Young People in AA Taught Me to Un-Be the Way I’d Learned to Be – Martin E.

About This Speaker Tape

Martin, an alcoholic and addict from the North Georgia mountains, tells his story at the Monday night Blue Chip Speaker Meeting at the Nava Club. He traces his drinking back to age 12, when he chugged vodka chased with mouthwash in a friend's basement and was still throwing up in church that Sunday. From there, it was a straight line through middle school liquor theft, a first suicide attempt, a teenage drug habit, and a pair of bald-headed men in his bedroom at 3 a.m. shipping him to a wilderness program. None of it took. He went to Belmont University in Nashville on a family friend's dime, got himself banned from Belmont, Vanderbilt, and the Ryman Auditorium, and eventually fell asleep at the wheel after shooting up on a mountain road.

Back in Georgia, he tried the half-measure route — calling himself sober at NA because he wasn't doing heroin, passing out of a front-row chair at a meeting, eating handfuls of gas-station boner pills on a five-hour car ride with his mother. He worked stacking dead chickens, broke into houses for a living, and woke up crying every morning because he was terrified of what he'd have to do that day to feel okay. A second suicide attempt and a convulsion in the dirt beside his truck finally produced the thought: the people in AA were right.

The back half of the tape is the step work. His sponsor asked if he was willing to go to any lengths and for the first time Martin said 'I don't know' — his first honest moment. He walks through each step concretely: the Kroger parking lot where he slammed into a blind man and Prego exploded on his gray Nikes; the Belmont amends email for a bench, an ashtray, and roughly 100 chicken sandwiches; laying hands on his mother in a hospital parking lot because she was telling him the truth; praying for his dad's girlfriend's kids in the same North Georgia bathroom stall where he used to shoot dope; a white-light meditation experience at ten days sober after trying to trick his body out of withdrawal with lime juice shots.

He closes on the shift from running-from to running-toward — the fire moved from under his butt to inside his heart. He credits the mentors who taught him to un-be the way he had learned to be, and says if he can help one person the way his sponsor helped him, his whole life is worth it.

Topics

Timestamps

• 0:00 Opening — Mike chairs the Monday night Blue Chip meeting at the Nava Club; Tim introduces Martin from the Winter Circle big book study in Chamblee
• 2:30 Martin reads from Big Book page 172 — 'my whole life seemed to be centered around doing what I wanted to do without regard for the rights, wishes, or privileges of anyone else'
• 4:00 First drink at 12 — vodka and orange juice in a friend's basement, then chasing vodka with mouthwash when they ran out of juice
• 9:00 First suicide attempt in middle school after drug and alcohol trouble at school; stomach pumped, crying, 'I just want to feel better'
• 14:00 Two bald-headed men in his bedroom at 3 a.m. — shipped to a wilderness survival program, stranger's hand on him for the entire six-hour drive
• 20:00 Belmont University in Nashville — banned from Belmont, Vanderbilt, and the Ryman Auditorium; falls asleep at the wheel after shooting up
• 30:00 Five gas-station boner pills for the five-hour court-date car ride with his mother — the pitiful bottom before real surrender
• 38:00 Second suicide attempt — convulsing beside his truck, one thought: 'the people in AA were right'
• 48:00 Kroger parking lot — slams into a blind man, Prego explodes on his gray dress Nikes, resentment prayer comes alive
• 56:00 Praying for his dad's girlfriend's kids in the same North Georgia bathroom stall where he used to shoot dope — the full 180