Carl Radke of ‘Summer House’ on Losing His Brother and Getting Sober

Sharing and releasing this monumental discovery about myself disarmed it in a way and allowed me to be really honest. To me, sobriety means having brutal honesty. I wasn’t always honest about that. A few years ago, I would have said I was just into alcohol. But cocaine is a big part of my story, too.

I started to date probably six months after getting sober. The advice is that you should wait a year, but I did not. A lot of change happens in that first year of sobriety — physically, mentally, and emotionally. I was having feelings for someone I had a real friendship with. I can’t change what happened, but I definitely learned from that. It’s a good tip, but everyone is on their own journey. Watching my ex (and “Summer House” co-star), Lindsay Hubbard, question my sobriety in the current season has been uncomfortable. We were having a difficult moment. You’ll see more of how that plays out during the season.

People say, “How are you involved in a show where there’s a lot of drinking?” And my response is, “If I were drinking, I wouldn’t be there.” I do believe that if I were not on reality TV, if I didn’t have that footage and that mirror into my life, I wouldn’t have gotten sober.

I’ve been afforded an amazing opportunity with an amazing group of friends. You can still have a good time without getting blackout. You can still have fun without alcohol, and I’m proud to show that. I like being social. A lot of times, my social-ness with alcohol was embarrassing, cringey, aggressive, weird; not my best version. So, I’ve really enjoyed actually showing up to situations and events and conversations as myself. I’m more myself than I’ve ever been on this program, and I think people are more interested in seeing that than seeing someone masking themselves with alcohol and drugs.