The Power of Identification Through Hearing Other People’s Stories – Bridget K

For the next session, hello and welcome to the Aussie Quarantine Conference number two. My name is Toya, I'm a recovered alcoholic. With that, I'd like to introduce our Bridget Kay from Perth, Australia, who will share her experience with us on step 11. Take it away, Bridget. Thanks, Toya. I'm an alcoholic, my name's Bridget, and just want to say thanks, Dan, for asking me to share. I was a bit reluctant. We had a little back and forth but, yeah, it's always good to be a part of AA and I got into AA a long time, nearly 25 years ago as well and it was just amazing to hear the last speaker. I just had so much identification from her story um but uh yeah so I um I've lost track already I'm really I'm actually really really nervous but that's okay I know I'll just get into it and um uh I'll start with my my um with an idea I think most people have done that um over the weekend which has been really um yeah it's been really powerful to to get back into you know what it used to be like and and how I got in you know I came in in November 1996 and I didn't really know my story. Like, I just didn't even really know how I got there. And I, you know, by the time I got into AA, I was living in a pub, I was working in another pub and I was married to a publican. And I'd been married two years and my life was completely in shambles and I didn't know how that had happened. And, you know, I came into AA and I listened to people and I started to identify with the stories that people were saying and like the previous speaking, I started drinking, I found alcohol when I was eight years of age and it was in the form of cough mixture and I did not know that until I came into AA and um and I didn't even know that alcohol was in cough mixture until I'd gotten into AA but you know through identification and through hearing um through people sharing their stories I was able to piece my life together and piece back um just yeah just peace for what had happened and um so um you know I I you know look back at that time and I was as I said you know eight years of age and and I Was I was dishonest already I was I was practicing dishonesty as a way of life at eight and uh I would put it put on the cough to try and get hold of this mixture and I'd um I'd take this little bottle of if I went and stayed with a I'd always make sure I had this little bottle of cough mixture and it sounded like a seal, actually. I was just able to put it on at will. And anyway, you know, but like again, like the last speaker, you know I had my first real drink at 13 and it was Bundaberg rum and it was just, I don't remember anything except waking up the next morning and I had thrown up all over my room and my sister had come in to help me clean it up before my parents came to see it. And that started my – I started drinking from then. Like, it didn't stop me from drinking. Like, I just – I kept on drinking. And so I became a binge drinker and every weekend I'd do whatever I could to get a drink. I got a job so I could get more money to get a drink and so I was 13 at that stage and lied to get the job told them I was 15 by the time I got to so yeah at 16 I left home and became by 17 I was a daily drinker and I was working in the hospitality industry I'd gotten a job as a chef and everybody drank I was in a share house with other really good drinkers but none of them drank the way I did so my dishonesty in that continued I lied all the time about how much I was drinking and I was hiding how much i was drinking I just couldn't couldn't um just couldn'T be honest about any any part of my drinking and um couldn'T BE honest to myself either you know um I uh By the time I was 23, I managed to finish my apprenticeship but I had to re-sit my exams, my cooking exams because I just couldn't apply myself. I wouldn't show up to exams and then I'd have to organise another time to sit them and just couldn'T see how drink was affecting my life, couldn'T See the effect that drink had on my life at all. It was just totally full of delusion and full of justification and rationalisation. I wasn't that bad, yeah. So by the time I was turning 23, I'd finished my apprenticeship and I'll tell this story because it really shows me the progression of alcoholism and for me it was a really slow progression in so I couldn't see it. But at 23, I got the opportunity to manage a restaurant in St Kilda in Melbourne. And this guy started to come to the restaurant and he'd have about 10 cups of coffee every time he got there and it turned out he was a member of AA. And anyway, I didn't really think anything of it because I didn'T see that I had a problem with drink and he never said anything to me about it. But he asked me if I would give this opportunity to a young lady who had just gotten sober and, you know, she was trying to stay sober and she needed a job. Anyway, so I thought, yeah, no problem. Anyway, she'd been there a couple of days and I went to the bank this one morning or this one afternoon and I came back and she was in the kitchen and she was underneath a cask of wine and she could barely stand up and she was just, within half an hour of me going to the bank I'd come back and she just couldn't, she was so drunk and I was horrified, I couldn't understand that she was what had happened but by the time I got into AA at 31 I was doing the same thing at work and it was just a really clear story, it was a really clear experience for me for what happened when I was 23 and what I saw and how I felt about something when I was 23 to how I saw myself at 31 and by that stage I was still justifying all of my behaviour at that point and anyway as I said by the time I got into AI I was living in a pub and I didn't have a lot of responsibility and and so it was really hard to see that my life um was unmanageable it was very hard to say for me at that point um that um you know i had a lot of stuff in between um in between those that um by the time but when i first started drinking to when i got into aa there was a lot of i couldn't say that i didn't have any respect for myself like you know couldn't see that I um you know even before I got married I think I got married because it was just safer to do so like I just because I would always I'd go out drinking and I'd end up in strange places with strange people and you know I just you know i couldn't again I just I would justify and rationalize all of that behavior and I could never see that i could never make the connection that drink was the problem that drink was thing that led me to do that and um anyway so um my sister um had crashed her car a week and a half before I got into AA and she she was taken to a meeting um via her um by her work colleague and um he uh he didn't go to AA anymore but he said you know I'll take you to this meeting and um so off he went and um off they went to this her first meeting and uh and she asked me she didn't say to me oh bridge you need you need to do some you know something about your drinking as well she said um do you want to come along and have a look at what's you know what what it is and um and i said yeah but not because i wanted to to to actually go not because i thought there was anything wrong with my drinking because I didn't um I went because um I was a people pleaser and I wanted to look good I wanted to look like I was going to be there for her I wantedto look like i was encouraging her I want I just I always wanted to it was all about how you know what I was presenting to the world and um I really relate to that part in the big book where it talks about whether it's a big book or 12 and 12 which talks about um you know the character that we want to present to the world. And I was so far from that. I was just so far from that my sister lived in England for 10 years, and she would often write to me and I just never ever wrote back. And not because I didn't love it. I just had no, it wasn't that I didn't like it, I just said no capacity. I never put effort into anything. I've never put into relationships or whatever, I just would, you know, I would just go from one friend to another friend or one boyfriend to another boyfriend or one job to another job like I just couldn't I couldn't have a relationship with anybody and um and certainly not with my sister and um so I never wrote to her and uh and I didn't see that until I got sober I didnít see that till I started to you know I did my first inventory and and and I really saw what I was like and um you know when I when I first got into into um AA I was I I kind of neatly evaded the God thing, I thought. I was a bit worried about it because, you know, I came from a family that did not like... Well, not that they didn't like. They just thought people who had religion were a bit weird and, you Know, we had a lot of people who would come to door knocking and try and push religion, you know. And so my mum was very vocal about that and she'd chase people off the veranda and she would be very... She was a little bit scary, my mum. um and uh anyway so I was a bit worried about this and and um and I remember saying that to my sponsor and um she you know she she was cat my first sponsor was catholic and um and you know he she used to go to church and but she never once said to me you know I needed to get her you know her brand of religion or anything like that she just um she didn't really talk about her religion. But I knew I had to find God, I knew, I did know that. The very first note my first sponsor gave me was a little note and it said, I sought myself, myself I could not see, I sought my God, my God eluded me, I saw my brother and my sister and I found all three. And for me that just, you know, it kind of gave me permission to use the group as a higher power and I did that for a long time. I did that for a very long time and I still get the power out of going to a meeting. I still get the power even just listening in this weekend has been amazing. James started off the convention with just the most amazing story and I just am always being so inspired by people who can share really well. I'm not really a speaker. I mean, I love going to meetings. I love listening to speakers but I'm not really a speaker and so I feel, yeah, anyway here I am still I'm speaking but I remember going to my first speaker meeting in Hawaii. I was encouraged to get around when I first got into AA and I went to my first international convention in Hawaii and I remember listening to Earl Hightower and he was just, his story was amazing as well and it's just the power of people who can speak really well and to carry the message is, you know, his stories still, I still find comfort in listening to his story and he were someone that really hit hard because, as i said we know i i lived a life of dishonesty and um in um uh you know when i was working in hotels and restaurants and things there's an opportunity to steal and i did um you know i i took uh took a fair amount of money from my my current sponsor my current uh employer at that time and um you Know when i listened to early talk he talked about um you if you're if you smart enough to steal it you're smart enough to pay it back I was like shit so you know for me I went back to Australia I just spent a whole lot of money going to the convention and to Hawaii and stayed there for a month so I went to the bank and I got a loan for the money that I stole and took it back to my to that employer and you know so I'm just you know I'm just constantly inspired by people and um um yeah I love I love AA I love you love the zoom meetings it's just been fantastic to go around to different different meetings on zoom um but uh yeah so anyway so I got into I got Into The Steps really early on I knew I needed to find God and um and I worried of the fact that I didn't have God and I worried about other people that didn't have God and I just you know I was a bit crazy anyway I drove down I think it's about two months over and I drove Down to um I drove DOWN to Esperance not Esperance sorry Albany and um there's a girl I was working with her mother was a um used to be a nun and um so I thought she might be able to help with God so I drove DUN to I drove dUN to um to Albany it's ABOUT a five six hour drive and um I uh um she didn't really say very much to me she was just really kind and she gave me this book called Jonathan Livingston's Eagle and she she she fed me and she was just really really kind to me but on the way back from that five hour on that five-hour trip back I saw the jacaranda tree and the the West Australian Christmas tree it just kind of lines the highways of Western Australia and it's just the most amazing tree and um and the jacaranda tree is just a beautiful purple tree and I'd never seen a tree like I just never saw I you know I I just had not seen anything um quite so beautiful and I was and it was almost like for the first time I was awakened and um and I um you know I just was excited like AA excited me and I was enthusiastic and I just I just loved it and uh you know my first my first home group was just full of really enthusiastic um AA members and um that encouraged me to you know get a get a sponsor get a home group all of those things and and I did I did those things because I was willing and um but um you know I seeing seeing the jacaranda tree and seeing the WA Christmas tree and just really you know, I just realized just how asleep I was and um and uh um and that you know that but it was the kind of the first you know. I was starting to awaken. I was starting to be able to hear people in meetings and I was starting to see things. And, you know, the amazing grace, I remember just being, oh, I know what that means. I know What That's About Now. Like, you Know, I once was blind and now I see. You know, I just couldn't, yeah, it was just fabulous to be alive and I got, I was, I Just Found AA to be such an amazing place And, you know, I got into service because I was a chronic people pleaser, chronic approval seeker. And,you know, people said to me, you know, do the same amount of put the same amount of effort into recovery as you do into your sobriety and sorry, same amount of effort into your into recovery as you do into drinking and um I just couldn't you know I just you know I just I I just did it I was willing I went to two sometimes three meetings a day I didn't know how to live I didn'T know how to feed myself properly I didnT know how TO put myself to bed at a decent hour so you know going going to meetings was was really easy for me and you You know, I was still working at the time but, you know, I really came to see, you Know, how sick I was and I didn't really know why I drank until I stopped and I was, yeah, I just, you know, as I said, I did whatever, you know, just did the next indicated thing. I did pretty much what I was told but I also had this, there was still a part of me that just wanted to do, what I wanted to do whenever I wanted to do it. So although I was doing a lot of stuff, a lot the suggested things in AA, there was still a big part of me that was dishonest. Like I was just, you know, just as dishonest in so many areas of my life and someone shared, you know today about getting into a relationship with a bank robber and like I don't know that he was a bank robber, but I got into a relationship with a guy that was really, really sick. In fact, I'd warned most women in AA against going anywhere near him and I ended up in a relationship with him and, you know, So I got to see, you know, I got to see how much, I've got to see myself. I really got to say myself in that relationship and, you know, in that relationship my world got smaller. So, you know, I had 10, 11 years in AA when my life had gotten bigger. I'd stopped being a chef. I used to be a chef and I'd stopped being a chef and got an opportunity to get into another area, which I love and I'm still in that area of training today. But I just lost my train of thought. But yeah, I got into this relationship and my world got smaller and smaller and I began to um I stopped going to meetings I sacked my sponsor I got I told um you know anyone that I was sponsored I think I was sponsored I don't really even remember I think i was sponsoring about three or four women and I said to them you know I can't sponsor you anymore and I did my world Got Smaller and Smaller And Smaller and um and I got suicidal I remember just sitting in the bath and you know you know I'd never been suicidal before before that and um you know wasn't drink I was never suicidal in my drinking I wasn't suicidal as a kid I but I came to that point and in that because I my world had just gotten so amazing and then you know within a year it had just closed and umand I was um yeah i was at the jumping off point and i'm you know i i remember um robin who's in this meeting today he said to me you know you're in trouble and you know thank god it's been said today thank god for the old sorry remember um you know he confronted me you Know and uh and he told me i was a coward and i was furious and he Told me i didn't have step one and i Was even more furious um but he was right I didn't really I understood it to a point but not really um you know I understood it as far as drinking was concerned but I didn' t understand I still wanted to live life my way and I still and I was still full of dishonesty I still couldn't tell the whole truth I still could'nt be I still coud'nt beat me um anyway um you now I I went I thought I think I only had about six or seven resentments and I think three of them were on myself and the others were on him. I don't really remember the detail, but I remember really seeing myself through that inventory and just thinking, why can't I change? And it's been shared this weekend. It was because I couldn't change because it wasn't my job to change me. it was just my job to to you know take inventory and and you know um and get a relationship with a with a um a higher power and to get a relation with god and um you know i think at the time um i just you know I just thought it was impossible and um but that's you know today um i do have a relationship with god and i don't call it higher power it is a high i've got lots of there's lots of powers greater than me um bloody sandwich can change me so sandwiches higher power is a greater power than i am like it can totally change me from being you know a uh a lunatic into somebody who you know it's a bit more balanced so um but yeah i i you know i got i got to have a relationship with the big book and I've been through the big book, you know, a number of times and I took sponsees through the Big Book a number of times but like it really came alive for me and I really saw myself in all of the pages and, you know, I just I'm always amazed when I have pause and I know, you You know, look, I have a little dog and, you know, if I've got a big dog going for my little dog, I become lunatic. I'm so really protective of this dog. And, you Know, yesterday this dog came chasing towards my dog and I'm like, oh, my God, and having a bit of a, you know, telling this dog to stop. And anyway, the woman who owns the dogs called the dog over, hasn't apologised, hasn't done anything, just called this dog over and put it back in her yard. And, you know, I didn't say anything. Like, you Know, I just didn't Say anything. And I'm always amazed when I can do that. I'm just always amazed. And I know for me today that that pause comes from God. it doesn't come from me and, you know, because I'm like my mother. I just, you Know, as soon as somebody, as long as I feel threatened, I go on the attack. And so, you Now, to be able to just pause yesterday, you Know, I've got lots of those times, lots of those examples today where I've got that and that's not always been the case, you know I need to practice this program every day, I need to put this into my life every day because otherwise I affect people, I am one of those people that if I haven't got, if I'm not practicing the principles in all my affairs, if i'm not suiting up and showing up to AA and to my life and the responsibilities in my life. I just become a lunatic and AA's shown me that and the inventory process has shown me that but I also need other people, you know. It's going back to when Leslie and Robin helped me through that inventory a few years back now. Robin pointed out that I'd made myself look really good in it and um because I've I was you know again like the previous speaker I was I got into step four really quick because I could see that as a real action thing to do and um and and I again you know I did I did my step four because I wanted to look good you know. I wanted to look like I was Miss AA or whatever and um so to you know when I um when I uh when I did that in I didn't realize you know that that's what I was doing I didn'T realize I couldn't be honest I didnT realize that um I just didn'T realized any of that stuff you know and uh you know so I was able to really um get to see what I what I WAS up to and um you know I'm still I can still get up to stuff I mean in my mind I can STILL be dodgy and it'S really important for me that if i'm up to stuff that i tell somebody about it and and get really going get really honest this is it this is about being honest with myself and um and and that's what i try and do today you know leslie and robin just sent me a little message going you know no can't wait to hear share and i'm like i'm sitting here i can't hardly breathe robin's just said just tell the truth and umand that's it it's just i just got to come here and tell the truth and that's what i get i just get to be myself today and um you know i um haven't really talked very much about step step 11 but a few years ago i um i started a new job which i'm still in today and and uh you know I the I got this job and um the the I managed a couple of a couple of people and I and when I got my um when I was offered the job I was explained it was explained to me that somebody was was working had been working in the job for three years prior to me getting the job and she went for the job but didn't get it but I would be managing her and I'm like oh no I just don't know how like I just couldn't even imagine how resentful I would be if I was in her position so I really wasn't sure how you know what I was going to do anyway and she's a difficult character but it's interesting because she just reminds me so much of me you know in my drinking and also when I'm in untreated alcoholism she's just the same And anyway, you know, I wrote out the 11th step from the big book about, you know we go through the day and we pause when agitated or doubtful and we ask for the right thought or action. And I kind of rewrote it in a way that was really personal to me and, you Know, it just kind of steps out all of my character defects that pop up through the day for me and the things that I need help with. Like, you know, unless I do a 10th step, unless I kind of know who I am, I don't know what to ask God for help with, I mean, I don' t know, you know, I d'on' t know how to ask God for the power to carry out what if I don' t know what it is I need to, you know, I need the power for and so So, you know, this rewriting of it really, really helped me and I was able to go into that, into work every day for, I read this every day probably about six months before I'd go into the office and it changed my relationship with her. I'd Go to her office door and she would just grunt at me. She wouldn't say good morning but I still, every morning I would go in, go to the office and I would say good morning and she made no bones that she just didn't want me in the office at all, let alone coming to her office door and saying good morning. But I continued and, you know, she would go on holidays and I Would ask her about her holidays and, no, I wouldn't say that we're friends but we're on friendly terms today and it's been three years and,you know,she just got back from a holiday last week and, you know, just being interested in the photographs of where she went and just saying I'm glad that she was back to work. She's a really good worker and just being able to focus on the good things, not the difficult parts of her personality which always just show me mine. It's been amazing. Like I just couldn't do that. I just can't do dat. But, you now, with God I can and with Step 10 and 11 I can do dat I can be a decent human being, I can be part of, I can just do the things that I can just be a responsible person. I mean really at the end of the day that's what I've been given the ability to have a responsible life and you know that's I was irresponsible my whole life and of course tried to pretend that I wasn't yeah so yeah I guess um other ways that i i um there's been times throughout my sobriety where i've i've written emails to to god and i've sent them on to my sponsor or i've set them on two people that i sponsor and and for me that's it's uh i've always been a writer um you know since coming into recovery i've journaled and and and it's really showed me who i am through those practices and And I, yeah, I just, you know, I still write. Like I love technology. I've got in the notes section of my phone, I've Got So Many examples of where I've written out inventories through the day where I have had fear or I've had a resentment on someone and, you now, I go off to the toilet and I'm writing out my inventory and I might be down on my knees or whatever it is just to, you know, to get through, yeah, just to get Through the Day and not react and not, you know, just to have a life that I never ever thought I could have, you know. As I said when I first got into, you know, when I first started drinking, you know, I was going through an apprenticeship in cooking and it's not difficult work uh as far as the theory component goes but i could i couldn't i couldn' t actually get you know i just couldn't even show up for those exams you know and it's not because i was i was stupid it was because i just wouldn't apply myself i just i couldn''t i couldn ''t do life i just wanted to drink no matter what and um and now today i look and i love life i'm um I'm, as I said, you know, I've got a little dog that I adore. And but, you Know, I'm not, I know how much drinking is taken from me as well. You know, yeah, I didn't, I wanted, I really wanted children. And, you Now, so to anyone who's kind of new in AA or, you You know, it doesn't mean life's going to go, yeah, life hasn't gone exactly the way I wanted it. But probably the biggest thing for me was the fact that I didn't have children and I absolutely loved children but AA gave me the ability to love other people's children and be really happy for other people who have children. Like whenever somebody else, you know, when somebody has children, and I'm just happy for them, but I'm still sad for me that I missed out on that. Like I didn't, I just didn't have the capacity to, you know, to, yeah, to have children and even be in a relationship. You know, it took me a long time to even have another, to have a relationship with another human being And, you know, I have that today. You know, I hung out with my mum and my sister and my niece last weekend and we went down to the beach and it wasn't any, you Know, it wasn' t a huge celebration or anything. It was just about being with them. And, You know my sister although she got me into AA has never ever come back to AA. She came for about six months and then she had my niece and then she never came back in and i just um yeah i don't know like i i don' t tell her she needs to come back in or anything like that but i i do i just love her and i don''t judge her today you know her life and her journey is her life of her journey and i've got no right to tell her you know how she should live her lifeandum yeah so you know i i just think aa is such a great place to change and you know be inspired like you know I've just been really really inspired this weekend as I always am when you know hear people share you know. I went to my first face-to-face meeting yesterday and it was just such a great meeting like it was Just a really it was fabulous to see people yeah it's fabulous to say people in the flesh and give them a hug and yeah I just I don't But, like, AA for me is, yeah, it's what gives me the power to keep going and love life like I do. I just love life today. And I think it was somebody in the first meeting that talked about feeling older when they first came into AA than when they got, you know than when they are now and I feel like that like I'm 50 I think I'm 54 or something like that 53 or 54 and um I'm really you know I don't I don'T feel it I feel much younger than when I came in so you know um I donT know if I've I probably know we're near time but as I said I'M I'm not really a speaker, so I'm just going to probably – I'll finish it with the St Francis of Assisi prayer because it's such a beautiful – actually this was given to me by my sponsor and it says tune into the infinite God first and all will be added to you. Love, Kerry. And, you know, I love this prayer and it's this Lord make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love. Where there is injury, pardon. Where there is doubt, faith. Where there is despair, hope. Where there is darkness, light. And where there is sadness, joy. O divine master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console, to be understood as to understand, to be loved as to love for it is in giving that we receive it is in pardoning that we are pardoned and it is in dying that we aren't born to eternal life and um yeah i mean i still for me i i think i was about three or four years sober and i really understood the um it's better to understand and be understood You know, I went to – I spent some time in – because I live in Perth now but my mum and dad lived in Melbourne and I went over to do some training in Melbourne and stayed with my mum and her partner for three months or a month. Anyway, it doesn't matter. Stayed there for a while and, you know, they were talking about work and it was my first day with them. I hadn't seen them. I hadn'T seen my mum and my dad, my mum and her partner for a couple of years at that point and they were sitting at the table and they Were just kind of talking amongst themselves and I could feel, you know, it was like I wasn't even in the room and it kind of reminded me of when I was younger and I just kind Of went into that real small place as a kid and like I had no voice at all and I remember just having this feeling of devastation that they weren't asking, they werenít talking to me or they werenís and I remember that, you know, itís better to understand than be understood and, you Know, and I was able to just get up from the table and go and do the dishes and not, You know, I was unable to catch it. I was enabled to catch that moment of where Iím just about to go straight into self-pity and stay there or I can make a decision and, You Know, be useful and that's what I did and, you know, I just realised that they just, it wasn't personal and it was a bit like when my dad was dying and my sister and I went over and he, my dad died an alcoholic, drinking alcoholic and he by the end of his drinking he couldn't connect with my sister or his wife or anyone. He was just so disconnected from anything outside of himself and definitely inside himself. He just drank and did crosswords and that was it. And my sister and I went over to see him and my sister was just devastated that he wouldn't talk to us and I just said, like, he can't. He doesn't have the capacity there. Like, he just doesn't Have the capacity. it and um and you know and again it was that to better it's better to understand and be understood and um I guess that was the same in my um you know with when I you know started this job three years ago you know I was able to put myself in in this woman's position who didn't get this job and you knows she's having to work for this person who did get the job and it's that same thing and And it's AA that's given me that. I didn't get that kind of direction from my family. So, yeah, look, there's so much in the St Francis prayer as well. You know, whether it's despair, hope, and AA has given me hope and AA continues to give me hope. And, yeah. I'm really, really, yeah... I love that because at the moment, you know, I can't... You know, I've listened to a few people around the world on Zoom and here in Perth we're really lucky, you know, that COVID has almost stopped. Like it's almost there's just nothing here inPerth and, you Know, all of our restrictions have been lifted and it's, you KNOW, it's Almost like we haven't even been touched and, YOU KNOW, that's not true. People have lost their jobs and all kinds of stuff but it's nothing like what's happening in other parts of the world that, you know, and these Zoom meetings have really, you're able to hear what's happening with other people and have gratitude for what you have got. Well, I certainly have and that's, you know, I came into AA ungrateful, really ungrateful, not grateful for anything in my life and today I'm really grateful. I'm grateful that, you know, I bought a house with a friend a year ago and, you Know, it's amazing that I can, you know, that I Can share a house With somebody, you Know, because I, you Know, I'm not somebody That shares easily, you Know, i'm a giver But i'm not a receiver I find it really difficult To receive and the person I share a House with is that she Is a giVER And it's like, I don't Want to receive but I'm you know I I'm getting better at it and um I uh you know and we've had to we've had to have some really uh difficult conversations and um but you know she's in Al-Anon so you know she's got her program and I've got mine and um yeah it's I didn't I I never thought that I would I would um be in the position that I'm in you know. I thought I thought my life would look very different and um and i'm glad it looks the way it looks you know i i am no i'm just trying to think of another story i think i'm probably almost at time though aren't i daniel five minutes oh god okay a five minute story um yeah um yeah no i haven't got five i haven'T GOT ANOTHER ONE I DON'T THINK I'VE GONE A BIT I'VE GONE a bit blank um i'm just really you know i'm just really grateful that i've been able to show up though and do this because daniel did give me an out he said if you want if you wants um to to uh to get someone else he said i'll do it so um yeah sorry everyone you got me instead of daniel but thanks very much for asking me daniel it's appreciated Thank you so much Bridget. That was wonderful to hear you, thank you for being so authentic and real and carrying the message to us today.