You Cannot Save Your A*s and Your Face at the Same Time – Kim P.

About This Speaker Tape

Kim P. shares her story of growing up consumed by fear, insecurity, and zero self-esteem in South Philadelphia. As a child living above her parents' bar, she watched patrons glowing with drinks in hand and decided alcohol was her solution. She began stealing liquor and feeding quarters into the cigarette machine on Sunday mornings, and by age ten she was drinking every weekend. By fifteen she had her first alcohol overdose and had dropped out of school entirely.

Her drinking career took her through bartending, selling what she calls "non-AA conference-approved materials," relationships she destroyed, and a three-year blur down the Jersey Shore. A boyfriend named Joe told her through tears that it was too painful to love her. She reached a point of pitiful, incomprehensible demoralization — drinking at least a fifth and a half of Cuervo, long necks, and one or two bottles of wine daily. After a devastating rejection by a man she had pinned all her hopes on, she collapsed in a fetal position begging Higher Power to help her or kill her.

A voice told her to call her sister Dawn. She scraped together exactly $12.10 — the precise cost of two bus tickets from Ocean City to Philadelphia — and arrived at her father's AA meeting at the South Philadelphia Group on January 23, 1994. She saw the same bright eyes and big smiles she had envied as a child on the bar stairs, and knew she was home. She white-knuckled her first five years on fear and fellowship until a woman named Claire K. walked her through the Big Book. Kim describes the spiritual malady as the root of her condition and shares a powerful deathbed amends she made to a man she had long resented, experiencing total release from that resentment as he died the following day.

Kim emphasizes that she is a recovered alcoholic living in Steps 10, 11, and 12, driven by the conviction that Higher Power's love will not be outdone. She closes by urging listeners to trust Higher Power, clean house, help others, and walk the walk — because you never know who is watching.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Introduction — identifies as a recovered alcoholic, mentions five years of white-knuckling before working the steps with Claire K.
• 6:30 Childhood fear and zero self-esteem — describes people-pleasing survival strategy and dishonoring people from the moment she met them
• 12:00 School terror — counting heads to rehearse her reading paragraph, too afraid to be called to the chalkboard
• 15:00 Sitting on the floating stairway above parents' bar watching drinkers glow with happiness — decides alcohol is her solution
• 18:00 Sunday morning ritual — stealing liquor and quarters, feeding the cigarette machine one coin at a time, catching a buzz as a child
• 25:00 Bartending in South Philly, selling non-AA conference-approved materials, drinking around the clock, daily walk of shame
• 33:00 Joe Johnson relationship collapse — he tells her on his front lawn it is too painful to love her
• 38:00 Rock bottom — fetal position on the floor begging Higher Power to help her or kill her after the drummer rejects her
• 42:00 The voice says call your sister Dawn — scrapes together exactly $12.10 for bus fare, complains she cannot even buy an orange juice
• 50:00 First AA meeting at South Philadelphia Group — sees bright eyes and big smiles just like the bar patrons from childhood, knows she is home