The Scottish Man in the Barbados AA Meeting — Chris S.

Welcome back, my friends, to the AA Recovery Interviews podcast.
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.
On this episode of AA Recovery Interviews, I'm pleased to welcome Chris S.,
a good friend of mine from an AA club we regularly attend.
I first met Chris when he came into the program in 2007
and watched with concern as he slipped a half-dozen times
before locking in his sobriety date two years later.
What's really interesting about Chris's story is that he seldom drank until he was in his early 40s,
despite the fact that he had experienced abject loneliness and isolation
sometimes.
Throw in low confidence, poor self-esteem, and feelings of self-loathing,
and you get the picture of a man who somehow survived a dysfunctional marriage
and the raising of three children without the help of alcohol or drugs.
It wasn't until his second marriage that Chris found alcohol and cocaine,
and his whole world changed.
Finding the feeling he had been looking for his entire life,
he set out to make up for lost time.
Naturally, it didn't take long for alcoholism to pull the rug out from under him.
As Chris grew older, he began to realize that alcoholism was a form of addiction.
His booze and drugs rapidly eroded his life.
He ended up in a psychiatric hospital,
where he experienced, for the first time,
AA meetings brought in from the outside.
Chris started drinking again when he got out,
but the AAC had been planted.
He went to meetings and even half-heartedly worked the program,
but it took six desire chips over two years
before he finally put the bottle down for good.
Sponsored by one of the AA Club's legendary members,
Chris's program finally took hold.
Over the years,
I've watched Chris become a middle dweller in the program.
He's a regular meeting attendee, reliable sponsor,
and a trusted servant to both the club and the general AA community.
In the process of being of service,
Chris has also taken AA meetings into Texas prisons over the past five years.
I'm grateful for Chris's presence in AA and in my life,
which these days are one and the same.
His ready smile and easygoing nature make all feel comfortable.
He's a daily fixture in our AA Club,
and he's become the guy who you hope to see in the next meeting you attend.
I think you'll enjoy the next 65 minutes with my fine friend and AA brother, Chris S.
My name's Chris. I'm an alcoholic.
Hi, Chris. That's the right answer to that question.
So, you're batting a thousand for today so far.
I really appreciate the fact that you've agreed to do this interview on AA Recovery Interviews.
Thank you, Howard. I appreciate it.
I appreciate you asking me.
It's kind of weird.
We're both retired and we had so much trouble getting our schedules.
Well, us retired guys, we're busy. We're busy with all the fun stuff.
And to me, this is a lot of fun.
I've enjoyed doing these interviews for the better part of two years now.
And I've had the opportunity to interview people from all over the world.
And you're one of the people who I knew I wanted to interview for quite a long time
because you and I have been going to meetings for years now,
since the club before the club before the club.
I don't use the name of clubs or the name of churches or other locations nor last names
to maintain the anonymity as part of this process.
But you and I are sitting in one of our favorite AA clubs and you're a regular here every day.
Yeah.
We just came out of a really great meeting that I got to hear you share.
Yeah.
Okay, so you shared in that meeting.
I was thinking, I better close my ears because I don't want to hear what he has to say
because otherwise it'll feel like I've heard it before today.
But it was beautiful.
You may hear it again.
It was beautiful. It was beautiful.
Well, so your sobriety date, how long have you been sober?
I celebrated 13 years in June.
So I got sober in June 21st is my sobriety date.
My last drink was June 20th in 09.
A little over 13 years ago.
Wow.
Was that your first time trying to get sober?
Oh, no.
I've got a bunch of desire chips.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I went into treatment in 07 and got my first taste of AA.
But I relapsed for two years.
My first sponsor kept saying I wasn't done and he was right.
But I didn't have the confidence.
The consequences I had before I went to rehab.
So I fooled myself into thinking maybe it wasn't all that bad.
And did it turn out that way?
I didn't have near the negative episodes I had in those two years, but I just couldn't stop.
I didn't want to.
So is it a matter of you knew you needed to, but you didn't want to?
I knew I had a problem, Howard.
I knew that way before I sobered up.
And I don't know.
I think I pretty much just lost all hope.
And I wasn't doing any less.
I was just being more careful.
I was totally isolated.
Had no friends.
Hardly ever got out of my apartment.
And was doing massive amounts of cocaine, which is my drug of choice.
And drinking massive amounts of alcohol so I could do more cocaine.
I think I might have even backed into alcoholism because I drank so damn much.
Trying to keep my heart from exploding.
I've known people who, once they could not get their drug of choice, especially when it comes to opiates,
people who didn't necessarily want to go from OxyContin to heroin on the streets,
they decided to ramp up their drinking to take the place.
So when was the very first time that you went into AA?
Would have been in 07.
When I was in rehab, they took us around to clubs.
One of the ones was this club here.
Yeah.
What did you think when you were sitting in that first meeting?
I didn't give a damn.
I didn't.
I don't even remember.
What was said.
I didn't really think about the future.
I didn't know if this was going to help or not.
I did listen when I was there.
I don't remember the meeting.
That was my first meet.
Well, actually, that was my first AA meeting.
I'd been to NA a time or two on my own.
I didn't know what they kept talking about working these steps.
It sounded like too much work to me.
Now, the inpatient psychiatric hospital that you went to,
didn't they have an AA meeting that came into that hospital?
They did.
They had two, actually, at the time.
Uh-huh.
The alumni, we called it, who had been in treatment there,
they had a Friday night meeting and a Monday night meeting.
And so, a lot of these people in this meeting here,
that's where I met them when I was a patient.
I always say Marcia G and I were litter mates
because she was in there right before me.
And we always say there's that extra special bond
when you meet in a mental institution.
Well, Marcia did an interview,
so hers is one that people can listen to
if they want to get her perspective of that whole experience.
So, to what extent did the hospital emphasize the handoff
between treatment there and continued sobriety
after you got out of there?
One thing I noticed when I was in treatment,
and even the guy that ran the unit,
most of the techs and the guy that ran the unit
were not one of us, which I call alcoholics.
So, they knew the theory, they knew what was in the books,
but I tell you, it's really hard to explain,
I call them earth people,
to an earth person what we have.
They think we have a lack of willpower,
and it's a mental obsession.
So, I noted that.
So, I guess I didn't take a lot of credence.
They did give us these little bitty big books,
which I don't remember getting in too much.
But a lot of the groups were helpful,
and the alumni coming in, I think, were helpful.
That's where I got my first sponsor.
And we're still friends today.
I remember going to that meeting many, many years ago,
like in my first five years of sobriety,
and it used to be held in the cafeteria, I believe.
Was it there when you were going to?
And it was interesting because there were always
three or four people from the outside
who were really engaging, excited,
and you normally don't go to those kind of meetings
unless you're the kind of service person
that gets a lot out of it.
But most of the people were sitting there
kind of bleary-eyed and, you know,
if there's a look for disinterest,
that was on most of the faces.
One of the things I've noticed, too,
about some of these treatment centers is they do a great job.
They do a great job at getting people sober,
but the handoff from the time they get out
to the time they get into AA is not real strong
or the emphasis is not enough on the importance of AA
after they get out.
So the thinking is, well, I'll go here.
They'll get me straightened out.
I'll be able to take all the knowledge
and everything I've gained in the 60 or 90 days
or 30 days plus the outpatient.
I'll be able to take all of that and stay sober.
And, oh, AA, yeah, I'll do that if I need to.
Yeah.
I'll get out of there.
Is that right?
One thing that helped me was I did the intensive outpatient
for several months after that,
and I met two very nice ladies who were, again, not one of us.
But I learned a lot in that.
I think I was going to that once or twice a week for months.
But I think it was more me.
I did do the AA.
I don't think I did the 90-90.
Mm-hmm.
My first sponsor took me through the steps pretty quickly.
So I don't know.
I think the fact that maybe,
at that time now, I still go over there, actually, as an alum.
Mm-hmm.
And a lot of the people now, the guy that runs Unit 10,
which is where the residency people are, where I was,
he's one of us.
He's got over 20 years.
And that's one of the great things that's come out of that for me
is he and I are fast friends now.
We've had dinner together with our wives and really good guy.
And I've actually drug him over here a couple of times.
So I think you're right.
The handoff probably wasn't there.
And I don't know if that was a function.
It was a function of people not really understanding alcoholism,
alcoholics.
Well, it's almost counterintuitive for somebody who owns and runs
and profits from inpatient or outpatient treatment programs
to suggest that here's a program out there in Alcoholics Anonymous
that, if you were so inclined and willing to turn your whole self
over to that program, you wouldn't need their program.
So it's almost counterintuitive for them to be recommending something
that, even though it's not direct competition,
it's an alternative approach.
I've been visiting that place on Mondays for over 10 years now,
and there's a lot of repeat offenders.
There's one guy I probably saw five or six times in a year.
What does he tell you about his slips?
I don't think this particular person I don't think ever wanted to get sober.
They come in there, and they'll stay until they won't pay for it anymore.
Now that you mention it, I think that's probably why I went in there.
I needed a break.
Yeah.
I was only in two weeks because I look good on paper, right?
I got a job.
I don't have any felonies.
I just never got caught.
So I was in there two weeks, and I just needed a rest.
I never went a day without drinking and or drugging ever for 20 years.
So you went in there the very first time you got sober
or was it the very last time you got sober?
No, no.
I was in there in 07, and I got out.
I was telling the lady in the meeting today,
I stayed at 90 days and decided to celebrate,
and then a pattern started.
I put together a month, and I went and got a desire chip every time,
but I wasn't going every day.
I go way more now than I did my first year.
So I did that for two years, and I finally got to the point probably the last six months,
I just said to hell with it, and I just quit going altogether,
and I actually upped my intake.
Well, so in 2007, you tried it.
You got a lot of desire chips between then and your final desire chip in 2009.
Mm-hmm.
How many times did you go back to the hospital, or was it just the first time?
Well, actually, you know what helped?
I really did this after 09 more.
Yeah.
Yeah, I didn't go back to the hospital at all except for IOP
until after I sobered up this time.
At which point you became part of the alumni.
Correct, and when I finally decided I'd had enough
and I was going to be serious about this thing,
that Friday night meeting, I did that for three years because it saved my butt
because Friday night's a really good night to go get messed up, right?
Uh-huh.
So the meeting was at 7.30, I believe.
So at 6.30, we would meet, and we would go on to the unit and talk with the patients.
And then we'd go to the meeting.
I think it was 7.30 to 8.30.
Yeah.
And then we would all go over to Jack's.
Oh, for dinner.
And I would stay there.
Liquor stores were closed, and my dope man wouldn't answer the phone.
He'd answer the phone after midnight.
So I would stay there with those guys.
And I did that for three years.
It saved my butt.
I felt like if I could get past Friday,
and this time after 09, I was going to meetings pretty much every day.
So you'd gotten to know yourself pretty well by that point, triggers and so forth.
Well, I knew the triggers.
I mean, I wouldn't drive on the North Loop for years
just because that was dope central for me.
I don't go over there now unless I have to.
After all these years, my car still would know where to go.
Yeah, isn't that something?
I'm very careful with that.
I think the idea of a trigger is a good way to put it.
When that new lady in the meeting today, when I met her at the beginning of the meeting,
I asked her how long she'd been sober, and she told me, like, three months.
And then I said, have you tried this before?
She said, yeah, I was sober for 10 years.
And I said, well, what happened?
And she started listing off all the things that happened.
And I said, well, you know what?
I said, well, you know the real reason you drank, don't you?
She said, what?
I said, you know the real reason you drank.
She said, why?
I said, because you're an alcoholic.
Those things might have been triggers, but we drink because we're alcoholic,
not because we get divorced, not because we lose all our money,
not because we get sent to jail.
It's something that I have to remember, and I get reminded of a lot in this particular meeting
because this meeting has a nice cross-section of people from all walks of society.
Watching you over the years has been a real treat for me,
and our leader today.
You remember what he used to call me when your sponsor, Howard Jay,
was still in town before he moved out of the country.
You remember what Jimmy used to call me?
Mm-hmm.
And it bothered you more than it did.
We had two Howards, and of course, he and Howard had known each other for a long time,
the other Howards, so he deemed you the good Howard, making him the bad Howard.
Yeah.
And it bothered you more than it did bad Howard?
Well, it didn't bother me.
I took it tongue-in-cheek, but whenever he would call on me and say the good Howard,
I'd say, I think all Howards are good.
Including that guy over there, and I'd point at Howard.
Yeah, I remember that.
Yeah, I got to know him very early in my sobriety.
He's a good guy.
Oh, he's amazing.
I do want to say one anecdote here of what I've gotten out of you,
and I've known you since I got in the program because you used to come over here pretty regularly.
And I love it when you ask somebody, has anybody told you that you're loved today?
I actually used that on my priest at my church a couple of years ago.
He was really down from the COVID, you know.
We had to stop church, and he was getting close to the mandatory retirement age,
and I could tell he was just down.
And I was at the church one day, and I stuck my head in the door, and I said that to him.
And he just lit up.
He said, they have now.
So thank you for that.
Well, sure.
Sometimes that's what people just need to hear, especially earlier in the day.
So what was your family life like growing up?
That's a good question.
I don't really follow the norm on that, Howard.
It's kind of baffling to me.
I grew up in a, well, we went from upper middle class to lower middle class because my dad got in trouble.
But I had an absentee father and a really good stay-at-home mom.
I had one sibling.
We were never hungry.
We were never poor.
In fact, when my dad hit it big, I was ashamed of the wealth we had
because I was ashamed to have the old guys over from the hood to this big house.
It was really weird, and I look back on it now that I know myself a lot better than I did then.
I kind of thank God for that because money has never been up here for me, never been a top thing.
I mean, I've been totally broke, and more is better than none.
But I've never had that as a priority, and I think it's served me well.
It seems like the less I want, the more I get.
I had a chunk of change.
It was tens of thousands of dollars.
Show up from a company I had been fired from 20 years ago.
This happened a few months ago.
It was called a Pension Plan B or something.
Here's this check, and I'm going.
And first thing I did from the program, I looked up and I thanked God for it
because that's where it came from.
Isn't that amazing when those things happen?
Yeah.
But my childhood was normal.
But I was an unhappy kid as far back as I can remember.
Why were you unhappy?
Do you remember why?
Howard.
Bless his heart.
Made me go back.
Took us a year to go through the steps.
I'd been through the steps twice with my first sponsor.
And I guess I did the best I could, but Howard's thorough.
So we spent three months on the doctor's opinion.
The first exercise he gave me, there's three qualities of an alcoholic.
The full flight from reality, maladjusted to life, and outright mental defect.
He made me go back and give him three experiences I had that fit into all three of those categories.
But here's the catch.
While I was not under the influence of anything, because we say alcohol's but a symptom, right?
It took me a month to do that, Howard.
I was so pissed.
Yeah, because you can blame it on alcoholism all day long.
But when you take alcoholism out, where do you go with it?
It's but a symptom.
Yeah.
So he gave me an analogy.
He said, it's like somebody come in here and say their truck's broken in the parking lot.
What do I need to do?
Well, he said, you got to find out what's wrong with it.
So after all of that soul search, I had to go back to my childhood.
When I was a kid.
And then we had to separate the things that were, is that an outright mental defect or is that six-year-old boy?
Just being a six-year-old boy.
That's why it took me forever.
And that's how I can tell when I sponsor people now, because that's the way I start out.
And you can tell if they're in it or not after that.
I'm not going to do this.
What did that process uncover for you?
It uncovered why, and I'm still not sure why.
But it uncovered why I drank like I did.
It was my self-hatred.
When he brought that out of me, I went all the way back.
And I had that growing up.
I had no confidence.
I was the exact opposite of what I am now.
I was just a quiet, never-talked kid.
I disliked myself.
I was a perfectionist.
You know, if I got a B or a C, I'd be mad at myself.
Nothing to do with my parents.
I wasn't abused, you know.
My dad was a moderately heavy drinker.
I don't think he was an alcoholic.
I do know I had an uncle and a grandfather that were probably alcoholics.
Uh-huh.
So the immediate genetics weren't there.
I was unhappy on my own.
You know what's interesting about what you just said, Chris,
is that you've just told me about how you were unhappy and no self-confidence
and low self-esteem and those kind of things.
Yet when we first started talking about it, you said,
I had a normal childhood.
Yeah, maybe.
Isn't that ironic?
Isn't it ironic that we would get so used to that kind of stuff
that we can look back and say, that was normal?
That was the kind of stuff that was normal in my house, too.
Complete dysfunction.
Uh-huh.
Which is why for years, dysfunction felt normal
because things were always in such a state of chaos
that the only way you can deal with it is to make chaos the new normal.
Does that make sense?
Uh-huh.
Yeah.
Unfortunately, yes.
When you took these things when you were a kid,
I mean, and I remember complaining to my mother
about what a crummy dad my dad was and that kind of stuff,
but what kind of support or lack thereof did you get from the family
over what you were feeling and experiencing as a kid?
I don't even know that it ever came out.
My dad was one of these, you know, he was born in the 20s,
and he was one of these guys that just didn't share his feelings.
And like I say, he was a workaholic.
He was addicted to work, so I didn't see a lot of him.
He wasn't prominent.
But he did do things for us.
He helped us with our sports, and my mother was a good person.
So I guess everything around me was normal but me.
Maybe that was it.
I was the abnormal one.
When you got together with your friends,
the people who you hung with when you were a kid,
what did you see in their lives that made you envious?
I've got a lot of character defects.
That generally hasn't been one of them.
Start out with I've never had a lot of friends when I was younger.
I never had a lot of friends until I got sober this time.
Let's put it that way.
But I hung around with more of the kids were fairly well off like we were.
And my only friends, it was usually we had one common interest,
and that was music.
It was a great time to grow up in the 60s with rock and roll just being invented.
Well, he got an XKE Jaguar for his birthday.
Oh, my gosh.
I might have had a touch of envy over that car
because that's my favorite car of all time.
Yeah. Yeah.
But not too much.
Maybe life was simple when you don't have a lot of friends.
There's not a lot of drama.
Yeah.
I was a real loner, and I hear that in these rooms all the time.
Just a loner.
I preferred my own company, even though I hated myself.
Go figure that out.
So loneliness is a great reason to drink and to try and escape.
And the only thing that we usually can't escape is ourselves in the process
because we take ourselves into that process,
whether we're drinking or using drugs.
So what was school like for you then?
You're this loner.
You're this kid who does it.
I hated public school all the way through high school.
And there was a caste system there.
And I might have been a little envious of the popular people,
now that you mention it, yeah.
But I did nothing to try to make friends with anybody.
So I hated it.
I made good grades.
I did fine.
I went to class.
Didn't get into much trouble.
A little bit of vandalism here and there.
But I did some things I didn't get caught over,
like stealing a bunch of beer off of a beer truck at the Colonial Golf Tournament.
Did that.
Didn't occur to me to drink it.
I sold it.
You sold it.
Isn't that weird?
My first drink, Howard, I was probably 13 or 14,
and I decided I was in the house by myself.
It would be a good idea to raid my parents' liquor cabinet.
And I'm pretty sure what I drank, I just drank it out of the bottle,
was cooking wine.
Oh, no.
And it tasted like cough syrup.
And I said, I don't see any kind of benefit out of this.
Yeah.
So I didn't drink enough to get the buzz.
So I didn't try it again.
I really didn't start drinking until I got in college.
And that's when I decided to join a fraternity.
There was just a lot of free beer around.
Yeah, yeah.
So alcohol wasn't a big part of your high school story.
What ways, when you were a kid growing up and having these feelings,
I'm assuming from being a young kid until, let's say, high school,
what kind of things did you do to deal with the feelings of loneliness?
And did you have any interests or anything else that took you out of that feeling?
Because I've talked to people who have been loners,
and they talk about having been voracious readers or stamp collecting
or whatever they did to convince themselves
that they weren't lonely, they were just very immersed in a single pursuit
that didn't involve other people.
What was your story?
I probably did that.
I would lose myself in the music.
I loved music.
I started going to concerts when I was 14.
I've got a little sign at home that says I might be old,
but I got to see all the cool bands.
Well, that was me.
So it was music.
And then I did participate in sports.
And I was pretty coordinated.
So I did all right in sports.
I started bowling.
I played street football.
But I didn't play any organized sports because I had no confidence, no self-esteem.
I had a really poor mental attitude.
But I was pretty good at things.
So I'd say those two things.
They kept me afloat.
It was probably the music.
I'd build these little model ships and stuff.
That was a hobby.
Airplanes.
And I loved to do it.
And I know it's not good for the records,
but I'd stack the vinyl ten high and just, through headphones,
listen to music for hours.
All day long, huh?
Yeah.
And knew I liked women, girls,
but it was too damn bashful to really start dating.
Probably didn't start dating until I was a junior in high school.
What was that experience like?
Did that get you out of yourself?
That helped.
If I'd have known what I knew 50 years later when I was going through the steps with Howard,
because every relationship I ever had with a female,
even if we didn't have sex,
ended badly.
And this is all the way into the steps.
No, this is when I met the lady I'm married to now.
Because I proposed to her.
Everything was good.
And then I don't consider myself a control freak,
but I started trying to run the weddings.
It was her first wedding, my third.
And I'm in there trying to control everything.
And I was telling Howard, and he looks at me and he says,
you've made her your higher power.
Oh, my.
Step back and just do what they tell you to do.
And I thought back, Howard,
every female I'd ever been with, I had done that.
I put them on a pedestal where they can't live up to expectations.
All of them.
But still tried to control them on that pedestal.
Somehow.
Because they couldn't meet my standards,
which I'm not even sure I knew what those were.
God, what a revelation.
And that's a pattern that follows us through life, isn't it?
I mean, until we get the kind of help that you're talking about
and the kind of understanding that a guy like Howard
and the Balcoholics Anonymous and the Steps can bring us.
I'm curious.
You said you went to a lot of rock band concerts and that sort of thing.
And it was my experience.
I didn't go to anywhere near as many as you probably did.
But the ones I did go to, if I wasn't under the influence,
I'd become under the influence once I got there by what was just around me.
You know, joints being passed and drinks and that kind of thing.
Were you drinking and using by the time you were doing that?
I was very naive.
What did you think about all that going on around you?
Well, it's so cool you brought that up because my formative years
were in Fort Worth, Texas, and we're talking early to late 60s.
Sure.
I thought about this.
I always said, oh, and by the way, when you started that line of questions,
I knew right where you were going.
If I'd have been born in California, I'd probably be dead.
What happened is the drugs, I was just ahead of the drugs.
Even weed was very rare when I was in high school.
And if people were doing it, I wasn't hanging out with them.
I didn't even ever smoke a joint until I got out of college.
Going to all those concerts, I never saw any.
Either that or I wasn't paying attention.
But we're talking mid-60s.
Well, we're also talking Fort Worth, right?
And Fort Worth.
And I just don't remember it being around.
So you didn't have exposure to it that way.
Thank God I didn't.
I'd probably be dead, Howard.
But once you got to college, things started to change with regard to drinking.
Just the drinking.
I knew people that smoked weed, but nothing else.
I don't know if there was more of a stigma maybe on the hard drugs back then.
It was around, but I just didn't come into contact with it.
Looking back on it, whatever kept me away from it for so long was God.
Because I didn't get started until I was in my early 40s, but I caught up in a hurry.
I get that.
So I might have not made it if I had done it earlier.
But I wasn't hanging around with the people or it wasn't around.
I don't know.
So that's a good thing, though.
I look back on it, Howard.
And I enjoyed the music because of the music.
Yeah.
So when I did get into drugs and alcohol, it was there.
It caused me to miss a lot of shows.
Either I was there and don't remember, I couldn't get to the concert.
But afterwards, it was not a trigger.
And I love music.
So I still got to have my music because I love live music.
And I've got a lot of musician friends in Houston.
And they only play in bars.
So when I sobered up, I found a company.
I found a couple of guys in the program that liked that kind of music.
And I would go with them.
Oh, that's great.
Because I didn't trust myself.
The bar is the center of attention.
And you're in a bar.
Until I got where I didn't need that.
But you know the book says, if we have a reason, go.
And I was there for the music.
Thank God it wasn't a trigger.
Thank God you were around other people who could remind you to stay sober.
I don't know if you knew Russell M.
Big, good-looking guy.
He's the guy I used to go with the most.
And he was apparently a bay magnet.
And every time we went somewhere, at least one woman would come up and offer him a beer.
You know that recall from a hot flame?
That's what he would do.
No!
And scare him to death.
You were in a fraternity.
It was easy to drink.
You drank.
But you just mentioned that you really didn't get involved until your 40s, really involved.
Yeah, with a few exceptions.
A few exceptions.
So walk us down the road.
You graduated from college?
I did.
Walk us down the road from the time that you graduated, let's say age 22, 23, whenever it was,
until when you started to use alcohol or use and misuse and then abuse.
Before I got out of college, I married my high school sweetheart,
which is really good because we fought all the damn time.
So you know, you marry her, right?
I wasn't even out of college.
She was a very controlling person.
And we had three wonderful children, six grandchildren.
But we were together a quarter of a century, married 23 of those.
And I think the fact she was so controlling, I can hardly remember having alcohol in the house.
Now, every once in a while, I'd tear down.
But I think just the fact she was such a teetotaler, I was concentrating on my career,
raising kids.
I got a night degree.
I got a master's degree at night.
Wow.
So I was so damn busy.
I don't know.
And we didn't have many friends.
So I didn't do a lot of socializing.
I was still pretty, you know, isolating.
Those feelings of loneliness, did they accompany you through those years?
I think at first having her around kind of offset some of that.
Mm-hmm.
Things didn't really start going south until probably 10 years into the marriage.
So looking back on it, I think that was a protection, Howard.
I mean, I remember I went out with a bunch of guys from work.
We went to a basketball game.
And we met at this guy's apartment.
And he had joints there.
And I smoked a couple of them.
And, you know, it felt like Ben having a buzz to me.
Uh-huh.
And I went back, told my wife after it was over, and she was appalled.
Oh, no.
Oh, yeah.
So I was scared of her.
We'll be right back.
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And we're back.
You said about 10 years in, the problems started.
And you were married for 23 years.
Yeah.
What kind of problems and how did you deal with them for so much longer after they actually started?
I tell you, I've learned in the steps, I've learned that I had a part in this, too.
And I did.
But she became really verbally abusive.
And I just, I don't know, I just put up with it.
And I already had an inferiority complex.
And I'm not saying this is why I started drinking heavily later.
Right.
But it didn't help.
It just kind of beat me down.
But you know my part in it?
Probably more than her part.
I let her do it, Howard.
I could have left.
And I used the excuse, and maybe it was a good excuse.
I had three children growing up.
I didn't want to abandon them.
So I stuck it out as long as I could.
And I was faithful to her in our marriage until about 20 years in.
She kept accusing me of having affairs.
So guess what?
You finally had one.
Not one.
I kind of lost my mind.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's a long time to be in an unhappy marriage, isn't it?
Oh, I tell you, Howard, it is.
It is.
I was probably almost as miserable then as I was when I was getting in trouble drinking.
Did it occur to you during any part of those troubled years in your marriage to escape via alcohol and or drugs?
That was weird, Howard.
That's a good question.
Again, I had been exposed to drugs just that little bit a week.
And I didn't really like weed.
And I didn't like being drunk because I always got sick.
Maybe it was like my own anabuse built in.
I don't know.
Natural anabuse.
I mean, I can remember counting on one hand the times I really tore down and got drunk where I was really sick.
I didn't like the marijuana, so I really wasn't tempted with that.
The hard stuff never showed up.
And my drugs of choice were stimulants.
And I didn't do that until much later in life.
I was so stoic, Howard.
It was just like, you know, work, kids, work, kids, night school.
So you didn't allow yourself enough time in between that?
I didn't allow myself to realize how miserable I was, I guess.
But those are good questions.
I hadn't even thought about a lot of that.
Did you ever seek any kind of outside help for that, like seeing therapists and that kind of thing?
I did.
I did.
I did.
Probably we'd been married 20 years.
My temper had become horrible.
When is this?
This is probably the late 80s, early 90s.
My temper had become unbearable, and I was just losing it.
And we would scream in matches at each other.
I call it Friday night fights because she worked, I worked, and we came on Friday and we retired and had a huge fight every Friday night.
How did that affect the kids?
Not good.
That's why I finally left.
But you're asking about help.
She's the one that made, she said, you need therapy.
She was right.
And I went to this therapist.
I still remember this lady.
And she helped me start on the path to realizing I wasn't that bad.
And this is when Prozac first came out.
She made me go to the psychiatrist.
Didn't make me.
I went to a psychiatrist.
He gave me a prescription.
And I was still going to her every week.
Then my wife got pissed that I was going to her, even though she's the one that wanted me to go.
And the Prozac just, it was weeks and weeks and weeks.
She said, because she was on it.
She told me she was on it.
I wasn't feeling anything.
And it took about six weeks.
And I just had, it wasn't like a high from a drug.
It was just like a little bit of well-being.
And it just got better.
And I could feel that it helped.
And my wife hated it.
I don't know if she hated it because I was better.
Or she hated it because she didn't trust pills and drugs and stuff like that.
I even bought her a book on it, how it works.
But, yeah, so that lady helped me a lot.
You asked how it affected the kids.
It affected the kids.
And by this time, my youngest was 14.
My oldest was in college.
It was really bothering her because she wasn't there during the school year.
She went to Oklahoma.
And I finally decided it was better with me not being there.
Not there than me there because it was getting out of hand.
And ironically, the therapist who she insisted I went to had been through, had the same experience.
And I told her I was going to leave.
I had to go.
She told me all kinds of little things to do.
I wrote letters to the kids so they would have that.
And I left.
That wasn't a good night because she had been telling me to leave for five years.
She'd just say, leave, get out.
And then when I did, she was really upset.
So you finally left after 23 years of marriage.
Well, maybe 22.
It took so long to get a divorce.
It might have been another year.
Those were unhappy years.
And part of the reason I think I twisted off, I had this totally wrong impression of myself that I hadn't done enough.
I hadn't sowed my oats because I got married when I was 21.
I hadn't been with enough women.
I hadn't done this.
I hadn't done that.
So I set out on this quest to make up for lost time.
That's in your middle 40s.
Yeah, early 40s.
And I met this wonderful woman at work.
And she went through the same kind of divorce I did.
I ended up marrying her.
We were together 12 years.
We were together six years.
Then we got married.
But we pretty well drank and drugged ourselves out of the marriage.
She was half Native American.
She liked to drink.
So she was a heavy drinker before you guys met?
If she was, it didn't manifest for a long time for either one of us because we were so into each other.
It was a beautiful relationship.
I can still remember the good times.
What was your relationship with your kids like during the time that you were in your second marriage?
I think they liked her.
At least two of them.
I have three kids.
I think two of them liked her.
She was a sweet woman.
Beautifully attractive physically.
She'd walk into a room and heads would turn, which was a problem because the guys were always hitting on her, even after we were married.
But she was a wonderful person.
So that lasted about 12 years.
Anyway, I can't even remember us having alcohol in the house at first.
But the drinking got more and more and the partying.
We loved to go out and party.
This is when I discovered when I was buzzed, I could talk to people.
You know, we've heard that story over and over and over.
Yeah.
All of a sudden, I'm Superman, right?
So I enjoyed that.
That got more and more and more.
And one night, I still remember the date.
It was April 15th, 2000.
Not 2000.
1996.
We had gone out.
My ex-wife, we weren't married yet, but she had a best girlfriend.
And she used to go with us.
She liked the music.
And she used to go with us to clubs and stuff.
We went over to her townhouse one night.
And there were three little lines of cocaine on the counter.
This is your wife's friend?
Yeah.
Your new wife's friend.
My wife's friend, my wife, who wasn't quite my wife yet, and me.
Okay.
So your ex-wife's friend, the woman who was going to become your wife, and you.
Right.
Right.
Facing three lines of cocaine.
Yeah.
Never done it before.
And they weren't big either.
Yeah.
But I'd never done it.
Right.
So hit the line.
And it takes five minutes.
And all of a sudden.
And all of a sudden, this is the way I've wanted to feel my whole life.
This is it.
And I don't even think we did anymore because we got distracted.
And I won't go into details, but it had to do with those two women being naked and a
waterbed.
Right.
Best night of my life, right?
Right.
Right.
So every time I do cocaine, that's going to happen.
But that high I had.
And it was funny because I wasn't craving it.
It never came around.
It never came around again.
I didn't know how to get it.
And we're still going to all these parties and stuff.
And now we're hanging around with the people that are doing the hard drugs.
So I get contacts.
And I can even remember back in the mid-'90s going or late-'90s going.
I started getting worried because I said, we're doing this almost every weekend now.
But I liked it too much.
So you found the thing that made you feel the way that you always wanted to feel.
wanted to feel. And you sought it out through these friendships and these groups of people
that you hung with. At some point, did you withdraw back into isolation while you were
continuing to do that? Or were you still always involved in social situations?
As long as we were together, my second wife and I, we were usually in party mode. And you know
it's fun at first, right? Every alcoholic that's recovered. And that's part of the reason for
relapses. We think we can go back to when it was fun and we can't. And I tried. It was fun
almost the whole time we were together. And we had been married six years. The six years we were
married was a nightmare because we had actually split up in between that. We were together six
years. She got tired of my BS. So we took a, I don't know what it was. Like a separation?
Yeah, but it wasn't even understood. I just thought we had broken up.
You were married?
No.
We weren't married yet. I'm a weak. No, we weren't married yet. So we had six years unmarried,
10 month break, and then reconnected, six years married. So my usage when I was by myself
doubled. You know, I made her my higher power. My higher power had turned her back on me.
So there it went, man. That's when I really twisted off.
Did you ever recapture that first feeling? Or do you remember there being more times like that
first experience? Or?
Were you always chasing something that never reoccurred?
Well, not with the three-way, but the high. And I hear this in AA all the time,
that people never can catch, especially with opiates, which I never got into because nobody
ever had any of them. Because I'd try anything if you had it. They say they can't reproduce that
first high. But Howard, every time I took a snort of coke, it was like, yeah.
There you were.
Every time. Until I started taking it and I didn't want to.
Then I did. But I,
I could stay high. I had to do more and more to stay high.
You were using all the time in greater quantities. Is that?
Yeah, I think that's probably when it got me. You know, we say it's cunning, baffling, and powerful.
Sure.
Well, the way it works, it lets you have fun for a while. I had fun for six years.
And then when I upped everything, by the time you realize you got a problem, it's too late.
It's got you. And it had me.
So you were with her for six years doing it. Then you broke up. And you,
as a part of that breakup, you were with her for six years. And then you broke up. And you, as a part of that breakup,
you jacked up your use.
And then you guys got back together with you on a higher level of usage.
I don't know. She didn't like to do drugs by herself, but she did drink a lot.
So she probably kept drinking. She told me once she went to the guy we were using and
got a little bit and tried to do it party by herself, but she didn't like it. And me,
I would prefer being by myself when I was fucked up.
So cocaine became problematic.
And would you say you were addicted at that point?
Yeah. Yeah. That's when I got addicted is that 10 month period when we were apart.
So you come back into the relationship for another six years, you said?
Got married.
Got married for the next six years with you in an active addiction to cocaine.
And drinking was drinking part of that equation at all?
A lot. Absolutely. When the cocaine usage went up, the drinking went up.
It did.
Yeah. I was probably drinking.
Well, I like the single malt scotch. So that's expensive. So my first two or three drinks would
be that. And then when it was going south, I'd pull out the $30 handle of Johnny McBread.
So I was drinking several of those a week. Yeah.
So this takes us up to what point prior to you actually getting sober?
Well, at the end of six years, we didn't talk about it, but she would go,
I'm going to try to stop for a while. And I'd go, I can't.
And then I would do it. I said, I think I want to try to never occurred to me to go to AA.
I didn't know anything about it. I'm going to stop. She didn't want to.
So finally, my shenanigans just got out of hand. And she just got with me one night.
And I think it was her family. Her family's kind of snobby.
And of course, I gave her reason not to like me because every time I went up there, shit based.
And she ended the marriage. She ended it.
So you guys got divorced?
Yeah.
Yeah, we got divorced. And then my usage went up some more.
Were there any children in that?
No, no, no children. Everything was amicable.
We shared a divorce lawyer. It was 400 bucks. Split all our stuff up.
We didn't have that much stuff, but split that up.
And it was so weird because we were both still using and drinking that every once in a while we'd get together.
So the using and drinking prompted that kind of behavior?
I think so.
Yeah. But you said you also ramped up after that.
So here's another trigger for you.
You're breaking up your marriage and you ramp up even further.
So now we're talking about really heavy drinking and cocaine use.
Yeah, every day.
So when was that?
She divorced me. That must have been 05 or 06.
OK, so we're close to your first sobriety date, right?
Yeah, yeah.
So what did the final couple of years, months and weeks look like before you got to AA?
The very first time?
Well, it wasn't too bad.
I actually I actually had a girlfriend for about six months and she didn't even know about my demons.
We drank together and had fun.
She didn't know after, you know, if I didn't spend the night over there, I'd let her off and I'd go score and, you know, stay up for another day or two.
So she wasn't aware of your cocaine use at all?
Not at all. Never brought her into it.
That's why I wish when I'd broken up with her, I'd done it different.
I wish I'd have Howard made when I broke up with her.
Howard made me go make amends to her because I did it over the phone and we'd been on a vacation together.
How'd that work out?
Oh, she was pissed.
Everything I'd ever given her, she mailed back to me.
But you got straight with regard to the amend.
Yeah. The way I finally ran her down because I didn't know it was the year I didn't have her phone number.
I didn't know how to get a hold of her.
And I found her on Facebook.
I was on Facebook at the time and I messaged her.
Hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I said, can we talk?
I want to make some amends.
She said, pretty much, no.
So I need to tell you, I've shared this in the meeting today, but I'd like to tell you what happened when it became apparent to me I was done.
I was on vacation with my girlfriend.
We were in St. Lucia, a beautiful island.
Had been there a week probably.
Mm-hmm.
And we were in a bar in late afternoon and not particularly drunk, just talking, enjoying.
We'd been snorkeling.
And I had my tie in my hand and I finished it, and Howard, there are no adequate words
for what happened to me.
Like I shared in the meeting, I didn't get up that morning planning on quitting.
I hadn't thought about quitting.
Mm-hmm.
I hadn't had a lot of consequences, you know, in the last few months.
Mm-hmm.
And I set that drink down, Howard, and it was like there were no words.
It was a feeling.
Huh.
It was like a warm wave came over me.
And I had a feeling that was my last drink.
We need to stop.
I had had just enough AA to know I wanted to come back to this club we're sitting in
right now.
It was a different location.
Mm-hmm.
I knew I wanted Howard Jay to sponsor me.
That came into my head.
You know, I barely knew anybody here, but what drew me to Howard was that belly laugh
he had.
You know, he's a big chubby guy with a beard, and I used to call it, my wife called him
Santa Claus.
Yeah, yeah.
And I was like, oh, that's what I wanted.
I wanted that happiness he had.
Mm-hmm.
And didn't know he was that kind of hard ass.
I did not know he specialized in slippers because he was a big slipper.
He called me an amateur slipper because I only slipped two years.
And his story is great.
I hope one day to be able to record it.
That would be neat.
I've been blessed enough to be able to see him twice in the Philippines.
We've been to meeting in prison together in the Philippines.
Wow.
That's so cool.
I knew who I wanted to sponsor me.
I knew I had to lose a girlfriend.
That was all part of it.
And of course, I didn't do that right.
But I did.
I didn't want any distractions.
And it was this feeling like the compulsion was lifted right there.
And I knew, even though I had my back turned on God all these years, I knew it was him.
So it was a real spiritual experience for you.
It was indescribable.
There were no words relayed.
So it wasn't a gradual awakening.
It was the Bernie Bush.
A Bernie Bush.
Wow.
I didn't see it.
I just felt it.
And it was gone.
The compulsion.
Now, it'll come back on me every once in a while.
But it's not, I know what to do.
You know, it lasted.
I had two or three more days on that island, didn't take a drink.
Got back first day, came right here to this club, ran Howard down, said, would you sponsor
me?
And we talked a second.
And then, you know what he told me?
I'll never forget this.
He said, this is after two years going through the steps twice.
I'm going to get sober.
He said, there's no reason you can't do this.
So this time that you were in San Lucia, this time that you were there was in the midst
of the years, couple of years in which you were slipping in and out of AA.
And you get to this point in San Lucia that you're finally getting the spiritual experience
that God has revealed in this feeling that you have, that you have to stop, takes us
up to 2009.
That was June 20th, 2009.
Had you done any cocaine?
Had you done that trip at all?
The only thing that didn't occur to me to find it, we took a tour through a rainforest
and our guide was a Rastafarian.
So we found weed.
That was the last drug I did was weed.
The last time I did cocaine was at my house by myself before that vacation.
And I went through as much in three hours as I used to do in a weekend.
And that scared me.
I'm always curious to find out what people were thinking while they were in
the midst of going to AA and then slipping.
What was there about your experience in AA that found you slipping five or six times
before finally getting it?
I think my first sponsor had it right.
He said, you're not done because I went back to him every time I slipped.
Some of the slips for the first slip was for like three days.
Yeah.
I didn't even get my money's worth.
Then the slips became worse and worse until I just, like I said, gave up on AA.
But I don't know.
Something must have been registering.
You said you gave up on AA.
What was that feeling like when you said, well, AA doesn't work for me?
I think that was when the hopelessness really started because, you know, we all say this
is the last house on the block.
And I think the fact I hadn't had any of the dire consequences like falling off the balcony
or things like that.
When did that happen?
That was probably 05.
You've become kind of a legend in this club with that story.
I'm serious.
Not very many people fall off a balcony.
Could you inform our listeners about that?
Well, I'd been up a couple of days, listeners, and it was a Saturday morning.
I had nothing on but a pair of shorts and I was on the second floor apartment.
I had a balcony and it was drizzling.
And I went out on the balcony.
It's Saturday morning.
I've been up for a couple of days.
I'm trying to decide whether to go to sleep and go hear my band play that night that I
loved or go get some more and just party on through.
And luckily, I never had to make that decision because I was leaning out over the guard rail.
Yeah.
And I lost my footing and went over the rail and came down on my head on a sidewalk.
Oh, my God.
I remember it.
I remember the thud.
I was knocked out after that.
But I tried to stop my fall with my hands, ended up screwing my shoulder up and laying
there in the drizzle.
I don't know how long I was out.
By the way, I fell through some azalea bushes that were like 10 feet tall.
I think that might have been the hand of God slowing me down.
Right.
So I didn't die right there.
I should have been dead or crippled.
And yeah, I came to on the sidewalk and I felt this weight on my head like I had a hat
or something.
And it was where my skin of my forehead had come down because I had a horseshoe-shaped
cut and it had come down.
There was blood everywhere.
And I was locked out of my apartment, right?
Oh, God.
I went back up the stairs.
My neighbor, I had to kick on the door because I was bleeding.
And he called me an ambulance and went to the ER that day.
And I spent a week recuperating.
My best friend, she has a little ranch up north.
Her and her husband took care of me and didn't drink or do any drugs for a whole week.
And when I left her house, guess where I went first thing?
To Dope Man.
Wow.
So you were really lucky to survive a traumatic brain injury with that kind of accident.
I have had some repercussions from that.
What kind?
I've had a couple of seizures.
I go to a neurologist and she said it was probably the fall that triggered that.
Luckily, there's a mood stabilizer called Lamictal and Lamotrigine is it's generic.
It's not as expensive.
And I'll be on that the rest of my life because I tried to get off of it once and I had another
seizure, which is weird.
It's not a grand mal.
It was a seizure like you're in a blackout.
I had all my short-term memory left and so I'm missing like eight hours and it happened
twice.
I've heard about people getting epilepsy.
This is just like a blackout.
My wife was with me both times.
She said I was totally lucid, but I couldn't remember what just happened.
But I remembered my family's name and all of that.
And I don't remember.
It's just like a blackout.
I don't remember.
A few years after that, you're sitting there with that Mai Tai that you put down.
You have that feeling come over you.
It's been a while since you fell off the balcony.
Yeah.
Three years.
So even three years after that, you were still engaged.
Yeah.
In the disease.
So once you got to AA, to the club here, this has been your AA home for the better part
of 13 years.
You've talked about Howard.
Howard was your sponsor.
How many years had he sponsored you before he moved to the Philippines?
Probably five.
What did you learn from Howard about sponsoring other men?
Well, I think it came the way we went through the steps because that's the way it was explained
to me that I use that as a base.
Uh-huh.
It's probably the same way he did me.
I usually don't take a year, but it's several months.
What is the method that Howard uses for taking people through the steps?
First of all, he doesn't give you a damn thing.
He draws things out of you.
We spent three months on The Doctor's Opinion, which is what, eight pages or something?
Did that bother you at all, that it took you so long to get through just the small part
of the book?
It's funny you ask that because no, it never bothered me.
Huh.
Because whatever happened to me on June 20th, he never bothered me.
He never bothered me.
I think the book, The Doctor's Opinion, was written in 2009 and it stayed with me.
It didn't matter.
I understood it was one day at a time.
Right.
I felt no need to get through these steps like some magic was going to happen.
I lost a sponsee who was in such a hurry, he didn't want to go that slow.
Uh-huh.
But, no, I never did.
And the obsession being gone helped.
I wasn't thinking about it all the time.
But I largely take people through like he took me, and then I've actually learned from
sponsees some other things I would like to learn.
like to do so yeah it's dynamic it changes since covid came around i've taken four and a half guys
through the steps and two of them completely on zoom met them one time at on our fifth step we
met we met for a fifth step and i keep up with both of them they're still sober one of them's
got a year the other one's got two that's so cool this shows you the reason i share that zoom story
i got my own little zoom account it's free yeah and so we were face to face but on a computer
monitor uh-huh if you want it bad enough that'll work i don't know if i'd have been getting sober
during covid or not yeah i've had people tell me that they they weren't sure whether or not they
could have stayed sober i know different people over the period of time that covid was rampant
in the first year even there were people who i'm very close to who just said i just don't do zoom
i just don't i don't see i don't do electronic meetings if i can't meet with people in person
then i don't then
do it and so what that meant was they were left out of the fellowship largely because of their
decision to not engage with the technology that made it possible for people to stay in touch
it would have been akin to somebody during the second world war who didn't want to write letters
because writing a letter is not being in a meeting i mean we we find ways to stay in touch and i still
belong to a couple zoom groups that i uh that i still go to but the face-to-face is really
important did you have you found the same thing
i did i and thank god bless jose for starting that zoom meeting because everything was shut down for
that year and those first zoom meetings were crazy with all the bombers and stuff but um i didn't
realize how much i missed the live meeting though i came back this time when the vaccinations came
out and i felt more comfortable i came back to this meeting and it had been it had been going
a few months yeah and uh that's when i realized it wasn't the same yeah that was a pretty pretty pretty
pretty scary time. How long did it take you to go through all 12 steps? About a year. Have you
revisited any of those steps? Have you done multiple fourth steps? Or have you found yourself
making amends years and years later after identifying who you needed to make amends to?
Well, since I'm married again, I'd use the 10th step quite a bit. Me too. I've done three fourth
steps on my mother-in-law with two different sponsors. She came to live with us a few years
ago. And she's a sweet lady, but we're just on opposite ends of the spectrum. Yeah, I get that.
She thrives on chaos and noise, and I want peace and quiet. Oh, geez. So I have used the steps like
that. Yeah, yeah. I haven't gone all the way back through them. I feel like I'm going through them
every time I take somebody through. Yeah. And I'm telling you, the last two years, I've probably
taken more people through than I did the other 11 put together. And Howard kind of jolted me into
that, because when we finished the steps, he said,
go enjoy your sobriety. And I did. And then about a year later, he looked at me one day and said,
how many people are you sponsoring? What kind of service work are you doing? He wouldn't lecture
to you. He'd just ask those kind of questions. Wow. That's when it dawned on me. I was afraid
to sponsor at first, but I got over that. Yeah. And knowing the importance of sponsorship, and
we sponsor others to keep ourselves sober and to ultimately teach them how to sponsor other people.
And to me, that's really it.
You have grandkids. Yeah, yeah. The same sort of thing. Isn't it interesting that you didn't
start using drugs or alcohol really until quite, quite late in life to, let's say, your middle age?
Yeah. That was a super midlife crisis, Howard. But you got sober at a point at which you still
have enough of your life left to really make a big difference in your own life and other people's
lives. Sometimes I ask people to go back and revisit what they would have told a younger
person of themselves about drinking and drugs that might have made a difference to them back
then. But your story being a little different, I wondered if you could go back and visit Chris
as a kid or as a teenager or whatever else. Knowing what you know today about life just
in general, what would you tell that person that might make a big difference in their life?
Well, that's a good question. For me, it probably has something to do with spirituality.
Yeah.
I always believed in God, but never really thought about it.
I never thought much about him, him, her, whatever. But knowing me, I wouldn't listen.
Yeah.
I think everything had to happen the way it happened.
Yeah.
And I've got a regret or two. The promises say you shouldn't do that, but it has to do with my
second wife because I was kind of the ringleader. One thing I didn't mention, kind of a sad ending
to that story, she died four years ago. She's 54 of cirrhosis. She saved my life, Howard. When she
ended that marriage, it still took some time.
It took some time, but I could sober up easier by myself. I didn't do it by myself at AA, but without
my drinking buddy with me. And that was sad. I reconnected with her family, didn't really care
for me. And I think there's some bad feelings there that I maybe led her astray. So it doesn't
bother me to the extent where I'm going to drink over it. But my current wife met her twice. We
ran into her at restaurants. She said they hit it off.
She said, she's somebody I could like. And I said, y'all have a lot in common. Yeah, that's a sad
thing.
It is a sad thing.
What got me out of my self-hatred once I realized what it was, because we identify that early in
the steps. And then about halfway through the steps, you know, two and three, I started getting
a spiritual connection. And I started growing that. And it grows really fast at first if you
work on it. And I was. And about halfway through the steps, I realized that God loved me. I should
be able to love myself.
Mm-hmm.
And up till that time, I let the group love me, even though I didn't know that's what was
happening. So all that stuff, we talk about work.
Oh, that's beautiful.
But service work now to me is just doing God's will.
Yeah.
And Howard used to always talk about standing in the sunlight of the Spirit. And today,
I live in it most of the time, and it feels good.
And I see you in meetings, and I want to acknowledge that, because I see that in your
countenance and in your demeanor. You often seem to be, with the exception of Tall Tom,
you often seem to be one of the most relaxed people in the room.
Thank you.
And so talk about wearing life like a loose garment. I see you being able to do that. And
that's just my perception. But you and I have had a chance over the years to share enough of the
time to know that that's probably also the truth.
You're right. Now, above all else, I value my peace and serenity.
Sounds like those are great gifts for you.
Oh, my gosh.
I mean, there's certain things in my life that I look at, and I just, I can't believe,
it's that good. Do you have some things in your life like that?
Oh, maybe. I'm getting ready to go to Africa in the morning. Yeah, stuff like that.
Tomorrow morning?
It's a trip we planned in 2020 and got canned twice.
Oh, how cool is that?
Yeah. When my current wife and I first got together, we discovered we both love travel.
We set a goal to set foot on all seven continents, and we've done that.
You went to Antarctica?
Mm-hmm. In 19, right before COVID.
Oh, my God.
No.
It was 18.
What a great thing to do.
We love traveling, so we're getting to travel again. We've been to Africa once. These are
different countries.
Do you go to AA meetings at all when you travel?
I do.
What's that like?
It's amazing. Australia's the best, because they've got some drinkers in Australia.
There's meetings everywhere. I've been to a meeting in New Zealand. I've been to meetings
in the Caribbean, Hawaii.
And what a gift you must be in those meetings, because I'm virtually certain there's nobody
in any of those meetings who's ever heard it like Chris Est.
Am I right?
Never heard this accent, for sure.
You become a celebrity in those meetings very quickly, don't you?
I went to a meeting on Barbados. It was hilarious. My wife went with me. It was an open meeting,
so it was her first AA meeting. And I was early in my sobriety, like a year or two,
and I needed AA. And we found one, and I saw the circle and triangle, and it was like,
yeah, I'm home. So Barbados is West Indians, and they're all dark-skinned. So there's me and another
guy in there that are white, and everybody else is black. And the Bajans, they call themselves
Bajans, they talk, they speak English, but it's a lot of slang in there, and it's hard
to understand. So they call on the white guy, and I say, oh, good, I'm going to be able
to understand this guy. And he's from Scotland.
Oh, gee.
Couldn't understand anything he said.
That's great.
So, yeah, we love to travel, Howard. The miracles, I mentioned the money showing up from a company
I got fired from.
Yeah.
You stay around a long time.
You stay around a long time.
You stay around a long time.
You stay around a long time.
You stay around a long time.
You stay around a long time.
You stay around a long time.
Long enough you hear these stories. But the thing I love about it the most is my
connection with my higher power. And Howard, these last two years, even though we've had
COVID, I do a lot of service work. I retired in 2018. I made a deal with God, because my
company had been bought, and they're going to give you some money to leave. Please get
me on that list. I'll do whatever you want. And he gave me a list of things to do, and
I'm doing them. And Tall Time gave me the idea. I've been, for the last five years, I've been
going into a prison to an AA meeting. I had this idea right before COVID, one of the guys
wanted to go through the steps. And I've only got once a week with him. Can't call him.
And so we got permission to meet for a half hour after the meeting. And we did that, and
we got up all the way to the fourth step. He was just starting to write it, and they
shut everything down because of COVID. So I came back, and we finished. So all together,
it took over a year. But guess what? Now this guy's taking other guys through the steps.
There's no way to do that in this prison. And he's taking three guys through the steps.
And now I'm watching these guys change. They're changing right in front of my eyes. And one
of them will say something good about the guy that's sponsoring them, who I took through
the steps. And he's just over there smiling like a proud father.
And you see yourself in them because of the influence that you are having on them. And
I see Howard in you.
Because I've known Howard. I haven't talked to him in a long time. But he and I knew each
other for quite a number of years.
I know you do.
So that's beautiful to see that.
Oh, it's amazing. And you know, I can't ever pay Howard back, but I'm paying him forward.
Yeah. You certainly are.
But I'm not doing this for me. But it gives me pleasure. But I'm doing it because it's
his will. And I love the thank yous I get. And that's just that warm sunlight of the
Spirit.
And that's such a beautiful sentiment.
It's amazing.
Such a beautiful feeling to have. You are living an extraordinary life, my friend. And
I am so glad that the day before you're going on a major trip, you would sit down with me
to do this interview. I think folks who listen to this, it's going to have a measurable impact
on their own sobriety, their own sense of hopefulness. Your experiences are very informative,
but they're also, you can see God in them all.
Good.
And that's his goal for me, is to let other people see his light coming from me.
And it's definitely shining through you, brother. And I'm so glad you did this for
me today.
Thank you.
I love you.
I love you too, Howard.
You're a good man.
Has anybody told you that today?
Yeah. As a matter of fact.
Well, I love you too.
I think it's going to be a very meaningful podcast when it comes out.
I appreciate that. My wife wants to hear it. So she's heard all this. When we're recording,
I, you know…
Gradually, I let her in on some of the things I've shared with you today. Kept thinking,
well, this is going to do it. She's going to run away. But by the time she married me,
she knew everything.
Because you're a different man.
That's what she tells me. She said, I'm seeing the best version of you.
Isn't that beautiful?
Yeah.
What a great way to feel.
And she is. And it's growing.
I'll bet.
Imagine that, a relationship that I'm in growing.
God's gift to you and to her.
Both of us, yeah.
Well, thanks again for doing this, Chris.
Thank you, Howard.
You're welcome.
I was honored when you asked me. I appreciate that.
Oh, you bet.
Well, my friends, that's a wrap for today's episode of AA Recovery Interviews. I want
to thank my guest, Chris S., for sharing his story. And thank you for tuning in. If you
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