Step 1 – Judy A. – Wilson House Big Book Workshop Retreat – 2020

in any recovery program. What happens is you come in, you go to a bunch of meetings, and no one qualifies you or you don't really look at the information. You don't really do a self-examination on what is powerlessness, what is the first step, and is it true for me? And we lose a lot of people before we even get them because of misunderstandings with step one. So a little bit about me. I started drinking around 1969. The first time I drank, what happened was I cut school with a couple of my friends and we decided we were going to go and get drunk. It sounded like a cool thing to do for like a 13-year-old, you know? And we did that. We went back to my house. We cut school, and I pulled down a bottle of Four Roses whiskey, and I poured three big water glasses and I handed them out to my buddy. Now, what's very interesting, what happened with my buddies, what happened with my buddies were they drank about half, maybe two-thirds of the glass of Four Roses, and they'd had enough. Don't you hate drinking with people like that? No thanks. I've had enough. Are you crazy? You know, it's only 11 o'clock at night. You know, let's go to the city. Hey, cocaine! You know? I mean, that's how I drank. And so they'd had enough, and they pushed the glass back, and they just watched me. Because I am bodily and mentally different than a large amount of the population out there. This is something that I need to really know about myself. When I put alcohol in my body, it creates something called the phenomenon of craving, the allergy to alcohol that they talk about in the book Alcoholics Anonymous. They talk about it in the doctor's opinion and more about alcoholism. And what it looks like with me is this. The first drink always does one thing every time. It asks for the second drink. The second drink insists on the third, and the third demands the fourth. It's a physio. It's a physiological, mental craving that happens with me, and it's biochemical, it's spiritual, it's mental. You know, I don't know exactly what it is, but I do know this, that when alcohol gets put in my body, I want more alcohol. And that's one of the signs of alcoholism. So that happened to me the first time I drank. I'm 13 years old, and I drank myself into a blackout. And I come to in a field not knowing how or why I got, with missing time. You ever have like missing time? It's like time travel. You wake up in the future handcuffed in the back of a cop car, you know? Like what? Whoa, dude, you know? And so, you know, all this missing time, you know, and my friends are gone. Now, for two days, I am done. I am dying. I am so sick. I'm horizontal. I'm projectile vomiting. My head is like exploding like a gong. And, you know, everything's spinning. And, you know, I'm just illing for two days. And the whole, that whole two days, you know what I was thinking? I'm going to do this a lot. Is that insane? I'm going to do this a lot. Now, I want to explain. I want to explain why I was thinking I'm going to do this a lot. Because this has a lot to do with my personal alcoholism as well. As a young kid, my earliest memories were memories of not feeling right, not feeling connected to, not feeling comfortable with, feeling apart from, anxiety. Like, you know, I won't be able to fit in with those kids. And, you know, I'm going to do this a lot. And, you know, these kids over here are too lame for me. You know, all this, all this, this perspective of separation and exclusion, I can remember it from a very, very early age. You know, I couldn't share in class. It was just too much for me. You know, I'd be worried that somebody would think I'd said something stupid. And, you know, they'd say something and I'd have to kill them. I mean, all the time. Yeah. All this stuff is going through my head. All these voices like, this is wrong. This is a dangerous environment. You know, I got to be cool. I just got to act cool and get the hell out of here, you know, as soon as I can. And this is me like from five years old to like, you know, 20. And I just, you know, I couldn't talk to girls. You know, I'd be really, really attracted to a girl and I wouldn't talk to her because she'd make me so nervous. I'd go talk to somebody I wasn't attracted to. I mean, just all this stuff in my head, you know, I just wasn't comfortable with myself and I wasn't comfortable with my environment. And the day I put that Four Roses whiskey in my body, you know what happened? This happened. Ah! You know, just dropping all the fear, all the anxiety. Just all of a sudden, I was with the coolest people doing the coolest thing that you could ever do and this is perfect. This is great! You know, and that's what alcohol did for me. Alcohol doesn't do that for everybody. Aunt Fanny and Uncle Fudd, you know, don't go to the city for an eight bowl of Coke, you know, after a six pack of beer. That doesn't happen to them. You know what I mean? There's something that happens to the alcoholic. And from the get go, even as ill as I was, I'm gonna do this a lot. You're damn right I'm gonna do this a lot. Because this is the first time I feel comfortable. This is the first time you're lucky to be hanging out with me. You know what I mean? Like, you know, I'll call you sometime if you're lucky. Instead of being this repressed, anxious, shy, you know, worried about everything kind of a person, I was larger than life with this alcohol. And I started to use it. And I started to use it pretty strongly. Now the Four Roses got me really ill, so I at least knew I'm gonna skip on the Four Roses. And I started to drink a lot of the things that the 13 year olds were drinking. There was a company that had a marvelous line. I was a young man. I was a young man. I was a little bitAMA, you know? I was like, Ralph Brunsen, then went to the store that had that built in in Detroit to tell me what top notch steps I was letting happen. And, oh boy. As I was opening . . . Unfortunately, I .... At roads. never go near unless you have to. But so what happened was I started to use alcohol to be okay. I started to use alcohol to be able to fit in. I started to use alcohol to be able to go to the parties. I started to use alcohol to be able to go to the dances. And this was not conscious. It wasn't like I was, you know, I wasn't thinking, oh, my goodness, my drinking is increasing exponentially. I may not get into the college of my choice. I mean, that was not going through my head. It wasn't a conscious thought. It was a need. It was a biological need to get that alcohol. And the book Alcoholics Anonymous talks about over any considerable period of time, alcoholism gets worse. It doesn't get better. It's a progressive illness. And so for the 19 or 20 years that I drank, every year it got worse. There might have been brief periods of time where I thought I was getting my hands around this stuff by using specific drugs or whatever. But it always, at the end of the day, it was always worse. And I was starting to really suffer some consequences. Now, you know, I'm not a big drinker. I'm not a big drinker. I'm not a big drinker. I believe so much of this goes back to my sense of dislocation, my sense of being separate from and not being comfortable with sobriety. You know, folks, why do we go back out? Because sobriety sucks. That's why. And we haven't done enough recovery work to start to get okay with this not, drinking anymore, like never, Lou, you know? Not even on Christmas? So, you know, I believe the recovery process is about healing, healing that sense of separation. And the fellowship especially is so important about bringing us back into community. Every year that went by, I was walking further and further away from you. You know, in high school, yeah, I had some friends and, you know, I'd go to the parties or whatever. You look at the last years of my drinking, I was like Gollum, you know? I was like in a room in my mother's house talking to the bottle. My precious, you know? It was just decadent, decadent and ugly. And, you know, and... It was just... It got so bad that, you know, every once in a while, you know, somebody would make the enormous mistake of asking me to go out drinking with them. And, you know, I'd leave the house. And, I mean, it was so... You know, I was doing a lot of drugs and smoking a lot of cigarettes and drinking a lot of hard liquor. And, you know, that really kills your system. And I was doing a lot of vomiting. And I got so used to vomiting that I'd be talking to you, oh, how about those... You know, you take the glue. You take the... You know, make the... And they'll be looking at me like, did you just vomit? You know? I'll be like, yeah, I always... I always vomit, you know? You know? And, you know, I was not... I was, you know, it's not suitable for the world. You know? Like... And that's really one of the reasons I'm all isolated. I'm all by myself. And I'm all like... You know the lonely... Do you remember the loneliness? Because you just shouldn't be with anybody. You know? So... But you'd get really lonely. You know? I'd like... I'd like drunken dial. Any drunken dialers in here? Anybody drunken dial? Isn't that... Like, I would come downstairs and I'd see all the phone numbers, right? I'd go, oh, my God! Mary Lou McGillicuddy from seventh grade, you know? And I could just imagine the phone going... I'd love you, you know? Oh, oh, I got to kill myself now. So... So what I started to do was I started to cut the phone lines. You know? Like when I started to drink, I'd cut the phone lines to keep myself from doing that because it was traumatic, you know? Coming to, finding out who you'd talk to. Or... Can't remember talking to. So I... But I'm an electrician. So I know how to put the... I put them back together. So I start cutting the lines by the knot holes down in the basement and make it harder to splice back together. But somehow I get... There's one time I threw an extension ladder up on the roof and I cut the phone lines way up at the peak of the roof. Well, when I got drunk, I found a milk crate to put the extension ladder on and I got it back together. Finally, it got so bad. That when you picked up the phone, all you heard was... Right? So we had to cut the phone... We had to call the phone company, you know? And the phone company guy comes out and he's looking. He's like... He's like, what the hell? He goes, it looks like somebody cut this phone line 20 different places and scotched taped it back together. And you don't want to look stupid, right? So I'm like, yeah, that's what I thought it was too, you know? You know? We should probably run a new line, you know? And like, there wasn't like... That wasn't like an isolated incident. Stuff like this was going on all the time all around me. It was a crap show, you know what I mean? It was just... It was Jerry Springer on LSD. And it just was terrible. And it got to... It got to the point where alcohol got my attention so much that I figured, you know, I really got to quit drinking it. And for about two and a half to three years, I tried to quit every day. And this is what I would come to in the morning. And remember, I'm like 130 pounds. I'm drinking a quart of vodka every night. And then go to work. I was no vision for you on the... You know? On the electrical track. You know what I mean? I'd be electrocuting not just me, you know? I'd be accidentally electrocuting plumbers. Oh, God. Never electrocute a plumber, let me tell you. They got no sense of humor. Anyway. They'll be coming for you. So... So every single morning, I would be swearing to God, I don't want to feel like this anymore. I don't want to feel like this anymore. I'm dying. I'm shattered. Today. Today. God damn it. Today. I'm going to quit drinking. That's it. I'm going to quit drinking today. And if you had a lie detector and you wrapped it around my wrist and you said, Chris, are you really going to quit drinking today? I'm going to quit drinking today. That needle would go to true. You know? Because we mean it. When we promise our families we're done. When we promise our bosses are the judge. We mean it. You know? But what would happen is lunchtime would come. I'd get like half a sandwich down. I'd rehydrate with like half a gallon of iced tea or something. And I'd start to feel a little human. And I would start to say to myself, you know, you know that not drinking decision this morning? That's a pretty serious thing. That might even be an overreaction. You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? You know? We may have to modify that position because of its extremity. And what I would do is I would have modified that decision to go to the liquor store on the way home from work. So nine o'clock in the morning sworn off. Lie detector. I'd pass it. Four o'clock in the afternoon I'm on the way back to start this whole nasty cycle back again. This whole nasty cycle. Now, the second part of alcoholism is the part that so many of us just don't understand, that we don't internalize the truth from this second part. And the second part is basically this. How much power is powerless? It's not a hell of a lot. You know, it's certainly not in abundance. And so the first step is telling us we're powerless. And what that means is I can swear off alcohol in the morning and I can be drunk in the afternoon. That's what it means. It's the obsession of the mind. And it's so hard for us to admit this. Who among us wishes to admit that kind of defeat? Glass in hand, we've warped our minds to such a degree that only an act of divine providence can relieve us of this obsession. Who among us? And I spy. I sponsor tons of people. You want to know what the death knell of the sponsor is? I got this. That's like the death knell. When you hear that, you know you won't be seeing this guy around much any longer, because he's got it. But that's the way we are. We want to have it. We want to be in control of this drinking thing. And some people, depending on how far down the scale you have gone, some people can make a decision to not drink and have that mean something. But on the flip side, folks, some people can't. And those are people who, some are sicker than others. Some people have gone down the scale. It says in the big book, your ability to quit drinking on a non-spiritual basis will depend upon how much choice you have lost in drinking. So some of us have lost a lot. I lost enough choice that within an eight-hour period, I can't stay sober. I can't make a decision and stay sober for eight hours. There are people that can go long tracks of time and end up drinking. But the fact of the matter is, I need to understand that there's this thing called the mental obsession. The best way it was described to me is like this. I've got a lot of thoughts in my head. Call my sponsor. I've got to make coffee at the home group. I'm going to go see so-and-so. This, this, this. And those are all thoughts in my head, and they're directing me to where I'm going to go. But then all of a sudden, the thought crosses my mind that a little whiskey and some milk won't hurt me. Here's how. You know? And this is my example of this. I knew I could not separate from alcohol. And I knew that I just couldn't do it. And I know I really wanted to, you know? But then I would change my mind halfway through the day and decide to go drinking. And it was killing me. So I had gone through an outpatient to get my license back years ago. And I knew that the sixth and the seventh floor of this hospital was called CAI, Center for Addictive Illness. And I signed myself in for a 28-day program. I walked no pressure from police or family. I walked in there, and I signed myself in, and I said, you've got to help me. I went to the 28-day program, and they said you should go to some AA meetings, and you should do the outpatient. So I did them all. I'm doing what I think my job is. And I'm going to two meetings. And I out-thought the meetings because I said, I got this. I'm going to call the other coaches that are there. I'm going to give them that course, if they're not proud of me. But I did. I said, Frank, don't touch that. You're absolutely just insisting it because you should do it as a vote. And the day I got in, Frankaron told me I should be picking some people up for sober. And I told Frankaron I didn't know you, Frankaron. The guy was like, Frankaron is such an idiot. He just tell you I'm not. Why am I doing this? And I said how am I supposed to get people? And Frankaron said it's poultry. I said no. I said it's dogs. I said yes! Well, so I think . hi. aircraft. So I'm just going to listen really well, and then I won't need a sponsor. And then they were saying, get a home group. I'm like, well, the two meetings at the top of my street are not home groups, but I go to them very regularly, so that's probably the same thing. So what I was doing was I was out thinking all the fellowship suggestions, all the suggestions that are designed to root us in here long enough for us to find a recovery program. We've got to be safe in here until it's time for us to be exposed to the 12-step recovery program. So some of us quick, some of us slow, but we've got to be safe in here until that happens. And I wasn't. So I'm sober almost 90 days, and I'm driving to an AA meeting, and the thought crosses my mind that I'm not really, really doing this AA thing with all eight cylinders. And I can't even, geez, it's been months since I drank. I can't even remember what being drunk is like. If I bought a gallon of vodka and I drank it, you know, first of all, I'd shoot back to Alcoholics Anonymous at 100 miles an hour, and number two, I would remember what it's like to be drunk, and it'd be like a shot in the arm. It'd be like, you know, it'd be like adding some enthusiasm to this whole thing. So fun. And folks, I bought a gallon of vodka and I drank it to improve my sobriety. Now, some people will say, well, he just wanted to get drunk. No, I did not. If there was a I don't want alcohol to ruin my life meter, I'd have blown away all of you in the room. I did not want my life to get ruined by alcohol. Alcohol doesn't care whether you don't want to drink it or not. Alcohol doesn't care what the reasons are for you not drinking. Alcohol wants to put you in the ground. And so if alcohol has to convince me that drinking it will help my sobriety, then that's what it'll do. And I got drunk and I was out for seven months, and it was seven of the most gruesome months of my life. Oh, that was it? Yeah. Okay. Got to toss it to you there. Yeah. Well, if you were writing a book, they'd call it a cliffhanger. I'm Judy. I'm an alcoholic. Hey, Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. I'm Judy. And I'm an alcoholic. Thank you all for being here and for such a great welcome. I hear an echo. Is that supposed to be there? Yes. Okay. Following Chris is kind of a task, isn't it? But, you know, to a counterpoint, you know, I'm kind of the hideous example of a different story. And so I'll tell you that story because that's the one that's mine. And I'd love it. I'd love to be Chris sometimes because nobody I've ever known can make such a great story as Chris can of what happened. But it's not my story. So a little bit about me. I'm a Chicago native. And I come from an Italian-Irish family like so many of us do. And this becomes pivotal for me, but somewhere along the line when I'm about 13, my dad dies and life is different. And I've not had a drink. I have 14 years of Catholic girls' school education. I went to school with girls all my life. Never went to school with boys. Never figured out how to dress without a uniform. I'm still looking for a uniform. And how to put it all together because, you know, it's either brown or blue. And look at green. And I never figured out how it is that you do that daily thing with a boy because I never went to school with boys. Okay. So I didn't drink when I was a kid. We didn't have liquor in the home. We didn't have coffee in the house. We didn't have any of that stuff. My dad was kind of a semi-invalid sometimes. And so we had none of that stuff. We were pretty – my mother was a really kind of modest, quiet. Our family was ordinary. They wanted us to go to school. We had the means to achieve things. I have no quarrel whatsoever with how I was raised or my family. They did not make me an alcoholic. As far as I know, I'm the only one of my – with my three siblings, I'm the only one among us that's an alcoholic. So got no idea where that came from. But I will tell you that out of the four of us, we had eight marriages, eight of which were to alcoholics. If there's an Al-Anon gene one of these days, 23andMe is going to put it on there. Because we got it big time. So I'm doing my best. I got a goal. And I want to tell you, I had a serious goal. I was going to be a doctor. In typical alcoholic fashion, perhaps, I was going to be a doctor. I was going to – I also had a lot of musical stuff going on in the home. So we had a piano and an organ and an accordion and all kinds of things. And so I was going to be – I was going to be a doctor. I was going to be a surgeon who would go to Africa, write symphonies, and save the world. Right? I didn't – I aimed high. And somewhere in the middle of my second year of college – I know, somewhere in the middle of my going into college, I passed the Pinochle game and came back for the bar that I was in. And my life changed. It was like I had – I like it. It was like I had a job. I was in a boat that was going in this direction very deliberately. I knew what I was doing. I knew why I was doing it. And I had all these huge dreams. You know, I had no small dreams. They were all gigantic. And I was going in that direction. And I walked into that bar. And little by little, that ship just changed and went in an entirely different direction. And I couldn't stop it, even if I knew it. And I didn't know it for a long time. My story is the story of denial. I never wanted to stop drinking. I never tried to stop drinking. I never tried to stop drinking until I was here for nearly two years. I continued to drink because you didn't have a message for me. I wasn't an alcoholic. It was clear. Anyway, so within a couple of years of my taking a first drink, I was dropping out of the school that was going to make me famous, purposeful, meaningful, and a life of note. I was going to be a doctor. I was dropping out pregnant without the skills to even get a job as a clerk in a department store. Right? I got these dreams that are way up here. And I've got this reality that's way over here. And those two are not even close together. My decision was to give the child away. And when I did that, within two days, I'd hit the bars with my friends. I'd left off for a few days. And now I had a reason. And I had a resentment. And I was almost of age. And my fake ID, which my sister had, I had to give it to my sister. My sister had very lovingly scraped off my date and made me older than I am, which is now not a good thing. Everything has a price. It always comes back. You know, the check always comes due sometime. And that one came back later. And so I took my little fake ID. And I was out the door with a resentment. And I was out the door with this thing for a drink that I couldn't stop and didn't know I couldn't stop. And it became part of my life. And it was just woven into everything I did. I drank every day. And I drank lots every day. And I got drunk every day. And I didn't know I was getting drunk. I didn't tell anybody I was drinking. My mother thought I was a bowling whiz. I'm going bowling, Mom. See ya. What kind of bowling alley is open until 3 and 4 o'clock in the morning, I do not know. But I was there. And I didn't learn to drive. I didn't learn to do anything. And I've never been afraid of the most ordinary things. I didn't have to drive. So I'd be going home from my favorite place. You know, I've got a seat at my favorite place. And they know when I'm coming in. And they shove my drink down the beautiful bar. And I'm somebody. I'm somebody. They know what I drink. They greet me like I'm important. And here it is. And it comes sliding down. And I'm going one and two fast. And I'm okay. But one and two is, as you know, I'm always in. But what happens is a pattern for me is that for nearly 20 years, what I do is I go into a bar to have one drink. I've never had one drink in my life. And every time I tell myself I'm going in to have one drink. And every night I'm calling babysitters because by now I got married to the next guy that dared cross my path that was the right height. And look. And I said he loves me. Let's get married. And I got married. And I was a terrible wife. I was a bad mother. Because I couldn't stay home. Now, I didn't know about alcoholism. I didn't know about my drinking. All I knew was that I could not stay home. When I take a drink or somebody leaves the house, what I had to do is I had to get out of my skin. And I had to go. I had to be gone now. And so I would get utterly drunk. I would get us and out I'd go. And I'd get a sitter. And that sitter would get a sitter. Do tell me when it's time, would you please? I'm trying to keep track of that. I don't? Okay. You're in for it now. But it's just, you know, such a boring, stupid story. I'm just a daily drunk who doesn't know they're having blackouts, who doesn't know they get drunk. I realize that every day I go into a bar and I tell myself, finally it was like, you know, I think I got drunk last night and I have never been drunk before. And I have never, ever had this happen before. It must be about the moon, the mood, you know, the hormones, the whatever. One of these things had happened every single night and I made up my story every single night. I had four kids and a niece living with me. So I had five little kids. And then I, of course, five little kids. And the drinking habit buys you a divorce. And it bought us instant poverty. And I'm in Colorado trying to raise some kids. And I don't know who was raising who. And I'm a drunk mom. And I'm bringing men home at night. And I'm no kind of example to anybody. And I thought, well, I know what I'll do. I'll become a brownie scout leader. I got a cute little uniform. I forgot to tell you I also had a 20-year drug addiction with diet pills that I never abused, never once in my life. My friend Don Pritz and I like the same drug. And he did them intravenously. I did one every morning. Because all of us did that. It was like finding out that was a drug. I was shocked. My brother said I was taking speed. And I thought, no, I'm not. I'm taking a diet pill. Everybody takes a diet pill in the morning. And so I could get really fast. And I could get a whole lot done. And I had a really clean house for a time. And I could raise my kids. And I could talk really fast. And I never got cold. And I never needed a jacket. But most importantly, I looked good. That's the only thing that mattered. I looked good. When they made those illegal and then when they made them really illegal, it was bad news. Anyway, drinking has always done for me something that not everyone does. It's the only thing that's ever done for me. It's the only thing that I can say is I know nothing else has ever done. It's that stuff that Chris was talking about. It's the feeling of belonging and the feeling of power when you neither belong nor do you have power. It's like total illusion. And because that stuff that Chris has so beautifully described fits exactly, even though the pattern is different. And I say that because each of us has our own little pattern. Each of us has our own little way and our own little history and our own little story. As a drunk woman, I put myself in places that were really vulnerable. As a woman that a man might not. And I have the history to show that, and I have the rape to show for it, and all that kind of stuff. And the disappointment and the resentment and the anger that you just stuff inside that you can't get rid of. All of that stuff was there. And I'm doing the best I can. I've always done the best I could. It just wasn't very good. Because I didn't know what a problem was. We're talking about a first step. I did not know alcohol was a problem. And my trips to my favorite bar, when we picked our house in Colorado, I said, there's a bar on this side about three blocks away. There's a bar on that side about three blocks away. I don't ever need to even drive. I could roll home if I needed to. And that's how we picked the house we picked. And I became so much irregular that I was going on the staff picnics. You know? It was like, I'm one of the group. I fit. I belong. I'm here. Never mind that I got four kids that I'm calling sitters for, raising, being raised by the telephone company and a bunch of sitters. Because they're home and I'm not. And I couldn't be. So when I drink, I go and I don't know when I'm coming back. I'm kind of a running drunk. It's one of the things that has affected me even now when I'm sober is that when I get into a tight place, what I want to do is I want to run. I want to escape pretty badly. And I think part of the program of recovery is that it teaches me how do we stand still? How do we get rid of the stuff that pushes us from inside that makes us need that kind of an escape so that I can live comfortably and I can live wholly with you without having to escape? I haven't run away from home in a while now. And but I was, I just couldn't be there. And I love these kids more than I love anybody on the planet. And I couldn't be there. And it's kind of hard to tell kids that when they're getting older. I love you guys so much. I'd come home at 2 in the morning and I'd pick up babies and I'd hold them in the middle of the night. I love you guys. And they're like, who are you? You know? It was kind of sad. I could not protect myself and I couldn't take care of my kids. Had it been the way life is today with more social services and that kind of stuff, I probably would never would have had those children without them being taken away from me. But they didn't. I would try to work and I'd put my kids in the car. I'd stuff them under the seat to try and do good and take them with me because I didn't know what to do. I didn't know how. And alcohol kept me from knowing what my problem was. Once I'd take that drink, I was off and running and I wouldn't go home. So one of the things that I know about myself is that during that time, that long time, even starting in Chicago, wherever I went, I was never afraid. I could walk around the streets of Chicago, middle of the night, never felt the slightest bit of fear. I had booze muscles, you know. I was superwoman. I could fly. But I'd be at home and the phone would ring and I'd know it was somebody needing some money. And I couldn't answer the phone. I think I thought some arm was going to reach out of the phone and gag me by the throat, you know. And so I became afraid of ordinary things and not afraid of the things that were probably dangerous. No probably about it. The stuff that was dangerous, I never. I walked away from, but the stuff that was everyday living terrified me. So this like distorted value. So I want to tell you a little story. I have permission to share this story. I have a friend at my home group named Andrew. And again, I have his permission. Andrew was schizophrenic. He has teeth that go in different directions and eyes that go in different directions. And he's kind of a mess. And he got sober because one of two of us, went to prison and talked him through his prison cell. I mean talked to him. They did prison work. They corresponded with him. They walked him through steps. They talked to him about our traditions. And when he got out, they promised him that a couple of them, a couple of us would be there to meet him when he got out of prison. Andrew is seven, eight years sober now. He's still schizophrenic. He belongs to a men's church group that is the other side of saving his life too. He's our coffee maker now for a year, I think. He cares about traditions. He's a good solid member of Alcoholics Anonymous. And he's still schizophrenic as crazy. He's crazy. And so I said one day, because I like to write, and I said, I'm thinking of writing a character who is alcoholic and schizophrenic. But I don't know what it's like to be schizophrenic. Could you tell me? And Andrew said, well, here's the way it is. This is kind of a physical thing. He said. Well, let me tell you. I was watching this great football game on TV. And I went in to, because I love to watch football, and I went in the kitchen to get some snacks. And I came out and I looked down. The television was unplugged. I said, I love that game. He hadn't unplugged the television. The television had never been plugged in. He said, and I was on the bus. And I was talking to the guy sitting next to me. And I was telling him about what I do, because Andrew's kind of gregarious about that. And the guy said, keep doing what you're doing. You're doing a fabulous job. I got to get off now. It's my stop. And the guy walked to the front of the bus. The bus didn't stop, and the guy disappeared. I said, Andrew, how do you live with those things and know? What's real from what's not real when your schizophrenia makes them? He said, I hear voices. They tell me to kill myself. I'm worthless. He said, I have all that. That's what it's like to be in my skin. And I said, how do you know what's real? He went over to the wall, a wall like this, and he smacked his hand against it. And he said, I touch what's real when I'm talking to you. I put an arm on your shoulder. I go, oh, that's Judy. She's really here. I put my arm on the table, and I think, that's really a table. It's really here. He said, I have to know what's real in order to function. I still have voices in my head. And I was thinking back to the doctor's opinion. I was thinking back to the part where it says that we cannot tell the truth from the false. We're talking about a first step. I couldn't tell the truth from the false. I had no idea that I was getting drunk every night. I had no idea that I had blackouts. I had no idea what I was doing to my family, none. For me, it was all about getting the things that, well, the way I put it's kind of crude, but we all are out for the same things, approval, attention, affection, appreciation. And we all do the stuff we do to get those things we so desperately need to fill that place that Chris was talking about, separation. And that was the first step. Loneliness. So we all do the things we do. And I was doing that. It never filled anything. Never filled the need I would become more lonely. And I would become more separated. And I would get to the bar. And some days, they would be opening the door as I walked in in the morning. I'd go to work for a couple of hours. And then I'd walk in the moment they opened it. I was done for the day until the next morning at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning, or an after hours place. It was just the way it was. So what happened was I have a relative who was in AA who invited me to drive her when her car was broken. And she took me to meetings. I would take her to meetings. And you guys would do what you always do, which is, hey, keep coming back. And I'd say, yeah, but I don't need to be here. Keep coming back. OK. You know, not a lot of people were inviting me back. You were so friendly. I just kept coming back. And there were guys there. And that's kind of what I was looking my approval and affection. And so I came. I found a club near my house. And I stayed. And I stayed at this club for a year. And I went to a meeting every single night for a year. And some of you know Bob Olson. Bob came. I think he was doing a missionary event. He came to this club. And it was the most exciting place to be outside of the bar you've ever seen. I was continuing to go to a meeting. I was going to go to a meeting every day and drink every night. Go to a meeting every day and drink every night. It was not incompatible in my mind. I never spoke. I never did more than just say, I'm Judy, and I'll pass. And I never said another word. And nobody challenged me. This part that Chris was talking about that we don't tell people, Bob Olson came and he said to this open meeting, which was filled with drama. You might. Some of you have been to clubs. You've been to clubs that work like that. Lots and lots of drama. We had our eldest member was going to kidnap his two-year-old grandson. And we had a lot of he, she, and then one guy was cutting hair in the bathroom. Somebody else was fixing cars in the parking lot. And somebody else was driving without his license, avoiding the police. And it was always great drama. And I loved it. It was my bar without booze. And so I was really addicted to the drama. And I loved the drama of this club. I had never heard some things that you might have said. I just never heard them. So Bob Olson comes. Bob O came. And he came with a friend. And he sat down. It's an open meeting. And he said, well, you know, this is an open meeting. And you can be here for strength, inspiration, wisdom, and help. But some of you might not be alcoholics. You might be overeaters. You might be gamblers. You might be Elanons. You're all welcome. You're welcome here for that inspiration. It's what we do in AA. But what we do here is we stop drinking. And that's what AA's purpose is. And I was stunned. Why had nobody ever told me? I mean, I truly was horrified. And I've been coming there every day for a year. And I'd never heard anything. They always start with a fifth. They passed the bingo balls. And whoever got the high bingo ball chaired the meeting. And we had the usual drama. One of the old guys kept the high one in his pocket. And yeah. And it was fun. But nobody had ever told me we stopped drinking at this club that I could have heard. I don't know why I couldn't hear it. But I never heard it. So when I talk about denial, this is my, you know, I'm not. I'm not. I'm not. You know. I don't get stuff till I get stuff. And I'm a very slow person to have gotten Alcoholics Anonymous. So from that point to an understanding of a first step was eight years. Now, the first year, I stopped drinking, finally. I said, I'm an alcoholic. What I meant was I'm a problem drinker. I did not mean I'm an alcoholic of the hopeless variety with no power. I did not mean I was an alcoholic who had no control over my alcohol. I meant I'm a problem drinker. And the way that meant to me was that when I drink, I drink. And when I don't drink, I don't drink. I was very clear to myself. And I didn't have a sponsor to disagree with me. Because that meant someone was telling Judy what to do. Might have disagreed with me. So I just talked to myself about this issue. And I was very clear. And I was very clear. And we decided. Now, Andrew's not the only one who's a little schizophrenic. I often think, how schizophrenic are we all? Because I used to say, I don't know what happens. I take Judy out for a drink. The next thing I know, she won't go home. And then she won't tell me what she did. And I'd say stuff like that. And my eldest son would look at me every now and then. And he'd say. Mother, you don't tell people that, do you? And I'd say, well, yeah. No, I'd not do that. Anyway, so Bob, in his own way, saved my life. Because nobody had ever put it so bluntly or so boldly that this is what we do in Alcoholics Anonymous. Nobody told me at that time what made alcoholism alcoholism. I raised my hand within two weeks with a lot of self-searching of my past, and my history, and my life. And what I was doing, and confusion. But I raised my hand as an alcoholic. And what I meant was, I'm a problem drinker. But that was enough to get me in the meeting. I didn't want to drink. I wanted to be part of this thing. I got what you were doing. And I sort of got what we were doing here. Over the next couple of years, we had the traditions and the steps. We didn't have the concept yet. We had traditions and steps. And our little meeting. We had a meeting where it was a room the size of that locker room. And there were 20 chairs in there. And 19 of those people would be smoking at the same time. And we were all smoking and talking. Smoking and talking. And you know, I've come to think of it as relief for the mentally ill. Because that's what it was for me. Certainly, you know, it helped take some of that tension away. And I didn't drink. And I don't know why. Except I think God rewards intention and fools. And I didn't drink. I don't know why. I just didn't drink. I raised my hand and did the best I could. And I listened to you. And I listened to your stories. And I identified with you. And about a year later, I began to get a sense that I probably belonged here. Took about a year. So I was reading the steps on the wall. We were having open discussion meetings. We talked about everything. And it didn't occur to me for a really long time that what I had done, and I didn't know this until I knew this, that I could talk about the steps. And I could talk about the traditions. And I could talk about what it felt like. And I could share what I thought was that if I thought it, I had done it. Maybe none of the rest of you have ever been in that place. . And I am so addicted to what I think that if I think it, I believe that I have done it. And I thought I had done the steps. Yeah. So along the way, I'd found the man of my dreams who walked in unwittingly as a brand newcomer. And we were not a couple for a long time. But I was in love. And I was in love. And I was in love. And he was in love. And we were in love together. And it was wonderful. And we had all these kids between us, all of whom were I was it was a bad scene in my home. I'm a family person. It means a lot to me. I'm raising these evil, bad kids who had been raised by a drunk or two and no parenting whatsoever. So until I got into AA, everybody I ever dated helped me pick up one of my kids from a police department. And this order to my drivers is they lived inSt6age in Berkshire still whenever they were free. So a 44-year old boy weighed within 4.5 pounds and stopped at a gym or aгр Wheeler. I didn't have the mirror. I listened to him. I listened to the music that� He was singing And he had the same smile as your kids. It was like exatamente 뭔가AMA folds. ¬-¬I fell in love. ¬- ¬ I crash the Sideguards. I'm going to a meeting. I've got a home group. Never been to a service meeting. I'm not interested in anything that doesn't talk about me, truly. And they didn't talk about me. And so I'm about, I think I was 1989, Lou and I got married. I'm sober in 1982, so seven years. And we get married, and I'm holding the hand of my beloved next to me. Because we were holding hands all the time. You know how you are? I found him. And we married, and we were so happy together. Except that I couldn't stop crying. I'm married, and he's patient. He's quiet and calm. And I'm crying constantly. And I'm sober. And I don't know what the problem is. This gets to exactly what Chris was talking about. I realized somewhere that I have never done the stuff that you have done to take this program deep enough to have changed who I am. I am a person who hasn't had a drink in seven years. And I haven't got the slightest bit of idea of how you make a partnership with another human being. I've never taken any guidance. I've never taken any deep look within myself. My program is off the wall. I can talk about it all day long. But I had never done the work of confronting my innermost self in the way that we talked about that is necessary to recover from alcoholism. And now I'm married to somebody, and the vulnerability and the fear of being married to somebody when you have no skills to get over the pain you know you're going to feel when he leaves. I'm not going to do that. The pain I know I'm going to feel makes me crazy. And I'm anticipating everything. It's awful. It's terrible. I don't have any coping skills. And I'm in Alcoholics Anonymous. And I'm dying right here in the chair. So it was a whole different journey for me than for Chris, right? I'm not on the roof splicing electricity. I'm doing other stuff that's interpersonal stuff, maybe complex emotions. I'm not on the roof splicing electricity. I'm doing other stuff that's interpersonal stuff, maybe complex emotions. I'm not on the roof splicing electricity. I'm doing other stuff that's interpersonal stuff, maybe complex emotions. I'm not on the roof splicing electricity. I'm not on the roof splicing electricity. But I'm crying. But I'm crying through every meeting we go to. And finally, my beloved says, should I get worried here somewhere? You know, and people are looking at us kind of funny. I'm like, you know, through every meeting. And I have no idea what's wrong. It's like my face is crying. But I don't know because I have never gone inside to deal with what's going on. And I don't know what's going on in there. Never. I've never gone in to look at what's the causes and conditions of alcoholism in my life. I've never done the emotional hard work, the pick and shovel work of going any deeper than that surface that I came in with. So I had this magical thing happen. A friend of ours in Denver, some of you know him, tapped me on the shoulder and said, Judy, we're going to start a big bookstore. I said, okay. I'm going to start a big book study. I'd like to know if you would come. Why? Out of all the people in Denver, he picked me to be able to come to his big book study. I have no idea. But he did. And I said, I'd really love to, but I can't because you're going to do that at 630. I'm an hour away and I have to be at work. He said, no problem. They love this program so much, we'll move it up to 6 o'clock so that you can be at the hotel at 6 o'clock. Okay. And we'll have our big book study just move it up for you because these folks love this program that much. So we got in the car at 5 o'clock every time we were headed off every week for a year to go do a big book study. What happened was in our little group of 15, 18 people, two women, what happened was we told each other our fifth steps. We walked through every line of the big book. We heard from a master what this program is about. We looked at a first step. And when I came out of that a year later, I was a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. I was a member. I was no longer a voyeur with all the right words. I was a member down to my toes. And the promise had been that what had been done with me I would do with others. So the second half of the program, the sense of community begins to kick in. I now have a responsibility. I now have a purpose. I now have a meaning. And I now have something to share. But I never had a first step because I didn't know what a first step was. No one had ever told me. And I had never invited anybody in to tell me any of that. And so, you know, when I talk about my sense of denial, it was strong in that I didn't say, you know, I thought denial meant you would look at something and say, I don't like that. But I realized that denial is more like, I don't know what's there. I didn't know a first step looked like that. I didn't understand powerlessness. I didn't understand that I could love my kids and once I had that first drink, I could never go home because I had to have another drink. And I didn't until some magical hour in the morning when suddenly it was like internal alarm bells would go off and I'd go, I've got to get home right now before the house burns down. And I'd go racing home, sometimes getting a ticket on the way. But I'd go racing home my three blocks, getting to my place to pick up my kids and wake them up and be sure they're all okay. And I don't know what that was. No matter what happened, there was a time in the night when suddenly I had to be at home. I was their only parent who was around. Their dad died of alcoholism not too many years ago. But he was gone. He wasn't present much in our life. And our life was ruined. Our life was tawdry. It was the poverty stricken life of two drunks with children they don't know how to raise. Self-centeredness in the extreme. Selfishness in everything I do. And I had no choice in that because I didn't understand that was the effect of alcoholism. When I drink, I feel powerful. Anybody else ever feel powerful when you drink? I felt strong. I felt invincible. I could start fights and sneak out as the Wonder Woman, you know. I could tackle the streets. I never felt afraid of anything. But without my booze, I'm kind of a coward, you know. I'm a chicken. And I knew it. So I didn't like to be without some booze. I loved that feeling of power. And I get that for me, that sense of powerlessness over alcohol was at the very core of it. But it took me a long time to get it because nobody had ever explained that. Nobody had ever brought me to an understanding in a way that I could hear. And I was blessed with someone I could hear. So when I talk about it today, I realize that one of the things with sponsorship that's so important is, is it somebody I can hear? It doesn't even have to be somebody I like. Is it someone I can hear? Because I have selective hearing. I can only hear some people. And until I can hear that person, I can't take what they're offering. You know, I just can't. It doesn't matter even if I like them. I can't or don't like them. It has very little to do with it. Who can I hear? But I didn't understand powerlessness. I didn't. Chris did an excellent job of explaining all that. I won't go into it again. But this sense of control, this sense of craving, I could not come home. Could not come home while there was a drink out there. And I used to say when I was stopping drinking, I moved from that to, of course, to wine. And because now I'd stopped drinking. And my drinking habit was, my daughter said, yeah, a gallon of red on one side of the door, a gallon of white on the other side of the door. She stopped drinking, all right. And I didn't know that was booze. That's wine, you know. And I didn't get that either. So we went through all kinds of phases. And I, along the way, I tried to graduate from school. It had been one of the huge, big regrets of my life. Was that I had to do it. Was that I had disappointed myself and my family by dropping out of school. And in an effort to control my drinking, I enrolled in school, got my kids to agree to kind of take care of themselves and let me carry a lot of hours. And I had gone sporadically for ten years. And so I only had, you know, 50 credits or so to do. And I went to the local school. And we'd had a fire. It's one of the things that had happened. We'd had a house fire while I was out drinking with the neighbors. And I had driven over one of the kids while I was, you know, little stuff happened. But, you know, it's alcoholic. It's alcoholic lives. Those things happen to people. I drove over my youngest kid. And my kids were so warped by now that they were planning a party. They wanted a cake with an upside-down car and a little robot mom and a little robot kid with his arms up. And I had a little kid with his arms sticking out like that. Because, yeah, they thought it would be great fun. And here's this little guy, you know, and I almost killed him. And I didn't think I could live through it without a drink. Without a drink. I didn't know what to do. But it took me from the first awakening of something's wrong with my drinking to the moment when I raised that arm with a partial surrender. It took five years. One year I drove over my son. One year. And so I said something's got to change. So I changed my office. And the next year we had the house fire. And I said something's really got to change. And I changed careers. And then the next year, I forget what the next year was. Oh, I went to school. I carried 23 hours one semester. I carried 25 hours the next semester. I did graduate. I was determined to show my kids that you could do that. And I became, instead of a daily drinker, I became a weekend drinker. Because I learned that lesson that you all knew but I didn't hear. And that was that if you take one drink, you're off. As long as I didn't drink, I was okay. I could make it through the week. But once that school ended on Friday afternoon, I'd pick up a drink and I was gone until the following Monday. One more time. My drinking had shifted to accommodate the life. And I think what I did was I came to Alcoholics Anonymous as another way to stop drinking. Without realizing I was going to stop drinking. I mean, I came to control my drinking. And now one of the things we tell people in our first step, you know, we really are pretty clear that when people come to Alcoholics Anonymous, all they have to have is a desire to stop drinking. It says that in our traditions. In the short form, anyway. And it says it a little differently in the long form. And much more powerfully. But in the short form, it says, I have a desire to stop drinking. And I think it's one of the things we do most to make everybody lie to themselves. Which of you came here wanting to stop drinking, really? What we want to do is we want to stop the disasters. And still maybe pick up a drink. So we ask people to kind of lie about that. And I was perfectly willing to lie to you or myself. You know, perfectly willing to do that. But I realized that in the long form of the third tradition, it talks about all who suffer from alcoholism. And if you don't know what alcoholism is, how are you going to learn? So I didn't know that. I didn't know what I didn't know. Five years of one disaster after another, until finally I wind up with the last house on the block that I didn't know I was walking down. Until I wound up with you. And then I didn't know what I didn't know. And it took me several years. It's not a very dramatic story. It's just my story. But I'm a really slow learner. And once I went through that little big book study, and the two of us went through our big book study, I realized that deep down inside, alcoholism is a whole mess of stuff that the program deals with. And today there's nothing that I can't take through that big book. Nothing that I can't take with a sponsor to help me deal with whatever is the disaster that life has brought to me up to this point. And I believe we can have full recovery, and I believe we can have recovery from anything. And I'm staking my life on that. Because that is the way it has appeared in my life. Slowly, by slowly for some of us. Not a whiz kid here. But every time I've had those kinds of experiences, I'm always the last one to know. Like, I just don't know what you don't know until it happens. So ever since I've been telling that little story, we'll talk more about our story over the weekend. But that was first step stuff for me. It was mysterious. It was far away. I didn't get it. And I didn't get it for several years. Thank God you all were there who knew what this was about. Because when I was willing to hear, there you were. There you were, just waiting. I'm excited about that. Thanks. . We're good with time, yeah?