His Early Drinking Was an Adorable Little Sippy Sip — Dan D.

About This Speaker Tape

1986. A truck backed up to the house, and Dan D. stripped his parents' home down to the carpet. It was the finish line of a blur that started at twelve with an "adorable little sippy sip" of alcohol and accelerated into a three-hundred-dollar-a-day cocaine habit. He had a front-row seat to the disease through a raging alcoholic stepfather, yet he found himself running the streets, robbing houses to feed a hunger that moved a million miles an hour.

The ultimatum was simple: treatment or the street. Dan chose the former and leaned into a service-oriented sobriety. Eight years later, the wreckage took a new form: a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis. He describes the terror of the unknown—the double vision and the eventual transition to a wheelchair—as "really chunky crap." By utilizing the tools of his Higher Power and the grit of men's meetings, he transformed a debilitating illness into a unique qualification to sponsor others facing their own incurable burdens.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Introduction by Howard L. outlining Dan D.'s background and MS diagnosis
• 6:20 Dan discusses the initial fear and spiritual condition following his MS diagnosis
• 13:45 Childhood history involving a father who died of alcoholism and a volatile stepfather
• 22:10 Details of teenage drug use, including cocaine and the transition to criminal behavior
• 31:00 Entering treatment at 18 and the influence of early Houston AA old-timers
• 42:15 The benefits and honesty found within men's meetings
• 52:30 Managing the progression of MS symptoms and the role of a Higher Power
• 1:05:00 The impact of the program on his marriage and raising children
• 1:15:20 Discussion on co-sponsorship and working the steps with a sponsee