Today there were about four or five people, who had stopped drinking for a day or a week or more. They, for the most part had been in and out for a while. When I sit and listen to this I wonder if they really don’t believe that they are alcoholics.
I know of others in the past who have done the same. They would come in and hang around for months at a time, resting from the effects alcohol had on them, and then, when clear and feeling better, would go right back out again. Not done drinking.
In all these cases none had ever surrendered to the fact that they were an alcoholic. They could even get years under their belts, but on any given occasion drink once again and come back when it got rough. Always amazes me that anyone would really do this. But they do.
I know for myself, looking at this kind of alcoholic, I can only be puzzled at how someone like me could go on like this with alcohol. All I can do is look back at what happened to me. My inability to stop drinking and my drinking everyday and every night. Most of the time all day and all night. I had tried everything. Moreover I had never really heard of the name alcoholic or alcoholism. On top of all of this I had never heard of AA.
I was so desperate and depressed, in total despair. On my last day drinking I decided I needed to end it all by taking my own life. Sitting in a bar that day, drinking of course, I got up from my seat at the bar and started out the door to commit suicide, when the bartender grabbed my wrist and asked if he could help me. He went next door and got a friend of mine I drank with, who I later found out had been treating a member of AA. He came to me and told me that there was a place where men and women met and stayed sober together.
That put a new light in the darkness within me. I had found hope at last. I prayed that night and begged the God of my understanding to help free me from alcohol and the way of life I was living and promised I would do anything he wanted. I fell asleep and woke up the next day and the alcohol was gone.
I had surrendered totally. No exceptions in my mind. But I came in to the program and hung around but was not interested in what the people in here were doing. All I wanted was to never drink again. Other than that I thought I knew what I was doing. And, of course, I ran into all those old timers back then, who challenged me and my thinking. They were not easy going. I got my mouth shut by their demand that I keep it shut, that I didn’t know what I was talking about. My sponsor told me that I didn’t know that I didn’t know. I only thought I did.
Looking back I am so grateful that they did what they did. They opened my mind to the truth I so desperately needed. They helped calm the fear within, which I was covering with my irritation and resistance to whatever was being said or presented to people just like me. I look and think of how they actually saved my life. Had I continued the way I was going I probably would have fallen flat on my face and drank again.
We often tend to laugh and cross talk in these meetings, but there is nothing humorous about being a desperate non sober alcoholic, who is facing what we all have faced. Horror, torture, completely owned by alcohol, and finally insanity and death. I have seen this over and over since I came into this program. My first sponsor was such a victim and I have never forgotten that.
That’s why I love this program. It changed me. I’m in a position of having had a spiritual awakening. I have been restored to sanity. I don’t want to ever drink again. I have found a new freedom and a new happiness and so much more in here. I have found Higher Power, who has enabled me to stay sober and has given me the strength and courage I so desperately needed. That and the willingness I lacked because of my insanity and my immaturity. Talk about being grateful.
I wish it was possible to do what those old timers had done for me. I know I get “kidded” around for my attitude on all of this, but I don’t think we’re here to go to picnics, parties, dances, golf, or whatever. I’m here to stay sober and to be helpful to those who desperately want this program. In fact, as I left today, I spoke to one of these people and hopefully planted something in him which was given to me. I don’t know. I can only hope.