Healthy, Vegan, Marathon Runner — Also Drinking a Handle of Liquor Every Single Night 🫠 – Jennifer W.

This reading is based on a passage from page 29 of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous. Each individual in our personal stories describes in their own language and from their own point of view the way they established their relationship with God. These give a fair cross-section of our membership and clear-cut idea of what happened in their lives. We hope no one will consider these self-revealing accounts in bad taste. We hope that many alcoholic men and women in our room tonight and listening later on aabloochipspeakers.org desperately in need will hear our speaker, and we believe that it is only by fully disclosing ourselves and our problems that any of us shall be persuaded to say, yes, I am one of them too, I must have this thing. So tonight's speaker is somebody that I'm meeting for the first time, and I think it's really great if somebody speaks, but it's even greater if they agree. I'm going to tell you a story to do it on Christmas night. So with that, I'll give you Jennifer. Hey, y'all, I'm Jennifer, and I am a real alcoholic. Hey, Jennifer. And I think the miracle is that it's Christmas night and we're all at an AA meeting and sober. In my family, we do celebrate Christmas, and we were commenting today that it was the best Christmas ever. And I know that for me that's partly true because I'm sober. Each Christmas since I've been sober has been better because I've been sober since I've been sober. And I know that for me that's partly true because I'm sober. This time, I got sober October 31st, 2014. But that wasn't my first time of coming in. So like many people, I grew up in a house with alcoholics. I come from a long line of alcoholics and come by it honestly. My dad's dad died of alcoholism. My dad more or less died of alcoholism. My brother's an alcoholic. My stepdad's an alcoholic. You know, like that. I grew up in Kansas, and I grew up in a house that was pretty chaotic. Lots of drinking, lots of holes in walls, lots of police in the middle of the night, lots of chaos. Let me just say that. And a big instigator of the chaos was my brother, who's 12 years older than I am, who, by the grace of God, is also sober today. But he wasn't then, and he was sort of the lead guy in his high school of getting the drugs and getting the alcohol and getting the girls and getting in jail. So I watched him do that, and I watched what my dad did, and I thought, that is not going to be me. I am not going down that path. So I used to think my brother was the one who acted out, and I was the one who kind of acted in. You know, I was the good kid, the good student, you know, slide under the radar, get the good grades and sports and music and all of that. So Scott did all of the stuff out in the world and causing problems, and I tried to be as good as I could. But then I started managing my feelings not by picking up alcohol or drugs when I was in junior high or high school, but doing things like, trying to become as perfect as I could be and making that the way that I was going to control my feelings or using food to control my feelings. So I didn't go out and start drinking when I was in high school, but I did start starving myself and start hurting myself. So different ways of trying to manage my feelings and different ways that, for me, became obsessive. So I became obsessive. I became obsessed with controlling through food, and then I became obsessed with A's, and it was really all about not feeling, really. I mean, avoiding the bad feelings and trying to be accepted and trying to be loved and trying to get through. Like I said, I grew up, alcohol was all around me, and, you know, and I had six early on. I'm not one of those people. I'm one of those people who, from the very first sip I had when I was five, like, went off to the races at that point. Like I said, it wasn't alcohol and it wasn't my thing at first. And when I was in high school, I think I went to one party, had a couple drinks, and I don't know how, but that was it that time. But I think that was the only time that I went and I had a couple drinks and I stopped. So I started late, I mean, kind of for at least some alcoholics. You know, I didn't start at 13 or earlier or whatever. But I noticed that when I did, aside from that first time at that first party, when I drank, there was no off switch. I mean, from the beginning, really, there was no off switch. And I didn't think anything of it at the time because I was convinced that I wasn't going to be one of them. I wasn't going to be like my dad. I wasn't going to be like, and I knew I wasn't like them because I was a good student and I was a good kid and I followed the rules and Scott broke all the rules. So obviously, I wasn't like that. So if I drank, it must be okay because I was okay. I was different. So therefore, it wasn't a problem. What I can see looking back is that I was absolutely drinking alcoholically in college. I mean, hands down, no question. I already was drinking in a way that when I could get my hands on it and I wasn't bad enough to get a fake ID or to sneak in or do whatever or cool enough or whatever. So for me, it was when I could get it in different ways. But anytime I could get it, I drank till it was gone. And that was every single time. Or when I would go out, I would drink until I was sick in the back of the bar or of the restaurant. From the very beginning, like I said, there was no off switch once I did really start drinking. And when I look back, that's really clear. And I can see, I can think of times in college where I was already doing the swearing off. So I didn't start drinking really until I was 19. But by the time, by the time I was 21, I already had gone through enough periods of drinking until I was drunk and blacked out. And the next day feeling like I was going to die and I'm poisoned and saying, oh, this is poison. I'm not going to do this anymore. And then doing it again. And then this is poison. I'm not going to do this anymore. And then doing it again. You know, and I, I had, at that time I would, I could still have some like longer stretches where I could swear it off. And I did the geographical cure. I moved to Boston for a relationship and left thinking I was leaving the chaos of my family in Kansas. And maybe if I can get to this new, maybe if I get to this new place, it's going to be better. You know, it's going to feel better. I'm going to be better. I'm going to feel better. I followed a relationship. It was a really bad idea, but I couldn't see that. At the time, I couldn't admit it. And, you know, of course it all went with me. So, and I would trade back and forth between either. For me, it was trading back and forth between using food and using alcohol to manage my feelings. For me, alcohol was always my drug of choice. That, that one did it for me. I didn't need to go any farther than that. So I stayed there. I'm grateful. I mean, I think if I had kept at it long enough, I would have, I would have gone farther. And, and when I went out, like I said, I moved to Boston. And I was following. The other thing for me, there was this line along the way of chasing success, you know, chasing achievement. If I could perform well, if I could, and it was this idea still, I think that there would be some way that I could protect myself from judgment, from feelings, from whatever. Something just occurred to me that I want to, I want to put this to the side for just a moment. And I want to go back to the beginning. And I want to say, I, I accepted to come tonight because I really want to stay sober today. And for me, remembering where, remembering where my alcoholism took me and remembering what AA has done and how AA pulled me out of it and the life AA has given me. That, that helps me stay sober. So when, when, when this day was an option, I said, yes, I'm nervous. And I feel uncomfortable, but I really want to stay sober. And so I want to say that that's why I'm here. And I also want to want to give away some of what I have experienced in AA and what I have learned that has saved me. And like I said at the beginning, has enabled me to have again, the best Christmas. Of my life. So coming back to coming back to the timeline, I started a graduate program when I was in Boston. So I was still doing that thing where performing really well, doing really well, getting really good grades, all of that. Very unhappy in my relationship, drinking more, but still trying to trying to be good. Still just not thinking of myself like, like my father, like, it's just different. It's different because I'm in graduate school. It's different because I'm in Boston. It's different because I'm me. I'm not, I'm not him. But I was increasingly doing things like hiding alcohol because my, my significant other disapproved. And as soon as I could see that he disapproved, he came back and he saw how much I had had to drink while he was gone for a weekend. Like my takeaway was finish it all next time or hide it. Right. I mean, it's obviously not drink less or don't do it. It was, oh, okay, he doesn't, he's not on board with this kind of drinking. So I better, I better hide it. So, so I did that and I did that and I did that. And then, and I had like, I think like, like at least a few other people in here. I have what some people call outside issues, which I think is kind of a misnomer because like all of it is all of its inside stuff and all of it affects. It's sobriety, but, but, but some of my outside issues I was dealing with at the time. And I ended up in doing an outpatient psych thing when I was in, in, in Boston. And, and, you know, I didn't mention maybe how much I was drinking, like while I was doing that psych thing. So I would go there during the day for the stuff I was supposed to do. And then, you know, stop off at the bar on the way to my therapist's office. And, and then I was thinking about my dad then, but then I was romanticizing it. I'm, I'm like you. And, and that's, there's something cool about that. I'm not sure how that switched, but, you know, I needed it to switch. So it switched. So now I'm identifying with him. So, you know, because he had died by then. He died early because he lived hard and he didn't treat his body well. So I was doing that. And one weekend, you know, I stayed up all night drinking one night. And the next day I was sick as anything. And I ended up going over to the infirmary because I couldn't stop throwing up. And I was worried that I might have alcohol poisoning or whatever. I was by myself. My, he was my husband at the time. He was out of town. So I was in the infirmary all day. Couldn't drink, couldn't drink that night. And the next day I was out. And so I'd gone, whatever that was, like 20, less than 24 hours without drinking. And I was going to class the next morning and I walked, I walked most everywhere. So I walked, I lived in Somerville and I walked over to Cambridge, Massachusetts. And as I was walking along, I noticed that I was having a hard time walking. I was like, what's going on? And I kept trying to walk and my muscles were seizing up. And then I noticed that, and I actually had to sort of like lean against the wall. And then, my jaw started clenching and I couldn't open it or shut it. And on some, somewhere in the back of my brain, I thought, is this what DCs are? Is this like, no, that can't be like, just because I missed a day of drinking because it hasn't been that bad. But, but I, I don't even know how. I mean, at some point I had to crawl because I couldn't, I couldn't walk. And I ended up back at the infirmary and I had a doctorate. I had a doctor I'd been working with at the time. And somehow I might've mentioned something about how I had kind of not really been wanting to live lately. And then there was this thing about how I actually was drinking on the side. And she said, you know, I think you actually need to be impatient and not outpatient. And I think we could safely say that you're an alcoholic and, or at the very least, we're putting you in there in part because you need to be on detox so that you don't die from the way that you've been drinking. And that was shocking to me, to say the least. That didn't fit with my self image. It didn't fit with, it didn't fit with my, my life, any of it. And that was when I, that was in 1999. That was in January of 1999. And I attended my first AA meeting. I was introduced to AA in Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge, Massachusetts. And I spent the first long time thinking, what, what am I doing here? I don't relate to these people. I don't, I did that. I did the compare instead of identify thing. And it was a lot of, I haven't lost that. I haven't lost that. I haven't lost, of course, I hadn't had any of it to begin with. I mean, I hadn't had a house yet to lose and I hadn't had, you know, but, but anyway, um, so, but I gradually wrapped my head around the, okay, uh, okay. I mean, I, I guess if I ended up coming, to the hospital through the hospital through detoxing, maybe I have a problem. I'll give them that. So I did go to AA meetings and I did give up. I did give up alcohol. And so January 25th, 1999 was, was my sobriety date. Uh, and when I came out of the hospital, I went to meetings. I went to meetings in Somerville and I went to meetings in Cambridge. I went to, um, I went to lots. I went to AA and NA meetings. I went to anything that, that I could, um, and when I moved down to Atlanta, um, later that summer, I picked up and I went to meetings here and, um, and I stayed sober for seven and a half years. And, um, and when I came in in 1999, I was 25. So I'm, I want to just rush on so you don't do the math, but, um, I, seven and a half years after being sober, I did that. By then I'd finished my PhD. I had a partner. I had divorced the guy. It would have been a terrible relationship. And, um, so fast forward, I'm in the program. I go to meetings. Um, and I've, I've, I'm getting all these things. The promises are coming true. The promises are totally coming true. Um, I'm not attributing it to the program. I'm not attributing it to sobriety. I'm attributing it to like, remember, like I, I pursue success and I pursue achievement and this is what I do. And this is, it's just happening because that's what I, that's what happens. Um, and, um, and I gradually, I did the thing, right? You could just like have pressed control C on somebody else's speech and then press control V right here. So I started going to fewer meetings. I started talking less to my sponsor. You know, that whole thing. Um, and I, I started, you know, that little voice in my head saying, maybe it's different. You know, I'm sure maybe one or two of you have heard that voice in your head at some point. Um, maybe it's different now. I was really young before. I was really unhappy in my relationship before. I was really depressed in Boston. That was just not a good place for me. Um, things are different now. I've got, I've got a partner. I'm happy. I've got a house. I've, you know, I'm finishing. I finished my PhD. Look at this. I'm sure I could drink again and I'm sure I can, I can drink normally. Maybe it wasn't really a problem. So, um, and that, that started in part because, and my partner was not, not one of us. Um, and kept sort of doing that thing of, are you sure you, are you, are you sure you're an alcoholic? I mean, you were really, you were really young when you, and so eventually, you know, I had a drink. And at first I did the, like, I'm going to, I'm going to do it differently this time and I'm going to pay attention to how much I drink and it's not going to be a problem. And, um, you know, and that lasted for, that actually did last for a few weeks or a few months or something like that. Um, and then, and then it didn't last anymore. Um, and that was in 2006 and there just began, this downward spiral into, into what happens, you know, so drinking more and more and more and more and trying to justify it and trying to play it off as if it's not alcoholic drinking, but I know it's alcoholic drinking. The trouble started to happen. started staying out too late, coming home sick, blacking out, not remembering things, doing the, I'm so sorry, it's not going to happen again. I mean, and I meant it. Like, I mean, I don't want it to happen again either. I'm so, I'm so sorry. Um, and how many times my partner helped clean up and helped and was so, all of that, you know, all of that, um, happened and happened more and more, making promises, um, very obvious that I didn't drink normally. Um, I knew really that I couldn't drink normally. And all of that led to, um, to a crisis, to a crisis point in my, in my life where, where under the influence, I made some really bad decisions. And, um, those really bad decisions had a very negative effect on my relationship. Um, and it was really obvious that if I wanted the relationship, I had to stop drinking because I made really bad decisions when I drank. I mean, that, that, that, that just was always the case. I don't know how now that I did this, but at that, this was in 2009, I just stopped cold. Um, it was, I, I had this stark panic of, I'm going to lose my partner if I don't turn myself around. It was, so I just, I did. And I don't know how I did it and didn't come back to AA. I stopped cold, focused on other things, focused more and more on a passion of mine that has always been there, which is running. Um, fast forward a bit, stayed dry, um, decided to get pregnant and have a baby, stayed running, running, running, um, running very seriously, um, running somewhat competitively, marathons and half marathons. I'm thinking, had a baby, um, so wasn't drinking. My partner drank. Um, my partner drank responsibly. Um, and I was like, I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. Um, my partner drank in ways that I could never fathom drinking. Although with me, when I was drinking, she always drank more, but still not like me. Um, and after, after I had our child, um, about not even a year, after watching her night after night after night after night, have a, have a bourbon, have a bourbon, have a bourbon, have a bourbon, have a bourbon, have a bourbon, have a bourbon. At some point, I mean, that's like working on me in the back of my brain, working, working, working, working, working, working, working. Um, and I started to convince myself and then I started working on convincing her that it would be okay. I can have a sip. I could just have a sip. And, um, you know, I found out from a nurse friend, you know, how much would be safe, you know, because I'm a responsible person, you know, and I was still breastfeeding and there's that whole thing. So how much can I safely drink so that it doesn't hurt my son and so that I can, stay with that limit. Um, and, and then at my birthday, because, so the door was open, right? So the door is open. And then, um, a month later, maybe not, maybe a month later, on my birthday, drank a bottle of wine at dinner, um, in 2012. And really, it was off to the races again. But I kept telling myself, it's going to be different now. You know, before it was going to be different, because I had the partner and the house and I'd finished the degree and I had the job. Now it's going to be different because I still have those things, but I also have a child and I'm responsible. So I will never drink like I did before. I will never do those things that I did before because now I have a child and that's, that's going to make a difference. Um, and, I mean, and it did in certain respects so far, but, but the same things happened because I'm an alcoholic and I don't have an off switch. So when, so when I drink, I keep drinking and the volume of what I drank continued to increase. Um, and I did those things that maybe one or two of you couldn't relate to about going to different liquor stores because I was embarrassed about how much I was buying or having awkward conversations with people in the store about the party that I must be having because of how much alcohol I was buying. So, I was buying. Um, and, you know, ha ha, yeah, I'm having a party this weekend with myself. Um, and so that was happening. You know, and doing those, doing those crazy things that, that we can do. Um, I sprained my ankle so badly that I couldn't go to work and I have the kind of job where if I don't work, I don't, I don't, I don't get paid. Um, I work for myself. Um, so I stayed home. I didn't work, but I did, I did manage to go to a package store, you know, and hobble in to buy alcohol or being sick and having medication that says, um, you know, if you take however many drinks or more, you know, don't do that and take this medicine. It's not safe. They don't mix. And so then I just didn't take the medicine because I wasn't going to stop drinking. That, and that was obvious. So just those things, you know, that, that we can do. Um, and for sure, we're trying to hide how much I was drinking, um, because I knew that it wasn't normal. And then I started this cycle with my partner of the, she would say, well, just drink less. Like, just, just moderate it. You know, you are so disciplined. You run marathons. You did a PhD. You are so disciplined. Just put some discipline into your drinking. And I, you know, and I'd say, yeah, okay, sure, I'll do that. I knew I couldn't do that. But I would want to. So I would try to convince myself also because I didn't want the conclusion of I can't drink anymore because I still, I still loved it or thought I loved it. I think then maybe I did still love it. Um, and then something else would happen and I'd black out. I'd get sick or whatever. And we'd have that conversation again. Um, and part of what is, um, part of, um, what my experience is in terms of, um, in terms of a bottom with my alcoholism is that for me my bottom was, um, it was profoundly an emotional bottom. Um, there were a lot of things I hadn't lost yet at that point. Um, I somehow never got a DUI and it's definitely not because I never drove under the influence I don't know how I didn't get a DUI. Um, and I'm lucky not to, I'm lucky not to be hurt. I'm lucky I never hit anybody. Um, I did hit some inanimate objects like poles and columns and things. But, but nobody ever got hurt. Um, I never lost a job. Um, I have my own practice and I didn't drink. I'm so far. I mean, and what I know now is that these were yet. I hadn't yet begun drinking before work. I hadn't, I hadn't yet gotten to that point. I hadn't yet driven with my son in the car while I was drunk. I hadn't, I hadn't gone to jail. But what did, oh, and I continued to run in a way that I was beating all of my personal best. I won a marathon only because fast women didn't show up. But, I still did. And that was while I was at the height of my drinking or the depth of my drinking or the whatever. So, there was a part of me that could also say, but I can still do this. I can still get up to go to work. I can still take care of my son and do all of the things and take him to, you know, the children's museum or the zoo or the park or the whatever. Um, and, um, I can still function and I can still move through my world and, um, and I, I got to the point where I knew hands down I was alcoholic, I was drunk, hands down it was a problem. I got to a point where I said to myself, but I'm a, I'm grown. I can do what I want. And so long as it doesn't affect my son or my work or whatever, what's the problem? No harm, no foul. I can do what I want. Um, and I would think about people I knew and think about famous writers I liked like Hemingway or whatever and I would romanticize, I would romanticize my drunkenness and my right to be to be drunk and my right to be drunk whenever I wanted to be drunk, essentially. Um, so, there's that piece going on. Um, so there's that. And, but, what I also noticed was that, oh, another really important piece in this. What was happening was that the, I was aware that it was out of control. I was trying to tell myself that it was okay because I wanted to do it. I wanted to do it. I wanted to do it. I knew, though, that I was doing it partly because there were things in my life I didn't want to face. I didn't think I would stay in the relationship if I stopped drinking but I couldn't face leaving the relationship. So, alcohol was a great buffer because by the end, I, I passed out every night and, and every morning would be, like, wondering how much damage did I do last night? What did I say last night? What did I do last night? I tried to stop. I did the, because the other thing was I would tell myself I'm, I'm healthy. I mean, I'm a runner. I take that seriously. I'm vegan. I eat well. I eat clean. But then I drank like that, you know, and I couldn't see the contradiction in it. Not really. But I knew inside. And at some point, at a couple points, I tried to stop and then I had that experience that I think a lot of us get to where when I did try to stop at that point, I couldn't. I just couldn't. The, the mental obsession was too great and the physical craving was too great and I would make promises to myself that I wouldn't be able to keep. And I had a friend in the program who had 13 years who just left the hand of AA there and he would just, every once in a while, just say, you know, we're here. If you want to come back, we're here. You know, we're here. And he said things like, I hate to see you so sick. And I remember thinking, what do you mean sick? Like, look, I'm healthy, I'm vegan, I run. But I was sick. And you know, and I didn't, I couldn't see that then in the ways that I can see it now. And I don't know how long it would have taken me to come back in, but in the middle of October in 2014, my brother came to my house. My brother came from out of state to my house to see some family we had visiting. And to make a long story short, I ended up calling 911 to have an ambulance come to our house to take him to Atlanta Medical Center and he had a blood alcohol level of .4. And we didn't know he drank. And he tried to convince us that, well, he had just been like starting to party for the weekend, but he didn't usually drink. And the doctors are saying, well, you know, you really can't drink it to that level without being unconscious. Or even dead unless you've built up a tolerance. So he apparently had been hiding vodka in the trunk and around everywhere and we didn't know. So there he is at Atlanta Medical Center detoxing and I'm thinking, that should be me. That should be me. By that point, every single day I woke up, every day I woke up with a state of panic and anxiety. I would think, I don't want to drink today, but I know I'm going to drink today. By the end, I didn't want to drink, I had to drink. By the end, I didn't like the taste of any of the things that I drank. I just needed to drink. I had the physical craving, I had the mental obsession. By the end, I reached that point that, and I've read about it in the big book, I couldn't imagine, it was that crossroads. It was that total crossroads. If I keep going this way, I mean, death is the sure answer if I've got to do something different. Because at that point, I couldn't imagine life, I couldn't imagine going on like that. I couldn't imagine life with alcohol any longer, but I also couldn't imagine life without it. At that point, I wanted to die constantly because I couldn't imagine that there was another way out. Until I thought, until that happened with my brother, and I thought, I'm going to try AA again. I don't want to end up like that. Because he, he did what he did for us to call 911, in front of my son. And it was really scary. My son still remembers it. And he still, I mean, and he was three at the time. And he still cries when he talks about the police coming and the ambulance coming and all of that. And I didn't want that to be me. So I decided to stop drinking. I don't know how I did it, but I actually tapered off. I started coming here. I came to the 11 o'clock meeting. I decided that I wanted to stop drinking. I decided that I wanted to stop drinking. I was going to do it differently. That one of the things that I don't, that I was going to throw myself into this because I finally knew the gravity of it. When I was in the program before, when I was younger, I would hear people say, if I go back out, I might die. I would think that they were exaggerating. And I'm sorry to say that now. I mean, now it feels very disrespectful. But I didn't get it. I didn't get it. I would really just think that they were, they were exaggerating. By the time I came back in this time, I knew that was true. So I thought, I can't keep living like I was. My only hope for it to be different is the program. I'm going to throw myself into it and see what happens. So I decided to do a 90 and 90. Had my friend be a temporary sponsor from day one until I could get somebody who wasn't a friend of mine. And I started I started actually seriously working the program. I read the literature every day. I followed the suggestions. You know, again, you could do the control C and the control V. You know, all of the stuff that you're supposed to do. You hear everybody say, and then, that's the stuff I did. I did that stuff you're supposed to do. But when I came in, I came in, you know, with all of the earnestness at our command. I was earnest when I came back. And I found a way to do 90 meetings in 90 days despite all of the commitments. And I watched my life start to change. And at first, the change was things got really hard because those things that I was afraid would happen that I wouldn't be able to stay in the relationship. And some of those things, yeah, that was true. And so I went through some of the hardest time of my life. But I also did it with this whole sense, this whole network. Of support. And people who said, you can do it without a drink. And you can call me if you feel like you need a drink. Or come to a meeting with me. Or let's go to another meeting. Or this prayer helped me. Have you tried doing the third step prayer? Or sometimes I pray the serenity prayer 20 times. Have you tried that? I mean, I just would hear people and have their support. But, you know, I was talking about how from the very beginning, even though it wasn't alcohol for me, I was avoiding myself. I was avoiding my feelings. Always. Always. So when I stopped drinking and had to face this stuff, it was, oh my God. I mean, and I remember thinking, I've never felt fear like that since I was a kid. Because since I was old enough to find ways of managing emotions, I'd been managing emotions. But what is amazing to me is that I really did it. Day at a time, I really did walk through all of those things without taking a drink. So that, so yeah, I went back out in 2006. And I was so deluded and so in denial that at the time I didn't even think of it as a relapse. I just thought I didn't have a problem before and I was going to have a drink. So for me then, coming into the program has absolutely changed my life. In every way for the best. And it was easy for me coming in with the steps one, two, three, because by the time I came back in, it was easy to acknowledge that I was absolutely powerless. I was ready to be done. I didn't know how to be done, but I was ready to throw up my hands and say I can't do this anymore. I don't know how to get out of this, but I need help getting out of it. For me at first, the program was the higher power because, I knew that in the rooms that everybody in here who had even one day more of sobriety, they'd managed to do it. And I would think about all of the people over all of the years in the history of the program who'd managed to space over and I would just imagine that as my higher power. And I had a sponsor. I worked through the steps and day by day I worked through the difficult changes and I started to see things, I started to see positive results. And I know early on for me, just knowing that finally I didn't have anything to hide was an amazing thing. That finally the things that I did and the things that I said and the things that I thought were actually congruent for the first time in years. I mean, there had been different stories that I was telling different people or parts that I was hiding all over the place for so long. And it was such a relief. To just be able to be honest. And it was such a relief to try to do things differently. And for me, I had to stay really close to the program. And one of the things that I learned retrospectively that I did wrong before, aside from all of the other obvious things, was I never sponsored anybody. And I don't know how close I stayed to myself. But in seven and a half years, I never sponsored anybody. I didn't get the 12th step and the importance of that kind of service work. So I've been intentional to stay close with a sponsor this whole time, going through the steps again. And as I go through the steps again, getting to deeper levels of defects and working on things. I've had sponsees now who have been from the time that I had a year. So every day, I'm making contact with the program, with reflections or with prayer, with the literature, with talking to people. So all of that has helped me get to a place where I can live in congruence and I can actually really be healthy and not just think I'm healthy because I'm eating okay. So that's what my experience has been. And the final things that I want to say, I don't know where people in this room are with time and how many white chips or all of the rest of it, but for anybody who came in or is coming in young or is coming in and you're still on your first white chip, one thing that I wish I would have heard is that relapse doesn't have to be part of your program. I mean, it can be and it is for a lot of people, and that's okay. We'd always rather have people come back and be alive, but it doesn't have to be part of your story is what I meant to say. Alcoholism is that strange disease. It's one of the only ones or the only one I know of where people don't want an early diagnosis. With other diseases, we're glad to get an early diagnosis. We can start the treatment soon. We can live longer and healthier, but with alcoholism, we're like, I'll deal with that later. Like, we don't want that diagnosis, but how much easier it would be if we took it. And the other two things or three things that I've heard that have been helpful for me and that I've heard from sponsees that have been helpful, one is not to compare your bottom to anybody else's. I've heard people say, oh, well, I had a high bottom, and so maybe it wasn't so much of a problem. I've had somebody say to me, well, you had a high bottom, so you know what it's like. I don't play that. I mean, I didn't come here to socialize. I didn't come here because I was looking for some place to go on a Monday night at 8 o'clock. I came here because my life was going to end, and it was disrupting. So whatever was going on, whatever you lose or don't lose, like, we didn't, I think most of us are here because we didn't have any other places to go by the time we get here. And then the other thing that I had a sponsee say that was helpful to her when she started thinking about taking a drink was to remember that every time I drink something, every time I drink, something bad doesn't necessarily happen, but every time something bad happened, it happened when I had been drinking. So that's what I have to share. Thank you for letting me share so that I could remember how bad it got and how glad I am to be sober, and hopefully you got something. And anyway, you're sober, so that's great. Thanks. Just another homesick time to be in your style. I've got marriage. I can make it through this fine. I won't make it in until I work it all out. It's not China's world I'm up against. Well, I know my best defense. When the struggle gets its day and the last dance full of pain, keep it calling out your until I walk on the bottom of the shadow.