Surrendering the Isms When Drinking Was Just the Symptom – Ernie G.

Welcome back, my friends, to AA Recovery Interviews.
I'm your host, Howard L., and I'm an alcoholic.
Sober since January 1st, 1988, one day at a time.
I'm grateful you've joined us.
AA Recovery Interviews is the podcast where Alcoholics Anonymous members from around the world
share their extraordinary stories of experience, strength, and hope.
To date, there are 145 episodes of AA Recovery Interviews.
I invite you to listen to them all at my website, aarecoveryinterviews.com.
They're also available on all podcast apps.
Every episode is unique, inspiring, engaging, and meaningful.
Each story is a powerful testimony of the recovery available to all in AA.
Today is an encore episode of my interview with Ernie Gee, originally broadcast in July 2021.
This is the 35th interview in my podcast series,
and features my longtime friend, Ernie Gee.
His story is a fascinating excursion into a high-class lifestyle of
fast cars, flashy clothes, and glittery nightclubs,
all underwritten by a high-paying day job and cocaine dealing on the side.
As his alcohol and cocaine use turned into alcoholism and drug addiction,
all accountability to career, family, and friends evaporated.
His risky behavior escalated until he was arrested in a DEA
sting and jailed in federal prison.
When he got out, he managed to avoid cocaine, aided by increasing use of alcohol.
Meanwhile, his marriage and parenthood suffered irreparably.
Separation from his wife and daughter soon occurred and culminated in divorce.
Left alone and still addicted, Ernie returned to his nightclubs every night of the week to find
relief, but those days were gone. Incomprehensible demoralization was hastening his demise until his
moment of clarity during a visit to his largest business client, who also paid for Ernie's
inpatient treatment. From there, three AA members, including his present-day sponsor,
pulled Ernie into a program of hard work, prayer, and service. His relationships with his daughter
and ex-wife finally began to heal. Today, nearly 16 years later, he is still sober,
and his life reflects the willingness of a man who unconditionally allowed the grace of God and
the program of AA.
There's a lot more of Ernie's story that you're going to enjoy, some with which you may identify.
Like all my other interviews, it's both unique and entertaining, while conveying the serious
message of possibilities and hope available in Alcoholics Anonymous. So, enjoy listening to
this episode of AA Recovery Interviews with my friend and AA brother, Ernie Gee.
I'm Ernie. I'm an alcoholic.
Hi, Ernie.
Hi, Howard.
I'm so glad you could do this this morning.
And I'm so happy that we were able to arrange this. I know we've been looking at our schedules
and trying to match things up. So, this is really special. You know, I first met you, Ernie,
I guess it was when you had been sober, maybe, what, six months, maybe? Or does that sound about
right?
Randy's my sponsor, and Randy's been taking me to the Sains meeting and the Sunday night meeting
since I got sober, almost week one, week two.
I remember those first few weeks and months of your sobriety. One of the things that really
impressed me about you at that time was that you were in the process, I believe, of raising
a daughter, or you had a daughter at that point that you were essentially raising. And that's
pretty extraordinary for a man to be raising a child in the early days of sobriety. And it
really impressed me.
Can you tell me how that worked at that time?
Yes. So, I was released from my inpatient treatment center, and George had requested that both my
sponsor, Randy, and my great-grandsponsor, Steve and Em, come to my house and do an inspection for
drugs and alcohol, and do an inspection for contraband to make sure the house was safe.
And the house was clean. And so...
Did they have an AA search warrant? That's what I want to know.
Well, I'll tell you what, they missed something pretty important. They did come and spent a whole
Saturday morning going through my house and clearing out the debris. God gave me two serious
tests during my sobriety. I think there's a second test I'll mention later. I will tell you this,
the guys came in and did an inspection for contraband.
And several months later, a little bindle of cocaine fell out of a book or something at some
point, which was an early test. But the reason I bring any of this up was you asked me about my
being a father in early sobriety and what that was about. And it all stems from Steve and Em,
who was a father, and as luck would have it, had a daughter the same age as my daughter.
Oh, wow.
And when he came to my house and he saw how I was...
He was living, he was really disgusted and very unhappy.
Uh-huh.
And what he said to me on that Saturday morning is, it's time to be a man, Ernie. And I need you
to get a maid over here first thing Monday morning to clean up this house because you are a father of
a young lady and this house needs to be in impeccable order and needs to be a clean house
for your daughter. Number one. Number two, you're a married man. I need you to cause no further damage
with your daughter.
To your wife. I said, how do I do that? He says, mostly just keep your mouth shut and make sure
your wife and your daughter have the money they need to survive and live off of. And number three,
and this is most important, you will always do what's in the best interest of your daughter.
And he was pointing his finger in my face. He was pissed off.
I'll bet.
I was really fortunate. I had Steven and Bobby J.
at a weekday men's meeting at 7 a.m. that I went to. And Steven repeated that mantra to me.
Umpteen times, you will cause no further damage with your wife and you'll do what's in the best
interest of your daughter. And so that probably had a lot to do with me bringing up the fact that
I was a father, you know, in early sobriety.
Yeah. Now, so when we're talking about early sobriety, how long have you been sober? What's
your sobriety day?
Sobriety date is August 2nd, 2005.
Okay. So you've got, you're coming up on 16 years?
16 years on the 2nd.
Very, very cool. Well, I know Bobby J. and I've gone to meetings with him for years. I have not
recently so much, but in the early days, certainly, and Steven M. as well, and also Randy M. And
those three fellows, just between the three of them are like, they're amazing with the way they
work their program and the no-nonsense approach. Now, you mentioned your, you know, your, your
wife. Were you guys still married at that point?
Yes, we were still married. My, my wife, having grown tired of my act, had moved out with my
daughter.
So you were separated.
We were separated. That's correct.
So you were separated when Randy took you to your first meetings of AA?
Correct. I was separated when I went into the rehab facility.
How long were you in rehab for?
I was inpatient for a couple of weeks. And then, you know,
outpatient thing for the prescribed period, whatever that was, four weeks or like.
Your exposure to AA, was that prior to or during or after your inpatient experience?
After my inpatient experience. I, I had heard of AA a few times prior to going to rehab,
but I don't know. I had no idea there was any solution to my problem. I really didn't know.
I'm familiar with the treatment center that you went to, and I know that they have
inside meetings. They've got an alumni group that does AA.
AA in, in that particular facility. So you were exposed to AA to some extent before you even got
out. And then you did your IOP once you were out in conjunction with AA?
Yes. So once I was in my IOP, I was released on a Monday. Two days later on that Wednesday,
which was supposed to be my first day with my daughter. I was supposed to have my daughter
that night.
Yeah.
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Ernie, there's an incredible men's meeting tonight that I really strongly urge you to
attend. In fact, I need you to be at this meeting. And I thanked Randy for the suggestion
and told him, yes, I'd really like to go, but tonight's my night with my daughter and
she needs me and I need to be there for her.
And Randy said, but your daughter needs is a sober man.
I really, really think you should come to this meeting and make arrangements to see her on another night.
Wow.
Yeah.
I can see that that still kind of chokes you up to think back to that, huh?
It does.
And at the time, it angered me that he was telling me that the meeting trumped.
And I wanted to curse him.
I may have, I don't know, but I went to the meeting.
So by that point, you and your wife were separated, but you had it worked out when you would get to see your daughter?
Yes, I had it worked out.
And I don't think it was, I don't know if it was a legal separation or not.
I don't recall.
I don't think so.
We were just kind of working it out.
I see.
She was mad as a hornet, of course.
And wasn't too sympathetic.
And I missed my daughter's first day of school because I was in rehab.
How old was she?
She was in kindergarten, so five or six.
So what had things gotten like in your behavior that led up to the separation?
What kind of things were you doing?
And when did the bottom start to fall out?
Basically, it was my comings and goings.
Coming home super late, not at all, that kind of stuff.
Not being where I'm supposed to be, those sorts of things.
And it was one of those weekends where I was supposed to go on a trip that I never took.
I just hung around so I could, you know, party, you know, without any accountability.
And one of my wife's friends spotted me about town and let her know that I was in town.
I was supposed to be in Vegas playing a poker tournament.
Hmm.
That was the catalyst for that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
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Yeah.
That was the catalyst for her moving out.
That was the final straw.
Had she suspected anything or called you on the carpet on any of your behavior prior to that?
I'm sure she did.
You know, we partied together.
We were, you know, we were a pretty good team.
Sure.
The difference being you could go out and have a good time with friends for the most part and not have to continue on.
She's not an addict of my variety, you know, that sort of thing.
I get it.
I get it.
I get it.
So, you mentioned the word addict.
Which substance was the prevailing for you?
Oh, cocaine.
Yeah, cocaine.
Cocaine brought me lots of trouble.
It culminated in a rehab, but that wasn't my first.
There were problems before that.
Were there?
Yeah, there were.
When did the problems first start?
I guess the problems with consequences happened in Dallas in the mid-80s.
I found I could gain lots of popularity by peddling the substance.
And that culminated with me eventually getting locked up for a long while.
So, you were dealing cocaine when you were up there.
Was that mostly to support your own using or was that how you were making your income?
No, I had a full-time professional job that was a fairly well-paying job.
It was more about popularity in nightclubs.
That was the driving force.
I was more passionate about my nightclubs than I was about my own career.
Yeah, cocaine has a way of doing that to people, doesn't it?
Yeah, it does.
And they kind of go hand in hand.
It moves you off the trajectory that you might have been on.
It's a horrible drug.
What I like to tell particularly young guys that I work with is don't sabotage your life like I did myself.
I feel like I started sabotaging my life when I was 13.
Yeah.
So, when you were 13...
What was the sabotaging that was going on and what led up to that sabotaging?
Was it something that occurred in your family of origin?
I've had some discussions around that topic, too, because unlike many people,
I don't feel like I have those sorts of family issues that may drive people to want to escape.
Rather than...
I was super popular in school all the way through.
And I was a jock.
And I was...
And I was good at sports.
I'm 5'9", and I was 5'9", when I was 12.
So, it gave me a big advantage in sports.
Yeah, I'll bet.
And so, I was very, very popular in school, you know.
And when I got to junior high school...
In California, junior high school starts in 7th grade.
So, it goes 7th, 8th, and 9th.
So, I got to 7th grade, and I was very popular.
But that wasn't enough.
There was a group called The Stoners.
The Stoners, yeah.
The Stoners.
And so, for some reason, I wanted to...
Gain some popularity.
I wanted to join that group.
So, I did join that group, so to speak.
And that's when I started smoking pot.
At my junior high school, there was a designated smoking area.
And there was even a yard lady there.
But it was mostly a pot smoking...
Cigarette smoking, pot smoking area.
I never smoked cigarettes until much later in my life.
But that's when I started smoking pot.
That was the gateway, so to speak.
Was that something that other jocks were doing?
Or was the smoking pot and the moving over to The Stoners group,
did that pull you away from or separate you from the jocks?
Did you go from being a jock to being a stoner?
Or were you able to maintain both identities?
I was able to maintain both identities,
but none of the other jocks were stoners at that point.
By the time I got to high school, that had changed.
But in 7th grade, it was just me.
All the jocks were pretty straight-laced people.
It was just me.
Yeah.
I was able to maintain both, but my friendships changed.
I stopped hanging around like after school with the jocks
and started hanging around with The Stoners.
And smoking pot, as I recall from my own experience,
made me less ambitious about the things I had passion for prior to smoking pot.
Did your interest in being a jock wane as a result of your hanging with The Stoners and smoking pot?
No, no.
I love sports.
Going back to when I was...
As soon as I could read about...
Third or fourth grade, nine or ten,
I would race my father to the sports page every morning at 6 a.m.
and read it cover to cover.
And then I read the front page.
I love sports.
So, no, it did not affect my love for sports or my participation.
I played in all the sports all the way through school.
But what it did do is wane my passion a little bit for school.
I was in a star math class.
But I remember in 7th grade, I went from the star math class.
I dropped down one level just to make my life...
Life easier so I could party more, be more social.
That was that.
Yeah, so partially answer your question.
Yeah.
Well, I've heard that a lot from the people I've interviewed that they were good students up to a point.
And then they started getting involved in alcohol and drugs and it moved them off the mark.
Some it didn't.
Some were still able to.
I mean, I was able to excel academically even though I was smoking pot all the time.
What role did alcohol play in your early pot smoking days?
Sure.
Yeah.
So, you know, both my parents were alcoholics.
Uh-huh.
And we had a fully stocked bar in our house.
Cases of everything.
Vodka, scotch, bourbon.
They buy it by their case.
And so, drinking was accepted and normal in my household.
And the rule was it's okay to have a drink as long as it's in the house.
Yeah.
And so, it was pretty casual.
Yeah.
In my house.
So, we, you know, I think that was sort of the early catalyst, you know, for drinking.
Uh-huh.
And I remember my very, very first bad episode with alcohol.
I was in seventh grade.
I went to the seventh grade dance.
And I poured, I got a 16-ounce bottle of Coke bottle filled up with vodka, pure vodka.
And I pretty much chugged the whole thing between my house and the time I got to the dance.
Uh-huh.
And at some point.
At some point at the dance, I realized I was like just really, really drunk.
And I ran all the way home.
And it was a long run.
Several miles.
Yeah.
Two or three miles from the dance to my house.
Went, snuck it back into my house.
And then threw my guts up.
Big time.
Just horrible.
Yeah.
And it was such a horrible memory experience.
I didn't drink vodka again until I was in my late 30s.
So, I was 13.
That's how bad it scarred me.
Yeah.
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I'm pretty sure I drank the next weekend.
I just switched it to something different.
So, like a lot of people, you had a terrible first experience, but yet you couldn't wait
to do it again.
Couldn't wait to do it again.
Couldn't wait to change the way I feel.
So, you were hanging with people who were drinking and smoking.
You were still participating in sports.
And academically, you were still doing pretty good.
Were there any signs that you were starting to have a problem with that or it was causing
problems?
Or what kind of consequences were occurring while you were in junior high and high school
that might have pointed to there being a bigger problem with drugs and alcohol?
There were actually no consequences during my junior or high school years.
I always had a goal of getting A's in the courses that I cared about and at least B's
in the courses I didn't.
And I knew I wanted to go to college.
Sure.
Sure.
I knew I wanted to keep those targets and do that.
One thing that looking back is that we used to go to all these parties and I used to get
in these brawls, these fights all the time.
One of my friends, he was an Irish guy who couldn't drink and I created a little joke
with him.
He joked to me about the shortest book ever written and he called it, you know, the book
on Italian war heroes because I'm Italian.
So, I had a counter joke.
I said, well, that book is about as short as Great Irish Drinkers.
He was a bad alcoholic.
He passed away.
He was my first friend who OD'd on drugs and alcohol.
Oh.
He would get us in a fight every, almost every single Friday night.
I mean like hundreds of fights.
So that would be the indication that there was a problem, all the fights, all the brawls.
So that was the sign for sure.
But nobody knew about it.
You know, I never got messed up.
I never got any broken arms and legs or cuts in my face and stuff per se.
And so.
Did you ever get arrested for that?
Did your folks ever find out?
No, but you triggered a memory, Howard, that I forgot about.
In seventh grade, we were smoking pot at Pioneer Park and some cops came up and arrested us.
And there was no consequence of that.
I don't recall if it was a court thing or if the cops just brought us home and told
our parents, you know, back in those days, things were a little different.
But other than that, no DWIs, no car crashes, no car accidents.
I had friends who crashed their cars into tree stumps.
Yeah.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That, you know, happened a lot in high school, a few times in high school, stuff like that.
But.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So you were one of those charmed alcoholic drug addicts, I like to call them, that were
able to get away with all of that behavior without DWIs, without getting arrested, without
the consequences.
And it sounds like you had umpteen opportunities to get in trouble, but you didn't.
Did that influence the way you felt about your, the impunity with which you use drugs
and alcohol?
That's a.
That's a.
That's a.
That's a.
really good point. The way I viewed myself, you know, post-college is, you know, here I am. I'm
a young master of the universe. I make six figures. I work hard and I play hard. I got, you know,
I dress in nice clothes and I've got fancy friends. And how could I have a problem? How
could I be doing all that if I had a problem? Yeah. So you continued that behavior, you said,
through college. Did it deviate very much from the kind of behavior you had in high school?
Were you fighting as much? Were you getting drunk and stoned as much or more? So what were
the kind of groups you were hanging with in college and how did they influence your later
behavior? Yeah. College was pretty standard, you know, drinking, you know, after intramurals games
and, you know, with the guys in the dorm and that sort of stuff. But here's the thing I discovered.
I realized fairly early on the game, I really didn't like pot. It made me paranoid. And so I
actually sort of just slowly but surely started smoking less and less pot, started turning down
the bong hits because I just, I didn't like the way it made me feel. Sure. I get that. You know,
the pot smoking wane just, you know, every year just got less and less and less until I finally
came to the point that I, I hate pot. And I would, I would make this comment even right before rehab,
you could put a bale of hydro in my living room, come back in one year and there wouldn't be one
gram missing because I just didn't like, didn't like the drug.
Yeah.
Yeah. Did the moving away from pot movie more towards alcohol or other substances?
Yeah. So, um, there were, you know, there was no cocaine in college. It wasn't on the radar.
It was really, really expensive. Yeah. You know, I started working at a nightclub my senior year
in high school and there was a drug dealer there. And so, you know, sometimes he'd front me a little
bit and I would be able to sell a little bit so I could afford some of myself. That's what cocaine
started creeping in a little bit. Yeah. Uh, probably like senior year in college, but I would
study,
it's a library until about 10 or 11 o'clock and I'd go out almost every night, but it was just
pretty much, it was mostly just drinking. I wasn't really a sloppy drunk per se.
Yeah. That's interesting. So, so once again, you live the charmed life of an alcoholic through
your college, uh, but now cocaine is looming. Was it exclusively snorting cocaine? You,
you weren't doing anything with crack or mainlining or anything like that, were you?
No, I wasn't. There was something called free base, which is crack
for crack was crack. And there was a few stints of that. You know, after college, I went back to
San Francisco and then from San Francisco, uh, moved to Dallas and then Dallas is where things
really blasted off the cocaine. And there was some free base. It was kind of a hard thing to do and
cook, cook it up. And so I was a snorting guy. So you mentioned going back to San Francisco
and then coming back to Dallas and you'd mentioned earlier about dealing cocaine up in Dallas and
also being arrested and going to jail. How many years after you were out of college was all that
going on? Oh yes. About four or five years after college.
Okay. So you're working in your career four or five years after you were selling, uh, selling
dope on the side. What were the circumstances under which you were arrested and went to,
went to jail? Yes. So, um, it probably saved my life, but, but what happened was I was living in
Dallas and me and my girlfriend and we were going to nightclubs and we lived for nightclubs. I've
always lived for nightclubs. I've, I've moved cities for nightclubs. I moved from San Francisco
to Dallas for nightclubs. The Dallas nightclub scene was way better than San Francisco. It
wasn't even close.
Yeah.
And then I decided to move to LA for a nightclub. I was living in Dallas and then I took a job in LA
to go to that nightclub scene. And then my boss said, why don't you go to New York? You can stay
at the same company and New York's got better nightclubs in Dallas. So I said, yeah, that's a
good idea. And I won't have to switch jobs. So I reneged on a job that I had accepted in LA and
stayed with the company I was working for and, um, took a job in New York and I had a little entourage,
you know, we were wheeling and dealing cocaine, you know, and I knew everybody, I knew everybody
at the nightclub.
Mm-hmm.
So I pulled up to the nightclub to see what part, but anyway, I was moving to New York. So
world life was going to change. And so we're, I'm in New York for six weeks waiting to get
an apartment. And then I get the apartment, the movers are coming to get our stuff in Dallas.
I go back to Dallas to, uh, wait for the movers. It was like a two day thing.
Yeah.
And my entourage had arranged for one last deal. And it turned out that deal was with the DEA.
Had they been following you for a while?
Yes. Yes. It's, it's so funny how, you know, you'd save yourself,
because you're, when you're doing coke, you get paranoid and you say, you know,
those weren't two G-men in a suit walking in the parking lot of my, my garage. It couldn't be.
And then one day I was driving out of my, my apartment in Dallas. I come up and there's,
you know, and I, and I stop and I look both ways and there's a guy on the other side of the street
snapping a picture of me and my Corvette as I'm pulling out. Like that guy couldn't be taking a
picture of me. And it, even on the day we got busted. So that cannot be a helicopter trailing
us around the city of Dallas. Oh, yes, it could. It was, you know, and so.
Oh my gosh.
You think, you know, I'm just being paranoid and guess what? I wasn't.
Right.
I wasn't paranoid. Yeah. So I went back and we were set up by the DEA and then it's, you know,
how five of us got arrested and five of us ended up going to jail. Yeah.
Wow. So what kind of sentence did you get from that?
Five years with, with three years special parole. I'll give you a little fun fact. So I went to
Lewisburg, uh, federal prison. Uh, federal prison. Uh, federal prison. Uh, federal prison. Uh, federal
prison. Uh, federal prison. Uh, federal prison. Uh, federal prison. Uh, federal prison. Uh, federal prison.
And, um, it's a very impressive prison. The gutters are made out of copper and the scales
of justice are imprinted on these copper gutters every three feet. I think Al Capone may have stayed
there. It was pretty impressive place, but I had a good job. I, you know, I was being a white collar
guy. I got to work for the warden. That was, that's where I worked, you know, during the day
and did paperwork, uh, you know, for the warden. So it wasn't bad, but it wasn't bad at all. Worked
out every day, read a million books. So you were the Shawshank redemption guy.
Working for the warden.
Yeah. Because yeah, that's true. That's true.
So how long did you spend, uh, actually behind bars?
About 30 months. Then I was procured to New York city. We had moved to New York
and you know, it was kind of funny how even that happened. So, you know, we got busted in Dallas
and I hired like one of the top criminal attorneys in all of Dallas and all the money I had made,
you know, wheeling and dealing, I gave him and he got me no true build. You know, we were indicted
by the state of Texas. And so I'm living in New York thinking everything is pretty cool.
And then about one year later, I get called up to the HR department and I really thought
I was going to get a promotion because I was doing pretty well. And I get up there and it was the two
same DEA agents that arrested me one year earlier. I had been indicted federally.
Ouch.
And my attorney had actually told me that could happen and it did. So, what you learn is
pretty damn easy to, if you hire attorneys and spend money to get off a state deal, almost
impossible to get off a federal deal, no matter what. My dad had told me a long time ago,
ah, I'm too old to go to jail because I told my dad what I was doing. So, I'm too old to go to jail.
And he says, you know, they're smarter than you and they got more resources, you know,
and he was right.
Yeah. So, what was the outcome of that federal case?
Yes. And, you know, so I went back and, you know, we were watching Miami Vice a lot back
during those days and I thought it was Don Johnson. I had a Don Johnson jacket. I mean,
almost exactly the same as his. I drove a black Corvette and we used to, you know,
this would watch, you know, Miami Vice and then we'd go out partying. And so, I thought I was done.
And that was my downfall because I had like, I had a, like a sawed-off shotgun in my car and they
used that as leverage to get me to. So, you might be able to bullshit your way out of the drug thing
because I didn't get caught. My entourage got busted, not me. So, you might be able to shake
that. You're not going to shake this gun that was in your car. So, I ended up pleading guilty and
got that five-year sentence.
Okay. So, that was another five-year sentence or that was the original sentence you're talking
about?
That was the original. That was the original. Yeah. Because
of five years.
The first one, the state beef, I was looking from zero to 99. Texas is not a place to get
busted for drugs. I was looking at the maximum five to 99. It was pretty hellacious. But again,
no true bill. So, I got off the state indictment.
You were off the state indictment and moved right into the federal indictment.
Yeah. Federal, yeah. And so.
So, 30 months behind bars, you're paroled. Did that experience in prison,
did that change your thinking about what you had been doing? Did
it make you want to stop doing it? Or from an addiction standpoint, did you still feel that
you were addicted while you were serving your time? What did that look like?
As funny as this may sound, I never thought I was addicted. What did I learn from
that experience? I learned that I didn't want to be in jail. So, what did I learn? I learned not to
sell drugs. That was crystal clear, right? I learned that lesson really well. Never again,
not selling drugs, not doing that.
And so, I just wanted to get out of there as quick as possible and resume my life.
And then when I got out, I was on parole. And parole in New York City was no big deal. The
guy was so busy, didn't even have time to worry about me. But then I moved to Houston about a
year later. And when I got to Houston, the parole officer, Rocky P, he used to show up on my
apartment at eight o'clock in the morning and piss test me or show up at work and random piss test
me. So, now I could drink. Wow.
There was no rule against drinking, it was just no drugs.
Right.
So, the entire time while I was on parole, I never used drugs ever. Until,
I was on special parole for five years. I went four years and 11 months without using any drugs.
On the 12th month of the fourth year, I was at a nightclub and I finally broke down and used some
coke. You had to sweat out a piss test. Because with special parole, you come back and do the
whole thing. They can make you do the whole thing over. But be burned by parole.
Wow.
So, I drank but no drugs and no DWIs to the stand. Never got a DWI, luckily, of course.
That's amazing. So, while you were in prison and after you got out,
you never acknowledged a drug problem, you acknowledged a drug selling problem.
Correct. Nobody ever suggested I get help, do a 12 step program. That was never
suggested to me, anybody at all, or if it was, it may have been very briefly. It was, nobody, family-wise,
wise or girlfriend wise. Yeah. Were they bringing AA behind bars at all at that time? Did you
notice? I don't know. Probably. Yeah. One of my earliest guests, Tom D, got sober in prison and
was sober for 20 years before he got out. And this is an amazing story, but he credits AA in prison
with saving his life. You got out and so you went back to behavior. Instead of going back to cocaine
immediately, you waited to the very end of your parole to do it. What was the outcome?
Did you get caught again or what was next after that? Yeah. So after that, I just was working
pretty hard, got my license, playing a lot of golf. I was like a four trick pony. Work, go to the gym,
play golf and go nightclubbing. That was my four trick pony. Those were my four passions and I did
them all really, really well. This is while I was in Houston. And so what I'll say about...
Drinking all the way through, all my buddies drank. And so a fair amount of drinking.
Cocaine use, it was only as available. It wasn't... None of my friends did cocaine. And so
hit and miss. But if you look back, it was probably a slow, pretty slow acceleration.
Here and there, a little here and there more. And it kind of started snowballing. And then
when I met my wife, we started partying pretty good. And then it really amped up quite a bit.
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You're going to love it. And we're back. Did your alcohol use supplant your use of
cocaine during the years that you weren't using cocaine very frequently? Did you,
did you do that?
Did you drink like a drug addict, or would you not have considered yourself a problem drinker at
that time?
Yeah, yeah. I had discipline in terms of, you know, only drinking at nightclub. I didn't drink,
I wouldn't be drinking at home alone, that sort of thing. Pre-heavy cocaine use,
my drinking was pretty much, you know, limited to nightclubs and, you know, after the golf game,
that sort of stuff. Looking back on it, you know, the drinking sabotaged my life because,
you know, going out nightclubbing,
and drinking, and then you wake up, you're not, you're not full strength the next day for work.
I was sabotaging. So I'd say, yeah, it was probably a substitute for changing the way I feel.
This is the point, I guess, in your story where you met your wife. You met her in a nightclub?
Yes. So I like to say I met her at the gym.
Okay.
A nightclub was more accurate.
So how many years prior to your getting sober had you guys gotten married?
Well, we had been together 10 years before I got sober.
We hadn't been married the whole time. We've been married about half that time.
You guys first got together 26, 25, 26 years ago.
We got together about 95-ish, and I got sober in 2005, right?
So did you just continue on with what you were doing, but now you were with somebody?
Yeah, yeah. We liked to go out dancing and listening to music. I never thought my ex-wife
had a problem because she was never really a big drinker, but she was like life of the party
because she had the personality and the, you know, she was vivacious and fun,
and people liked her and liked us as a couple. So it was more about just, you know, going out and
just having a fun time partying, and she liked to dance too. So it was more about dressing up
pretty and going out and nightlife, you know?
So Ernie and his girlfriend or Ernie and his wife, who are, they're beautiful people,
they're the life of the party. Is that a pretty accurate description?
That was a pretty good description. You know, all of our friends were of the same sort of ilk,
liked to dress up, dancing, and have fun. So it was, so yeah, so I think we were just
considered.
Part of, you know, part of the fun bunch. What separated us probably from an average couple is
we would like to do it every weekend, not just once a month or something like that.
So as we move towards your sobriety date, when did you first notice that the wheels
were starting to get a little bit wobbly? And what did you attribute that to?
So during the, during those nightclubbing episodes,
finally ran into some people that also liked cocaine as much as I do.
And so...
And so they, you know, so they had access, I knew where to get the cocaine. And so my cocaine use
really started to accelerate late nineties. Took a, took a break from that when our daughter was
born. We, we managed to take a year off from partying and then sort of kicked back in.
Started to take over my life, I would say around maybe 2003. And, and I remember exactly
what guaranteed I was going to wind up either dead or in rehab or in jail was three things
happened. You know, step one was I went on my own business-wise. I left the company I worked for and
started my own practice. So I call that, you know, in terms of accountability, one giant
lop of accountability was, was removed. Step two, my father passed away. So I used to go visit my
father two or three times a week. I moved him from San Francisco to Houston and...
He looked around the corner and he had a girlfriend and I spent a lot of time over there,
but he passed away, you know, around age 80. And so that was step two of accountability taken away.
So how long were you working on your own when your dad passed?
Maybe a year or something like that. But then I'm really out of control. I was in really,
really bad shape for his funeral. I mean, it's pretty embarrassing. I look back and I go,
I'm so cringeworthy. It was really pathetic. And that reminds me, you know, he was, you know,
you know, he's in hospice.
And I take off to go party and he passes away, you know, that next morning.
It's the same thing to my mom. It was, you know, 10, 15 years earlier, you know,
I went to San Francisco for a party when my mom was basically going into hospice. I mean,
you know, we talked about that selfish, self-centered, self-seeking,
you know, root of our problem. I had the isms in spades. I think I'm a really good example of
the isms being way greater than the actual drink part of it.
You know, drinking was just a symptom of the real problem. And the real problem was just all the
stuff that we identify in the big book. Cocaine was way worse. The alcohol was not good, but
the isms, my God. And so, you know, I think I tell that story, you know, I bailed on both my
parents when they were in hospice situation to party. And so, he passes away. And then,
so that's two out of three accountability. I was in bad shape by my dad's funeral. At that time,
I was like out of control.
Time period after that's when my wife left me. And then, I had no accountability whatsoever.
And then, it just took me six to 12 months to wind up in rehab.
Did you know she was going to be leaving? Has she threatened to leave on certain
occasions? Or did it take you completely by surprise? Or
was it something that you knew about deep down but weren't able to really admit to yourself?
I think it caught me by surprise. I was becoming quite the jerk
and horrible father and husband.
Just thinking about myself.
But yes, it did catch me by surprise. I didn't think she would do it.
Did she move out or did she kick you out?
She moved out. Yeah.
She did. Wow. Do you remember what her parting words or what she told you when she
left that sticks with you?
She was just mad as a hornet. So, you know, that final weekend where, you know,
I was supposed to be on a trip that I wasn't, you know, that was the final straw. Just like she had
it. Final straw. That's just...
You know, no, I tried to talk her out of it. No reconsideration. Like, nope, you know, you know,
had it with you. So...
Huh. And that was how long before rehab?
I would say six to 12 months. I don't remember exactly.
So, you had a period of time in there where your three-step route to perdition allowed you
no accountability to anybody. So, did you really go to town at that point? Or was the
moving out of your wife, did that...
Yeah.
Yeah.
Interfere with that?
Yeah. That was full. That was just full steam ahead. Seven days a week.
Oh.
Not six, seven. Seven days a week.
Seven.
Drinking. Yeah. And so, when anybody who does a lot of coke, you get really high,
strong and nervous. And so, alcohol cuts the edge. So, my drinking really ramped up quite a bit
that last year to cut the edge. And so, I drank so much that... And I knew I didn't want to go back
to prison, so I always had– it either took a taxi or wrecker home. I used to take the taxi.
And then I realized I didn't like not having the car the next morning.
So, I got smart and I started having a wrecker taking me home every single night. You know,
I always shut the var down. Like every night, seven days a week. Shut it down at 2 AM,
have a wrecker drive me back home, drop me off, a couple of houses down because it's loud,
clang clang clang i didn't want my next door next door neighbor to know so um but right but i've got
to that got to that point where i needed to have a record bring me home every night that's pretty
pretty ingenious i like that that's a i i never thought about it one way to keep i i used to have
a friend who said that i've got an absolute fail-safe method for not getting a dwi and that
is don't drive you know so so he would get all of his arrests for pi you know public intoxication
so well that that's interesting so what was the the moment of truth what was the actual
turning point that you just said i need help i gotta do something yeah it happened the the day
i went into rehab i me and my well so the night before i remember the night before uh july 31st
2005 it was a sunday and um so i got that morning when i woke up late i thought i was
gonna go see the man picked up my cocaine went to my office and i remember i remember i was playing
cards with two homeless people back in my office you know a guy and a girl and i had we're playing
some cards i'm a card player and um right and i remember i wouldn't give him any of my drugs but
i gave him i gave him alcohol and i was alone i was very lonely i was just super super lonely
and then i then i went home
and I was lonely. So I went to a nightclub, and I had a female friend who didn't have any
romantic interest in me, but I talked her into letting me spend the night at her house that
night. And I had a business meeting the next morning at 7 a.m. early. And so I brought my
suit, and I met my business partner at my biggest client's office at 7 a.m., and we walked up in
my business, and Tommy said to my partner, can I have a moment with Ernie? And he pulled me into
his office and said, say, I've been acting really, really strangely this last year or two,
and I couldn't figure out what it was, and it finally dawned on me, do you have a monkey on
your back? And I just started crying my ass off because I was really, I had that, you know,
the book talks about, you know, that demoralization, and that loneliness and demoralization
that, you know, few men feel.
I was there. I had that, you know, I was just really, I was just really, really sad and lonely.
And I just started crying and said, yes. He goes, do you want help? And I said, yes. And he said,
good. He called up his insurance agent who recommended a facility for us to go to. He
drove me to the facility and wrote a check for 15 grand for work I hadn't done yet so I could
go into that facility and get help. Wow. Wow. Now this is your client who's doing this for you.
This is my, this is my client.
I call him my guardian angel.
Sounds like it. That's amazing. What a neat moment of truth to, to go in and see your largest client
who, did, did you believe all along he never thought you had a problem? I mean, did you feel
like you were getting away with it the whole time he was a client of yours?
He's a really smart guy. I really suspected, you know, he knew something was up and I just thought
maybe because he liked me, he was cutting me a little slack. And plus I had a business partner
who really-
Ah.
Was helpful, you know, for, you know, keeping things looking, keeping the work, uh, uh, you know,
good quality. So.
Yeah. It sounds like, so as a guardian angel, he would necessarily know what he was doing. And
so he gets you checked in. You were there for two weeks, you mentioned earlier, and then you did
IOP. Did you do that for six weeks after, uh, or how long after?
You know, I don't recall, I don't recall the prescribed period, four weeks, six weeks. It
was quite a while, but I did that faithfully. I did.
I did everything by the book. I was really, it was, it was a miracle. You know, that, that was a
God thing, you know, that God, you know, what, the one thing I tell my sponsees, um, is I've done two
things really, really well when I got, you know, I didn't drink. Number one, most foremost, number
two, I really surrendered really well. I, if you recall, I mean, I never, you heard me, you never
heard me say, I think, you know, when I got called on meetings, I would say I would report I'm on step
one.
I'm working with my sponsor. I'm in step one. I didn't really even talk too much. I just reported
what step I was on as, as, as my sponsor told me to do. So if someone's eating your lunch,
tell it, you can go ahead and tell it. But otherwise just tell them what step you're on.
Yeah. And people won't, people won't know what, what you're, what's going on for you. If you don't
tell them it's so easy in the three to five minutes that you have to share in any given
meeting to talk about anything, but what's really going on. So I really admire that. And that to me,
uh, demonstrates the real importance.
Of a good, a good fundamental sponsor. I get that. So let me ask you this question, Ernie,
do you think that based on your experience and what you've experienced over the years with AA,
do you think you could have gotten sober in AA without going through treatment or
was treatment kind of a vital first step for you to have to go through before you could get to
your willingness to engage in AA?
I think I definitely needed treatment. I think I needed to be off the streets
for a period of time.
That was just so helpful to be check out of life. All, you know, no phone, no contacts and really
just, yeah, that, that break from life. Yeah. I highly recommend it. Um, anybody who, if he was
given a try to do it on their own failed once or twice, that's much easier.
So as time has gone on, so you've been sober going on 16 years now, and that's a,
that's a heck of a long time. Um,
were there times during that period between when you first got sober and came into AA and
along the way, or even up to today that your sobriety was severely tested or, or your willingness
to stay sober was stretched to its limit. And, and how did you handle those situations if you had
that? Um, I'll tell you about the biggest test. It happened on a Saturday morning. I,
I drove to the office and no one was there. Parking lot was empty, covered parking,
parked my car, went to the trunk, got my briefcase out. I always keep my briefcase in the trunk. So
it doesn't get stolen. I go into the office, work for an hour, 90 minutes, come back downstairs,
go to the trunk, open the trunk, stick the briefcase in the trunk, look down.
And I see a giant bindle of cocaine, like, like an eight ball worth, a big bindle sitting right
there at my feet in the trunk not in the trunk on the ground on the ground on the ground oh my gosh
and i'm thinking what are the odds that there would be this giant bindle eight ball of cocaine
sitting there um you know at the foot of my trunk which i don't think was there when i
this morning like i just i just seemed so improbable so improbable that that would
happen and i'm all these thoughts are going through my head what should i do what do i do
you know you know do i do i throw it away you know you know what what what's the next right
thing to do i i i was like just didn't know what to do didn't i just you know i didn't know what
to do and i had these thoughts you know should i call my sponsor yeah i probably should call my
sponsor
how long were you sober at this point uh six months and ultimately i decided the best thing
to do was to do nothing drive away and call my sponsor and that's what i did i just i didn't
touch it i just was backed up and pulled away i thought maybe i was being set up you know by my
by somebody to get busted to get i i didn't i just thought i was being set up somehow some way
and i just thought the best move was not don't touch it just drive away call your sponsor and
that's what i did i jumped in the car and i called uh and called my sponsor
you
did you look around for it the next day no no no no no no it's um i've been lucky you know
i have the relief that the big book talks about you know recall like a hot flame you know i'd
like to i always mention that today i you know if god came down to me right now and say ernie
you just had this great interview with howard you're really in a great place you can resume
drinking like a gentleman i would i would thank god you know for the offer and say no um um i
don't need a sprinkler i don't need a sprinkler i don't need a sprinkler i don't need a sprinkler
anything in my life to make it better and i have the best family of friends in the whole wide world
i would never want to give that up for anything nothing there'd be there's no substitute for our
fellowship it's just the most amazing thing in the world and and so it's such a you know such a
gift such an advantage in life um how we walk life together we do life together you know it's just
it's just an amazing thing so um and you're talking about a tandem blessing there is what
what i hear you saying and what you're saying and what you're saying and what you're saying and what
you're saying the fact that you got through that situation at six months and in the years since
you've recognized the importance of the fellowship and staying close and staying connected we started
out talking about your your daughter and the fact that you have a relationship with her
that probably would not have been possible without being a sober member of aa is that a is that a
pretty fair statement i didn't know how to be a good father i didn't you know
didn't know what that looked like remember what i was too selfish self-centered self-seeking to be
a good father step one step two i really didn't know the right action moves but um my grand
sponsor my grand sponsor gets all the credit because he had a daughter and he showed me
exactly step for step what it means to be a good father our present father a father who's there for
their daughter at all times a man that their daughter can really can count on and so um and
so i tell my young guys
because i really like working with guys who are going through divorces and who have kids because
i was there my my ex-wife came to my house uh four days ago and cut my hair you know i'm getting
married in next year and she wants to come to the wedding and my my fiancee's down with it wow like
what could go wrong with that but it just it just shows the power of the program that you know i can
have my ex-wife and her husband over at the house and we
it's all thanks to the program you know we you know we learn you know what's important what's not
you know and so um and so i like to tell the guys who are going through divorces and and broke and
have credit card debt and all that stuff there's one of us out there who's gone through whatever
you're going through and can show you how to do it sober sober style yeah do you find that you
realize that about them after they've already been attracted to you uh that's how it's been
for me as a sponsor is that a guy will ask me to sponsor him and somewhere along the way i'll say
yes but it isn't until we start getting together and start working the steps that i start to realize
just how much like me he is or how much like him i am have you found that to be the case as well
or do you seek out those guys i don't i don't even know if i should say this this is kind of
it's kind of bizarre but i mean seems like i seem to attract a lot of gay guys for sponsees you know
that and guys who are broke um because i talked about my credit card debt most of us have
that when we come in the program but i feel like i have a lot to offer the men who who have wives
who are matters for minutes because me and my ex-wife we almost we almost rekindled it was
possible it was possible right so um the program yeah you know i was talking to a guy the other day
i said you know you just have to stay sober work the steps and let god take care of your wife and
the kids you have to trust that you have to trust i guarantee you it'll work out for the best if you
just stay sober
work those steps guaranteed no questions asked that's a process that you have to go through and
you have to trust in uh and the results are nothing short of phenomenal that's been my
experience and are you still involved in the alumni group uh at the facility that you got
sober at uh yeah no i'm no longer doing the men's luncheon um i had the pleasure co-chaired it for
many years so the gifts of sobriety are materializing and have materialized over the
course of your sobriety
you just mentioned one just now you're going to be getting married as a sober member of
alcoholics anonymous the woman that you're marrying is you know we like to believe that
our spouses are are really very very supportive of our programs have you found that to be the
case with your fiancee oh my god i could not have a bigger fan you know i told her we're taking
randy to uh lunch on sunday and then going to watch him pick up his uh his uh 17th year chip on
sunday night and she said give him a kiss for me for for getting you sober and so i said i told her
i said he'd probably like to have it directly from you but he's the best sponsor in the world just
yeah yeah he's he's amazing he listens exceptionally well yeah he does i've i've had the
opportunity to get to know him and and he's he's been through quite a bit himself over the course
of his sobriety and he really demonstrated some pretty exceptional coping mechanisms
very closely to his participation in the program we're getting ready to wrap up here i just wanted
to ask if there were any things that you could say to a newcomer who's kind of on the fence
about alcoholics anonymous what would you say to them i would say find a couple of people
who have two things one great sobriety and two you find them very attractive as humans
and spend as much time as possible with them
i wonder how you and i love the meetings we love the fellowship it's a joy wednesday night's my
home group and it's my favorite day of the week i wake up happy wednesday morning because it's
right yeah and i perceive i have friends who actually who stopped working the program and
i managed to stay sober and and they just don't enjoy the program like we do they just don't
enjoy it and for me i i love the program i enjoy the fellowship i enjoy the men yeah so i perceive
that perhaps some people just don't get that connection and so i i my
thought was like i'm thinking out of the box here because obviously you know get a sponsor work the
steps is the answer but if you sure i think sometimes maybe if you can find some people
you really click with who you're attracted to have and have great sobriety and then just spend a lot
of time with them become really close with them and develop some really close friends in the
fellowship yeah life is a we deal this program is a super we deal and we can't do it but i mean i
guess you can do it by yourself wouldn't be any fun if you could even if you could like why i mean
life is more fun when we do it together yeah it's the good and the bad the ugly
everything we do it together it's like it's just so beyond amazing that's so well said and what
you're talking about ernie is the intersection between the fellowship of the program and the
fellowship of the spirit and how through other people i am able to connect with a power greater
than myself by virtue of the relationship of love and mutual respect and understanding and
tolerance and consideration for other men who have the same disease
as i have who have the same challenges and foibles and who enjoy the same opportunities
enjoying their lives as anybody can who does work the steps of the program so i think that's a
terrific attitude to have you know when you're talking to somebody who's on the fence to say
find the people and stay close i always say if you don't come back to aa for yourself come back
for the other people because your presence newcomer is so important for
the people sitting in that room to feel as long as they want to feel grateful about the gifts of
the program so you're an extraordinary example i think of a man who's worked this program to the
fullest i see you residing in the middle of it too that's the cool thing i never whenever i see you
i never wonder well i wonder how how ernie's doing because your your program is reflected just in the
way that you are and and i see it whenever i see you and it's it always brings a smile to my face
when we run into each other
uh you know i love you and and i'm so glad to have you as a friend and a fellow trudger on the
road of happy destiny and this has been amazing for you to be able to sit here with me talk about
our respective lives and sobriety and uh i can't thank you enough thank you harvard and uh i love
you and i want to compliment you one of the things you did for me in those first days is you
remembered my name you talked to me with love and respect and i love you and i love you and i love
you you made me feel like i was you know one of the guys in the fellowship from day one i didn't
feel like an outsider i felt like you know i knew you were like well loved and connected
and since you loved me i felt safe like well like if howard's hugging you you know like you know
you're in it went a long way and i you know i observed that that's you know i really appreciate
how you embrace all of us men every last one of us it's it's a special gift thank you thanks ernie
my friends that's a wrap for this episode of aa recovery interviews thank you for tuning in
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