Ep 130: What Your Holiday Is Telling You | Rethinking Alcohol |

What if your next holiday could tell you more about your drinking than any ordinary day? Anna Donaghey is joined by travel writer and longtime non-drinker Teresa Bergen to explore why holidays are such a flashpoint when it comes to alcohol.

They unpick the cultural scripts that equate travel with "letting go," the invisible pressure to drink in airports, at resorts, and on work trips, and how travel can act as a mirror for your relationship with alcohol. Teresa shares decades of sober travel, surprising lessons from writing The Sober Travel Handbook, and the vividness of seeing the world clear-headed.

Listen to rethink your travel story and design holidays that match what you actually want.

Here are the Highlights:

00:00 Intro: Rethinking drinking on holiday

01:29 Teresa’s story: 38 years as a non-drinker and the “holiday script”

05:19 Why do we link travel to different rules around alcohol?

10:13 The bizarre normality of airport drinking at dawn

14:12 “No drink = no fun” & what it’s like to break the social norm

18:11 Why holidays reveal our biggest beliefs and fears about alcohol

23:30 The benefits of holidays without drinking

27:11 Building holidays around your real interests, not just the booze