We Had to Fight for Women to Be in Alcoholics Anonymous – Liz B.

About This Speaker Tape

Liz B. shares her story at the 56th Florida State Convention in Palm Harbour with 60 years of sobriety, having come to AA on July 11, 1952, at age 31 after 19 years of drinking. She describes growing up in Manhattan, getting her first drink at 12 when her mother left her to sieve homemade rice wine, and selling bootleg "King Kong" liquor at 14 to put food on the table and shoes on her siblings' feet. She married Mr. Bailey at 17 after a courthouse wedding in Baltimore, and quickly found she needed alcohol for every daily task — washing, ironing, cooking, even sitting on the stoop.

Her drinking escalated until she was disappearing for days, leaving her two young sons in the care of neighbors and her husband. Guilt and remorse crushed her. One morning, hungover and reading the Bible, her husband screamed at her and she climbed into a second-floor window to jump. A neighbor spotted her and screamed for Mr. Bailey, who begged the neighbor to let her jump. That moment of horror drove her back to bed, but it was her 12-year-old son Richard she finally confessed to — telling him she planned to throw herself in front of a train. Instead, she cried out to Higher Power, remembered the seed Mr. Bailey had planted about AA, and called Intergroup from the phone book.

At Intergroup in Manhattan, a woman told her plainly: it is the first drink, and meetings keep you alive. Liz threw herself into the program — seven meetings a week and three on Sundays — with a tough sponsor who told her AA did not need her but she needed AA. She built a foundation through service: 12-step calls that meant cleaning houses and cooking for families, opening four groups, and founding the "I Can Club" clubhouse in New York. She spoke at Bill Wilson's 28th anniversary at the Hotel Commodore with 2,700 people in attendance.

Sobriety did not spare her from suffering. Her father committed suicide, her alcoholic sister jumped 30 floors from an apartment building, and her son was shot and killed at 28. Her oldest son has refused to forgive her for 54 years. She was diagnosed with cancer and given six months to live — she is now 45 years cancer-free, and the doctor has died. At nearly 91, she has had 10 operations, recently lost the ability to walk and is relearning, and remains booked for speaking engagements into next year. Her message is direct: build a foundation, give it away to keep it, come to AA to live and not to die.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Opens with gratitude and thanks to convention organizers, introduces herself with 60 years of sobriety since July 11, 1952
• 5:00 Describes AA when she came in — 17 years old as a fellowship, 150,000 members — and urges people not to come to AA to drop dead
• 9:00 First drink at age 12 sieving her mother's rice wine, selling King Kong bootleg at 14 to support her siblings
• 13:00 Marrying Mr. Bailey at 17 in a Baltimore courthouse, crying through the ceremony — he never stopped crying either
• 18:00 Having babies hoping they would stop the drinking, kneeling to Mr. Bailey in guilt as she disappeared on binges
• 23:00 Speaking at Bill Wilson's 28th anniversary at Hotel Commodore for 2,700 people, husband's resentment of her AA life
• 28:00 How she got to AA — the window jump attempt, husband begging the neighbor to let her jump, confessing to her 12-year-old son
• 35:00 Intergroup visit in Manhattan, woman explaining the first drink and cough medicine story, building a foundation with seven meetings a week
• 42:00 Losses in sobriety — father's suicide, sister's 30-floor jump, son shot and killed at 28, oldest son's 54-year grudge
• 50:00 Cancer diagnosis and 45-year survival, founding the I Can Club, closing message about building a foundation and giving it away to keep it