Doc Said the Librium Would Make Me Drink Less — Mostly by Keeping Me Unconscious 🫠 – Dave P.

About This Speaker Tape

Dave P. shares from nearly 30 years of sobriety, opening with a warm tribute to the collective power of AA meetings — reminding the audience that because of this meeting, children are being tucked in safely, jail bunks sit empty, and lives are being quietly transformed. He describes the week of April 11-18, 1976, when he was drinking six half gallons of vodka a week in a small apartment in Carrollton, Texas, unemployed and living on $63 a week from unemployment, spending $44 of it on a case of whatever vodka was on sale so he wouldn't "foolishly waste" money on food or rent. He hadn't bathed in weeks, survived on 59-cent Swanson frozen chicken dinners, and was seeing a therapist at the Dallas County Mental Health Clinic named Jeanette — telling her nothing but "pure alcoholic drivel" while trying to get her to like him.

Dave traces his failed attempts to find help through human power: ministers who seemed to own Higher Power and set conditions he couldn't meet, a doctor who prescribed Librium 75mg (which Dave knew from his PDR would only make things worse), and a therapist he couldn't be honest with. He had once been a promising computer programmer starting at age 19 on vacuum tube machines, rising to titles like vice president of operations and senior scientist, but alcoholism destroyed every career opportunity. When Jeanette finally told him to go to Alcoholics Anonymous because "they do better than anybody," he had to think about it for two days — even with death as the only alternative.

He walked into his first meeting on April 14, 1976, still drinking, and a woman named Helen Elliott hugged him and said she was glad he was there. For four nights people told him to ask whatever Higher Power he could believe in for help. On Saturday night, April 17th, he stood in his apartment with a drink in his hand and said, "Higher Power, if I'm going to quit drinking, you're going to have to help me." The next morning a paramedic named John made sure he didn't drink, and he hasn't had a drink since. Dave reflects on how that experience completely changed his understanding of Higher Power — from a judgmental, angry figure to a presence that lives inside every person.

Dave closes with deeply moving stories about his son Michael, who got sober, discovered he was HIV positive, and spent his remaining years volunteering for the Texas AIDS Commission and caring for others through AA and his church before dying with his whole family around him and no unfinished business. Dave's estranged daughter showed up eight months sober just hours before Michael died, and Dave gave her her first AA birthday cake the following March. He urges newcomers to just keep coming back, to conceive of whatever Higher Power works for them, and to stop throwing their lives away.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Introduction and the Recovery Tartan from Scotland — wife Polly brought it back from speaking trip
• 4:30 The impact of a single AA meeting — kids tucked in safely, empty jail bunks, lives changed by collective effort
• 9:00 The week of April 11-18, 1976 — six half gallons of vodka a week, $63 unemployment, $44 on booze
• 14:00 59-cent Swanson dinners, not bathing, going to Dallas County Mental Health Clinic every Monday
• 20:00 Career history — programming vacuum tube computers at 19, VP titles, destroyed it all with drinking
• 25:00 Failed human powers — ministers who owned Higher Power, doctor who prescribed Librium, therapist he couldn't be honest with
• 32:00 Amphetamine distribution in the San Fernando Valley — first wife ordering speed on doctor stationery
• 37:00 Jeanette says go to AA because they do better than anybody — first meeting April 14, Helen Elliott's hug
• 44:00 The prayer on April 17th with a drink in his hand, John the paramedic keeping him sober the next day
• 52:00 Son Michael's sobriety, HIV diagnosis, AIDS volunteer work, death with family gathered and no unfinished business; daughter arrives 8 months sober