AA Convention, AA Old Timers Panel – Fran, Nathan, Barbara, Chris

Fran

[00:00:00] Fran: Thank you. You reminded me to give my sobriety date.

[00:00:09] Okay, so let's see where we're at here with this format.

[00:00:16] Oh, boy. Okay.

[00:00:19] I was corrected on the time. We actually have until 1230, so I guess we're going to do about 15 minutes each. 1225, right, so we've got about an hour, right? Almost an hour, a little bit more. Actually, we have an hour and five minutes. So, you know, I'm going to just start out by saying my name is Fran, and I'm an alcoholic, if you haven't been able to tell just yet.

[00:00:53] My sobriety date is September 23rd, 1977, for which I'll be eternally grateful.

[00:01:00] They've got me in the format as 49, and I can't claim that yet. You know, those old-timers that I came in with would be rolling over in their graves if I tried to take, you know, an extra two weeks when I don't have it yet. So, you know, I'm just grateful to be here. I'm grateful we're back at the Hyatt, you guys. This is so awesome. You know, it's just a beautiful building.

[00:01:24] And, you know, I guess we've been gone from here for about five years. So, you know, I want to give credit to the convention committee, Kevin, sitting back there. I don't want to swell his head too much. He's been getting a lot of approval this weekend.

[00:01:39] But, you know, let's give a round of applause.

[00:01:46] You know, I haven't been, I've been coming to conventions my whole sobriety.

[00:01:52] My story is, is that I came in on that September 23rd day, and, you know, I was bouncing off a wall. So was my six-year-old daughter due to my alcoholism. And I had an eviction notice always on the door. I couldn't rub two nickels together.

[00:02:13] By the way, I guess we sent around the seventh tradition while we were doing all the other stuff. I hope you got time, you had time to contribute. If not, you know, we'll see you after the meeting.

[00:02:27] Anyway, you know, my life was unmanageable. I'll put it that way. And I was a daily drinker. By that time, I was a chronic drinker. I had to have my alcohol. And I was having an affair with my best friend's husband, which tells you a lot about my morals when I drink. I don't have any. And he said to me one day, you know, Fran, you don't drink like a normal drinker. And I said, what are you talking about? He said, you know, it's not normal for someone to order four drinks at once.

[00:02:57] It was normal for me because I was a chronic alcoholic by that time. And we were going to those big discotheques, you know, it was 1977, and it was, you know, disco ducks, and it was Donna Summer. And we were going to places like the Tennessee Gin and whatever mill, you know, up on Ventura Boulevard. And it was a big place. And I knew that waitress wasn't going to get back to me. And so I would order four drinks. And I would get them, you know. And that's all I cared about. And he said, look, he said, I went to check out an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting for you. And it's on, you know, on Wednesday night at a place called The Hole in the Sky. And so I went to my very first meeting, not for any other reason, because I had had a history with sobriety in a place called Synanon.

[00:03:54] I don't know if anybody remembers that place, but it was a drug program on the beach in Santa Monica. Started by a guy who got a resentment at Alcoholics Anonymous, took his coffee pot, you know, got a storefront, and started bringing in mostly addicts, you know. We were the product of the great generation, and these people didn't know what to do with us. And so my parents, you know, enrolled me. They paid the donation gladly and put me in there when I was 22 with a heroin habit. And I stayed for six years, clean and sober. It was a commune. We called it a social movement. We thought we were the only sane place on the planet.

[00:04:37] And, you know, it was a pretty crazy place, but it was based in sobriety.

[00:04:43] And so I was there for six years. So, you know, when I left there at 27, I began to drink again. I had made a decision that I absolutely was not going to use drugs, because by this time I had gotten married, I had a three-year-old, and I had a responsibility to take care of that three-year-old. So I wasn't going to do drugs anymore, but I would drink alcohol, because it's legally, it's legal, it's socially acceptable. It's like a Slurpee, for God's sakes. I mean, what's it going to do to me, you know? And I have to tell you, you know, it's like having seats on the Titanic. You know, you're both going down. And that's exactly what happened, and I became that chronic alcoholic mother. And so by the time I got that edict from the boyfriend when I was 31 years old, you know, I have forgotten all about what sobriety felt like.

[00:05:42] And so, you know, I've never slept since I've come to AA, but I understand how the slipper feels, because when you leave the safety of these rooms and the fellowship, you know, I can never take the fellowship for granted, because, you know, Clancy used to say, we're safe and sane and sober in here. And that's nothing to minimize, because when you leave, as I left Synanon, and I was out there with that three-year-old, and I had a husband who got right into his alcoholism.

[00:06:15] You know, we were divorced within six months, and then I was off to the races, like I said, being that alcoholic mother.

[00:06:23] And when you leave the safety of these rooms, and you go out there, and all of a sudden it's just you and your disease, it's a horrible place to be. You know, the loneliness came back, the fear came back, the constant anxiety. All of that came back right away, as soon as I took that first drink. And yet, you know, I was out there for four years drinking, and didn't remember what it was like to be sober. So I understand when the slipper says, you know, I just couldn't get back. Some people are lucky, and they get back. You know, other people go out there and do a lot of damage, you know, to themselves. The other day I was watching the news, which I don't really advise for alcoholics, because we're so sensitive, you know. But there was a lady on there that got a resentment at work.

[00:07:14] She was a nurse, and she took a few drinks, got in her car, and drove 130 miles into a family of five, and killed that family. Of course, she survived. Of course, she survived. See, that's the problem with us. We survive this stuff. Other people don't, you know. We do affect our families. I affected that little three-year-old daughter.

[00:07:37] By the time I got to, you know, Alcoholics Anonymous at 31, she was six, and she would sit in the car and stare out the window, and she wanted absolutely nothing to do with me. She didn't trust me. She didn't know what it was going to be like from minute to minute. And so, you know, when I walked into that first meeting, I have to say I was struck sober, because the difference that I felt in that room, the electricity, the camaraderie, the fellowship, the hugs, the kisses, the smiles, the clearness of the people's eyes. It was so electric to me that I was struck sober. I didn't know what you had. I had no idea what I was looking at. And I didn't correlate it back to my sober time in Synanon, because I was a different person at that time. But here I was, you know, a very low-bottomed drunk now.

[00:08:36] And so I was able to see the difference. I felt difference. And there was a guy at the podium, his name was Larry Marsh, and some of you might remember him. He really was, he's gone now, so I can say this, he was kind of a wet brain.

[00:08:52] A wet brain is when you drink so much that your brain becomes brittle, you know. It's so dry that the synapses don't meet anymore. But, you know, like everybody else here, we get the message from somebody else. And so what he did was he just repeated what he had heard over his years of sobriety. I didn't know the messenger, you know. I had no idea who he was or what his story was at all. But I knew that he had the truth. He was speaking the truth to this alcoholic. And he said things like, it's the first drink that gets you drunk. And I thought, it can't be that simple. There's no way, you know.

[00:09:37] One drink, he said, will get you drunk. He said it's the engine, it's not the caboose that gets you drunk. You know, and being a newcomer and needing a visual, I got it. You know, I could see what he was talking about. And that's enough for me from the first meeting. That was enough for me to make that connection that sobriety must come first. You know, physical sobriety must come first. It's the great must, Bill Wilson said. You know, because without physical sobriety, you can't stand a chance of having any kind of a psychic change. How could you, you know, the sunlight of the spirit is cut off by those chemicals. And, you know, he said things like, you know, we have a spiritual malady, an obsession of the mind coupled with an obsession. You know, we have a phenomenon of craving. That's what he was saying. That once you take that first drink, it sets up that phenomenon of craving.

[00:10:37] If you don't take the first drink, that doesn't get set up. So he kept stressing, physical sobriety must come first. And I got that. And so I left that meeting thinking, wow, you know, there's some hope for me. I can do that. I can stay sober. I had done it before. I knew that was something that I could do.

[00:11:02] I went on, and in my first year of sobriety, you know, some very pivotal things happened. I met my husband when I was about two months sober, and he had 12 and a half years. So I'm not the speaker that can say, don't do that. That would be hypocritical. And I have to tell you, I really don't believe that Ted Summers was going to get me drunk, you know, because I was surrendered. You know, they say, you know, the first step is the only one we have to take 100%. And I had taken that first step. I had conceded to my innermost self that I was an alcoholic at that first minute. And that's why I've stayed, you know. And I know that doesn't happen for everybody, so don't get that, you know, that awareness, you know, for quite a while. But I did. I got it. And so we started on that path, and I have to tell you, we had a beautiful love affair for 42 years.

[00:11:57] And, you know, this week has been a little bit hard for me because the anniversary of his death happened on September 9th. He's gone for seven years. And, you know, I learned so much from that man because he was second generation AA, and he loved Alcoholics Anonymous, and he loved its people. And everything that he wanted to do was attached to AA. And so what I'm saying, for a newcomer to get in a relationship, hopefully you'll luck out and get somebody who also has a program, because I certainly had none, you know. And so I kind of rode on his coattails for about the first nine months. And I was happy hanging out with Ted. That was fun. We were going to conventions. He rode a motorcycle. We'd go to the Beaver Convention. We'd go to the Roundup in Palm Springs. I was lucky to hear all the great speakers of the day. Chuck C. I heard on a regular basis. He was my husband's sponsor, so I got to be in a lot. He's the man that wrote a new pair of glasses.

[00:12:57] And, you know, he just was a very special member of this fellowship. He had a hell of a message. And, you know, Clancy became his sponsor when Chuck died. And I got to hear Clancy on a regular basis. Norm Albee, Marion Chapman, Virginia Maxwell was my first sponsor. Tiff brought her home to me when I was about nine months sober, because he knew that I couldn't be my sponsor. And that started me on a road into these steps. I let Virginia go after about a year due to a resentment that I had. She didn't do anything wrong, but you know how it goes. I would say if all the people that I ever sponsored were still with me, you'd have to rent the Hyatt Ballroom, you know. We're a fluid society, which is all good, you know. And I went to Rosalie Matthews, and she took me through those life-changing 12 steps, and my life changed, you know.

[00:13:56] Through those steps, through the ninth step especially, I've been able to make a living amends to my daughter. She's 55 today. And, you know, we're friends. And I've been there for the last almost 49 years through every major event of her life, you know. That's never going to happen if I kept drinking. I know that my grandson that is 27, her son, he wouldn't be alive today more than like. I have six grandsons. My husband had three kids. I had one. We grew that family together over those years. And, you know, through that ninth step, my sponsor said, you know, you weren't very nice to this one particular little girl that was in my inventory.

[00:14:41] We lived in a house of hate, you know. It was alcoholic. And so, you know, she said, you have an opportunity to make amends to her. You can't find her, but you can have no wreckage with your stepkids. And that's my story today with my stepkids. They're in their 50s and 60s. They were 9, 12, and 15 when I got them. And both of their parents are gone. And I apologized to them. I said, you know, I'm sorry. I'm the one you've got left, you know. But we're friends, and we have no wreckage. That's due to that ninth step. You know, Dave is here. He was our speaker last night. And I thank him again. He opened me up because, man, what a story. And it was all about the ninth step. And I thank you so much for sharing experience, strength, and hope with us. And, you know, if you guys haven't heard it, you know, see if you can get hold of that talk. It was very powerful. All about the ninth step, you know. It's a powerful step.

[00:15:40] I know a lot of people get to that step. They call it the Judas step, you know. They don't want to tell you. It's hard. It's hard to look that person in the eye that you've harmed. But it's such a rewarding life you can have if you can do that. And that happened for me. You know, I sat down with my parents. My sponsor said, you have to make amends to that Marine Corps father that was in the top of your resentment list for the first six years. And I sat across from them, and I thought, you know, I said, I'm sorry for the daughter I was. I'm sorry for the mother that I was to your granddaughter. And if I'm going to stay sober, I can't be that person anymore. And I just knew that my dad was going to say, no, you know, it's my fault. You know, I moved you every two years. He was a Marine, went to ten schools in ten years, you know, and all over the country and places in the south, in the 40s and the 50s and 60s that I saw injustices that, you know, I gathered to, you know, stockpile for my resentment list.

[00:16:48] And instead he looked at me and he said, you know, Francie, you're right. You are the most selfish, self-centered human being I've ever met in my entire life. And I could hear my sponsor say, and let him speak. Don't say a word. Let him speak. He may have some feelings about his alcoholic daughter as well.

[00:17:09] And when he was done, he said, that's okay, baby. He said, I love you very much and we never need to talk. So it was well received. And I'm lucky that doesn't always happen. And we became friends. And when he died, you know, he knew that he had a sober daughter and that his granddaughter had been having a really good life. I was 19 years sober when he died. My mother lasted a little while longer. She was more, she was here for another 16 years.

[00:17:34] And, you know, she had Alzheimer's the last six years of her life. And this falling down, irresponsible, undependable daughter was able to manage her life, her higher life. I heard Jenny talking about her mom this morning. This is true for so many of us. So many of us are caregivers for somebody in our family, you know. And we're able to step up to the plate and do those things because we're sober, you know. And I'm so grateful. That was such an honor there of my mother. And my husband, my husband was sick for 30 years with one thing or another. But he never, you know, never stopped being active in AA.

[00:18:16] He used to say, if I take care of my number one problem, my alcoholism, everything else will fall into place. And sure enough, it did, you know. And I was able to be his caregiver the last couple years of his life, rolling him around in meetings in a wheelchair, you know, that kind of thing. You know, going to a lot of doctors, treatments, he had cancer. And so, you know, I've been able to show up, you know. Dave was talking about last night, you know, that each person here has a gift.

[00:18:44] You know, you may be that you have, you know, a story like Dave's. You may have a story like Fran. You may have a story like Jen. Have your own story, you know. But this is a design for living that works. I'm so grateful. Sober today. I have a home group that I met in my first year of sobriety. The beautiful Pacoima group, you know, where everybody feels welcome.

[00:19:09] And so, you know, for me, I apologize for being a little disoriented this morning. Me and Lenore, you know, we're thrown in with these formats. And they're not exactly in sync. But somehow, you know, in Alcoholics Anonymous, it all works out. And so, I'm grateful for Anur and for the committee. And I'm looking forward to hearing the rest of the old-timers. So, thank you for letting me share.

[00:19:39] And I'd like to start with Nathan. Can you please give us your sobriety date?

Nathan D

[00:19:45] Nathan: Sure. Good morning, everybody. My name is Nathan. I'm an alcoholic. Good morning. My sobriety date is February 16, 1985.

[00:19:56] I want to go I stop on time. It's the 15th from now. So, thank Mike for having me out here. It's good to be here. It's my first old-timers panel I've spoken on. I'm sober 41 years. That's awesome. So, you can tell I got sober pretty young.

[00:20:13] So, I'll tell you a little bit. It's hard to squeeze everything in thinking. But I'll tell you a little bit about my story and how I ended up here. A little bit of how I managed to stick around. So, I grew up in northeast New Jersey, right outside New York City. My father worked in Manhattan. Most of the fathers were a community in the city.

[00:20:33] And it was a normal kind of time. We grew up in our house. It was a little bit crazy. I'm the youngest of six children. So, I have four older brothers, one older sister. So, in my family, my dad died with 48 years of variety.

[00:20:47] Myself and my four brothers were all alcoholic. My mother and my dad worked out in our family. So, my parents divorced when I was five. I don't really have many memories of it. It's a little history.

[00:20:59] So, my mother, she had to work two jobs. She had to work two jobs to support kids. So, she should really be in the Hall of Fame of Mothers, right? Two jobs and raise six kids on her own. Which, as a kid, didn't seem like such a big deal. But now that I'm a husband and a father, and I understand what an effort to make. And, to make it even harder on her, my sister was pretty normal, and she was never, ever around the house. My four brothers and I were five of the most rotten little bastards you can't ask.

[00:21:29] Terrible kids. Terrible, terrible, terrible kids.

[00:21:32] So, in my house, in the basement, there were people drinking and getting high every single day. So, my earliest memory, it was just drinking and partying, and that's all anybody. So, it was a small town in New Jersey. Everybody knew who the Dixons were. In fact, my teachers, by the time I came along, they didn't even know my name. They just called me Dixon. Because, we're all kind of clones. We all have the same, but this weird voice. So, everybody in the town, they just called me Little Dixon. That was my favorite. So, I grew up with this kind of crazy, constantly uneasy, irritated, you know, not super fearful. Just like, I didn't like people, didn't like being around people. And, I grew up with this feeling like humanity was over there, and I was over here. I just couldn't sync with humanity. And, since I couldn't be friends with you, I hated you, right? So, I just, I could not get along with anybody.

[00:22:32] And, so, you know, I started drinking, obviously, pretty early. All the parents told their kids, don't hang out with Dixon, because, you know, which is good advice. I have three sons. If there was a family like my family in the back town, I would say, do not hang out with Dixon.

[00:22:49] So, I was a little bit of a loner, which was fine. I get along good with myself.

[00:22:55] And, I had to hang this family dog, Duke, who was just awesome. I mean, I get a team with him. But, but, but anyway, it was me and him, just hanging out. And, then I'd steal, you know, pot and drugs from brothers and steal alcohol and stuff. And, so, I smoked a little pot earlier, but that's not really the story. The story is, so, how can I describe what alcohol did for me? There was, there was, there was two bookstores, because I wanted to go quick. I stuttered really badly when I was a kid. I mean, I couldn't say Dixon. Like, I couldn't say my name. I really have a lot of compassion for people who stutter, because your mind knows exactly what you want to say. And, just screaming it, but it won't come out. It's just super frustrating. I feel sorry for people. I had, luckily, I had a speech therapist to help me. I don't know, I think. But, anyway, so, so, one day, I'm, I don't know, maybe 16, in front of the mirror, and I'm stuttering. I'm frustrated with it. I'm done with stuttering. I'm going to teach.

[00:23:52] I did not say, you know, some letters are easy, but like D's and P's, really difficult. And, so, like, I'm, I'm literally almost ripped the mirror off the wall. I knew my mother and I, we played hide and seek with their alcohol, right? So, so, I knew she had some alcohol in the house, and I had to find it. So, I, I found it, it was tucked back, behind the Lazy Susan, in the corner of the kitchen cabinets. I could see a fifth of the bourbon with the New Jersey tax seal on the top, unbroken. I'm like, sweet. I took that thing, a couple of ice cubes, half a glass of bourbon, a little bit of water, boop, boop, boop, boop.

[00:24:26] How do I do the second one? I stood in front of the mirror and went A, B, C, D, E, F. Alcohol cured my stuttering in 10 minutes. I, I was down, I was down in the woods, and there were some, uh, kids hanging out there. My sister's age, Brian Gray, they had obviously stole some alcohol from a parent's liquor cabinet. They poured it in this jug, and they went in, poured a bunch of vodka, and they didn't have any weed. What you guys don't know is my brother, Mike, used to be a big distributor of stuff. I used to, I used to lighten the load a little bit when you'd pass out. So, so, I remember, I wanted to bid it with this group of kids so badly. You know, I wanted them, I wanted to, again, they were over there, I was over here, I wanted to be a part of that. I pulled out this bad weed, and I said, I'll give you some of this, if you give me some of that. And they were nervous, because my brothers put the word around that anybody who got me high is going to get their ass kicked. So, um, they were kind of thinking about it, and probably they said whatever. And so, I started drinking some of that alcohol, and within 10 minutes, I'm like, guys are punks.

[00:25:26] I literally took the alcohol from me.

[00:25:31] And so, that is what alcohol did for me. Every single time, it took me, and it just put me in the middle of it. It kind of, I just loved the effect produced by alcohol. I say this every time I talk. I did every single drug known to mankind from 1975 to 1975. Drugs never one time made me feel the way alcohol did. Alcohol just put me right in the middle of it, absolutely. So, you know, February 15th, 1985, the day before I got sober, I had all kinds of problems. You know, just being out of a little kitchen, you know, just a normal alcoholic. Maybe a little crazy than some, but, you know, whatever. It was just, we didn't have time for that now, anyway. So, I'm down, I'm down, living on this guy's floor, and he's like, you got to go. Yes, I had a big fight. Oh, it's February 16th, 19th, a pillowcase with two clothes in it, old bicycle that I couldn't sell for five horns. No one would take, no people don't even know what collect calls are.

[00:26:30] I was telling my son, and I'm going to digress for a second, I'm going to tell my son. So, August 12th, 1991, I was at the Monday night, Demarest meeting, in Demarest, New Jersey. A young woman walks by.

[00:26:45] Asked for her number, and she didn't want to look like, oh, I'll get my number out to newcomer. They thought I was a newcomer. I had like four years, but they said, I had to look it up. And the kids, they didn't get it. They're like, look it up, look it up in work.

[00:26:58] There's this giant book.

[00:27:01] Anybody's phone number in it. They still, they couldn't, they just couldn't. The one guy goes, even their cell numbers? And I'm like.

[00:27:15] So, I, literally, it was God's grace, God's mercy, because I did not want to be sober. I didn't want to be here. I had been in four treatment, three psychiatric hospitals, a bunch of little kid jails. I'd been around AA, I didn't, I wanted nothing to do about it. My dad was so forever, there were sober family members. I wanted to stay away from those. Drinkers don't trust non-drinkers. Like, people that don't drink, you're an ark, right? So, I, so I, so I end up in this, in this, in this meeting. So, for some reason, it, it has to be God's mercy and God's grace that I didn't drink this first few months. I thought about alcohol every single moment. My first six to eight months, I thought about three things. Alcohol, sex, and homicide. I was just, I could not, like, there would be days where I'd be like, I cannot go one down.

[00:28:11] And one day, I was at a plant's house in the yard, right field, with a resentment. You get to positions by sobriety, and I'm way better than the infielders, but on the right field, because I've got no sobriety. So, I'm out there, you know, having this conversation with me and all my buddies, and I had realized, I realized, I hadn't thought about drinking. I hadn't thought about drinking in a couple days. And it was, like, this, kind of, boom, boom, da. So, so I kept going.

[00:28:39] I had this sponsor. Here's a great mystery. My life, I had a guy named Chuck Nesbitt was my first sponsor. And I never have, I don't have the memory of saying, hey, Chuck, would you be my sponsor? Or Chuck said, hey, I'll be your temporary sponsor to it. It's just one day, this old guy, he's just breaking my balls for no reason.

[00:28:59] Like, he would literally follow me around the meeting saying things like, you know, you can't, you can't dress like that. We don't curse. We don't know all these rules and stuff. And I had to think like, who is this guy?

[00:29:10] So, here's one of the great mysteries of my life. I, I listened to him. There's no, there's no enforcer. There's nobody in the Pacific who looked at me or anything I didn't want to do. For some reason, I listened to him. And regardless of the person or the intent, the actions. Chuck made me go to 15 meetings a week. I went to almost 15 meetings a week, my first two-year-old morning meeting, and three on-site meeting at night. And I did those things because, um, I'm, I'm not sure why. Like, as I got sober, as I got sober a little bit longer, I saw my brother and a few other guys. And I kind of knew that they were like, big shit. So, so here's a big turning point in my life. So, I'm a super, super willful guy. I was young, young, and I got my health back quickly. Really bad attitude. Super, super full. And in three and a half years, I was going to blow my brains out. I couldn't take care of it. I hadn't been going to meetings for a while. I had, I was in this relationship. I wasn't working.

[00:30:06] I had a couple physical fights. I mean, like, like, like, I was literally booked twice in my first two years. In my second year of sobriety, like, handcuffed, arrested, right? And so, like, I had a, I was just kind of, uh, over it. I didn't think I could live sober, and I didn't think, I knew I couldn't drink. I knew if I drank, what would happen? And so, uh, I was going to do something, sometimes I tell the story. But prior to me doing it, a thought occurred to me, I don't know what you call your Uncle Bill. Uncle Bill was a guy who got sober in 1963, part of Pennsylvania, was like 350. So the common thought would be, what is an old fat guy in Pittsburgh? You know, that'd be a young and cool in Los Angeles.

[00:30:47] And that's just nothing. He knows absolutely nothing about that. But what he does know a whole lot about is alcoholism and the recovery from alcoholism. And I called him 412-681-523. I called that number almost every day for 30 years. Picked up, talked for five minutes, he talked for an hour.

[00:31:04] It turns out there are two parts of the first step. Minidah is powerless over alcohol, absolutely no problem. The second part is that I've been in my life as a man. Seriously? Like, you can manage my life better than me? Come on.

[00:31:17] It just didn't, intellectually, it didn't make sense, right? And this is why I feel so many people fail in Alcoholics Anonymous. Alcoholics Anonymous cannot be intellectualized. Some of the smartest, brightest people in the world. Charlie's got a non-mobile cabinet. I can blame it, but you won't get it. It has to be experienced. So you take these acts, I don't believe in it. And I got to a point where I got hammered. I surrendered. I was just hammered into a surrender. I surrendered. He started making suggestions. Took these suggestions. Oh, no, with my remaining two minutes, I'm on the bad basis. So my life, from that point forward, has just been an up and down, up and down, up and down, gradually, on an upward trajectory. And so I think, then I'm going to talk about this. So part of the ways I grew the most in sobriety is we make a ton of mistakes. I make lots of mistakes. I screw up all the time. And when I make a mistake, generally there's one of two reactions to that mistake.

[00:32:15] If I was to justify that behavior, I am the master of rationalizing that behavior. I wouldn't have slapped it. I wouldn't have ripped off my boss if he paid what I was worth. I wouldn't have told that, you know, Maurice Starbucks, how stupid she was if she wasn't so stupid, right?

[00:32:29] Or, or, I can accept responsibility for my mistake. I can make amends for my mistakes. I can make actions to correct it. I can either maintain bad behavior or I can learn from my mistakes and grow. Guys I sponsor, I love it when they make mistakes. Because here's an opportunity for you to grow and get that over. And what happened for me is I was emotionally immature. I couldn't, things didn't go my way, I would lose it. I would lose my temper. I would not be so. By making these mistakes, it helped me to rely more on God and less on me. And to do things like just take responsibility from my actions. So anyway, my life today is, I just celebrated 32 years of marriage.

[00:33:12] 41 years sober in February, coming just to the gym, going to meetings. My wife is in Croatian right now.

[00:33:21] My life is good. Thank you. Thank you.

[00:33:28] Fran: Thank you, Nathan.

[00:33:30] Okay, I'm going to time you guys to make it easy. Okay, 15 minutes each. I'll give you a one minute heads up. How's that? Barbara, would you clear with us? And give us your sobriety date, please.

Barbara C.

[00:33:43] Barbara: Hold on, my heel is coming.

[00:33:46] Dress a lot.

[00:33:49] I can't wait to get back in tennis shoes. I'm Barbara, I'm an alcoholic. I'm Barbara, I'm 986-92. I'm the baby of this group. I love that.

[00:33:59] Welcome to those of you that are new to Alcoholics Anonymous. I always share that, you know, this was not where I thought I'd land. But if you ask the people around me, except my mother, who took it personally, that I ended up here, that others would not be surprised.

[00:34:13] I'm from a very tiny family. I'm an only child. I was conceived in Lake Arrowhead, California. And my grandmother got a resentment one day and told me all the little details of my early life before I knew what was going on. Apparently out of wedlock, here I am. And that was 1963. I was born in 64. I got sober when I was 28. And my dad's a self-professed alcoholic. My mom has the mentality that if you're quiet enough, good enough, supportive enough, you can fix alcoholism. Turns out nobody can fix this except God. And it's not fixed. It's a daily reprieve, for sure.

[00:34:52] Because I have a disease that I'll have for the rest of my life. My experience is I was born this way. I always had feelings of difference, of hardness, not good enough. I just never, I couldn't. I think back, I share the story, there was a little girl at a playground when I was little. There was just that little girl and her mom and myself with my mom. And my mom said, why don't you go say hi to that little girl and play with her? And the idea of walking across that playground and talking to that little girl, and maybe she'd reject me, or maybe I'd have to be like, have a friend. And put like, the process that my mind went through, I just broke down and started sobbing. And my mom didn't like, this kid's cuckoo. Like, there's something wrong with this child. And I just always had just crippling shyness. I just couldn't even function in the world at all. And so when I was 16, when I was 15, my parents got divorced. My mom got rid of the problem, she thought, which was the adultering alcoholic husband. And when I was 16, we went to a little wedding reception.

[00:35:52] And social situations just, I couldn't do it. If you're shy, self-centered, self-obsessed, is what you guys told me. Thank you. It's very challenging to be in social situations. And it would just drain me. I just, my head just, it would explode of all these different things. I'm not good enough. I'm not pretty enough. I'm skinny enough. I don't fit in here. I'm not smart enough. Like, all these things. I mean, it just was just like this grinding in my head. And my mom's a social butterfly. If you giggle across the room with a couple other people, she's like, what's so funny? If you giggle across the room and I'm in the room, I think, you son of a, because I think you're laughing at me. And now I don't like you. Where are you going next? Because I'm not going there. Or maybe I'll follow you there because you're going to pay. You know, I mean, just like Bramado. It was just, it was insanity. And so I ended up at this wedding reception. And the bride was getting a lot of attention. And I can still picture her thinking, you know, totally jealous of her at her own wedding reception and not happy about this situation.

[00:36:50] And just this guy, a lot going on. And then a kid that was a year older with me, Dennis, he was there. And I was like, oh, he's too popular. I can't, you know, just like you guys know, you're alcoholic. And a bunch of the kids were sent to the kitchen. And I went there to the kitchen, kind of out of the way of all the adults. And Dennis pushed a glass of beer across the table. And I didn't even hesitate, you know, to just pick it up and start drinking it. And, of course, I didn't like the taste at first. I soon learned to love beer. That was, I love beer. And that room went from, like, this hospital place where I didn't fit in. It wasn't good enough. I just wanted to leave. I just was so uncomfortable in my own skin.

[00:37:31] And a couple of gulps of booze in a little 16-year-old body went, I could physically feel it go down and come up. And I promise you I remember this like it was yesterday, just like it was yesterday. It went, it hit my neck and kind of went out into my arms, which I understand non-alcoholics also feel the effects of alcohol. But it did something different for me. And that is that I looked up from that table and all of a sudden I was like, the bride's no big deal. Who cares if she's getting attention? And then I remember looking at Dennis and thinking, why is he so popular? He's not even good looking, you know. All of a sudden I went from being less than to not just good enough, I was better than. And I'll tell you what, I was going to visit that. As often as I could. And I knew it was the booze that did that. And I really believe that alcohol saved my sanity early on. There's no question. And it was great until it wasn't. You know, we all have that experience where we wouldn't be sitting here, right?

[00:38:28] Because there's people out there today and it's still working for them or maybe it's not. Maybe they find us and maybe they don't. And so my mom saw me drinking that booze and she, and I don't blame her, she thought alcohol caused alcoholism. And my experience is, and what I learned here is that it's a symptom of my alcoholism, but it didn't cause me to be alcoholic. And what happened in that moment is what makes me alcoholic. And what happened was that it set up a phenomenon of craving and an obsession of the mind. Bam. And I thought about drinking from that moment until 12 years later when I ended up with you. And that was an everyday thing. I was obsessed with drinking alcohol. And I'm someone that my husband's old sponsor, Cliff Roach, used to talk about most of us die from this disease, functioning alcoholics. I functioned. I didn't end up in jail. I didn't get a DUI. I, you know, I said, well, I didn't lose a marriage. Well, no one wanted to marry me. I didn't lose any kids. Well, I didn't keep my kids.

[00:39:23] It's like, you know, I didn't, you know, but I absolutely, you know, this disease absolutely took everything from me or everything that I could have had. And I functioned. I paid my bills. I had insurance on my car, had a car. I did everything to keep that front of a facade because when I would let that down and people would see the amount of alcohol I could consume and the way I behaved behind that, the eyebrows would raise up, people would back away, people would leave my life. And if they said anything and commented on my drinking, get the hell out. That is not an option. You can say anything you want about anything about me, but not about my drinking, period. And I defended my right to basically die a slow death. And by the time I was 28, I had a bachelor of science degree in elementary education, three different colleges.

[00:40:15] I'm a person that's a geographic junkie. It's always everyone else's fault. It's the job. It's the state. It's the building that I live in. It's the professor. It's the boyfriend.

[00:40:25] And so I would constantly move. It never occurred to me the only commonality was me. Never once did I see that commonality. And in college, I had met this guy right here. This is a bad drunk. Ew. Like, horrible. I don't know how he's lived.

[00:40:40] Other than my father, and he's way worse than my father, I'd never seen anyone so handsome and so idiotic all in one package. It was horrible. And so I'm a person I like to do compare and contrast, you know. Well, I don't drink like you. And that's how you get lower companions. Keep those people around you that look worse than you. And your disease sits there and says, you don't have to quit drinking. You're not a loser like this one. You don't have any problem. And that's what my mind did. Well, this jerk, he got sober. And so I had a front row seat of what Alcoholics Anonymous could do for somebody that, you know, would show up at parties and we knew the cops were soon to follow. You know, I mean, this person had a mouth on him. I've never seen anything quite like it. But it was a miracle, quite frankly. And I don't use that word loosely. And what I saw was a man who the sunlight of the spirit had been sealed off. He was dead. He was the walking dead. And I saw Alcoholics Anonymous bring God back in his eyes. I saw that shine through, and there was a program of attraction there.

[00:41:39] But I didn't know that's what I was witnessing. And all I could think was, I can't wait until Chris can drink again. I can't wait, because that's what I thought you did here. You learn how to drink properly. Isn't that what we want to do? And so I graduated college, and we had dated briefly, but, you know, that just didn't work out. But we were very, very dear friends. He was my soulmate. I know if you don't throw up, but this is my ride or die. This is my person. But I moved to California because I knew what the problem was. I was born in California, conceived in California, and my parents moved to Oregon to get away from the hippies. And so I'm not from high intellect stock, but here we are. And I came back here, and I took a life full of promise and a bachelor's degree in elementary education. I don't like kids. I don't know why I got that degree. It was the shortest route to graduating from college. And I took a life, and five years I just drove it into the dirt.

[00:42:35] And I was living by the Hollywood Bowl with a guy that was going to make it in the industry and brought home no income. And what happened was that I drank whenever I could, but I had to function because I was one paycheck away from being homeless. And I still had that option to drink. And I know, when they talk about yets, I know that those things hadn't happened yet. And I know that this disease is progressive, and ultimately that would have been what would have happened to me. I would have, you know, whatever, ended up like so many people in my family have ended up. And I know that now. But what I thought was, my dad's a drunk, and I see what that is, cautionary tale, and I won't be a drunk like him. And I wasn't a drunk like me.

[00:43:17] I was a drunk, and I was owned. This disease owned me. And it lied to me every step of the way. Every step of the way. You get it. My case is different. All I am. And I would have died with that mantra. I absolutely would have died. But this guy got sober five and a half years before me, and he was visiting his dad. His dad at that time was living in Temecula, and I was living with a long-haired rock and roller that was going to make it in the industry. And we used to drive around Hollywood with our hair flying back. And tourists in the little vans would stop and take pictures of the Hollywood hotties, you know. I mean, we just like thought we were all that with a cherry on top. And I was completely dead inside. And I had no control over alcohol. And I wanted to die 99% of the time. But I'd grown up in a religious home, and I was afraid of what that might turn out to be. So I was too afraid to kill myself. But I was also incapable of living. I had no skills. I was profoundly mature. I was overly sensitive. I was super shy. I was hateful. I was mean. I was cruel.

[00:44:17] And I was addictive. I was just this rolling package of contradiction.

[00:44:21] And this beautiful man with five and a half years of sobriety, we met up just to have some lunch, went down at PCH. And he said a whole lot of stuff. I'm not even sure what he said except the one thing. And he said, you deserve to be happy. And I thought, you're right, and you're it. And so I went home, and I left my boyfriend. I didn't tell him. I came home to nothing. And that's how I break up with you. And I went up to Oregon to be with Chris. And I just quit drinking as a gift to him. And the most efficient substitute, I lost my ever-loving mind. And I absolutely was a train wreck. And in that short period of time, cops were called on me. I punched holes in walls. I kicked holes in walls. And this poor guy's like, what is?

[00:45:04] Because my drinking looked very different than his. Functioning alcoholic.

[00:45:09] Not, and you can tell his story, not functioning alcoholic. And so I had gotten a giant Hershey bar, knobbly Hershey bar. I was eating it like a ravenous psychopath. And there was a little bit left. And sugar, it placates me a little, but it's not alcohol. But you guys know, like the promise of something, just a little relief. He ate the last of it. And I went to get my little sugar fix, dry as dry can be, just not drinking.

[00:45:35] And I lost my ever-loving mind, lost it. And it was like 2 in the morning, and he looked at me, and he said, if you were to drink again, what would you do? I said, oh, I'd go down to Santa Fe restaurant, double shot Corbin Gold, beer back, keep them coming, and go to Mission Theater. Oh, my God, I knew exactly what I was going to do. I didn't know where anything else was in Portland, Oregon, but I knew where all the booze was. I said, what would your mom do? And my mom thinks alcohol is a beverage.

[00:45:58] She'd have a grasshopper, drink half, and be done. And he said, what would your dad do? My dad's an alcoholic. I said, my dad, he'd be down to Santa Fe, double shot Corbin Gold, beer back, keep them coming. And I stopped short and said, oh, my God, am I an alcoholic? And he said, I can't answer that self. Self, you know, you have to self-diagnose yourself. And so I called the hotline for his suggestion, the old man, probably my age at this point, hands on the phone. And I was crying and saw me. He said, Barbara, what do you want to do? Maybe go to treatment or rehab, whatever. And I said, I just need an effing drink. And he said, just so you know, no normie would ever answer that way. They don't need a drink to answer that simple question. And it was game on. I went to my first meeting the next day. And for two years, I didn't do it the way it was outlined here. And I died from untreated alcoholism, stone cold sober in these rooms. And finally, I hit a bottom in my sobriety.

[00:46:52] And it was more painful than anything I had out there because due life, just not drinking, is horrific. No promise of relief whatsoever.

[00:47:02] And so I got a sponsor. I hadn't gotten a female. I hadn't gotten any sponsor because I don't trust women. I do now. And I started doing this program like my life depended on it. And here we are. We've been married almost 34 years. I just celebrated 34 years of sobriety. If you're new to Alcoholics Anonymous, like this is – it isn't – I cannot put it into words. You've got to experience this. But I can tell you this. This is the easier, softer way. This is absolutely divine here. So if you've landed here, I hope you stay. Claim your seat. Thanks. Thank you.

[00:47:37] Fran: Thank you, Georgia.

[00:47:39] By the way, we're being recorded. I forgot to move this thing, so I hope they heard us. I can't wait to hear from this other alcoholic.

[00:47:48] Jess, would you give us your sobriety data? I'll give you about 14 minutes in on one more. Fourteen? Yeah. These guys got 15. And then you get another minute.

[00:47:59] Fifteen all together.

Chris C.

[00:48:01] Chris: Hi, everybody. My name's Chris. I'm an alcoholic.

[00:48:04] My sobriety date is February 5th, 1987. Mike, thank you for asking me to come do this.

[00:48:12] I didn't know it was a conference until I got here. He just said, will you come talk? And I thought I was talking at some little meeting somewhere. But anyway.

[00:48:23] Nathan described his alcoholism as humanity being over here, and he was separated from it. And that's the story of my life. Putting the alcohol aside, I've never been able to navigate life. I seem to have been shipped to this world with a set of emotions that were uncontrollable. I had this hypersensitivity and this hyper self-consciousness and just this ill at ease. And everybody else on the earth seemed to be navigating the world just fine. And I could never bridge that gap and become and join those people and be a part of or one of or as good as. I also came shipped with this sense that I was not enough, even though there may be things that intellectually I would know that should make me better than those people. I still couldn't mix with them, and there was that sense that I wasn't enough.

[00:49:23] And alcohol fixed that. And Nathan's story about stuttering, that's it. I never stuttered. But I was so locked up inside myself.

[00:49:33] And it's just excessive concentration in myself that I just, everything, I was just alienated from everybody on this planet. And alcohol was the magic answer to that. A certain amount of drinks and that self came down, and I was able to cross over and mix with the civilians in a way that I never was able to do without the magic of those drinks.

[00:50:03] And that would have all been good had I been able to just drink a certain number of drinks, mix with those people, and maintain the effects produced by those certain amount of drinks. But as an alcoholic, I didn't have the ability to control it, or I ultimately ended up losing control. And I drank myself into, I was a daily drinker from the day I ingested my first drink, which was a half a fifth at Jack Daniel's, to my last drink 11 years later.

[00:50:31] I became a daily oblivion drinker, somebody that was just essentially living to drink for about the last year and a half or two of my drinking. And I tried all sorts of things to stop drinking with no success whatsoever. But the hidden truth and the secret that I didn't want anybody to know was there was something else really wrong with me. The drinking was obvious. I was arrested 16 times, all for alcohol-related offenses, nothing criminal, just attacking bartenders for cutting me off, drunk driving, public drunkenness, that sort of, those sort of arrests. So it was obvious that I had a drinking problem, but what I didn't want people to know is that I was, what was going on inside of me. I had such a high level of angst. It felt like I was screaming at the top of my lungs inside myself, but it wasn't coming out.

[00:51:27] And anyway, I was forwarding to the end of my drinking, because I'm going to talk just a little bit about, since I'm limited on, I only have 14 minutes.

[00:51:38] I'm going to talk a little bit about just some sobriety.

[00:51:42] And one of the keys that has kept me immersed in the middle of the program, and when I say immersed in the middle of the program, that doesn't mean I'm immersed in the middle of the fellowship. The fellowship is not the well, it's a conduit to the well, and it's a vital conduit to that well, but it's not God. So I don't worship the fellowship, nor do I worship the big book. The big book also is a conduit to the well, which is God, but that's just a tool to it. And that's important for me to define, because I am not somebody that can adequately navigate life by being immersed in the fellowship and the activities of the fellowship. It does not spell out the transformative power I need to be able to go out and function out there comfortably in their world without alcohol. And so when I say immersed in the program, I mean the program as a way of life and really doing the deal.

[00:52:40] Anyway, in January of 1987, I had just gotten out of jail for eight days for my third DUI, and I had done a geographic earlier to a dry island in Alaska to cure my alcoholism. I'd been arrested, I think by that time, seven times that, 12 months for alcohol offenses.

[00:53:02] And I got out of jail, started drinking, and was arrested on the streets in Ashland, Oregon, and the police department told me that I should go see this guy, Joe Fisher, that he was an expert on alcoholism. And in an attempt to get out of the arrest, I told them that I would.

[00:53:18] A day or two later, I was walking down the street, and there was one of those sidewalk preachers that, you know, read the Bible, the passerbys, you know, as people pass by. And I came walking by this guy, and he read something out of the Bible. I have no idea what it was. But for some reason, it seemed to correlate to the police telling me to go see this guy, Joe Fisher, which I had no intention of ever doing. And I thought to myself, as I went by, I thought, if I was somebody that believed in God, I would think, that's like the hand of God working in my life. And I should actually go see this guy, Joe. And I kept walking, and then I had a moment of clarity or an intuitive thought or inspiration. Now, this is before I ever heard the terminology of intuitive thoughts or acting as if or any of the AA jargon that we use around here. But that was the thought.

[00:54:16] And then I thought, what if I don't dismiss this God stuff as for, you know, as stupid and for weak people? And even though I don't believe in God, I go see Joe anyway.

[00:54:32] And I thought, what do I have to lose? I do desperately want to stop drinking. My plan at the time was to go to the Schick Center, which was the 10-day aversion therapy program with two-day follow-ups. And I thought, maybe he's a graduate and can give me some tips. So I went up to see this guy, Joe. Joe had nine months sober in Alcoholics Anonymous. He did what we do. He shared a little where he came from, what happened to him, what he was like now, and then invited me to a meeting, which I absolutely did not want to go to. I'd been to AA before, and the AA meetings that I had been to did not adhere to the traditions of Alcoholics Anonymous. And because of that, there was no atmosphere of identification.

[00:55:14] And I didn't hear the music. So I knew AA wasn't for me. No, I don't want to go. But I told him yes out of a sense of obligation because I did ask this guy for help. I went to the meeting that night. It was Thursday night at Clay Street Group in Ashland, Oregon.

[00:55:31] And the speaker got up. She gave a 20-minute talk and shared what she was like, what happened to her, what she's like now. And then each participant shared. And they all focused on the singleness of problem, the one problem that we all share. And it wasn't that they didn't do all sorts of other things or have neurosis or issues or drug addiction or anything else. But the one thing that these people all had in common was alcoholism. And they dwelled on that. And through that dwelling on that, it created this atmosphere of identification where me sitting in the back sat there. And somewhere in the middle of it, I started nodding out of identification. And each participant did the same thing. Anyway, I heard the music. I walked out of that meeting.

[00:56:22] And I knew that that was a place where people drank the way I drank, felt the way I felt, and thought the way I thought. And they were staying sober. I drank for one more week after that. And on February 4th of 1987, I had one more plan where I was going to prove that I was the exception to the rule.

[00:56:43] I blew the plan before I even left my apartment to go down to the bars to drink. Went down to the bars. Drank down at the bars. Got cut off at the same bar that I met her at. By the way, when she says, we met in college, she was the only one in college.

[00:57:01] I went. I just happened to land in that town. I went to two terms, never made it to a single class, was on academic probation, kicked out of campus housing, had a restraining order put on me by campus housing. And allegedly, they had a picture of me in campus security that said, do not approach a loan. He's dangerous.

[00:57:21] So that was my college life. So this wasn't like we met, you know, she came to some frat party and I just happened to be there.

[00:57:32] So I had, I got cut off at the bar, this bar. And so, you know, I attacked the bartender, assaulted him. And cops were called one more time. I was arrested one more time. They processed me, took me home. The difference between that arrest and all the other arrests is that I had zero fight left in me. Instead of spewing obscenities and throwing punches and fighting the cops, I just wept the entire time through the processing and through when they took me home. And my last conscious thought before I passed out that night was, something's different about tonight. I wonder if I'll feel this way in the morning. And when I came to in the morning, it was still different. And what it was is I was beaten by alcoholism. And in that desperation and in that defeat, I fulfilled that requirement that's in our chapter, we agnostics.

[00:58:20] I cried out to a God that I didn't believe in, and I said, please kill me or make this stop. I said a prayer from my childhood religion. And then because of that one meeting I went to where I identified, I thought, there's a place where I can go. And I thought, I will go there.

[00:58:38] And this is what I fulfilled in that chapter, we agnostics. I said, I will go there. And if I have to believe in God, I will.

[00:58:46] And so what happened is I became willing to believe in God, even though I didn't. And that chapter emphatically assures us that we're on our way once that decision is made. And here's the thing about that. This is before I had a sponsor, before I read the book, before I'd been to 90 meetings in 90 days, before I had a service commitment or any of that. That morning, in that surrender, and in that prayer, I was freed of the obsession to drink alcohol. I didn't know at that moment. I only know that in hindsight.

[00:59:18] But February 4th, 1987, I lived as an obsession to drink alcohol on a daily basis. And I could not stop. And I could not shake that obsession. February 5th, after that prayer, I was relieved of that. And I believe that's in two parts. One, because of the surrender. Two, because of all the action that was followed up and the way of life and the design for living that I incorporated and lived by, sometimes did very well and sometimes did it very poorly, but nevertheless was on that path. And so what I kind of want to conclude with this and what I was thinking about, because I don't consider myself an old-timer at 39 years. But if I was somebody with a few years looking at, you know, somebody with 41 and 39 and so forth. 49 and 48. Don't change that. 34, so forth.

[01:00:18] And it's like, how do I stay engaged in this? And the thing is, is that for me is, I'm powerless over alcohol, but my life is also unmanageable by me.

[01:00:30] And for me, what that means is, is that I came into AA and they said things like, you know, just trust in God. Just don't drink. Trust in God.

[01:00:41] Wash the coffee cups. Work the steps. It'll all work out. God's going to do for you what you can't do for yourself. And I had no choice but to act like I believed in that and did it. And in doing that, I continued to stay physically sober, but also I shifted on the inside and became a, I changed. And I've never been, it's lasted. I've never been the same as a result of that. But Dr. Thibault, in one of his writings calls, he talks about the alcoholics, the amazing recuperative power of the alcoholic ego.

[01:01:25] And what that looks like for me is, is that I come into this program and I take actions that have no relevance to my problem, it seems.

[01:01:35] You know, I'm going to lose my job. We'll shake hands at the door. You know, I have no rent money. Do more prayer and meditation. You know, and, but, but what I found is God did do for me what I couldn't do for myself. That was a way of life. But what, and this amazing recuperative powers of the alcoholic ego is over time, as I start looking more like those people over there, and I'm able to mix comfortably with them. I start thinking that I have some of the abilities that they have, which is, is that the, the practical application of real world solutions is going to, thank you, is going to fix my spiritual malady. Because after all, I have a certain amount of time in AA.

[01:02:27] So now I can go read a book on this issue or go see a therapist on this issue or this, and I'm not knocking those things, but my, it's like this. I surrender, and I surrender, and I give God the baton of my life. He takes it, and my life works out. And a little bit later, when I start feeling better, I say, okay, God, give me the baton. I'll take it from here. As if, as if, as if a certain amount of this is going to transform me to be one of them. At the end of the day, I'm still an alcoholic. My life is still unmanageable by me. And if I continue to live in the middle of these principles as a way of life, and continue to carry the message and really try to help the new alcoholic, and do AA 101 and the basics, God's got it.

[01:03:26] And he does a much better job than I ever could have. It just appears as though I'm doing it, but it's not. I'm doing Chuck Chamberlain's, one of my favorite quotes, he said, my business is to do his business, his business is to take care of me. So thank you.