If I Take the Right Actions the Feelings Will Change – Polly P.

Hi everybody, my name is Polly and I'm an alcoholic. Jeez, I can understand how the other two speakers felt. What a privilege to be able to share at the Pacific Group. Rita, thank you very much for inviting me. It's like overwhelming. This is really nice and it's really a privilege. It's a privilege being able to do anything in a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous But it seems like a special privilege to be able to be invited here. I was listening to Richard as he shared, and he was talking about how he wished he was just like a normal alcoholic and had a few drinks and woke up and ended up in a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. And that's kind of what I thought I did. I just didn't feel like I was the person that had anything to say in the program at AlcoholicsAnonymous. And I call myself a couch potato alcoholic because I just wasn't out there doing all those things. I just didn't think I had anything to say. And when I came to the program as Alcoholics Anonymous, I was told that this program is to share your experience, strength, and hope, and that the rest is God's deal. I was listening to the feelings, though, of both of the other speakers, and it's amazing how we do so many different things. but I felt the same way that they felt about the things they did when I came to the program as Alcoholics Anonymous that's what I was told to do was to identify with the feeling because the things we do in Alcoholics Anonymous the way we drank when we come here we're all different in that respect but how we felt about it is so similar and I felt so similar as a little girl I just felt so totally inadequate and I came from a family where there was no drinking and so I'm living breathing proof that you can come to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and not have alcoholic parents my parents did not drink and if anything I was in a religious organization I grew up in a very fundamentalist church and one of the great big thou shalt not was thou shalt NOT drink. And my dad died at age 60 and he had 60 years of sobriety. My mother is 73 and she has 73 years of sobriety, so whenever I have an AA birthday and I seem all jazzed about my AA birthday, I can tell you it doesn't impress my mother at all. My mother is one of these people, you know, if you just hadn't drank, you'd have never gotten that trouble anyway. So my, you know, my 14 years of sobriety doesn't do a thing to her. And one of the things I've learned in the program as Alcoholics Anonymous is that when I came here I wanted everybody to understand me and I was one of these people who walk around Alcoholics Anonymous you know the most misunderstood person in the world you know please understand me you know you don't understand and I was told to get into the 12 and 12 and to burn the 11-step prayer in my brain because it had nothing to do with me being understood and I'm so grateful for for that because you know I always wanted my mom and my dad to understand please understand my alcoholism please understand what I do in these meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous but I'm so grateful to this program because what you have done for me is that you have taught me that it's not important that my mother understands it's important that I understand she doesn't understand. And I'm so grateful for that. When I was a little girl, I was one of these people who had pimples all over my face, who was very skinny and felt totally inadequate. I am a person who needed a drink a long time before I took a drink of alcohol. I'm also a person who couldn't stand to be teased. I had these feelings of such total inadequacy. And when you teased me, I just fell apart. I couldn't even hang together. I was so terrified if you teused me. I had this God that I felt that was real punishing and that there was no way that I would ever be good enough for him, that everything I did never, ever measured up. I just felt so totally inadequate. I felt like there was No Way I'd Ever Be Good Enough for God. I just felt like I was just a person who was just never, ever going to make it. I am so grateful to the program at Alcoholics Anonymous because you introduced me to a God that it doesn't matter. Just what I am is enough, and I never did understand that. I'm so grateful that you told me where I can find God because, see, I always thought God lived somewhere up in the sky. but I came to a program called Alcoholics Anonymous and he told me where I could find God and he taught me that God is deep within and he showed me how to find him and he said to search fearlessly and I'm so grateful today that I know that because today I never ever have to walk alone again also I have a God who has a dynamite sense of humor my name is Polly It's not Paula or Pauline, it's Polly. And here I am, this skinny, pimply-faced little girl with this name of Polly, and I'm here to tell you if you have a name like Polly you're going to be teased a lot, and it's going to mean things like Pauly Wants a Cracker and Polly Wally Doodle All the Day, and I'm sensitive, you hear? I don't like to be Teased. But I've learned in the program at Alcoholics Anonymous that there's just no negatives in god's world that everything has a positive result even though i perceive it as negative i have learned in the program at alcoholic synonymous that i have a disease of perception i don't see things the way they really are and today i just love having the name polly because most of the time i can come into a room with this many people and if somebody says polly I'm pretty sure they're talking to me. I didn't know I had a disease called alcoholism, but I knew I was a drunk and I knew I was alust. And I used to drive down the freeways in Dallas, Texas and pray to God to have heart disease or cancer or something because I knew that I was dying and I just wanted to die of something respectable. And today I know that the disease of alcoholism is my greatest gift because if I didn' t have the disease of alcoholism, I wouldn't qualify for the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. And everything I am or hope to be, I owe to the Fellowships of Alcoholic Anonymous." Ten and a half years ago, I married Dave. Dave's last name is Pistol. My name is now Polly Pistol . Now, I don't know about your higher power. My higher power has a dynamite sense of humor because I can guarantee you you're not going to walk around on planet Earth with a name like Polly Pistol and not learn to be teased. So rule 62 works, you know just don't take yourself so damn seriously and having a name like Polley Pistol has definitely just helped me learn to lighten up. When I came to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous I would hear people talk about their mother and their father and they would talk about their alcoholic mom or their alcoholic father and they would say things you know like gosh I never wanted to be like my old man or I never wanted to be like my mom. And they would start to tell their stories of things that happened in their family and I began to identify with the feeling and I began to feel the same way these people felt about their alcoholic parents. And I've come to believe that the only difference between my dad and I is my dad just forgot to take a drink. Everything else was there. My dad used to have fits of rage, just like a periodic alcoholic. And you never ever knew when he was going to have one of these fits of range. And my mother used to say things to me like, Polly, just be nice. If you'll just be Nice, then daddy won't have one of his fits but you see daddy always had one of his fits and when he'd have one of these fits he would curse and he'd scream and he knocked my mom around and somehow or another i always thought it had something to do with me had i just been better or done better then daddy wouldn't have had one of his fit and i used to look at my dad and i used to have the same feeling that i heard people talk about in meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I would look at him and I'd say, there's no way I ever want to be like you. And the irony of it was, I became just like him. And i would look at my mom and I would think, you're such a wimp. You won't stand up for yourself. How do you let him treat you that way? And I would just swear that I would never be like her. And, the irony if it was I became just liker. And found out when I came to the program as Alcoholics synonymous, that I was the worst of both my parents. I was an angry wimp. I was one of these people. We all know what sarcasm is, you know, these darling little remarks that are supposed to be cute, but they rip your heart out. Well, I just seem to be a person that's a recipient of those kind of remarks. And these people would throw these zingers at me and I might flinch or something and they would say, oh, Polly, I'm sorry. Did that hurt? And it was like, you know, oh no, that's okay. And I would swallow it down. And I've learned in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous whatever goes down has to come up. And what I would do is I would go home and I would take that anger and rage out on my two little boys. But to the rest of the world, I just looked so nice. Nobody ever really saw what I was really like except my two Little Boys. I'm so grateful to a program called Alcoholics Anonymous because I have learned in this program that I have a disease and it is spiritual in nature. Today I know that I was not only a loved child, I was an adored child. I was the only child. I mean you talk about getting it all. My parents absolutely adored me. But I know today because I had a disease called alcoholism and it's a disease that is spiritual in nature, that there is no way that these parents could have loved me enough. They couldn't have done enough. They couldn'T have given me enough There was no way that anything was enough. I am so grateful to know that. The big book talks about being cut off from the sunshine of the spirit. The big books talk about having a spiritual malady. I'm so grateful today that I have been taught in the program as Alcoholics Anonymous about love. Because until I could begin to give love, there was no way that I could receive love. And I learned in the Program as Alcoholic Anonymous to take a set of actions contrary to the way I felt so that I can begin to care about other people. When I was 18 years old, I married an Air Force officer and I just knew that I had found my knight in shining armor and we were going to sail off into the sunset and live happily ever after. Now, I'm one of these people that has always wanted to be taken care of and I was just certain that I have found the person who was going to take care of me. A long time ago, I was willing to turn my will and my life over to anybody that would take it. I just did not want to be responsible. I've never ever wanted to do that. I've always wanted you to be responsible. I just never ever knew how to suit up and show up for life. I just wanted you to take care of me, you to make me happy, you to show me the fun, you to do it all. And if you took care of my life, if you did a good job at me, it was your responsibility and if you didn't do a very good job, I would get really hacked off at you because it was Your responsibility to make Me happy. I was introduced to alcohol in the airport and I felt real betrayed by this church because this church had told me, or let me just say I had heard, I'm not sure they told me but I heard this, that people who drank were bad. But these were not bad people. These were good people. And I was introduced to alcohol. And I didn't progress to the morning drink. I started with the morning drinks. In the Air Force we have these things called coffees but they serve more than coffee. They served Screwdrivers and Bloody Marys. So it was Screwdrives and Bloody Mary's in the morning, Sherry before lunch, Martinis before dinner, and Black Russians and Singers after. And for a very long time, it never ever occurred to me that there was anything wrong with my drinking. Now also, I was always taught to be a lady. Now, I'm Southern born and raised, and in my household, feelings didn't count. the only thing that counted was what the neighbors thought so I was tailor-made for this job so it was like you go off and be this wonderful military wife and you look good at all times and it's certainly not appropriate for a woman to be drunk and I really knew that and for a very long time it was okay and I could go and I Could drink and I can do all the chitty chat and just do the things that you're supposed to do to be socially acceptable but then the drinking progressed along about 1962 we're stationed in a very northern bay and I've got these two little bitty kids and it's 50 degrees outside and I have no idea how to be a parent I don't know how to cope I have No tools in which to cope and these two Little Boys are driving me crazy, and I don't know what to do. And I'm having a nervous breakdown every 20 minutes. So I ended up going to an Air Force doctor, and he said, take these. And from 1962 until 1977, when I came to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, I drank alcohol, and i took Librium and Valium and Seconol and Minutol. And i'm here to tell you if you take those kind of drugs and you drink alcohol, you are not an active alcoholic. I was not an active alcoholic, I was an alcoholic who did my dying on my living room sofa. I just laid there and watched soap operas and listened to Joan Baez sing the blues. I'd like to describe if there are any other alcoholics in here who have had to do some controlled drinking. The disease of alcoholism had progressed, and I didn't know I had a disease called alcoholism, but I knew that I couldn't drink. If I drank, I couldn'T guarantee my behavior, and my behavior was very important. It was important that I looked good. So when I would go to a party in the later days of my drinking, I knew that I couldn't drink much. So I would take a drink and I would try to sip on it. That still makes my spine crawl. And just sit there and just sip it. And I'm here to tell you, a four-hour party can be a lifetime, just a lifetime. And i couldn't wait till I could get home and just drink all I wanted until I passed out. I'd like to tell you about the last days of my drinking and what got me to the program at Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm a person who has been through treatment three times, and the first time I entered treatment was because I had a car wreck and I was picked up by the Irving police and I Was brought to the Irvin police station and I got to see that look on a non-alcoholic face that just doesn't understand why we do the things we do. And this policeman looked at my husband with so much disgust and he said, why don't you just take her home and sober her up? And on the way home, he said Polly, there's a treatment center and it's not far from our house and I wish you would go. And I entered that treatment center and it was a detox center and a social model detox center and all they did is we just went into this detox center and went to a lot of AA meetings and I really liked the meetings but there was just something way down inside of me that just said, Polly, people like you just don't become alcoholics and I stayed in that treatment center and when I got out I had in that treatement center what we call in Texas a jitterhouse romance you know where sick falls in love with sick and you're going to walk off into happy destiny we walked off into Happy Destiny for 58 days and I was brought back into that treatment center more dead than alive. I had been 12 steps out of a motel in Euless, Texas and I knew now what my problem was. My problem was sobriety. I can't live with the feelings of being sober. I can'T stand what it feels like to be sober. I can'T stand what kind of mom I've become and what kind wife I've became. I just can't stand what I've become, and I just knew that I couldn't stay sober. And when that seven days was up, I got a bottle of scotch, and I got another bottle of Valium, and checked into a motel. I'm so convinced today that every one of us has an Eskimo in our life, someone who leads us to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I had such a lady in my life, And she knew nothing about the disease of alcoholism, but she loved me. And she said that day that something came over her. And today I know what that something was. That was God working in my life through her. And she drove around until she found my car parked outside this motel. And I hadn't shut the door all the way. It was on a half latch. And she pushed it open. And she found me laying there. and on April the 8th of 1977 I was pronounced dead on arrival in a hospital in Bedford, Texas needless to say that didn't take because I'm standing here tonight but I need to tell you about the miracle of the program as Alcoholics Anonymous in my life I didn't know you know when you go to the meeting after the meeting and everybody tells you can you top this story how do you talk about being a couch potato alcoholic You know, I didn't have any DUIs and I did all my affairs sober. So, you know, how do you talk about that? So Mike and you taught this story was I was pronounced dead on arrival, feeling absolutely nothing. And I sat in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous for a very long time with that feeling. I was not in touch with a higher power. I had to hit a bottom in sobriety that was every bit as devastating as the bottom I had hit behind alcohol and drugs, and that was behind relationships and sex. I would have done anything for you to love me because, you see, I thought if you just loved me enough, then I would be okay. And people in Alcoholics Anonymous loved me so much because they would say things like, Holly, it's an inside job. There's no way we can love you enough. You have got to find a power greater than yourself. And then I would begin to walk around meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous and act like I had that higher power. I would start to talk the talk because see I thought that's what you wanted me to do. I thought if I said all the things that you wanted me to say, then you would love me. I walked around in meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous for over five years talking the talk and I had two fears that were going on inside of me and the fear was that you're going to find out I don't have a higher power and the worst fear was is that you have a high power and I'll never find one. And somewhere along about five and a half years of sobriety, I'm sitting in a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous and this wonderful feeling came over me. And the feeling was everything's going to be okay. And today I have that feeling most of the time. I am so grateful that I heard people in these meetings say just don't leave five minutes before the miracle. It was a long time before I could share that because I was so embarrassed that I was such a slow learner in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and that it took me so long to find a power greater than myself. But today I know that I'm not unique, that I am typical, and that other people sit in rooms of Alcoholic Anonymous for a very long time and they don't find that feeling either. And I just want to share if you're one of those people, just don't leave five minutes before the miracle because it will happen to you. And the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous promises it will happen to you. It says in the promises that all these promises are being fulfilled, some of them slower, some of them faster, but they will materialize if we work for them. At any rate, I ended up in a hospital in Dallas, Texas on April the 11th of 1977 and by God's grace in a program called Alcoholics Anonymous I've been sober ever since. When I started coming to meetings of AlcoholicsAnonymous I think the only thing that I did was come to meetings and get into service because I was told not to get into relationships and I think I was sober 20 minutes before I got into the first one but I came to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous and I remember being told to get active in the program and I began to learn those things that I had learned in that Baptist Sunday School and one of them is you reap what you sow and I begin to learn that I am going to get out of the program of Alcoholic Anonymous in direct proportion to that which I put into it. And I love to come to the meetings that the Pacific Group has and groups like yours because these are groups that are into service. And I am so grateful that I was in a group in Texas that was into service because it was being into service that saved my life. If I had not been active in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, I know that I would not have been able to stay sober. I worked the steps. I did the things that I was told to do, doing it just like the big book, but I never could seem to get that feeling that everybody was talking about for a very long time. But I was so grateful that I Was told to get into service. If you'll get into Service, you'll begin to feel better about yourself. Go out and share with another alcoholic. If you have 30 minutes more sobriety than him, go share that 30 minutes of sobrietry. And just maybe, just maybe you'll get to stay sober. I'm so grateful because I think that's the thing that drives psychologists and psychiatrists crazy because I suffer from a spiritual malady. And it's not about what happened to me. It's about what am I going to do today? What am I gonna do today that's gonna change the way I've been living, to change the way I think, to change my perception. What am I going to do? And I began to reach out and help another alcoholic. And I couldn't understand how that could possibly work, but it worked. And today I know that the more I reach out and help Another Alcoholic, the better I feel. The miracle of the program is Alcoholics Anonymous. One alcoholic sharing with another alcoholic And I think the greatest privilege that I've had in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous is to be able to sit down with another alcoholic woman and to share all the things that you'd never tell anybody because they're just so shameful. But to beable to share that with another alcoholics woman, to just be ableto share all those secrets. And I was told in theprogram of Alcoholic Anonymous we're just as thick as oursecrets. And my secrets were so shameful to me, but I'm so grateful to this program and the love that I got here. Because see, you loved me no matter what. You loved me with all the warts, you loves me. I'm still grateful to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. When I was three years sober, I divorced and I had been married for 22 years. and my husband was really ill and I thought he needed me and that he needed me or he would surely die because he had congestive heart failure well in Texas they do the same thing they do in California they just get right in your face and tell you the truth whether you want to hear it or not and people used to get in front of my face and they'd say Polly your husband is not dying from congestive heart failure, you are and at three years of sobriety, we divorced. And I need to tell you how important I am in this man's life because six months later he remarried a much younger woman and he has never been healthier or happier since. So much for me being his higher power. He had one and it certainly wasn't me and that's one of the things I've learned in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous is that shot. Everybody has a higher power, and it's definitely not me. At three and a half years of sobriety, I married my best friend. Dave and I had been friends in the program as Alcoholics Anonymous, and I mean friends. That's all. And David moved to Salt Lake City, Utah, and I was still in Texas. And Dave came back to Texas, and he said to me, he said, Polly, I love you, but you need to get something straight. I want to marry you. I don't want to have an affair with you. And, you know, those kind of things aren't supposed to happen to people like me. But that's what happened. And David said my greatest gift in the program is Alcoholics Anonymous. I've learned in the Program of Alcoholics Anonymous that love is a healer. And in this relationship, I've had a lot of icky character defects to surface because they surface so the love can heal them. And one of the worst character defects I've had is the character defect of jealousy. Because you see, if I think Dave is the greatest guy in Alcoholics Anonymous, then I think all the other women think so too. And I'm here to tell you that I sponsor the most gorgeous women in Alcoholic Anonymous. And they're all younger than me. And worst of all, they're all thinner than me. And Dave adores them and they adore Dave. And I had a lot of working through a lot of feelings, a lot insecurity. And what I've learned about jealousy is that jealousy isn't insecurity. And today when I have those icky feelings that come over me, that's my barometer to know that the only relationship that I need to pay any attention to is my relationship with God. Because when my relationship with God is in order, then I don't have those icky feelings. And I am so grateful today that I know that. I'd like to share a little bit about my two sons. When I came to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, I realized that my 14-year-old son was a full-blown drug addict. And And I used to walk around meetings and I would say, this just isn't fair. It just isn' t fair that James is a drug addict. And it was rooms like this and people like you that told me, Paula, you just suit up and show up because you may be the only big book James ever reads. And I also had to stand and do an inventory and stand and take a square look at me in mirror and admit to myself the hardest thing short of being an alcoholic for me it was so hard and that was to admit that I was a child abuser because you see what I had done to those kids because of a disease of alcoholism was to strip them of their very being and I didn't mean to do that, but because I had a disease called alcoholism, that was the result. My oldest son is one of our Al-Anon members and I don't know when is the last time you've seen a passed out drunk, but we don't breathe too good. And many is the time that I've come to and Russ has been screaming, Mom wake up, wake up. Are you dead? And me to come to see the fear in his eyes. And you know, for the past 14 years, I haven't had to come to and see that kind of fear in anybody's eyes because it's something I'm doing. And for that, I've been overpaid in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. Well, what would a good Al-Anon do if their alcoholic sobered up? They'd go marry a practicing alcoholic. And she sobered us. And my daughter-in-law is calling me on the phone and she's telling me that my son has taken a bottle of sleeping pills and he's cut up his arm. Because see what I found out is, is that our Al-Anons need one of us or they don't have a purpose for living. And my son no longer had a purpose per living. Again, I was told in meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous, Polly, you just suit up and show up for meetings and you let God take care of Russ. And God moved Russ to Sheboygan, Michigan. And to make a very, very long story short, he divorced a lady in Texas, married a lady in Michigan and they moved to Asbury Park, New Jersey. And then a hell began. And my son began to try to take his life. And there were times I just didn't think I could stand it. I just didn't believe that God was big enough to take care of us. I knew that God was big enough to get me sober, but was God big enough to take care of us? But you know, when the student's ready, the teacher will appear. And this is a very special meeting because I was speaking at this meeting and I was in a lot of pain because my story then is different than it is tonight. And a gentleman after this meeting came up to me and he said, I am compelled to write your son a letter because my mother and my sister committed suicide, and I think your son needs to know how that feels. And he wrote him. I so believe in the power of prayer because people would come to me, and they would say, I'm going to pray for your son Russ. And I believe it was the prayers in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous that reached out to my son. Barney M. reached out to my sons. They're in the same industry, and he reached out. And it was people in the fellowship of Alcoholic Anonymousthat reached out to myson. And two years ago and nine months after my son had been in the hospital after putting a pair of scissors in his stomach. He entered the program of Al-Anon. And for two years and nine months, my son hasn't tried to take his life. Now for a long time, Russ didn't do it my way. I didn't think Russ went to enough meetings because Russ went through one meeting whether he needed or not once a week. And you know, I just didn't thank that was enough meetings. But Russ goes to a lot of meetings of Al-Anon today. We were together in April, and I'm going to kind of share that too, but I'm never reminded of the disease of alcoholism because my son still carries those scars. And today I've learned that most of the wounds heal, but a lot the scars remain. When I was six and a half years sober, my youngest son called me on the phone and he says, Mom, I want what you have and I said well if you want what I have you probably need to go to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous he says well he didn't believe he was that bad so we ended up going through a fellowship called adult children of alcoholics and through that fellowship he ended up coming to the program of Alcoholics synonymous and James celebrated seven years of sobriety on on january the 3rd and it's been a joy to be able to share this fellowship with another member especially my son another member of my family and last july we got to celebrate at bill w's family reunion and james was there and our soon-to-be daughter-in-law kelly were there And we got to celebrate sobriety. And I've learned in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous that this is not only a progressive disease, it's a progressive recovery. I'm so grateful for the program of Alcoholic Anonymous. A lot of joy has been here. Someone asked me tonight, you know, how are you doing? They hadn't seen me in a while. How are things? And it's like, gosh, maybe this is recovery because I'm at the same job for six years, and that's a miracle. I'm with the same husband for ten and a half years. My kids are in the program of recovery, and it's like, gosh, is this normal? You know, I don't know. It's like there's not chaos in my life. And I just looked, and I said, is that recovery? It's so neat to just be able to live life on life terms, And I never, ever was able to do that, to just live life on life's terms. We had a very exciting event happen in our house, or in our family. It didn't happen in Our House. On April the 21st, we were in Chicago, and James and Kelly were married. And it was an AA wedding. And my ex-husband was there with his wife. And my son and daughter-in-law from New Jersey were there. and my mother was there, and James and Kelly and all their friends. Our whole family was there. And as I saw this beautiful wedding taking place, down in my heart the thing that I noticed was that the common denominator and what was going on in that room was the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. That's what had brought us there, was the Program of Alcoholic Anonymous, because Kelly is also a member of this fellowship. The miracle of the program is Alcoholics Anonymous. You know, I was so grateful when I got here sober. I was just so grateful that I got sober. I never dreamed that I would be able to have my family here too. I never dreamt that I could have the kind of marriage that I had because the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous says left to me I would have settled for so much less I would never have had the nerve to ask God to give me a husband like Dave I would've never had the nerves to ask god to give my friends like you I wouldve never had to know the big look at alcoholics anonymous says that, left to me, I will self-destruct. Left to my own devices, I will self destruct. The very best I could do for me, the very best was to get me pronounced dead on arrival. But thanks to a program called Alcoholics Anonymous tonight I'm all the things I ever wanted to be. Tonight I am the woman that I I always wanted to be. I am self-supporting through my own contribution, and I never ever knew I could do that. Tonight, I am a woman who loved her husband with all her heart, and I Never Knew That I Could Do That. Tonight I am A Good Friend. When I say I'm going to do something, I do it. And I never, ever could do that. Those are the things that you taught me to do in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. But most of all, the greatest gift that I feel that I have gotten from the program with AlcoholicsAnonymous is the gift of being able to know a God of my understanding. And by knowing a God of my misunderstanding, tonight I am the mom I always wanted to be. Tonight I am the mom that my sons call me. My son called me in New Jersey today and he said, Mom, I just haven't talked to you in a couple of days. And when I don't talk to you real often, I miss that. And you know, there was a time when my sons did not want to talk to me. I am so grateful to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. When I was in Center Hospital, one of the counselors used to start every day with a prayer. And I end my AA talks with it because it's what this fellowship means to me. I sought my God, my God I could not see. I sought My Soul, My Soul eluded me. I soughtMyBrother and I found all three. Thank you. Hi, everybody. My name's Polly and I'm an alcoholic. Man, I tell you, this is a big meeting! Wow! I'd like to thank Clancy for asking me. This is such a privilege. I'm secretary of a Monday night meeting and Clancy spoke for us Monday night and after the meeting he came up to me and he said, what are you doing Wednesday night? And I said, I don't know, but I can go check my book. I thought maybe he wanted me to go on a panel. And he says, well, I'll see you at the Pacific Group, the largest AA meeting in the world. And at that time, I could hardly close the book. But it's, boy, what a treat to be here. Ed walked up to me and he says... Well, there's only 900 people, you know, judging you. And so, you now, I was just sort of shaking in my boots And he said, but Paula, you know what's different about this meeting is that everybody loves you going in. And I really feel that. That's one of the things that I learned in Alcoholics Anonymous is that this fellowship is the language of the heart. And I learned about love in the fellowship of AlcoholicsAnonymous, and I love you for saying that. Thanks. I want to talk a little bit about my higher power because one of the things that happens is I ask God when I come to this podium to just please help me to be honest and one of things that happens is that you know I want you to just love me and think I'm wonderful and the thing about it is I'm not here to be wonderful I'm here to share my experience, strength and hope and to be hones and that's what I ask from God before I come on the podium is that he helps me to be honest. So if I can just talk a little bit about my higher power, it just helps me get out of the way so that I can share and be honest My name is Polly. It's not Pauline or Paula. It's Polly and when I was a little bitty girl I had these sensitive alcoholic feelings. I don't know if there's any sensitive intense alcoholics in this room but I am one of those sensitive intense alcoholics and if you say anything that offends me, I get my feelings hurt and, you know, I cry and pout. And with a name like Polly, I got teased a lot and I couldn't stand to be laughed at. I absolutely hated to be laughed at and people would call me things like Pauly wants a cracker and Pauley Wally doodle all the day. And, you know, all these things and my sensitive alcoholic feelings, I just, they just hurt my feelings. And I needed a drink a long time before I took a drink. And what happens is I have learned in the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous that there just are no negatives in God's world. My perception of reality is distorted and things look like a negative, but they really always have a positive result. And with a name like Polly, there's not very many Pollys in AlcoholicsAnonymous. So when somebody says Polly I'm pretty sure they're talking to me. I didn't know I had a disease called alcoholism, but I knew I was a drunk and I knew i was a lush. And I used to drive down the freeways in Dallas Texas and I used to pray to God to have heart disease or cancer or something because I knew I was dying and I just wanted to die of something respectable. And today I know that the disease of alcoholism is my greatest gift because if I didn t have the disease of alcoholism, I wouldn't qualify for the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. And everything I am or hope to be, I owe to the Fellowships of Alcoholic Anonymous." Eight years ago, I married Dave. Dave's last name is Pistol. My name is now Polly Pistol! You know, I don't know what your cross is, but that one's a heavy one. My higher power has a marvelous sense of humor because, you know, these sensitive alcoholic feelings I couldn't stand to be laughed at. With a name like Polly Pistol, I can't even get my name out that people don't laugh. But, you now, because of that name and God's wonderful sense of humour, I have learned a lot about Rule 62, and that is just don't take yourself so damn seriously. and I'm grateful for that and I am always saying God works in mysterious ways sometimes I really do question his methods but at any rate I am really grateful to be here and the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous says that I should tell in a general way what it used to be like what happened and what I am trying to be liked today I would like to say I am the only child of Southern Baptist faith so that means I came into the program of Alcoholic Anonymous with a lot of old ideas I know that being an only child That I was very special to my parents And that they just absolutely adored me But because I have a disease called alcoholism I have the disease that is spiritual in nature And I know these parents loved me And they cared for me But because i have a desease that is spiritual in nature I was not capable of feeling their love so when I grew up the things that I took with me and the things that I remember were the things that I disliked most about these parents my father was a very angry man I do not come from alcoholic parents in fact I always say the only difference between my dad and I is he just forgot to take a drink everything else was there my dad was a very angry man and my mother and I would walk around on eggshells because as my mother would say, now Polly, just be really good and stay really quiet because we don't want Daddy to have one of his fits. And for no reason it seemed like Daddy would always have one of his fit. And of course I always felt like there was something I must have done to cause Daddy to having one of his fits and when he would have one of these fits he would scream and holler and cuss a lot and furniture would fly and he'd knock my mom around. And what I would do is when all this would happen is I would take my mother in my arms and I would comfort her just like she were the child and I was going to be and I had a lot of power, I thought, in this family. The big book of Alcoholics Anonymous talks about us being the directors and the producers and the actors and I wasn't I was working this whole system and I didn't know and I don't know I was getting set up for that first drink At any rate, I would look at this father and I would just be so disgusted with his anger And I would think there's just no way I'll ever be like you But the irony of it was, I became just like him And I'd look over at this mother and I'd just think that she was such a wimp And you know, you don't stand up for yourself And you just sit there and you take all this And I Would Just Be So Disgusted With Her And The Irony Of It Is, Is I Became Just Like Her and I say that I came to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous an angry wimp because it just seemed like that I had this boiling anger inside of me. And what would happen with this anger? And see, I didn't know anything about resentments and all of that stuff. You know, I don't know where I was when they passed that information out, but I didn' t hear it until I came into the program at AlcoholicsAnonymous. but what I would do is I'm southern born and raised which means you know that you always look good it has absolutely nothing to do with how you feel but when you walk out of that house as my mother would say no matter what had happened the night before she would tell me you put a smile on your face and go to school and so I would put a smell on my face and walk out the door and what would happen is it's when somebody would hurt these tender little alcoholic feelings or something would happen to me that would upset me, I'd pack it all in and then when I would get home I had these two little boys. And I would scream and rage and holler at them just like my father had. But to the rest of the world, I looked so nice. But everything that would happen to me, that would cause anger, I took out on these two children. When I was 18 years soul, I married an Air Force officer and I knew that we were just going to sail off into paradise and everything was going to be wonderful. And I had married a SAC pilot. And, you know, here I was looking for somebody to take care of me. Here I thought I was such a responsible person, but the reality was is that I didn't want the responsibility of me, I wanted somebody to take care of me and I had married an air force officer and he was a SAK pilot and I mean this man was going to be gone for years at a time. And then I had these two little boys and all this responsibility. Well, in the Air Force, drinking is a way of life. And I loved what alcohol did to me. When I took my first drink of alcohol, it was just like all that stuff just started to get better. All that stuff started to get bigger. to get better. And then long about 1962, we were stationed in a marvelous place called Loring Air Force Base, Maine. And it is absolutely the armpit of the world. And at any rate, I was real nervous. And I went to an Air Force doctor and he said, take these. So from 1962 until 1977, when I came to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, I drank alcohol and I took Valium and Librium and Secadol and Nemutol. Now if you take those kind of drugs and you drink alcohol, you're not an active drunk. So you guys are not going to hear a drunk-a-log tonight because if I tell you a drunk a-log, we're all going to go to sleep because that's what I did. I did slept through it I just I was just one of these kind of people I've heard in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous that there's two kinds of alcoholics those who want to get in and those who wanna get out and I was one of those alcoholics that just wanted to get out I did not want to suit up and show up for life I just wanted out I didn't wanna feel I didn'y wanna deal I just didn't want to so I just laid on my sofa and I did my dying on my living room sofa and I watched soap operas and I listen to Joan Baez sing the blues. So dramatic. The big book of Alcoholics Anonymous says that selfishness and self-centeredness, we think, is the root of our disease. Selfishness and soft-heartedness and self centeredness is the route of my disease. When my husband had been in the Air Force for 16 years, he was diagnosed with congestive heart failure and he would have to retire, and his prognosis was very bad. When that doctor told me how sick my husband was, the only thought that went through my head was, who's going to take care of me and these two kids? I am horribly ashamed of that. But the only difference between that person and the person I am today who had absolutely no consideration for another human being who was dying because they were not there to take care of me is the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. That's the only difference, and for that I'm grateful. I'd just like to quickly tell you how I got to the program of Alcoholic Anonymous I would have been through treatment three times There are some of us who are sicker than others The first time I was in treatment, I ended up having what we call in Texas a jitterhouse romance. You know, where sick falls in love with sick and you walk off into happy destiny. At any rate, I was 12 steps out of a motel in Euless, Texas and I was brought back into that treatment center more dead than alive. And I had reached that place in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous that talks about pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization because I had been beaten up in numerous and sundry other things. And I knew now that I could not live sober I could Not live with the feelings Of being sober My problem was not drinking My problem Was sobriety Because with sobrietry I felt And with sobrietty I couldn't stand The kind of mother I had become And the kind of wife I had becomes And the Kind of daughter I had Become I have heard In rooms Of alcoholics Anonymous That men Hate what They've done And women Hate what They have Become I hated what I had become and I just did not think that I could live with the feelings of being sober After I left that treatment center. I got a bottle of Valium in a bottle scotch, and I checked into a motel But you know I don't believe that there's anybody in this room that doesn't have an Eskimo in your life Somebody that leads us to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous You know it may be a TV ad or it just maybe somebody at your work you saw get sober. And that might be the example. And I had such a lady in my life. She knew absolutely nothing about the disease of alcoholism, but she loved me. And she said that day that something came over her. Well, see tonight, I know what that something was. That was God working in my life through her. And he started driving around and she found my car parked out front of a motel and the door was on a half latch and she pushed it open and she found me laying there. And on April the 8th of 1977, I was pronounced dead on arrival in a hospital in Bedford, Texas. Now needless to say, that didn't take because I'm standing here tonight. But I have to tell you about the miracle of the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. You know, I'm a real slow study in the program of Alcoholic Synonymous. I see people come into this program and they get it. And you know, I just couldn't get it But the thing that I managed to do was suit up and show up long enough until I could get it. Because people would talk in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous about that feeling of God. And you know, I just couldn't get that feeling. And then you'd have the meeting after the meeting, you know where everybody tells their war stories. Well what if you're a couch potato alcoholic? You know, it's like I didn't have any war stories, so my can-you-top-this story was, well I was pronounced dead on arrival. And, you know, I had no feeling because I had no value on my life. I had no value on life. And what I would do for about three and a half years or three years in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, I had to bottom out in this program and self-destruct one more time behind relationships and sex. I was just looking for somebody to love me enough so that I could feel good inside. Because I couldn't feel good outside, so I would destroy myself that if you just loved me enough, I'd feel okay. If you just would give me enough I'd, feel okay and then one day along about five years of sobriety I'm sitting in a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous and the magic begins to happen to me. the magic you know I was told in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous that God loves me and that I'm God's child and the miracle happened in my life and I began to feel it and the Miracle tonight in my life is that you told me I was God's Child and you told me that God Loves Me and tonight I know it I know It and that's the Miracle the big book of Alcoholic Anonymous says the main object of this book is to find a power greater than yourself that can solve your problem. And I was always looking for it in some man, that my higher power was whatever man was in my life at that time. I couldn't find God. I ended up in a psychiatric hospital and then I ended up in another treatment center. And by God's grace, in a program called Alcoholics Anonymous, I haven't had to have a drink of alcohol since April the 11th of 1977. And for that, I'm very grateful. The miracle. And you know, if you're sitting here tonight and that feeling of God's not there, the hope I'd like to give for you is just to please, please don't leave before the miracle. Just keep suiting up and showing up. Because I can guarantee you, if You just keep coming back, it'll happen. The book says it in the promises. But it says that some of these promises are happening faster for some and slower for others. I'm just one of those people that it just took a little longer. After I left that treatment center, I was given a prescription to stay sober. And that prescription said go to a lot of AA meetings, talk to God, get a sponsor, read the big book. And the last item on there was don't ever listen to the way a man talks. just watch the way he walks. And you know I've been doing that in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous for the past 11 years. I've been watching the way people walk. You know when I go to a meeting, I love meetings like this because people participate in their sobriety. You know when somebody asks me how do you get sober? I don't know. Get a broom. You know just get busy doing something. Because when I first came to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, I couldn't read. I was too jumpy to read, but I could wash cups. I could sweep floors and I could shake my hand at the front door. And those are the things that I began to learn in the program of Alcoholic Anonymous. And before I could ever find our steps or the principles in the Program of Alcoholix Anonymous I fell in love with the fellowship. I fell in love with the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. I was one of these kind of crying, whining drunks, you know, just poor me, poor me. And I would go to my, yeah, I would go to AA sponsor and I was just always saying, they'll never love me again. They'll never forgive me. And I was told to get in the 12 and 12 and to burn the 11 step prayer in my brain because it had absolutely nothing to do with me being loved. It had only to do that I be loving. And it had absolute nothing to that they forgive me. It only to that I forgive them. And it had absolutely nothing that I'd be understood, only that I would be understanding. And you know, that's when I began to learn about the paradox of the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. I would standing, I was told, you know, you go talk to that newcomer. And I was the kind that said, well, I have nothing to say to that new comer. And i was told if I have 30 minutes more sobriety than him, I'm to share that 30 minutes. And just maybe, by God's grace, I'd stay sober. And those were the things that I learned when I first came to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. I learned about the paradoxes. You got to surrender to win. You've got to give it away to keep it that's why we drive psychologists and psychiatrists crazy because they're saying you know they're looking for everybody to do something for us that's our problem you know we've got to get outside ourselves get relieved of the bondage of self and reach out the way I stay sober is to reach out to another alcoholic the more giving I am the better I feel you know there was that those, you know, I learned a lot of things in those Baptist Sunday schools that I didn't think I learned. And one of them is you reap that which you sow. And you know the more I participate in my own sobriety and the more active I am in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and the more I do in this program, the more i receive from the fellowship and the principles and the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, and I just didn't know when I came here that that's the way it worked. I just did not know. You know, the big book of Alcoholic Anonymous says when everything else fails if you are having a bad day, go work with a newcomer. The best thing I can do for me is to get outside of me. I have got this head that is just, you know, this brain up here. You know, I can have this little thing going on over here. Just a little something. I can run it one time through my brain and I have a trauma. And that's the kind of head I have. But if I stay active in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and if I keep working with newcomers, that head of mine doesn't have to wreck my day. And for that I'm grateful because I learned to do these things in the Program of Alcoholic Anonymous. When I was three years sober, I divorced on this program and you know I had this idea that this husband of mine was very sick and that he needed me to take care of him. And I was told by a wonderful AA sponsor that my husband was not dying of congestive heart failure, I was. So at three years in sobriety we divorced and we had been married for 22 years. I just didn't believe you divorced. And we did. And I need to tell you how much this man needed me. See, I thought without me, he would die. I mean, he's sick. Well, after we divorced six months later, he remarried a much younger woman with three small children. And I found out that he had a higher power and it wasn't me. The miracle of the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. When I was three and a half years sober, I married my best friend. Dave and I had known each other ever since I was six months sober. And we had been friends in the fellowship of Alcoholic Synonymous. And Dave had moved to Salt Lake City, Utah. And he came back to Texas And he told me, he says, Polly, I love you and I want to marry you. But you need to get something straight. I don't want to have an affair with you. I want the best for you. I want you to marry me. And see, I just never believed that something like that could happen to somebody like me. But I began to learn about unconditional love in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous because my past was no secret today. And I began to learn about how we love each other in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. Now, the big book of Alcoholic Anonymous says that we're selfish and self-centered. How do two selfish, self-centered alcoholics make it? Very carefully. That's not true. At any rate, Dave and I have been married. It will be eight years in October. And Dave is one of the most wonderful gifts that I have been given in the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. And the one thing that's real important to us is the program of Alcoholic Anonymous, that is first in our life. That's what we do first. I've had a lot of things to learn in this relationship. I have being given lots of opportunities to grow. One of the things that I truly believe today is pain is an opportunity to grow I once, someone said to me one time that pain is optional. I don't believe for me that pain is optional but suffering is optional I believe that pain is what Bill says and as Bill sees it, that pain is the touchstone of all spiritual progress because I am one of the alcoholics that you find in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous I am willing at any time to rest on my laurels and I am will at any moment I'm willing at anytime to become complacent but just let a little pain start up You know, the guts start turning, the chest starts getting tight, and the temples start throbbing. That's when God and I get real acquainted. And that's when I'm dusting off my big book, and I'm reading it, and I're in the 12 and 12, and in some spiritual book, I'm praying on the freeway. God andI get real acquainted. And it is those times that I feel I grow the most. It's not that I don't feel like I grow when I am not in pain. I just feel likeI grow more when Iam in pain And some of the things and some of the pains that I've had in this relationship is that I have had a lot of jealousy and envy to deal with. I am convinced that I sponsor the most gorgeous women in Alcoholics Anonymous. Every one of them are younger than me, and all of them adore Dave and he adores them. And I've had a lot of struggles in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. I have learned and I have had to face these demons head on because that jealousy and that envy nearly took my lunch. I was eaten inside because of it. And today, I realize that, you know, Dave is just my gift from God. I don't own him. I came to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and I used to hear about, we don't have relationships, we take hostages. And you know, I began to understand that. It's like I wanted to take this thing and hang on to it, you know. And don't you get out of my sight. And I beganto learn that my relationship and my feelings for this man were in direct proportion to my relationship with God. because see I came to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and I didn't trust I didn' t trust you not really I didn''t trust him not really and I certainly didn' d trust God and the more I began to have a relationship with God and the most I could trust God the more I could trust my husband and today I know that just what it says in step 10 in the 12 and 12 it is a spiritual axiom if something disturbs me it's me no exception and those are the things i have learned in the program of alcoholics anonymous and that how i feel today and what's going on with me today is in direct proportion to my spiritual condition for that day I want to quickly tell you about my two sons my children were raised in a home where their mother was either drugged up or drunk and their father was gone and this was a devastating effect on these two kids when I sobered up in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous I realized that my 14-year-old son was a full-blown drug addict. And I'm walking around meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous saying, this just isn't fair. It's just not fair. I'm sober. And then I was told in meetings just like this, maybe not this big, but meetings like this that, Polly, you just keep suiting up and showing up for meetings of alcoholics anonymous because you may be the only big book that James ever reads. My oldest son is one of our Al-Anons. Russ took care of me. He was the one who would put me to bed. He's the one who would call work when I couldn't show up. He was the person that took care of me." Now what would one of our Al Anons do? See, the reason, you know, all our Al Anons, they need one of us to have a reason to get up in the morning and that's what he had. And I don't know when's the last time you've seen a passed out drunk but I have come to many a night with this kid screaming at me mom wake up wake up are you dead and me coming to to look at the fear in his face and you know for the past 11 years I haven't had to look into anybody's face with that kind of fear because of something I'm doing and for that I've been overpaid in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. I sobered up. So what would a good Al-Anon do when his alcoholic sobered up? But go marry a practicing alcoholic. Three and a half years ago, she sobered up. And one more time, Russ didn't have a reason to get up in the morning. And she called me up on the phone and she said that my son had taken a bottle of sleeping pills and I had cut up his wrist. And you know, I wanted to get on the next thing smoking to Texas to save my son. But again, it was rooms like this and people like you that said, Polly, you just keep showing up for meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous and you let God take care of Russ. And I let God take care or Russ and he moved him to Sheboygan, Michigan and I'd have never thought of that. And Russ... It's true. And Russ was real active in the program of Al-Anon. for about nine months and then russ found his drug of choice which was a woman and this past january he got married and they moved to upstate new york my daughter-in-law just this easter called me up on the phone and she doesn't understand what's wrong because she says she can't stay there she can t live there because you know russ is just not available to her and she doesn't understand it because he doesn't drink. And I try to explain, he has a disease and it's spiritual in nature. And no matter how much you love him, he can't feel that love because he has the disease and its spiritual in Nature. And she has to leave. And my son calls me up on the phone and he tells me that he's going to kill himself and that he is going to commit suicide. And you know God has a wonderful way of working in our lives. And i had the opportunity to go to Reno, Nevada to talk and this lady had lost her 17-year-old son to suicide and she came up to me after the meeting and she put her arms around me and she says, Polly, sometimes people just have to do what they have to be done. And the next time Russ called me, I told him, I said, you know, I really hope you don't do that but I am powerless over whatever you do. I am powerless. You just need to know that I love you. You just needs to know I love your. three weeks ago my daughter-in-law called me up on the phone again and my son had stabbed himself and he hadn't hurt himself you know badly but he had stabbed himself and I just didn't know what to do and I mentioned this I've had the opportunity to speak in some meetings and people would come up to the meetings afterwards and they would tell me you know I'm going to pray for your son. I'm going to pray for you son. And you know, I believe in the power of prayer. I believe in it because I had the opportunity to share in Oregon with Barney and Barney said, you know I'm gonna gear my talk towards Russ because Russ is a radio announcer and Barne used to be a radio announcer. And he sent that and I bought that tape and I sent it to Russ and he really heard what Barney had to say. He really heard. There's power in these drones. But I am convinced more today than I have ever been convinced that this is a family disease and that there are people who die from the disease of alcoholism and they never take a drink. I'm watching it happen in my own life. I am watching that happen. Almost five years ago, my youngest son called me up on the phone and he said, Mom, I want what you have. Six and a half years before, he hadn't wanted what I had. Six and a half years before, I was supposed to attend a function at his school. And he says, don't you dare show up at my school because I am ashamed of you. And six and a Half years later, he calls and he says he wants what I have. James has been at the University of Texas, and he comes home at Christmas, and his sobriety date is January the 3rd. And I have had the privilege to give my son a cake for the past four years in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, the miracle of this program. in April James moved to Chicago now he got sober in Texas and sobriety in Texas is just like it is here in California you know we kiss and we hug and all that kind of stuff and and he loves it and he moved to chicago and and they don't do it that way and he called me up on the phone and he says mom they don'T DO IT RIGHT HERE THEY DON'T DO it right and then he'd call up and he'd say I need a hug. I've just got to have a hug." Well, you know, after a while he sat on these feelings and he sat on them and finally he went to a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous and he dumped them. You know, he said, "'I'm not new to AlcoholicsAnonymous but I'm new to Chicago. And, you Know, I need somebody to shake my hand because I'm real lonesome here.'" And so the secretary got up after the meeting and he said,"Well, James has made it real clear that we don't do it right in Chicago, that we Don't Greet Right Here." He says, in that case, James, why don't you be the greeter? And you know, that's the way it works in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. Because now James is the greeder of three meetings in AlcoholicsAnonymous. And he says that people in Chicago are getting hugs whether they need them or not. And that's how it works. That's the ways it works in the Program of Alcoholic Anonymous I am so grateful for this program I love Alcoholics Anonymous and I love being sober and you know when I came to the program of AlcoholicsAnonymous if I had made a list of all the things that I wanted in sobriety I would not have had the nerve to ask God to give me the things that he has given me in the program of Alcoholic Anonymous I would never have had I would have not had the nerve to ask him to give my the kind of husband I have or the kind of life I have today or the kinda job I have I just would not have had the nerve And the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous says, left to me, I would have settled for so much less. The big bookof AlcoholicsAnonymous also says, Left to Me, I'll self-destruct. The very best I could do for me, the very bestI could dofor me is to get myself pronounceddeadonarrival until I came to the program of AlcoholicAnonymous and you absolutely breathed life into me. me. When I was in center hospital, Bill used to start every day with a little prayer and a little poem. And I end my AA talks with it because it's what this fellowship means to me. I sought my God, my God I could not see. I sought my soul, my soul eluded me. I sought my brother and I found all three. Thank you.