The Prodigal Daughter Walks All Twelve Steps Home – Mildred F.

call for those sitting at the back to see the speaker for that reason her image will be projected on the screen no videotape is being made however of course her voice is being recorded and tapes will be available after the meeting at this time I've been given the privilege of introducing Mildred F she She comes from Aurora, Ontario, Canada. Please welcome her. Applause Pardon me? Okay. I'll try to remember. My name is Mildred and I'm an alcoholic. Hi everybody. Hi Mildrid. It's my privilege this morning on Valentine's Day to wish you a happy Valentine's day and ask you, will you be my valentine? I've asked a lot of people that over my lifetime but never had such an enthusiastic response. I would like to take the opportunity to thank Doreen and Nancy and Eileen and Barbara and my two good angels Melissa and Suzanne who have looked after me so well this weekend. I would like to thank them for organizing such a wonderful conference and I'd like to thank the other speakers I found applause applause applause I think what I experienced here this weekend I would like to describe as being real i didn't hear anything phony and it went right to my heart because it was the language of the heart it's my first experience speaking to this large group of women only it's me first experience at the international women's conference conference, and I trust it will not be my last. It's been fabulous. Having had some involvement with conferences, I would like to reiterate what the lady from Tucson said. I think the committee has done an absolutely fabulous job in the organization and in the management of all affairs for everybody's comfort. So with that, I'd like to begin. I'm going to share my experience with you I like you have a lot of knowledge and I like you believe that knowledge really is not very useful we can carry it on our backs we can in our heads we can it in our briefcases and unless it is incorporated into our lives it really isn't worth much experience is learn to trust your own self learn to trust the light within learn to love within because it's all there my experience in the program has taught me that it's not a question of learning a whole lot of new stuff what it is a question of is unlearning the stuff that's not right, the stuff that doesn't work. My journey has been a journey into myself to find the light within. I don't know if you're familiar with the writer Wordsworth, but in a poem that he wrote, he wrote these words. Truth is within. It takes no rise from outer things, whatever we may believe there is an inmost center in us all where truth abides in fullness and the way consists rather in opening out a way whence the imprisoned splendor may escape than in finding truth that lies without and i think you could take the word truth and you could change it to love and you could change heto any of the other wonderful qualities beauty, life, love, excitement, and it would still be the truth. It lies within us. It's not without. It's a question of releasing it from within, and that is what I have found in the big book. When I saw the topic that I was assigned, all my programming came right to the fore, and I said heck that again all this idea that men have the the power the brains the logic the thinking that this is where the good stuff is and women do the feeling and they do all the soft stuff came roaring right to the force and I had to do some real thinking about this and I'm glad they assigned me this topic because I came to terms with a whole lot of stuff that I needed to come to terms many many years ago a great teacher walked the earth and he told this story he said that there was a woman a young girl actually who was the child of a very wealthy father and she got tired of what was going on at home though she had everything and she said to her father give me of my substance that i may walk into a far country and the father said all right he gave her her portion of his or of the wealth and she left and went into a far country she wasted her substance living riotously she must have been an alcoholic she found herself eventually the book says she took up what's the word anyway with a citizen of that country and found herself eating it in the pig pen eating the husks that the pigs left and it says no man gave her anything no man gay for anything because no man had the solution for what was wrong with her and so one day recognizing that help was not to be found in the pig pen she said I will arise and go to my father and I will say to him father I have sinned and sinned just comes from a word meaning not rather missing the mark i will go to my father and i will say father i have sinned before heaven and against thee and i am not worthy to be called thy daughter please let me work as one of thy hired servants she picked herself up and she went home what a surprise awaited her there because the story says that the father saw her when she was yet a long way off now if the father saw her when she had a long way off that says he was looking he was waiting he wasn't sitting there in criticism and judgment and you can imagine the excitement that went on in that household because he got the servants together and he said get the robe get the ring get the shoes for her feet kill the fatted calf because this This my child was lost and has come home. And it says when she came, he fell upon her and kissed her. And she said her thing, and the father just accepted her. And I didn't know this until a little while ago. Somebody told me that the giving of the ring meant it had the crest of the family on it, and it meant that all the power that the father had, anybody that wore that ring also had and all they would do would be go to wherever they wanted something and they would sign for it with that ring in other words the wealth and the power of the father was the wealth in the power of the child and all the child had to do would be to come home I would like to suggest to you that that story talks about the first member of Alcoholics Anonymous because when she was still in the pig Pigpen, she recognized that help was not to be found there and that this was not the way she wanted to live. So she took steps one and two. And then she made a decision. I will arise and go to my father, which was her step three. And on the way home, she did her four, five, six, seven, eight, and prepared to do her nine. And as a result of this, when she she got home, she was rocketed into the fourth dimension. And I suspect that if she continued to do 10, 11, and 12 on a daily basis, she lived happy, joyous, and free forever after. i identify with the prodigal daughter because i too lived in a pig pen i lived in the pig pen of my feelings i never lacked brains i never lack wit what i did lack was the ability to do to have good feelings my feelings were what railroaded me but I thought that my feelings were caused by the behavior of other people and therefore I was ultimately the victim of what other people did the good news I discovered is this one I am NOT my feelings I am a person experiencing feelings and at any time I must take responsibility for those feelings not only must take responsibility I can and I must change and the prodigal daughter gives us the means whereby we can really do that and my life is living testimony to the fact when I tell you that 19 years ago at this time I was living on skid row some days didn't have enough to eat I am NOT on skidd row emotionally I'm not there mentally and i'm not there physically today and that's because of this god-given blessed program that i have been allowed to participate in since may the 17th 1973 and for that i'm grateful how did this change come about i'm going to talk about this first and then I'll tell you a little about who I am and how things transpired in my life because I think if I were to say to you what is the one thing perhaps that you feel would make your life better you probably would say nice feelings don't we all like to feel loved don't we like to feel wanted don't be like to be successful don't we like to feel excited and enthusiastic how does that come about i used to think it was going to come about because of what other people were doing and i have learned two things about this one feelings are not accessible the way this glass of water is accessible and i can pick it up and i can move it at will so how am i going to change my feelings well after i began to realize that i had some power in that regard i got very busy i didn't want an incremental fix i wanted an instant fix and not end in addition to the program i got very busy seeking gurus and magic and seminars and more books and more speakers. And I was just going to find it someplace, and it was going to just rocket me into that fourth dimension, and I was goingto live happily ever after. AndI have news for you. It just doesn't happen like that. You see, I was still living in the problem. I was living in my human condition. I thought that I could fix it I thought that I could manage it you see we always have the choice we either live from our human condition or we live from our spiritual condition either I decide I'm going to fix it or I decide I'm going to do what I can and allow God to fix it and that for me works the other problem I had with this was I wanted to feel good first and then I would do good it don't ask me to do those things that i don't want to do when i can feel good no problem and that reminds me of a story i heard long ago about this cat the old tom cat was walking through the alley and he saw this little kitten madly chasing its tail and he said to the little kitten what are you doing you silly thing he said the little kitten said i have found that my happiness is in my tail and since it's in my tale i want to catch my tail and i want us to cure my happiness forever and ever and ever and the old tomcat said well he said i've been around the alleys of life for a long time he said i haven't had the opportunity to go to cat philosophy school and study cat psychology but he said I can tell you that my experience has taught me one thing he said my happiness is in my tail as well but he says my experience taught me that all I have to do is walk straight ahead and my happiness follows along behind me i love that story i'd like to tell you about my grass too because the story of my grass tells me a lot about how i think the power works in my life about four five years ago I bought a house and I guess about a year later one day I came home in the grass that had been beautiful that morning when I left beautiful and green and lush it looked as if a desert had had descended was brown and ugly you know and I turned the corner I thought my god what has happened here well what had happened was the man who looks after the fertilizing and stuff had put fertilizer on had left me a message to water the grass I had not read the message that he wrote to me and while the grass was getting long and lush it was burning underneath the gardener came and cut the grass and so when I got home what was left was what I have described to you so i called kevin and i said kevin what now he said well we may have a meltdown here he said i'm not sure we you know he said i don't know if we can save it well i said what should i do he said I'll tell you what the lawn needs he said it needs a lot of tender loving care he said you have to rake it all this stuff needs to be raked away and he said rake it gently and rake it a lot and water it early in the morning so i did exactly what he said and i was up at five o'clock every morning before i went to school and i was raking and watering and raking in watering and racking and watering and it happened without my realizing it and one day when i turned the corner i looked at my grass and the grass was lush and green again and the next morning when I was I always sit in my living room in a certain chair and meditate and the morning when i drew the curtains and looked out I mean I had a little spiritual awakening because I realized I don't know anything about growing grass really I couldn't put any chemical formula together or really explain the process of how grass grows but I did what i was supposed to do i raked it and i watered it and I tended it i did my part and God did his part and i used to stand on my grass sometimes to pray because it was very easy to pray and i think that's the way it is in my life if i want to feel good and if i want to experience the joy the happiness the fullness of life and that's what i i think because when we come home we've got the ring and if we don't use it to take to claim our inheritance it's not god's fault i believe god always says yes but i have to fulfill the conditions the grass was ready to grow and it would have not grown had i not done my part so i think basically over the last almost 20 years that's precisely what has happened to me i have done my part sometimes to the best of my ability always and god has done his part and to the extent that i have allowed the spirit in i have a wonderful life i'm really grateful to be an alcoholic i know that some of you going by the countdown the other night you're very new and i'm not stupid you must be in pain some of you you may be sober 20 years and you may be in paint you may be sober 10 years and you may be in pain life is an ongoing experience i used to think gee if i could only get sober 15 years i used to see some of these folks come in they always looked serene and i thought if i could just get 15 years i would just sail right along on an even keel and never have to suffer again the only things that don't suffer are things that are dead i believe things that aren't because if you're a growing being you are going to change change is life and like the trees you have to dance with the wind and you better have some roots so that you can dance with the wind whatever the wind is going to do to you so that you can take and dance and be solid and have some stability along with the flexibility to move wherever it is that you have to move so when i say that i'm grateful to be an alcoholic i don't think anybody comes here and gets a free lunch i think one way or another we all pay our dues you know you may look at somebody and that person you may say has everything do you know what goes on in here you see anyway i'm grateful to be an alcoholic because i had to i was brought to my knees through my alcoholism you may think that i should be locked up for such a stupid statement let me assure you that i'm no stranger to funny farms having been locked up at least 29 times that i know of in one mental institution insane asylum or psychiatric ward across this country sometimes for periods as little as five days sometimes for periods as long as five months sometimes because i wanted to be there sometimes because other folks wanted me to be there they gave me shock treatments one time i had 13 shock treatments another time they gave me 25 electroshock treatments and believe me they really light up your life if there are gaps in my story you'll know why they diagnosed me as being schizophrenic as being schizoid as being skizoid paranoid as being paranoid schizroid as being manic depressive depressed as being manic depressive manic so by the time a psychiatrist came along and said we think that you're alcoholic that was very good news indeed but i'm getting a little bit ahead of myself that was in 1966 and believe me i was not ready to make use of that information i was born on a farm in saskatchewan didn't like that girl didn't Like That I thought boys did the exciting stuff they made the money they had the power they traveled they they did things women had raised babies and gardens and I didn't want any part of that I was a Roman Catholic I didn't like that I was German and in 1932 and on that was not a popular nationality to be and I was the youngest of ten children and I thought that was obscene i'm going to talk a little bit after a while about world views like what do we think we are who do we Think We Are How Did We Get Here I Can Tell You This That At Three And A Half I Stood At My Oldest Sister's Wedding And I Can See It As Clearly As I Can See Anything In This Room I Had On Little Pink Dress And Little Black Shoes And I Could Sing and dance and i had made some money and i had a dish of money and i was standing there at the table saying to myself i don't know what i'm doing here i don want to be in this world i hated being alive i hated myself and i hated all the circumstances of my life i found ways to deal with them one i suppressed how i felt because the adults around me didn't seem to care they didn't seem to see what was going on inside me Now, I used to blame them a whole lot. I don't blame them anymore. I had built such walls around myself that they couldn't get in. You know, I can't say I was abused. I can'T say, you know, that I was beaten. I had everything. My father was one of the pioneers in Saskatchewan. He came here with some oxen and a plow. And you can imagine the kind of work that my mother and father father and the older children had to do by the time I came along my father was a wealthy man and I could go to school and I that my sisters used to say to me you're so pretty and you're so smart you can just do anything you like and I wanted to scream at them I'm dying inside can't you see there's something wrong with me that didn't get out they didn't see what was in here here and I couldn't let their love in so I was a desperately lonely kid I tried to suppress some of that I manipulated my father was a very authoritarian man I was afraid of him not that he ever hit me but sometimes he would raise Rouse in the house and emotionally I would get upset and if I saw that he was going to be upset I would lie I would go to him and I would tell him you know dad the parish priest today told me what a great man you are and so on and i could almost see that my flattery just it it just took the veil of anger away from him and you know i have to tell you that when i sobered up and i was 40 years old nothing much had changed and sometimes today if i'm not using this program to the best of my ability I still resort to my old ways of dealing with life I suppress, I manipulate I deny that it exists the one thing I don't do anymore and that's drink alcohol I was a late bloomer I began to drink when I was about five my father used to have his poker cronies over and he had homebrew and so it was real key it was considered really cute that little mildred would go and she'd pour the drinks what they didn't recognize was that little mildred was pouring drinks into herself and what i found was that all the ugly feelings that i had all the unhappy feelings all the lonely feelings they all went away that feeling that i couldn't handle life it all went way when i drank i'm not stupid you know I used thereafter every opportunity that I could to drink you know I don't know when I became an alcoholic and frankly it's really not even of academic interest to me the fact is that once I began to drink I used every opportunity to dull what was going on inside and I have to tell you as a consequence I put the off button onto into operation because I stopped growing growing, and all I really did was perhaps develop intellectually, but nothing happened in my soul. Nothing happened in My Spirit. Nothing happened to My emotions, and I became very twisted. I had a real problem with My mother. I hated My mother, and l've never really discussed this at a meeting, but l'm going to this morning, and L don't really know why. l hated My Mother. my mother was a good woman she had never done a thing that like I can't lay a thing on her except to say I thought that I should have a movie star for a mother my mother was a plain decent good woman but I more than hated her I despised her so much so that I wouldn't let her touch me I wouldn t have private conversations with her and And I made it my rule never to be in a room alone with her so I would never get trapped into any kind of intimacy with her at all. Now, you tell me that, like, I have never been able to figure that out. As the years have gone by, I have come to believe in maybe we live many lifetimes and maybe it isn't such a stupid idea that we revisit old stories. Why would I hate my mother like that and have these feelings? anyway one night because and then I this I really only need to tell you one story and you'll know how I dealt with my life forever I got trapped in a room with my mother and my mother said to me Mildred you're ashamed of me those were her exact words you're ashamed of me aren't you and i sat there and i tell you the truth i would have given both arms my eyes and whatever else if i could have gotten up and put my arms around her and said mother i love you you and meant it. Instead, I was frozen inside. I said, that's silly. And that was about the end of it. She said, no, I know. And I knew she knew, and we both knew that it was the truth. About that time, my father came home with some people who were going to play cards, and I went into my bedroom and put the pillows over my head, and I screamed, and and I screamed, and I dreamed, and i screamed because I didn't know what to do what was wrong with me inside. And about two hours later one of my sisters came in. We never talked about real things in my home but I'm not saying that in criticism. My parents you know they were pioneers. They were so busy with making making a living and bringing up this family and so on, I don't think we had a lot of time for group therapy and hug sessions and all that kind of thing. They were probably very glad at the end of the day to be alive and to just be able to crawl into bed and not tuck everybody in and kiss them goodnight and all That Kind of Stuff and say, And how are you feeling today? And so we didn't talk about real things. And so my sister came in, and she said, are you all right? I said, yes. She said, would you like some food? And I said no. Nothing was said about what had happened before. It was as if it had never occurred. So I can tell you that when I came in I had a lot of anger. I had the feeling that I was going to die. I had an unresolved stuff, and I still have a lot of unresolved stuff. I've just done another four and five, and I have found things in myself. it's been wonderful the walls are starting to come down the walls and and the blocks inside so that the power can flow out and the light can flow and the love can flow in life is getting easier and if you're there you know let's use each other's strengths like the Sequoias do they intertwine their roots so they can grow tall and they can be strong but they're together that's what i see in this program and that's what i see in a sisterhood such as this let's use each other's strength in each other's experience because i got through all that somehow or other and i don't feel that way anymore and just lest i forget to say this i i got sober in a way in 1966 and before my mother died i was able to talk to her I was a little stoned at the time, but nevertheless, I did talk to her. And I said to her at that time, I said, you know, Mother, I've been lying to you. I said first of all, I don't go to church anymore, though I do go when I'm home here. And I say, you now, there's been a lot of stuff between you and I. And she said, I know. But she said Mildred, it's all right. And we couldn't talk more. We couldn't elaborate. But she gave the best she had, and I gave her the best I had at that time. She died a few days later. But I'm sure she has looked after me. i have felt through this journey in alcoholics anonymous that she has been with us and with me and that as i change in the program and as new insights come to me and as new challenges come to be i feel very strongly that my mother has her arms around me and you know sometimes i think if my mother were walking the earth now could i put my arms around her now and i become more and more convinced that yes i could anyway by the time i was 11 i was ready to go to boarding school to high school because i was a smart little kid and my parents didn't think i should go to the local school so they sent me to account and boarding school and you know what's coming now i was younger than the other kids and again i was different and i'll tell you that's one of the reasons why i will not go to uh i will Not speak more than once a month i do not need to be different from the members of alcoholics anonymous you know that's just my my opinion like I feel that I need to be part of you not a speaker not somebody that is specially brought in and this kind of stuff I need to be the run-of-the-mill I spent too much of my life isolating myself making myself different from other people and feeling that I was different the more I let down the walls and let you win the happier my my life becomes. It's really that simple. So when I was 18, I decided I was going to go to a convent. They didn't want me. I was a full-blown alcoholic by this time, so I thought, I'll fix you. I'll find a convant that wants me. And I knew where the swinging convents were. They were in the United States because all the swingers lived in the the United States. And I remember I found about 40 addresses and I wrote about 40 convents and one day I picked the lucky bunch. They had an outfit in Saskatchewan and in Ontario and I picked them, I wrote them a letter and sight unseen they said yes come. I think they live to regret that. My brother took me out. We drank on the train for four days, and I was drunk the night I entered, which probably says as much about them as it does about me. And if you think it's bad being a Roman Catholic drunk, try being a Catholic sister drunk. I stayed there for 15 years I didn't like being a woman don't you know I rejected that I rejected the bodily functions I rejected the concept of having babies I rejected everything that was associated with being female convent was a great place to hide it was also a great place to drink believe it or not I always used to have my booze supply delivered to the bell tower of the church and then I made sure I had all the jobs in the church I was an organist in two churches I had three choirs I trained the junior and senior servers I decorated the altars and I was in the Church most of the time because that's where my boozed supply was I lied I cheated and stole, and I did everything. I was a good sister, and there are no tunnels between the priest's house and the convent, by the way, in case you're wondering. I was a good sister in every other way except where my alcoholism was involved. I needed money to do what I was doing, and so I had big choirs. I used to direct operettas, and I was assistant to the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony and Operatic Society. And I had money available from all these things that I did. God, they never made any money. You know, don't you know we have a lot of expenses, but you know where all that money went. Anyway, after 15 years, my mother superior called me in. My father had died, and I went home, and And I cut quite a swath in my black habit. We didn't dress in those days the way sisters dress now. We wore it all. And I was drunk at my father's funeral and all this stuff. So when I came back, Mother Superior and I had a little chat and she said, Sister, would you like to leave? She said, I don't want you to go. She said you're so competent you can do everything. I don' t want you too go but she said I don''t think you're happy here. And the understatement of the word, but I mean, the fact is, if you had said to me at that time or any time in my life, what kind of life could we put together for you that you would be happy? I couldn't have told you. However, she said, you know, I think you're young enough. I was 33 at the time. She said, You're young genug to make a life for yourself. God knows not a word was said about alcoholism. Not a word were said about pills. You know, those things that keep you unblinking for three days. and I used to vacuum a lot at 3 o'clock in the morning. Anyway, we wrote to Rome, and on January 10, 1966, my dispensation came through. And I signed it, and thereby was returned to the state of secular life. I was no longer Sister Mary Eugenia. I no longer had to wear the habit. I was not a nun. I was now no longer subject to monastic discipline as defined by the Holy Rule. And I remember standing on the steps that night waiting for the car that was going to pick me up, thinking that my problems were over. You know, by that time I had three university degrees. I had studied theology and philosophy. Sure doesn't say much for education, does it? i stood there thinking i swear to you that some nice man was going to come along and he was goingto find me and we were going to just live happily ever after what i didn't know was that i carried a tiger around inside of me that the beast was within within three weeks i was thrown in jail now that may not impress you but it impressed me i went down to the bars where i felt comfortable and i became the lower companion the rounders that sat at the bars within three weeks four weeks they didn't want i was bad news i used to drink 226s a day that's what it took that's not every day but most days If that's what it took to quiet my soul, that's what it too. My object in drinking alcohol was not to feel, not to have to deal with the despair and the depression and the hopelessness that I felt and the bad feelings I had about myself. I knew I wasn't what I should be. So I became a tramp. I was engaged three times in that 10-month period and disengaged the next day. The first date I remember, I was very unsophisticated. We went to the bar and he said to me, what would you like to drink? And I asked for three triple Tom Collinses. He never asked me out again. and the whole experience of sex that's another issue well oh yeah sure I think I became as close to being a bag lady as i ever want to be i went to a friend's place and i eventually ran out of people i ran out OF MONEY I RAN OUT OF EVERYTHING AND ONE DAY I'D BEEN WITH AT A FRIEND'S HOUSE AND SHE SAID HER HUSBAND SAID YOU CAN'T STAY HERE ANOTHER NIGHT AND I HAD NOWHERE TO GO AND A MINISTER THAT HAD SEEN ME THE DAY BEFORE GOD YOU KNOW I THINK ABOUT ALL THE GOOD PEOPLE that have crossed my path i'm convinced of this whatever needs to happen will happen the spirit will send whoever it is you need to hear the spirit will send you whatever it is that you need to experience if you are willing it will happen you need have no fear that man had seen me the day before and he told me about a psychiatrist at 999 queen street which at that time was considered an insane asylum and i went there and i begged to be let in and they let me in and it was there that my brother and sister found me and they took me back to the west to another psychiatric hospital where i met the man who was to become my husband guess who a psychiatrist he too was an alcoholic and if you can think of a more mixed-up pair than and a drunken psychiatrist, and a drunken ex-nun. You've got to go somewhere. My friend Phil puts it this way. He says their neuroses were complementary. The rocks in his head fit the holes in hers. he had only one oar in the water and neither did i have two oars in the water we were together and i used that term loosely about seven years and in that time we moved 35 times which should tell you something some of those were little moves and some of those were major moves. He suggested I go to Alcoholics Anonymous, and I did for five and a half years. It was lovely for three weeks. I wasn't near Prince Albert at the time, so when you mention Cease and his sponsor 10 days older, Nancy, I'm well acquainted with Cease in Elmer, and they with me. And I loved Alcoholics Enormous. It was nice to wake up and know where I'd been. But then the bill collectors found me, and of course my emotions came roaring to the fore and I had no idea how to live. Not a clue, not a clue. And so I did the only thing I knew how to do because I didn't want to leave Alcoholics Anonymous. I took drugs. And I used to sit at the meetings for five and a half years with my eyes bugging out of my head, stoned. You know, they even let me do 12-step work. They let me go once a week out to the women's jail. I suspect I carried the disease rather than the message, but they let me go anyway. And Cease used to say to me, there's something wrong with you, isn't there? And I'd say, no. He'd say okay, keep coming back. And you know Nancy, when you said the other night, you know if you're still drinking, that's no reason not to come to Alcoholics Anonymous. I totally agree. My life depends on the fact that the people in AlcoholicsAnonymous allowed me to keep coming back i stayed five and a half years and then i stay i went away because i felt so ashamed of myself and of course the program as the program is written and as i practice it today was not a part of my life in the at that time and so um i walked away because I was ashamed of myself and it wasn't very long and I drank and I need not tell you that the last year and a half were absolute disaster I got to the point where I was having convulsions I've had convulsiones four times I've had the DTS four times i've had blackouts that lasted from five to ten 10 days. Hallucinations were nothing, Lord. The walls used to sing. The tea kettle used to talk to me. The bugs used to crawl over my bed. That, you know, I'd hear voices. I'd hear discussions that I don't know, you now, that never took place but they went on in my head. Tell you a little story, silly little story. But one day I was in my bedroom. We We had a housekeeper at that time, and, you know, we deserved a house keeper like and could afford a house cheaper like you can afford the crown jewels. But we had a Housekeeper, and my husband was away, and I had given her the day off because I wanted to drink the way I wanted to drink, so I had no booze in the bedroom. One morning I woke up, and the wind slammed the door shut, and the lock was damaged, and I couldn't get out. and our bedroom was about a story and half story and three quarters up it was three o'clock in the morning what was i going to do so i did the only thing i know how to do i looked out the window and it looked a long way down i tell you so i thought gee if i jump all the way down there i might break a leg so i felt what i'll do is i'll throw out a chair and i'll jump on the the chair. You see, I was not in those mental institutions for nothing. It's what I did and I jumped out. And I need not tell you, I broke both feet. Anyway, I didn't feel it at that time now how to get into the house uh the property we had had a riding stable on it so i went out to the riding stable and at this time i weighed about 85 pounds and in my baby dolls i took out what was an ox goat it was about that long tipped with metal on the end and here i am taking flying leaps at the back door and I realized I'm not going to get these doors pounded down so I got a rock and I pounded in the window broke the glass opened the door went downstairs had a few belts and then called the police to tell them that our house had been broken into it and that I'd had a few drinks because I was so nervous about that and would they please patrol the air oh yes mrs. Frank they said we'll just look after you so well and they used to come patrolling the road and I used to think oh god you know this is awful living like this well the the end came for me on May the 18th 1973 I guess I don't really want to say this but I guess they should that That marriage was a terrible example to me of what can happen when you're not in charge of your own life. I was abused, I was beaten in that marriage and I say that because, not that you feel sorry for me but because that was my state of mind. You see, I had the victim and when I have the victim sign out there's always a persecutor who's going to find me and he found me and he took out his anger on me and you know I just went into my shell and I understand why women stay in situations where they're beaten where their bones are broken and they stay anyway because they don't know how to get out maybe 18 1973 I woke up in a hospital in a psychiatric ward where else i'd been there since friday and that morning the nurse took me to the breakfast room and as we came back she took me through the washroom and i looked in the mirror and i was black and blue and i had teeth knocked out and i just looked an absolute mess and i look in the mirror my god it has happened you are now a woman of the street i didn't know where i had been the last 10 days and i went back to my room and we never know when god no when we're ready when we are ready to receive the gift because i do not believe that god gives the gift to some and denies it to others i hear people say i'm so lucky to be sober what about the poor person i've had a sponsee who committed suicide drunk do i flatter myself that this god has said well you know i'm going to let her be sober i'm going to really pour the grace and the gift on her and let that person die i don't want to believe in such a god and i don t believe in such a God i just don't think that's the way it is i think i reached a point of readiness if you've seen the movie the natural there's a character in there says we all live two lives the one we learn with and the one we live with after that and I believe that every step along those first 40 years was necessary and that morning though I didn't know it I was ready and God came to me and I lost the compulsion to drink like that I knew who I was I knew what I had to do I was not sure about how my life was going to be but one thing I knew that I was not going to drink again it was that clear i cannot i'd be lying to you if i said it any other way and i don't mean to the big book tells me i have a daily reprieve dependent on my spiritual condition and the book says there will come days when you have no mental defense against the first drink and i i also believe that but what i have tried to do is what uh may read out last night that our spirit our daily reprieve is dependent on our spiritual condition and that doesn't mean levitating over the heads of others you know in the convent i used to get up three quarters of an hour earlier so by the time we went down to prayer and meditation i'd have a good jag on and i felt so holy i could see which niche they were going to put my statue you in when i died that's not spirituality but that morning the compulsion to drink was removed it was removed like that you know at the time i didn't realize what a powerful gift that was to take somebody like myself and just remove it that's power and i have in the next ever since i've never never never ever had to struggle with it i've been carried four times in my life and that was one of them i was carried again by god i believe these special times when you can't account for the things that happen other than that you're ready and the power just the loving father just gives you your birthright i was sober a year and i thought i'd never teach again and one day i I picked up the newspaper. There was a job offered. I still was not buried together, believe me, at one year of sobriety. The morning I went for that interview, I was completely together. I was in charge of that interview. They said, we'll let you know Wednesday. Instead, they called me in two hours and said, there's nobody like you. We want you for the job. I tell you, they regretted that as the years went on. anyway I feel just recently I've been carried again I decided I know it's time to make a change and I don't know where the future is taking me but I knew that I had to move I lived about 25 miles north 25 kilometers north of Toronto in a town called Aurora and I know I need to get closer to the city I don't know what it is that's moving me but I was motivated to list my house and in a market where people list them and don't sell for six months my house sold in three days and about two weeks later a house the same size as mine sold for $47,000 less than mine so I have to believe that something is working in my life and i had no stress over it i just knew it was looked after and i said to the agent now you have to find me a place to live and the first place she showed me was the place i took i said we don't need to go any further it's perfect the way it is and that's taking place on march the 8th and i don't know what journey and i have some fear but i know that when i have fear i feel the spirit stirring in me and i Have to walk with that and go where it leads me and whatever it is that i have to do and whatever steps that i have to take you'll probably hear about it sometime but i'm walking i'm not sitting still saying you know god help me i can't help myself i've got to do what i can do and i always know that god will do what he can do so that's what happened that day i went home I went home and there was booze around and I'm going to hurry up because I see my time is going and I had to wait three and a half weeks I'd asked to get into a hospital called Donwood there were no treatment centers in those days and and there was this hospital and i sure was not going to go to these stupid aaa people who hadn't fixed me the first time sure wasn't going back there so i went through donwood and i met things started to happen the spirit was moving and i was moving and things started i stayed out of aa for six months i was going to do it on my own that God stuff never worked in the first place no money we were bankrupt at this time I had all my belongings when I went to this institution in two bags we lived up moved to skid row I'd never known there were places like that but I'm eternally grateful we didn't have enough to eat I remember that we had two beautiful dogs I had them put to sleep because it didn't know what else to do with them we couldn't feed ourselves let alone feed two dogs and I didn't know who to give them to so i went and had them put to sleep and i think that's the day i started to grow because that day my heart was crying out to those animals and i didn't want to have them put asleep but i had to take the tough decision so that we could get on with the business of living they made me soft inside and i had two they were put to sleep quietly and nicely and you know whatever i met a psychiatrist in the institution who gave me a spiritual awakening i went to tell him one day that i'd been planning suicide the night before and i remember sitting there with my arms crossed like this thinking now we're going to have little discussion about my my familial relationships he said mildred if you want to commit suicide go right ahead and he said if you want to get well he said I'm here it's possible to get Well but he said you've got to have the willingness and you've to do the work he said I'm going to even give you my home number so you've your safety valve but he you've got to do work end of interview and I thought you bastard it took me about from the time I left his office to the time i got onto the bus to realize precisely what he had said and i said you bet i'm going to get well and then i went to a because i was so desperately lonesome my husband at this time and believe me he is not my problem i do not have men like this in my life today because i'm not like that inside but in those days i still didn't know how to cope i didn't know how to unentangle myself he sat there depressed and i felt sorry for him so i went out and i answered telephones and did whatever didn't even have boots walked out in the snow and um he sat at home and he said i'm depressed and so my first sponsor said to me do you ever realize that he may not get well but that you can get well i'd never thought about that i never thought i could do that on my own that was my first awakening and then we had a fellow coming to our meetings called moose who used to say it's not important what you think of me but it's very important what i think of you if you choose not to like me that's what you have inside but if i choose not to like you i've got to deal with that and i i didn't really understand it but i did understand it and then there was a young man came to our meeting who used to say do the do things I knew what that meant it was a struggle in those days to get out of bed and brush my teeth and comb my hair and do whatever to get to work but I would hear those words ringing in my ears do the do-things and so I did the do thing and then my first sponsor got drunk and I got another sponsor and this was a man and I chose him because he had something that I wanted you know I don't know it's nice I think maybe it's a good idea that women sponsor women and men and I think generally that's a good rule but I've gone to the people who have what I want the first year that I was so when I met this man he was as tough as nails and I found out the first interview he said well I want to talk to you and so the first interview we had he said to me I'll sponsor you on one condition he said that when you're upset you're wrong why did I ask this turkey I've got to speed this along I left my husband when I was a year three quarters sober I did my steps I followed the people in my group because I didn't have a sponsor who there wasn't a sponsor in my life who made me do the steps but I knew that I had to do the steps and I followed the people in my group who had what I wanted there was a man for example he always used to come in a suit and a shirt and a tie and he looked good and he was sober two years and he used to say that he'd come into Donwood with his stuff in two plastic bags and I thought he's my kind of guy if he can put it together so can i and i used to follow him and i'd say what did you do and he'd tell me and i would go home and do it i was hungry to get well after a year and three quarters i said to my husband one day do you still blame me for everything that happened he looked at me and he said well about 95 five percent and that day i knew that the marriage was ending and eventually i i left three weeks later i was entangled with a man who was who did the same kinds of things to me you know it's not what's out there i think it's what i am inside that draws to me what it is that i need for my growth and i will keep on repeating and repeating and completing the same mistakes and i will keep on having the same pain until i do what i have to do god does what he has to do and the miracle happens inside and the old things that no longer fit fall away and a new life is born and a kind of living is created and so i began to teach and that's I had done the first nine steps and I thought if you did the first nine steps all was well then you just sailed into the sunset and one time Mac cheater came to Toronto and I was having a lot of mood swings the kids used to open the door I teach emotionally disturbed adolescents they'd open the door and take a look at me and they'd say i'd hear them and like i fancied myself mrs aa and i thought i should be cool i know this aa program and i'd hear them say don't go in there she's in a bad mood oh i nearly would die inside so i went to mac mac is dead now but if you knew mac you knew that you were looking into the face of god when you looked at mac and max i said to him mac what do you do like i'm not stupid if mac got the way he was then i was going to find out what mac did i wanted to know when he meditated how he medicated how he prayed what books he read and everything that he did and i was gonna do what mac did and I was gonna be a little maquette and i was just gonna sail right into the sunset mac said to me i do steps 10 11 and 12 on a daily basis I said yes Mac I know that but what do you really do like you can tell me he said I do 10 11 and 12 on a daily basis you go to 10 11 & 12 on the daily basis and one day you'll know what I said and you know that's exactly what I did I didn't know that what I was doing but that's really what I because I tried to improve my relationship to myself my self-esteem and the way I see myself I tried to improve my life with God and I tried improve my light with other people and you know it all comes together how I feel about myself determines how I fell about you how I how I deal with you is dependent on how I feel about God it all come full circle you know and it all intertwines in it all entangled and I can't say I'm going to be a good AA member and then go home and be a witch and I don't can't be nice to you out here and then go home and be a witch and I can't go home and pray and sit and meditate and then not carry that out and if you can't do that perfectly and none of us does don't expect perfection the book tells us there is no such thing this grand experience of life look up at the stars look at the moon look at the great giant trees and these beautiful mountains here. Life is much bigger than we think it is. You know, we limit ourselves. We think that it's all contained here. I don't. I think I lived before and I think I'm going to continue to live and experience and grow and get out experience ever more wonderful things. And that's why I was able to forgive people and take responsibility. I know when you're beaten and you're abused and people are stronger than you and they do things to you it's so easy to say well i'm just a victim i think i drew those things into my life i drew them into my Life for the good of my soul and that's really all it's about it's About the Good of our souls i think we have a soul sickness when we're separated from God that's the hole we feel and the more the closer we get to God the more the things we do that take away the more truth we experience the more we do good things in our lives the more practice the principles and the traditions and the legacies the more service we give the more of the spirit can out and the more the spirit shows out the easier life becomes and it just becomes all a great wonderful experience experience and if you are not there yet don't beat yourself you know the world is perfect now you are perfect all this stuff that we see in its imperfection none of that is in god when god looks down at you today he looks down and says you are my beloved child i'm perfectly pleased with you it's not a question of trying to be better and all that kind of stuff it's a question of letting go and as the big book says we do step forth so we remove the blocks what blocks the things that block the light of the spirit from shining out so that the spirit can live in me and can live as me and do the things and experience life through you and through me we weren't meant to be like each other we weren t meant to have the same experience where you are is perfect for you we make a very dumb statement don't we when we say if I were you or if I had that to do over again I never have it to do all again God is now health is now life is now love is right now as my sponsor says in this hot second and that moment is gone and a new moment takes its place and another moment takes its place and yesterday is no more and tomorrow doesn't exist my disease came in three words them there and then and God is not in them there and then God is in now here and me and if I keep that in mind life becomes simple life becomes simply and life is a growing experience there were things I had to forgive and I would forgive intellectually and maybe three days later I would be unforgiving again and I had keep at it till the thing could come full circle and while you're in that process don't forget you have all the tools that you need to live a successful life you don't beat your child because your child tries to walk and falls God doesn't beat us because we try to grow and we make mistakes we beat ourselves we beat each other but our father never beats us there is only love there is the only light within and I'd like to close with another experience three years ago a sister who was really like a mother to me died she died of cancer and my nephews called me and said you better come because she has probably three weeks to live I was dreading going out because for a lot of reasons I came home I really didn't need an airplane because that was another time when God carried me and the time when I feel I looked on the face of God because I went to see this sister and she was paralyzed and all she could move was her hands and you know her head a little bit and i have to admit the saturday i went to see her the first night i thought why don't they just let her die and the next day when i came back to visit she asked everybody to leave the room and she said to me mildred she said last night when you were in here you were thinking they should leave me let me die weren't you and her honesty captured me and we had one of those moments where no no no time existed nobody else existed and she said to me i want you to know something that life is not dependent on how high you can jump it's not dependent the clothes you wear it's not dependent what you have it's dependent on being able to go from place to place she said though I can't move and I'm totally dependent on other people for my most private bodily function she said I am as alert and alive as you are she said never forget that the great gift of life should not be taken before it is time for that person to go I looked at her face she was 67 and she was she was lined and she was tired but that day her face was transfigured at least I saw no line I saw nothing but love and life and the joy of what it means to be able to relate to the spirit and i went home with a new appreciation of life life is not something i take for granted anymore i don't care life doesn't life doesn t always have to be fun fun fun but it can always be happy joyous and free and there's a big difference and speaking of lines i'll just close with a little silliness uh i chaired our provincial conference about two years ago and the day the conference and if you chair the conference you chair the banquet and we have the big screens up so So the next morning as I was walking around, one of the conference attendees came to me and she said, you know, you're really very photogenic. She said, did you ever look great on that screen? She stood back and then she said... As a matter of fact, she said I think you look better on the screen than you do in real life. Just remember something. if you carry a candle in your hand I can knock it out the rain can fall on it the wind can blow on it you can drop it you can lose it the light you carry within is yours to nourish it's yours to tend it's ours to fan so that it glows ever brighter to make this world a better place to live you're fabulous you've been a wonderful group I love you God bless Thank you.