'Sobering': Actress Sarah Zanotti on Drunk Driving with Her Niece, OCD, and God's Radical Grace (Episode 19)

“If I’m numbing the lows, I’m numbing the highs. And then I’m just in this nothingness.”

Here's the thing about alcohol: So many of us use it to numb the lows, but alcohol isn't a precision numbing agent. What does that mean? That while it can be useful to deal with the valleys, it also keeps you from enjoying the peaks.

That’s exactly how Sarah Zanotti describes the trap alcohol created in her life. Sarah is an actress, filmmaker, songwriter, and content creator you’ve probably seen in sketches with John Crist. But beneath the laughs is a story of drunk driving, OCD, eating disorders, and a desperate search for control that nearly cost her everything.

In this conversation, Sarah gets brutally honest about the night she drove drunk with her niece, why that wasn’t even her rock bottom, and the voice of God that told her: “The person you want to be can’t take alcohol with her.” She talks about why grace became more addicting than alcohol, how creativity was reborn in recovery, and what it means to live in peace instead of constant performance.

We explore:

—Sarah’s creative journey from Berklee to Nashville to filmmaking
—How OCD, religious scrupulosity, and eating disorders shaped her story
—Driving drunk with her niece in the backseat and why that wasn’t rock bottom
—Why addiction often grows out of perfectionism and control
—How alcohol felt like instant relief but robbed her of real peace
—The moment she realized, “the person I want to be can’t take alcohol with her”
—Learning to sit with uncomfortable emotions instead of running from them
—How sobriety rebirthed her creativity and music career
—What her relationship with God looks like now—less careful, more honest
—Why the biggest lie is believing we’re separate from God

Instagram: @sarahzanotti

Film: The Unraveling (available on Amazon)

Music: Sobering

Follow Jon: @jonseidl

Order the new book, Confessions of a Christian Alcoholic: www.christianalcoholic.com.

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