Why Letting Go Absolutely Is the Only Way Out – Sheila A.

One minute speaker is Sheila from San Diego. Hi, my name is Sheila and I'm an alcoholic. Thank you, Larry, for asking me to be of service. I'm extremely nervous. Wow, this is a big meeting. Okay, so my story is full of a lot of sex, alcohol and rock and roll. But I will not be talking about that tonight because I only have 10 minutes. My drinking career began when I was 11, and I bought into the fact that I like to show off. I wasn't one of those little sippy kind of girls. I'd go straight for the whole bottle and drink the whole thing because I thought I was cool. Needless to say, my mom found me in the shower a few times with my clothes on, boys jumping out the windows, and I vomited a lot. So I'm going to skip to where I was introduced to AA. I was introduced to AA when I was 14 years old. My first meeting was at a place called the Lucadia Step House. It was full of a bunch of crusty old men. Not that there's any here. Not here. And I remember I rode in on a van where, you know, we were in one of those places and they'd see the little van pull up and all these little obnoxious teenagers got out came into their little facility, and the first thing one of them said was, take the cotton out of your ears and put it in your mouth. We don't want to hear anything you have to say. Thus began my resentment against the crusty old men. I thought it was cool because I could go there and smoke cigarettes. But I can tell you that from a very early age, I didn't buy into the first step. I didn' t think I had a problem. I was only 14 years old and I knew everything. Needless to say, I knew every thing for about 25 years after that. So I got sober, I don' t know, for a couple of months and thought it was pretty lame. because I was all into the sex and rock and roll thing. And so I'd get clean, and I'd get loaded, and you know what? I've got to tell you, I have in my story a lot of drugs too, but I always went back out drinking. As I got older, I thought that I was not an abnormal drinker, and if I got a little frou-frou drink that it was going to be okay. By the time I hit my 20s, I was a firm believer in if I was in a blackout, it never happened. And I don't remember a lot of stuff, but I actually ran into John, who's your treasurer, and he probably remembers a lot of stuff because we used to run together. That's one of those little blessings that AA has, when you run into somebody you used to drink with or get high with and they're clean and they've got more time than me too. But it's one of those blessings. So I ended up running around and drinking and having a good time. And I had a daughter by then and I did a lot of pawning her off on my mom or whoever would watch her so I could go to concerts and drink and be a groupie, I guess. But I never bought into that fact. But now that I look back, I did a lot of stuff that I'm really not proud of. And it was always about getting dressed up and waking up next to some horrible person that I didn't remember going home with. But maybe some of them are in this room today. Don't remind me. So I ended up, I went through a rehab when I was about 23 and I got married. I married somebody that just came out of prison and they were in rehab and I figured it was a great thing to stay off the street and he wanted to stay out of prison. And we got married and we had like two years clean. And he asked me one day when one of his little cellmate people were coming out of jail, do you think it would be okay if we drink? You know, it's been a couple years. And I'm like, well, do what you feel is right. Thus began a whole new drinking career and a lot of Jägermeister puke. So we did that for a few years, and it got really ugly, and I had three more kids, all female. I have four females because my higher power has a sense of humor. And, um, and it's awesome. And seven years later, he ended up dying. He passed away. And I found myself homeless with my four girls. And and I remember I remember my cousin. She was like, you're homeless and your husband's gone and you have no money you have no education and you know but I'm excited and I looked at her and I was like you're excited my life pretty much sucks right now and she's like yeah because I want to see what God's going to do in your life and I'm like okay that's wonderful so I ended up going to some sober livings that would have me with all those kids and um and I ended Up getting clean again and uh four months later my best friend got killed so my husband died four months before my best friends got killed and i got started getting this huge resentment against my higher power and um so i stayed clean for a little while and and uh nine months after that my brother got killed. He OD'd on drugs, and so that began a major resentment. I'm like, you know, I get clean. I try to work the third step, turn it all over, and I still didn't buy into the fact that I was an alcoholic, okay? So I was off and running again. I was pissed off at God, pissed off at you, pissed off at the world and was on kind of like a suicide mission. And by the end of my suicide mission I kind of figured out that I was one of those people that if I jumped off a tall building a mattress truck would be driving by. So again I found myself homeless with my kids and at that point I began to think that you know what I'm not going to die. So there's obviously a plan for me. I don't know what it is. I'm really pissed off, but I'm willing to do whatever it takes to get clean. So I went into a rehab and at some point in the rehab, I was having a conversation with my higher power. And, um, I said, if you take all this anger away from me, I will do and go wherever you want me to go and do whatever you want me to do. And my higher power took the anger away. So I got out of that rehab and actually moved across the street from a place called the Lakeside Hotel, where there was a crusty old man named Big Book Bob. And for anybody that knows him, he's absolutely amazing. Because for the first time in my life, somebody would stop me when I was coming out of the meeting, and we'd have like an hour of these freaking educational sessions. And I learned what the Fook meant. I learned that I am a real alcoholic, that I do have an allergy. I also learned that I could be restored to sanity. I had a real problem with the second step. I could believe all day long But I was still insane. And once I turned it over, my thinking started being a little rational and a little more rational. And I have to tell you, today I lead a pretty blessed life. I have the ability every day to carry the message of recovery. And I also buy into the fact that blessings often come disguised as disasters. Um, I've had a lot of tragedy in my life, but I can tell you that there's always been a tremendous gift on the other side of it, no matter how ugly the tragedy was. And, um, I'll wrap up. Wait, I have like two minutes left, right? Okay. Well then I'll rap up with this because this week I got an amazing blessing and, um. That is my 14 year old has been hooked on ecstasy for the last year. And I've been praying and praying and praying that my higher power would intervene in her life. So Tuesday we went to court and they decided to mandate her to rehab for the next year. And the judge ordered that she go to juvenile hall. And she was like, oh my god I'm actually going to jail. And I had one of those aha moments when the judge looked at her and they were cuffing her up and she was crying and he said, no, I'm excited. This is the first day that you're going to recover. Your recovery starts here. And it took me back to when my cousin was talking to me and telling me she was excited. So I got goosebumps and I got a big smile on my face and I was just like, I am so excited to see what God does in her life. And my higher power does for me what I can't do for myself. And the trick is, is when I work the third step, I can make that decision all day long. But until I let go absolutely, nothing happens. And so I'm a firm believer in letting go absolutely. I don't have to control everything in my life. I just have to get up, suit up, show up and not pick up no matter what anything. And that's pretty much all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you.