Only We Get Two Lifetimes — the Old Self Surrenders So the Stronger One Can Thrive – Susie D.

About This Speaker Tape

Susie D. shares her story at a Blue Chip Speakers meeting, dividing her 28-year drinking career into three sets of nine years: the party years, drinking to cope, and drinking without choice. Raised in Madison, Wisconsin in what she perceived as a dysfunctional, hyper-religious home, she was crowned Miss Wisconsin in 1976 — where she guzzled champagne at a race event and had to be carried onstage. She became a flight attendant for Eastern Airlines and traveled solo to over 100 countries, using men and alcohol as dual crutches while she "unfriended God" for 28 years.

Her volunteer work took her around the world, including working alongside Mother Teresa in Calcutta with orphaned children and at the house of the dying — yet even in that sacred environment she smuggled warm beers under her cot. She was fired from United Airlines training after maids discovered half-gallon vodka jugs in her closet. By age 42 she was a full blackout drinker, physically wasting to a size zero, hallucinating bears and snakes on walks, and consumed by suicidal obsession. One night she held a Smith and Wesson to her head but was diverted by worry about blood on the white carpet.

Divine intervention arrived as a man she calls T-Bone, a newly sober passenger on a 17-hour flight to South Africa. After she drunkenly assaulted him on the plane, he later dropped her at an airport with two words: get help. On July 4, 2003, she called central office, attended her first meeting, and detoxed alone in bed for three days. She nearly relapsed in Sydney, Australia, but a midnight call to the local central office brought an old-timer who rode three buses downtown to take her to a meeting of 80 AAs.

Susie married T-Bone two years into sobriety on the same aircraft where they met — a first in aviation history. She forgave her mother on her deathbed, and the character defect of lust was removed. With 17 years sober at the time of this talk, she credits meetings worldwide, prayer, sponsorship, and Step 12 service as her tools for living. She tells the room that recovering alcoholics get two lifetimes in one — the first descending toward darkness, the second always rising toward the light.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Tim R. introduces the Blue Chip Speakers meeting and welcomes Susie D., sober since 2003
• 2:30 Susie begins her story, outlines three phases of her 28-year drinking career in sets of nine years
• 6:00 Growing up in Madison, Wisconsin — dysfunctional family, hyper-religious mother, warped image of God
• 10:00 Crowned Miss Wisconsin 1976, guzzles champagne at the Rex Mays races, carried onstage slurring
• 14:00 Becomes Eastern Airlines flight attendant, solo travel to 100+ countries, men and booze as higher powers
• 20:00 Working with Mother Teresa in Calcutta — orphans with severed limbs, house of the dying, smuggling beers under her cot
• 26:00 Late-stage alcoholism: size zero, hallucinations, suicidal obsession, holds gun to her head
• 32:00 T-Bone on the 17-hour flight to South Africa — drunken assault on the plane, he says get help
• 37:00 July 4, 2003: first meeting, prayer on her knees, three-day detox, red wagon of free booze to neighbors
• 42:00 Near-relapse in Sydney, midnight call to central office, old-timer rides three buses to collect her for a meeting