallway at 3 a.m., slam the door on his own intervention because “nobody gets sober on a Thursday,", and then casually mention founding one of the most successful rehabs in America. On this episode, Richard and I laugh (because sometimes you have to) about his six-month drug runs fueled by Big Macs, what it felt like to land in a top bunk in sober living, and how sobriety gave him back his kids. Spoiler: he’s still alive to tell it.

Kim Evey is here, and let me just say: when your sobriety story includes Bartles & Jaymes in a high school bathroom, 99¢ store wine tastings, and accidentally peeing in your suitcase on Ambien… you know it’s going to be a good episode. We laugh about the “math” we used to do to justify three martinis before driving home  , the art of hiding booze in the kitchen cabinets  , and how motherhood makes “just one glass” an absolute scam . This one’s equal parts hilarious and terrifying, which pretty much sums up the experience of getting sober.

IG: @KimEvey

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