Addiction is one of the most misunderstood forces in men’s lives. It doesn’t always look like rock bottom. It can look like a high-functioning executive who has a spotless professional record. It can look like the life of the party who stays for the after-party when everyone else goes home. It can look like a college student pulling straight A’s while quietly unraveling in private.
That’s exactly what this conversation is about.
In this April Roundtable episode of the Men’s Therapy Podcast, host Marc Azoulay, himself in recovery from polysubstance use, sits down with three therapists who specialize in addiction recovery: Jack Lambert, a New York-based therapist trained at the Addiction Institute; Dr. Michael Zang, a gambling psychologist and founder of Incumental, a gambling recovery support platform; and Tim Mullins, a substance abuse therapist who entered the field after his own long recovery journey and 11 years in Adult Children of Alcoholics and Dysfunctional Families (ACA).
Together, they cover the full landscape: what the signs of addiction actually look like, how isolation and deceit function as warning signals, what role shame vs. guilt plays in the recovery process, how spirituality in addiction recovery fits in (even for men who resist it), and what sobriety really feels like in those early, unvarnished months.
This isn’t a polished, clinical overview. It’s a candid, experienced, and sometimes raw conversation from people who’ve seen addiction from both the inside and the outside. And it’s a conversation that could genuinely change the way a man looks at his own relationship with substances, gambling, gaming, porn, social media, or any pattern he’s been quietly defending.
This episode is for any man who’s ever asked himself whether his drinking, gambling, or substance use is becoming a problem, and then quickly changed the subject. It’s also for men who love someone going through this, and want to understand it better without judgment.
Jack Lambert points to a simple motivational interviewing question: “What would it be like for you to not use or drink for a week?” The reaction alone tells you a great deal. Tim Mullins adds two near-universal markers he sees in clients: isolation and deceit, using differently when alone versus in company, hiding how much, or leaving social situations early to use more. Marc adds that when a substance becomes part of your identity, when people know you as “that guy”, letting it go means dismantling who you think you are, not just breaking a habit.
Not necessarily capital-T trauma. Jack distinguishes between big-T trauma (abuse, PTSD) and small-t, complex trauma, the accumulative weight of growing up feeling invisible or emotionally unimportant. Tim puts it plainly: “Alcohol’s a fantastic emotional anesthetic. Some people drink it and think, wow, that feels good, and they don’t even realize they’ve been in pain their whole lives.” Michael adds that the addiction itself becomes its own trauma, and the trap is returning to the addictive behavior to escape the very pain it created.
Marc challenges the idea that shame is simply the enemy. “Shame is telling you that you are living counter to your values. It is your conscience.” The danger is medicating that feeling instead of acting on it. Tim offers a distinction that lands with many clients: “Guilt is I did something wrong. Shame is there is something wrong with me.” Guilt leads to repair. Toxic shame leads to more of the same. Michael reframes what he calls appropriate shame, not a sign that something’s broken, but a signal that a man is growing beyond who he used to be.
Marc does not sugarcoat it: “The phase after sobriety is quiet desperation. You finally see your life for what it is.” Jack frames it this way, sobriety doesn’t guarantee life gets better, but it gives a man the ability to choose. Tim uses a group exercise called Red Balloon Black Balloon: the black balloon holds everything addiction is made of; the red balloon holds what actually feeds a man’s life. The move is not to obsess over shrinking the black one, it is to blow up the red one. Real addiction recovery, Marc says, isn’t swapping coping strategies. It is building a life you don’t need to cope from.
Marc believes it is, but not necessarily as religion. During his own recovery, his higher power was the present moment. Tim grounds it in the 12-step framework: a practical playbook for letting go and finding faith that things can get better. Jack extends it further: spirituality is fundamentally about stepping outside yourself to observe and change. Michael frames it as connecting to the transcendent, relationships, purpose, the world beyond the self. Whatever the form, all four agree: a stable, internally sourced sense of self-worth is at the core of lasting sobriety.
Each guest closes with something concrete. Marc encourages men to ask someone they trust — a friend, partner, or family member — whether they think there’s a problem, because honest mirrors are rare and that single conversation can open a door. Jack suggests looking up motivational interviewing questions online and sitting with them honestly, so that a man has language for what he’s already experiencing. Tim asks men to become scientists: change a variable, try stopping or reducing, and observe what happens without the usual defensive filter. And Michael leaves with something worth returning to again and again, “You do not have to earn your worth. You already own it.” Take that to a therapist, a journal, or someone you trust, and let it move from concept to lived experience.
You can find Tim Mullins at his website, and through Men’s Therapy Online.
Dr. Michael Zang is on LinkedIn and at his website Incumental.
Jack Lambert is on Instagram and at his website.
All episodes, blogs, and resources, including a searchable addiction content library, are at Men’s Therapy Online. You can also explore individual therapy or men’s groups there. MTO also offers a free Slack community for men doing this kind of work.
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