One Day the Lurking Notion I Wasn’t Really an Alcoholic Was Simply Gone — Christina G.

About This Speaker Tape

Christina shares her story at 3.5 years sober, sobriety date June 14, 2012. She grew up in Atlanta with hippie parents she now describes as wonderful, and spent her childhood trying to fit in. She drank from the first time she tasted homemade Kahlua as a kid, and by 16 kept a cooler of beer in her car at school. She skipped a trip to Europe and refused to take the SAT-2s because both would have interfered with drinking.

College took her to UC Boulder — the country's highest-ranked party school — then back to University of Georgia, then into an accounting job with a family friend. She showed up two and a half hours late on April 15th, quit before she was fired, went homeless in Athens selling her belongings for alcohol and drugs, landed a telemarketing job, and was fired for being rude on a recorded call. She moved in with her parents at 27 and eventually reconnected with a man who was four years sober in AA. He convinced himself he wasn't really an alcoholic and they drank together for five years — every morning she promised she wouldn't drink; every night she did.

They walked into a meeting where the timing of the Al-Anon room steered her into Al-Anon first. She stopped drinking to keep an eye on him. A fight where he said 'at least I'm working a program' sent her to a pizza after Fifth Tradition where she declared that whoever had offered to sponsor her would be her sponsor. Claire became her sponsor, had her pray on her knees, read the Big Book out loud together, and one day the lurking notion that she wasn't really an alcoholic was simply gone.

She now sponsors women, reads the same pages of the Big Book every day, prays written prayers — third step, seventh step, St. Francis — kneels so she doesn't drift off, sits five minutes in silence with a phone timer, and stays active in two home groups. Her husband stayed sober with her and they are married. The obsession that ran her life for twenty years is gone, and every week is better than the week before.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Introduction — the list of things she swore she would never do in AA, starting with telling her story at this meeting
• 3:30 Atlanta childhood with hippie parents, always trying to fit in at a school with uniforms
• 7:00 Homemade Kahlua and white Russians as a kid — talking to lifeguards at the pool, the first time alcohol 'worked'
• 13:00 Gin and juice at 17 — knocking out her best friend over a spilled drink and driving to the liquor store
• 20:00 The April 15th accounting firm disaster — two and a half hours late on the biggest day of the year
• 28:00 Five years drinking with her now-husband — every morning promising not to drink, every night drinking
• 35:00 Walking into AA with him and being steered into Al-Anon by accident because of the room timing
• 42:00 The fight where he said 'at least I'm working a program' — walking into Fifth Tradition pizza and getting Claire as her sponsor
• 50:00 The moment the lurking notion went away — finally accepting she was an alcoholic after praying the first three steps
• 58:00 Daily practice now — kneeling prayer, written step prayers, five-minute silent timer, two home groups, free of the obsession