Episode 241: Allison Deraney

On the identities we no longer need, the alchemy of recovery, and mourning the person we used to be.

• (0:00) – Introduction and Background of Allison Derani
• (2:13) – Allison's Journey and Grief in Recovery
• (5:21) – Parenting and Self-Abandonment
• (7:04) – The Ambiguous Grief of Self-Abandonment
• (7:50) – The Liminal Space of Sobriety
• (18:39) – The Importance of Listening to Questions
• (22:57) – The Practice of Slowing Down
• (25:21) – Closing Thoughts and Future Plans

Allison Deraney is a woman in recovery from alcohol who credits sobriety for waking her back up to her first passion—writing. Currently a licensed real estate attorney, running her own business, she's writing more creativity into her days via her Substack, Dare To Be, and working on her first book, a memoir about the healing and revealing as we recover from the ambiguous loss of self-abandonment. Dedicated to speaking up and speaking out about living a conscious sober life, Allison lives in Massachusetts with her husband, two kids, and two rescue dogs, spending her free time wandering and wondering in nature, and cheering her kids on from the sidelines of the basketball court.

Allison's book-to-be is about grief; not the traditional kind, though there is some of that in there. The biggest lesson she's learned in recovery is this: Rejecting grief, in all its iterations, is a form of self-abandonment. Grief requires that we surrender to it. So does addiction, compulsion of perfection and aging.

It's a book that explores how my midlife journey is intersecting with the deeper parts of recovery in the most terrifying and beautiful way. It's a unique book in that it is written during the transformation. Because I am still in it. Sobriety has been my portal to Divinity and I'm here, feet planted on the threshold, weaving words to capture the experience as best I can.

https://allisonderaney.substack.com

Here are Allison's three favorite posts from her Substack, DARE TO BE, out of an immense pull to write through her sobriety.

https://open.substack.com/pub/allisonderaney/p/setting-off-our-own-fireworks-a95?r=rkt4u&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false

https://open.substack.com/pub/allisonderaney/p/its-been-a-whole-hand?r=rkt4u&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false

https://open.substack.com/pub/allisonderaney/p/my-permission-sticks-they-still-keep?r=rkt4u&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false