Katie P. at the Westside Men’s Group 21st Annual Fellowship Breakfast – 2025

Hi, y'all. I'm Katie Parker. I am an alcoholic. I've had the gift of sobriety since October 28th, 1984. That was a special day. You know, it's really something in a couple of weeks I'll be 41 years and that's a big deal but today it was a little disappointing to still be standing at 40. I wanted 41, you know. You just look forward to that moment in time. um you know i want to thank everybody that had anything to do with getting me here uh it's i take this very seriously i take recovery very seriously and we also have a blast my home group is the primary purpose group in austin texas we may i know if you've ever been to one of them they're really cool and if you don't like it right away stick with it for a little while you will really see this thing change your life we alsohaveone on zoom if If anybody's interested, I can send you that link. But we meet on Tuesday nights at 2701 South Lamar. And you'd be surprised how many people actually swing by there when they're in town or they'll make an extra trip to stay a day or two to see it. We have about 150 people studying the book. And it's a really cool deal. But I got to tell you, when Art called me, what a trip. I mean, I swear there was a fine line between is this guy really who he is or is he screwing with me? You know what I mean? You know, he said his full name and it was like, okay, sir, I am here, sir. I'm not quite sure if I'm getting pistol whipped or what is happening. And then he said, it's a men's group. And I thought, praise God, I have finally been invited to the men's groups. Because I don't know if you guys know this, but in AA when there's a women's retreat, treat sometimes they have men speakers but they never have a female come for you guys so this was a real honor and he goes no no no it's co-ed oh well that's okay that's fine we can still work but i got the honor to be with them yesterday and and i'm telling you it was it was a treat we'd have drank together hands down that's the highest compliment it's the happiest compliment you can give an alcoholic synonymous you know we'd had drank together but we'd gone to jail together too and that's where they would have separated us you know which would be too bad you know if it's a chick that I'd have drank with we'd have Thelma and Louise did at the end of the deal you know but uh and I love drinking man I if I could get away with drinking I'd get away with it today but it didn't work for me and Ben thank you very much where are you sitting Ben oh perfect thank you Very Much Ben has been nothing but a gentleman has picked me up has It's been fantastic early on the spot, held the door for me the whole nine yards. Always appreciate that. You know, we come into Alcoholics Anonymous and we have to grow up. We have to be respectful. We haveと have integrity. We have то do all of this. And I was giving the boys last night, and I say boys because I don't care if you call me a girl. I have no offense against boys, men, whatever the deal is. If that's an issue, you got to write inventory on it. I don' t have a problem with it. And, you know, I mean, so I had all the boys last night and I was telling them, I said, you know what you got to be careful about stag meetings you know because some guys just only do stagg meetings and that's dangerous because you get you get a little neanderthal-ish right same with women they get too weepy you know so i mean it goes for both teams so you know you gotta you gotta get out there and you gotta blend you gotta learn how to be with them because that's once you walk out that door you're with the opposite sex like it or not so my husband always would say uh when one of his sponsees would call he goes hold on a second katie take it i'm like okay so what's going on you know and and there's just a little bit deeper level and at the same time the fact that you guys can do a plus b equals c and shelf an emotion we are jealous okay so don't ever don't never be fooled by that we may give you grief but i wish i could do that i wish I could have an emotion and just shelf it but i don't know how to do that i wasn't wired that way i am extremely passionate my husband likes to say i'm like taking a drink out of a fire hose i'm a lot coming at you and i get very very passionate about alcoholics anonymous you know i've been around a while and let me tell you i wasn t nailing it you know i wasn' t nailin it for many years i didn't know any different and uh let's see if there's oh and then pete where are you that gave me the angel coin there you are he gave me a coin uh it's too long a story to tell, but it was my first husband died tragically. And he gave me the coin that Joe used to pass out to people in AA. And I couldn't believe it right before I was getting ready to speak. And just, oh, I was emotional. And He found me today and gave me another coin. And that was just really special, really, really special. You know, one of the things is, and I hope you have this in your life, is I'm an AA member. Okay, I may be behind the podium, but I am a drunk just like you are. And if you have problems, I give you my card. I give you my phone number. I am here for you. You can call me with any problem as long as it's not too sexual. I can't do that with the boys. The girls bring it, bring the heat, but with the voice, I can help you out of a tough spot. I promise. That's the beauty of having 41 years been there, done that know what it's all about. Uh, when I was on the plane, I'm kind of funny. I'm old school. I was raised by World War II vets, and I think the kids today could benefit from being raised by world war two vets but we won't go down that road. And you know you got your butt kicked you know? You didn't get this done, get this one, this is the way we operate here. And I'm on the plane and I decided to do carry-on which I never do and the bag is so heavy and I'm 67 years old and trying to lift that bag this way is too much for me. I may look like I got guns but they got got no strength right they're all all show-and-tell so I look at this guy and I said sir could you could you help me lift that bag and he said no no idea who you're saying no to I absolutely was shocked and and the guy stand next to go move out of the way buddy I got it and I thought I looked at him I thought I'm just gonna pretend like you don't understand English you know what I mean is what I thought. Wow, you know? And I was just taken back by that. And I thought, you know what? I'm in the real world. I got to behave. You know, sometimes we got to do that. The real world isn't always the greatest out there for all of us. There's, I like to also say, you Know, I'm an AA member. I've been around a while. I know, I know the book pretty darn well, but I'm living the book too. And, and I like to say I am the vessel to help you get connected to the power. I'm not the power, I don't know know what job you should take, what car you should buy. I always like to say, I don't know what boy you should date, but I know the one you got ain't it, right? This is a big problem. But I really don't know what God's got in store for you. Maybe you've got to learn a lesson 110 times before you're going to see it. You know, I know that's been the case for me. I'd also like to state that the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous was named as one of the 88 books that changed America have you ever heard that first time I heard that I thought I'm saying that at every talk I ate the one of 88 books and it sat on my shelf for 15 years and I said that in front of a group of about 2,500 and for some reason there was a collective groan and I got I got a hair trigger reaction you know what I mean I'm just that girl and other time I said oh like your book hadn't sat on the shelf everybody in here is nailing it from day one. Come on, you know? And to me, it was so interesting because the truth of the matter is that the directions are clear-cut, but everybody has a different experience. That's what Dr. Bob said, right? The directions are clearly cut, but everyone will have a different experience. And I think some of the tough things that happen—I'm going to set this down here. I'm going use it in a minute. I think the tough thing that happens is sometimes we get lost that you have to have the experience to help somebody. That is not true. If you lost a child, you've been been raped, severely beaten by the opposite sex. Now that you need to talk to somebody else. That's never happened to me. But anything else, if you're a hairdresser, you don't have to go talk to a hairdresser and figure out, have you ever had this experience with a customer? My job is to point out how self shows up for you. How did you make a decision based on self that put you in this position to be hurt? That's all the book is trying to get us to wake up to and to get unblocked so so we can connect to whatever power we want. We throw the gate so far open on the power. You know, one guy, well, I was at a very big event that was just a bunch of blowhards is all we were. You know? We all had an opinion. And this one guy was just flipping out about the atheist, agnostic, whatever. And Charlie goes, so you really think that's going to run the new guy off as the power? He said, I think the not drinking is going to be a big problem for him on day one. Yeah. Yeah, all they hear is, so I don't get to drink at all? Okay, I don' t care what fairy, hairy, fairy stuff you want me to believe him. Kip Collins, if you ever got a chance to hear him, he's an amazing, amazing individual. He used to say it's easier to get an alcoholic to stop drinking than it is to get one of us to quit playing God. And if that really resonates with you, especially if you're like me, the ego turned out, you know, this thing keeping it quiet is not an easy task. ask, the ego turned inward is the same alcoholic I am. It's just a different way that self shows up. So I have to learn how to shut up. They need to learn How to speak up. So don't get lost on that. You know, if when the book talks about this extreme example of self will run riot, though, she usually doesn't think so. You'll you'll think yourself, well, I'm not like her. And it's like, oh, no, no. We're all we're all in that pot. It'S just how self shows Up for you. That gets us in trouble see alcohol was the solution not the problem i did not realize that so when you take away my solution of drinking i don't get okay right i'm restless irritable and discontent the rest of the world for you guys that are uh not alcoholic when you see us stop drinking you're like thank god and what you don't understand is we are wrapped tighter and tighter and tired till we snap and then we take a drink and you're just devastated what happened i thought booze was the problem see I thought not drinking was the finish line I'm not alone in that thought let me tell you it's it's interesting because don't get me wrong we need you not drinking that's a very short part of recovery but I thought that was it now my job is to go out here and to be a good person right I'm gonna show up and be a person we were learning in back in the 80s how many of you guys got sober in the 80s early 80s yeah most of them aren't here and they're not necessarily not drinking. They just ain't here anymore. You know, they grew out of AA. They don't need it anymore. But I guarantee if their families were here, they'd be wishing they were back here. See, that's the problem is we just think we've gotten to the finish line. I don't meet AA anymore. I got it from here. You know, I'm doing this. I'm doing that. I did all of the above. I am telling you I have done it all. There is not much that that I haven't done that most of you guys have done too. So that's one of the reasons I like when I get a chance to tell my story because it gives you a, like, I haven never heard it put that way, or wow, she's got a point there. That did happen to me. It's interesting in the forward to the second edition. I'm going to move this down without trying to turn it off. Dr. Bob, this is when Bill and Bob met. This is why Alcoholics Anonymous is such a big deal. Dr. Bob had repeatedly tried spiritual means to resolve his alcoholic dilemma but had failed now he knew the Oxford group was the answer right what they were doing he knew that that that no excuse me Bill knew that the problem with Silkworth was the physical allergy and the mental obsession and he knew That God was the power, he didn't have the program of action. That's what Dr. Bob had. So when those two came together, I was reading some history about it took the prohibition Imagine if prohibition happened today. I'd be okay, but the rest of the world would not be okay. If prohibition happen, the depression and World War II, it required those three disasters to happen for Alcoholics Anonymous to be born. And I always like to say what that important point is, is when you are in your darkest days, there will be the sun shining, but you got to get through that dark day to get to the brightness so we see we want to come in here and get rid of all our problems no more problems we're fine and that's just not the way it works we've got to have these problems to break through that's the spiritual awakening is the problem the enlightenment is when you're in the good spot and i had that all mixed up so it says dr bob repeatedly tries spiritual means to resolve his alcoholic dilemma but it failed but when bill gave him silkworth's description of alcoholism and its hopelessness, Dr. Bob began to pursue the spiritual remedy for his malady with a willingness he had never before been able to muster. He's sober, never to drink until the day he passed. See, the whole world has a malady, right? That's human nature. The only problem is our malady takes us back to a drink. That's why we have to do this because for us to drink is to die, but you can die sober in these rooms too. So, you know, I mean, it's a tricky I'm the youngest of three kids. Like I said, my dad was a World War II vet and you knew it because he told you. And he ran a household like that, but we were a fun house. He was a drinker in 1968. We had the entire Buffalo Bills at our house. I mean, it was so fun. My mom was in the back yelling at somebody and I kept thinking, I couldn't figure out this man or woman came out from the back and she's yelling at him. And I never understood until I was older. And Okay, I got it now. I mean, think about the football players back in those days. I mean early – middle 60s and 70s, they're wild anyway, but they were really wild back then. So I knew my home was something interesting. But what I didn't understand, you know, is I was the youngest of three and we were all pretty much two years apart. That's kind of what you were doing back in the day. And, I mean I came out of the womb with like Mighty Mouse. I mean don't dare me, don't devil dog dare me. you know red rover red rover let katie come over i'll break your arm you know what i mean i mean i swear to god i think i don't really believe in reincarnation but if there is when my time comes i got a question for the creator and that is was i in the military in a previous life because i know i was special forces i was not it's not an enlisted man but there is something in me that i'm the first one to run into a burning house that's just my nature and and it's interesting because I love that part of me but boy can it get me in trouble if I've learned to this is tap down so 40 almost 41 years this is tapped down and I liked it I also like to say about your childhood you know see when we were getting sober it was all about you know inner child work and don't get me wrong I'm not flying in the face of any of that stuff but in the 80s that was a big deal you know Bradshaw what colors your parachute you You know, all of that stuff, you know, relive your childhood, rebirthing and all of that stuff. And that stuff was very beneficial. What it taught me today is how to hear inventory at a deeper level, which I'm very, very grateful for that. It did not treat my alcoholism. And I didn't realize that because in counseling and I think counseling is a privilege. Don't get me. Don't ever hear me not say it's not a privilege, but the problem is, is the counselor is going to say, who are you upset with? That's column one, dad. at. What he did, column two. What it affected, my self-esteem, my pride, my envy, column three. And that's their job. And then you take that to your sponsor because she's going to take you to the fourth column. Where did you make decisions based on self, right? So that's why it's so important to not just go to counseling and think you got your problem solved. You'd be alcoholic. You have got to see it from an entirely different angle. And that's the beauty of what that does. I also like to ask my sponsees before they found the drink if the drink was this you know what's treating my alcoholism what how what what was what did you find before you you were alcoholic and I went back into my life and my sister and I love to hyperventilate I don't know if you guys were doing course they've turned it sexual good god everything is sexual that you just want to go what has happened in our world that everything has turned sexual but we used to just you know at 8, 9 just choke each other out in the bedroom. I mean it was fabulous and that moment where you're coming back in and you're like and you know you're doing again do it again and you can tell the Al-Anons in the room right? The Al-anons were the ones running out going they're choking their self in there! We're just like oh my god it was I loved that feeling I I knew right away that that was something I wanted to achieve again, right? Because you can't find a drink. I mean, if you were drinking at eight, whatever. But, you know, I mean it was long before that and then I was also a sick kid. You know, it was back in the day, it was called the croup. So I had the humidifier and everything and I had that bottle of Vicks Formula 44 by the bed and I still take a pull off my cough medicine. My kids are like, don't touch that. Mom put her lips all over it. You know? And I'm like, I just remember taking that pull And that was back when Vicks had alcohol in it. And it was just warming, you know, that burn going down. Some people didn't like that at all. Well, they're not alcoholic, right? And then there's another piece of this puzzle that's interesting. I've been around a while and I've heard a lot of speakers. I've got a lot OF speakers that are friends. I know a lot A.A. members. And a lot Of people said they took the drink and the drink finally made them feel okay in the world. That was not my experience. I liked who I was from day one. I took that drink and believed that you needed to know how great I was. So that's how it turned on me, let me tell you. The whole world isn't excited that Katie walked in the room. Oh, Jesus, here she comes. I have a feeling Art had the same thing going on. It's like, you're damn lucky to be in my presence, letme just tell you that. And he and I, I swear to God, could have been the day. Okay. It's interesting, you know, my mom died when I was young. She had a kidney disease and it was back in the 60s, 1967. Dads were traveling, they were doing the work. The mom was a stay-at-home mom. It was just the day and age we lived in. And my dad, he was working for Union Carbide at the time and he needed to have somebody take care of these three kids. So he remarried three times in 18 months and we had four live-in housekeepers all through that but just let that settle with you Charlie used to say well he could close a deal he could keep it closed but he could close the deal and I would have told you when I came into AA as a matter of fact I believed when I can oh this Florida humidity this should be interesting what the hair does see they're gonna be look like a wet rat or just frizzed out when When I came into AA, I would have told you that made me alcoholic because I think there's a big misunderstanding of why you're alcoholic. You know, the teetotalers keep the booze out of the house and the kid still is alcoholic. I believe it's a genetic bull and it's not up for argument with you. That's just what I believe. And I'm the only one in my family that got it, but there was alcoholism riddled through my family. And my sister's an Al-Anon that likes to get her drink on and my brother's a hard drinker. Given sufficient reason, he can't stop or moderate. That was not my experience. So when I began to understand more about alcoholism, I began to see it more interesting. So what happened with my mom dying? It influenced my old ideas. See, the book says that we have to get rid of these old ideas, the result was nil until we let go absolutely and then you ask somebody when you're listening to their problem, you got to be able to be a little armed with the facts and look for what their old ideas are because not all old ideas are bad. See, like the old idea that it's good to be respectful, well, that's good until you take it over the limit, right? It's good for you to be a little bit more respectful and it's going to be sure you're telling people stuff. Old ideas like I'm a good mother, but I'm really a better mother than you. I'ma good AA, but Ima better AA than you, so these old ideas get you in a lot of trouble and that's what you gotta keep watching for. I had a kid, I came in at 26 years old, I was a single mother who was that ugly ugly ugly you know I managed to figure out how to drink with that poor little girl and she's 45 years old now and thank God we have managed to have a relationship an incredible relationship and then I have a 10 year my son was 10 years younger than her he's 35 but you know she was a five-year-old a pitiful incomprehensible demoralization I know it you have the eyes of a kid looking at you and you're not getting out of bed and you're screaming at them and they're three years old running around, you know something's wrong with you. But I would have never guessed it was alcohol. It's just, I got to stop partying so much. I'm just partying too much. See, I had no idea that physical allergy was what gets it. See, when I start, I can't stop and I can' t stop start. There's two parts to alcoholism and I think there's 90% of the people sitting in the rooms of AA that do not know what it means to be alcoholic. They must be one, but they don't know and I didn't know it until I was 17 years sober and neither did Charlie. oh god bless charlie i miss him so bad but my story starts with uh uh i i was it was halloween i was dressed this is gonna shock you as tina turner one of my heroes and uh dang i was looking good i was invited to really hop and party i felt like i'd hit the big time i was going with the the the drinkers and the drug users that were here not here so i thought i'd really hit the Big Time long way around the bar my crappy car broke down and I had met this young man that was coming in to hear Bob Earl. I mean, talk about the silver linings of what God does. If you'll watch every day, you're being sent a lifeboat. But if I'm not watching for it, I won't see it. People say, well, I don't see any burning bushes in AA. You're not watching. They're everywhere. We are the luckiest group of people. I think we've been given an extra dose of something. And this youngman was coming. He was chasing one of my buddies that was was for better, you know, a better way to put it, my role in the hay bunny. Okay, you with me with that? So let's try to keep it clean. I know I'm at a men's meeting. You can tell by the beating on the table and the ho, ho, ha, ho. Oh, boy. Oh, my God, last night, I was trying to tell the guys, I said, look, I'm not against men's meetings. Please don't hear me ever say that. But some folks only go to men's meetings. well you're missing how to become a part of society so this guy walks up it's all the guys and us and we're at the country club and he comes over and he stands between me and art and he pets us both on the back and my pat was lasting a little longer than i was ready i thought i'll give him a break in about another four seconds it's like dude get your hand off my back but he said he goes well what are y'all doing talking about sex and the guys looked at me i said that's what i'm talking about just fyi that's where it's just you know and then so you think if you stay in men's meeting you you don't do that that's incorrect a moon duck okay just saying i will not get off on this because i'm honored to be here uh so i am i'm honoured to be her everybody charlie was still alive when when art called me i said so i'm being invited to a men's group praise god and he goes no there will be co-ed it was like that's okay the majority of the men so you know and and i i'm telling you i've been a tomboy all my life i'm the president of the shotgun shooting club in austin texas if you ever come please come shoot with me i i know how to live in this world with both sexes right and so i don't have any issue in that area so this boy this young man is coming in to see bob earl and that my role and the hay buddy is bringing him to the house. And when I looked in his eyes, I knew I was going to marry him. Now, I didn't realize that they were in AA, and I wasn't sure what that meant. And I thought it was trench coats and a paper cup, right? That's just what I thought Alcoholics Anonymous was. Needless to say, I chased this boy into the rooms of AA because I knew I had a problem. I wasn' t an alcoholic. I just wanted his attention. I knew three people in that room. That's never good, okay? You know, people in AA got a little bit of a problem going here anyway. And so I chased him in the rooms. He had six years, I had 10 minutes and it was a match made in heaven. And I tell you, it really was. Joe and I were together for 20 years and a heartbreaking story. He was the father of the son that was born 10 years after April. He adopted April and we're sitting in the Rooms of AA and we have some tragedy. We have some tough stuff happening. But I had no idea we were not treating our alcoholism. I had no idea that you need to continue to write inventory. What? I thought the first one was all you needed to do. I'm doing five meetings a week. We're really just kind of going in there whining, right? I missed the whole boat. So did Joe. And it was really, really sad. I learned, I thought AA was about drinking. I had no idea that physical sobriety looks like recovery, right, that physical physical sobriety is not recovery. I didn't realize that. My story is all about that. I thought counseling was for learning, you know, how to live in life. And once again, I'm not against counseling. I'm a big fan, especially in your marriage. If you're having troubles, you need a mediator. You need somebody that goes, did you hear her? Okay. Did you hear him? Okay, because I mean, you needs that mediator sometimes. Otherwise, for alcoholics, I mean, you know, been married one year. I mean one time, two times, three times, four times, five times. I mean you just get a lot of marriages if you're not careful, right? And then everybody wants to blame the other person. So just an observation, guys. And then I thought church was all about finding God. I had always leaned towards Christianity. So at about three years sober, the shine was starting to wear off in AA because I think that happens between 18 months and three years. The shine starts wearing off. Joe says, hey, do you want to go to church? And I thought, eh, not really my cup of tea. Non-denominational churches were happening. And he said, just come and see this, Katie. And when I walked in, that music and everything, I was like, oh my God. I fell in love with it. And that's what we do. We're like chameleons. We find something and we throw ourselves into it. And what I didn't understand when I woke up in 17 years, in the book it said, And once again, this book started coming alive in a way I'd never seen it before. And it took me a while to even be willing to listen to somebody with the book. I'm like, I already know everything. So, oh yeah, I'm assuming I'm sitting with people. I assumed I'd see a little more heads nodding, but I'm seeing some really wild eyed looks. So Carl Jung and Roland Hazard, right? Most of us know that story. Carl Jung was a psychiatrist. psychiatrist. He realized a psychic change was necessary, but could you imagine if he came out with that? I mean, could you image if you went to go see a psychiatrist today and they said, you need a psychic changed. They're like, you're going to take these 19 pills, they're all going to have a side effect so sorry about that. You know, so Carl Young had to keep this on the down low with he and Bill when they were talking. So Roland Hazard went over to Europe and he was there for one whole year and Roland Hazerd was going to the boat to come home. He's from a very wealthy family, and he drank after that one year. And he went back to Carl Young, and she said, what is the problem? Carl Young said, I've been trying to make this vital spiritual experience happen, and this is Roland Hazard. Upon hearing this, our friend was somewhat relieved, for he reflected that after all, he was a good church member, so was I. This hope, however, was destroyed by the doctor telling him that while his religious convictions were very good. In his case, they did not spell the necessary vital spiritual experience. So it doesn't mean don't go to church, but church is along with working the 12 steps, right? Not just going to AA meetings. You have to do both. So I missed, as I said 110 times, I missed a lot of that. That was a big piece of my story. I think the gifts of sobriety take us out. I've watched Tons of people around six, seven, eight years sober start having kids. The next thing they know, their lives get busy. They get the better job. They go back to school. They do all the things that they need to do because it says when we rest on our laurels, it's the dangerous thing. And let me tell you, there's no doubt about that. When Joe and I went to church, I mean, we became, we're very much chameleons. We became, well, we looked Amish. I mean it was like, we brought in basically celebrate recovery was kind of the thing we were doing, but it was called Lion Tamers back then. And after about three years, we were losing our mind. And I always like to say, I started wearing underwear when I went back to church. I mean, that's how converted I was. And Marcy, Marcy is one of the greatest Al-Anon speakers we have. She goes, I don't know why that's not in y'all's literature. None of you alcoholics wear underwear. Not a bad point you got there, Marce. But at about three years, Joe and I realized that we're in real trouble. So now I've got six years sober and Joe was always six years more than me. He's got 12 years sober. And he said to me, Katie, he goes, I'm not doing well. And I said, I don't know what to do. I'm going to go back to AA. And I asked him, what should we do? And he goes let's go back AA. And we still had all our AA friends. Don't get me wrong. We were all about staying sober. So we go back into the rooms and we went back to our old home group. There was Ed Hasbrook. All my peeps were there. And I leaned over to Joe, and I said, you know, honey, we're home. We're home, and he said, I know, and, I mean, it was, I will always feel good in here. This room is where I belong. Whatever else I do has to be along with, not instead of. I belong in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. I belong with the alcoholics. My work here is to get to a place that I can help you but still help myself. Sometimes sponsoring people really feels good, and we don't do our own work, right? Right. That's a very, very easy trap to get into. I always like to talk about spiritual maturity between 18 months and three years is where the guy's really in trouble. And I say guys, just because that's what I say. And they're really in struggle because they don't understand the root of their trouble is selfishness and self-centeredness. They think that you got the drink off of me. I got it from here. Then we hit another wall between three and five, five and seven, seven and 12, 12 and 15. You have to hit these walls spiritually because they're the nature of it. It's like the difference between what you knew at 20 and you know at 40 is huge because you've got 20 years experience. Spiritual growth and maturity go hand in hand. So you have to be open to new things, new ideas, the different things that are happening in your life. What's some of the most unfortunate family problems in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, estranged children. And I'm telling you, if that's the case, God put me behind this podium to help you. I can help you get back in the kid's life. Now here's the deal. You might not want to, but you got that burning desire. You'd like to, but you don't know if you're willing to. And I totally get that. That just is kind of what happens. Joe and I entered into for the next nine nine years, what I call meeting-based sobriety. And I mean, no offense against that. We didn't know that you needed to be working the steps. We, you know, I basically took the steps off the wall. If you said, what's the third step? Well, it means I've turned my will and my life over the care of God, right? What's the first step? I'm powerless over alcohol. You know, 10th step, continue to take personal inventory when I'm wrong, promptly admit it. So if I step on your toes, I know, you Know, I've been startled awake. I know I need to apologize. apologize that's what i thought it was all about i had no no idea there was so much more and i'm telling you what what happens in in in my meeting based sobriety is oral recovery gives you uh relief not freedom see i wanted freedom so i go into a meeting that we're all talking about fear and i walk out and i feel better because everybody's got fear and i didn't realize the relief was happening i wasn't getting the freedom i wasn'T going deeper than i needed to go Joe. And I'm telling you what, oh, as my life goes on, Joe, yes, as life will, says on page 14, you know, we're resting satisfaction and happiness out of this world if we just manage well. Joe and I were AA couple, right? Everybody just loved us. We had kids, we had troubles, we were freely talking about it. We were really working hard on keeping this marriage together. It says for if an alcoholic, on page 13, for if a alcoholic failed to enlarge his spiritual life through work and self-sacrifice for others he could not handle certain trials in low spots and i'm telling you there's someone sitting in this room that is right there and scared to death to admit it and i i will stand behind this podium and say i get to caa on a very large level there are people dying in our rooms and i not on my watch remember special forces probably delta not not a seal i don't really like the water but i mean i think i was special I'm telling I can't wait to meet God so on page 25 now and really really hear this because it's very important I know some of this and we'll get to the laughing and all the funny stuff but on page 25 if you are a serious alcoholic as we are we believe there's no middle-of-the-road solution we were in a position where life was becoming impossible you're answering yes to that question you are not alone and if we were passing through the region from which there's no return through human aid. We had but two alternatives. One was to go on to the bitter end, blotting out the consciousness of our intolerable situation the best we could. That's sober. And the other was to accept spiritual help. But in order to accept spiritual help, you've got to get somebody that understands how to give you that spiritual help." God will take two people and teach both of them, right? You don't have to have somebody that knows the answers. But if you both get in the boat together and start rowing, amazing things will happen. So now Joe and I are quite a few years into sobriety, he'd always had six more than me and he starts getting sick and we got a problem. And we had both had catastrophic insurance. We were both self-employed. It was back in the nineties. HMOs were just happening. And I'm sitting at my meeting and you know, I went five days a week. I love my peeps in AA and I'm talking about Joe, there's something wrong with his brain. I think he's depressed. I can't figure it out. My girlfriend says, you ought to go drive a school bus katie you'll get an instant hmo and i thought hmm remember i'm like i do it i'm a go-getter i'll go drive that school bus you know get the job for two weeks get the hmo get his head scan that's what the doctor wants we can't afford an mri we're just barely making it as it is and so i go to drive a school bus let's just take a moment and hear what i'm saying okay Okay. Now imagine you're putting your precious commodity on my bus. And by the way, no adults are allowed on your bus. So if they try, oh, no, no ma'am, no mam, step off. Just me, just me with this. And I mean to tell you, oh my God, I could tell you bus story after bus story, after bus story. So we get the insurance and I tell Joe, Joe, did you call the neurologist to get the appointment? Because I only want to be on this bus for two weeks, three weeks max, right? I mean, I don't see anything selfish in that. I see that as a wise chick. And he says, Katie, they said it's going to be about three months. Oh, no, no. No, it's not. So I call my GP who's a World War II vet. God love him. And he goes, oh, hell, Katie. Go on into the emergency room. Just tell them he's got something wrong with his head. They'll scan him in there. So I said, okay. So Joe and I go have lunch. And then we go to the emergencyroom because nobody's arms cut off. You know what I mean? Nobody's bleeding out. And we get in there, and I don't do well with a Western medicine. Never have. Instant dislike. I put off a vibe. They don't like me. I don' t like them. One of those deals. So in comes the guy with the white coat, and you could just instantly sense, because I'm taking over. I go, and Iím in complete untreated alcoholism. I said, ìSir, my husband, thereís something wrong with his brain. We need to have his head scanned.î And he goes, ëOh, we do.í Iím talking. Yes, we know. And now my doctor told me theyíre going to run into a series of things, and i said so joe be sure and fail you know come on let's work let's work at angle come on you got to think that's pretty brilliant right so when they tell you to touch your nose touch your elbow touch and so the doc does that exact same thing and he's telling joe and he goes touch your notes joe's like and i get behind the dock i'm going oh my god i'm not i don't care if i gotta shove you in the tube you're not we're not getting out of here i'm not going back on that bus okay i've been on it two weeks So the doc says, Joe, what's two plus two? And Joe said, you know, I'm a carpenter. I should know that. And he goes, I'll go scan his head. And I thought, oh, well, thank you. You know, we instantly did one of those numbers. And he brings Joe back pretty quickly. And the next thing you know he's gone an hour and a half. And I don't think anything of it. I think he's making me pay, right, because we alcoholics know everything. I know what you're thinking. I know where you've been. And it's not a woman-male thing, trust me. It's just an alcoholic thing. And he comes back, and he puts his hand on my shoulder, that doc, and he said, My God, he's got a tumor in his brain as big as my fist. And he must have said, my God, three times. And the very first thought I had is, I'm going to be driving this damn bus forever. That's the level of self-centeredness we suffer from. I'm not going to say that to Joe. You know, I know better. but i you know climbed up in joe's lap and we cried and cried and they of course thought it was cancer and we didn't leave that hospital for 11 days and alcoholics anonymous does what alcoholics don't just does people at the hospital were like are you a movie star we've never seen so many people you know it was just devastating and it turned out that the tumor was benign it was a 14-hour surgery uh it was it was unbelievable it was benigne i have a whole lot of opinions on why, but that's controversial. And so what ended up happening is I drove that bus for another three years. Okay. Now, I don't know about you. I'm in the fitness business. I have a Jazzercise franchise. I'm teaching seven days a week. I start teaching kids. I started doing the whole nine yards. Joe's not going to work. The doc writes him a letter because we're going to get social security disability. He said he'll never work another day in his life. That was like swallowing a tennis tennis ball. We had a kid in college. And I'm telling you what, when we got denied Social Security, I could have easily been put in federal prison for going down to, oh, I mean, to tell you I'm slamming on the counters. I'm like, I got a letter from a neurosurgeon and you're telling me you're going to deny me? I've been paying into that since I was 13. Are you with me? Okay. So I know you look a little shocked, but come on. It's a little stressful at the Parker house, you know and so I got to tell you driving that school bus God was so good to me but it was pretty crazy and I drove a gas bus and gas buses go fast diesel buses go very slow gas buses go fast and I needed to get this done quickly I had a life to get done I mean I'd flip a curb from time to time you know I mean and so one day I'm on the bus my son was on the bus he was elementary in junior high I didn't do high school high school was just weird you know elementary and junior high and and all of a sudden the kids had to go down these two humps come to a stop take a right and they love the back end of the bus bouncing right and uh it doesn't take much to bounce the back edge of a bus and they're like miss kate miss kane bounces bounces i said guys i'm gonna get in trouble and your life's in the mirror right and i look up in that mirror and i realized oh hell it's all boys you know you can't hurt a boy and my son was one of them i said oh get in the back and they all got to the back to the bus and i gas that and have you ever seen armageddon when ben affleck gets that thing going i swear to god that was it was exactly like that and i mean i see these kids just and i thought oh my god i mean we're coming down at some point and uh your whole life is in the mirror and when we came down you heard this and I mean they drop like rocks and I thought oh god I got broken necks broken collarbones I broke every bone in their body and I swear to God they all went one of them goes what was that I go I don't know so we all get off the bus and I have blown all four valve stems off the back end of that bus I actually had a guy in Wichita Kansas I hope he hears this talk they told me that couldn't happen you think I'm on this podium lying come on then Charlie goes Katie I don't know what it is about you but people just want to just come at you and I'm like oh my god well you know what call my bus boss he'll tell you we're all for valve stems off the back so I have to call the bus yard and I mean I'm in trouble because I gotta have this insurance right Joe is a sick man and so I called you know get on the radio and it's a They had a turtle bus to base, turtle bus to base. They go, yeah, turtle bus, what's up? And I said, Billy, man, I've blown all four bell stems off the back end of this bus and big boss man carried a radio on his hip and he goes, what? I said yes, sir, I'm over on Lisa Lane. I don't know what happened. And he goes we're on our way, you know, they're there in 15 minutes and those kids were like rats from a sinking ship, man. They were all gone, even my son. I mean their houses were close in the neighborhood so I'm just And Billy comes, and a big boss man, I'll respectfully not say his name. And he looks down, he looks up that hill, and he looks at me, and he goes, you don't know what happened? And we like to say we don't lie. Oh, yes, we do. And I said, no, sir, I do not know what happening. There was no way I could lose that job. There's no way Joe's medical bills would have been astonishingly large. And he goes really take her back to the yard. And another word was never spoken about that. And I'm embarrassed to tell you, it was 15 years I was sober. It took me 15 more years. So at 30 years, almost 11 years ago, I finally found that bus boss to make that amends to him. And I said, when I got him on the phone, he wasn't working at the bus yard anymore. And I says, you know, it's Thanksgiving. I just want to tell him thank you for having helped Joe and I out. And he goes, oh, come on, Kate. What's up? up. And I said, well, sir, I'd like to talk about those valve stems. And he goes like this. He goes, oh, it was so uncomfortable. It's like, okay, stop laughing. This is really difficult. And when I didn't tell him, I'm sorry for lying. That would not have been the appropriate amends. The amends was that I made him step out of his values. His job was to protect those children. children. I put those children in danger. So he took a risk on me staying there. He could have been in really big trouble, and that's what the amends was about. And by the time we finished, it was about a 15-minute conversation, and he said, you know, Kate, I got to tell you, he said you always reminded me of my mother, and I find that as a compliment. People, I don't care. I'm 67 years old. I're not lying about how old I am. And he said he always reminded me of mom, and she was a strong woman like you, and knew you were in real trouble with Joe. and he said, that's why I did it. He said, I knew you would never hurt those children and long way around the barn he said at the very end of the call he says, you know, you've restored my faith in humanity so you never know you never knows those amends are so much more for them than they are for us it's a very, very big deal and I'll tell you one other bus story then I got to move on okay, I by accident went down the wrong road that happens sometimes when you're not thinking okay, when you drive in a school bus you should be thinking but sometimes I'm not thinking so I go down the wrong road well you can't do that you can circle around and come back you got to back out and get down so there was all elementary kids and there was a bunch of first graders in the back of the bus and there were those big concrete mailboxes in the neighborhood and I told him I said hey guys when I get close to that just say whoa whoa whoa okay I cram a smash right into it and I get up and I go back to another guy go what happened you were supposed to say whoa and this little girl starts crying she She goes, I'm only six. Fair enough, fair enough. Maybe I've been asking too much. Well, and I got a hundred bus stories, but that'll have to be for another time. I got to get back to alcoholism. So Joe is not doing well, right? Not doing well at all. It's a long story, but we are not doing very well. And he ends up relapsing, goes back out at 23 years sober, and dies of a heroin overdose. It's devastating. I mean, the whole, the entire AA community was on its ear. I didn't know what, what the hell happened and everybody was blaming it on the problems we had. It wasn't the problems. We had, we were not working in AA program. I didn'T know that. That's why my message is so much about this. Charlie, uh, my, my husband who unfortunately for anyone who knows our story passed away two and a half years ago of liver cancer. I got a hole. If you have hep C, please talk to me. So he passed away two and a half years ago of liver cancer, and he had had a plane crash at the same time Joe died. So Joe died, Charlie had his plane crash. I'm losing my mind. I mean, in my 40s, he's my best friend of 20 years. We're like brother and sister best friends. You know, that opposite sex, it really has a best friendship. And that's what Charlie and I had. But I lost my mind. And he was a real player. I means, he was the guy who just kind of I procreated his way through Alcoholics Anonymous too. But, you know, he always wondered what Joe and I had, blah, blah. So I lose my mind because I'm in complete untreated alcoholism. Of course I'm going to step outside my sexual values. And I try to kiss him. And he's sitting on the couch, and he pushes me back. He goes, What the hell is wrong with you? He goes—I said, I'm losing my mind. I can't believe I'm single, and I'm 40. You know, in the mid-40s. And he goes, Well, I've not blown a 20-year best friendship because you've lost your mind. and so I thought oh rejection really I mean snap snap right that's a just thought react thought react and I thought okay then this kiss my foot man and I'm walking out the door and I don't even get to the doorknob and he goes hold on hold on I thought yeah you got one quick window brother in that window shut and needless to say it was like kissing your brother it was creepy it was weird but it worked okay and it was whoo was it weird and he charlie just did not know how to have a marriage and i did and i loved him so much as my best friend we clearly got through all that and it looked like mayhem and now today i understand what god was trying to do was to get us behind the podium so we can talk about untreated alcoholism in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous this and what it looks like. I'm not saying everybody in here has it, but once we start waking up the world, we were an incredible team. How many of you guys ever got to see my husband speak? Oh, he was an amazing man. Amazing guy. Oh my God. We were the yin and the yang. We were a lot coming at you. There was nobody surrendered. Let me tell you that. So in an airport, you wouldn't even know we were together. It's like one time on a plane, I wouldn't sit with them it was on southwest and he keeps trying to follow me i go god leave me alone and the next thing you know he has to get sit over here and so i hear him going so where are you going to college oh i see how this deal is working and he won he won there was a winner or loser in almost everything charlie and i but charlie woke up because he had the plane crash i've lost joe we're losing our mind we're in real trouble and we don't know how much trouble we're at and he meets a man named mark houston and we go to a big book weekend and mark housten woke charlie up he did not wake me up i sat in the presence of a man who knew this book forward and backward a whole lot like joe and charlie i mean if you got an opportunity and i just happened to be married to a joe in a charlie not the same joe don't get that confused yeah they were about 25 years older than i was and that wasn't happening in my world back then i i could have gone younger you know what i mean but so one of the things is is that that these guys were bringing the book back in and mark houston was amazing you either liked him or you didn't but what he could bring was the heat but it didn't touch me because i'd done the counseling thing but charlie started getting better well he can't get better on my watch and i don't know about you ladies but uh i'm gonna be better than my husband okay so so i mean i went and found marty my sponsor she's a female male, she was in untreated alcoholism about four years younger than me. But her dad was a rocket scientist and she was smart as could be. And she goes, well, hell, it's a textbook. Surely I can teach you the textbook. Now she almost killed me, but she did get through it. And now she's, you know, we go 20 years later, she's on fire, I'm on fire. We're just, we're blown away at what God did with a handful of people. The ripple effect is unbelievable. And I got about 10 more more minutes. I know it's hot in here, just bear with me. But this is what we began learning and this is well into sobriety. The second surrender, Bill called it emotional sobrietry, right? What is emotional sobpriety? I think it's, in my opinion, and God knows I got plenty, I think it is a misunderstanding of our third step. I had no idea that the first requirement is that I have to be convinced that any life run on self-will can hardly be a success. On that basis, I'm almost always in collision with somebody or something even though my motive is good so now you're talking about good motives are you kidding me I thought that's what we're supposed to come in these rooms and become good people so all of a sudden I'm pissed off at you because you don't see I'm a good person I'm just trying to be helpful here come on so I mean it was so deeply misunderstood for all of us selfishness and self-centeredness is the root of our trouble do I believe that do I belief I get rid of that yeah that's questionable You know what I mean this thing up here is still quite selfish and self-centered I have learned not to say as much out of here, but let me tell you it is It's not stingy and conceited. I don't think too much of myself or too little of myself All I think about is myself so everything. I'm saying you are judging right now like that No, no, I don' t agree with that. Yeah I mean, that's just our nature so when you're sitting there talking to one of us You could be nodding your head. You're not even agreeing with me at all yeah Yeah. But you're like, yeah, she just hadn't evolved as far as I have. You know, she she doesn't get it. So, I mean, trust me, I could be either person in this play. Right. See, life's not coming at me. It's coming from me. Right. I'm bringing it all to me. And I think life's coming at Me. That's a big, big misunderstanding. I was voted most likable four years in a row in high school. Clearly, I'm not stingy and conceited with this self-centered Charlie. gnarly on the other hand. Oh, it was all over it. Now you see that the hypocrite in that? I mean, that's the beauty of what's between column three and four in a resentment inventory, right? Call it the sick man prayer, call it whatever you want, but it's the, it's The Hypocrite. I could be either person in this play. That's how I get compassion. I can be the one speeding past you and scaring the crap out of you. Or I could be the One that's got this crap scared out of me, right that's that's the beauty of this i mean i'm such a hypocrite that when i'll never forget we had backyard dogs right everybody had backyard dogs it's none of this walking them on a leash and you have to have a leash you have to have leash like okay we've gone a little over the top with this dog thing and uh and i remember the first time i saw doggy daycare whatever are you kidding me well we got a covid dog and my little girl goes to doggy daycare on Wednesday, and she has a spa day once a month. Please tell me you hear the hypocrite in there, okay? And when I'm doing it, I'm like, oh my God, I am such a hypocrite. Every once in a while on the hike and bike trail, I'll see somebody, and they look like an old vet, right? They look like an Old Vette, old hippie. Austin's still got a lot of old hippy in it, and he's got his dog off the leash, and I was going, that's impressive. And people are like, oh for god's sakes does that dog look like he's gonna bug you now if you got a german shepherd that's all over somebody that's a different story but and charlie's defects were so glaring right i thought i had put up put a lid a little bit on mine and charley's his family is off the chain with what we call story stealing now run this through your repertoire of who you are so what happens is somebody comes up to charlie and i and they say you know hey man we're uh i'm going to switzerland charlie leans and goes switzerland i've been there i went to this mountain in that mountain and charlie tells him all the story of switzerland and then walks off and i look at the guy and i go so where are you going in switzerland apparently my self-centered husband is going to walk away and so we're in a big we're doing a big workshop and and i said you guys i said you know you we got to be active listeners so when somebody's talking to you ask them three questions right and then then become an active listener and then we take a break and this guy comes running up with his pad and paper goes what are the three questions and see now the whole room should have laughed on that i said well you big dope it depends on what the conversation was i mean if they're going to switzerland you don't go is your wife pregnant yeah and and i swear i thought i need to keep telling that story so we can understand at. I just assume, right? The book says also the, now wait till you hear this one. The world and its people really do dominate us in that state. The wrongdoings of others, fancy to real has the power to kill. Go have a good day. I mean, you just go, what? Read that again. I thought I swear to God it's in the book. I did not know that. So the world and its people dominate us. Other than that, go have fun. Go pump your car, pull gas. You know what I mean? I mean you're pumping your gas and you're looking over at somebody and they're doing something like, oh, see, I should throw a flag on the field for that one. It's not a good move there. I mean, we're the sheriff of the world because I've got my badge on. I'm going to have to get everybody to set them right. And here's another one. I talked about the first requirement. After I lay something out that's pretty heavy and somebody leans in and goes, well, would you rather be right or happy? Well, I'd rather knock you in the head, really, if you really want to know the truth. But, I mean, if I want to be right or happy, I damn sure want to be right. And if happiness follows, lucky me. You know? I mean that is truly who we are. You know, now I can fake it. Oh, yeah. Good point. But you got to, that's like asking me to work the step and hope the promise, or work the promise and hope the step comes true. You've got to work this step and then you get the promise. It says that I'm a victim of the delusion that I can wrest satisfaction and happiness out of this world if I just manage well. Well, let me tell you something. I got a buddy named Mike Lorenz. Get a hold of some of his stuff. Some of y'all have heard Chris and Charlie and I in Canada. That was 2008. I've learned a lot since 2008. Try to get some more current stuff if you like. If I speak your language, I may not speak your language. You may be going, when is this chick over? I get it. I get it. But if I speak your language and you're understanding what it is, there's a lot more out there. There's other people that do speak our our language. But this victim of the delusion, a guy named Mike Lorenz, his Don Pritz lineage, really an amazing lineage and Gary Brown, that whole crowd. I swear to God, I do 10 steps calls with him. And every once in a while, I got to put pen to paper really to find out. I think you should write inventory once a month on a big problem that's rolling around in your head. Are you getting relief? You're getting freedom. We're looking for freedom because those little blocks that you have will cause you big problems, right? Before you know it, you're blowing up at the counter at the bank so that's what i'm talking about so i called lorenz and he said you know katie he said what would happen if you took the high road and i swear to god i thought oh it never happened i mean that stopped me in my tracks and i said mike here's the worst part i don't even know how to get there what is the high road i have always been a conflict of interest scale what you got a problem let's talk about about that and so what ends up happening is he goes but I'm more interested in why and I said well if not me who who's gonna settle the problems of the world out there for God's sakes you know I mean you got to have somebody at the pump come on move it move it we got people wait and get off that phone right big problem so I met a conference and Charlie couldn't make it to the conference with me and the next thing you know the guys up there reading how how it works. There's about 600 people in the room, and I'm the guest speaker, right? That's not my meeting. I'm a guest speaker. And he can't get a hold of the room and he's reading how it works. It's like, rarely have we seen a person. And I thought, oh, he's killing me. And then I thought, no, I'm not going to get up there and tell these folks to shut up. I am the guest speaker. Just, and all of a sudden, my buddy, the taper comes out from behind there and he leans in. He goes, hey, everybody, shut up! We got an AA meeting going here. And i thought, well, I'll be damned one week later I got to see what Lorenz was saying it's not me who somebody else will step into that position I had no idea I'm telling you guys and the other thing is one of my sponsors that just like me called me one day she goes she couldn't take the high road she didn't know how to get there either and she said oh my god King there are no assholes on the highroad I said I know it. I was shocked. It's amazing. You get to set it down, right? I mean, my DNA is an extreme example of self-will and right. If you're looking at me and going, I see that she's got it, so do you, right. I'm just the one who's speaking out loud on it, but we all have this, right, I got about four more minutes, I swear, I know, it's hot. I am, since Charlie died, I have nothing nothing can die on my watch, right? He's been gone about two and a half years. Nothing can die on my launch. I'm getting a June bug out of the pool for God's sakes. It's little wing is doing this number. I am like, it's weird, but it's happening. So I'm driving down this fairly busy road in Austin and this little kitten just shoots out. And I realized, I look in my rear view mirror and I realized I can stop and try to grab it. And this guy's coming at me and he stopped so that the kitten is under one of our vehicles. Well, I think we may have run over it, but we didn't. and all of a sudden he's a hispanic guy he doesn't speak any english and he says it's you know basically up in my wheel well and so he hands me some gloves and this little kitten's just you know like this and a guy blows his horn i swear to god that's him and i mean i and i got it my sponsee on my ear butt i scream f you buddy sorry we're out in the middle of the road would Would you like me to explain why? Or can you wait a minute and a half, you know? And he goes like this. I thought, oh, do not mess with me at this moment. I get that kitten out, and I held it up like Mufasa. I mean, it was completely feral. It had bit through my glove, and, you know, I'm like, goddammit, I got this sucker dying on my watch. His little tail was all bent up, and I took it to the emergency room. I drove home like this you know oh my god I swear to God you know when it says I'm driven by this self-centered fear I'm scared to death I'm not gonna get it then I'm gonna get and I'm going to lose it I'm not gonna to get the job I get the Job now I'm scared of death I won't keep the job see this is this vicious cycle that a lot of us don't know the are the fears I have in life today for what they're worth i am scared to death we're going to lose the art of conversation the telephone has taken over and i'm telling you guys if you're sitting at a table and three people are on their phone and you know them you tell them put your phone down guys we're not gonna don't look at your phone somebody's got to take this say somebody's gotta stand up it's it's going to be lost and and the 15 people that are clapping you'll you got a lot of people that don't agree so So be sure you see this, okay? Because I'm telling you, the art of conversation is an art. And God cannot work through a cell phone like that. If you're not sitting next to somebody that's supposed to say something to you, you're going to miss the whole thing. I'm a huge fan of talking to strangers. You'd be shocked at what you end up getting. It says above everything we must be rid of this selfishness. We must or it kills us. So our troubles are of our own making. That's the greatest promise in the book. If you want to be free, the problem has got to be me. Period. I take full responsibility for any disruption I have. And I will take that. People usually associate victory with success, not falling and stumbling. And I'm telling you something, guys. The terms of the deal, he'll provide what I need if I keep close to him and perform his work well. In order to get close to them, I've got to get unblocked. And I cannot get unlocked by talk therapy in AA. I've got to put pen to paper in order to stay close to him. I got to get close to them in order, get close from, I got it. Get unblocked. I write love letters to God. I'm a huge fan of them. It's a little bit of the two way prayer that Henrietta Cyberling was the one who knew that somebody was coming to talk to Dr. Bob. Very cool history stuff. This is one of my love letters. It says, father, God, please guide me to who you want me to be. Help me see life through your eyes. Help me do what you want, what is right in front of me and stay in the moment. Please help me have fun in my life. my child, you're such a beautiful spirit. You want so much more for others and you guide them to it. So do the work and stay in the present moment. Your life is full. You are a gift. You always have been. I love you so much. See, I was living in this bungalow. I had no idea God had a palace. I'm 17 years sober, losing my mind and no idea, no idea. My pride thinks it's protecting me when in fact it's trying to kill me. I like to end with a love letter. My husband was such a romantic. romantic he was he was such a big old burly guy oh I swear to God he just he'd brush his teeth at the the restaurant if he could you know it's like Charlie Charlie Charlie let's step it up a few notches brother I mean I swear TO GOD we had the most wonderful life and yet at the same time we wanted to kill each other so so please do not think there weren't plenty of problems but he was such romantic and he had never been with a woman like me never anybody that held him him accountable for showing up at the person he needed to be. So he'd leave love letters all over the house. He says, I don't have the perfect words to express everything wonderful that you mean to me, but today I just want to tell you how much happiness you bring to me over the years. Being your husband is the pride and joy of my life. God is with us and he will always be with you. Thank you so much for being my best friend, my wife, and my great counselor. I hope you have a great birthday and I look forward to many more. Your loving husband, Charlie. It's been an honor Thank you.