Name: Bridget Phetasy's Rock Bottom with Addiction
Uploaded: 2021-10-26T18:19:45.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Bridget Phetasy's Rock Bottom with Addiction' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-10-26. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Bridget Phetasy's Rock Bottom with Addiction' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-10-26. Transcript available.

- The Joe Rogan experience.
- So to go back to when we met,
I think I was sober already.
I think I was like newly sober,
just to circle back to that.
And to anyone wondering when I actually did get sober,
sober sober, it was when I was 35,
so like eight years ago.
And, but it was like a long time coming.
From the, when I was first in rehab, I was 19.
And then from 20 to 35, it was like Coke and Molly
and weed and yeah, drinking.
- Woo.
- It was, I lived my life to the fullest,
but I probably should have died.
I mean, it's a miracle I didn't die.
- Did you ever OD?
- So right before I got sober,
I was doing lots of Molly at Coachella,
which sounds as disgusting as you just heard it,
but wait, it gets grosser.
And, um, the, I was probably dehydrated
because I don't think I had any water in like two days.
And I was like doing Molly during the day
and doing blow at night and drinking through the whole thing.
And I was really obsessed with this like blueberry Red Bull
that they had.
I fucking hate Red Bull, but I was just drinking it with,
and it was like laced with Molly or whatever.
So that was like, and then we were in VIP.
This is why I'm saying it's gonna get grosser guys.
So bear with me and we're walking.
And I went down, like, I just blacked out.
I was like, I looked at my friend and I was like,
I am fucking roll.
And that's the last thing I remember.
And I just went down like a, like just a bowling pin.
And apparently into some Australian chicks of all things.
And I wake up, come two, and there's like four cops standing around me.
And they're like, what day is it?
And I somehow knew it was Sunday.
And I mean, you've been to festivals.
You have no idea what day it is, even if you're sober.
Like, or what time it is.
Right.
And I knew what time, it was like my brain got a hard reset.
I really, I really think my brain was like, we're shutting it down.
Like, we need to reset the system.
Let's delete some files.
Yeah.
Reboot.
Reboot.
I came to, I was like freezing cold.
And the Australians were like, you have the worst friends.
You have the worst friends.
The worst friends.
Because they weren't too, they were like, ah, she'll be fine.
And one of my friends is one of my best friends from high school.
And she and I, she was around during the heroin days.
And we used to go to raves together and do like speed.
And so we had been through a lot.
And she was like, ah, she's taking a disco nap.
And they were like, they called it a disco nap.
A disco nap.
Your friend called it a disco nap.
Oh my God.
You have horrible friends.
I was like, wow.
That is a very funny statement.
A disco nap.
Yeah.
She's taking a disco nap.
That's a good phrase.
Oh yeah.
I like that phrase.
So I came, I came to luckily, but it was like a bit of a wake up call.
And I wasn't young.
I was like about to be 35 or maybe I already was 35.
Like it was a little bit old to be.
Blacking out.
Going down and VIP.
Like, oh, just so gross.
It was so gross.
I mean, pitiful demoralization.
But the fact that your friends said you're taking a disco nap.
Like, they're like, ah, she's fine.
Let's keep partying.
Then I found a Yankees hat and I put it on.
And that's when I knew it's time to get sober.
So where did you go to get, did you go to get sober on, did you do it on your
own?
Yeah, I just, so I had tried everything.
Like every, I mean, I was, I was the classic, like only drink, only drink booze,
only drink
alone, only drink with friends.
Only, I did the whole like marijuana maintenance, only smoke weed.
I got certified in yoga, become a yoga instructor.
I went to therapy, literally anything other than 12-step because I had been in
12-step when
I was 19, 20 that first time.
And I hated it because I couldn't drink at all.
And I couldn't do anything.
And I just, I came up with a big, you know, I, I, I came up with a big case
against 12-step.
I was like, it's fear-based and blah, blah, blah, and all the God stuff.
And I was off and running.
And I was out, my first husband and I were raging alcoholics.
We were in the restaurant and just, I was in the restaurant industry for a long
time in
my life.
That industry is riddled with alcoholism and drugs and partying.
And so I was just around it too, all the time.
And then, um, around 35 after that Coachella, that summer, I had just gotten
back from traveling
around the world for like two years.
I was very lost.
I was in LA and I didn't know what I was doing anymore.
I felt confused.
I went back East, worked in a restaurant where I had been.
And it was like this whole, I fell immediately into the rut.
I was like sleeping with the same douchebags I slept with when I had been there
like seven
years before having, doing tons of drugs, burning bridges with my family.
And I was coming back to LA after just, my sister wouldn't let me stay with her
and rightfully.
And I was a mess and I was coming back and I was like, I'm going to cop heroin
and kill
myself.
Basically.
I was just so internally, it was not necessarily.
Like many of my rock bottoms were actually physical or my first one, I lost
everything.
This was more emotional.
And, um, yeah, I was, uh, I went for a hike.
I went up to like Temescal because I was like, well, before I cop heroin, I
should maybe pause
and go for a hike.
And sometime on that hike, I decided to go to a meeting that night because I'd
done an experimental
year of sobriety in like 2010.
What was it about the hike that I was sweating and my, I was like sweating out.
I was just toxic.
I could feel how toxic I was.
I could smell how toxic I was.
And what did it smell like?
Oh, like chemicals, chemicals and blow and probably like baby powder.
You know, like everything just booze.
And, and, and I had been smoking a lot of weed to try and chemically balance
all of it.
And I ended up getting to the top and something, it was like, they call it like,
it was like
a window of grace.
I don't know.
It was like one small window of willingness.
I don't, I don't know.
Window of grace?
Is that what you're saying?
Yeah.
It was like, they're, they say there are these kind of like opportunities where
you can walk
through a like door of willingness if you're, you're really at rock bottom and
trying to
get, and I made, I've joked about this before.
I made alcoholism look amazing.
Like I had a lot of fun.
I was, I was killed.
I was like, Oh, from the outside, it looked okay.
It was just internally.
I felt like I was rotting to the core and I also couldn't really get out of my
own way.
And so I went to a meeting and I didn't even, I wasn't like, I'm getting sober.
I just didn't know what else to do.
And I was miserable.
I mean, I was fucking miserable the first two years of my sobriety, but it was
better than
feeling like I wanted to kill myself.
And so I just kept walking through it and doing what they told me to do.
They're like, get a stupid job.
So I was waiting tables and like, why do they say to get a stupid job?
They're just, you're, you know, a lot of times you have this kind of idea of
being a big shot
or not that I did at all.
I was still waiting tables and like broke all the time, but it's really just
this idea of
like being a worker among workers, like put yourself and get a day job so you
can pay your
bills and not be dependent and struggling and put yourself in a, cause
sometimes it's like
people who come from, you know, finance or whatever, they were big shots and
then they
kind of lose everything.
And so then they tell them to get a job.
Everybody needs, well, yeah, just for, just for consistency and to be
responsible and to
have to show up.
And I mean, I really realized I started drinking when I was 12 and pretty
alcoholically by the
time I was 15 and I were fucking 12.
Yeah.
I was young.
I mean, nobody was paying attention to you.
No.
I mean, my parents got divorced right around that age.
And, um, yeah, I started, I was off to the races and then it was just by the
time I was
19, I was in, it was, it made a lot of sense and I was in rehab for heroin and
then got off
that, but that kind of not being, I use that as an excuse to be like, oh, I'm
not an addict
cause I'm not doing heroin anymore.
So I use that to stay out for a long time as an excuse of like, well, as long
as I'm not
doing heroin because anyone would get addicted to that.
And so, yeah, I mean, it was a long, long journey to sobriety.
And then I, I was very miserable and somehow, and then around two years, like
the rubber just
started meeting the road.
I got my first column at Playboy.
I sold my first, um, freelance writing piece.
I started doing, you have so much energy when you get sober for somebody like
me who is wasting
a lot of it, just drinking and partying that I just had to do a lot of
different things.
And I'll, I couldn't really deny that my quality of life improving drastically
and starting to
do things that I'd always wanted to do, like be a paid writer.
It didn't seem like an accident that it was a couple of years after I had been
sober that
these things started happening.
And so while it was happening, did you follow any protocol?
Did you like, did you follow any advice from books?
I was in 12 step, like full on in, in.
But what, what, what didn't you like about that?
What didn't you like about the 12 step?
When I first left the 12 steps or just when I was in that?
Just in general.
Um, well, I have, you know, I had a lot of reason to think that abstinence isn't
the only
way, which they found isn't for everybody.
Uh, it is for me because there's no middle ground with subs.
I, I started smoking cigarettes in sobriety.
This is a perfect example of how there's like no mid ground.
And I was so mad because I'd quit everything.
And I started smoking cigarettes in 2015.
And I was, I had one cigarette at a meeting and I was like, all right, I'll
have a cigarette.
And then I was off to the fucking races smoking pack a day within like weeks.
I'm like, if this is any example of what I'll be like with booze or anything, I
just know
there's not, I do not.
Some people can be moderate.
They have that ability.
And I envy the fuck out of it.
Watch the entire episode for free only on Spotify.