How Giving Up Alcohol Transformed Everything, with Dr Alex George

0:04Me deciding to stop drinking was the single best decision I've ever made bar nothing. There is nothing in my life that has come close. No career decision, no path. That is the single best decision I've ever made. Everything else that follows on is because of it. I suspect it will be for a long time. That was the voice of Dr. Alex George, an A &E doctor, a reality star, turned a mental health advocate, a podcaster, a youth mental health ambassador, and now an author. But behind all of those campaigns and all of that incredible work, behind his public face was for so long a man medicating his life with alcohol.

0:41So December 4th 2022 sitting in a hairdresser's chair Alex was at rock bottom 20 stone drinking to suppress the grief of losing his brother to suicide and it was at that moment that he took an honest look in the mirror and it was the catalyst for transformation. He gave up alcohol and as you've just heard at the start of this episode it changed everything for him and we're about to explore why so many of us are auto enrolled into drinking why it's the only drug you have to explain that you don't take and the three groups of people that alex believes should never drink at all please make sure you hit subscribe and share this live recording with dr alex george with someone that you think may well benefit from the amazing wisdom that he's got to share as we welcome alex to high performance

1:30alex thank you so much for for coming and talking to us it's really nice to see you again Before we sort of get on with the structure of the conversation, I just think the way that your journey and your career has gone since Love Island has been absolutely fascinating to watch from the outside. What's it been like to actually be in the middle of it? Because you seem to be doing a different project and a new thing every single time I talk to you. Maybe that's ADHD, I don't know. I think it's been an interesting experience. There's many lows and highs and everything in between, to be honest. People often ask me the question, like has it made your life better are you happier and i couldn't honestly say i think my life is better off because of everything that has happened i think i've experienced so much and i think i probably contributed more yeah and i think i've done more because of it but actually when i look at it in many ways so i used to work um we're obviously recording this in central and i used to work at king's college london which is not far away and then i eventually went over to lewisham to work i loved that loved the hospital i worked at a and e it was a dopamine heaven uh with with ADHD, kind of running around this, you know, you're stabbing here and something else going on there.

2:37It was chaos, but I loved it. And I used to cycle to work every day. I'd do my job, had a good group of friends. Life was kind of good. And then I got persuaded to go on the show, literally dragged on the show, actually, mostly. Thought it was a two-week holiday, which was perfectly aligned. My contract was ending at the hospital. And turned out things went very differently. But, you know, I'm very grateful. I managed to do lots of different things in my life but I don't think that doing lots or being externally successful actually makes you happy necessarily it's always going to be within it's interesting isn't it as you get older I like there was a period where I thought like happiness is the goal right but actually the more that you live the more that you do things the more success or failures that you have along the way you more the more you realize that happiness is one of the most transient things that a human being can experience and that you just because you're not always happy doesn't mean you're always on the wrong path and I think so often in life as soon as people think well I'm not very happy doing this they have to chop and change but it's um it's a dangerous game the chase of happiness isn't it I think so I think um I think a lot of people probably get really stuck because they're chasing this um feeling which is actually one of many deflections from a baseline I guess happiness is is a that's you know floaty feeling of sat in the uh in the park the sun shining with your friends, that's kind of like a feeling of warm, like happiness.

3:55But that is just a deflection. You know, the purpose of sadness is important, of grief, of anger, frustration, all the kind of other emotions are really important. But I think we kind of put happiness on a pedestal and demonize lots of other feelings. And I think therefore, when you do feel angry or upset or like anxious at times, I think you then think that you are kind of failing. What we don't want to do, obviously, is get stuck in an emotion. And that's where the challenge really starts. Like if you're happy all the time, you might be suffering for mania. And that's a problem. That could be a real problem.

4:26That's what's wrong with me. But it's kind of like every emotion has its job. And I think it's trying to find a time where you can apply the right ones at the right times. And that's what I guess we're all trying to figure out. Absolutely. Well, can you take us to what the emotion was like on December the 4th, 2022, sitting in a chair at the hairdressers? Yeah, that was an interesting time, which now as we record this is like coming up to three years ago i was in a very difficult place at that time you know and um it's odd sometimes that you're the last person to see how bad things are and the kind of backstory to that was um i kind of sat down on that day and look on the hairdresser's chair and i kind of you get asked and you're like what we're going to do for you today and i looked in the mirror and i was like christ i don't know where you're going to start bloody lost here hell and i think there's a realization that i was like it wasn't just the physical appearance being like 20 stone overweight puffy face dark-eyed all these different things it was like looking within into my eyes i was like i don't actually it's a very frightening experience but i don't recognize i'm completely lost here and i think what had happened really i think probably i don't think love island was like a starting point for for the badness if you like but i guess you put into the public space i was then kind of like what am i going to do with this i went back to A &E, started working, talking about health, things started becoming clear on my path, I guess.

5:50The pandemic hit and I was like, I feel a real calling. I want to do something positive here. And then something happened, which often, sometimes the worst things that happen in your life is not expected. I think we often think we can worry and predict. And if we worry loads, you can control the outcome. And actually the truth is often, as my mum put actually after this happened, the worst things in life are often the things you hadn't even imagined. Like my mum was what she'd call herself a warrior all of her life. And she said, I worried about everything. And the worst thing that actually happened, I hadn't even had a moment's thought that it could.

6:27And so I'm referring to the phone call I got from my dad one day on a summer, sunny evening, sat with my friends to say that my brother just died and that he died by suicide. And that kind of moment, I'll never forget it. I mean, you're sat there with almost, you know, sat at the table, sat at the table here, you put your phone on the side, don't you? You're kind of chatting with your friends, looking at the starters. And we had a kind of agreement in our family that if something is wrong, ring through twice, because often I'm doing stuff like this. If you ring once, like it stops ringing, it's just ringing for a chat.

6:59Ring in twice, important. So obviously he did that. And I picked up the phone, and as soon as I heard his voice, I said immediately before he spoke, who has died? And I'd never in my wildest dreams imagined that would be my brother. and I assumed it was a car accident or a heart attack but when I found out it was suicide obviously that was life changing so what did I do? I worked hard afterwards started campaigning, doing all this stuff and drank loads of booze so it wasn't working, I was drinking so fast forward, what happens? you end up sat in a chair completely lost thinking, shit, what am I going to do now?

7:31and that was that day I was like, I can't continue like this anymore I was in a mess so that was the rock bottom moment for you? yeah, and I think it was and you don't have to get to rock bottom to stop drinking. There's many people that option out or many people who moderate well before and drink mindfully, I guess people like to say. But for me, it had to be that point and that moment. And really, I look back on my life and think that I'd been medicating with alcohol for probably most of my life. Really? Taking the edge off things. Yeah, I think so. Without realizing. I mean, if you look at...

8:03I was diagnosed with ADHD actually not long before I stopped drinking. and I think almost I wasn't ready to stop at the time I was diagnosed. I kind of carried on for a few months because I just wasn't really to fully accept what I was told. But I think all my life when I look back, alcohol is just a way of taking the edge off things, making yourself feel normal. I mean, many of us use it anyway for things like anxiety or like you go to a social situation, you have a quick drink before it calms you down. If you celebrate something, you have a drink. If something goes wrong, you have a drink. It's just used.

8:34But I was really medicating myself and what happened, I think what changed is suddenly it wasn't just to kind of round the edges, it was like to suppress and I think that change in that relationship was significant for me.

8:51A lot of people, I think when it comes to drinking, they don't realise there's a problem because they can't pinpoint a specific moment of trauma that might have led to this, right? But you did have a moment of trauma, you know, the death of your brother by suicide was a moment that a lot of people to deal with would have gone to therapy. They would have gone and seen a counsellor. Did you do that as well, or did you actually not deal with the grief at the time? I tried, but I think it's very difficult. I mean, I thought I was in shock for like a couple of weeks, but in reality, I think the shock lasted a year and a half, maybe even two years.

9:26I kind of, you lose almost insight. And my reaction was actually the very next day, I mean, I rung Harry, I think he was probably the second person I call. Harry's my manager sat here now. who I called at the time saying, look, my brother's died. Clearly, I was not speaking like that. It was quite a different kind of phone call. But I think it was like a day or so later, I was trying to carry on working, wasn't I? I was like, no, let's carry on working. I need to carry on. And this wasn't in a sense of like not caring. It was a sense of clinging on to like, I was falling into this hole and I was trying to cling on to any sense of normality of like what previous life would be like.

9:57And part of that was then working really hard. And yeah, when I was like not working, I was like, I just need to not feel. And I wasn't drinking like every night. I was drinking like three nights a week, but just a lot. And that cumulative effect at the time, plus not exercising, not looking after myself, not eating well, just was a compounding effect. And it's very easy to happen. It's so easy. You don't have to have a big trauma to get yourself in a difficult state. But I had to get to rock bottom to learn, I think, a lot of the stuff that I've learned on the other side, which has undoubtedly, I look back now, me deciding to stop drinking was the single best decision I've ever made bar nothing.

10:34There is nothing in my life that has come close into a decision, no career decision, no path, that is the single best decision I've ever made. I suspect it might, well, because everything else that follows on is because of it. I suspect it will be for a long time. Well, it wasn't the answer the hairdresser was expecting then, was it? No. When they said, what are we doing today? I said, well, it's going to be quite the dream. More than a trim. Let's talk for a moment. More than a trim today. Obviously, you did get your hair cut, right? Yes. after looking in the mirror and thinking this isn't like this something has to change i think a lot of people maybe some people in this room have had that moment where they're just like i'm just not happy i need to change something but then you go and have a drink or you go and have a meal or you go and see your friends or you go to work and that that moment's quite fleeting and maybe it comes back in a few months or a few weeks for you was it quite fleeting and you carried on as you were or was that literally you left the hairdressers and things had changed and what if so immediately what had changed well i was at a point where i could not continue yeah i was really at a point where this was now in a desperate state what how much were you drinking um i i was kind of i was drinking like three nights a week and i was drinking like i mean when i was really going for like eight pints nine pints something like that like you're like pissed a lot of the time yeah well it's only when i was drinking on the weekends yeah i mean when i was working i was working and actually to be perfectly honest with you the amount of i was drinking was probably not so different to a lot of people that live in London and just do it under the guise of fun but I think the reason had changed I think the effect clearly that amount is a significant amount of alcohol that's a lot but I think it wasn't just the quantity I think the why was very much tied in does that make sense it's like it's it's important the reason I think I think it's very different having you know look I personally because I will talk about a little bit some of the reasons I think that some people shouldn't drink but I think probably for me I shouldn't have ever drunk but I think some people can just like moderate and then do it for social reasons and enjoy that's fine but I think when the reason becomes very different and then it starts to run away you have to but yes I mean you know that day for me was like this has to change I mean you know it sounds very dark but when my brother passed away my the night after me and my brother Elliot who's you know here and my parents we all made a promise that none of us would ever leave that what has happened is so bad that no matter how much we kind of suffered because of it, we would always stay.

12:58And so I was like, well, if I'm staying, I better change and I need more than the haircut. So, you know, from that day onwards, like the two promises I made that day was, I'm not drinking anymore and I'm going to walk every morning. And I said, that sounds ridiculous, but I was like, I need to just feel grounded and outdoors. And my childhood was kind of running around, playing in the field, being in nature. And I was like, I just need to go back to that. And funny enough, that's kind of where the Stompcast came from. It was like, I need to just walk every morning to ground myself and walk for hours to get the stuff out of my head.

13:27And it became like the basis of like everything else that changed. Because a lot of people will say, well, you know, you've run London Marathon this year. You know, you're fit, you're strong. You've changed so much stuff. You've lost all this weight. You've done... I didn't start with that. And I think when you're trying to make a big change, I think a lot of the reasons people fail or don't do it on that occasion is because they're trying to do too much. I literally was like, I'm not drinking and I'm going for a walk every day. and then after a few weeks I was like kind of enjoying this walking's helping I'm now going to like I used to enjoy lifting weights I'm going to go to the gym lift weights I was way too overweight to run I was too heavy to run because I'd hurt my knees and things but I was like I'll start with weights and then eventually I was like I kind of probably should eat a bit better if I'm going to lift weights I want to feel my body and you can see how things and I built upon that and then you know that turned into I'm probably slim enough now I can go for a run for a couple of like 2k or 1k or whatever and then you follow that on for a couple of years and you run a marathon or whatever You don't have to, but that's how I get there, step by step.

14:21And did you also address the underlying trauma that was the reason for the drinking? Which is the hardest thing. I mean, putting down the bottle is the easiest bit. It's the dealing with the problems. Now, I didn't have an addiction. Addiction is a difficult concept because it depends on how people look at it because I guess a habit is something you turn to without conscious choice or that you're driven to repeat. So people are largely addicted to their phones. It's a conversation I think. people don't want to have particularly, but it is one of the most common addictions there is. You can't compare the consequences necessarily to other forms, but it is a habit that's an impulse.

14:56So in some sense, you could say it was habitual, but I very much felt like I could stop and I didn't have to do it. I was doing it deliberately for a reason. And when I stopped, I chose to. And this sounds great. And it sounds very positive and doing the exercise and eating less and stopping drinking. Fantastic. But there is obviously one other element that you would have brought back into your life that would have been really difficult is that when you're not drinking, you have to feel emotion. Yeah. And you'd already said you were drinking to sort of numb the pain of what happened. So what was that like when, for the first time probably in a long time, you actually had to sit with your own feelings?

15:30The most difficult part of it was, I say, putting down the bottle was like allowing everything to come up and you had to deal with your emotions. And that is a very difficult thing. I think that first year was the hardest year of my life. Not necessarily the year my brother passed away, but the year I kind of had to face that stuff because you know I was quite traumatized by what happened there's lots of other stuff that's happened in my life it's very difficult even the anger and frustration around being diagnosed at 31 with ADHD having a life of many challenges that could very much been avoided all of that stuff was just there and you have to deal with it and yes I brought in therapy and actually I managed to persuade my therapist which is quite new at the time to do my therapy walking because I don't like sitting still too long and I was like I feel like when you sat still it's very hard to like talk in the same way and so we walked and did all I did most of my therapy hours and hours and hours of it just walking and are you still in therapy yes I am but I it's funny because I think um you know I'm going through an assessment for autistic spectrum at the moment and I think in reality the older I get the more I'm actually looking back and realizing how much was already there since I was very young.

16:43I'm dealing with OCD as well at the moment. I think OCD is probably there since I've been a very young age. I find it very fascinating, actually, if you look at neurodevelopmental disorders, OCD, autism, ADHD, it's all very quite closely linked. And the prevalence and coexistence of all of those is very high in certain people. And I think probably all of that has played a huge picture in my life. And to be honest, I look at my dad, my dad to me is certainly autistic and has ADHD. Elliot, my brother, I believe firmly does as well. He's going to go through assessment. And I think probably theory did, you know, because it's so strong within us.

17:20We can see it within one side of the family pretty strongly. And I think the shame is, and there's questions around, well, if that had been picked up at a younger age, could it have been different for all of us? I think certainly for my life, my life would have been very difficult had I have different had things had been picked up. I wouldn't have drunk. You know, I often say to people I do talks now, I genuinely believe that there are three groups of people that shouldn't drink. For many people, I go to pub with my friends and they can drink mindfully and whatever, fine. But there's three groups of people I think that really shouldn't drink.

17:52And I think the first group is anyone with ADHD, because ADHD is a dopamine deficit disorder. The name is rather stupid, doesn't really explain a lot of what people experience. but at its core you have a lack of dopamine in certain parts of the brain, particularly the prefrontal cortex. And the job of the prefrontal cortex is to regulate your decisions. It's like a man or woman sat in a control room pulling levers and fundamentally that person's had a few too many beers and pulling the wrong levers a lot of the time, which means that emotional reaction isn't great, executive functioning can be quite poor, impulsivity can be high, inhibition can be poor, As well as, obviously, there's lots of parts of it that can be great outside-the-box thinking, but at the core of the problems of ADHD, it's executive functioning.

18:37It's making those controls. So when you pour alcohol in to an already disinhibited brain that's impulsive, that probably doesn't always make the best decisions, it's a recipe for disaster. That's why 40 % of ADHDers have alcohol misuse disorder. Significant number go on to have significant addictions and so on. so I think ADHD is definitely one to avoid alcohol I in my opinion the second group I think is anyone who's stuck in life I wonder in the room how many people have felt stuck and be like oh why can I not get where I want to be I can't get to my dream job or I you know really been meant to be consistent in the gym and I always fall out of the gym ask yourself the question is alcohol getting in the way because I think for a lot of people it's like that lead ball around your ankle I had Tony Adams on the Stomp cast recently, an England footballer, and he was saying how Arsene Wenger said to him when he's quit drinking, like, God, it's amazing because you've been playing all these years at 70 % capacity while he's drinking, and now you've got 100%.

19:35And he's like, everything's so much easier. And he was amazing after that and won the double and did all this stuff. And I genuinely believe that's true. It can be the weight on your ankle. And the third group, and I think this is very important, is that anyone's struggling with any sort of mood issue. If you're low and you're depressed or you're anxious, look at alcohol like it is a depressant it is a anxiety inducing drug and i think often we just like because of how society sells this thing that alcohol should be the you know you're happy have drink you know it's bad thing to have a drink really look at that because that in itself can make you depressed and there's so many people if you're trying to get better look at the booze i mean it's not lost on me the fact that i was taking antidepressants for a year while i was drinking and i look back now and think probably didn't make much sense so you were removing the depression with one drug and then adding it back with another.

20:24But it's so common. And so many people... Well, it's so common because we're auto-enrolled into drinking in this society, right? So, like you've already said, if someone dies, you have a drink at the wake. When someone's born, oh, you have a glass of champagne at the christening. When someone gets married, you have a glass of champagne. When they get divorced, you might have a glass of champagne. It's like every moment in life, we celebrate with drink. And then I say this fully aware that we were serving spicy margaritas. But they were bloody good, right? and it's it's really interesting isn't it that like it's about the only drug where you have to explain why you don't take that drug and when you do people take the piss absolutely and you're like oh my god are you boring and no one's going to have a line of coke or you're dull well some people are I mean we're in London right and we work in the media so that does happen but it's like it's just so common I think it's just being able to make a choice and like it's kind of like like I say I sound like I'm really anti-alcohol and for me in my life I am but I go to the pub and my mates have a beer and I'm so comfortable with that because for them, they don't sit in those three groups or at least they, but yeah, they don't sit in one of those three groups and they make a choice.

21:31They go, I choose to drink but I don't drink eight pints in a difficult situation or I don't booze three nights a week. They're kind of doing it with a consciousness and I think the point around auto-enrollment is exactly that. How many people make a conscious choice to drink? I'm pretty sure most people just do it because that's what happens. So if you choose to do something, then that's great. It's a choice. You've weighed things up. But I don't think I ever made that choice. It was like, I was 15. It was like, here's a pint. We started playing rugby. It's like necklace beer, whatever it is.

21:59And then you went to med school and drinking was just, as part of med school as learning is, it was just part of what you do. And I just think that it's just being able to make a choice. For so many people, they can drink and be happy. And that's great. But I do think we should probably give people more of a choice at the younger age. So what would you say to anyone in the room who's thinking about giving up alcohol or drinking less alcohol. I saw a study recently. It said only about 7 % of people want to fully give up alcohol. But about 80 % of people wish they could drink a bit less alcohol.

22:28Most people say that they wish they could either drink a bit less or that they'd do it in a way that was no more control, but more cognitive, like more of a choice. I think it's a great experiment just to go for a period of time and try it. I mean, a lot of people do dry January, but I think the first 30 days is kind of like learning, how do I kind of do this? and I think the next 60 days when you feel the real benefits, if you can do 90 days, it's a good challenge. You save a load of money, put the money aside and go on holiday. It's amazing how bloody expensive it is to buy. Look, there's probably three of those margaritas, right?

22:57How much do they cost you down the road? How much do they be down the road? Yeah, 20 quid for one or 15 quid? So go for your life. Yeah, yeah. So make the most of it tonight. I think, yeah, I think... Is that the right messaging? I think it's something worth giving a try. And then I think, like, for example, people go, what's the point of doing dry January? All the studies show that for the vast majority of people do go back to drinking after dry January. They drink more mindfully and they have a better relationship with alcohol. It does actually benefit their health. So give it a try. You know, why not?

23:26I also, and as you know, I'm not teetotal, but I drink a lot, like very, very rarely. I've got a friend that only buys like 300 pound bottles of red wine. I will drink when I'm with him just to try that red wine. Only with him, of course. Only with him. But I don't drink. And I'll tell you, I think a lot of it is to do with hosting high performance for the last six years, the number of times that we've had conversations with people and they've said the biggest barrier to success is people are unable to do the hard thing. If you can do things that are hard, it sets you on a path to success. And I actually really like the fact that not drinking is hard.

23:59And I think it's a great thing to be able to say no. Let's see how much strength we have as human beings, you know? I think it's really important. It's easy to talk about the other side of it. I guess that's how we start the conversation. But I'm much more in control of my emotions. I'm more productive than I have ever been. I run like six or seven different projects. I'm starting another business. I'm a calmer person. I'm better to be around most of the time. I get to do a lot more in life. I started riding motorbikes. Okay, you could argue one vice for another. I don't know, but I ride motorbikes carefully.

24:28I've traveled so much this year and I think I was able to plan and do those things and carry them out and enjoy them. When I go on holiday now, I remember all the holiday. I never sleep till midday hungover. I do the fun activities you're the ones you plan you go to a city and think oh I'm going to do those really cool activities but then you end up drinking you don't see any of the city I get to do that stuff and also I kind of think there's that thing I did enjoy certain parts of my drinking for sure I had some great times but if you're going to spend 15 years of your life doing something it's kind of fun to do a while of your life doing something else like is it I had to remember this one time actually not before I'd stopped drinking but I remember before I think a lot of people have this right it's like midnight isn't it you're in the pub and you've had six or seven pints and you look around and think like, what the hell are we all doing here?

25:13Like, why am I not in bed? Like, you just have this moment of odd clarity, don't you? It's like drunk clarity of like, what is going on? The floor's sticky, the music's bloody annoying. This person's telling me the same story the third time. It's kind of funny. You're just like, what am I doing? So I think there's some element of try something different. Yeah. Have you ever met anyone that's regretted giving up drinking? I haven't. Never in my life. I haven't. I genuinely haven't. and I think that's probably why a lot of people are doing different. But look at the stats for kind of like 18 to 21-year-olds, 18 to 23-year-olds.

25:42It's kind of nearly half of them just don't drink at all. I think probably because people want to be, want to have different aspirations and goals to what I guess we were told was fun. I think the idea of fun is changing. It's more experience, health-based, traveling, doing things rather than, you know, going to a club, et cetera, you know? That's totally right. I mean, I remember when I went to university or the age I never went because I failed my A-levels, but the age I could have gone to university. Nobody went to the gym. My mum and dad, like, it was not a thing. Now, universities are just full of people in the gym all the time.

26:14I think we've definitely moved away from drinking and definitely towards doing more exercise. One thing you said at the beginning that I thought was really interesting, you said going on Love Island was kind of the start of the bad stuff. Maybe it wasn't linked, but it felt like that. Most people would go, well, you went away, you were on a TV show, you were on a lovely island with a load of good-looking people having a great time. What were the challenges of going on a show like that? And why did it sort of signal the start of this tough period? I don't think the show was kind of irrelevant to the rest of it afterwards.

26:46I just think that my life changed a lot afterwards. What the show was kind of was almost irrelevant. I think change is something that can be amazing but unsettling as well. I think, for example, I moved to London from being in Exeter. I'm from West Wales, sleepy area. Go to Exeter, still quite sleepy. you come to London it's like this was my dream job I had a post on my wall studying at uni at King's College London I watched 24 hours on A &E I was like I want to work in a hospital when I moved here and got my dream job I was like oh my god like petrified and scared and in many ways it was unsettled I was like but this was the dream so I think change can be a big thing and I think I had just such an overhaul like I had 200 followers going on that show I had no agent I had no idea that I when I say people go oh I had no idea I was looking for love I wasn't necessarily looking for love I thought it was a sunny holiday but I wasn't looking for a career.

27:35I can say that honestly. I was going to be two weeks back to A &E. That was the plan of action. It didn't go to plan. But yeah, I mean, look, it did change my life and a lot of things that followed have allowed me to do things that I'm very proud of and I have to be grateful for that. You can't change the past. All you can do is learn from things and you learn from your mistakes, learn from things you do well and you move forward. I think being stuck in the past is not a helpful thing. We've got some questions from you all, which I'm looking forward to hearing. So I look forward to seeing who the first person is brave enough to put their hand up.

28:09Before we do that, though, I just want to mention your new book, Am I Normal? It's out on January the 15th. And he's such a lovely, humble bloke. He's like, oh, please, I don't really want to talk about the book. I don't want to make this a sale thing about my book. But before we take some questions, I think it's a really interesting book because we're in this space now where someone getting an ADHD diagnosis, right, is not a rare thing now. It suddenly is a big topic of conversation. but it's been a really really important period for you and you i think learned a lot about yourself and about the world having been through that process of a diagnosis yeah i mean and actually i must be honest and people often say the book right works hard i've written a couple of books now this is probably the hardest things i've ever done i think it's so hard because it's not written necessarily an autobiography but i really like dug through like a lot of difficult things in my life and i the way i did it is that i basically like wrote down the questions that i was asked like how was childhood how do you deal with this like what was your relationship with like drugs and alcohol what was university like you know really digging into like personal stories what's your relationships like and so I use these as chapter titles and just like try to work out like is it me or is it the world and I did it while trying to like figure this stuff out and it's really interesting I learned a lot of stuff about myself that I hope other people will resonate with and might help them when they're kind of looking into these things but also I actually looked at the world and thought screw you quite a lot like you you know the world itself and the way we set society i've not just it's not this book's not really just about neurodiversion is for anyone because society works against you a lot of the time a lot of the stuff we blame ourselves for and that we're really hard on ourselves and that we measure ourselves to fail all these difficult things and experiences it's society not you and i think so much of the time we just we always think it's our fault that we're like this is going wrong or this is happening our lives actually society is really set up against you quite a lot of the time.

30:04Right, time for some questions. Who would like to go first? Fine, I'll go first. Hiya. No, very inspiring. What's your name? Olivia. Hi, Olivia. Very inspiring insights. Thank you. So I lived in Germany before, and yes, drinking culture, they're as heavy as well. But in England, I feel like it's really like pint after pint or drink after drink every Thursday, every weekend. And people can be quite pushy about it. So how did you handle that social pressure, especially at the beginning? I think that's the beginning, you know. And what did you say to push back against it? So there's lots of different approaches and people do it in different ways.

30:40But I really, I think fundamentally, the most important thing if you try alcohol-free living is that removing alcohol shouldn't take away from your life, should add to it. And I think a lot of the time in January, people stop drinking, stay inside, don't do anything, don't leave, don't talk to anyone, and then they're miserable and they wonder why. I think when you take the alcohol out, it's serving something. Fundamentally, if you drink alcohol, you drink it for a reason. You would not consume it if it didn't do something for you, whether that's taking the edge off, having fun, numbing like I was doing, doing something.

31:07So you have to replace it with something. So that's really important. And I think remembering why you're doing that is at its core, almost when you are pushing back on people. It's like, I'm doing this because I want to travel more or live more, be fitter, do more in my life. So remembering that for yourself when people are pushing you. But for them, it's all about how much do you want to say. People always say to me, oh, you're not drinking, how come? It's like, well, alcohol didn't suit me that well. Sometimes I'll just be like, I'm trying a different way of life. Or you could say I'm training for a run.

31:36You can tell them a white light, whatever you like. But I think just remembering it's not for them to dictate whether you should or shouldn't drink. But I just don't think it leave it too open. Just be like, I've decided to stop drinking for a while and I'm enjoying it. And I think it's worth, though, saying that there's a lot of people you'll find that actually ask out of curiosity. I have a lot of people asking me. Obviously, I guess people will know that I don't drink. But in the first instances, oh, how come? That's really interesting. And that's a very different question because then you can have a really nice conversation sometimes about it.

32:06And sometimes that might inspire them. But you're right. People can be pushy. And there is no doubt, I would say, there is no doubt there are certain people in your life that you will lose. I think when people struggle after a while when they quit drinking and the time it can be difficult is when you're not willing to let go of a former version of yourself. Do you know who talks about this? Sometimes you hear dads talk about it. So if you have a, my friend has got two young children, he said, when you have children, you've got to let go of the life of going out on the Friday night and all that kind of stuff and realise your new chapter is beautiful.

32:37Your old chapter was fun, but you've got something new. And that's how I see it. It's like, I can remember the nostalgia and some of the memories, some of the fun nights I had, some of the bad ones as well. But I just think you've got to embrace this new way of being. So if someone pushes you, you've got to accept that most of your friends will accept you. And if they don't, they're not really your friends. And they never were your friends, is the truth. They weren't ever your friends. You're not losing something. But I've gained so many friends. You meet new people in different ways and it's fine.

33:05Do you ever drink? Alcohol? Never. I've never drunk anything since that. but I didn't stop planning to quit forever I stopped trying to fix myself and then actually discovered I actually really like this life I genuinely can tell you I mean why would anyone quit drinking if it wasn't better I genuinely I genuinely can say hand on heart I enjoy life more it's better I enjoy it it's better for me in my life another question at the back there what's your name Rolf hi Rolf good evening if you look at HD HD assessments and it just even closed the waiting list now if you were lucky enough to get on the waiting list you still have to wait 8 years I believe so yeah it's an 8 years average wait list for adults in the UK in England yeah and so a lot of people wait for the confirmation to get the diagnosis and then try to change anything do you have any other tips for people to forget about the diagnosis but just drink less exercise more and what else can you it's absolutely right and i think the sad fact of it it's completely wrong really and just might address this and i really it sounds like i'm being very negative tonight but um people sometimes people go oh you know everyone's got adhd these days and it's just a fad and so on i think it's really important to realize how much adhd impacts people's lives so a matter analysis a really big study 35 000 people released very recently and they looked at longevity.

34:33And they looked at longevity of adults, neurotypical adults versus those with ADHD, but not treated. So they're untreated people with ADHD. And women on average lived eight years shorter lives and six years shorter for men. Really interesting question about why there's disparity between men and women. I think lots of typical barriers probably are in place that we can talk about. But the point is it really does affect people's lives. It's not just longevity, it's quality of life. So the likelihood of mental illness and all these things are higher. So the point around, does it matter that we do something, is absolutely.

35:06And I think that's why it's such a criminal injustice that the government doesn't do something about it. I mean, regularly, ADHD medications just run out in this country. And for months, people go without them. If you run out of diabetic medications, quite rightly, people will be like, what the hell is going on? So that needs to change. But unfortunately, because of that situation, we have to a lot of people have to kind of self-diagnose or recognize these things themselves and do something about it i would say the some of the best advice is on the adhd foundation website they give a lot of advice actually specifically for those undiagnosed as does autism uk i think it is for for those with autism around like what do you do if you are not diagnosed and like what are the steps that you can take and there's some great um there's some great you know content creators and actually podcasts out there one of the best ones adhd chatter and uh he has alex has amazing guests on experts giving advice like what to do so i think it's looking at that for me though fundamentally exercise being massive um i think understanding like the the what happens to adhd brain the lever stuff has been really important recognizing um impulses and so on and just trying of build a bit of a life that makes sense with ADHD.

36:21I'm very fortunate. I build my own time and things. So I kind of work. I fell into a job in A &E, which actually makes a lot of sense for someone with ADHD. So I think it's trying to build your life as best you can around that. You know, it's not easy, though. Brilliant answer. Time for a couple more questions, I think. Hi there. Loving this. Thank you so much to both of you. Just the question is about, there seems to be so much diagnosis on neurodiversity spectrum, whether it's ADHD or dyslexia, et cetera. But there seems to be almost like a comfort amongst Gen Z about it. But the stigma around severe mental illness, like bipolar disorder or schizophrenia, it seems to be really being pushed down.

37:06And I've got a question around your thoughts around it. I think there are certain mental health conditions that people are not ready, that still see, that are not palatable. And I think that's the truth. We've done a lot of good work, and I genuinely think we've done, the positive stuff is really good work around some of the stigma around lots of the common, yes, neurodevelopmental conditions, but things like anxiety and depression, even eating disorders, some good work there, lots of work to be done on the treatment side, but some positive work in that space. But I think things like bipolar disorder, disorder mania, schizophrenia, and these things, people still have a lot of stigma and fear around.

37:41And a lot of that fear is actually because of like stereotypes that I've seen in movies and films and stuff. In reality, working in A &E, I can tell you that these people that are, you know, that are really struggling are very rarely a danger to anyone except themselves. Obviously, there are examples where that isn't always the case. But I can tell you 99 % of the time, it's themselves that they unfortunately are the most danger to. So I think we do need to continue to do work around that. and we need to talk not just about the stuff like depression and anxiety, which is kind of really severe but more palatable in an odd way.

38:13We need to talk about what's seen as more difficult topics as well, I guess. And I think that only comes through education. All ignorance, in my opinion, is combated through education, majorly, I think. That's a great question. How many of us have met someone who's bipolar? Hardly any of us. It doesn't mean they're not there. It just means they've not been diagnosed. People don't want to say. Yeah, the number of times I've met people after talks and say that they have one of, say, those conditions, or even people who say, look, I've got autism, they say, I can't tell my workplace because I couldn't tell them.

38:45And there's a real fear. In the medical profession, actually, a huge issue in the medical profession, that people will not say anything. Because, yeah, but if I tell them, they'll be fine with it, but I won't get the surgeon's job. You know, I won't get that training program. The fear is real, I think. So interesting, because, you know, six years of high performance, I would say 80 % of the people that have sat opposite Damien and myself as guests on High Performance are neurodiverse in some way because... Self-selecting group, I'm afraid. Well, I would throw ourselves into the... I think you're right.

39:12And it's that desire to keep pushing and do a million things all at a million miles an hour and constantly chase success and never be satisfied. That comes at a price. Would I have been like, screw it, all right, then I'll go on the show? No, probably not. If I had any sense of the time, probably not. Exactly right. I think we've got one time for one last question. we'll do you as well we'll do two more yeah um you said that like looking back you into your childhood you probably have had adhd and hcd for a long time what do you think would have been different if you'd have known about it then as opposed to getting to your 30s before finding that i think so i think it's it's almost where do you even start i think um the way that i viewed myself and i understand the most powerful thing that happens when you uh understand who you are and how you behave and how you move through the world is that I think you treat yourself with a lot more compassion.

40:03You provide yourself the care that you deserve. And I think you can advocate better for what you need, both internally and to others. And often I think the question of people say, well, you know, getting a label, what's the point? If someone doesn't have a label of ADHD given to them, it doesn't mean they don't have it. And they end up with other labels like alcoholic, depressed, suicidal, in jail, a problem, the naughty kid, the angry person. There's all sorts of other labels they collect instead. Whereas if at a young age we address what is going on and you realise you within yourself can develop in that way, but also adaptations should be made for people.

40:39It may well be medication in a sense of ADHD. But also it's just being able to move through the world differently. I would never have drunk if I'd have known. If I knew what I knew now, I would never have drunk alcohol. And there's so much pain and things that have happened in my life that wouldn't happen, not just with alcohol, but in general. I'd have managed it so much better. Final question. Thank you. Thank you both for sharing as well. I'll try to definitely empathise with some of the things you've said. Things that I'm still going through myself. But did you sort of find any of the, is there five stages of grief?

41:10I think that's what you talked about. So did you sort of resonate with any of those? And then also probably like in the darkest times or whilst you're trying to make sense of what was going on after the news of your brother, But was there anyone you could reach out to? Or were you sort of just left to your own thoughts and your own feelings? And if so, how did you get through that? You know, the five... Do you know where the five stages of grief model came from? Not entirely, no. It's been pointed out, actually. I think there was a couple of websites on the Married to Married website. So it was designed, and it was designed to describe the stages of grief someone goes through when they're dying.

41:50and it's been taken and popularized to be how we would approach grief of someone else dying but the stages you go through in your own palliative experience is very different to the experience of what you see in others and i think largely the five stages of grief model has been by a lot of like modern experts so it's said there's not that you don't want to say that useful there's no such linear experience and most people experience grief would describe that I had someone called Dr. Chloe on my podcast, and she's an expert in grief. That's what she dedicates her life to. And I think she brilliantly describes this, that it's much more worth realizing that you kind of go in almost this figure eight of eight into different emotions of grief.

42:30You sit in acceptance sometimes, then you're triggered and you're upset and you're angry, and then you go through all these different feelings. And it's much more important that you're able to continue the figure eight of eight and flow. Almost like I said at the start, it's not being stuck. You don't want to be stuck in the center of like the hot, sad, angry grief for six months. You want to be sad for an hour or so and then move back into a state of the middle bit. Being stuck is the issue. And so I think when you start to realize that it's not an end goal, there's no end point, there is no end point, and you allow yourself the fluidity and you focus rather on going, okay, I'm going to feel sad for an hour or so, but then I'm going to like laugh, get on with it and move with my life as well.

43:09You accept that that's okay and suddenly you lose a lot of the weight. and it's just a strange thing that happens when you stop trying to do the impossible suddenly everything feels better because trying to be accepting of someone dying is largely impossible I think I don't know when you wake up when I'm 80 I'm going to wake up and be like do you know what, I'm cool that Clear killed himself at 19 and I just think that would be a strange place to try and get to almost so I think that really helps what's the second part of your question about trying to it was just like when you were at a low point dealing with the depression and the grief were the people you could reach out to.

43:45Obviously, we have our support network as family and friends, but sometimes, especially as a mayor, as you point out, you don't necessarily voice how you're feeling. So I'm just wondering, were you able to do that? And if so, how? But if you were dealing with those feelings yourself, what ultimately enabled you to overcome them or deal with them better? I think everyone needs that one friend that you can call. I don't know about you, but I've got my friend Adam, who I said about the two children, like I call one thing one thing's a good I call him birth so things are really bad I call him and you have to have that person I think that's kind of your lifeline but like I think generally trying to focus on three groups is important you need someone within your within a professional setting you need your therapist or someone that's there to like to actually look in and help you I think you need someone in your friendship or family group and then I think you need someone in your workspace as well I think very difficult when you're trying to show up at work and pretend to be okay all the time like masking is exhausting so i think it's very important to be able to be transparent at work and actually that's why it's so important within the workspace that people aren't afraid to say hey do you know what i'm actually miserably depressed at the moment because i've gone through this shit thing you don't know about but actually i've got to show up at work you know and i think a lot of that is very tiring for people so i think trying to have someone at least in those settings is is important and also for yourself just remembering as this tattoo says on my wrist this too shall pass it's kind of that there's a feeling that the pain of um sadness and depression and things is very clever because it gives us a feeling of permanence uh but of course no feeling is no feeling is permanent and and for depression it's a deliberate trick of the disease if you catch a virus for example if you catch the flu what do you feel like you feel tired you want to be on your own you want to withdraw lie in your bed stay away from everyone that's deliberate partly because your body wants to fight the illness, but also it is a protective mechanism for the herd.

45:37So by withdrawing yourself from the group, you're less likely to infect others. It's a design of the human race. Depression is very clever because it does the same thing. Because what do you do when you're depressed? You want to stay away from people. You don't want to speak. You don't want to do fun things. You don't want to laugh. You don't want to exercise. What's the cure? What's the opposite of depression? You know, if you ask someone, often people say, what do I do when I'm depressed? Say, what do you do when you're happy? what do you do when you're happy because that's what you should be doing so I think it's very important to remember that it's not permanent and I'm not going to do what the depression tells me to do because that's what it wants you to do is keep you depressed what a depressing note to finish on go and have margaritas look thank you for your question I'm sorry for what you've gone through and sending you lots of love and thank you so much for being here but the biggest thanks goes to Alex for opening up sharing so much and please get your hands on his book.

46:29It's out on the 15th of January. Listen to the Stompcast. There are so many amazing episodes from over the last few years. Including the one that we went on. I don't want to make a big deal of that bit. It's a bloody good episode. And we really appreciate all of you coming out this evening and thanks to Fora for making this happen. Alex George, everyone. Thank you so much. Thank you, mate. Well done, mate. Thank you. Well done. What a powerful conversation. So Alex's three groups who shouldn't drink, anyone with ADHD, anyone who feels stuck in life and anyone struggling with their mental health and I wonder how many of you thought wow that that is a category that I'm in well I guess here's the hope Alex hasn't met a single person who regrets giving up drinking not a single one and as someone who drinks an awful lot less than he did before I absolutely understand that and if you've been thinking for a long time that maybe you want to drink less or actually even drink not at all maybe this episode is the catalyst for you Alex's new book am I normal understanding your place in a complex world is a deep dive into ADHD, neurodiversity, and whether it's you that's broken or it's actually society working against you.

47:34And please, if you're struggling right now, remember Alex's tattoo that he talked about, this too short pass. Please hit subscribe, please share this episode with someone that needs to hear it, and we'll see you next time for another conversation on high performance.

47:55Thank you.