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Source: Ann P – From Huntington Beach – Date Unknown.mp3 File: ann-p-from-huntington-beach-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 01:10:09
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Hi, my name is Ann, and I'm an alcoholic, and it's good to be in the meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. I'd like to welcome all the new people here today that are here for the first Jamboree, and they're here in the first year of sobriety. What an adventure you're really in for an adventure here in Alcoholics Anonymous, believe me. I'd like to thank the committee for inviting me here, and they're trying to get a hold of me every time they try to get a hold of me. When I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, I thought my life was over, and I was never going to be busy again, and it's like my life is so full, I don't have, I'm very seldom home, I'm just gone a lot, and I also would like from the bottom of my heart to thank Cricket for the fantastic message she gave us last night. What a walk, what a journey, and that's what Alcoholics Anonymous does. It tells us that we come from all walks of life, and that we're people who normally would not mix, and we come together, and we all have the last name, alcoholic, and what a family we have here. I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, and I tell you how long I'm sober because one of my very, very favorite speakers in Alcoholics Anonymous, who carried a tremendous message, who I just adored, his name was Norm A., and Norm is gone today, but if you ever get the opportunity to pick up his tape, please do, because he's got a tremendous message for the newcomer in Alcoholics Anonymous.
Norm, I always told you how long you were sober, because he said with so many things changing in the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous, he said that you might get a pension plan going here. One day he wanted to get his full benefit. So just in case you get a pension plan going here, I want to get my full benefit. I got sober on June 16, 1968, and by the grace of God, and Alcoholics Anonymous and very good sponsorship. But I had come to Alcoholics Anonymous, previous to that, I had come a year prior, in 1997, and I'm 67, I mean. I suffered from CRS. I was 23 years of age when I first came to Alcoholics Anonymous, and I looked around Alcoholics Anonymous, and everybody was very old. I mean, they were old. There were 35 and older. I just could not imagine life without drinking. I could not imagine life without drinking, and I didn't want to be an alcoholic. I didn't know what an alcoholic was, but I most certainly did not want to be one. I was told about Alcoholics Anonymous when I was 19 years of age, and I thought, no, I'm not an alcoholic. My idea of an alcoholic, when I came to Alcoholics Anonymous at that time, was an old guy I knew on Anaheim Street, and Anaheim Street in California is Skid Row, and Eddie used to wear a long black coat with a rope tied around it, and he wore his hair all flicked back, and he was always panhandling to get some money to get some wine. And I used to look at Eddie, and I'd think, that's an alcoholic. If I ever get like Eddie, I'll stop drinking.
And that was my idea of an alcoholic, and when I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, I graduated. I left AA. I just could not imagine life without drinking. I could not. I didn't know anything about projection, but I immediately projected into being 40 years of age. I don't know why I picked 40. I'm 40 and some now, but I thought, 40, you're really old. You're really dead by 40, I tell you. And I thought, I just cannot sit in these hard chairs for the rest of my life, so I left AA. I drank for eight more months, and I'm truly, truly grateful for that eight months, because in that eight months, I lost everything. And I'm not talking about material things. I'm talking about everything inside of me. There was nothing left, and I didn't start out with a whole lot, but there was absolutely nothing left. Alcohol took it all. And when I came back to Alcoholics Anonymous, I weighed 85 pounds. I was malnutritious, and my liver was shot. And on the Sunday morning, you know, I've had some physical problems in the last two years. I was diagnosed with cancer two years ago. My hair was supposed to grow back red, and darn it, look, it grew back gray.
I had reoccurrence a year ago in January. So I can't tell you that it's been a hard two years. I can only tell you that it's been a learning two years. And I can also tell you that I feel that God has pruned me, and pruned me back to the quick. And I really feel that if it wasn't for Alcoholics Anonymous, I could not have walked through what I've had to walk through with the dignity and with the courage that I've had to have in order to go through what I've had to go through. It's because of the people in Alcoholics Anonymous, and because of having all of their time and doing and being there and participating and
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doing all the stuff that I do to work the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. Some years ago, if I had to know my liver was part of my immune system, I would have took better care of it. Some years ago, when I got insurance about ten years ago, I'm a Kaiser member, and the year I was going to give it up, I thought, shit, I'm paying them all this money, there's nothing wrong with me. Thank God, God knows better than I do.
But the first time I got a physical, Kaiser was very, very impressed with my liver. And they never asked me if I was an alcoholic, and I'm not ashamed of being an alcoholic. I never had a problem saying, I'm Ann, I'm an alcoholic, and I came to Alcoholics Anonymous because I had kind of a nice ring to it. It was like being a doctor or something, you know, compared to some of the names I was called when I was out there drinking.
And so they never asked me, and I didn't tell them. I was probably about twenty-one years sober at that time, and I went in to get the results of that physical, and the doctor looked at me, and she gave me all the results of all the little things they take in the blood work, and then she looked at me, and she said, we're really concerned about your liver. And I said, oh really? She said, yes. She said, this really only occurs in people who are hard drinkers or heavy drinkers. And I looked at her, and I said, I'm a member of Alcoholics Anonymous, and I got all excited, and I said, I haven't had a drink, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And she looked at me, dead right in the eye, and she said, do you know that if you drink, you'll die? And I looked at her right back, and I said, no shit.
What a marvelous piece of information to be given me. If I know anything, anything today, I know as I stand up here before you this morning, my disease is progressing. If I know anything, I know that. And you may ask me, how do I know that, if you're new here in Alcoholics Anonymous? How I know that is, I've had the opportunity to sit, if you want to call it an opportunity, you just sit around Alcoholics Anonymous and watch some of your friends go back out. You just sit around here, and I'm not talking about people with two years, or nine months, or six months, or a year. I'm talking people with lots of years of sobriety. Lots of years. And it breaks my heart, because something happened, and whatever it is, you know, Cricket said last night, and I always have to remember this, I've got to stay small in Alcoholics Anonymous. I've got to stay small. There's no big shots in AA. We're all just members. And the one that is in control here is God. God is who is in control of all of this for me. And one of my dearest, dearest friends, she had a tremendous message in Alcoholics Anonymous, and she hasn't made it back yet. And you know, if they told me that I would die within a week, you know, I might do it, but I'm not guaranteed I'm going to die in a week. It's a very long, slow, slow suicide. And so, you see, I know that what I suffer from, I suffer from disease of alcoholism, and it progresses as I stand here. You know, when I was new in Alcoholics Anonymous, I used to say, why me? Where is it? Why didn't so-and-so get it? And those old-timers were just, well, God, they were not kind, I'll tell you that. And they'd say, why not you, Annie? There's something about your face that pisses God off, so you stop asking God, you know? And they had no kindness, no compassion, no understanding, no nothing. It was like, shut up, sit down, you know. And I, like Cricket, I came to Alcoholics Anonymous, I had an attitude problem. I walked around my first year as a bride, and I gave everybody the finger. I cursed you up one way or the other. From the first time I came in, when I came back, I tried to figure out how I could get out, you know. I wanted to get out here. I made a terrible mistake. I was too afraid to go out, and I kept waiting for them to tell me to leave. And they kept saying, keep coming back, you know. And then I found out they were telling everybody in Alcoholics Anonymous to keep coming back. I was so disappointed. I thought they'd just single me out of the whole group. I came into a group in Huntington Beach. I went to a lot of meetings, but when I came into a group, I came into a group in Huntington Beach, and I am so grateful, and I love these people very, very much. And I go to Jerry's, I cut hair today, and I cut hair at my house, because the people in Alcoholics Anonymous set it up so that while I was throwing up from doing chemo, I could get up and cut a head of hair because I am self-supporting through my own contributions today. And I would do that, and I do some house calls to some of those people that are not able to get out anymore, like Jerry does get out, but I don't want him to come to my house. He's blind, and I don't want him to fall into my house. And Jerry and Gloria were very, very good to me, and I go to his house, and I cut his hair, and I spend a lot of time there, and Jerry played a very important part in my early sobriety. When I was about four months sober, he used
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to call me Crazy Annie. I had bright red hair, and I had a mouth like a truck driver. And they'd say, here she comes, and they'd be taking bets on whether I was going to make it or not. And I didn't know this. I remember running up to Jerry when I was about four months sober, and I remember saying to him, where are those steps, and how often do I have to run up and down them? I had visions of twelve stone steps that I had to run up and down every day. That was part of the recovery. You had to go up and down these stairs twelve times. And he kind of looked at me, you know, like, oh my God, where did she come from?
He said, Annie, you go to a lot of meetings. And he said, you know, every meeting you go to, they read chapter five. And he said, the house stands for honesty, open-mindedness, and willingness. Now, I'm not going to tell you that I was honest, but I had a willingness, and willingness is the key for me. And he said, and there's twelve steps there, and they read them every meeting you go to, honey. And he said, I'm going to tell you, he said, if you work the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous or apply the steps to the best of your ability, he said, I guarantee you your life will change. And if you're new here today, if you apply the steps to the best of your ability, I guarantee you your life will change. It may not change the way you want it to change, but it will change, you know, because nothing ever comes to stay here in Alcoholics Anonymous. It always comes to pass.
I got me a sponsor, and I loved this woman very, very much. She became everything to me, and she was my sister, she was my mother, she was my best friend, and she was very, very gentle, and she was able to take me down when she needed to take me down, and she gave me directions, and she was the first person in my whole entire life that I can honestly say that loved me unconditionally, and it took me a long time to realize that with her.
And that woman told me on a daily basis that I was a child of God and God loved me, and I drove this woman insane, totally insane, absolutely nuts. I was, you know, I was calling her every five minutes of the day. She had five children. She was a single parent. No, she was married to John at that time, and then John and her got divorced. But it was like all the time she raised me. I went to her house when I got sober. I didn't know how to read, and I didn't know how to write, and it's got nothing to do with my disease of alcoholism. It's got to do with where I came from, and my people were not interested in education, and it wasn't that very important, and I was about ten months sober. I decided that I wasn't going to do the fourth step, fourth and fifth step, and John, my ex-husband, came up to me at my home group, and he said, Annie, he said, have you done the fourth and fifth step? And I said, no, John, I'm not going to do it. I said, that's for those of you who drank for fifteen or twenty years. You're much sicker than those of us who only drank for eleven. And he looked at me, and he said, you know what? He said, if you don't do the fourth and fifth step, he said, I'm going to announce it all over Huntington Beach for them not to listen to you, that you're not working the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. Well, he put terror in my heart, absolutely terror. I went home that night.
Now, I really relate with step two. I am really crazy, and I go home, and how I was going to solve this problem in order not to do it, I decided what I'd do was that I would drown myself in the bathtub. That's how I'd do it. I would just get in the bathtub, fill it up with water, and I would slide down in the tub and drown myself. And I listened very, very carefully in the meetings of reading chapter five, and I could recite chapter five.
They hated me. I would just, I'd still recite it. I'd never leave any commas, periods, or anything. I'd just say it like a poem. And I remember when they read chapter five, they'd say, and there are those who have grave emotional and mental disorders. And I kind of stood back up, and I thought, uh-uh, those guys are not going to go around there and say, well, that's what happened to Annie. She had grave emotional and mental disorders. That's why Annie commits suicide. So I didn't, and I'm not big on suicide. I'm more apt to kill you than I am to kill myself. And any time I ever talk about suicide, it's usually I'm just going to jump off the curb because I don't like to hurt myself that much.
I ended up, the next day I went out, and I got all this paper and pencils, and I didn't drive a car for the first four and a half years because I couldn't take that silly little test. And I got a ride, and I ride over at my sponsor's house, and I sat down at our kitchen table. And if you're new here today, you're going to find that you're going to find a whole bunch of very narrow-minded people here in Alcoholics Anonymous. And I sat down, and I hand her all this paper and pencils, and she had all colors. And she said, what's this for, honey? And I said, well, I'm going to tell you all about it. You start writing.
And she looked at me, and she said, I'm going to write. And I said, yeah, I'll tell you. You just write it. That's what they want me to do. This is what we're going to do. You just write it. That's what they want me to do. This is what we're going to do.
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And she said, Honey, I've done my inventory, and now you get to do yours. And the only emotion I knew when I came here, I was very angry, just rage. And anger for me is terror. Absolute, total terror. And I left the house, and I got a ride home. When I went home, and I'd call her, and this was way before they had machines, and I would call her up on the phone, and all she would say was, Right, right, right, right. And I would hang up the phone.
And I was a good pacer. I loved to pace. I used to have the big book under my arm, and I'd walk back and forth, you know. And I used to think it was going to go up through my arm and into my head, and I was going to get all this knowledge. This is how I was going to get all this stuff. And I couldn't tell her. I couldn't tell her. I had a lot of secrets, but I couldn't tell her that one. And so I told her, and she said, Annie, she said, I don't care how you do it, but you do it.
And so I did. I made a lot of marks on our paper, and I did that inventory. And I am so, you know, in step six in the 12 and 12, it says that wishful thinking is a character defect. And to this day, I wish I kept that inventory, because there's no comparison to the girl that took that inventory to the woman that stands before you tonight. I do know how to read, and I do know how to write, and that came, again, through people in Alcoholics Anonymous.
There was a little gal named Mary Jane who was in special education, and the gal that made the 12-step column, they happened to be a teacher, and both of those got together, and Mary Jane's gone today, and she's just a wonderful, wonderful lady. And Mary Jane and Carolyn got together, and they took me out to some psychiatrists out there in Orange, and they tested me, and they gave all kinds of tests, and they said, they came up with, they said I wasn't wired right.
Well, God, I know all my life I wasn't wired right. You know, I didn't need a group of psychiatrists to tell me I wasn't wired right. And they said I had a thing called aslexia, and that I saw things backwards, and I did. I saw things backwards, and I even tell my story backwards sometimes. And so they, my sponsor, I was five years sober, and my sponsor took me to, another lady came into play there, and another lady taught me my ABCs and taught me.
She was a child psychiatrist. I thought that was very, very appropriate for somebody like me, and took me to school, and I remember when she took me to this learning center, I remember standing outside. She filled out all the papers and got me ready just like I was five years old. I was kindergarten. And she stood at the door, and I said, you come in with me, please. And she said, no, honey, I'll be here when you come out.
And what I'm trying to tell you is that I have not had to do anything alone in the 29 1⁄2 years driving sober in Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. And what I want to share with you, what I found in that inventory, and I'm not going to give you details, folks, I used to, is to say, let your hair down, and I did, and then they said, no, no, no, not too long. Don't do that. I mean, I'd give you all the details.
I don't do that anymore. I'll tell you in a general way what I learned in that inventory. And I've taken many, many inventories because I'm one of those, one of these people that believe, at least for me, I don't know about you, but for me, I believe that I have to continue to work the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. I don't believe that the last three steps are maintenance steps. I have to go back, and I've had to go back and rework those steps into my life because the same steps that worked for me last year most certainly will not work for me this year.
And I tried to do an annual inventory, and I tried to do it right before my AA birthday, et cetera. I know where I'm at and what I need to be doing for the next year. And, you know, I've found I've got more defective character now than I did when I walked through the doors. You know, I didn't know what a defective character, I thought that was something you ate. I didn't know what that was when I got here.
I go back to being very, very young, and I was born with tremendous, tremendous fears. And I'm Irish and I'm Catholic. That gave me two strikes against me right off the bat. And I'm not one of those Irish that's never seen the skies of Ireland. I lived there for seventeen and a half years of my life. And I'm the eighth child out of ten, and we had a very, very small home. And I listened, and I was raised in the school of Alcoholics Anonymous.
You do not label someone else an alcoholic. But I've listened to enough men here in Alcoholics Anonymous that I would say that my dad definitely had a problem with alcohol. My dad had a problem not just with alcohol, he had a problem with gambling, and he had a problem with women, and he had a lot of problems. And he brought it into the house, and my mother, the only thing she ever did was she had too many kids.
And she was absolutely, my mother was nuts. She was married at fifteen years of age, and she never grew up. My mother died two years ago, and I want you to know that I love my parents very, very much. It took me a long time to get there because I was a blamer. I blamed everybody. I couldn't take responsibility for me. And through Alcoholics Anonymous, I take full responsibility for what I say and for my actions today.
But I couldn't at that time, growing up in this household. And my father would get drunk on a Friday night and a Saturday night,
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and he'd come home, and he'd be there, my mother. Now, I didn't know that this was going on all over Ireland. I just knew it was going on in our house. And I remember as a child, I'd be upstairs in our bed, and I'd have the pillow over my head, and I would be terrified, but I'd be praying to that God that they were teaching me, and I was afraid of Him, too. And while I was praying to Him, I'd say, please, let Him kill her, or maybe she'll kill Him, or maybe I would die.
I prayed a lot to die. And I guess the next morning, all these things went on inside of me, and what they were was guilt, remorse, and I was a very, very bad child for thinking all these bad things with my parents. Now, I didn't know that until I came to AA. And I went to Catholic school, not because we were rich, simply because that's all there is in the part of Ireland I came from. Now, I tell you this part of my life simply because I really believe, for me, I was getting ready for alcohol way before I picked up a drink.
I really believe, for me, that if I had not found alcohol, I would have gone an absolute stark raving mad. Alcohol saved my sanity until one day it turned on me and I found a fellowship called Alcoholics Anonymous. I went to Catholic school, like I said, not because we were rich. And people used to say to me, how come you didn't get an education? And I used to say, because I had frustrated Irish nuns.
The priest at Alcoholics Anonymous says, the brainstorms are not for us. And I had my first brainstorm in second grade. And I remember very well, and we had catechesis every morning when we went into school. And every morning we had to memorize. And I couldn't memorize because we had this very small house and I never slept in a bed by myself either. There was always four or five of us in the bed. And I used to hide under the cold hole.
That's where I used to find my peace because my mother would start yelling and she would go down and list the names and who she wanted. And if you happened to be there right in front of her, you got it. You know, up the side of the head. So I was always kind of trying to avoid all of that. And I couldn't memorize the catechesis and I was just so full of the fear because of the anxiety and the stuff that went on.
There was a lot of anxiety. The only time the Irish in my house was when they were telling you to levy and they were usually telling you the other side of the house. And so I went into school this day and I decided I was going to get this nun before she got me. I had made that decision. I thought, I'm so tired of getting that round ruler down on my knuckles. Boy, she'd just come right down on my knuckles.
So she asked me the question and I couldn't answer it. And she grabbed it. I jumped out of the seat and I often slapped her across the face as hard as any little second grader can hit somebody across the face. And there was a black petitioner in this particular classroom and Mother Superior just happened to be teaching that particular day. And she just happened to turn her head and she just happened to look and see me do it.
She came running in. She grabbed ahold of me. You know, she had the big black robes, you know, and the big cross and the rosary was down there and the white thing on the head and the veil. And she's just, I mean, she's coming in. She's furious. And she grabbed me by the back of the neck. She kind of shakes me like a puppy dog. And I stood there and looked at Mother Superior and 30 kids and said, I didn't do it.
You know, I was to do that until I came to the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous. I would stand and look you dead in the eye and say, I didn't do it. Because I could not take responsibility for my behavior. And so they took me out of there to move into another grade and I kneel in front of two statues and I assumed I was supposed to pray. And I always say three weeks and it probably was a week but it felt like three weeks to me.
And I had to get up. I got tired of kneeling on these hardwood floors. I had great big knots on the floor and so I went back up to apologize to the class. And I remember standing in front of that class and I remember Sister with that round pointer and I take her in my back and she wants me to say, I'm sorry. And God, I don't want to say, I'm sorry. I've lowered my eyes and she's hooking me with it and I said, I'm sorry.
And something else happened inside of me and what happened inside of me was you against me. And it was always you against me from that time on. By the time I left school I was just, I just barely turned 13 when I left school and I went to work in a factory and I had all those hopes and dreams every other girl had. I was going to find me a nice Irish fella and get married and have kids and I am truly, truly grateful God does not answer stupid prayers.
Truly. I found alcohol and I found boys all in the same week and my first drink was a half a bottle of cognac and this guy told me that if I drank this half a bottle of cognac he would give me a pound note which was equivalent to $3 in your money at that time. And I was, the deal was I was to drink this half a bottle of cognac down and I wasn't to stop and I drank that half a bottle of cognac down and I didn't stop.
And I went into the bathroom and I got very, very, very sick and I threw up and I went back out and I said give me my money. You know if I knew what I know now I didn't know
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that that night I sold my soul I sold my soul for a drink. I didn't know that at that time. And I got my money and I went up to the bar and if you're Irish and you're in Ireland and you know how to name your drink they will serve it to you. You don't have to be any age. And so I went up and I ordered me another drink and I continued to drink and I can tell you what it did to me. That knock that was in the pit of my gut was gone.
It didn't matter whether my father beat up my mother. It didn't matter whether there was no food in that house. It didn't matter whether I had no education. I found the secret to living. Now I didn't drink every day from that time on but I drank at every opportunity from that time on. By the time I was 17 years of age my father made the decision for me. I had absolutely nothing to do with this decision.
He decided I was going to go to the streets and pay for gold. I've been there 35 years and I'm still looking for those bloody streets to pay for gold. I had never been anywhere in Ireland. I'm a Colchie. We call us people from the country. We're country people. We're Colchies and city people are city slickers. I came from the country and I had never been anywhere in Ireland. As far as I ever got in Ireland was Dublin, all I knew that it was going to be different.
If I could get away from this family I'd never tell anybody I was Irish and it was going to be different. That's alcohol drinking. Even then that's how I thought. It was always going to be different somewhere else. If I could have left me home I would have had a good time but I always brought me with me. When I got home to the United States and my sister I'd come out here and I remember going up to Dublin and I remember getting on that plane and I remember drinking champagne and I remember the feeling and the feeling was freedom.
I wanted to be free. I wanted to be free and I remember that we had a beautiful home. She had a liquor cabinet. We didn't have one in our house and they drank vodka and I used to drink vodka and I used to fill a bottle up with water. When I get drunk I used to break out all over my body with big wells all over my body. I shook a lot because I had a lot of secrets and I was terrified. I walked around most of my life feeling so ashamed of who I was and I couldn't tell her I couldn't be with my peers and I couldn't go into that office and fill out those papers.
I was going into a state of fear that someone was going to find out something about me. I slid down the door and she looked at me and she told me that I couldn't leave her alone. When I got out of there I had a lot of friends and I had a lot of friends and I had a lot of friends and I had a hundred people that worked there and I had a lot of friends and I had a lot of friends and I had a lot of friends and I had a lot of friends and I have this month ago I started living in the US and you don't even know that I had this month ago
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I have this month ago my mom I ate that cigarette. I literally ate it. He took it down to me and he whipped me and he kicked me. And my mother came running into that little living room and she said, God, Jack, you're going to kill her. I said, yeah, I'm going to kill her. She's no good. Never will be any good. You know, I knew that from the time I was probably five years old. I was no good. Never would be any good.
They couldn't let me out of the house for a couple of weeks because they were too afraid that if they let me out, someone might see me. I was so badly beaten. I don't know what they would have done. And I don't know what they do today if you even, you know, correct your kids. So that memory stayed with me and I knew that if I was deported that that man would meet me at Dublin Airport. He would kill me first and ask questions later.
So I moved on uptown at that time in my life. One of the other things I like about being sober and alcoholic phenomenon is that I got clean clothes on today and my hair is combed and my eyebrows are in the right place. They're exactly where they're supposed to be. That's not a purple eye I got from someone hitting me. That's purple because I put purple eye shadow on this morning, you know. And when I drank, I drank everything and anything anybody ever gave me.
But when I bought, I bought Ripple. I don't know if you get any Ripple drinkers here. But I'll tell you, if you've never got drunk, it was 37 cents a bottle. It came in a long neck bottle. And if you've never got drunk in Ripple, I'm telling you, you missed a trip. You definitely missed a trip. Anyways, you know, you never felt cheated when you drank Ripple. You could, you know, get too drunk for the price of one, you know.
And drink water the next day and you're drunk all over again. I used to walk along Catalina Avenue and I hated everybody. I had so much hate in me. I hated everybody. I hated the Americans because all you ever talked about was education. Whether you did or you didn't, that's all I heard. I didn't want anything to do with the Irish because all they did was talk about… They'd just change addresses to behave the same way here as they did over there.
I really want you to know that I like being Irish today. I really believe there was a force of Irishism that holds you in meetings in a phone booth. Now, I know a lot of people don't like to hear that. You don't have to be Irish, you know, to become a member. It just helps a lot. My sponsor told me many years ago the reason why God created whiskey was he was afraid the Irish were going to take over the world.
He'd slow them down just a little bit. I used to walk around with a paper sack, bottle, rubber go-aheads, jeans way before they were fashionable and walk around Catalina in an old t-shirt and give all the cars the finger. And I don't consider myself a wino. I guess I would be a winet. So, I took the lesson to evils. I don't know if there's any Spanish people here or Mexican people, we call them, here in the group.
Well, I took the lesson to evils. I start running around with Mexicans. I want you to know that I like Mexicans. People always get a sense when they think that I'm saying something bad about Mexicans. I'm not. My best friend in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous is Angie. I'm sure some of you have heard Angie, Angie D.. Angie and I, many, many years ago, sat down and we kind of dissected the two nationalities and what we came up with.
The only difference between the Mexicans and the Irish is that we ate potatoes and they ate beans. They drink hard, love hard, and beat the hell out of you on Saturday night whether you need it or not. And so I learned, I got involved with a group of Mexicans over there in Tarzanita and I learned to speak Spanish like a native to their tongue, except it was all swear words. I didn't learn anything else. I didn't have a big resume for a job. I didn't work.
I couldn't seem to hold a job. I couldn't seem to hold anything. And so this guy was drinking in the morning. I was just drinking in the afternoon. And he introduced me to the morning drink. It was a very, very, very exciting time in my life. I was jumping out of cars and running, just chasing. The only time you ever see a Mexican go fast is when the cops are after them. They really go fast then. Norm A. always said that when you drink, don't think.
And I got to thinking one day.
[00:35:00]
That was one of the things that, you know, the sign that says, Think, think, think, in Alcoholics Night. And I would come up with some real winners and I'd bounce it off my sponsor and I'd say, Well, the sign says, Think, think, think. She said, Not for you. That's for other people. Not for you. You do not think. Do not think. I will tell you what to think. And Norm always said, you know, don't ever think when you're drinking.
And I got to thinking one day. You know, I've been running around with this guy long enough and we ought to get married. I think it was leap year. I'm not sure it was leap year or not. But I had moved all the way from the top of the hill. I'm now living over in Gardena. And I took me half a gallon of red mountain wine, drank it, and I got out in the road. I used to do a lot of hitchhiking. The hitchhiker rider was Detorn F. and I found him.
I want you to know you could smell me long before you could see me. And I proposed to him and he looked at me and he laughed and he said, I wouldn't marry you if you handed me in a silver platter. Now, I don't know how you handle rejection, but my next thought was, I'm going to kill you, son of a bitch, because unless Mexican in this world, we'll all be better off. I've never owned a driver's license, like I said, until I was four and a half years sober.
I've got pictures of this car. If you ever want to see it, I've got proof I did do this. And I got in the car and I had the line between my legs and we're driving the car and I thought now is my big chance and I was in the harbor freeway and I turned the wheel of the car and I took 25 feet of guardrail, went down 30 feet in the bank and I thought I killed me a Mexican. Now, that's total insanity. I was able to do so many things when I was behind alcohol.
It's the craziness. I never gave it one thought that I would get hurt. I just wanted to kill him. That's how much rage I had in me. I almost killed him. And what I learned out of that, folks, is if you're going to kill one Mexican, you've got to kill the whole family. For some strange reason or another, they don't take too kindly to you messing with the people, even if they do call you Annie the Irishman.
I also learned that when you're running with Mexican people, you never yell cop. Ever yell cop. I yelled cop one time. We were downtown Long Beach and we used to have telephone booths in California one time and I got out of the bar and I yelled, got in the phone booth and I'm calling the cops on him and he kicked the door and he kicked me and I yelled uncle. Now, you see, I have no illusions. There's not something wrong with me.
I don't know what normal is. I don't run around with normal people, even in Alcoholics Anonymous. Most of the people I run around with are a little off. You know? Now, the only… I don't know what… Now, I think my oldest daughter is probably the closest I've ever seen to normal, but I keep telling my husband, save your money because she's my daughter and she's going to need a good psychiatrist one day.
You know? The only place I ever get to see normal is in my washer and dryer. It's this normal cycle. You know? You know, I like to think that I'm delicate. You know? So, I know there's something definitely wrong. I have to assume there is such thing as normal, that people, when they get into these situations, they run and they leave and they get away from it. I don't. I crawl out of the phone booth, I go to the bar he's at, and I said, let's have a drink and we'll discuss this.
You know? That's not really right. You know? Because this almost half killed me, and I'm bent over, crawling back to the bar to have a drink to discuss our relationship. You know? I also learned in that inventory that I had some other things that went along with it. I never had a relationship, whether it be with a man or a woman. You know? Friendship, girlfriend. I always got hit. For some reason or another.
It talks about my type of personality in step eight. It talks about the type of personality I had. I would antagonize, and I would antagonize until you had nowhere else to go, but they hit me. I'm not saying I deserved every slap I got. I didn't. But I really antagonized it. There was some stuff that went on, was that if you didn't hit me, you didn't love me. I related to getting hit with love. I also had something else going on, was that I wanted somebody to hit me hard enough.
If you just hit me hard enough, it would kill that part of me that wanted to keep screwing up. And you know what I found here in Alcoholics Anonymous? That if you kill that part of me, that's the part you love here in Alcoholics Anonymous. You will kill all of me, because that's the part you love here. And I have not, nobody has found it necessary. Believe me, there's been several in Alcoholics Anonymous that would have loved to have hit me.
I mean, one guy came out of a meeting when I was about a year sober, and he was absolutely livid, crazy. And I had my tennis shoe off, and I'm beating him with my tennis shoe, because he didn't like what I had to say at the meeting. And those old-timers are standing back there, and they're saying, Don't hit her. Don't hit her. That's what you want.
[00:40:03]
Couldn't understand what they were saying, you know. I listened to Cricket Blast, and I talked about them. They called a special steering committee meeting when I was five years sober to have me, what was that one? They impeached me out of Alcoholics Anonymous. Can you imagine impeaching me out of AA? Because they didn't like how I was running the meeting, because I wouldn't do what those old-timers wanted me to do.
And there was this guy that I, him and I were really good buddies, and I still adore him today. We're good friends today, except that we had to part ways. And I was starting to get help, and I was starting to get well, and I thought I was getting well. So they said that it was a time when a lot of homosexuals were starting to come into meetings with California. And I said, Nothing against homosexuals.
That's your preference of life, and that's fine with me, too. I don't have any issues with anything today. And I, um, this guy came up to me, and he said, You know, you are very hostile behind the podium of Alcoholics Anonymous when you're making the announcements. And I said, I am? I said, My God, this group has improved 25 percent since I became secretary. Nothing like a little ego. It's really grown, and the only reason it's grown is because of me.
And, um, he looked at me, and he said, Well, he said, The type of people, he said, that you attract have no quality. And I went off. Crazy. I said, How dare you? How dare you? Quality? You asshole. I said, Do you realize that when you got to the door, you came out of state penitentiary, and I came off the streets of Long Beach, and if they were looking for quality, they would have access to both leagues?
You know, how the hell are you going to get quality? You know? And so that night, I got to the podium to make my announcement, and I said, Those of you with quality sit on this side of the room, and those of you with quality sit on that side of the room. I never tell that story. Very quick, those old-timers call a special study committee meeting. They're going to have, and I was terrified, and that was, too, when I learned about traditions.
I was terrified I was going to get, I thought, Oh, my God. Now I want to stay. Now I'm ready to stay. Now they want to get rid of me. And I was terrified I was going to get, I thought, Oh, my God. Now I want to stay. You know? Now I'm ready to stay. Now they want to get rid of me. Now they want to get rid of me. Nothing ever came of it. The group split, and they took to a coffee pot and moved to another area.
I guess that's how meeting starts. I don't know why I got off on that one. But I had that, but I had that thing, and I ended up in Arizona with this man and I couldn't let go. I had the obsession for alcohol and the obsession for men was unbearable. And, and, and, and, and, and, and, and it just now all shocked me and it was really unbearable. And I always got that wish that someone wanted to kill me, and I was in Prescott, Arizona, and it took me years to remember where it was and I was very drunk and I was very belligerent and I said some stuff to the sky as a monk.
I don't know what I said. But I tried not to use that four-letter word. That was my favorite word. And I went out to the backseat of a car to pass out and four guys came out after me and pulled me out of the backseat of the car and beat the hell out of me. And one guy said we'll go get the truck and ran over me. And I remember how my life had gone and how I didn't want it to go. And this truck comes and these three guys jump off of me.
I don't know where I got the fence to roll off the dirt road. I roll off that dirt road and my hair is full of gravel and my dress is full of dirt. And I don't know where I got the fence to roll off. I don't know where I got the fence to roll off. I don't know where I got the fence to roll off. I don't know where I got the fence to roll off. I knew what was going to happen to me if I let go of all my old ideas.
I didn't know what was going to happen to me if I tried some of your new ideas.
[00:45:00]
I'm so grateful to the women in Alcoholics Anonymous, especially the women. And I really do believe there's only two kinds of alcoholics, there's male and female. The women are the ones that have really helped me the most, that knew how far down that snake pit I'd gone, and knew that they would have to spoon-feed me Alcoholics Anonymous just a little at a time. And I did try on your new ideas. I missed a whole lot here if I hadn't tried on your new ideas.
And I know it's like to die, end up in this little room, this little hotel with $10 a week, and I could never come up with the $10. But I would come up with the money for drinks. And you had to go down the hall to take a shower, and I didn't take too many showers in those days because the only time I was ever relieved of what was going on inside of me was when I'd be influenced with alcohol. I'd start drinking to get past this feeling, and to, you know, to get down to do what I needed to do.
And I'd never go down the hall to take a shower, and I lived in that room for six months, and I died in an instant of time in that little room. I remember in that little room, I remember lying on the bed one night, and I had a hot plate, and I had a sink, and I had cockroaches, and I had a gal and a nanny in that room. And this particular night, I was lying on the bed, and I was sucking off a vodka bottle, and I screamed like a banshee, and I was just screaming.
I wanted somebody to understand me. There had to be somebody in this world that understands me. I couldn't hold on to no relationship. And I remember getting out of that bed in the room, and putting on those little rubber go-aheads, and putting on that old pair of jeans and those old t-shirts, and headed out to Western Avenue. And I'm here to tell you today that I always found somebody, and I always laughed about it for a very brief time.
I always got beat up and thrown out of cars and left to my own self one more time. If you're new here today, I want you to know that I have been understood beyond understanding in the fellowship of alcoholic phenomena, and it took me a long time to understand that, too. And if you're new here today, I want you to know that I've been loved beyond anything that I have dreamed of in the fellowship of alcoholic phenomena.
I ended up, I moved out of there, I thought, if I could just get away from this group of people again, by thinking it's going to be different somewhere else. And if I could just get away from this group of Mexican people that's there to cause me the problem, I'd move, and I… I moved to Long Beach, and I… I had walked across UCLA campus one day, told somebody I had a four-year college degree. All these well-meaning people were getting all these fancy jobs, and I thought, gee, I can't be like my name.
Never mind, get a job in a hospital. So I ended up in Anaheim Street, and Anaheim Street, I was there eight months, and I could not have done any longer than eight months in Anaheim Street. Yes, Anaheim Street is Skid Row in… in Long Beach, and… and while I was down there, the skinny-throat communal guy came along, and he asked me out, and I asked him if he had a job. And he said, no, he didn't work.
I said, that's a taunt. You know, you have to get a job. I'm having a hard time supporting myself. I'm most certainly not going to support you. And so he got himself a job, and he gave me two of the blackest eyes I've ever owned in my whole life, and I knew that we were in love. My thinking is not that great. I mean, my eyes were black. My whole face was black all the way down to here. I mean, the biggest sunglasses would not cover those eyes.
And we had gone together all of six weeks, and we got married, and we moved to Minnesota, and I met his mother and his father, and he were beautiful people, they were very, very good people. I really liked his family. I didn't like them then. His mother didn't drink, she didn't smoke, she didn't gossip. She went to church on Sundays, she didn't screw around, and I had absolutely nothing in common with her.
I thought, my God, I should have checked this guy out a little bit better before I married him. And I really thought that I was going to be, you know, I wanted… Marrying him meant that I could drink him as a custom, in the manner I always wanted to become accustomed to. I think every day he was taking bottles out of my purse and telling me when I could drink and when I couldn't drink, and he wanted me to cook some breakfast, and he wanted me to cook dinner, and I thought, my God, I married you.
Isn't that enough? And five months into this marriage, I decided I'd made a terrible, terrible mistake and that I ought to get back to California and find that Mexican that really loves me. And I got another one of those brainstorms, and what it was that someone told me that if you get pregnant, you automatically grow up. What a lie, you know? What a lie. So I got pregnant, and five months after I'm pregnant, and I don't want to be pregnant anymore, the doctor put me in beer and wine.
I started one glass of wine a day and one beer, and then I found a six-pack a day. I spent about nine months by the toilet bowl, and there was five other girls in that apartment building that had babies, and each one of them came home, and they're all real happy. And I was the last in that building to go and have a baby, and I wanted the same thing that those moms had. And I had my baby, and I put that baby in my arms, and God, I hate this part of my story, but I really don't pretend that I just loved her from the very moment I put her in my arms.
I got an overwhelming feeling of responsibility, and what do we do now? And I took that baby home, and God, I want her to be a good mom.
[00:50:02]
I want her to be a good mom, and I didn't know how, and the big book saves me there. It says we cannot transmit something we don't have, and I couldn't give to that child something that I didn't have, and I very quickly started to do what was done to me, and I, many, many nights, my husband had to take me off of her, and I started to leave home, and I couldn't stay home. I had to get out in those streets, and I had to go, because I couldn't stand somebody, and that was the only thing I wanted to take care of.
I still have a hard time with that today, when I was doing my treatments, and people coming over. It's so difficult to allow you to help me. I'm sorry I'm in a wimp. I'm sorry. I guess it's Valentine's Day, and I got no friggin' Valentine's. I, um, I did want to be a good mom, and I love that girl so much today, and that's where the women came in, because they were like crickets. I couldn't let you touch me.
I couldn't let you hold me. I couldn't let people come up to me. They're all pathetic, and she'd come up to me. I'd back up, and I'd say, please don't touch me. I was so afraid that she'd touch me, and I'd keep you away from me. I kept you away from me with my mouth and my behavior. I love to be hugged today. It's been hard for me to be hugged, because I've got a lot of pain on this side of my chest, and I can't hug as hard as I used to hug, but that's not always going to be that way, and I, um, that girl is 31 years old today, and she's named me a grandmother.
I've got two beautiful little grandkids that want to meet, and I have to tell you that I've got to thank the women in A&A for helping me raise my kids. Thank you for raising my kids. I, um, I abused that little girl up until I got, well, after I got sober. My husband threatened me that if he didn't, if I didn't do something, that he was going to take that baby away from me, and as bad as I was, I didn't want to take that baby away from him.
He was going to go back to Minnesota, and I, um, called Carolyn. I had been on a four-day drunk, and I had got beat up really bad, because, you see, I thought that I'd been married, give me a license to say whatever I wanted to say to you, and, you know, men hit just as hard, whether you're married or not. They don't care, and, uh, that last four-day drunk, Billy B and Leona, both Billy B and Leona died, and they died of horrible death, close to the liver, and I, uh, ended up on that Sunday morning on June 16th, my husband sat at the end of the couch, and his head hanging down, wringing his hands, and my little girl stood at the other end of that couch, her little diapers half off, and her legs all black and blue, her little eyes kind of slunking in our head, and I said, I've got to go see.
I'm going to call that gal that wants to be my friend, because Carolyn has called me and wanted to be my friend, and I didn't want to be her friend, because I didn't want to have to come here, and so he said, you go ahead. You've never completed anything in your life, and you won't stay there either, and I said, I've got to go see, because I can't stand what's going on inside of me, and Carolyn came and got me on that Sunday morning, and I sat in my hands, and I sat by the door, and I was just, I had been so sick the night before.
I always got very, very sick. I would get so sick that the boil would come off my stomach, and then I would pull my nose and start drinking the next day in order to keep it down, and I sat by the door, and the man stood up here like I am tonight, and I know this is so true, and I wanted, all I wanted from you was to please stop my head from racing, take this knot out of the pit of my gut, and make these shapes go away, and I would have cheated myself, and the man said that I suffered from a three-fold disease.
I don't know who this man was to this day, but I know what he said. He said, you suffer, and he said, you suffer from a three-fold disease. It's an allergy to the body, an obsession with the mind, and you're spiritually sick, and he said that I could get sober, and I could stay sober the same way I drank. I'm a daily drinker and a periodic drunk, and I went out of that meeting, and I'd like to tell you that I didn't want a drink.
I wanted to bring more than anything in my life. I wanted to drink. I could taste it, because you hadn't done the thing I wanted you to do.
[00:55:00]
You hadn't stopped my head from racing. You hadn't taken the knot out of the pit of my gut, and you hadn't made the shapes go away, but I hear the man say, you don't take the first drink, you won't get drunk, and I went to another meeting, and I went to a lot of meetings, and my behavior, like I said, was not that great. I was nine months sober and nine months pregnant. I gave birth to a baby boy, and I had that baby boy.
I had two children. I had three children, all total. My youngest one, I never laid a hand on. I probably should have hit her a little harder. I never laid a hand on her, and she's the one that's got the biggest mouth. But I love her very, very much. She's very, very much like me. She's not into alcohol yet, but she's got all the predisposition of it. It's all there. It's just waiting, and I hope she doesn't have the allergy to it.
But I was… I ended up… I had that baby, and when I had that baby, something happened for me. It was really a very profound spiritual awakening for me at that time. And there's women in here, and you know when you go into the living room, and it's very, very cold in the living room, and I was so scared of labor, and I had one labor pain, and I said, if there is a God, show yourself now. And a blanket of warmth lay across me, just a blanket of warmth, and I started to cry.
Tears were coming a little bit down my face, and I said, do you feel him? Do you feel him? He's here. Do you feel him? The nurse was looking at me like I'd really lost my mind. Literally lost my mind. And that stayed with me because that's what I needed. But I was still afraid to really turn my will and my life over to care of him. I was still afraid to surrender to him. And something else happened inside me.
What happened inside was I admitted to my animal shelter as an alcoholic, and a big book of alcoholic's nonsense that it was his first death and recovery. And I'd also, because now I was not fighting alcohol anymore. I had surrendered to the fact that I was an alcoholic. I wasn't obsessed with wanting to drink. And I was two and a half years sober. I was still doing a lot of stuff to my children, and I'm not proud of it.
I didn't come into alcoholic's nonsense and come out of a dark room and come into the sunlight, and everything was okay in my life. It took me a long time. My recovery had been very, very slow, and thank God it's been slow because I needed to be slow so that I'd learn it real well. I had that baby boy, and I wanted to be a good mommy because now I'm sober, and you know, the illusions that I'm like other people have to be smashed.
And I wanted to be, I wanted to be like those other mothers. And I very quickly was abusing that little boy. And I got pregnant again, and I know what caused the thing. But I'm not, I'm not willing to give it up either. That's just the way I am. Don't ever tell me it's a character defect, you know. I had three children. I had my baby girl, and we're still kind of hanging in this marriage. He's not going out on them.
He doesn't drink at this time in my life. But at two and a half years sober, and I've got to tell you this, and I've got to probably shut up. At two and a half years sober, I beat my son. And I don't tell you this because I'm proud of it. I tell you this because I really believe what these old-timers tell me. And you talk a lot about God here when I was new. And you talk about the peace within, and I had no peace.
I still was just crazy. I was crazier now at two and a half years sober than I was when I walked through the door. And I beat that little boy, and the man came to the door. He was ten miles away from home. He came to my door, and he took that baby away from me. And he said, you called somebody. And I called Mary L., and I, I knew that I couldn't drink, and I couldn't take any pills. I couldn't take anything.
I knew that I had to, something had to happen because of this outburst of rage. This little rage. I just went red. I couldn't see. I had, I was just crazy. I went to a meeting, and I went into the meeting, and I asked them to help me. I said, please help me. Help me make the 180-degree turn. I don't want to drink, and I don't want to use drugs, and I don't, I wasn't, I never used drugs, but I knew that you could get some valium, some tranquilizers to help you.
And someone said something, and I threw a chair down the meeting, and I ran out of the meeting, and thank God I didn't drive. And a woman came out after me, I knew it was Edna, and she grabbed ahold of me, and she held me in her arms, and I started to cry. And I couldn't stop crying. You see, I couldn't cry. I couldn't really cry right down deep in here. And then they held me, and I thought, if I cry, there's going to be nothing left.
It's going to be just a big blob of jelly. And then they held me, and she took me to Orange County Psycho. I didn't stay at Orange County Psycho, but that's where they took me. Because when I was new in Alcoholics Anonymous, they took me to Schizophrenics Anonymous, because they didn't know what to do with me. And Edna, the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous taught about the hereditary… Anonymous Talks, and I was reborn that night in Edna's arms, and Edna was nine years sober, and three months after, Edna gave me life, Edna committed suicide, and to this day, I don't know why Edna committed suicide, but she gave me life, and I mention Edna every podium I go to, because Edna will always be a big part of my life, because you just don't know who's going to be there, you don't know who
[01:00:18]
else is going to send to you to help you along the journey on the road, I ended up with a psychologist, and I'm not here for a psychologist, but I had done my fourth and fifth step, and I had given it away, and I had taken it all back, and I pushed it down, because I couldn't forgive myself, and I prayed to God a lot in my own life, and I ended up with this man, and he never charged me any money, I think I gave him a dollar in the last session, and I want you to know there's so many people who are really grateful I was gone, they keep saying you keep going, you better keep going, you better keep going, you better keep going, you know, I mean, they were so down, and it would be because they'd all spent thousands and thousands and thousands, of dollars on psychiatric, and you know, I really resented it, and I, and he told me that I wanted someone to love me, and I knew there wasn't anyone in this world who could love me, I was never told I was loved, I was not brought up, I was dragged up, I was one more lump of seed in that arm, and I don't blame that man, those people, those people never were told themselves, so how could they give me something they didn't have? I, I knew there wasn't anybody, and he said, there's got to be somebody in here, and I said, there isn't anybody, he said, what about those people down there in the end? I said, oh, those are people who only tolerate me, because the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking, you know, and God only knows, I want to, don't want to drink, my sponsor, who's loved me so, and still does, will tell me, like I said earlier, on a daily basis, you're a child of God, and God loves you, Annie, and I love you, and I went home, and I called her up, and this little, I don't know, this is taking, with the, with the three kids in the car, because I didn't know I should take me out to Orange County to the psychiatric unit, and before that, I had my son tested, because I knew he was the problem, that was the one he, he needed, and they said, no, they wanted to see me, and I called Lois up, and I said, Lois, I said, do you love me? She said, Annie, I love you so much, and I came to believe that there was somebody that could love me, I am, I couldn't love you, I didn't know it, I start to touch my children, I start to hold my children, I love my kids so much today, every time I see them in the house, my kids have been absolutely, absolutely wonderful through all of the stuff that I've had to walk through, they have been there for me, and the people in Alcoholics Mounds, and the women have been there for me, I was five years sober, nobody ever asked me to be their sponsor, nobody, those old-timers used to get those newcomers, and move them away, and say, don't talk to Annie, just don't, just let her, she'll be okay, I mean, they, they, they do it in front of me, they used to call me crazy Annie, right to my face, you can go behind my back and say it, they said it to my face, you know, this little gal came into the program, and I, I was watching crickets sit with her legs up underneath, well, I had this little gal who came to the program, her name was Cindy, and Cindy had long blonde hair, beautiful blonde hair, she had this loose eyes, loose, just crystal blue, beautiful, and she, she asked me to be her sponsor, nobody ever asked me to be their sponsor, and I said I would help her as much as I could, and she wrapped her legs around her neck, she used to sit in meetings with her legs wrapped, I can't say the words, so I don't say it, she'd sit in meetings with her legs wrapped around her neck, and one night I went into my, my home group where we all went, and I walked in, and I was over talking to the secretary, and this guy came up to me, and he said, Annie, Cindy's over there by the door, and she was hallucinating, she was six weeks clean and sober, and she'd used a lot of drugs, and a lot of LSD, and he said, are you her sponsor, and I said yes, he said you need to go over there, and I was so scared, you know, so scared I'd do something wrong, and I went over, and I took her legs down, and I put them down where they're supposed to be, and I took her out of the meeting room, into the bathroom, and I sat down on the floor, because there's no, nothing there to sit on, and I took her in my arms, and she looked at me, the bluest eyes I've ever seen in anybody, and she said, Annie, you look, and I felt love for the first time for a little human being, and my tears went down like trichity running through my whole body, and I looked, and I said, my God, Cindy, I do love you, and I had three children, and I love God to ask for my children, and I really believe that it's not what God wants me to give you, it's what God wants me to give to you, and I'd like a lot to you, I ended up sending my kids to Catholic school,
[01:05:08]
and my motive behind that was to get back at all those walking nuns, for all those walking priests that were supposed to come in, I ended up making a 12-step call to a priest, Father Jim W., and I ended up, him and I became very good friends, and he ended up being a very fine member of Alcoholics Anonymous, and I ended up making amends for those nuns, for what I did when I was there, I divorced my husband six years ago, after 11 years of divorce, my husband started drinking, that was not supposed to happen to me, because I'm still a member of Alcoholics Anonymous, don't you know, don't you know that alcoholism, don't you know that I'm supposed to stay married forever, I'm very angry at God, really angry, it's not fair, I've done all the stuff, I've done all the H&I, I've done all the 12-step work, my marriage should work, I've wished about it for years, he just started drinking, and I tell you, I gave some of my finest talks at my kitchen, I used to have the big book on tape, I still have it on tape, I play the big book, I get in sleep, and I put it on tape, and thought he'd get it at night, you know, I'm really a good candidate for Al-Anon, I did go to Al-Anon, I took him, I got involved in charismatic, and I took him, I had them pray over him, and finally about six years ago, it was in November, six years ago, I got very, very suicidal, and I knew I couldn't drink, but I thought blowing my brains out looked pretty good, you know, I mean, here I am, going to all these meetings, and doing all this stuff, and this joker, I'm married to him, he can't get it, well, you know, alcohol is much more powerful than men, and so my daughter, my oldest daughter had to tell me, she said, Mommy, you've got to go, you can't stay here, that's not going to change, and I want a mother, and I see you're going to end up killing yourself, and you've got to go, my other daughter told me the same thing, and I left, it wasn't easy, it was not the easiest thing I've ever done in my life, but it's the best thing I've done in my life, because I've given him the freedom to do what he needs to do, and I have grown up, and I have done a lot of things, I learned to take care of myself, write my own checks, pay my own bills, and be self-supporting through my own contributions, I am very, very, very blessed, very, very, very blessed, God has been very, very kind, when I got diagnosed with cancer, I did not blame God, I don't believe God does these things to us, I believe He puts them in our lives, at least for my life, to see how I'm going to react to this, and see what I'm going to do with it, I'd like to close, I read a lot of spiritual books, but my favorite book is Gabron's, and I always close with this, because it helped me so much, and those of you who have got children, and are trying to raise children in Alcoholics Anonymous, my kids have all turned up real well, and this helped me a great deal with my kids when I was raising them, Gabron says, our children come through us, they are not out of us, my children came through me, but they are not out of me, my sponsor told me many years ago, they are only a loan to me, they are only truly a gift to me, a gift from God, and I can only be there to guide them, and I can't get into their world no more than they can get into my world, and I came through the people I came through, but I'm not out of those people I came through, I'm out of the people of Alcoholics Anonymous, because you are the people, you're the ones that walked the extra mile with me when nobody else would walk with me, you're the ones that held my hand when nobody else would hold my hand, you're the ones that seen a nanny that nobody else ever gets to see, and you bring her out, and she walks tall today with dignity, because she is a sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous, and I'm not ever, ever going to thank you for all you've given me, throughout the years I've been here with you, God bless each and every one of you.