Author: Alysse Bryson

Mental Health Awareness Month called. It wants you to find 19 words. This month’s Sober Search is packed with the wellness terms, brain chemicals, recovery practices, and self-care essentials that make sober life actually work. Not the Instagram version of wellness where someone lights a candle and calls it healing. The real version. The one that involves therapy, sweat, setting boundaries, and occasionally ugly crying in your car before going inside and being fine. All 19 of those words are hiding in a 15×15 grid. Some are sitting right there in plain sight. Others are backwards, diagonal, or tucked into…

Two months in and Clued In is becoming a habit. The good kind. The kind your therapist would approve of. May is Mental Health Awareness Month, which means this entire crossword was built around the science, the practices, and the lifestyle choices that keep sober minds and bodies running on all cylinders. No filler clues this month. Every single answer is something you’ve either experienced firsthand, Googled at 2 AM, or discussed in a session you’re still processing. What You’re Walking Into Thirteen clues spanning the full spectrum of sober wellness. We’ve got neurotransmitters your brain is finally producing on…

I binged all ten episodes of Running Point Season 2 (Netflix) in less than twelve hours. I am not even a little bit sorry about it. Here is how it went down. I sat down, hit play, and the only time I moved was to get from the bathtub to the bed. The first three episodes happened while I was soaking in a hot bubble bath, iPad propped on the edge, completely checked out from the noise of the world. Then I migrated to my bed in cozy pajamas, cozy sheets, iPad in my lap, and Bella, my chubby Boston…

Jim Norton Has Been Sober for Over 30 Years. He’ll Be the First to Tell You It Didn’t Fix Everything. His whole career is built on saying the stuff most people only think in a shame spiral at 3 a.m. Jim Norton is one of the most respected voices in stand-up comedy — not because he’s the most polished or the most mainstream, but because he goes to places most comedians won’t. The darkness in his material is not performed. It’s reported. He has lived enough of it to fill several careers, and he got sober before most of it…

Rufi Thorpe came to BACKSTAGE. Here is the five-minute clip, the conversation that broke the room, and the answer I am still thinking about.

Two weeks ago, I was outside a concert at The Moore Theatre in downtown Seattle, begging a 20-something to blow cigarette smoke in my face. That’s where we’re starting. We’ll get to the jelly sandals. I’m two weeks shy of 20 years sober. My anniversary is May 1. That means when you’re reading this I’m clocking in at 19 years and roughly 50 weeks. Close enough to taste it. Far enough away that life still gets to hand me a pop quiz every once in a while. This one came wrapped in rubber.  🎤Listen to this article in Alysse’s voice…

There are two kinds of people who walk into a non-alcoholic bottle shop for the first time. The first kind already knows. The sober, the alcohol-free, the zero-proof evangelists. We walk in like we just found the last open bar in town. Except better, because we’re not about to throw away twenty years of sobriety on a grown-up Capri Sun. The second kind is the curious. The friend who tagged along. The wife who’s three weeks into a dry challenge. The guy who heard “non-alcoholic bottle shop” and assumed it meant apple juice in fancy bottles. At Dry Spell Bottle…

Jamie Lee Curtis Has Been Sober Since February 3, 1999. She Calls It Her Greatest Accomplishment. She had rules. Never before 5 p.m. Never when she was working. She held to those rules for 10 years, which is how long it took her to understand that needing rules is not the same as not having a problem. Jamie Lee Curtis spent a decade hiding an addiction to opioids and alcohol behind a working actress’s schedule and a very disciplined set of personal regulations. She was filming movies. She was raising children. She was doing interviews. And she was taking Vicodin…

There is a very specific hour of the day that belongs to the sober person. It’s somewhere between 5 and 7pm. The sun starts doing that thing where everything goes warm and gold. Your neighbors are pouring something cold on their back porches. The bar down the street is an hour deep into happy hour. Every restaurant on the block is doing the low lighting and the clinking glasses and the ritual. For a lot of people in recovery, this is the hardest hour of the day. It’s the hour that used to mean something. It’s the hour that your…

🔒 BACKSTAGE Exclusive. The hibiscus mocktail recipe Founding Members are already drinking. Open to the first 200.
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🔒 BACKSTAGE Exclusive. The non-alc margarita that ruined every other margarita for me. For the first 200 Founding Members. → [Join Backstage]

🔒 BACKSTAGE Exclusive. Pink, perfect, and zero proof. The Cosno is the Cosmo’s better-behaved sister. Founding Membership open to the first 200. → [Join Backstage]

🔒 BACKSTAGE Exclusive. The Faux Fashioned drinks like a Don Draper monologue minus the existential crisis. Founding Membership open to the first 200. → [Join Backstage]

🔒 BACKSTAGE Exclusive. Same beach vibe. Same fresh mint. None of the slurring. Founding Membership open to the first 200. → [Join Backstage]

BACKSTAGE Exclusive. The NA Negroni drinks like Stanley Tucci’s Italy series in a rocks glass. Founding Membership open to the first 200. → [Join Backstage]

🔒 BACKSTAGE Exclusive. The aperitivo spritz that fooled my Italian friends. Founding Membership open to the first 200. → [Join Backstage]

Join me LIVE on BACKSTAGE Wednesday, April 29, from 6 to 7 PM Pacific for a hands-on demo, tool reviews, and a year’s worth of bedazzle receipts. 🎧Listen to this article in Alysse’s voice  Prefer listening? ▶️Press play and follow along. Here is a sentence I never expected to write in my sober life: I have strong opinions about glue. I also have strong opinions about wax picker tips, which rhinestone brands fall off in the dishwasher, why bigger gems are sometimes better than smaller ones, and whether you should bedazzle the cover of a hardback book. (Yes. Obviously yes.…

There are drinks that whisper “special occasion,” and then there are drinks that walk in wearing black and gold and fully expect to be seated near the centerpieces. Just Enough Alcohol Removed Brut Bubbles is firmly in the second category. At first glance, the can is chic enough to make you assume it has opinions about glassware. The Pantone situation on this can is giving “I know exactly who I am and I don’t need to explain it to you.” Minimalist, intentional, and honestly a little intimidating in the best way. The black with a hint of gold design feels…

Samuel L. Jackson Has Been Sober Since 1991. The Career You Know Came After. While Samuel L. Jackson was in rehab in 1991, Spike Lee called with an offer. The role was Gator in Jungle Fever — a crack addict. Jackson had just spent years living a version of that life. He took the role. He brought something to it that no amount of preparation could have manufactured. He won a special jury prize at Cannes for it, a category the festival created specifically to honor his performance. He was 42 years old and had been a working actor for over a…

Some people have the kind of résumé that makes you want to sit up straighter. Toni Will is one of those people. She has spent 25 years in leadership, starting in banking and eventually becoming the General Manager and Governor of the Kalamazoo Wings, a men’s AA professional hockey team in the ECHL. She was the first female GM in franchise history and the first woman to serve on the ECHL Board of Governors. Under her leadership, the Wings have earned multiple awards for sales, revenue growth, and diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. Casual. And somehow that’s only part of…

When we dreamed up the first-ever BACKSTAGE with The Sober Curator event featuring Rufi Thorpe, author of “Margo’s Got Money Trouble”, we knew we wanted it to feel like more than a virtual author talk. We wanted a vibe. We wanted a little indulgence. A little conversation fuel. A little “main character energy, but sober.” And ideally, something that felt smart, elevated, fun, and just a tiny bit unhinged in the best possible way. Enter: the Killjoy Mocktail Kit. This is NOT a self-care kit. This is a vibe. This curated box of zero-proof drinks, adaptogenic sips, and delightfully extra goodies…

I have been building something. Not quietly, not slowly, and definitely not without rhinestones. BACKSTAGE with The Sober Curator is our brand new members-only cultural membership, and it is officially open. Two hundred Founding Member spots. A private community. Monthly live events with people who are actually interesting. And a calendar that, if I do say so myself, I am genuinely proud of. This is not a support group. It is not a recovery program. It is not a Zoom room full of people reading from worksheets. BACKSTAGE is a cultural space for people who are done drinking and just…

For those of us living alcohol-free—whether for personal, health, or recovery reasons—reading ingredient labels is second nature. But one product that often flies under the radar? Perfume. Traditional fragrances almost always contain alcohol, usually in the form of ethanol, as the primary ingredient. It’s the industry standard because alcohol helps the scent evaporate quickly and project into the air. But if you’re someone practicing total abstinence from alcohol, you may prefer products that align with your lifestyle on all levels—including your fragrance. The good news? More and more luxury brands are finally getting the memo and creating alcohol-free perfumes that…

Florence Welch Is 12 Years Sober. She Describes Herself as an All-or-Nothing Drinker. Here’s the Full Story. Florence Welch has one of the most recognizable voices in music. She also has one of the more honest answers to the question of why she stopped drinking. She is, by her own description, all or nothing. Not the kind of person who has one glass of wine and calls it a night. The kind of person for whom one glass of wine is simply the beginning of a longer and less predictable evening. She stopped drinking in 2014. As of 2026, that…

 🎧Listen to this article in Alysse’s voice Prefer listening? Press play and follow along. Why Sober Dates Deserve Main Character Energy Here’s what nobody tells you about sober dating: it’s actually better. Not “better considering” — just better. You show up as yourself, you remember everything, and the chemistry you feel is real. No asterisks. In your drinking days, the plan was basically: show up, order something, order another something, and hope the dim lighting and lowered inhibitions did the rest. (Chemistry! Or at least a convincing impression of it.) Take alcohol out of the equation and suddenly you realize:…

He was 20 years old, one of the most famous people on the planet, and he was showing up to work hungover. Not once. Not occasionally. Regularly. Daniel Radcliffe has said he sometimes filmed scenes for Harry Potter while still under the influence, or close enough to it that the line had stopped mattering. He wasn’t partying. He was coping. There’s a difference, and he’s been honest about that difference in a way that most people in his position never are. Radcliffe stopped drinking around 2010, when he was 20. As of 2026, that’s roughly 16 years. No dramatic rock…

Kat Von D Has Been Sober for 17 Years. Her Life Looks Nothing Like You’d Expect. She drew a line in the sand sometime around 2008, and it had nothing to do with a rock bottom. Kat Von D decided to get sober because her work was suffering. That was it. She is an artist before she is a celebrity, before she is a brand, before she is anything else, and when drugs and alcohol started blurring the precision she brought to her craft, she cut them off. Not dramatically. Not with a press release. She just chose the needle…

In a powerful episode of What’s In Your Neighborhood?, host Melanie Vargas sits down with me—Alysse Bryson, Founder and CEO of The Sober Curator—for a candid conversation about recovery, identity, and what it really takes to live authentically. This isn’t a surface-level interview. It’s a deeper look at what happens after you’ve done the “big” work—when sobriety, success, and structure are already in place, but something still feels… off. About What’s In Your Neighborhood? Melanie Vargas’ podcast is built around a simple but powerful idea: We all carry emotional neighborhoods. The quiet backstreets of ambition, shame, identity, and the stories…

Anthony Kiedis Is 25 Years Sober. Here’s the Full Story. He spent his last $10,000 on treatment. It was Christmas Eve 2000. He was the frontman of one of the biggest rock bands on the planet, and he was completely out of moves. That’s where Anthony Kiedis draws the line between before and after. As of December 24, 2025, the Red Hot Chili Peppers singer has been sober for 25 years. No slipping. No asterisks. Just one of the longest continuous sobriety streaks in rock history, held together by hard work, surfing, fatherhood, and a level of self-awareness that took…

Elizabeth Vargas was having a panic attack in the makeup chair while America waited for her to deliver the news. She looked calm. She sounded authoritative. And she was already thinking about which bottle of chardonnay she would open the second the cameras cut. That is exactly why her story hits so hard for those of us who are sober or sober curious. She was not a tabloid regular or a reality star trying to rehab a brand. She was the calm, serious voice of American news, showing up in living rooms in a blazer, not a bandage dress. While…