Girl Walks Out Of A Bar: A Memoir Download Free (EPUB, PDF)
"Lisa Smith gives us a darkly comic, honest, and completely relatable inside look at high-functioning addiction in the world of corporate law-a sort of 'Sex and the Psych Ward.' It's inspiring, informative, and impossible to put down." --Jennifer Belle, best-selling author of High Maintenance and The Seven Year Bitch "Whether she's telling the town car driver to turn around so she can ditch showing up for her niece's birth and meet her coke dealer, or staging her own semi-intervention, Smith takes us into the mind of someone who's completely in control while being radically out of control. This girl may have walked out of a bar, but she's walked into one of the best addiction memoirs I've ever read." --Anna David, New York Times best-selling author of Party Girl, Bought, and Editor-in-Chief of After Party Magazine "Raw, naked and unflinching, Girl Walks Out of A Bar catapults the reader into the sordid, desperate reality of high-functioning addiction: the booze, the coke, the lies; the denial, the depression, the blackouts. All are on full display as New York lawyer Lisa Smith loses herself in a deep and all-too-human descent into perpetual numbing. A chilling, cautionary tale." --Ann Dowsett Johnston, author of Drink: The Intimate Relationship Between Women and Alcohol Lisa Smith was a bright young lawyer at a prestigious law firm in NYC when alcoholism and drug addiction took over her life. What was once a way she escaped her insecurity and negativity as a teenager became a means of coping with the anxiety and stress of an impossible workload. Girl Walks Out of a Bar explores Smith's formative years, her decade of alcohol and drug abuse, divorce, and her road to recovery. In this darkly comic and wrenchingly honest story, Smith describes how her circumstances conspired with her predisposition to depression and self-medication in an environment ripe for addiction to flourish. When her close-knit group of high-achieving friends celebrate the end of their grueling workdays with alcohol-fueled nights at the city's clubs and summer weekends partying at the beach the feel-good times can spiral wildly out of control. Girl Walks Out of a Bar is a candid portrait of alcoholism through the lens of gritty New York realism. Beneath the façade of success lies the reality of addiction.From the Author
File Size: 1154 KB
Print Length: 288 pages
Publisher: SelectBooks (June 7, 2016)
Publication Date: June 7, 2016
Sold by: Digital Services LLC
Language: English
ASIN: B01G12I6SI
Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray: Enabled
Word Wise: Enabled
Lending: Not Enabled
Enhanced Typesetting: Enabled
Best Sellers Rank: #3,754 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) #1 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Health, Fitness & Dieting > Addiction & Recovery > Alcoholism #5 in Books > Health, Fitness & Dieting > Addiction & Recovery > Alcoholism #24 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Biographies & Memoirs > Women
For a female attorney who drank and used as copiously as Lisa Smith did, I'm surprised most anyone who had any contact with her in her firm wasn't well aware that she had an addiction problem. I practiced law for many years as an active alcoholic, basically of the binge drinking variety. So even though I only drank on weekends for the most part, I learned you get pegged pretty quickly. There's just too many ways for people to tell and for the firm's lawyers to figure it out, no matter how good you are at maintaining. A little mouthwash in the mornings isn't going to hide it.So while I didn't believe Smith's version of how she was skating by undetected, I found her amazing somewhat repetitive drunkalogue both entertaining and scary. Anyone with an alcohol or coke problem will find themselves here in full debilitating glory. The intense pressure we put on ourselves as active alcoholics is a crushing experience right up until we "stop digging."The recovery portion of this memoir is the best part. The fact that she never relapsed after initially seeking in-patient treatment and her willingness to change and grow into a sober person is an enlightening guide to all those who want to know what it really takes to turn it all around. If you're having trouble grabbing hold of a program or path to sobriety, this just might be the book that helps you figure out what it takes.
WOW. I don't usually write reviews, but felt compelled to for this book. This story is so honest, so real, so funny, and so heart wrenching that it demands a thank you. It's a hard book to read at some points, and a hard book to put down at all times. The writing is quick paced, vivid, and witty, sort of a "girlfriend's guide to addiction", a page turner that has you wondering whether you want to know what happens next at some points, as you root for the heroine.This book is really two books in one: A fabulous summer beach book offering an authentic, funny, and insightful look into the world of addiction for those lucky enough not to be touched by it, and it's also a compassionate and accountable companion for anyone's journey on the path to sobriety. Thank you Lisa Smith for sharing your story!
Girl Walks Out of a Bar tells the mesmerizing tale of a driven, successful woman who self-medicates to gloss over the self-loathing and anxiety that has plagued her since the too many cupcake days of childhood. What begins with a sugar buzz quickly moves into booze and drugs. The price is extraordinarily high . . . blackouts, constant illness, and the spectre of death looming behind the drawn curtains of her upscale apartment. In thoughtful, witty, sarcastic, and biting language, author Lisa Smith pulls her readers through her can’t-put-it-down memoir. With her clear message of hope, attending to self-prompts, and everyday gratitude, Girl Walks Out rings faithfully to the best in humanity, and certainly to the best that was always part of Lisa Smith. An inspiring read for anyone trying to understand addiction, or for anyone in the struggle.
Lisa Smith has a thoroughly entertaining way of writing about a very serious subject. Being ten years sober, she could see the humorous side of her addictions (alcohol & cocaine). This book was difficult to put down.She grew up during a time when fathers came home to cocktail hour with their wives. Weekends were a time to gather friends and booze, and Lisa observed that people seemed to get happier the more they drank. As a little girl, she got the job of arranging the cherry, olives and bottles for the all-important drinks. She was a fat kid who "needed" something that loosened her up her inhibitions, and alcohol fit the bill. Her alcoholism developed from drinks with friends at parties & special occasions to drinking every night after work to drinking before and after she went out with them to actually drinking as soon as she woke up in the morning. Then, of course, she needed a boost of "powdered energy" in the form of cocaine after drinking morning and night.With no self-pity, she clearly writes how insidious alcohol is by claiming more and more of your time, money and importance in your life. Lisa even missed the birth of her brother's first baby because of drugs & alcohol even though she was a highly-functioning corporate lawyer.It's a fascinating book, and I highly recommend it. Very well-writen.
Girl Walks Out of a Bar is an amazing book that I recommend to everyone. The raw emotion and insight to a taboo topic are absolutely stunning. I found it impossible to put the book down. As I read Lisa Smith's story I was captivated by her addiction. I felt sadness and sorrow with every negative event and joy with each success. I couldn't help but cheer her on through her road to sobriety.For someone who has not dealt firsthand with such an addiction, this book was a real eye-opener. It is not often we have the opportunity to peek into the head of an addict and understand what day to day life is like for them. Girl Walk Out of a Bar really helped me gain a better understanding of life for an addict and in return open my eyes to others situations.I feel very fortunate to have had the opportunity to read this book and recommend it to every adult who would like to better understand those around us.
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