Marty M. on the First Women in AA and the 1930s

About This Speaker Tape

A Lexington Avenue bus, a "dish" of a woman, and a scrap of paper with an address. Marty M. recalls the bait used to lure a desperate man into the rooms, but her own entry was a slower burn. In the 1930s, she was "shooting down like a shoot-the-shoot," losing everything while doctors spoke vaguely of "people like you." Convinced she was insane, Marty cycled through shrinks and sanitariums, treating alcohol like magic that eventually turned into a cage.

The turning point came in a third-floor attic room with a red cardboard manuscript. After fighting the "God bit" for weeks, a moment of blinding rage and a single line—"We cannot live with anger"—acted as a battering ram. She collapsed in tears, experiencing a sudden, total freedom. From the wreckage of a fractured hip in later years to the early days of the fellowship in Brooklyn, Marty describes the shift from being a "wild eyed dame" to finding a room of strangers who became her closest friends.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Laughter: Bob tells the story of Ed and the bus note.
• 2:30 Marty discusses her recent hip fracture and the need for a 'second rebirth' in AA thinking.
• 5:15 Discussion on the 'magic' of alcohol and the physical allergy.
• 8:40 Marty describes her five-year descent and the failure of 'shrinks' to identify her alcoholism.
• 12:10 The struggle to accept the fact that alcoholics can never drink normally again.
• 16:45 The introduction of the Big Book (multi-lib copy) and her initial resistance to the 'Higher Power bit'.
• 20:15 The 'battering ram' moment: surrendering to a Higher Power after a crisis of anger.
• 24:30 The conversation with her doctor regarding her authentic spiritual experience.
• 27:00 Her first meeting in Brooklyn and meeting Lois W.
• 30:15 Reflection on the fellowship and the immediate identification with other alcoholics.