Why Staying Sober Is Harder Than Getting Sober — Emotional Sobriety Behind Bars – Rose E.

About This Speaker Tape

Rose E. shares her story at the Suncoast Roundup in Florida with about seven years of sobriety. She describes growing up painfully shy in an Irish Catholic family in New Jersey, feeling like a misfit with red hair and extra weight, always trying to be someone she wasn't. At 14, she drank three bottles of Rheingold beer before a high school dance and for the first time felt normal — from that moment she drank with one mission: to get drunk. By 15 she nearly died from alcohol poisoning. By 16 she was a regular in bars. Her father, a bartender, sat her down at 17 and told her she had all the earmarks of being an alcoholic. She knew he was right and did not care.

She spent 13 years in an abusive relationship with another alcoholic who became physically, sexually, and psychologically violent. She worked for a Fortune 500 company and maintained a polished exterior — the right car, jewelry, and perfume — while drinking 1.75 liters of whiskey every night from 20-ounce Solo cups with a straw. She tried rehab once, stayed sober a few months, then drank secretly for ten years while letting her family in Florida believe she was sober. She describes the nightly ritual of staring at a drink for thirty minutes, begging herself not to drink it, unable to stop.

On November 25, 1998 — the night before Thanksgiving — she left a bar, dropped a cigarette while driving, and struck and killed a 45-year-old man walking in the road. She did not stop. Police found her two and a half hours later. She was charged, attempted suicide four times in the aftermath, and eventually came to Florida where her brother-in-law invited her to an AA meeting. She got sober January 12, 2001, but was sentenced to 12 years and 30 days in New Jersey state prison. In prison she joined the Puppies Behind Bars program and an eight-week-old black Lab named Sandy broke through walls she had built for years — the dog loved her unconditionally and she realized that if she still wanted to die without drinking, the problem was never the booze.

Released after six years and three days, she came to Florida, found her way back to AA, got a sponsor, joined the Wise Women Group in Spring Hill, and began working the steps. She speaks about emotional sobriety as the real challenge — that drinking was only a symptom of the underlying pain — and closes by reading a passage from Mother Teresa about doing good anyway because in the end it is between you and Higher Power.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Introduction — sobriety date January 12, 2001, Wise Women Group in Spring Hill, speaks about fear and the gift of desperation
• 4:30 Childhood in New Jersey — painfully shy, red hair, overweight, feeling like a misfit, baby sister displacing her at age nine
• 10:00 First drink at 14 — three Rheingold beers before a high school dance, drinking to feel normal for the first time
• 14:00 Rapid progression — alcohol poisoning at 15, bars at 16, father's warning at 17, college dropout
• 19:00 13-year abusive relationship — domestic violence, isolation, drugging his drinks with sleeping pills to survive
• 27:00 Solo cup ritual — staring at whiskey for 30 minutes unable to not drink, wetting the bed nightly, buying plastic mattress covers
• 33:00 Thanksgiving eve 1998 — hit-and-run vehicular homicide, finding flesh on the windshield, police arrival
• 40:00 Trial, prison sentence of 12 years, four suicide attempts, miscarriage during trial
• 48:00 Puppies Behind Bars — black Lab named Sandy breaks through emotional walls, moment of clarity in her cell
• 55:00 Release after six years, returning to AA in Florida, finding a sponsor, emotional sobriety as the real challenge