This episode can be listened to in tandem with Episode 85, also featuring Ash K, recorded almost two years later — offering a striking and meaningful comparison of early recovery and long-term growth.Recorded at the Tus Nua meeting when they were just under 11 months sober, Ash K shares a raw, searching reflection on what it meant to finally get sober for real. Rather than focusing only on not drinking, they speak about learning who they are beneath trauma, masking, and survival — including coming to understand their autism, ADHD, and the long-term impact of complex PTSD.Ash reflects on a childhood shaped by addiction, emotional neglect, violence, and repeated responsibility for the wellbeing of others, especially within their family. They speak candidly about growing up unseen, carrying adult roles from a young age, and how those patterns followed them into adulthood, substance use, and relationships. Alcohol became both escape and erasure — a way to disappear, numb anxiety, and avoid being fully present.In early sobriety, Ash describes a turning point that came not from consequences or intervention, but from exhaustion and self-honesty. Through connection in the room, therapy, and learning to unmask safely, they begin to experience something unfamiliar: self-compassion, emotional expression, and the right to take up space. They speak about grieving their mother, losing a business during the pandemic, and the quiet pride of choosing sobriety without external pressure or approval.This is an intimate, emotionally layered share about unlearning shame, breaking generational roles, and discovering that a sober life doesn’t require perfection — only a commitment to “no matter what.” A powerful snapshot of recovery in motion, and a revealing counterpoint to the person Ash becomes nearly two years later.

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