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Source: D. D. & Wally R – Ohio Al-Anon Convention 2025 D. D. and Wally R – Date Unknown.mp3 File: D.-d-and-wally-r-ohio-al-anon-convention-2025-D.-D.-and-wally-r-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 00:58:15
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I guess that's okay. I don't know, Jimmy. Good morning, everybody. My name is Wally. I'm an alcoholic. I'm a very grateful member of Alcoholics Anonymous, a program that saved my life. My home group is Keep It Simple Big Book Discussion in Lorain, Ohio. I love that group. We've been through the Big Book a few times, which I continue to do because I love the Big Book and I need to go through it continuously. I was taught that continuous sobriety requires continuous effort. That's what I continue to do because that works.
My family, I come from the proverbial alcoholic family. I'm the eldest of ten children. I'm also a member of that little side cult, CIA, Catholic, Irish, and alcoholic. Sorry, Father, no offense. That's what we were. We had our own pew at St. Mary's Church for many years. As I say, we hit the lottery. Both my parents were alcoholics. Me being the oldest, I was the first one to join that situation. I mean, there's talk about whether this is a genetic thing or a social thing. How do we get to become alcoholics? It really does not matter, but in my family, the old line, if it looks like a duck, waddles like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it's a duck. I know an alcoholic when I see one, usually. My family was loaded.
Doesn't really matter why. In fact, one of the things I strive to practice these days is not asking why so much. It's a lot easier because the answers you get anyway, how meaningful are they, really, most of the time. I'm 38 years sober. I'm grateful to God and to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and Al-Anon. I came in the program after going through a lot of sickness being an alcoholic. Our house was chaotic. It was crazy. We lived in a little bungalow in Avon, Ohio, a little three-bedroom bungalow, and we got ten kids, two parents. My dad threw together some little operation in the basement, a little bunk house down there. That's how we made it. My parents drank, but it looked to me like they were just having fun. Back at the time, maybe they just were most of the time. They weren't really acting like what I would think what alcoholics would be like. They were just having a good time. I couldn't wait until I got to be part of that, get to do that myself. That would be a ways off for me. I remember my first drunk, which is unusual as I think about it.
Then there were many, many years that I didn't remember a lot of anything because I was a blackout drinker. In high school, this is a little old. Back at that time, Avon was just a little old farm town on truck farms. I picked strawberries and beans and stuff like that. Avon is unrecognizable to me today, but that's beside the point. School was crazy. I made it
[00:05:08]
through school. I already had alcoholic tendencies very young. I didn't like authority figures. My colleague talked about it yesterday. I didn't like being told what to do. I wanted to do what I wanted to do. Those were my first alcoholic signs. That was early on. I didn't like school that much, except for just having fun. I didn't like doing homework. I would usually con the girls into doing my homework. I already had these kind of tendencies of being able to con people into doing things early on, before I ever picked up a drink. It only resonated and increased as the older I got and started drinking. My first drunk, I was probably a senior in high school. I remember falling out of the car that night. We were riding around drinking three, two strohs beer back in the day. I'm giving away a little bit how old I am. I'm grateful for how old I am. I never thought I'd make it this far, believe me, the way I was living. I am here. God had a different plan, fortunately, for us. Before I go any further, I want to thank the committee and all the volunteers that put this weekend on. They did a tremendous job. I'm thankful that they asked me to be a little small part of it. I'm grateful for that. Thank you again. We were riding around drinking three, two beer in the little country roads. I didn't really like the taste of beer at first. I learned many years later on that taste has nothing to do with it. Charlie and Joe used to tell me, I like the taste of cold mountain spring water too, but I never sat down and drank a case of it. That night, I fell out of the car we were in and I couldn't get up. That was my first drunk. Then the guys were all laughing at me, making fun of me and dragging me into Rosie's Pizza House. We went from there. Maybe another time or two, I might have gotten drunk before I got out of high school and moved on with my life, which was, like I say, I think it was already tending in a certain direction and without even having any idea of what was to come. My parents wanted me to go to college. We didn't have any money to go to college, but back in that day, it didn't cost much and the state schools were pretty much free. I didn't want to go to college. Now, it sounded like too much work. I already was avoiding, I didn't like manual labor either. I didn't like any kind of work. I just wanted to be a loafer for the rest of my life. College sounded like, the party part of it sounded like it would be a lot of fun, but the work part I didn't go for. My dad was a naval pilot in Pensacola, Florida, which is where I was born right before he got out of the military.
I decided, well, I'll be a sailor. I'm just going to join the Navy. That's what I did. That was a long time ago, 1963, and it was the beginning of the Vietnam era. I was in for a rude awakening when I went to boot camp. My parents were disciplinary to a certain point. They taught us manners and all that stuff. I went into the Navy and boot camp was shocking because anybody who's been in the military knows how shocking it is if you're really a slacker like I was. I made it through boot camp and I went to radar school and I got assigned to a ship overseas in the Tonkin Gulf during the Vietnam War. I ended up making three deployments towards a duty over there. I did okay at first. I made it through school, but once I got on the ship and we deployed and we did a six-month tour in the Tonkin Gulf and Vietnam. We got time off to
[00:10:09]
go to these R&R little towns in Japan and the Philippines. It turns out that it didn't take me long to become the epitome of the Duncan sailor. Most of this stuff, when we pull into port, there's certain people that would go up with their cameras and get pictures of all the cultural things and the different places we were, but that was not me. I didn't own a camera, didn't want a camera. Most of the stuff that I wanted when we got into port was on the first street and wherever we were. Bars and et cetera, et cetera. I was 18 years old when I went in.
I don't need to elaborate too much on that. I was in there for four years. No, this is a progressive disease. At first, I was just having fun, going into port. I got out four years later. I had a little bit of trouble here and there, but my alcoholic abilities to con got me out of trouble whenever I got in trouble in the service. The Navy doesn't really approve too much of not showing up for ship's movement when your ship is going out of port, but that happened a couple of times. I never ended up in the brig. I conned because as being a raider man, I was in the middle of the ship and it was a very important area.
We're in Vietnam. I actually was an air traffic controller. Every time I got in port, things got a little bit worse with my drinking. Of course, I didn't realize it or notice it or really care about it as long as I got back to the ship on time. Most of the time, I did that, but my drinking already is progressing. I got in no serious trouble or anything. I got an honorable discharge, Vietnam ribbons, all that stuff.
Fortunate and grateful that I made it back from Vietnam. Man, many brothers and sisters did not and for that ridiculous situation, but that's beside the point. I got out when I was 22 years old. I really believe at that point that I was already alcoholic. I was already having blackouts in the military. That's some of the reasons I did have my little skirmishes in the military. I was a blackout drinker. I got out. It was early 1966, really. Beginning in 1967, here we are in the 60s. If you were around at that time, you know what was going on. At least for a guy like me, it was beautiful. I served my time in the military. All I wanted to do was party. What else do I need to do? Maybe get me a little job where I can afford to buy the stuff I wanted to buy, which already involved some kind of little drugs other than alcohol. When you get into port, you just want to party for three days and then take your one day on board ship when you're into port. At that time, somebody turned me on to amphetamines, speed. I loved speed as a sailor because I didn't want to sleep. When you're in port, I just wanted to go out and have fun. I didn't view that at all as any kind of problem.
It was just a facilitator. I got out. Like I say, it was the late 60s. Life was just a party for me. That's all I did. I managed to keep a job. I always loved music and dancing. I spent a lot of time in clubs. Even my beautiful wife and I, we're together. We're both like that. We like music. We've been to a lot of concerts. I still love music. We don't dance as much as we used to. We don't dance as much as we used to. We danced last night a little bit, though, you know.
[00:15:03]
I'm not quite as nimble as I used to be, but, you know, but I still can go at it, you know. But, yeah, so, alcoholism is definitely a progressive disease. I'm already in trouble. I'm already having blackout drinks, and I was out drinking, like, pretty much every night, partying every night, you know. This was before I met D. D., and, you know, I was having a ball, and nothing seemed bad to me. A blackout, well, what's that? That happens to anybody that drinks, doesn't it?
You know, people forget stuff, you know. Forget, I would forget weekends, and, you know. And, you know, because I'm an Alcoholics Anonymous, these things never have to happen to me again if I follow directions. I used to wake up in jail and not know why I was there. That was one of the scariest things for me, because I know what I'm capable of doing sober, let alone drunk. You know, they could have come in and told me, you know, you killed somebody, you know.
And I had no way of disagreeing or arguing with it, because I didn't remember the last 10, 12 hours, you know. And I never have to have that happen again. And if you get into the program that I'm in, and, you know, those kind of things, they don't have to happen again, you know. But it also means that you have to apply yourself right away, which was not my deal. But anyhow, I'm already jumping into recovery.
But I never got in any serious trouble, you know, drinking. You know, I got a few drunken disorderly's. I was a bar drinker, as I already mentioned. Even after I got married, I never drank at home. Because, well, first of all, there was someone there that didn't particularly care for me drinking at home. I would bring guys home from the bar at 3 o'clock in the morning. D. D., guess who's here? Somebody so-and-so wants to see you.
Can you make breakfast for us? You know. This is one of the little trivial things that she put up with. Okay. Oh, okay. We didn't start exactly at 10.15. Anyway, I met this beautiful young lady a couple of years later in 69. She is actually… We have been together for 56 years. I used to say, I don't know how, but there's only one possible way. Okay. Up there, God. There's only way. I was on a death plan by 30.
And here I am, you know, like 51 years later. And fortunately, God had a different plan for me and for us. And I don't want to get into telling any of her story. That's her job. But my disease is progressing. We got married in 1972, three years after I conned her into marrying me three years later. And we already… We had a lot of fun. We had no idea about alcoholism. You know, I just thought, I drink a little too much sometimes.
And, you know, she just graduated from high school, you know. And guess where I met her? At a bar. Where else? You know, in a nightclub. It was a dance club, a real nice club on Lorain, Ohio. And like I said, I already liked dancing. Well, I learned early on that girls like dancing. They like guys that dance, you know. And I said, I'm going to learn how to dance. And all the guys would be up against the wall there.
I said, I don't want to talk to you guys. So I did a little. I just got out there and started, you know. And that worked for a lot of years. It still works sometimes, you know. But I enjoyed it, you know. But my drinking just took off. And, you know, the saying that I heard a long time ago that is true is that I was in love with her right away. She was beautiful, still is beautiful, as those of you who know her know that she is.
[00:20:05]
And I, we had no idea what was going on. And I told her when we got married, I said, well, honey, you know, I work every day. So I'll probably still stop at home on the way home for a beer or two, you know. And she said, well, that's no problem. I understand that, you know. Well, little did I know what that declaration came to, you know. And little did she know, which is more important, what that little declaration would come to, you know.
And that wasn't my plan. My plan was to be, you know, I loved her at that point as much as alcohol and drugs would allow me to, you know. And my plan was to be, you know, I'm going to cut down on my drinking. You know, I spend too much time at the bars. And, you know, after two, three years of being there every night, you know, I have to change. A big change has to come here to slow my drinking down.
You know, I'll be a husband and maybe a father. And, you know, I want to be a good one of those or two of those. You know, I want to be a good person and change to that. I wanted to have, you know, I never thought drinking at that point, that was just a matter of moral turpitude. It was a matter of morals and controlling my drinking, the great obsession of every alcoholic. Okay, to drink like other people that aren't alcoholics, you know.
And it says in the book, it teaches us. And, well, it went okay for a little bit. But then my drinking, it wasn't happening the way I had really planned. Because, as I said, I drank a lot in bars and almost every night. And so I was trying to curtail that. And it wasn't working very well. I'm still stopping at the bar more than I had planned on. And I didn't know why I couldn't just go home right away.
Well, you know, Dr. Silkworth describes it in his doctor's opinion in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. I take a drink and I get the phenomenon of craving. Those three words that stick in my brain and I hope they always do. Because I know what happens when I pick up a drink. And for those of you who have never had that, it's hard to explain it. And I don't need to explain it because the doctor explained it.
If you want to know a little bit more about it, read the doctor's opinion in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous if you haven't. Because he knew the problem. But he did not know how to solve the problem. He was a doctor in Towns Hospital in New York City where Bill Wilson's co-founder spent a considerable amount of time. But Dr. Silkworth explains really what our problem was. And he just didn't have the solution.
It was very frustrating for him. But our lives went on and it was bad. I couldn't stop, you know. The disease, as I mentioned, is progressive. And, you know, if you're in this room, you probably know that without me telling you. If you live with somebody that has the disease, well, you are one of us, you know. So it went on. It wasn't good. I did not want to be living the way I was living. I did not want to be mistreating my wife and children.
By this time, we have two little girls. And I couldn't go home. You know, we lived in Lorain, Ohio, which off the ramp on I-90 was a turn to the right. But my brother owned a bar about a mile and a half off the left of that ramp. Well, for years, I wanted to go home and make that turn and go home to my wife and children. But the obsession to drink alcohol was more powerful than that. It's sad to say, but that's what alcoholism does.
You know, like Bill says in his story in the book, alcohol was my master already, okay. And I couldn't make that right turn. You know, I'm obsessed with drinking. Well, I'll just stop to have one or two.
[00:25:01]
And I'd go up that ramp off 611. I don't know how many people I cut off pulling over into that left lane to go to my brother's bar instead of making that simple turn to the right and go home. I couldn't do it. Alcohol was in charge. It was running my life, okay. And I hated myself. You know, and this went on for a few years. I couldn't look in the mirror anymore. The last few years, it was seven years later, and I walked around with the infamous cloud of impending doom over my head.
I knew something bad was going to happen. I didn't know what it was going to be. But I found out seven years later. By this time, my mother and dad got almost 20 years of sobriety, both of them. And they loved D. D., and they were giving her some tips about how to handle my alcoholism. Hit the road, okay. And God finally gave her the courage. And she wasn't the kind, you know, she never called me at the bars, bitching, and get home and, you know, get home and all that.
She didn't do that. She was taking all this pain inside. And that's why she became a classic Al-Anon member. But God finally gave her the courage. She called me into the kitchen. Like I say, two little girls. She says, we have to talk. I went, uh-oh. She never said stuff like that. And she told me, she said, I'm not going to live like this anymore. I can't. I'm not going to raise our girls like this anymore.
And you're sick. I hope you get help. And I went, oh, boy. There's the cloud of impending doom just burst, you know. Because I really loved her. But, again, I already said as much as booze would allow me to, alcohol is my master, you know. No matter how much I felt that I loved her and my family, alcohol was still in control, you know. And I hated myself by this point, you know. And she had the courage to do that.
And then her mom, she has a big family over in Amherst. And, you know, she would be spending time with her moms and her aunts. And they'd say, well, where's Wally? Where's Wally? Well, Wally was always at the bar. But she had a lot of different things. Oh, he had to work later or whatever. I don't know what all her answers were to that. But she always was having to come up with some reason why I was not around, you know.
So, okay, I called my dad. I said, okay, dad. I finally, I took, I handed that willingness to a certain point. I did not want to lose her and them, you know. And I got to that place where I would, you know, for my parents, I'd been to hear my parents do leads, you know, and stuff. And I thought, man, I'm glad they're here, you know. They really belong here, you know. And because I knew what they had, you know, I said, well, I'm smarter than that.
That's never going to happen to me, you know. And here we are. I'm calling my dad, asking him for help. And he said, take this number. And I called my sponsor, who was my sponsor for 46 years. And he just passed away Christmas night. My sponsor, Chuck, what a great guy he was. Anyway, I started going to meetings. And I kind of like took the AA right away. There's a lot of weird stuff that I didn't, you know, one day at a time, really.
It's a little simplistic, isn't it? I don't think they know maybe who they're dealing with here, you know. They knew exactly who they were dealing with. Another drunk coming in looking for, you know, looking for some kind of help. So I started going to meetings. And I took the AA. And Dede had left with the girls. And a few months later, I actually kind her into coming back with the kids. I said, honey, I'm going to AA.
I mean, it's great, you know. So here I am actually getting full paychecks, you know, instead of half of a paycheck to get her to run the house. instead of half of a paycheck to get her to run the house with and so on, but anyway,
[00:30:02]
the time thing here has got me confused because we didn't start it, so I don't know, I'm probably going too long already, I want it to be her turn, anyway, so I didn't actually run the actual program of Alcoholics Anonymous for another eight years, my Catholic background and my knowledge of God, I was an altar boy, all that stuff, I did not need all these weird steps that they're hanging up on the wall and this, God, they talk a lot about God, I know all that stuff already, God, I just want to quit drinking, you know, and that's what I did, so I thought I was doing a pretty good job, you know, for a while, and this went on for years, me just not drinking and no other program, but I was, you know, I thought I was an active member in Alcoholics Anonymous, you know, and I picked up a little side, you know, things that kept me a little bit happy that I couldn't drink, but, you know, a joint once in a while doesn't hurt anything, that never bothered me, you know, it was that tequila and that wild turkey that was my real problem, it wasn't a joint every now and then, you know, so I went on that program, and for an extended period of time, I might add, and I'm not proud of it, but I'm up here to tell my story, and that's what it is, you know, I'd like to eliminate that part, but I can't do that, you know, so anyway, eventually, and D. D.'s already in Al-Anon by this time, so she's doing well, and I said, well, I'm glad you're going there, honey, because when I first came in, we used to go to meetings together, you know, and she can tell what happened, how she got to Al-Anon, but I played that game for quite a few years, and I finally, one day, God just said, okay, stupid, that's enough of this, either go out there and drink and die, or get with this program, which I had to do, and finally, I did, and here I am, you know, 38 years later, grateful to have been sober, you know, and, you know, one of the writers I read, she said, you know, you can't let the past define the present, you know, I never want to forget it, you know, like one of the, I still have a problem with one of the promises, you know, in the book, number two, I believe it is, we will not regret the past, nor wish to shut the door on it.
I still have a little bit of a problem with that one, you know, because I've had trouble forgiving myself for all the pain that I've caused people in my life, you know, especially my family, my wife and children, but everybody paid the price for Wally's alcoholism, everybody I came in contact with, people I worked with, you know, just friends, people I grew up with that weren't alcoholics, but somehow, they paid for it, even the people in the bars that were my buddies, somehow they paid, I was either stealing their money or having them buy me drinks and drugs and, you know, everybody paid the price that I came in contact with, and I was fortunate enough to get into the twelve steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, which is the solution, you know, and the fellowship, you know, you can't shortcut any of this stuff, you know, it's fellowship and the twelve steps of AA and working with others, you know, doing the things I'm asked to do in the program, and I'm grateful to have the opportunity to give back a little bit of what's been so freely given to me, and, you know, I could really, I got a lot more to say, but I'm about out of my time limit here right now, I could stand up here, I could talk about Alcoholics Anonymous forever, you know, and I'm so grateful that there was no other solution for me, it says there's a solution in the big book, there is a solution, I like that heading, especially, it doesn't say there might be a solution or there could be a solution, there is a solution, and it lays it out for me, all I gotta do
[00:35:01]
is learn how to follow directions, I hated following, I already admitted hating following directions, but if you don't do it in AA and do it the way you're supposed to, the way they lay it out for you, it's laid out, it's simple, the solution is there, and I'm so grateful, I love the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, you know, tells me, you know, my problems, the root of my problem is selfishness and self-centeredness, and forgive me who was there Friday night, but I said, you know, my friend Jack from Baltimore, my late friend Jack, used to say I may not be much, but I'm all I think about, you know, and that's the way it was, and sometimes it still is, but anyway, that's enough out of me, I am going to have my beautiful, lovely wife come up here, thank you so much.
Thanks Jimmy, hi everybody, my name is D. D., I'm a grateful recovering LNN, it's so great to see everybody's faces this morning, I thought maybe this room would be just a couple front rows here, you know, it's a long weekend, time to go home, anyway, thank you Walter for sticking with the program, and deciding that you'd rather be married and have a family, and took a, you know, took a real love to program, because it's what brought me here, and my home group is the Wednesday Westside LNN family group in Amherst, Ohio, and I think there may be a few of us here tonight, I'm not sure, good to see all my people, and Karen, thank you for the introduction, it's been beautiful to get to know you, and over the years to have that constant fellowship of people that we've known since we were first in program, and so desperate to find a solution, Father Tom, thank you so much for your share, it's just beautiful, the resentment piece, your story, I love how authentically you talk about today, and dealing with resentments, and dealing with all the human stuff that we have to deal with, and that, you know, I don't have to be perfect, I can be who I am today, and I can integrate all the things that I have learned and I've experienced to be of service to anyone that comes into my path, and I'll start with, I'm the third oldest of 10 children, so we have quite a crew between us, and we have, and I think, you know, growing up in a big family, especially if you're one of the older ones, you really learn how to not feel, do not feel, and do what you're told, and you have work to do, you have young ones to take care of, you have, you know, housework to do, you have all these things that you have to do, you can't really be a child. Oh, there's my other girls over here.
So, you know, I learned how to take care of business around the house, I could take care of a household, I could raise kids, I could cook, I could do everything possible, and I also learned, and my parents are very loving, there was some alcohol in our family, I don't, I can't say that my father was an alcoholic, he abused alcohol, and I, as a kid, I loved it because he was always so happy, and, you know, my mom was the problem, not my dad.
My dad was a lot of fun, and of course now I understand what my mother was going through adding an eleventh child, you know, to her brew of ten. So my dad was the fun-loving kind of guy, and my mom was the disciplinarian, and she was the, she ruled the roost, and my father, you know, gave her the paycheck every day. I thought that's how people lived. And so, when I met my husband, and we decided to get married, and I knew he drank a lot,
[00:40:05]
or he drank too much, and, but I was out with him, we were having a great old time, lots of music, lots of dancing, lots of alcohol. I could have, I suppose, if I drank long enough become an alcoholic, but I got sick. Now, so if you're a real alcoholic, getting sick has nothing to do with not drinking. So, you know, I realized that I'm probably not an alcoholic. I don't have the obsession for alcohol, but I have obsessions, and those obsessions made me so sick. You know, the obsession to control, the obsession to make things look good on the outside, the idea that not being able to really label my own feelings, you just kind of stuff them down, and you keep moving forward, and make things look good on the outside, and don't let anybody know what's going on on the inside. And that, I really played that game for a long time until I couldn't do it anymore. And what I found in my situation, my stomach, my esophagus, my intestinal system all got mixed up in this anxiety and neurotic behavior. You know, he talked about anybody that lives as an alcoholic is going to probably be neurotic. Absolutely true in my case. I became obsessive about what things looked like. So, if you walk into my house, you're going to see a beautiful house, everything nice and clean. But if you looked on the inside, you'd see a lot of pain, a lot of self-hatred, a lot of self-recrimination for how could I have married somebody who drank like this? How could I marry somebody that was going out and, you know, whatever happens in the bars, what happens at closing time, those things are happening. How do, you know, I don't know how to handle this. I'm a, you know, 21-year-old.
Have two children now. You know, I'm under 25. So, I was heart sick. And I guess that's the best way I could say that, that feeling of being so sick in my heart to have to love someone and to not know how do I make this work? How do I make this person? He wasn't acting the same way my dad acted when my dad drank. And so, I had no clue about alcoholism. And until I started learning about alcoholism, learning about blackouts, learning about how I was responding, how the family responds to alcoholism, you know, the self-worth and the self-esteem, feeling worthless, what's wrong with me? Why am I married to somebody that doesn't want to come home at night? There must be something about me. You know, his alcoholism was about me. And that's how ignorant I was about alcoholism. So, when he came in program, when I, you know, I've seven years of living like that, day in, day out, always financial insecurity. This is a guy who had a job. I mean, it wasn't, you know, there was work. There's always work. So, I couldn't, I didn't understand how this could all be happening. And I knew that I fell in love with this man and that he was a good person.
He was becoming not the man that I fell in love with. And I certainly wasn't the woman that he fell in love with. I became angry, resentful, but I never said anything out loud. Everything was all pushed down. So, what happens? You know, your body starts to have an effect. And the effects of alcoholism became physical for me in the sense of intestinal issues, anxiety, panic attacks. These are all the kinds of things that living with alcoholism can do. And I didn't understand that he was living with some of those same things, but he was just medicating. And I was stark raving sober. I mean, I looked kind of like, you know, I weighed about 115 pounds. I was smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee. I didn't eat.
I was just constantly on the move, always on the move, afraid to sit still. I don't know what I was exactly afraid of other than understanding that my own feelings were going to be coming up. I had to keep pressing those down by doing something else. And I didn't want to be the kind of wife that was nagging and calling the bars and doing all that kind of stuff because I had to look good. That was very important.
Good. That was very important. So realizing that as his disease was progressing, so was
[00:45:02]
my disease. My wanting to pretend, to deny that it was as bad as it was, that just became the forefront of my obsession, really. And, you know, little by little, that breaking down of my own persona, like I couldn't deal with all the feelings I was having. I didn't know what to do with them. I didn't have anybody to talk to about it. I was always, you know, lying to my family about what was happening. So, you know, when he got in the program and I started reading the Big Book and I was so, oh my God, I was so excited. I started reading the Big Book and I'm thinking, oh my God, this guy's going to be fabulous as soon as, you know, he starts reading this book. I'm telling you, our life is going to be miraculous.
And, you know, he, we, the girls and I left and I had that little conversation. Those are always the words he never wants to hear. Honey, I need to talk to you about something. And so, you know, we had that conversation and it was, you know, it was heartbreaking for me because I wanted a long-term marriage. I wanted a marriage that was successful and supportive and loving. And it seemed like it was starting out that way. So after seven years of that devastating despair of not knowing what to do, who do I turn to, who do I go to? I don't want to go to my parents. They already know something's happening. I mean, of course everyone knew. This isn't something everyone knows. And that facade of trying to hide everything is just, it's such an exhausting existence. And so to be able to, you know, he called me and said, well, I'm, you know, I'm going to a meeting and blah, blah, blah.
I was like, oh, cool, but you know what? We're not home now. You know, I don't know what's going to happen. So he came in program. I saw he was starting to make changes. I certainly wanted that to work. And so, you know, got back into my marriage and I was going to meetings with him. I was reading the big book. I was at an AA meeting with him one time and at this point I hadn't been to Al-Anon and I didn't think I needed to because, you know, he was the problem. And so he was acknowledging he was the problem. That was my biggest concern.
Is he ever going to acknowledge that he's the problem? I'm not the problem. So, you know, so for him to go in program and to admit all these things, I was thrilled. And I could still hide. I could still hide. And so he's getting better. I see he's getting happy. And so I come home and the girls and I were all as well and go to a meeting with him several times a week. We'd go to a meeting together. And one meeting I went to, there was a woman who was the speaker that night and she said she'd come into AA through Al-Anon first and I didn't think too much of that. And she goes, you know, I think the non-alcoholic is sicker than the alcoholic. I went, what are you talking about? Have you lost your mind? And all of a sudden, I felt like a big spotlight was on me. And I could feel myself getting like heated red. I wanted to have a sign that said, it's him, not me. You know, like, because I did not want to acknowledge that I had become a person that I did not know. And not only had I become a person I didn't know, I had never developed a personality or a voice to stand on my own. I really had never done that. And I didn't realize that that behavior that I learned as growing up about caretaking and not caring, it doesn't matter how you feel, it's how is this going to work for the family. You know, I didn't realize that as a human being, I have wants and needs and my needs need to be acknowledged and met and discussed and talked about and all that kind of stuff. So, you know, I learned you just don't worry about yourself, you just take care of other things. And so that's just kind of what, you know, as a spouse, that's how I felt I was supposed to be living my life.
So to get that, to understand that that inside job that we talk about is about really truly
[00:50:01]
having a spiritual emptiness that I didn't realize I had a spiritual emptiness that what I was always looking for other people to fill in me was really a space that was for the God of my understanding. And so coming into program and hearing this woman say this about the Al-Anon, you know, the non-alcoholic, I was embarrassed and I got embarrassed easily because I was so self-conscious about just kind of being alive. Like, do I deserve to be here? Is it okay if I breathe? You know, it's kind of crazy when you think about that, but that's the whole point is not thinking that I had the right to be here unless I was doing for someone else. So I went to my first Al-Anon meeting after that because I thought, well, hell, I got to do something. If they're going to be pointing the finger at me, I got to look like I'm doing something. So I went to Al-Anon and you know what? I walked in those rooms and I heard people talking and I had the biggest breath, exhale that I could ever, I could never have imagined that, that going into a room with people that I'd never known before and them talking about their feelings and about what it was like living with alcoholism would allow me to exhale for the tension in my body to leave me. I thought, what is happening here? You know, and so I felt at home immediately and I start going to Al-Anon. I was going three, four, five, six meetings a week. Anytime I could get to a meeting, I started being able to label the things I was feeling. And once I could put a label, and I used to hate meetings where they were talking about feelings. I would, I'd say, no, no, no, no, no, do not talk about feelings because I was always afraid I was going to start crying and I would never stop. And so learning that I could, I could dissect all these feelings, I could understand what they were about and I was allowed to have them. That was the biggest thing. I'm allowed to have them. It's not right or wrong. And that what I was really missing was a spiritual connection, that I needed, I needed a spiritual connection and it had to be different than the one that I grew up with because I felt only the fear of God in that situation. So learning about the love of God and that within the steps, working the steps myself meant that I had acknowledged my own powerlessness about everything, not just about alcoholism. I cannot control other people. And that was a big light bulb for me because I was playing God in so many different ways I never even understood. And so learning how to understand myself and working the steps, becoming willing to believe in that power greater than myself and being willing to acknowledge my part in our relationship. It's not one-sided. I played a part in all that and I needed to acknowledge that that controlling, nagging, tense behavior and constant watching. I was always watching, watching, you know, vigilance, always looking to see what he was doing or what he's not doing and he's not doing this right and you know he's supposed to go to a meeting and he's supposed to do this, la la la la la. And you know just understanding that the focus now belongs on me. And so, you know, getting the steps in my life, being able to take a look at my own inventory and not take his. I was always judging, you know, my critical nature even if I didn't say it out loud it was always in there criticizing. The inner critic is constantly alive. So to be able to tampen that down, you know, and to let the God of my understanding deal with the world and its people, it's not my job. It's just been, you know, it's been fantastic to be able to let people be who they are and for me to learn to love myself as I am, that I could love other people the way they are and get past the outside facades of everyone. You know, this body is just a dressing and inside is all that really matters and that if I can get past behavior and see that within each and every one of us is the same divine spark, that child of God within us, that's what I need, that's what I want to get to. And so, getting through the steps and continuing to work the steps in my life, keep going to meetings, participating in these kinds of things, thank you committee. You know, I always wanted to stay small. I don't want to be in the spotlight and then I realized, you know what, when someone asks you to do something,
[00:55:05]
that doesn't mean you're big. It doesn't mean you're big at all. It means you're part of a community that is supporting each other and that's what I want to be. I want to be part of a community that is supporting one another, people that are suffering. There are so many people suffering out there that don't have any idea that there's a better way to live and that I don't have to control the universe to feel okay. I can be within this world and be okay and know that I don't have to control anything else, that my job is to stay connected to a higher power and that that higher power will demonstrate through me what my higher power can do. It has nothing to do with me. It's just staying to be like an open vessel, you know, to be willing to be shown how to do something and then let that power work through me. That's all that matters. So kind of in a general way, that's what our life has been like. And what do I do today? I go to my home group. I sponsor people. I have a sponsor. My sponsor passed away a couple of years ago and for a little while I was kind of floundering. What do I do? What do I do? How can I get a sponsor?
And then, you know, about a year or so ago or something like that, Sharon, I don't remember how long it was, I said, Sharon, you want to go have lunch? I need to talk to somebody. So we went to lunch and I said, hey, could you be my sponsor? She's like, yeah, I'd love to. I'm like, yeah. So we start working on the books. We have book studies together. I have book studies with girls that I sponsor. We have book studies that are meeting. I have book studies at my home. I love all of it. We have such beautiful literature. Our literature is so reflective of all of the things that have happened to me and within me. It's amazing.
What makes me understand that we are all so much alike, that this disease really cuts through any circumstance you could possibly, any, it doesn't matter. It cuts us all in the same place, a heart. It really broke my heart. And what I had to understand is, it's my higher power allowing my heart to be broken open so that I could receive, kind of release the stuff that was in there, pounded down, and then receive the love of God through me, which I needed so badly. So to be able to continue to live this kind of life has been, really, truly been a gift and a miracle. And I am so grateful to all of you for being here, grateful that this program exists. And I'm going to close. What are we doing here?
Yeah, I'm going to close. People are looking so sleepy and I'm sleepy. So thank you so much.