Not Unable — Unwilling to Be Honest with a Single Person Alive for a Decade – Anne E.

About This Speaker Tape

Anne E. shares her story at the Monday Night Blue Chip Speakers meeting at the NABBA Club. She grew up in the Tocco Hills area of Atlanta with a Turkish father who was cold, controlling, and a perfectionist, and a loving mother who was always there for her. From her earliest memories she felt insecure, like her skin didn't fit, and like she never got the rule book to life. She started drinking at 13 or 14 and was a blackout drinker from day one — alcohol quieted the noise in her head and made her feel like she belonged for the first time.

Her drinking escalated rapidly through her teens and early twenties. She partied in Buckhead starting at 15, went to UGA as an exercise science major, and racked up four DUIs by age 22, along with multiple hospitalizations and overdoses. She was also a committed gym rat and workaholic who could somehow function through the chaos. Her father disowned her at 21. After the legal consequences hit, her drinking turned from social binge drinking to nightly vodka-chugging behind closed doors. She even voluntarily put a breathalyzer ignition interlock on her own car because she couldn't stop driving drunk in blackouts.

Anne spent ten full years attending AA meetings while secretly drinking — faking sobriety, building friendships under false pretenses, and exhausting herself with the double life. She worked for years in a chiropractic-type practice through a complicated relationship with an older man from the rooms who gave her a chance when she was essentially unemployable. Her bottom came about nine and a half years before this talk, when she broke down crying on her mother's kitchen floor at 3 PM, blackout drunk instead of studying for nursing school, and said her first sincere prayer.

Two days later she entered Second Chance, a halfway house in Sandy Springs, and got sober on September 7, 2013. She got a sponsor, got honest with another woman for the first time, worked the steps from the Big Book, and built a prayer and meditation practice despite having no belief in Higher Power. The obsession to drink was fully removed by the end of her first year. She has maintained three to five sponsees, three to five meetings a week, and active step work throughout nearly ten years of sobriety — even while working as a nurse and completing a doctorate in nursing. She also found Al-Anon essential for dealing with her severely mentally ill brother and family chaos. She closes by reflecting that the biggest gift of sobriety is learning life isn't all about her.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Lisa opens the Monday Night Blue Chip Speakers meeting at the NABBA Club and introduces Anne
• 3:00 Anne introduces herself — sobriety date September 7 2013 — admits she faked sobriety for ten years while attending meetings at this clubhouse
• 7:00 Growing up with a controlling Turkish father and feeling insecure from earliest memories — love felt conditional on grades and achievement
• 12:00 First drink at 13 or 14 — blackout drinker from day one — alcohol quieted the noise and made her feel like she belonged
• 18:00 Partying in Buckhead at 15, UGA years, four DUIs by 22 — high-speed chase, passing out on Highway 316, multiple hospitalizations
• 25:00 Legal consequences hit — six months jail, two years DUI court, three years without a license — drinking turns to nightly vodka behind closed doors
• 32:00 Working in the practice, the complicated relationship, years of faking sobriety — voluntarily installing the breathalyzer interlock on her own car
• 40:00 The bottom — breaking down on mom's kitchen floor, first sincere prayer, entering Second Chance halfway house in Sandy Springs
• 48:00 First year sober — got a sponsor, got honest for the first time, obsession to drink fully removed — working the steps as laid out in the Big Book
• 55:00 Life today — nursing doctorate, Al-Anon for family chaos, staying busy in the program despite a demanding career — the gift of getting out of herself