17 months sober from alcohol but life's terms had me putting my program at a lesser priority. also I was "california sober", still using delta 8 weed vapes like a fiend and the dishonesty was eating at me.
I finally owned up to my sponsor, who helped me clean out my truck of all these fucking empty vape carts as a sort of symbolic effort and go into the meeting and re-establish my sobriety date. I told him, 'you know I can just go to any headshop or gas station around here and get another', but the act was necessary
I was also extremely depressed, resentful, full of jealousy and self pity and was more or less suicidal. I stood at the turning point.. well, parked my truck in the liquor store parking lot anyway. sat there for a good hour deciding if I was going to :
1) get a bottle and head to the airport for vegas to run from my problems
2) go home and kill myself and end this misery
3) pray for God's will and the next right thought or action
I left the parking lot, and later that night I called up the drug and alcohol treatment facility that helped me detox and get initially sober 18 months ago, and I said I needed to come back or I was going to die. they explained marijuana is not a qualifying addiction for insurance to cover the expense of rehab, so I told a lie that I had relapsed on alcohol for the last week
the wife was not happy when she found out I was seriously going back for another 30 days. "Marijuana is not an addiction, you don't need rehab for that, its all psychological!".
"I am psychologically fucking broken, and I'm trying to save my life". I told her I said I had been drinking again so I could get admitted. as I left she said it would not change anything between our broken relationship, I said fine I am not doing this for you and left.
on the 2 hour drive towards the rehab, the cunning and baffling nature was in the back of my mind. I thought, she is probably so angry at me for doing this she will call up to the rehab place and tell them I was lying and I was afraid I would not get my bed.
So I found myself at a lonely gas station in rural Texas, buying a 12 pack for the first time in almost 18 months. It took about 15 minutes of holding the first open beer, crying aloud to my higher power how I did not want to drink this. The first 3 went down approximately this way. The powerful nature of my allergy of choice ensured drinks 4-12 went down quite easily. Cheerfully, even.
I checked into rehab extremely inebriated, overly flirtatious with the lovely intake tech. Spent the night vomiting chunks of neon green demons or 'somethings' out of my gut. But I was now safe, safe from drugs and alcohol and the stresses of life's terms that I was at that point unable to live out.
day 18 now. starting over at step 1 with my sponsor when I get home. feels good to be active, recovering and really trying to learn radical acceptance. She told me by the time I get home she'd be gone and moved into her own place, I have no idea what is waiting for me at home if anything. But I have to accept that the situation will be exactly as God intends it for me, or I shall find no serenity until I do.

The parable of the Prodigal Son is one of the most enduring stories from the Bible, offering deep insights into forgiveness, redemption, and the power of unconditional love. Its themes resonate profoundly with the journey many face in recovering from addiction, providing not just a blueprint for spiritual renewal but also practical wisdom for those walking the path toward healing.
Understanding the Parable In this well-known parable, a young man demands his inheritance early, squanders it on a life of excess, and finds himself destitute. In his lowest moment, he decides to return home, expecting scorn and rejection. Instead, his father welcomes him with open arms, celebrating his return rather than condemning his departure. This story, at its heart, is about redemption and the possibility of a new beginning, regardless of past mistakes.
The First Steps Back The journey of the Prodigal Son mirrors the initial steps towards recovery from addiction. The decision to return home symbolizes the moment of realization and acknowledgment of one’s addiction, where the individual understands the need for change. Like the Prodigal Son, this acknowledgment often comes in the depths of despair, when the consequences of addiction are undeniable and all-consuming.
Facing the Past One of the hardest steps on the path to recovery is facing the past and the harm caused to oneself and others. The Prodigal Son’s return home is a metaphor for facing one’s mistakes and the humility it takes to seek forgiveness. It’s about confronting the reality of one’s actions and the impact they have had, not just on oneself but on family, friends, and community.
The Role of Forgiveness The father’s response in the parable highlights the power of forgiveness in the recovery process. Forgiveness, both self-forgiveness and receiving forgiveness from others, is pivotal. It’s a recognition that everyone deserves a second chance, that our past actions do not define our future. This unconditional love and acceptance are what many seek from a higher power, their loved ones, and themselves during recovery.
A Celebration of Renewal The celebration upon the son’s return home underscores the joy of recovery and renewal. It’s a reminder that returning to a life free from addiction is not merely a return to normalcy but a cause for celebration, a second chance at life that should be embraced with joy and gratitude. This celebration is a powerful motivator for those in recovery, offering hope and something beautiful to strive towards.
Lessons for the Journey Ahead: The parable of the Prodigal Son offers several key lessons for anyone on the path to recovery from addiction:
Acknowledgment is the First Step: Recognizing one’s need for help is the critical first step toward healing.
Humility Opens Doors: Admitting mistakes and seeking forgiveness are acts of courage that open the path to recovery.
Forgiveness Heals: Forgiving oneself and accepting forgiveness from others are essential for healing and growth.
Support is Crucial: Just as the father welcomed his son with open arms, having a supportive community is vital for recovery.
Every Day is a Celebration: Every moment of sobriety is a victory, a testament to the human spirit’s resilience and the joy of a second chance at life.
The story of the Prodigal Son is a powerful narrative that resonates with anyone on a journey of recovery from addiction. It serves as a reminder that no matter how far we may stray, there is always a way back. Through humility, forgiveness, and the support of a loving community, recovery is not just a possibility; it’s a cause for celebration.
Self-Reflecting Questions/Journal Prompts:

1. Moment of Realization: Reflect on the moment you realized that change was necessary for your life. How did you feel, and what motivated you to seek a different path?
2. Facing the Past: Consider the challenges you’ve faced in confronting your past actions and their consequences. How have you managed to seek forgiveness from yourself and others?
3. Accepting Forgiveness: Write about a time when you felt truly forgiven, either by yourself, someone you hurt, or a higher power. How did this forgiveness impact your recovery journey?
4. The Role of Humility: How has humility played a role in your path to recovery? Reflect on moments when admitting vulnerability or asking for help led to significant growth.
5. Support System: Who has been your “welcoming father” on this journey? Describe how their support has made a difference in your life.
6. A New Beginning: What does the concept of a “new beginning” mean to you in the context of recovery? How have you embraced this new chapter in your life?
7. Lessons Learned: Reflect on the most valuable lessons you’ve learned through your recovery process. How have these lessons shaped your perspective on life and relationships?
8. Celebrating Milestones: Think about the milestones in your recovery. How have you celebrated these achievements, and why is it important to recognize them?
9. Forgiving Yourself: Forgiving oneself can be one of the hardest parts of the recovery journey. Write about your experience with self-forgiveness and the challenges you’ve faced.
10. A Letter to Your Future Self: Imagine writing a letter to your future self, reflecting on your hopes, dreams, and the person you hope to become. What advice would you give to your future self about maintaining resilience and hope on the journey ahead?

Here are 100 Tips to Advance Spiritually on Your Recovery Journey

1. Start your day with prayer, asking God for strength and guidance.
2. Read the Bible daily, focusing on verses about healing and recovery.
3. Join a Christian recovery group where you can share your journey with others.
4. Memorize Scripture that speaks to overcoming temptation and maintaining faith.
5. Keep a journal of prayers, insights, and daily progress.
6. Attend church regularly to worship and connect with a faith community.
7. Practice gratitude by thanking God for three things every morning.
8. Offer your struggles to God in prayer, asking for His help to overcome them.
9. Serve others through volunteer work, which can shift focus from self to service.
10. Share your testimony with others to encourage them and strengthen your own faith.
11. Find a mentor or spiritual director who exemplifies Christian living.
12. Participate in Bible studies to deepen your understanding of the Scriptures.
13. Practice forgiveness, letting go of old grudges and asking for forgiveness from those you’ve hurt.
14. Avoid triggers and situations where you’re tempted to relapse.
15. Maintain healthy boundaries in personal and professional relationships.
16. Stay active to help manage stress and improve mental health.
17. Eat a balanced diet to help stabilize mood swings and improve overall health.
18. Get adequate sleep to ensure your mind and body are well-rested.
19. Practice humility by acknowledging your weaknesses and asking for help when needed.
20. Celebrate small victories in your recovery journey, recognizing God’s hand in each.
21. Seek professional counseling if you struggle with underlying issues contributing to addiction.
22. Pray for others facing similar struggles, which can deepen your empathy and connection.
23. Participate in retreats focused on spiritual growth and recovery.
24. Practice patience, recognizing that recovery is a journey, not a destination.
25. Engage in regular self-reflection to assess your growth and areas needing improvement.
26. Stay connected with supportive friends and family who encourage your recovery.
27. Use your experiences to advocate for recovery support in your community.
28. Develop a personal creed or statement of faith that you can turn to in times of temptation.
29. Learn to recognize God’s presence in everyday life and lean on Him during tough times.
30. Set realistic goals for your personal and spiritual growth.
31. Practice mindful meditation focused on biblical truths and God’s love.
32. Join a service project at church or a local charity.
33. Educate yourself about the physiological aspects of addiction to better understand your body’s reactions.
34. Encourage someone daily with a phone call, text, or email.
35. Make amends where possible, as part of your healing process.
36. Limit exposure to digital distractions to enhance your focus on recovery and spiritual growth.
37. Read Christian literature that supports recovery and spiritual well-being.
38. Create a peaceful home environment that supports your recovery.
39. Attend workshops or seminars on Christian living and addiction recovery.
40. Practice the art of listening to God and others, enhancing your empathy and understanding.
41. Engage in creative activities like writing, painting, or music that express your journey.
42. Develop a routine that includes time for work, rest, and spiritual practices.
43. Seek opportunities to share your skills and talents with your church or community.
44. Maintain a spirit of joy, finding reasons to smile and laugh each day.
45. Dress modestly and respectfully, reflecting your dignity as a child of God.
46. Be honest with yourself and others about your struggles and successes.
47. Respect your body as a temple of the Holy Spirit by avoiding substances that harm it.
48. Cultivate gentleness in your interactions with others.
49. Take responsibility for your actions and their impact on others.
50. Participate in community prayer groups or start one if none exists.
51. Commit to lifelong learning about your faith and how it relates to recovery.
52. Use technology for good, such as subscribing to Christian podcasts or recovery channels.
53. Support others in their recovery, offering your time and presence as a mentor.
54. Engage with nature, appreciating God’s creation as a source of peace.
55. Maintain a clean and orderly living space, which can improve your mental clarity and peace.
56. Honor your commitments to others, showing reliability and respect.
57. Seek silence regularly, allowing God to speak to your heart without interruption.
58. Pray before meals, thanking God for His provision.
59. Participate in fasting as a form of spiritual discipline and focus.
60. Practice saying “no” to non-essential demands that may lead to stress or temptation.
61. Develop financial discipline, using resources wisely and avoiding debt.
62. Attend a different community’s church service to experience the broader body of Christ.
63. Watch or listen to testimonies of other Christians who have overcome addiction.
64. Plan for challenging situations by having a strategy to maintain your sobriety.
65. Participate in communal worship, such as singing hymns or contemporary Christian music.
66. Adopt a spirit of perseverance, knowing that every day with God is a step toward recovery.
67. Educate others about addiction, breaking down stigma and spreading hope.
68. Take time off when needed to maintain your mental and spiritual health.
69. Pray with and for your family, strengthening bonds and spiritual connections.
70. Celebrate religious holidays with true spiritual fervor, focusing on their Christian significance.
71. Visit historical Christian sites or take pilgrimages to deepen your faith.
72. Incorporate Christian symbols in your home to remind you of your faith.
73. Give anonymously to those in need, practicing the gift of giving without recognition.
74. Join or form a support group specifically for Christian addicts in recovery.
75. Use Christian apps that provide daily scriptures and prayers.
76. Hold regular family devotions, integrating faith into your household’s routine.
77. Teach a Sunday school class or small group, sharing your knowledge and faith.
78. Partake in communion regularly, remembering Christ’s sacrifice and promise.
79. Invite friends to church or spiritual events, sharing your journey and community.
80. Maintain a prayer list, regularly updating and praying for the needs of others.
81. Reflect on the lives of saints and other Christian figures, drawing inspiration from their faith and perseverance.
82. Practice hospitality, opening your home to fellowship and community building.
83. Engage in spiritual warfare prayers, recognizing and combating the spiritual roots of addiction.
84. Forgive yourself and others, releasing bitterness and focusing on God’s mercy.
85. Decorate your living space with verses and Christian art, creating an environment of faith.
86. Observe a Sabbath rest, dedicating time each week to rest and spiritual renewal.
87. Speak words of affirmation and faith to yourself and others.
88. Consult with your pastor or spiritual leader regularly to stay on track.
89. Embrace modesty in thoughts, words, and actions, focusing on purity.
90. Conduct a weekly review of your spiritual and recovery progress.
91. Be proactive in your church community, taking part in its activities and outreach.
92. Learn to manage stress through faith-based practices like meditation and prayer.
93. Teach about addiction and recovery in your church, spreading awareness and support.
94. Maintain a balance between work, rest, and play to support your overall well-being.
95. Create a vision board that includes your spiritual goals and inspirations.
96. Participate in ecumenical gatherings, recognizing the unity of the broader Christian community.
97. Implement a “media fast” periodically to focus more on your spiritual life.
98. Pray for global issues and missions, broadening your spiritual concern beyond personal needs.
99. Set up a prayer corner or altar in your home, dedicating a space for spiritual reflection.
100. Routinely update your mentor or accountability partner about your progress and struggles.

Spiritual Growth

1. Daily Prayer: Commit to daily prayer sessions asking for strength and guidance.
2. Scripture Reading: Read and meditate on scriptures that focus on strength and recovery.
3. Worship: Participate in regular worship services to reinforce your spiritual foundation.
4. Faith Affirmations: Use Bible verses as affirmations; repeat them during cravings.
5. Confession: Regularly confess struggles to a trusted spiritual leader or trusted friend.
6. Fasting: Occasionally fast to seek clarity and reinforce spiritual discipline.
7. Spiritual Retreats: Attend retreats for focused spiritual renewal.
8. Christian Meditation: Practice Christian meditation (pondering scripture, etc.) to calm the mind and spirit.
9. Listening to Gospel Music: Use uplifting music to enhance spiritual connection.
10. Prayer Journaling: Keep a journal of prayers and God’s responses.

Community Engagement

1. Church Support Groups: Join groups for individuals struggling with addiction.
2. Accountability Partner: Partner with a fellow believer who can provide support and accountability.
3. Volunteering: Engage in church-related volunteer work to stay busy and inspired.
4. Christian Counseling: Seek professional counseling from a Christian perspective.
5. Family Involvement: Involve your family in your journey through church events.
6. Youth Mentorship: Mentor youth, sharing your experiences and learning from service.
7. Online Christian Communities: Participate in online forums or groups for spiritual support.
8. Testimony Sharing: Share your journey at church gatherings to inspire and receive support.
9. Bible Study Groups: Regularly attend Bible study to deepen faith and community ties.
10. Church Activities: Be an active participant in church events and functions.

Personal Development

1. Routine Exercise: Incorporate regular physical activity to reduce stress.
2. Healthy Diet: Maintain a nutritious diet to improve overall well-being.
3. Reading Christian Literature: Read books that encourage spiritual growth and recovery.
4. Creative Arts: Use arts like painting or writing to express feelings and reflect.
5. Time Management: Structure your day to minimize idle time that could lead to cravings.
6. Goal Setting: Set short and long-term goals that align with your spiritual values.
7. Learning New Skills: Take up hobbies or classes that keep you engaged and learning.
8. Rest and Sleep: Ensure sufficient rest to maintain physical and mental health.
9. Nature Walks: Spend time in nature to find peace and perspective.
10. Avoiding Triggers: Identify and avoid situations or people that trigger cravings.

Coping Techniques

1. Deep Breathing: Practice deep breathing exercises during moments of craving.
2. Mindfulness: Practice mindfulness to stay present and reduce anxiety.
3. Assertiveness Training: Learn to assertively say no to temptations.
4. Stress Management: Develop strategies to handle stress without resorting to substances.
5. Emotional Journaling: Use journaling to process emotions healthily.
6. Self-Reflection: Regularly reflect on personal progress and setbacks.
7. Positive Visualization: Use visualization techniques to imagine a sober life.
8. Gratitude Lists: Regularly list things you are grateful for.
9. Reward System: Set up a reward system for reaching sobriety milestones.
10. Relaxation Techniques: Learn and apply relaxation techniques.

Support Systems

1. Peer Support: Regularly meet with a peer group for encouragement and advice.
2. Spiritual Guidance: Seek regular guidance from a pastor or spiritual mentor.
3. Therapeutic Relationships: Maintain therapeutic relationships that reinforce recovery.
4. Family Counseling: Engage in family counseling to repair relationships affected by addiction.
5. Professional Help: Don’t hesitate to seek help from addiction specialists.
6. Educational Workshops: Attend workshops that teach coping skills for addiction.
7. Supportive Friends: Cultivate friendships with those who support your recovery journey.
8. Avoiding Negative Influences: Steer clear of environments and individuals that undermine recovery.
9. Church Elders: Reach out to church elders for wisdom and support.
10. Sponsorship: Consider a 12-step program with a sponsor who shares your faith.

Renewal and Reflection

1. Anniversary Reflections: Reflect on the progress made over each year of recovery.
2. Spiritual Renewal Days: Designate days for intensified prayer and meditation.
3. Baptism or Re-baptism: Consider this as a symbolic fresh start.
4. Witnessing to Others: Use your story to help others in their battles with addiction.
5. Spiritual Literature: Delve deeper into spiritual texts for insights and inspiration.
6. Pastoral Visits: Invite pastoral visits for home blessing and personal encouragement.
7. Renewing Vows: Renew personal vows of sobriety in a ceremonial way.
8. Pilgrimage: Undertake a spiritual pilgrimage as a form of personal and spiritual exploration.
9. Reflection Retreats: Engage in retreats specifically focused on overcoming past habits.
10. Memorializing Milestones: Create physical or digital memorials of your recovery milestones.

Emotional Resilience

1. Emotional Awareness: Develop awareness of emotions and triggers that lead to cravings.
2. Seek Forgiveness: Embrace forgiveness, both from others and for yourself.
3. Offer Forgiveness: Offer forgiveness to those who have hurt you, releasing bitterness.
4. Spiritual Songs: Sing or listen to spiritual songs that uplift and comfort.
5. Hope Messages: Write down messages of hope and revisit them during tough times.
6. Encouragement Letters: Write letters of encouragement to yourself for future moments of weakness.
7. Daily Devotionals: Follow a daily devotional plan that addresses addiction recovery.
8. Prayer Chains: Initiate or join prayer chains for continuous spiritual support.
9. Healing Services: Attend healing services focused on emotional and spiritual restoration.
10. Scriptural Promises: Memorize promises from the Bible that assure support and deliverance.

Social Connectivity

1. Social Activities: Organize or participate in sober social gatherings with fellow church members.
2. Church Family Outreach: Engage in church family outreach programs to build a supportive community.
3. Mentoring Others: Become a mentor to others struggling with addiction, sharing lessons and faith.
4. Recovery Testimonials: Regularly give testimonials at recovery meetings to inspire and affirm.
5. Family Devotions: Hold regular devotions with family to strengthen bonds and mutual support.
6. Prayer Groups: Form or join small prayer groups focused on overcoming addiction.
7. Christian Conferences: Attend Christian conferences on recovery and personal growth.
8. Community Service Projects: Lead or participate in community service projects to foster a sense of purpose.
9. Recovery Celebrations: Celebrate recovery milestones with your church community.
10. Faith-Based Podcasts: Listen to and discuss faith-based podcasts on overcoming challenges.

Mindset and Lifestyle

1. Optimism: Cultivate an optimistic outlook based on faith and hope in God’s plan.
2. Daily Affirmations: Start the day with Christian affirmations about strength and recovery.
3. Mindfulness of God’s Presence: Continuously remind yourself of God’s presence in your life.
4. Avoiding Idleness: Keep yourself busy with meaningful activities that align with Christian values.
5. Spiritual Biographies: Read biographies of Christians who overcame significant struggles.
6. Health Check-Ups: Regularly attend health check-ups to monitor physical health during recovery.
7. Sabbath Rest: Observe Sabbath rest as a time to rejuvenate spiritually and physically.
8. Christian Movies: Watch movies with Christian themes that reinforce your resolve and values.
9. Spiritual Accountability: Regularly review your spiritual and recovery progress with a mentor.
10. Prayer Walks: Incorporate prayer walks as a way to combine physical activity and spiritual meditation.

Continued Learning and Growth

1. Biblical Courses: Take courses on biblical studies that relate to healing and redemption.
2. Spiritual Workshops: Attend workshops that focus on spiritual growth and overcoming addictions.
3. Faith-Based Counseling Techniques: Learn counseling techniques that are based on Christian principles.
4. Scripture Memorization: Engage in scripture memorization to strengthen spiritual warfare against cravings.
5. Pastoral Workshops: Participate in workshops offered by pastors that focus on living a sober life.
6. Faith and Science: Explore the intersection of faith and science in understanding addiction.
7. Christian Leadership Courses: Take courses in Christian leadership to empower your role in the community.
8. Retelling Your Story: Learn to retell your story in ways that highlight God’s grace and your growth.
9. Spiritual Discernment: Enhance spiritual discernment to recognize paths and choices that support sobriety.
10. Continuous Prayer: Maintain an attitude of continuous prayer, acknowledging dependence on God for daily victory over addiction.

Mondays used to be a drag for me, like many of us, but now they are something I look forward to because every Monday is a reminder of how far I've come in my sobriety journey.
On Mondays I come into work and see my coworkers struggling with hangovers, dragging themselves through the day. And I realize that used to be me, but not anymore!
Now Mondays are a symbol of clarity and energy and the freedom that comes with choosing sobriety.
So here's to Mondays and all of us on our sober journey!!

I have a thing for symbolism and aesthetics. It’s part of the reason I enjoy Japanese woodblock art so much. I love it so much I have a piece tattooed on me. But more than that is what is symbolizes.
In Chinese antiquity, the koi symbolizes determination, while its color represents an attribute, like wealth (gold), masculinity (red), etc., and the direction the koi is swimming also has meaning; upstream meaning you’ve overcome obstacles, while downstream means you’re still creating inner strength to overcome obstacles.
Having one tattooed on me makes a lot of sense given my struggles with substance abuse and mental illness. Just in the last two weeks, I’ve had more family tragedy, and it’s nearly driven me to drink, losing two years of sobriety.
When I see people in this sub struggling with all manner of things, I want them to know: you’re definitely strong enough a person, internally, to handle whatever life throws at you. You wouldn’t have gotten this far otherwise.
Considering my life took me halfway across the world and back—twice—I think it’s self-explanatory that life will send you where it sends you. And it’s up to you to either fight against that tide, or let it take you wherever. What you may think is a calling might not be one after all. That passion you don’t think you can turn into anything other than a hobby? It may be your ticket to prosperity.
We have one shot at this life. Let the problems come, because you can solve them. Let your troubles come, and then give them a good slap in the face.
You’re gonna do great. 👍

Hi everyone!
Here i am at one month without a drop of alcohol. here's what i've observed about myself and other around me.
The first days were complicated for me psychologically alcohol was part of my life since i'm an adult so it was a big decision that i was afraid to fail. application that count de days of sobriety are really effective and worked well on me to challenge me to go one day at the time.
i increased my soda consumption a lot to compensate alcoholic breverage and it worked really well. i discovered NA beers and other substitute that looks and taste like alcoholic beverage it's amazing. the first days are quite fun because you buy a little of everything to taste what it's look like i took notes and made comparative.
in my country NA beers have quite the same packaging as the normal beers so one of my game is to drink one of those in the street early in the morning or in public space just to grab the disapproving look of people by doing nothing wrong it's quite fun.
Sleep is sooooo much better and really only this point worth the trip to don't drink alcohool anymore. i work as an architect so some time i don't sleep much and i used to drink alcohool to maintain me in the workflow. but without it i can be so much aware about what i'm doing and i never loose the big picture and i can do in the day what i usally did in the night. so it made me realised that alcohol is a tool to deal with problem that alcohol bring. so the first days are rough, you have to step up out of the circle and as soon as you get back on your horses with a new routines everything is better.
one of the biggest improve is that i never have the fear to hurt someone without notice it. i'm self aware of myself and i'm not afraid anymore to not remembering something i said or did while drunk.
you also make people around you proud. Sometimes people can be a little awkward it's maybe because in our society when you go to someone's place it's a symbol of friendship to bring alcohol on the table. And when you say you don't drink you surprise people who don't expect that. i'ts a little bit like annoucing you're vegetarian on barbecue day people don't know on the moment how to respond to it but after a while you stop being a subject of interest.
You also bring people with you. when i stop drinking my wife told me she would'nt do it with me which is fine quit alcohol is my decision and i can't expect the world go in the same way. But after a while she tried my NA beers and found some of them really good, and she started to drink alcohol outside with friend and she confessed that she felt better because we don't drink together so she decreased drastically her alcohol consumption.
I also the feeling to be a better fathehusband / friend because i have the absolute certitude that the phone can ring at any time anywhere if someone is in need to help i will be able to answer it.
that's all fot today folks! i hope you're all doing well!

General Content Warning for this entire write-up, so everyone can have a good time: - Extensive discussion of topics related to mental illness, including self-harm, suicidal ideation, mania / bipolar disorder, distortion of truth, medication, involuntary hospitalization, medical abuse in a hospital setting, and romanticization of mental illness. - Non-detailed mentions of domestic violence (implied abuse by intimate partner and parents) and sexual / gender-based violence (including rape, child sexual assault, grooming, sex trafficking and torture). These last few items feature prominently in one installment, pertaining to a work of fiction; descriptions may be a bit more specific/detailed in that segment, but not graphic. - Mentions and quotes of unchill bigoted behavior, including ableism (mental and physical), white nonsense / white fragility / racism, fatphobia, prejudice against drug users.
Additional CWs may be added at the beginning of specific segments when relevant. While these are heavy topics, the tone of this write-up is generally light-hearted and aims to entertain. If this approach sounds uncomfortable or trivializing, this may not be a good read for you; please trust your gut!
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Picture this: it's the early 2010s, somewhere in the western world. Instagram is a novelty, Harvey Weinstein runs Hollywood, almost no one on Earth leans one way or the other about RNA vaccines, and Donald Trump is that one real estate guy you vaguely remember from Home Alone 2. New player Lady Gaga is the most interesting thing to have happened to pop since Madonna, and the whole industry is attempting to catch up; Miley Cyrus is the chick who used to be on Hannah Montana; Melanie Martinez hasn't hatched yet. The time of Oddball Concept Divas is dawning just below the horizon.
You're a Bowie-loving student who skipped goth night at the club to tag along with your art school friends for a very special evening. You're a giddy sixteen-year old rocking cat ears, purple Wet 'n Wild eyeliner, a polyester petticoat, and a coffin-shaped backpack. You're an effete theater kid who sewed his own waistcoat for the occasion, but won't dare wear it to school the next day. You're a buff, bearded dude in a Venom shirt who's trying not to look too excited, since your girlfriend supposedly had to drag you here. You're a slightly bemused parent leaning against the back wall of the venue, sipping a warm half-pint, wondering if this isn't all a bit dark for a tween. (“It's called 'Victoriandustrial', mom,” you've been told in the car, “and it's not dark, it's art.”)
On stage is a pink-haired woman, with red porcelain-doll lips and a heart painted on her cheek. Among a set of antique consoles, twee tchotchkes, teacups and plastic rats, she pounces and twirls in glittery platform boots, tattered striped stockings, and a tightly laced crystal-studded corset that looks like it's splattered in blood. This is ostensibly a concert, but there is no live band. Where one would expect a drum kit or a bass, three bedazzled burlesque vixens act as back-up singers and dancers, with the occasional vaudeville act – a fire-twirling number, a fan dance, throwing pastries and spitting tea into the audience. Lots of wholesome girl-on-girl kissing, too. The music on the backing track is a genre-bender of clanging beats and beeps, lofty orchestral strings, and the frantic hammering of a MIDI harpsichord, as the pink-haired frontlady sings of heartache and betrayal and drowning. Think if the Brontë sisters had invented industrial rock.
The audience gasps in excitement when the lady whips out a vamped-out wireless electric violin. With rockstar cool and virtuoso poise, she leans into the instrument, touches the bow to the strings, and tears out a single plaintive, impeccably distorted high note. Then her fingers go wild, and for a few seconds, everything is perfect suspended animation. Uncannily perfect, almost. Just behind you, you hear someone whisper: “Wait, is she miming it?”
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Forgive the theatrical intro, but I had to set the stage for... the drama. And I do mean drama in the thespian sense of the term! This, ladies and gentlemen, is a Shakespeare play: wordy and confusing, but it's neat how the main character's opening lines foreshadow the tragic climax. It's a Greek tragedy for the digital age – if, instead of killing his dad and banging his mom, after becoming king, Oedipus was doomed to becoming uniquely obnoxious. It's The Rocky Horror Show under the grim direction of Samuel Beckett. Like all good theatre, this story is about how fiction bleeds into reality – through the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves, and how all the world's a stage and all that.

WHO IS EMILIE AUTUMN, AND WHAT'S THE DRAMA?

Here's the Broadway Weekly blurb, so you can decide whether the show is worth your time: Emilie Autumn, also known as EA, is a US-American alternative singer-songwriter, author, and actor. She became known in alt circles in the mid-2010s for her violin skills, unique fashion, outspoken stances on feminism and mental health advocacy, and the way she dramatized and sublimated her own life story in her art. In 2009, she self-published a semi-autobiographical book that became a sort of bible to her creative universe and fandom. She toured extensively and enjoyed niche, but considerable success until the mid-2010s – with hordes of devoted fans adopting her fashion sense and lingo, and crediting her music for getting them through dark times.
For the past twelve years or so, EA has mostly been focused on adapting her book into a stage musical, releasing two more albums of songs intended for the libretto. At the time of this write-up, it has been six years since the last album and a decade since the last live show. Although she still talks about the musical as an ongoing, Broadway-bound project, in recent years, she's often gone dark for months at a time on social media. There is no forum, no large Discord, no active community to speak of; comments are restricted on her currently-inactive Instagram and blog.
Who is she hiding from, you ask? Why, you've probably guessed it: the hordes of devoted fans whom she infuriates every time she does anything.
And what are they furious about? (Or frustrated, flummoxed, or plain ol' flabbergasted?) Well, it depends who you ask. For some, it's disappointment in her artistic and marketing choices (what are fans for?). Others cite unkept promises or absurd release delays. For others yet, it's the AliBaba merch sold at jaw-dropping markups with three paragraphs of purple prose in the product description.. Or maybe it was the angry rants on Twitter? Okay, it's the casual bigotry that she staunchly denies or dismisses. It's the criticism she can't take. It's the fact that she won't stop lying about her own life! Either way, I don't personally know of any fanbase that has been so consistently exasperated, for so many years, and for such a diverse array of reasons, by their favorite artist.
In truth, each individual mini-scandal isn't all that juicy or scandalous. Nobody died, no one got sued; nothing of significant value, other than time and sanity, was taken away from anyone. What I find interesting here is the years and years of bizarre parasocial codependency (and antagonism) between a fragile woman who became addicted to her own poppycock, and an obsessive fanbase who cared way too much not to take it personally.
Before we even get to EA's relationship with her fans, you're going to need some lore about EA herself. A “Hobby History” of sorts. Strap in! There's romance, tragedy, laughter, character development, variety numbers, numerous costume changes, (actual) celebrity cameos – and based on how long this OpenOffice doc already is at the time of my writing this, we're probably going to need several intermissions too. This write-up is link-heavy, both with receipts and with additional watching and listening material. Not all of them need to be clicked in order to understand the story; I'm merely providing the rabbit holes. I've tried to make things more easily navigable by including a little glossary about the nature of links; one emoji-indicator carries over the next link until I use a different one.
🪞 = picture / visual 🎵 = music 📺 = video 📝 = primary source / receipt 🔍 = press article / write-up / further reading 🎤 = song lyrics / spoken word audio 🐀 = anonymous fan confession 🦠 = reaction / meme

BAROQUE BEGINNINGS: THE VIOLIN YEARS

VampireFreaks: Do you ever smile to yourself knowing your old music teachers might be seeing your success? EA: I smile to myself knowing they might be dead. (Long-lost interview, late 2000s)

Born in Malibu in the late 70s, Emilie Autumn, often known as EA, was originally trained as a classical violinist.
By her account, she started playing the violin at age 4, and was homeschooled at age 9 so that she could focus on her instrument. After stints at various performing arts colleges, some rather prestigious, she dropped out of formal schooling in her mid-to-late teens to embark on a solo violin career.
In 2001, after disappointing experiences with major record companies, she created her own label, Traitor Records, and released a EP of chamber music, with minor success. The stuffy industry of classical music didn't “get” the twenty-something manic-pixie-fiddler, who played Bach just a bit too fast, but with electric stage presence – wearing period corsets, combat boots, and the occasional fairy wings. But EA evidently knew that there was an audience for that somewhere.
And that somewhere – drumroll – was Illinois.

VW: What do you most hope to accomplish? EA: Everything. (‘Virtual World Radio’ Interview, 2002 📝)

ENCHANT ERA: BRUSHES WITH FAME ON FAERIE WINGS

What if I'm an ocean, far too shallow, much too deep? (...) What if I'm a siren singing gentlemen to sleep? (“What If”, 2003 🎵)

Soon, EA relocated from her native California to Chicago. There, in between odd jobs, she veered away from baroque and began performing her own “fantasy rock” stylings at piano bars, holiday fairs and local venues – and building a decent following through her LiveJournal, website, and IRL friends. People loved the whole renegade genius thing, loved the violin, loved the nightingale voice, loved the fairy wings and costumes🪞, loved the handmade merch and general disdain for The Business, loved her deadpan humor and bookish nerdiness. In 2003, she released her first LP, Enchant 🎵 – an ethereal, introspective indie-pop joint, born under the sign of Imogen Heap, with a moon in Fiona Apple and Tori Amos rising.
Everything about EA's act was exquisitely DIY, personal, and intricate. For instance, the Enchant booklet folded out into a Masquerade-style puzzle of her own design.🪞 The first person to solve the puzzle would win “the Wings, Ruff, Fan and Scepter of the Faerie Queene herself” – all lovingly handmade by EA, and depicted in peak 2003 graphic design on the booklet. For months, YEARS after Enchant came out, people poured over the cryptic metaphors and literary references, the historical symbolism and visual puns of the artwork, looking for hints and patterns. They read every fan chat, every interview, every relevant Shakespeare play, hoping to decipher the inner workings of EA's mind and find new keys to the puzzle. Sure, it's been two decades now and no one's ever managed to crack the damn thing 🔍, which is by now widely assumed to be flawed and unsolvable; still, it's the kind of zany, brainy, immersive experience that tends to cultivate a niche but hyper-invested fanbase.
So it makes perfect sense that underground aficionada and internet frontierswoman Courtney Love (she haunted public AOL chatrooms as early as 1995! 🔍) would take an interest. Just a few months after releasing Enchant, EA was off to southern France to record violin and vocals for Courtney's new solo album; a few months after that, in early 2004, she joined Courtney's band on a brief tour to promote the record.
Alas, no cigar: America's Sweetheart flopped. Maybe because most of those summer recording sessions were ultimately lost to an engineering oopsie; maybe because Courtney was having an especially rough year – and going through all the “rock-bottom moments” that she would discuss in group therapy, later that fall, when she began her sobriety journey at court-ordered rehab. EA, a former homeschool kid who had never done drugs, seems to remember the tour as a generally terrifying experience; she later stated, with some bitterness, that the experience was not worth the time it had taken away from her own solo career.
But it was a good year for TV appearances! Here she is on the David Letterman Show in March 2004, rocking out on a perfectly inaudible violin as C-Love fades in and out of her own body. 📺 She also landed a cute tutorial segment on HGTV's Crafters: Coast to Coast, making sushi-shaped soap and fairy wings. In December, she accompanied Billy Corgan for a Christmas song on a Chicago station.
All of this was chronicled in quirky, wordy posts on her blog – interspersed with late-night musings about casual misogyny in the media 📝, including against Courtney, handmade crafts and clothing auctions, candid pictures of outings with friends in Chicago... as well as periodic updates on the progress of her next opus: Opheliac.

God, too much to even begin to tell right now, and I’m recording anyway, but I can give you this update: I just finished yesterday recording violin parts and backing vocals for B. Corgan’s first single (...) More later, recording piano for my new track “GOD HELP ME”…why do I torture myself with my own self-inflicted drama…or is it a way of exorcizing…yes, I’ll go with that one for now…☠ (“Whirlwind...”, December 2004)

By that point, EA was starting to be more open about her conflicted relationship with what would later be diagnosed as bipolar disorder. The galaxy-brain moments, the trance of creative frenzies, the liminal high of going three days without sleep, the magic... the crippling sensitivity, the restless anxiety, the Zoloft that one both needs and hates, the ever-lurking suicidal thoughts. As EA gradually revealed over the course of 2004, Opheliac would be an exploration of the “mad woman” archetype. The title was a medical neologism for “the syndrome of Ophelia”, as in the tragic character from Hamlet 🔍, driven to insanity and ultimate self-destruction by the fuckboys who rule her life. Here's EA explaining it in her own words. 🎤 The album would dive into how psychiatry and romantic relationships are governed by old misogynistic tropes, and how the “mentally ill” label is used to silence and downplay the justified anger and hurt of abused women.
In a striking case of life imitating art (are you picking up on the theme yet?), this concept was about to become more painfully relevant than ever to EA's personal existence.
CW: implied partner abuse, suicidal ideation.

DISENCHANTMENT: A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS

In the lake, you will find me Behind your house, behind your house (...) My ocean is bluer than the heart you had to break My sea is deeper than your lake (“In the Lake”, 2005 🎵)

Where were we? Ah yes, the Christmas song with Billy Corgan at the end of 2004. Around that time, EA was also recording violin parts and backing vocals for his upcoming solo album. 🎵 They had presumably connected through Courtney, they both lived in Chicago, I guess something clicked.
In January of 2005, EA abruptly went off of her meds, broke up with her live-in boyfriend-slash-bassist, packed up her violin and corsets, and moved into Corgan's mansion. In March of 2005, she posted very melancholy lyrics about drowning in a lake to haunt a deceitful lover. The post was entitled“In The Lake (The Zoloft is calling my name...)” 🎤📝. Later, after the song was released as a B-side, EA disclosed that it had been intended as a public suicide note 📝.
Blog entries from that time touched on a “whirlwind of action and emotion”, “changing residences” and feeling like “you're falling through the air, but you don't know if you'll hit the water or the rocks” 📝. But, EA being an expert vague-poster, her posts remained very elusive about what was going on, who was involved, and how it impacted her. (The specifics were pieced together years later, by fan-led forensic efforts – which, obviously, involved ascertaining the existence of an actual body of water in Billy Corgan's backyard 📝).
Whatever happened over the course of those months was never disclosed explicitly by EA, but is widely assumed to have inspired songs such as “Liar” 🎤, “Misery Loves Company”, “Let the Record Show”, and “I Know Where You Sleep”, , recorded that same spring. A solid quarter of the Opheliac tracklist – which was shaping out to be decidedly darker and grittier than Enchant.

You can lie to the papers, you can hide from the press (...) I know your tainted flesh, I know your filthy soul I know each trick you played, whore you laid, dream you stole I know the bed in the room in the wall in the house Where you got what you wanted and ruined it all I know the secrets that you keep I know where you sleep

Even as her personal blog posts grew more somber, nihilistic, and generally fed-up in the face of what she called “the worst breakdown of her young life”, even as the songwriting process had her rummage through traumatic memories [CW: CSA] 🎤, and even as the Corgan-adjacent trauma was compounded by various rushed moves and broken friendships over that summer and fall, EA remained remarkably (some might say frantically) prolific.
Other than progress on Opheliac, 2005 saw multiple violin collaborations with alternative bands, numerous auctions of, mh, visually strident “punktorian” fashion pieces 📝🪞 (“STRESS COUTURE!” 🦠📺), and an updated re-issue of her 2001 poetry collection, complete with audiobook. ("...The book has been selling like crack in a limo with Courtney Love (and believe me, I know)." - Ooooof, EA. Low-hanging fruit. 📝)
In October, she started recruiting:

WANTED: Hot goth bitch to join touring band of other hot goth bitches. (...) Must be able to: sing backing vocals in a wide range with excellent pitch, growl à la Kittie, handle minimal keyboard parts, push buttons/turn knobs with killer attitude, be extremely comfortable on stage in bloomers and a corset, reside in the Chicago area, know the difference between a crumpet and a scone, have at least one hidden talent. 📝

By winter, most of her blog post titles were written in THIS FORMAT!!!!!!!! In December, she announced that “Emilie Autumn and the Bloody Crumpets” would preview Opheliac live at the Double Door in Chicago, on Friday the 13th (ooh!) of the following month. “We are coming to destroy your world,” the post threatened enticingly. "Miss it and suffer. We really don't want to hurt you.” The flyer advertised a dress code:

Masquerade, Ophelias, green girls, Victorian insane asylum escapees, princes of Denmark, bloomered harlots and rogues – general burlesque ribaldry!

Exit diaphanous butterfly wings and elven tiaras 📺, enter the haunted murder-doll with the blood-red heart on her cheek; out with Elizabethan chamber-pop, in with Victoriandustrial. The fairy had to die to make way for the iconic, the sublime, the tragic, the ridiculous, the positively bananas...

OPHELIAC ERA: LET THE RECORD SHOW

EA: What's more interesting, and what's more fun to watch, than a crazy girl's self-destruction? Nothing. Nothing in the world. (The Opheliac Companion, 2008 🎤)
If I'm going down Then I'm going down good I'm going down Then I'm going down clean (...) The prettiest broken girl you've ever seen (“Let the Record Show”, 2006 🎵)

CW: mania, self-harm, abortion, suicidal ideation, hospitalization.
If you haven't gathered as much by now, what fans were witnessing in real time on EA's blog, without necessarily seeing it, was the ebb and flow of a months-long manic episode. That's not me armchair-diagnosing: EA herself has discussed penning and recording a lot of her best material in a trance-like rush, “when you're writing on the ceiling because there's not enough paper to contain your thoughts”.

...Once I became stable and healthy, I realized that I had no memory of how a great deal of my music had been created. I had written and even programmed most of my best work in a similar manic state, and, when stark raving sane, I didn’t know how to do it anymore, because the part of me that really composes never needed to know how to do it, it just did. (2019 Instagram post 📝)

It's not an uncommon experience for artists with bipolar disorder. Before you burn so hot that you wind up in the back of an ambulance, and/or before the pendulum swings back towards debilitating depression, the boundless energy, heightened sensitivity, and unexpected thought patterns associated with mania can lead to periods of prolific and effortless creation.
Mania also has the potential to lower your inhibitions, making you more bodacious, more quick-witted – more dazzling, more fun at parties, more dramatic. All traits that are valued in the entertainment industry, especially one that, with the rise of social media, was coming to rely increasingly on parasocial engagement and “personal branding”. Why would you refrain from oversharing, overreacting, overworking, overpromising, overcurating a fantasy image of yourself... when new industry models reward exactly that?
My point is that, in retrospect, “the end was built into the beginning”: all the things that would make fans go “What the hell, Emilie!” in subsequent years were brewing below the surface before the album even dropped.
In the summer of 2006, EA said goodbye to her Chicago friends and returned to California, where she moved in with her new beau, another Illinois-born guitarist with an impressive forehead: Brendon Small, of Dethklok/Metalocalypse quasi-fame. (If you're into that sort of thing: the orchestral strings on “Detharmonic”? Yep, that's EA! 🎵📺)
In September, Opheliac was released into the world. Expectations were high... And many sources agree it was a goddamn banger. It was ultrafemme, ultradark, unhinged, hilarious and deadly and brilliant. It had gnarly kitchen-sink drums layered under angelic string harmonies, fauxperatic swells, and guttural screaming. It had sarcastically self-aware double-entendres that were also literary references that were also musical notation jokes. You get the idea: it was the album that a small, but sizable demographic of tormented millennial teens had been waiting to obsess over. Some time in late 2005 or so, EA had signed with German label Trisol Records, which gave her access to better promotion, press coverage and touring opportunities in Europe when the album came out in the fall. By winter, she was on the cover of alternative mags, and the talk of the town on underground music webzines. Within a year, she was embarking on the first of three almost-back-to-back European tours.
It was around that time that EA started giving her fanbase a more defined, aesthetically on-brand identity. EA, funnily enough, disliked the term “fan” due to its proximity to “fanatic”, and started calling individual supporters “muffins” or the "Bloomer Brigade". (After The Book came out in 2009, they would become “Plague Rats”. You know how pets get weird if you re-name them too many times? I wonder if the same is true of fans.) Meanwhile, EA's fanbase as a collective – as well as her home, her recording studio, her online forum and her inner brainspace... – became canonically known as “The Asylum”. Cue infinite jokes about her fans being “committed.”
And they really were, in a slightly more intense way than your average indie-alternative fanbase. Many fans enthusiastically adopted facets of EA's mannerisms and lingo, which gave the fandom a definite LARP-ing bend; and the official forum did, in fact, offer a subforum for Asylum-themed role-play. (In a number of ways, the Asylum was basically Juggalos for socially anxious theater goths. Substitute the clown facepaint, Faygo, and hatchets for cheek-hearts, Earl Grey tea, and obsolete medical tools.) While there was always some side-eye at the embarrassingly candid, often very young Plague Rats who took the Asylum thing too seriously (always speaking in character and worshipping the ground Mistress Emilie walked on), a lot of people were quite thrilled to play romantic Victorian madhouse with their new favorite artist. Live shows were like costume balls. The forum thrived.
It was like Opheliac had opened a portal to this vibrant and inclusive alternate dimension, which the community was now bringing to life in the real world. And each tour brought more inmates (muffins, Plague Rats, you get it) to the Asylum. “Spread the Plague!” was the name of the game.
So, on paper, in the three years that followed Opheliac, EA kind of won the high-concept-indie-artist equivalent of the lottery. After going through her own personal hell of abuse, major upheavals and serious mental health crises, she had decided to gamble on a radically different tone and musical direction. She came out the other side with critical acclaim for her soul-baring record, tons of live shows with a badass girl squad, photoshoots so iconic they pop up on random Pinterest boards to this day, snazzy corporate sponsorships (including Manic Panic and RockLove Jewelry), and an exponentially growing fanbase who couldn't get enough of whatever she had to give. And she gave quite a lot!
Within those three years, in between tours, EA released A Bit O' This & That 🎵 (a compilation of demos and back-catalogue curiosities), Laced / Unlaced (a full-instrumental double album - one side was the baroque recordings from her late teens, the other was demented, distortion-heavy classical-prog), and three EPs packed with new songs, covers, remixes and bonus content. There was also a deluxe reissue of Enchant, without the puzzle, but with a brand new booklet of handwritten lyrics and marginalia. All came in lovely inter-matching digipaks that really made you want to collect them all – much like the handmade merch 📝🪞 that EA still sold on some legs of her tours. She spent time with the fans at most shows, eventually holding meet-and-greets and private showcases for VIP ticket-holders. She also released “The Opheliac Companion”, a kind of “director's commentary” of the album – roughly 10 hours worth of lyrical deep dives, microphone specs, tangents within tangents within tangents, and whacky (tipsy, sometimes unintelligible) banter between EA and her sound engineer🎤. On top of all that, she wrote, designed and self-published a fully illustrated 200-page coffee-table book, the first print of which sold out within a year. Not bad!
Of course, things that seem to good to be true usually are: at this stage in the story, EA is never as enthusiastically prolific as when her personal life is falling apart behind the scenes.
In the three years that followed Opheliac, along with soaring success, EA got to experience: more rapid-cycling between manic phases and the pits of depression, multiple harrowing medication adjustments, an very-much-unwanted pregnancy followed by a traumatic abortion, a suicide attempt, at least one inpatient stay, and a break-up in the aftermath of it all. There were also a few physical health scares that required hospitalization. On one occasion, she had to go off all her meds cold-turkey when they were confiscated at the EU border right before the start of a tour. In some pictures from her summer 2007 festival appearances, you can make out faint self-harm scars on her thigh through the layered stockings. (Obvious CW, for the morbidly curious.🪞(But if you weren't, would you still be reading?))
So yeah. EA was not doing great.
She didn't share any of these struggles with her fans in real time; her posts were all droll banter and updates on tours and releases. Most of what I just listed was disclosed in late 2009, in the autobiographical part of The Book. (The Book gets at least one instalment of its own. Bear with me, there's a LOT to unpack.) And The Book, while never specifying a timeline, kind of really made it sound like the Bad Stuff (the abortion, the suicide attempt, the hospital stay) had taken place a while back, before the release of Opheliac. In fact, EA plainly stated as much, citing “getting locked up and being put in the asylum" 📝 as the reason for the shift in sound between Enchant and Opheliac.
She repeatedly referred to herself as “stabilized” and “now properly medicated” in interviews. As far as the fanbase was concerned, she had triumphed over her abusers, turned trauma into beauty, and lived to pass on her story of survival. And now she had found balance and community and true acceptance of herself, all that good stuff – and all was fine and dandy within the Asylum. On stage, she sang about blind rage and all-consuming despair and general hopelessness, but she didn't actually feel like that – not anymore, right?
This narrative was both inspirational and quite convenient for the fans. We love our Mad Hatters 🎵📺, our Rainmen, our manic pixies. We love and celebrate “crazy” when it manifests as outside-the-box brilliance and/or bubbly eccentricity. But in my experience, even in spaces that ostensibly focus on "destigmatizing mental illness", positivity and support can quickly turn to rejection and awkwardness when your “quirks” manifest in more challenging ways – like through erratic decisions, aggressive or dishonest behavior, or increasingly untethered beliefs about yourself and the world. No matter how much people claim to “embrace the madness”, it just isn't that fun or in good taste for a large group to play-act ~ whimsical insanity ~ with someone who is for realsies mentally falling apart.
Before time has had time to do its thing, "revisiting your trauma" is just called ruminating. And it's rarely good for you, even when you commit some of greatest art in the process.
I think fans had to assume that there was some critical distance in EA's act, that these extreme negative emotions were all theater – because if they weren't, then the Asylum wasn't an empowering performance about healing from past hurt. It was more like a years-long reality show in which a woman picked at her wounds publicly, again and again, in real time, to the cheers of oblivious strangers who thought they were watching a play.
All I'm saying is that EA was essentially still in the thick of raw trauma when she became a poster-child for overcoming it; that the last thing a person needs, at such a vulnerable stage in their life, is an intense parasocial relationship with sad goth teenagers, let alone one centered around romanticized retellings of their own darkest moments; and that if more people had declined to actively engage in pretend-play that toed the line of self-harm... there is a chance that things might have turned out differently. Maybe EA would still be a successful musician whose career isn't plagued by conflict and mutual disappointment, and maybe some fans wouldn't have wasted years getting red in the face at an over-exposed mentally ill woman for not getting her shit together.
OKAY, THAT GOT HEAVY (and preachy), apologies and thank you for your patience. I will now quit my soapboxing, resume telling the story, and let you draw your own conclusion as our dark plot unravels.

EPILOGUE: DEAD IS THE NEW ALIVE

A quick taste of the poison A quick twist of the knife When the obsession with death, the obsession with death Becomes a way of life ("Dead is the New Alive", 2006 🎵)
I am still over-glorified My reasons to live Were my reasons to die But at least they were mine (“306”, 2006)

In summation: becoming an overnight success thanks to your darkest trauma will do things to person's mind.
As EA kept hyping up how much her fans meant to her, and what an amazing and inclusive and free-thinking motley crew the Asylum was, she was also growing more and more controlling of her increasingly large (and opinionated, and overall rather young) fanbase – and more generally, of the way people ought to talk to and about her.
It was during the Opheliac era that she started reveling in made-up stories about her own life. Then came the habit of losing her shit on fans that she perceived as ungrateful or disrespectful. It was also then that massive kerfuffles became routine on the merch and planning front, and EA's creative output started to routinely fall short of her promises. The more fans started raising legitimate complaints, the more defensive and uncompromising EA became in her public interactions. The more people expressed weariness of the Asylum theme, or started questioning EA's hot takes on mental health and feminism, the harder she doubled down on the Asylum lore and fictional universe. Which is where the drama really starts.
Alright, the time has come. Let's talk about The Book.
...Actually, let's not. I'm nearing my character limit, and you could probably use a break and a stretch after making it this far. This is our intermission, and we'll get to The Book in our next instalment.
Thank you for reading! Stay tuned if you're interested in how it all comes tumbling down.

Drug addiction recovery is a challenging yet transformative journey filled with hope and healing. Rehab offers a pathway to break free from addiction, but it's not without obstacles. Here are key points to navigate this journey more effectively:
Embracing Change: Change can be intimidating, but it's essential for growth. Openness to change and seeing it as a chance to evolve is crucial. Symbols like recovery bracelets serve as reminders of progress and strength.
Overcoming Triggers: Addiction thrives on routine, making change daunting. Embrace self-discovery and view change as an opportunity for personal growth. Utilize symbols like sobriety bracelets to reinforce your courage and commitment to recovery.
Building a Support Network: Recovery requires support from understanding peers, support groups, therapy, and loved ones. Together, you're stronger than addiction.
Managing Cravings: Cravings are normal but manageable. Engage in healthy activities and carry recovery items to stay focused on sobriety goals.
Dealing with Relapse: Relapse isn't failure; it's a learning experience. Seek support from loved ones, support groups like AA or NA, and therapists specialized in addiction.
Addressing Co-Occurring Disorders: Many face addiction alongside mental health issues, requiring comprehensive treatment. Seek help from professionals and support groups for holistic recovery.
Cultivating Self-Compassion: Be kind to yourself, celebrate progress, and practice self-care activities to stay motivated and resilient.
In conclusion, addiction recovery is multifaceted but achievable with determination and support. Remember, each challenge is an opportunity for growth, and with the right mindset and resources, lasting recovery and wellness are possible.

Note* I don't know why my badge says 58 days but I counted from Feb 16 and I got 60 days 😂😂😂

1. This Reddit Group. When I discovered Reddit in Feb (I know, I'm late to the party) and found this sub, a new world opened to me. After reading your stories I knew there was hope for me!
   
2. The death of my dog. I began my sober journey on Feb 16, the day after we laid Ramses to rest. Symbolically, it felt like a good time to also bury this horrible habit. This is for you, Ramses!
   
3. Human support from the husband. Though he is/was my drinking buddy, he doesn't have the same cravings I have for alcohol. So he just stopped drinking as soon as I did and it's fully behind my sober walk!
   
4. Sugar Replacement. I replaced alcohol with sweets, junk food and sometimes non-alcoholic bevs. I gained so much weight but it helped to keep the cravings at bay. Better that than a relapse. (I did begin a weight loss program 2 weeks ago and have lost 7lbs of what I gained.)
   
5. Talked about it to whomever had ears. I told my family and friends that I was going sober. And I would chat with people in this sub. I would even tell my dogs how well I was doing 🐶😻 Talking about the struggles in a positive and healthy way really helped me stay committed. And I would let myself feel very proud of my sobriety.
   
6. Fought cravings by posting here. Everytime I started to feel that little niggling desire I would come here, post something to get encouragement, respond to everyone's comments and then comment on other people's stories. It re-focused my mind away from the craving.
   
7. Pranayama Breathing. There is a yogic breathing technique called Sheetali, where you curl your tongue like a taco (or straw) and breathe in air through your tongue. This helps calm anxiety and cravings.
   
8. IWNDWYT - The battle cry of this sub - I Will Not Drink With You Today - says that we should focus ONLY on getting through today without alcohol. It does not focus on tomorrow. This was a whole new concept for me, a new way of thinking that made breaking away from alcohol MUCH easier because I only was doing it for the day.
   
9. Prayer and Meditation. These are my two best weapons against anxiety which is one of the big reasons that lead me to drink. Prayer connected me to my faith and lifted my spirits (the only kind of spirit that is good for me) and during meditation I would visualize myself walking through my daily plan.
   
10. Having a daily plan. Yes, that's right. It really helped me stay on track specially when I had to take a 2 week trip to the US. I always associate travel with drinking. But I planned each day (did that the day before,) and had all kinds of contingencies in place, in case I had a craving. I carried snacks with me and brought books to read to get my mind focused away from boredom and cravings.
    

There are a few more things that helped but those 10 things more or less sums up all the right things I did to fight this addiction.
If you read this far, maybe you can share a tip or something that helped you greatly in your SOBER journey 💘
IWNDWYT DAY 60 WOOOOOHOOOOO 🥳🙏🎉🎊🤗

I was just thinking about this while watching the video of Lindor’s first at bat from tonight.
First of all, I was at the game and he absolutely smoked that ball that went foul.
Francisco Lindor created a new era of Mets baseball for me. An era of hope, where they aren’t relegated to being non competitive before the season even begins. Maybe a lot of this is personal feelings, but 2017-2020 just felt like they were a complete joke and going into the season felt like “ok, I’ll watch for a little bit until I get bored because they are obviously not doing anything this year”. Maybe it’s the new ownership (though I would argue they go hand in hand here). But since Francisco Lindor has been on the team I feel like anything can happen and they aren’t out of it before the season even starts.
They haven’t come through all the way yet, and they may never, but damn if Lindor hasn’t made me believe. And for that, I’ll give him a standing ovation every at bat.
Thanks for listening to my insane little rant tonight. See ya all tomorrow! I’ll be there section 329 standing up for Francisco Lindor and the New York Mets.
EDIT: As someone pointed out in the comments, the 2019 team was anything but a joke. My life was a joke in 2019, I was a raging alcoholic/drug addict and 2019/first half of 2020 was the worst of it. Definitely a big part of my feelings about this team and Francisco Lindor have to do with 2021 also being the first year I was sober for the entire season (6/1/2020 is my sobriety date). I still stand by everything else I said about Lindor being a symbol of hope and a breath of life into this franchise. But I stand corrected about 2019 being a joke.

Alright, a lot of people actually seemed interested in reading my review (thank you guys so much) so i finished it up and am ready to share it to the world. I spent a longgggg time on this, and no, it wasn't for a school project or anything. I just wanted to type this cause I think the album is incredible.
The Review is split into Chapters as well, and i'm back and forth writing from my perspective, and a overall perspective. So it might be a little confusing sometimes, but I hope it is good.
So, with that being said, here is my extensive review of older (with a link to it on a google doc as well because reading on reddit is hard and hurts my eyes). Please let me know what you think and enjoy.
Google Doc Link

Older- Lizzy McAlpine
(a review, critic, and analysis by Bobby HaltmeieCharlie Pearl)
(Chapter 1, Prologue)
Older By Lizzy McAlpine (24) released on Friday April 5th 2024 is her 4th studio album, and in my opinion her strongest to date. While I believe that my review of this album is easily my best review to date, I can not stress enough the importance of taking your own time with this piece of art. Lizzy spent over two years writing this album while openly dealing with mental health struggles which resulted in one of the most beautifully written, raw, and true albums I have ever gotten to hear.
Please take your own time with this album, it is what I believe to be one of the greatest pieces of modern music and arguably one of the greatest theatrical, pop, indie, rock, alternative albums of all time. While listening to the opinions of critics is a good way to better understand lyrics and songs, it is still more important and always will be for you to make your own emotional opinions. Music is subjective.
(Chapter 2, a musical analysis)
BRACE FOR IMPACT EVERYONE, alright let's begin… This album may be one of, arguably the greatest albums that I have ever heard. I have been writing album reviews for about 4 years now, and I don't publish them, but this one might make it out there this time.
Okay, let's start with the genuine music aspect of this album, every single track on this album is produced incredibly. Mason Stoops and lizzy (The main producers) are cooking up a masterpiece here, the highs, the lows, THE STRINGS (strings will always have a place for me as a violist), the vocal balance, the drums, the ambience, the piano, the raw guitar, the tone, the voice memo/homemade sounds (on occasion), the bass lines (pay attention to them it's amazing). But this is the best part of the music aspect…
The vocals, Lizzy has undoubtedly one of the most beautiful voices that I have ever heard, her flips to her falsetto, her lows, her vibrato, her perfection of tone and oh my… the double/tripled vocal tracks… I have never in my life heard an artist who has even tried to replicate or compare to lizzys doubled vocal harmonies because she truly perfects it more than any artist in the world. Her voice is beautiful too, the timing of her doubled tracks are insane too, truly emphasizing certain lines of the album (Well get into lyrics i promise).
Alright here are some tracks in no order that are either produced like god himself came down to earth and made music; The Elevator, All Falls Down, Drunk, Running, Broken Glass, March, and Vortex. However It is soooo important to me that I am not taking away from the production of any of these tracks, every track on this album is produced as a 10/10 and perfectly work for the album and the art that lizzy was trying to accomplish.
(Chapter 3, song analysis) (ordered by tracks)
The opening track The Elevator I was by no means prepared for. The track is incredibly quiet to begin, where I almost panicked thinking my headphones aren't plugged in. This is the shortest track on the album as well at barely over 1:30, the lyrics are minimal and short but begin the album with a beautiful tone for what we are in for. The song becomes a larger more theatrical song with the introduction of drums and doubled vocal tracks, before what sounds like the clicking of a gun (I am unsure) before the song turns into a full out instrumental masterpiece before abruptly ending and going into the next track.
Come Down Soon the second track on the album, is definitely one of the more fun songs to listen to. A lot of this album I would not consider “playlist songs” since a lot of them deal with some wild topics that might not be the best for most playlists (depending of course) but it is a cute little love song with minimalistic but perfect instrumentals. A simple guitar stringing pattern with a lot of ambience in the background of the chorus especially. This is also the only track where I am able to hear clear vocals from someone other than Lizzy, there is a male vocal in the background of the bridge/instrumental.
Like It Tends To Do starts with an eerie guitar tone that I am not sure how, but I wish I could replicate. Lizzy's vocals come in and are undoubtedly the forefront of this track, she wants you to pay the most attention to the lyrics, which you subconsciously do because of the minimal backing track. The vocals eventually end, and some ambient noise is brought in, with some simple piano melodies, and beautiful orchestral strings (a highlight of the track for me). The track is one of the quieter on the album, it is peaceful yet uncomfortable, soft yet aggressive, and relatable but hard to listen to.
Movie Star is undoubtedly a call back to Lizzys older music, especially things from her first album Give Me a Minute. The song is only really guitar, there are doubled vocal tracks and harmonies on many emphasized lines, especially when she says “over and over” (a lyric that also appears in the title track older) there are occasional piano keys and some ambience with reverb before abruptly ending.
But I especially feel the need to call out All Falls Down, because this track made me jump with its production at the end, chills. Chills. Chills. Lizzy makes tracks go from quiet and peaceful ballads to incredibly produced full band songs with drums, horns (the sax in some of these songs is actually such a highlight), and layered guitabass/piano parts which add genuine perfection to the album.
Staying is one of the quietest songs at the beginning before the piano begins to come in and introduce a beautiful melody. The first verse sounds almost poetic and doesn't follow clear patterns but it is beautiful. The song introduces one of the most important plot points as well, which we will analyze in more detail in chapter 4. (this song reminds me of Bad Luck -Noah Kahan a lot btw)
I Guess the second single from the album and it will tear you apart if you read these lyrics (I promise the lyric analysis will happen) but this song definitely has one of the largest full band sounding feels, it's got horns, strings, ambience, doubled/tripled vocal tracks, clear drums, catchy melodic vocal lines, and guitar. The song starts as a quiet yet charming ballad to a very quiet muted acoustic guitar, its a personal reflection on Lizzy's whole relationships, her relationship with her lovers, previous lovers, and most prominently, her father. The song was released on march 7th 2024, and it was dedicated to her dads passing (which had happened 4 years to the date before this song was released)
Drunk, Running… alright lizzy this is getting unfairly good. First off, I know I haven't touched on lyrics yet, but I have to talk about some of these. Her imagery??? Dude… it's insane. But this is one of those tracks that starts as a beautiful theatrical song, with incredible lyrics on some really serious topics. The production is insane with how it starts as one of the “voice memo/homemade sounding” songs, but somehow they were able to seamlessly transition the song into another beautiful even more theatrical track with some of the most beautiful melodic line spread throughout the backing track while also keeping many of Lizzy's vocals prominent and clear.
Broken Glass, first off, I am praying that this is not a true story that lizzy has been a victim too. ***If you have had a past with abuse and violence this song is a very serious and intense song about these topics so please proceed with caution and keeping that in mind*** From a musical aspect this song is incredible, I believe there are 2 guitar tracks in the background that bounce from ear to ear (The use of stereo on this album is wild btw) later during the chorus, a piano comes in and it is beautiful. During verse 3 we get some subtle 808’s that are wildly good (Lizzy pls give me lessons) the song then once again turns into another theatrical track with a large, loud ending. With a perfect buildup and it eventually drops back down to being quiet again so smoothly it's amazing. Please spend time with this song and break it down because there is far too much for me to describe in a paragraph.
You Forced Me To. Whoa Lizzy, this is probably the most theatrical song on the album (in a way) . I love the piano lines during the instrumental breaks (so theatery) the guitar is very theatrical and beautiful. The double vocals on this track stand out to me more than most tracks, and it's amazing. The way the song ends with its singular piano line is also perfect.
You Forced Me To transitions straight into the album's title track Older, which was also released as the first single for the album. The piano has a very iconic to lizzy sound where you can hear the pedals be lifted and pressed throughout the song which brings that awesome voice memo sound to it (which everyone loves). The song is one of a few that actually have a repeating chorus that stays the same throughout the track, but I mean, hey at least it is undeniably beautiful and perfect to the point of it being the most viral song off the album (as of 4/5/24).
Better Than This another throwback track that reminisces of her past works, the track is mainly just Lizzy and her guitar which makes it feel raw and draws more attention to the lyrics. The song sounds like a crisis, Lizzy is clearly feeling low at the point of writing this, as the topics and eeriness of the track reflect the self deprecating meaning.
Every album has highlights and lowlights, this album does not have lowlights at all. But to be fair I have a least favorite song (I know I know) and it's going to piss some people off. But I am very confident that this track will grow on me like crazy. March, it's definitely one of the most beautifully written, true, and raw songs on the album. Lizzy kept the tradition of the 2nd to last track being for her dad who passed. The song is so raw and real, you can feel it in her vocals and the repeatedly showing up piano melodies. I know the song will grow on me, but it's one of the less theatrical songs on the album, but still a ten out of ten undoubtedly. The track is obviously mainly lyric focused, which is why I know it is going to grow on me because I have an insane appreciation for lyrics.
The closing track Vortex; a almost 6 minute long track (the longest of the album) is what I would consider a perfect outro to an album I wish never ended. A beautiful piano ballad with occasional additions of accented piano in the background as Lizzy's voice sings a perfect reflection of every track on this album. The bridge of this song may have in fact ruined me and left me genuinely speechless. I don't have any words to describe this so I am just going to leave this line here… “And you're screaming at mе, and I'm watching it fall. And I'm slamming the door and you make yourself tall. But it's always an act and it never lasts long” The song has one of the most beautiful and gradual instrumental lines I have ever heard before becoming the largest and loudest track on the album (maybe All Falls Down tops it) but either way it's perfection that can not be described by words. Listen to the song yourself and realize the beauty of it.
(Chapter 4, lyric breakdown & plot breakdown *Side A*) (ordered by track)
The Elevator: The opening track is actually a reflection of what is about to come with this album “It wasn't slow, it happened fast” foreshadows the haste of the story that is about to follow in this album. The closing verse shows Lizzy in another time, hoping that the new relationship she finds herself in will last “Can we stay like this forever? Can we be here in this room 'til we die? I think we can make it. I hope that I'm right” Lizzy clearly doesn't have the highest hopes for the relationship as the most she can do is “hope that it lasts” this shows how Lizzy may have had a complex past with relationships, resulting in a false sense of hope and trust in this person.
Come Down Soon: The opening line, “He leans out the window. Of the car as it rolls away He says, "Do you come here often?" I have to laugh, 'cause that's so cliché” The imagery of this track definitely adds to the story greatly, this is the main way that lizzy writes so theatrically (her use of imagery). But this line also is in itself cliché, which adds a sense of humor and comfort to the track. “He says, "Do you wanna leave yet?" Only if I leave with him” Lizzy is in love with everyone. She seemingly had just met this person, and she is already hoping to go home with him. “Nothing this good's ever really good for me” is a repeated phrase throughout the chorus. It means that lizzy believes this new person in her life is essentially too good to be true, and that it won't last the same way it is now. The track's title Come Down Soon also shows Lizzy's pessimistic views on this relationship, believing that this will not end well. “Music spills onto the dirt. But we stand here in the freezing cold. And wonder who will kiss who first” once again lizzy uses imagery to show the setting, they are outside in the cold, listening to music with romantic tension. Lizzy and this unnamed person are in a mad state of love (or the honeymoon phase of the relationship) which Lizzy is aware of, and continuously reminds herself that the relationship will likely be downhill from here, or it will “come down soon”.
Like It Tends To Do: Things are beginning to go downhill, yet lizzy will try to hold on and keep hope. But she isn't sure where things are going to go from here, “I don't know where we stand anymore…Don't know why I feel I'm faking something. I don't know what to do with my hands anymore. Feels exactly like it was. But at the same time it feels so different” Lizzy says these lines poetically, and she seems weaker mentally, just a moment ago her and this new person she met were madly in love and it felt like they would never let eachother go. But things are seeming to change. The honeymoon phase is ending, they might still be together, but they aren't connecting the same way “If we were standing in the same room… Would I actively avoid you? Or would everything havе changed. Like it tends to do?” Lizzy once again is being rather pessimistic and struggling to see any good in what is yet to come. She believes that all her relationships in the past and in the future will eventually just fade into nothing “like it tends to do”.
Movie Star: Lizzy is likely being told things to make her feel better about herself in this relationship. Whether these things she is being told are true or not, we don't truly know at this point but we will eventually find out. “I'm special… He chose me out of everyone…[I’m] Famous to someone” Lizzy is enjoying this praise at first, but as we get to the 2nd verse Lizzy begins to catch on to the toxicity she may be falling victim to. “I wanna change, I wanna grow But it's physically impossible… I feel like a movie star, but it's getting old. Being famous for someone” Lizzy starts to feel trapped by this person, feeling “physically impossible to grow” is a metaphor for being trapped in a controlling relationship that is not allowing Lizzy to grow to her fullest potential.
All Falls Down: While this song is so groovy with its amazing sax and horns, with simple jazz style drumming as obe and bass clarinet carry an awesome melody. The song is far deeper than the musical aspect, the lyrics are once again back and forth between lizzy telling herself this relationship is good for her and is going to be good in the end. The track also reflects on Lizzy's personal life outside of this relationship, her struggles with mental health, touring, fame, and success. “More like you today, more than a shell of me… Twenty-three and a sold out show. I am happy, but I'll probably cry after you go home. Doing fine, like I always am. Am I that good of a liar that I believe myself again?” Lizzy is back and forth between feeling good about her life and career, she is selling out shows and having a great time, but she still feels trapped and unable to grow because of this relationship that she is stuck in. “Twenty-two was a panic attack. I can't stop the time from moving and I can never gеt it back” Lizzy is finally admitting that this relationship's benefits are not outweighing the bad, and that she is angry about the fact that she will never be able to get this time back. She expresses that when she was 22 (and in this relationship we can assume) she was at an all time low, having regular panic attacks and just overall mentally unstable.
Staying: This track is the heaviest track so far. Lizzy spirals heavily during this track, and ironically, the title completely contradicts the majority of the lyrics. The song discusses how Lizzy plans on leaving this person, while also still feeling trapped by them and unable to leave “I'm too far gone to care…How can you look so peaceful. When you know I'm gonna leave?” Lizzy claims that she is too far gone to care, she believes that she is so trapped in this relationship that she is numb to anything else that can begin to happen.
I Guess: This being the 2nd single from the album, lizzy obviously wants us to pay attention to it. “I'll tell a lie just to bring you home” This likely means that Lizzy and her partner are in a disagreement, or at the very least Lizzys partner is feeling reluctant to return home with her. Lizzy feels obligated to care for this person still however, even though she knows that they are not good for her, so Lizzy tells a lie in order to fill this “obligation”. “I guess it's all about timing. I guess it's all about the things you want but never get. I guess it's all about trying. To love someone you've never met” Not many tracks from Older contain repeating choruses, but this one is repeating and very beautifully written. Lizzy is still trying to tell herself that in a way, this could still work. She has been hurt, trapped, and unhappy, but she continues to think that there is hope, resulting in her trapping herself in this relationship herself (likely due to manipulation in the relationship) “we're equal, more or less (Mm). Now I am sick, and you're probably drunk” We see clear examples of an unhealthy relationship here. Her partner is drinking while she is sick, yet she still claims that they are equal… or at least more or less. “Wish it was easy, I wish I knew. What I was doing, but I never do. (Here we go)” These are perfected lyrics, they encapsulate the struggles of her mental health, relationship, and so much more. Life is a rollercoaster of unexpected things that are often out of peoples control, the best we can do is guess because nobody will know the correct path for you (because there is none).
(Chapter 5, lyric breakdown & plot breakdown *Side B*) (ordered by track)
Drunk, Running: Drunk running begins the second half of the album, and also notes a pretty noticeable change in mood. Things are beginning to get worse for Lizzy, both mentally and within the relationship itself. “What did you mean when you said that? You were sober now? Caught you in bed with a Red Bull Vodka” Lizzys partner is failing to keep his sobriety, and it is hurting Lizzy. She feels lied to, betrayed, and unimportant. Lizzy wants him to stop drinking for her, yet she he continues to clearly show a lack of care for her by continuing to do so. “No one stops you. Nobody takes it from your hand. Even when you. Break your leg drunk running… Say, "I love you" And then drink it backwards” The line “Say, "I love you" And then drink it backwards” is the closing line of the chorus and the most important to the song. The line means that every time Lizzys partner has a drink, it undoes the good, or undoes the “i love you”. “What if it was all my fault?... Make a person out of memories, they won't live up to it. I'm so sorry I stay when I shouldn't” Lizzy begins to blame herself for the harmful actions of her partner, which is clearly not her fault as relationships are meant to be balanced (which this one is clearly not). “Say, "I love you". And then drink it backwards. Say, "I love you". Uoy еvol I, Uoy evol I” The chorus then repeats again before fading into a beautiful orchestral outro, all while Lizzy is going back and forth between saying “I love you” and “Uoy evol I”, I love you in reverse, which reflects the repeating actions of doing and undoing the love in the relationship.
Broken Glass: *TW, if you have struggled with physical abuse, domestic abuse, self harm, or anything of that nature please proceed with caution. Remember that you are not alone and people are here to help.* This is undoubtedly one of, if not the most lyrically moving and difficult songs to listen to on Older. The song deals with topics of abuse within the relationship, this is obviously the worst point of the relationship yet. It is important to remember that not very long ago this relationship had seemed perfect. “Broken glass on the table. Pick it up, hold it to your throat. I can see who you are now that the windows broke. Drop of blood on the carpet. Didn't think it would go this far. Don't know why I held on this long” The use of the symbol broken glass, shows the weapon that is being used against Lizzy in the relationship. The shard is from a broken window, likely due to Lizzys partner lashing out and eventually breaking the window out of anger. Lizzy is being actively threatened by her partner, there is blood on the floor from cuts inflicted from one another. However any harm that Lizzy had done is simply in self defense, which is confirmed on the pre-chorus “I know you've been hurt. But you did it first to me… Broken glass again” This line shows that any harm or violence done was first done by Lizzys partner (inflicting onto Lizzy) and saying “broken glass again” shows the repetition of this behavior. “Maybe it doesn't matter. Who the blame gets assigned to next. Nothing's ever the way that I remember it” Lizzy is being manipulated into believing that any problems in the relationship are her fault, she is aware that no matter who starts the altercation, the blame will be turned onto her. “And every word is a landmine…It might seem like I love you. But I just don't want to be alone” this line is our first outright confirmation by Lizzy that she is not willingly in this relationship. Everything she is saying is being taken out of context and turned into something larger than it is (a landmine)
You Forced Me To: *TW, if you have been sexually abused or assaulted, this track contains details on those topics and it is important to proceed with caution, people are here for you if you are struggling*Lizzy is being brutally manipulated by this point in the relationship. This “partner” if you can even call him that anymore, is basically molding Lizzy into the version of her that he wants, this may even be happening in a sexually abusive way, as the first line says “You're on top of me. And I’m under you. And it never stops”. This shows fairly clear signs of more physicall and sexual abuse. The chorus shows how brutally Lizzy has been manipulated by this point, she is feeling terrible about herself, and feels that any harm done in the relationship, or even in general, is her fault. “I want you to hate me. I deserve it for my crimes. I know that I loved you. But you loved me harder. Every time. I am not the same as when you met me. I have changed because you forced me to” She continues to blame herself, while still being aware of the controlling nature of the relationship.
Older: The title track… Lizzy begins to branch away finally. Not directly, but she is thinking through things more clearly now. “Over and over, a carousel ride…Sick to my stomach, can't find the ground. Stuck in a loop…” She is reflecting on how terrible the things she was going through were. She also begins to understand that the constant repetition of the terrible things in the relationship were brutal and ruining her life, health, mental health, and more. “Thought it'd be over by now. Thought you would leave. Thought I would come to my senses. Wish I was stronger somehow. Wish it was easy. Somewhere I lost all my senses. I wish I knew. what the end is” Lizzy reflects at herself. She was so young when all of this happened, and she is beginning at least to realize how terrible these things were, however she still is wishing and blaming herself for the harm done to her. “Over and over, watch it all pass. Moms gettin' older, I'm wanting it back. Where no one is dying, and no one is hurt” Lizzy reflects on her childhood, wanting it back. She doesn't want her mother to age more because that scares her, and she doesn't want anyone to be dying (which likely refers to her father) “I wish I knew. what the end is” this is the ending line of the track, and it perfectly encapsulates Lizzy’s feelings. Life is a cycle of good and bad, and we will never know how it ends until we live it.
Better Than This: “There's someone at my door, I can hear him knocking. If I let him inside it will all be true. I didn't know that I was capable of all of this.” It finally sounds like Lizzy is accepting that this person was not good for her, she eventually leaves him, he tries to come back by knocking at her door, but for the first time in the relationship, Lizzy doesn't answer. “What if I'm not a good person? You always say that I am. But you don't really know me at all now. I think that I'm not who you think I am. But I like to be seen and I like to be wanted. Want it to mean something” Lizzy finally stops letting the manipulation get to her, she also contemplates going back, but eventually decides that it would be worse for her. She misses being wanted the way that she was in the relationship, but she doesn't miss the abuse and manipulation. “Someone will love me better than this” Lizzy realizes that she can do better, this relationship is not worth sticking around for anymore. “Someone will love you better” the final line depicts the last sliver of hope and care that Lizzy has for the now ex.
March: This track is likely about Lizzy's father, however there are still many pieces that can be connected back to the relationship this album focuses on. “...Tryna find the lesson in it all, but. I haven't learned anything” as stated in some of the previous songs, Lizzy wishes that she would just know how to live life “correctly”, blaming herself for any mistakes she's made, claiming that she “hasn't learned anything”. “Never looked much like my father” a line dedicated to her father who had passed away due to illness in March of 2020. Lizzy reflects on him in the next lines, but they are also applicable to her now ex. “I see him more now that he's gone. Or maybe I just see him in everything” She can't do simple things anymore, like certain songs might remind her of her ex, or her father. She claims to be seeing them in everything, a metaphor for everything reminding her of them and the times that she would rather forget. “And how could it take so long? Thought I had it handled but it slipped through. I didn't know it'd be this hard. So far away, and then it hits you” Lizzy accepts in part, that there wasn't much she could do. She was young and unknowing. But as she processes, it “hits her” and she begins to understand. “Called you when I heard the news. Spent the night lying next to you. What a way to start it off. So heavy from the start” This line is most certainly for her father. She would spend nights in the same room, comforting her father through his illness. She says how everything has been “heavy from the start” as in, nothing has been easy for her ever. She witnessed her dad pass at a young age, and everything since then has been so complex.
Vortex: This track summarizes so much of the album, “I know it's not my fault. But I can't say that I'm blameless” Lizzy admits to herself at last, it isn't her fault. But, part of her still knows she could have left which leaves her feeling guilty still, which she shouldn't, but she can't stop herself from. “I know it's not my fault. But sometimes it feels like I did this” Lizzy reflects on all the times that she has felt or been blamed for the things done to her, even though it isn't her fault. “Someday I'll be able to let you go… Someday I'll be kinder to myself” Lizzy admits to herself that she needs to be kinder to herself, and care for herself first sometimes, not the lives of others. “We're spinning out of a vortex. I don't remember who we are” Lizzy describes her efforts to forget this time of her life, spiraling repeatedly down a “vortex” and attempting to block out the memories. “And you're screaming at mе and I'm watching it fall. And I'm slamming the door and you make yourself tall. But it's always an act and it never lasts long. 'Cause I always come back when I need a new song. And I'm tired of this and the way that it feels. I'm not there anymore, this has never been real. We're just awful together and awful apart. I don't know what to do anymore” This bridge is the best lyrics on the album. It is a perfect summary of the hell that Lizzy was living through. With beautiful imagery, describing the arguments and fights they would have with perfect accuracy. Saying that he would often make himself tall, a metaphor for him making himself look bigger and scarier to assert a dominant nature. She talks about how it is all fake anyways and that it will go back to “normal” again. She talks about her struggles to leave, saying that she will always come back for something. She says that they are both awful together and apart, which tells us why she would continue to go back to him no matter how toxic he may have been to her. “Oh-oh, oh-oh. Someday I'll be able to let you go. Oh-oh, oh-oh. Someday you'll come back, and I'll say no” Lizzy accepts it at last, with the final line of the album where she confirms that she will never go back to this person again. (lizzy im so proud of you)
(Chapter 6, a brief lyrical review)
The story of Older is undoubtedly beautiful, there are moments that are hard to listen to because of the rawness, there are moments that make you want to get up and dance, there are moments that can make you break down crying, and there are moments that leave you with no words. Older is Lizzys best project to date, she shows signs of both musical growth, and emotional growth. This album encapsulates years of her life in one long story. Dealing with the early stages of a relationship where she is happy, the later stages where things begin to get dry, the lowest point where there are moments of abuse, alcoholism, and depression, to the final track has a long reflection during the bridge where she remembers all of the terrible things that were done to her before finally turning into a freeing moment of growth for Lizzy where she finally lets go, she is ready to move on now and she plans on never going back. (enough to make a grown man cry)
(Chapter 7, concluding thoughts)
Older as I previously stated is Lizzys best album to date. It is a masterpiece of writing, music, production, vocals, and so much more. And as I had mentioned in chapter one, it is so important to spend your own time with this album. While the review is helpful and can help you understand, please take your own time to appreciate the artwork that Lizzy blessed us with. This is a sit down, lyrics out, multi-listen, no distractions album.
(Author Note)
Hiiiii, if you read the whole thing, first off, thank you so so so much. This took a long time to write but I am so proud of how it came out. This is the best piece of writing I have done in years (maybe my life) and I am so glad that I get to share it with people in the world. If you think it's good, please share this around with your friends, family, and other Lizzy fans and let me know what you think. I've been writing my own music for a longtime now and this album definitely has inspired me so if you really want to be super cool, please feel free to follow my instagram @: charlies.pearly. (Charlie Pearl, Aka me :)) Thank you for reading and have a amazing day. I love you all and you are so important to the world <3

• Bobby Haltmeier AKA Charlie Pearl

Alright, a lot of people actually seemed interested in reading my review (thank you guys so much) so i finished it up and am ready to share it to the world. I spent a longgggg time on this, and no, it wasn't for a school project or anything. I just wanted to type this cause I think the album is incredible.
The Review is split into Chapters as well, and i'm back and forth writing from my perspective, and a overall perspective. So it might be a little confusing sometimes, but I hope it is good.
So, with that being said, here is my extensive review of older (with a link to it on a google doc as well because reading on reddit is hard and hurts my eyes). Please let me know what you think and enjoy.

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Older- Lizzy McAlpine
(a review, critic, and analysis by Bobby HaltmeieCharlie Pearl)
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(Chapter 1, Prologue)
Older By Lizzy McAlpine (24) released on Friday April 5th 2024 is her 4th studio album, and in my opinion her strongest to date. While I believe that my review of this album is easily my best review to date, I can not stress enough the importance of taking your own time with this piece of art. Lizzy spent over two years writing this album while openly dealing with mental health struggles which resulted in one of the most beautifully written, raw, and true albums I have ever gotten to hear.
Please take your own time with this album, it is what I believe to be one of the greatest pieces of modern music and arguably one of the greatest theatrical, pop, indie, rock, alternative albums of all time. While listening to the opinions of critics is a good way to better understand lyrics and songs, it is still more important and always will be for you to make your own emotional opinions. Music is subjective.
(Chapter 2, a musical analysis)
BRACE FOR IMPACT EVERYONE, alright let's begin… This album may be one of, arguably the greatest albums that I have ever heard. I have been writing album reviews for about 4 years now, and I don't publish them, but this one might make it out there this time.
Okay, let's start with the genuine music aspect of this album, every single track on this album is produced incredibly. Mason Stoops and lizzy (The main producers) are cooking up a masterpiece here, the highs, the lows, THE STRINGS (strings will always have a place for me as a violist), the vocal balance, the drums, the ambience, the piano, the raw guitar, the tone, the voice memo/homemade sounds (on occasion), the bass lines (pay attention to them it's amazing). But this is the best part of the music aspect…
The vocals, Lizzy has undoubtedly one of the most beautiful voices that I have ever heard, her flips to her falsetto, her lows, her vibrato, her perfection of tone and oh my… the double/tripled vocal tracks… I have never in my life heard an artist who has even tried to replicate or compare to lizzys doubled vocal harmonies because she truly perfects it more than any artist in the world. Her voice is beautiful too, the timing of her doubled tracks are insane too, truly emphasizing certain lines of the album (Well get into lyrics i promise).
Alright here are some tracks in no order that are either produced like god himself came down to earth and made music; The Elevator, All Falls Down, Drunk, Running, Broken Glass, March, and Vortex. However It is soooo important to me that I am not taking away from the production of any of these tracks, every track on this album is produced as a 10/10 and perfectly work for the album and the art that lizzy was trying to accomplish.
(Chapter 3, song analysis) (ordered by tracks)
The opening track The Elevator I was by no means prepared for. The track is incredibly quiet to begin, where I almost panicked thinking my headphones aren't plugged in. This is the shortest track on the album as well at barely over 1:30, the lyrics are minimal and short but begin the album with a beautiful tone for what we are in for. The song becomes a larger more theatrical song with the introduction of drums and doubled vocal tracks, before what sounds like the clicking of a gun (I am unsure) before the song turns into a full out instrumental masterpiece before abruptly ending and going into the next track.
Come Down Soon the second track on the album, is definitely one of the more fun songs to listen to. A lot of this album I would not consider “playlist songs” since a lot of them deal with some wild topics that might not be the best for most playlists (depending of course) but it is a cute little love song with minimalistic but perfect instrumentals. A simple guitar stringing pattern with a lot of ambience in the background of the chorus especially. This is also the only track where I am able to hear clear vocals from someone other than Lizzy, there is a male vocal in the background of the bridge/instrumental.
Like It Tends To Do starts with an eerie guitar tone that I am not sure how, but I wish I could replicate. Lizzy's vocals come in and are undoubtedly the forefront of this track, she wants you to pay the most attention to the lyrics, which you subconsciously do because of the minimal backing track. The vocals eventually end, and some ambient noise is brought in, with some simple piano melodies, and beautiful orchestral strings (a highlight of the track for me). The track is one of the quieter on the album, it is peaceful yet uncomfortable, soft yet aggressive, and relatable but hard to listen to.
Movie Star is undoubtedly a call back to Lizzys older music, especially things from her first album Give Me a Minute. The song is only really guitar, there are doubled vocal tracks and harmonies on many emphasized lines, especially when she says “over and over” (a lyric that also appears in the title track older) there are occasional piano keys and some ambience with reverb before abruptly ending.
But I especially feel the need to call out All Falls Down, because this track made me jump with its production at the end, chills. Chills. Chills. Lizzy makes tracks go from quiet and peaceful ballads to incredibly produced full band songs with drums, horns (the sax in some of these songs is actually such a highlight), and layered guitabass/piano parts which add genuine perfection to the album.
Staying is one of the quietest songs at the beginning before the piano begins to come in and introduce a beautiful melody. The first verse sounds almost poetic and doesn't follow clear patterns but it is beautiful. The song introduces one of the most important plot points as well, which we will analyze in more detail in chapter 4. (this song reminds me of Bad Luck -Noah Kahan a lot btw)
I Guess the second single from the album and it will tear you apart if you read these lyrics (I promise the lyric analysis will happen) but this song definitely has one of the largest full band sounding feels, it's got horns, strings, ambience, doubled/tripled vocal tracks, clear drums, catchy melodic vocal lines, and guitar. The song starts as a quiet yet charming ballad to a very quiet muted acoustic guitar, its a personal reflection on Lizzy's whole relationships, her relationship with her lovers, previous lovers, and most prominently, her father. The song was released on march 7th 2024, and it was dedicated to her dads passing (which had happened 4 years to the date before this song was released)
Drunk, Running… alright lizzy this is getting unfairly good. First off, I know I haven't touched on lyrics yet, but I have to talk about some of these. Her imagery??? Dude… it's insane. But this is one of those tracks that starts as a beautiful theatrical song, with incredible lyrics on some really serious topics. The production is insane with how it starts as one of the “voice memo/homemade sounding” songs, but somehow they were able to seamlessly transition the song into another beautiful even more theatrical track with some of the most beautiful melodic line spread throughout the backing track while also keeping many of Lizzy's vocals prominent and clear.
Broken Glass, first off, I am praying that this is not a true story that lizzy has been a victim too. ***If you have had a past with abuse and violence this song is a very serious and intense song about these topics so please proceed with caution and keeping that in mind*** From a musical aspect this song is incredible, I believe there are 2 guitar tracks in the background that bounce from ear to ear (The use of stereo on this album is wild btw) later during the chorus, a piano comes in and it is beautiful. During verse 3 we get some subtle 808’s that are wildly good (Lizzy pls give me lessons) the song then once again turns into another theatrical track with a large, loud ending. With a perfect buildup and it eventually drops back down to being quiet again so smoothly it's amazing. Please spend time with this song and break it down because there is far too much for me to describe in a paragraph.
You Forced Me To. Whoa Lizzy, this is probably the most theatrical song on the album (in a way) . I love the piano lines during the instrumental breaks (so theatery) the guitar is very theatrical and beautiful. The double vocals on this track stand out to me more than most tracks, and it's amazing. The way the song ends with its singular piano line is also perfect.
You Forced Me To transitions straight into the album's title track Older, which was also released as the first single for the album. The piano has a very iconic to lizzy sound where you can hear the pedals be lifted and pressed throughout the song which brings that awesome voice memo sound to it (which everyone loves). The song is one of a few that actually have a repeating chorus that stays the same throughout the track, but I mean, hey at least it is undeniably beautiful and perfect to the point of it being the most viral song off the album (as of 4/5/24).
Better Than This another throwback track that reminisces of her past works, the track is mainly just Lizzy and her guitar which makes it feel raw and draws more attention to the lyrics. The song sounds like a crisis, Lizzy is clearly feeling low at the point of writing this, as the topics and eeriness of the track reflect the self deprecating meaning.
Every album has highlights and lowlights, this album does not have lowlights at all. But to be fair I have a least favorite song (I know I know) and it's going to piss some people off. But I am very confident that this track will grow on me like crazy. March, it's definitely one of the most beautifully written, true, and raw songs on the album. Lizzy kept the tradition of the 2nd to last track being for her dad who passed. The song is so raw and real, you can feel it in her vocals and the repeatedly showing up piano melodies. I know the song will grow on me, but it's one of the less theatrical songs on the album, but still a ten out of ten undoubtedly. The track is obviously mainly lyric focused, which is why I know it is going to grow on me because I have an insane appreciation for lyrics.
The closing track Vortex; a almost 6 minute long track (the longest of the album) is what I would consider a perfect outro to an album I wish never ended. A beautiful piano ballad with occasional additions of accented piano in the background as Lizzy's voice sings a perfect reflection of every track on this album. The bridge of this song may have in fact ruined me and left me genuinely speechless. I don't have any words to describe this so I am just going to leave this line here… “And you're screaming at mе, and I'm watching it fall. And I'm slamming the door and you make yourself tall. But it's always an act and it never lasts long” The song has one of the most beautiful and gradual instrumental lines I have ever heard before becoming the largest and loudest track on the album (maybe All Falls Down tops it) but either way it's perfection that can not be described by words. Listen to the song yourself and realize the beauty of it.
(Chapter 4, lyric breakdown & plot breakdown *Side A*) (ordered by track)
The Elevator: The opening track is actually a reflection of what is about to come with this album “It wasn't slow, it happened fast” foreshadows the haste of the story that is about to follow in this album. The closing verse shows Lizzy in another time, hoping that the new relationship she finds herself in will last “Can we stay like this forever? Can we be here in this room 'til we die? I think we can make it. I hope that I'm right” Lizzy clearly doesn't have the highest hopes for the relationship as the most she can do is “hope that it lasts” this shows how Lizzy may have had a complex past with relationships, resulting in a false sense of hope and trust in this person.
Come Down Soon: The opening line, “He leans out the window. Of the car as it rolls away He says, "Do you come here often?" I have to laugh, 'cause that's so cliché” The imagery of this track definitely adds to the story greatly, this is the main way that lizzy writes so theatrically (her use of imagery). But this line also is in itself cliché, which adds a sense of humor and comfort to the track. “He says, "Do you wanna leave yet?" Only if I leave with him” Lizzy is in love with everyone. She seemingly had just met this person, and she is already hoping to go home with him. “Nothing this good's ever really good for me” is a repeated phrase throughout the chorus. It means that lizzy believes this new person in her life is essentially too good to be true, and that it won't last the same way it is now. The track's title Come Down Soon also shows Lizzy's pessimistic views on this relationship, believing that this will not end well. “Music spills onto the dirt. But we stand here in the freezing cold. And wonder who will kiss who first” once again lizzy uses imagery to show the setting, they are outside in the cold, listening to music with romantic tension. Lizzy and this unnamed person are in a mad state of love (or the honeymoon phase of the relationship) which Lizzy is aware of, and continuously reminds herself that the relationship will likely be downhill from here, or it will “come down soon”.
Like It Tends To Do: Things are beginning to go downhill, yet lizzy will try to hold on and keep hope. But she isn't sure where things are going to go from here, “I don't know where we stand anymore…Don't know why I feel I'm faking something. I don't know what to do with my hands anymore. Feels exactly like it was. But at the same time it feels so different” Lizzy says these lines poetically, and she seems weaker mentally, just a moment ago her and this new person she met were madly in love and it felt like they would never let eachother go. But things are seeming to change. The honeymoon phase is ending, they might still be together, but they aren't connecting the same way “If we were standing in the same room… Would I actively avoid you? Or would everything havе changed. Like it tends to do?” Lizzy once again is being rather pessimistic and struggling to see any good in what is yet to come. She believes that all her relationships in the past and in the future will eventually just fade into nothing “like it tends to do”.
Movie Star: Lizzy is likely being told things to make her feel better about herself in this relationship. Whether these things she is being told are true or not, we don't truly know at this point but we will eventually find out. “I'm special… He chose me out of everyone…[I’m] Famous to someone” Lizzy is enjoying this praise at first, but as we get to the 2nd verse Lizzy begins to catch on to the toxicity she may be falling victim to. “I wanna change, I wanna grow But it's physically impossible… I feel like a movie star, but it's getting old. Being famous for someone” Lizzy starts to feel trapped by this person, feeling “physically impossible to grow” is a metaphor for being trapped in a controlling relationship that is not allowing Lizzy to grow to her fullest potential.
All Falls Down: While this song is so groovy with its amazing sax and horns, with simple jazz style drumming as obe and bass clarinet carry an awesome melody. The song is far deeper than the musical aspect, the lyrics are once again back and forth between lizzy telling herself this relationship is good for her and is going to be good in the end. The track also reflects on Lizzy's personal life outside of this relationship, her struggles with mental health, touring, fame, and success. “More like you today, more than a shell of me… Twenty-three and a sold out show. I am happy, but I'll probably cry after you go home. Doing fine, like I always am. Am I that good of a liar that I believe myself again?” Lizzy is back and forth between feeling good about her life and career, she is selling out shows and having a great time, but she still feels trapped and unable to grow because of this relationship that she is stuck in. “Twenty-two was a panic attack. I can't stop the time from moving and I can never gеt it back” Lizzy is finally admitting that this relationship's benefits are not outweighing the bad, and that she is angry about the fact that she will never be able to get this time back. She expresses that when she was 22 (and in this relationship we can assume) she was at an all time low, having regular panic attacks and just overall mentally unstable.
Staying: This track is the heaviest track so far. Lizzy spirals heavily during this track, and ironically, the title completely contradicts the majority of the lyrics. The song discusses how Lizzy plans on leaving this person, while also still feeling trapped by them and unable to leave “I'm too far gone to care…How can you look so peaceful. When you know I'm gonna leave?” Lizzy claims that she is too far gone to care, she believes that she is so trapped in this relationship that she is numb to anything else that can begin to happen.
I Guess: This being the 2nd single from the album, lizzy obviously wants us to pay attention to it. “I'll tell a lie just to bring you home” This likely means that Lizzy and her partner are in a disagreement, or at the very least Lizzys partner is feeling reluctant to return home with her. Lizzy feels obligated to care for this person still however, even though she knows that they are not good for her, so Lizzy tells a lie in order to fill this “obligation”. “I guess it's all about timing. I guess it's all about the things you want but never get. I guess it's all about trying. To love someone you've never met” Not many tracks from Older contain repeating choruses, but this one is repeating and very beautifully written. Lizzy is still trying to tell herself that in a way, this could still work. She has been hurt, trapped, and unhappy, but she continues to think that there is hope, resulting in her trapping herself in this relationship herself (likely due to manipulation in the relationship) “we're equal, more or less (Mm). Now I am sick, and you're probably drunk” We see clear examples of an unhealthy relationship here. Her partner is drinking while she is sick, yet she still claims that they are equal… or at least more or less. “Wish it was easy, I wish I knew. What I was doing, but I never do. (Here we go)” These are perfected lyrics, they encapsulate the struggles of her mental health, relationship, and so much more. Life is a rollercoaster of unexpected things that are often out of peoples control, the best we can do is guess because nobody will know the correct path for you (because there is none).
(Chapter 5, lyric breakdown & plot breakdown *Side B*) (ordered by track)
Drunk, Running: Drunk running begins the second half of the album, and also notes a pretty noticeable change in mood. Things are beginning to get worse for Lizzy, both mentally and within the relationship itself. “What did you mean when you said that? You were sober now? Caught you in bed with a Red Bull Vodka” Lizzys partner is failing to keep his sobriety, and it is hurting Lizzy. She feels lied to, betrayed, and unimportant. Lizzy wants him to stop drinking for her, yet she he continues to clearly show a lack of care for her by continuing to do so. “No one stops you. Nobody takes it from your hand. Even when you. Break your leg drunk running… Say, "I love you" And then drink it backwards” The line “Say, "I love you" And then drink it backwards” is the closing line of the chorus and the most important to the song. The line means that every time Lizzys partner has a drink, it undoes the good, or undoes the “i love you”. “What if it was all my fault?... Make a person out of memories, they won't live up to it. I'm so sorry I stay when I shouldn't” Lizzy begins to blame herself for the harmful actions of her partner, which is clearly not her fault as relationships are meant to be balanced (which this one is clearly not). “Say, "I love you". And then drink it backwards. Say, "I love you". Uoy еvol I, Uoy evol I” The chorus then repeats again before fading into a beautiful orchestral outro, all while Lizzy is going back and forth between saying “I love you” and “Uoy evol I”, I love you in reverse, which reflects the repeating actions of doing and undoing the love in the relationship.
Broken Glass: *TW, if you have struggled with physical abuse, domestic abuse, self harm, or anything of that nature please proceed with caution. Remember that you are not alone and people are here to help.* This is undoubtedly one of, if not the most lyrically moving and difficult songs to listen to on Older. The song deals with topics of abuse within the relationship, this is obviously the worst point of the relationship yet. It is important to remember that not very long ago this relationship had seemed perfect. “Broken glass on the table. Pick it up, hold it to your throat. I can see who you are now that the windows broke. Drop of blood on the carpet. Didn't think it would go this far. Don't know why I held on this long” The use of the symbol broken glass, shows the weapon that is being used against Lizzy in the relationship. The shard is from a broken window, likely due to Lizzys partner lashing out and eventually breaking the window out of anger. Lizzy is being actively threatened by her partner, there is blood on the floor from cuts inflicted from one another. However any harm that Lizzy had done is simply in self defense, which is confirmed on the pre-chorus “I know you've been hurt. But you did it first to me… Broken glass again” This line shows that any harm or violence done was first done by Lizzys partner (inflicting onto Lizzy) and saying “broken glass again” shows the repetition of this behavior. “Maybe it doesn't matter. Who the blame gets assigned to next. Nothing's ever the way that I remember it” Lizzy is being manipulated into believing that any problems in the relationship are her fault, she is aware that no matter who starts the altercation, the blame will be turned onto her. “And every word is a landmine…It might seem like I love you. But I just don't want to be alone” this line is our first outright confirmation by Lizzy that she is not willingly in this relationship. Everything she is saying is being taken out of context and turned into something larger than it is (a landmine)
You Forced Me To: *TW, if you have been sexually abused or assaulted, this track contains details on those topics and it is important to proceed with caution, people are here for you if you are struggling*Lizzy is being brutally manipulated by this point in the relationship. This “partner” if you can even call him that anymore, is basically molding Lizzy into the version of her that he wants, this may even be happening in a sexually abusive way, as the first line says “You're on top of me. And I’m under you. And it never stops”. This shows fairly clear signs of more physicall and sexual abuse. The chorus shows how brutally Lizzy has been manipulated by this point, she is feeling terrible about herself, and feels that any harm done in the relationship, or even in general, is her fault. “I want you to hate me. I deserve it for my crimes. I know that I loved you. But you loved me harder. Every time. I am not the same as when you met me. I have changed because you forced me to” She continues to blame herself, while still being aware of the controlling nature of the relationship.
Older: The title track… Lizzy begins to branch away finally. Not directly, but she is thinking through things more clearly now. “Over and over, a carousel ride…Sick to my stomach, can't find the ground. Stuck in a loop…” She is reflecting on how terrible the things she was going through were. She also begins to understand that the constant repetition of the terrible things in the relationship were brutal and ruining her life, health, mental health, and more. “Thought it'd be over by now. Thought you would leave. Thought I would come to my senses. Wish I was stronger somehow. Wish it was easy. Somewhere I lost all my senses. I wish I knew. what the end is” Lizzy reflects at herself. She was so young when all of this happened, and she is beginning at least to realize how terrible these things were, however she still is wishing and blaming herself for the harm done to her. “Over and over, watch it all pass. Moms gettin' older, I'm wanting it back. Where no one is dying, and no one is hurt” Lizzy reflects on her childhood, wanting it back. She doesn't want her mother to age more because that scares her, and she doesn't want anyone to be dying (which likely refers to her father) “I wish I knew. what the end is” this is the ending line of the track, and it perfectly encapsulates Lizzy’s feelings. Life is a cycle of good and bad, and we will never know how it ends until we live it.
Better Than This: “There's someone at my door, I can hear him knocking. If I let him inside it will all be true. I didn't know that I was capable of all of this.” It finally sounds like Lizzy is accepting that this person was not good for her, she eventually leaves him, he tries to come back by knocking at her door, but for the first time in the relationship, Lizzy doesn't answer. “What if I'm not a good person? You always say that I am. But you don't really know me at all now. I think that I'm not who you think I am. But I like to be seen and I like to be wanted. Want it to mean something” Lizzy finally stops letting the manipulation get to her, she also contemplates going back, but eventually decides that it would be worse for her. She misses being wanted the way that she was in the relationship, but she doesn't miss the abuse and manipulation. “Someone will love me better than this” Lizzy realizes that she can do better, this relationship is not worth sticking around for anymore. “Someone will love you better” the final line depicts the last sliver of hope and care that Lizzy has for the now ex.
March: This track is likely about Lizzy's father, however there are still many pieces that can be connected back to the relationship this album focuses on. “...Tryna find the lesson in it all, but. I haven't learned anything” as stated in some of the previous songs, Lizzy wishes that she would just know how to live life “correctly”, blaming herself for any mistakes she's made, claiming that she “hasn't learned anything”. “Never looked much like my father” a line dedicated to her father who had passed away due to illness in March of 2020. Lizzy reflects on him in the next lines, but they are also applicable to her now ex. “I see him more now that he's gone. Or maybe I just see him in everything” She can't do simple things anymore, like certain songs might remind her of her ex, or her father. She claims to be seeing them in everything, a metaphor for everything reminding her of them and the times that she would rather forget. “And how could it take so long? Thought I had it handled but it slipped through. I didn't know it'd be this hard. So far away, and then it hits you” Lizzy accepts in part, that there wasn't much she could do. She was young and unknowing. But as she processes, it “hits her” and she begins to understand. “Called you when I heard the news. Spent the night lying next to you. What a way to start it off. So heavy from the start” This line is most certainly for her father. She would spend nights in the same room, comforting her father through his illness. She says how everything has been “heavy from the start” as in, nothing has been easy for her ever. She witnessed her dad pass at a young age, and everything since then has been so complex.
Vortex: This track summarizes so much of the album, “I know it's not my fault. But I can't say that I'm blameless” Lizzy admits to herself at last, it isn't her fault. But, part of her still knows she could have left which leaves her feeling guilty still, which she shouldn't, but she can't stop herself from. “I know it's not my fault. But sometimes it feels like I did this” Lizzy reflects on all the times that she has felt or been blamed for the things done to her, even though it isn't her fault. “Someday I'll be able to let you go… Someday I'll be kinder to myself” Lizzy admits to herself that she needs to be kinder to herself, and care for herself first sometimes, not the lives of others. “We're spinning out of a vortex. I don't remember who we are” Lizzy describes her efforts to forget this time of her life, spiraling repeatedly down a “vortex” and attempting to block out the memories. “And you're screaming at mе and I'm watching it fall. And I'm slamming the door and you make yourself tall. But it's always an act and it never lasts long. 'Cause I always come back when I need a new song. And I'm tired of this and the way that it feels. I'm not there anymore, this has never been real. We're just awful together and awful apart. I don't know what to do anymore” This bridge is the best lyrics on the album. It is a perfect summary of the hell that Lizzy was living through. With beautiful imagery, describing the arguments and fights they would have with perfect accuracy. Saying that he would often make himself tall, a metaphor for him making himself look bigger and scarier to assert a dominant nature. She talks about how it is all fake anyways and that it will go back to “normal” again. She talks about her struggles to leave, saying that she will always come back for something. She says that they are both awful together and apart, which tells us why she would continue to go back to him no matter how toxic he may have been to her. “Oh-oh, oh-oh. Someday I'll be able to let you go. Oh-oh, oh-oh. Someday you'll come back, and I'll say no” Lizzy accepts it at last, with the final line of the album where she confirms that she will never go back to this person again. (lizzy im so proud of you)
(Chapter 6, a brief lyrical review)
The story of Older is undoubtedly beautiful, there are moments that are hard to listen to because of the rawness, there are moments that make you want to get up and dance, there are moments that can make you break down crying, and there are moments that leave you with no words. Older is Lizzys best project to date, she shows signs of both musical growth, and emotional growth. This album encapsulates years of her life in one long story. Dealing with the early stages of a relationship where she is happy, the later stages where things begin to get dry, the lowest point where there are moments of abuse, alcoholism, and depression, to the final track has a long reflection during the bridge where she remembers all of the terrible things that were done to her before finally turning into a freeing moment of growth for Lizzy where she finally lets go, she is ready to move on now and she plans on never going back. (enough to make a grown man cry)
(Chapter 7, concluding thoughts)
Older as I previously stated is Lizzys best album to date. It is a masterpiece of writing, music, production, vocals, and so much more. And as I had mentioned in chapter one, it is so important to spend your own time with this album. While the review is helpful and can help you understand, please take your own time to appreciate the artwork that Lizzy blessed us with. This is a sit down, lyrics out, multi-listen, no distractions album.
(Author Note)
Hiiiii, if you read the whole thing, first off, thank you so so so much. This took a long time to write but I am so proud of how it came out. This is the best piece of writing I have done in years (maybe my life) and I am so glad that I get to share it with people in the world. If you think it's good, please share this around with your friends, family, and other Lizzy fans and let me know what you think. I've been writing my own music for a longtime now and this album definitely has inspired me so if you really want to be super cool, please feel free to follow my instagram @: charlies.pearly. (Charlie Pearl, Aka me :)) Thank you for reading and have a amazing day. I love you all and you are so important to the world <3

• Bobby Haltmeier AKA Charlie Pearl

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Artificially whitened teeth are evidence of a personal failure of judgement and of dishonesty and of constitutional global weakness.
When a person who is over fifty smiles, and presents to you a row of perfectly even and blank white teeth - they are signalling their own aesthetic failure and their own vanity, and social dishonesty.
As a person ages, their teeth naturally yellow over time and this is not a sign of poor health or any other pathology or infirmity. It is natural and normal and healthy. There is nothing wrong with having natural looking living human teeth.
A person over 50 who has had their teeth 'fixed' like this - just looks as if they are wearing a cheap set of dentures made in a third world country. It shows how poor their judgement is.
Even a young woman who has not long obtained her sexual maturity will have a slight off white tint to her gorgeous gnashers. If she has already had the living health of her teeth obliterated from view by chemical insult at this stage of her life - she cannot be judged as a suitable, competent mate, due to this singular and due to this outstanding failure of ethical sobriety.
White symbolically, refers to death and to stasis, to the perfection of the uncreated and to the non-existent and the undefinable. This is not the original meaning of human teeth.
Only somebody with catastrophically diminished personal integrity could ever think that presenting their mouths as gateways to death and terminal finality - is somehow a positive social act.

I’ve thought a lot about writing this post because I couldn’t think of a better place to share these thoughts than with fellow Noah fans. I’ve also thoroughly enjoyed reading all the pre-existing threads on this song in particular.
Noah has shared some of where this song comes from (i.e., YouTube shorts here, here, and information shared in this sub here.) So, in no way is my interpretation meant to be a perfect analysis from Noah’s perspective; rather, it’s an analysis through my own lens.
I’d love to hear what this song does for you and celebrate just how freaking cool it is if you feel the same way.
Let’s talk about Verse 1 first:
The song opens with Narrator 1 (assigned as “1” and “2” given the perspective shifts in the song) speaking to a loved one, evident by the affectionate “honey” and the softness in Narrator 1’s voice (tone will be discussed more later, so please keep reading if that interests you, too).
But I can’t help but see this affection as somewhat condescending, especially as further context is revealed (“the party’s gone slower / and no one will tempt you” and, of course, “there’s orange juice… bought for the children / it’s yours if you want it” which has been talked about at length in this subreddit.
I lived in New England and it’s still one of my favorite places in the world. I can imagine many people from my life saying this exact statement to me (the “honey” paired with the perceived thoughtfulness) and it’s not much different than what friends have said to me, as someone who got sober in 2022 and is in active recovery today.
When I say “perceived thoughtfulness,” I mean that Narrator 1 doesn’t intend to cause harm to Narrator 2. They genuinely want to look out for Narrator 2 (sharing information about whether the party has a lot of active drinking and whether people will encourage them to drink) by trying to anticipate their needs.
And, to me, Narrator 1 wants to show that they still care about Narrator 2, but they’re not doing the one thing that gives any situation the most clarity: asking.
Personally, I don’t hold any ill will towards my friends who, out of their love for me, have noted whether or not there will be alcohol at a party or what non-alcoholic options will be present. And I’ve appreciated that greatly, especially in early sobriety. In the context of the song, I see Narrator 1 trying their best.
Chorus
You know when you miss somebody so bad that all you can think about is the giant physical space where they’re supposed to be? And it might be as heart-wrenching as someone moving thousands of miles away or simply it’s that they’re not next to you in the moment and you wish that they were.
And then, sometime after this great wave of missing, you’re met with the realization that you haven’t asked the other person how they’re doing, or what’s going on with them, or how they might be affected by some type of distance or absence.
This emotion is captured by the chorus, sung by Narrator 1: “Feels like I’ve been ready for you to come home / for so long / That I didn’t think to ask you where you’d gone / Why’d you go?”
Earlier, I mentioned that Narrator 1 failed to do one simple thing when approaching the potentially sensitive subject of this party that Narrator 2 is presumably coming home to after a long time away: asking what Narrator 2 wants or needs.
Notice the long, full pause right between “for so long” (when Narrator 1 is captured in their hurt/missing/confusion) and “that I didn’t think” (when Narrator 1 realizes that they haven’t asked how the other person why they ran and where they went).
The chorus gives Narrator 2 the opportunity to share their perspective; it also gives us more context to the situation. “Where’d you go?” immediately made me think of two possible answers: (1) Rehab, where someone might go to recover, and (2) The physical flight that often accompanies (a) living in a small town (and if you’ve never been to Vermont or New Hampshire, it truly is as Noah describes—you love it and you also dream of getting out, simultaneously) and (b) changing locations to recover from something whether it be addiction or trauma or frayed friendships.
Post-Chorus
One of the hardest lessons that I’ve had to learn (and am still learning) in sobriety is the ability to pause before I say or do something (typically a highly impulsive something). The idea is that my first impulse usually isn’t my smartest one and it almost always ends up with someone getting hurt.
To me, this pause is exemplified when the post-chorus swaps to the first words we get from Narrator 2: “Mm-hmm, mm-hmm-mm.” In addition to being an absolutely delightful hum when you’re blasting this full volume in your car, this reminds me of the many times I’ve had to bite my tongue and give myself a moment before I answer a question that I’d otherwise have a negative or unfair reply to.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I know that when I got sober, it happened because of something else happened surrounding drinking. And it made me realize how quickly I was headed towards irreconcilable, total self-annihilation if I continued.
“My heart has changed and my soul has changed,” Narrator 2 responds to the friend’s inquiry. Those first few changes in sobriety were rough. When I look back at who I was, it’s hard to recognize any part of me: physically speaking (I was constantly bloated, especially in my face, which the narrator covers with “my face has changed”), emotionally speaking, and spiritually speaking.
I find it interesting that the narrator chooses to share their 6-month sobriety at the end of their reply. And it makes sense to me. Like, yes, I’m sober. But this is about so much more than that. It’s about who I was and who I am now. And in between all of that, is what happened.
Verse 2
The “what happened” in Orange Juice is a car crash (and, as pointed out by this thread, the inspiration was an actual crash that happened in Noah’s hometown).
“Not one nick on your finger” implies that Narrator 2 wasn’t physically harmed in this crash but was emotionally burdened by the experience. My first impression was that Narrator 2, in this story (as I’m not familiar with the actual event and would like to be as respectful as possible to those affected by the real-life crash), wasn’t drinking but was drunk, and saw that they could have just as easily been the driver.
And even though they weren’t, there’s still a degree of responsibility that Narrator 2 takes on as someone who (hypothetically) got into the car, who perhaps knew that the driver was intoxicated, who maybe even passed the keys to them, and as a result, Narrator 2 is burdened with guilt. And, importantly, “filled with anger.”
Anger is important here because, though we don’t get a play-by-play of what Narrator 2 did, we know that they: experienced this crash, felt a sense of responsibility, became fearful (“you just asked me to hold you”), became angry, and got sober. That’s where Narrator 1 adds their final punch regarding spirituality.
The line “Now I’m third in the line up / to your Lord and your Savior” could just as easily be a plea: It’s not “Why did this affect you so much?”, it’s “Why did this affect you in this way… this way where you talk so much about God now?”
My own experience as someone who went from vehemently anti-anything-G-word to someone who embraces spirituality (not religion) in my everyday life as a necessary means to live life as fully and wisely as I can lives to hear this line from Noah’s insanely perfect vocals.
Narrator 1’s resentment fixates on the fact that Narrator 2 has prioritized something else above their friendship (in this case, spirituality which could be through a form of 12-step recovery). To me, Narrator 1’s anger and confusion is also a failure to recognize that Narrator 2 has likely only been able to make this trip back home, where such a pivotal tragedy happened, where this group of friends are partying and drinking, because of this spiritual belief.
And, Narrator 2 might not feel able to share the correlation between the two (as if Narrator 2 might suddenly say, dude, I’m able to be here to connect with you, despite the difficult memories that remain, because of what you’re chastising me about).
But the most fascinating moment of Orange Juice, to me, is when we get to the second post-chorus.
Post-Chorus
Earlier, I spoke about the tone shifts throughout this song. To me, there are two predominant tones: One of ache and longing and another of resentment and frustration. Both tones, though, pool into softer tones throughout the verses. This third, more delicate tone, to me, is love. The final post-chorus exemplifies this most clearly as Narrator 2 and Narrator 1 speak after the other.
The post-chorus starts with Narrator 2 pointing to the literal and metaphorical wreckage of the crash: “My life has changed / this town has changed / you had not.” This event affected the town, the people living in it, and Narrator 2 themselves.
Then, Narrator 2’s tone shifts into something slightly more accusatory as they question why such a fundamentally life-changing event didn’t affect Narrator 1. “Don’t you find it strange / that you just went ahead and carried on?”
We hear Narrator 1’s rebuttal shortly thereafter as they share that “the last time I drank / I was face down / passed out there in your lawn.” To me, “the last time I drank” implies that Narrator 1, too, has stopped drinking.
This line could also represent the heart of their conflict: It’s not that one person got sober and the other did not, but that one person left and one person stayed, one person found a higher power and the other did not, and yet their commonalities are far greater than these differences.
The tone changes twice before the outro, once again returning to Narrator 1. First, driven by Noah’s once-again soulfully perfect croon (specifically when he says “crows”, damn), Narrator 1 asks Narrator 2 if everyone from home is truly as detrimental as Narrator 2 has made them out to be (or, alternatively, this is what Narrator 1 has interpreted as a result of Narrator 2’s leaving them all behind).
It’s a uniquely resentful tone that bleeds into sorrow.
A note about the crows: According to Noah via Twitter (via the Genius lyrics for Halloween), “To me crows represent a haunted past or the trappings of small town distractions. Crows represent the past and the friends and foe left behind in the small town.” Interestingly, crows are also considered a symbol for “adaptability, embracing change, rebirth and transformation” (according to How Stuff Works, so take that with a grain of salt).
The resentment seems to leave Narrator 1’s tone as they implore Narrator 2 to see the facts of the event: “You didn’t put those bones in the ground” is repeated twice not only for effect but also reflects a further softened tone that sheds any resentment to reveal the depth of Narrator 1’s hurt and, despite it all, care and empathy for Narrator 2.
As I think about this line through my own lens of experience (and therefore not necessarily true to the song), I imagine that there’s another response that we don’t get to see, one where Narrator 2 explains that, even if they were not directly responsible for the crash, they still felt they played a part in it. And perhaps they did.
And, though also a stretch, I perceive that Narrator 1 has their own feelings of guilt because they believe they drove Narrator 2 away (“are we all just pulling you down?”). So, perhaps in my own version of this song, there’s a reconciliation that happens here through verse.
Either way, the song ends with a sense of unseen closure that we (or I) hope follows in the unwritten and unsung verses thereafter. Perhaps one day Noah will grant us with an Orange Juice: Part Two, but until then, I'll gladly continue analyzing this one.
Thanks for reading this far if you got all the way down here!