Audio
Transcript
Source: DICOBE-00620 – Conway H – FLORIDA STATE CONV – 1980-08-30.mp3 File: dicobe-00620-conway-h-florida-state-conv-1980-08-30.mp3 Duration: 01:02:10
============================================================
Hi, everybody. My name is Conway H., and I am an alcoholic. I'm also a physician licensed to practice medicine and surgery. I'm the father of five children. But now you'll notice that I say that I'm an alcoholic first. And it's important for me for you to know that this is the most important thing in my life, the fact that I'm an alcoholic. Because at any time should I ever forget that fact, then I would go back to what I was. And I was the loneliest, sickest, sorriest, suffering human being that you can imagine. But today, I'm one of the most nervous human beings you can imagine. Thanks to this program and the love of you people, I don't have to be ashamed of me anymore. I don't have to run, and I don't have to hide, and I don't have to lie, and I don't have to cheat. Because you people took me in. You took me in when no one else would have me. You loved me back to help them to sanity. You restored my soul, and you gave me everything that I have today. And I am so very grateful. I'm so very grateful for you and for this wonderful program, and to be down here with you in Orlando, and to come share with you today. And I do believe in telling, as it says in the big book, what it used to be like, what happened, and what it's like today. But if we were going to talk about gratitude, I think we'd be here all day. I could spend the rest of the week telling you how grateful I am of the many wonderful things that have happened to me in my life in the last few years since I've been in your program with you. I want to thank the members of the committee and those who were involved in asking me to come and be with you. And this is a great thing. You know, I can remember the time when nobody wanted me to be anywhere. And I'm very pleased to be here. In fact, I'm pleased to be anywhere today. And this is the way that I live my life, so many wonderful things that keep coming and happening to me. And just as I look out over this room, and I look into your faces, and I begin to feel the strength that's present here today, and the nerves are calming down, and I become aware of the spirit of the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. The spirit that's present here in this room today, it is a real thing. The spirit of our fellowship is the one thing that we have that I don't think any other organization that I've ever known of could anywhere near compare. This spirit is best expressed in the one four-letter word called love. The love that I see now as I look into your faces. And you know, faces are just like flowers. They speak the language of love, the language of the heart. And I look into your eyes, and the eyes are the windows of the soul. And now I know that I am where I'm supposed to be. And this is the way that I live my life. As far as that goes, right now, in this particular moment in time, at 2.15 on this Saturday afternoon, I know that I am exactly where I am supposed to be. And so are you. And in my life, I now have the assurance that I am fulfilling my destiny.
I was born and raised in Atlanta, and I lived there almost all my life. My father was a doctor, my mother was a teacher, and also a Sunday school teacher. When I came along, she realized I wasn't the smartest thing that ever come this way, so she spent a lot of time with me. She taught me how to study and how to concentrate, and this enabled me to go a long way. She also instilled in me a very deep and a very strong spiritual foundation, which I was to lose. I was to completely turn against the God of my childhood. But now I know I'm back with as close an association as I had been. We had a very happy family and a lot of love and a lot of warmth, and I had a very happy childhood. I never ever really remember wanting for anything, not that there was so much to go around, but I think that my folks saw to it that there was always enough love for everybody. We were a very close family, and I was very happy, up until about the age of 12. And somewhere
[00:05:06]
along about this time was when I first remember experiencing the feeling or knowing that I was different from other people, that I was different from you. Me and my things were different from other people. As a child might feel in a room full of adults, or as if I was surrounded and lived in a glass cage, I was different from other people. I forgot to tell you about taking my first drink, though, and I took the first drink, John, when I was about six years old. When I was about six years old, I had the whooping cough. Now, the whooping cough was a real serious illness back then. A lot of people died from the whooping cough. Well, I had the whooping cough, and it was a real serious thing, and I can remember these coughing spasms that I had. And finally one night, Bobby, it got real bad, and I remember running down the hall, and I stood there, and I grabbed my daddy around his legs, and my little body was wracking with these spasms of cough, and he took me into the bathroom, and he stood me up on the sink, and he poured out about that much alcohol, and immediately the coughing ceased. So you see, my very first experience with alcohol, it solved a need, it gave me relief, and I could sleep, the rest of the family could sleep, too. And I think that's interesting, but I don't think it's got a thing in the world to do with me being an alcoholic. What is significant about it, though, is the fact that I remember it so well. Here's something that happened 45 years ago, 45 and 6 is 51, if anybody's having any trouble. And my daddy took me in, he stood me up and poured out that. You know, something does happen when we are first united with this magic elixir. How many times do you hear people telling their stories, and they go into detail describing their very first drink?
You don't remember your first root beer or your first chocolate milk. I think that is significant because for many of us it's the first time we ever felt whole or felt complete. Finally the magic ingredient that we'd been missing all of our lives had been added. But anyhow, I went on to high school, I did real well, I made real good grades, not because I was so smart, but because my mother had taught me to study. And now also I began to search to try to find a place where I belonged, a place where I was needed, and a place where I was loved. Now I know my family loved me, but for some reason or other this wasn't enough.
And I certainly didn't feel like I was needed by anybody. But I went on through high school and then I entered Emory University College. My mother died during this period of time. I moved out of the home in college, mainly because I missed the presence of my mother. And so now, not only being different, I was alone. But I had known in high school and then in college a beautiful girl, she had very black hair and dark skin, and we had been high school sweethearts more or less, and we decided to get married and we did. And I loved this girl very much. I still love this girl very much. And we had two children. But now I was to lose her through a tragic illness.
First she went insane and then she died. And this was a tremendous loss. It was a tremendous loss then and it's a tremendous loss now. I also lost these two children because there was no way that I could take care of them and go ahead and after this I entered medical school and complete my training. So they were brought up by their grandparents and they were brought up to hate me. They were brought up to hate me and they were told that I was the one that was responsible for their mother's illness. But Bernice, the promises do come true. And I'm referring of course to the last promise where it says, I realize that God had done something for me that I couldn't do for myself. Because this young man and this young lady have now come back into my life and we're reunited in such a wonderful marvelous way that there's no way that I could ever have accomplished this. And we're so close to now together now and and I am so grateful for that. But anyhow I finished college and I went to medical school there at Emory University and I drank a little bit in high school, some more in college. Nothing, no problem drinking. But after my wife died and also after I entered into medical school I began to drink more and more and more. As a result of this my grades began to deteriorate and I fell from the upper 10% of the class down to the lower third. Drinking was
[00:10:05]
now being the most important thing in my life. I'm lucky I ever finished medical school because due to the feelings that I had then, the fact that I had accomplished this much of my goal in life, but I guess mainly because of the pain from from the loss that I felt at this time, I drank more and more and more. I never ever remember drinking though, solving this pain. I never remember drinking, solving the feeling of being different from other people or being alone. But I did drink considerably during my medical school years. When I finished medical school though I was accepted as an intern at Grady Hospital. Now Grady Hospital is a big city hospital there in Atlanta and this is real important. It was what we call the old Grady's. And the old Grady's were buildings built back before 1900 and they were spread out over two or three blocks and this was wartime and there was a tremendous doctor shortage. We only had four interns for that whole Grady Hospital.
Now we really worked. We worked 36 hours on and 12 hours off and I remember going from operating room to operating room you know and seldom ever would we even take time to eat. You know they'd bring you a milkshake and a ham sandwich and you keep right on going or a coke-cola or something like that. They're real big on coke-colas there in Atlanta. But anyhow we worked the whole time so that when our 12 hours off came I was completely exhausted and I'd go somewhere and go to sleep.
So I stopped drinking. I'm telling you this because it's important because I stopped drinking during this period of time. Also by working with these people and helping them for the first time in my life I'm providing a service to someone. Now I wasn't much but I was all they had and they appreciated it you see. For the very first time I'm responding to I am needed by somebody else. Now I don't know why either one or both of these reasons but I stopped drinking during this period of time and I think that this is nothing in the world except a stopgap in my progression to the disease of alcoholism. But anyhow I stopped and for the next four years I didn't drink any at all significantly. I finished my internship and I went into my specialty. I am a specialist. I'm a ladies doctor. And right now I want to thank all you ladies. You've been very good to me. And I want you to know that I appreciate it. But I spent the next four years in the specialty and the training of obstetrics and gynecology and I liked it very much. When I finished my time there though I had met and subsequently married one of the nurses there at the hospital. And this was a wonderful thing because I didn't have to be alone anymore. I had somebody to love me. Somebody to laugh with and somebody to cry with and somebody to share things with. And this was so very important because I had been so alone before and then I was drafted. Well they don't really draft doctors though but they send you a telegram and they say you better. And of course I did. But we got married and I got drafted and then they sent me to Fort Sam Houston, Texas. And that's where they send all doctors to make soldiers out of them. But they don't have any idea of making a soldier out of a doctor either.
So this wasn't anything in the world except for six weeks vacation with pay. And now this pay thing was important because all the five years at Grady Hospital all we got was $10 a month and all the milk we could drink and that was it. But now I'm an officer and I'm a gentleman and I have a salary and I have somebody that loves me and I can remember this now as one of the one of the happiest times of my life. And I remember driving down, we left Atlanta and drove down through Alabama and Mississippi down into Texas and and it was a wonderful trip. When we got to Fort Sam the shooting war had stopped. And this wasn't anything in the world now except party time. You know Fort Sam's known as a country club of the Army anyhow and and we really loved it. It was party around, you never ever had to look for a party, usually right in the middle of one you know. And it was the nickel beer and the bingo games and the martinis and all of these things and I really loved, I loved Army life. It was a very relaxed outfit out there. I remember most of us outranked our instructors and going out to formation in the morning.
Going out to Formation in the morning, you know, if it's raining, why don't you take an umbrella?
[00:15:06]
I can remember going along seeing those columns, half of them reading newspapers, and all of them smoking, you know, and somebody would holler out a command or two, and half of them would go that way, and half of them would go that way. You know, they never did. Some of those folks back together out there. But nobody got upset about it. It was a lot of fun, and I really loved it. I guess, about the best way to sum up my military career, I know most of you have seen the movie or the television series called M.A.S.H.
Well, it's true. Oh, no, don't get me wrong, there are a lot of hard-working, real dedicated Army docs, and they do a great job. We did a good job, too, but we worked hard and we played hard. But I finished my training, and I received orders to go to Orleans, France. I was to be in charge of a base hospital in Orleans, France. Now, my wife couldn't go, because it was still secure over there. Now, a coincidence occurred, and I want to go on record right now that I don't believe in coincidences.
But it seems as if the commanding general's wife at a large Army base was pregnant and expecting a baby. So I never got to France. I got all the way to Fort Dix. I was reassigned to the Pentagon and issued orders to go to Fort Eustis, Virginia, the transportation headquarters of the United States Army. Unknown to me was the fact that I was responding to a military emergency. I was the only one available to go and be sent to take care of the general's wife.
I got down there, my wife met me in Washington, and we drove down through that beautiful Shenandoah Valley, you know. And once again, my life is happy, and the birds are singing, and the flowers are blooming, and I wasn't going to have to be separated, and we were so happy. And I remember going down, we pulled into that Army post, you know, and the MPs stopped the car and came over and got my credentials, and they looked at them and they stepped back in a snappy salute.
And I said, Boy, this is a Class A outfit here. From the moment I drove through those gates, I was the commanding general's wife's doctor. Now, wherever the commanding general went, the commanding general's wife went, the commanding general's wife's doctor went. We took the yacht out on the river, Commanding General, Commanding General's Wife, Commanding General's Wife, Doctor. We took the helicopter to New York for the weekend, Commanding General, Commanding General's Wife, Commanding General's Wife, Doctor.
Wherever the commanding general and his lady went, the little doctor went, too. And they always saw to it that the little doctor had plenty to drink. But this wasn't problem drinking, this was fun drinking. And I enjoyed it, and I loved it, and these were mighty nice folks. I will have to say that she did have a nice baby boy, who I am sure someday will be a commanding general just like his father and his grandfather.
And this will have to go as my contribution to the defense of the United States. Well, I loved Army life, and anybody who had an assignment like mine would have, and I almost stayed, and I probably would have, except for this childhood dream, this ambition, this filial duty or obligation that I wanted to come back and work with my father. I initially started off, I wanted to be a doctor like my father, and then I wanted to come back and work with him.
So I knew I had to come back and work with him. And then I wanted to come back and work with him. So I did, I left the Army and I came back to Atlanta to go and practice with my father. And now the people in the medical profession literally rolled off the carpet to welcome me back. And I was put on more committees and given more jobs and more duties and more things, honors, you know. And by now my ego was out of sight anyhow, so I thought they were doing about like they should.
All except my father, all except my father. And you know he supervised everything I did. He was looking over my shoulder every time I signed my name. I'd even go down there in the hospital in the middle of the night, it wouldn't be 15 minutes before he'd be down there too, checking up on me, seeing what I was doing. And I resented this, I resented this. Here I was, a young hero returning from the wars.
I was ready to come in and take over, you know. But he had to be looking over my shoulder at everything that I did. And now my wife started having children. And I resented this.
[00:20:00]
I resented these babies being born, coming in here and interfering with my romance and with my love affair and changing my lifestyle. And I wasn't ready for this additional responsibility and to settle down. I resented these babies for being born and I resented her for having them. Yes, I know she did it all by herself. So you see though what I'm doing. I've turned against the only two people that really matter to me in this world.
And along with that now I began to build up my wall of resentments and fears and jealousies. And during this period of time I began to drink more and more and more. You know, drinking every night except the nights I was on call. And then going out and seeing the other doctors drinking and saying if it's all right for them it's all right for me. And beginning to drink every night and not waiting until 5 o'clock.
And the weekends are long weekends and trying to stop on Sunday and going to work Monday morning looking like the wrath of God and smelling worse and feeling terrible. And this is where I enter into the horror part of alcoholism or the cross over that invisible but completely irreversible line that once you go across you don't ever come back the other way. Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic. You don't become un-alcoholic.
Or as one of our friends says, once a cucumber becomes a pickle you never go back to being a cucumber again. And now I'm well pickled. And this is the way that I'm living my life and I enter into the horror part with all the running and the hiding and the lying and the cheating and everything that goes along with it. And right now I want to say everything horrible that you have ever heard that an alcoholic's done, I have done.
I'm not proud of this. But my story is no different from many others. Only the names, dates, places and times. But I'm not ashamed of the fact that I'm an alcoholic. I was probably born that way. I don't have to be ashamed of me anymore that I have a primary illness and that I can't drink alcohol. Of course I'm sorry for some of the things that happen, especially the people that I hurt. But I'm not ashamed of me.
Anybody that was doing the things that I was doing and living the kind of life that I was living, something had to happen. And it did. On Monday morning, October the 1st of 1962, I had a massive heart attack. I was taken to the hospital and for a while they didn't know if I would live. And I certainly didn't know if I would ever be able to work again. And I became very depressed and very bitter. And this is where I turned against my God.
Why did you do this thing to me? Here I've spent all this time, all these years working now just to be a place where I'll be of service to myself and to mankind. To be cast down here in the bed helpless. Not even able to bathe myself. The height of indignity is not being able to bathe yourself. Why did you do this to me? I became very depressed. Oh, don't send me cards and flowers. Plug the telephone in the room.
I don't want any visitors. Leave me alone. Can't you see how I suffer? Leave me alone. Wouldn't even let them draw the blinds in the room. Let the sunlight in. Now looking back at this, it wasn't anything in the world except the good Lord reaching down, grabbing me up, giving me a good shake, sitting me back down and saying, Now look, who are you and where did you come from and where are you going?
A wonderful opportunity to get out of the rat race, to get out of the merry-go-round. All excuses made and all expenses paid. I got no benefit out of it. Only more depressed and with some reason because I didn't know if I'd ever be able to work again. So I did get better though and after a short period of time I left the hospital to go down to live with my sister during a period of recovery. Now my sister had moved down to St. Simons Island.
Now St. Simons Island is a little island down off the coast of Georgia and I want to take a minute or two just to tell you about this because it's a very special place and it plays a very important part in my recovery. And I want to encourage any of you who are here that haven't been there, I want to invite you to go to this island of enchantment. When you drive across the bridges there and one of the first things that you're impressed with, you're almost overwhelmed by the natural beauty, by the flora and the fauna,
[00:25:01]
the rich, luxuriant, green growth. You look over to your left and you'll see a little white cross. And then you notice the trees, these tremendous pine trees, the tall, the majestic, the stately pine and the great live oak, the tree that personifies strength more than anything else that I have ever seen. These great live oaks that are 10, 12, 14 feet around in diameter and the limbs of these trees are as big as some small trees, and they're twisted and they're gnarled and they lean down and then they come back up and their branches point to the heavens and the Spanish moss is in the tops of these trees and the wind blows and the moss dances and there's music in the wind.
And there is a certain feeling of peace and serenity here that I have never ever found anywhere else. I know that I am closer to my God here than I am anywhere else. And I'm not the only one that feels this way. So if you ever have a chance, I want you to go down there and enjoy this wonderful feeling, this presence. I stayed down there for a little while and then I left and I came back to go to work and I did regain my strength and I went back to work with my father after a period of time.
But nothing, you see, had happened. Nothing had changed inside of me. But you know anybody who's having trouble with their heart is not supposed to get nervous. And everybody knows that a heart patient is supposed to sleep, a good night's sleep all night, every night. So I had tranquilizers to keep me calm and sleeping pills to make sure I slept and I washed it down with a pint of scotch every night.
Now, I don't think they meant for me to do that all at the same time. And this is where I feel fully qualified to speak as a drug addict. In fact, I'm a total addict. I could get addicted to an empty Jolton capsule if you told me it'd make me feel better. I took everything that had come out at that time. I took everything except Miles Nervine and Lydia Pinkham. I would have taken them too if they'd come in samples.
All I had to do was open my drawer, you know, and all I had to do was see if it was going to be a dangerous habit for me. Don't believe it. I'll try it. I do want to take a moment to say a word or two about these drugs and these mood-altering, mind-changing drugs because I think they're the most dangerous things that face us that have problems of addiction. I am a total addict. There's absolutely no question in my mind.
My drug of choice is scotch whiskey. If I should start taking any other type of medication that would interfere with my program, it's only a matter of time that I get back to the one that I want the most, and that's scotch. And I don't care what you call them. You know, they call them uppers and downers. Well, they got one now called a tricyclic. Makes you go all three ways. I'm not going to fool around with any alavil, ameloril, or transine, or cerax, or librium, or valium because these will only lead me eventually to my grave because I don't think I've got sober enough left in this body.
So I'm not going to fool with them, and I encourage you not to either. And I'm not telling anybody here not to take any medicine that they're on that their doctor has prescribed for them. That's wrong. And let's don't blame the doctors. It's our responsibility. Make sure that your doctor knows that you have problems with addiction and that you cannot take these drugs. It is our responsibility because we are the ones that have to pay the price.
There are certain advantages to these things, oh, you know. You can hide them. You can tuck them around in little places, and you never ever have to worry about what to do with the empties. So I was drinking and taking drugs and working and doing all the things that alcoholics do. Well, one night they called me up to come down to the hospital. They had a real bad case down there, and I got up in the middle of the night.
Now, I wasn't on call, and this wasn't my patient, and this wasn't my case, but they asked me to come down and help them in this bad emergency. Well, I got up in the middle of the night, and I put on my clothes, and I raced down the expressway, ego running wild, you see. I'm a doctor on an emergency, and I pull into the emergency room door, and I leave the motor running and the lights on, and I hop out of that car, and I go in that emergency room, some sort of a coma.
Card, I go in that emergency room some sort of a combination of Walter Mitty and Superman.
[00:30:00]
Have no fear, Conway is here. Well I went in and I took hold of the case and everything went all right and I would have been okay if I had kept my mouth shut. But you know no practicing alcoholic is going to keep his mouth shut. So I had to tell them how lucky they were to have me down there and I did and it linked. Well the next morning I went back down to the hospital and people were around, they were standing around in little groups and they were talking to each other.
And they were talking to each other and they were looking at me. They were looking at me sort of slouch-eyed. Now whenever they are doing that they are talking about you. You know they are talking about you because you can feel it right down here in your stomach. It didn't take me long to find out they were talking about me and I got called down to the administrator's office and told them in no uncertain terms not to ever come back to that hospital under the influence.
Well I had sobered up enough to keep my mouth shut. So I didn't say anything, I went out and I got in my car and I was driving all over to the office and I just got overwhelmed with righteous indignation. These were the most narrow-minded, unappreciative people I had ever seen in my life. I went down there in the middle of the night and I saved that woman's life. And they are talking about those two or three little drinks I had and maybe I did have a sleeping pill or two.
Well I reached up under the seat and I got that hot vodka bottle. There is nothing quite like hot vodka. That sends chills up my spine right now when I think about it. But it does have authority. If you can get one of those hookers to stay down, you are in business. And this is the insanity part of it because I believed it. Narrow-minded, unappreciative didn't appreciate me. And I went on and I went to the office and my father had heard about it and I left and I went back home.
And this was the way that I was living my life. But as it often happens to us alcoholics, I kept falling up the stairs. I kept getting promotions and elevated in my duties and my responsibilities. I got put on the executive committee of the whole hospital. And this was a real important committee, you know, the size of who they are going to hire, who they are going to fire, how much money they are going to spend and all these sort of things.
And at my age to be on the executive committee was quite an honor. So they called me up one morning to come down, come to the executive committee meeting and I did. They never called anybody else up and I don't know why they called me and if you know, I don't think I want you to tell me. But anyhow, they called me up and I got up and I got dressed to go down to that meeting and it was in December and it was very cold in Atlanta and it was right before Christmas.
And I put on a suit, an overcoat, a hat, gloves, a muffler and dark glasses. This was before daylight. And I went down there to that meeting dressed exactly as I had described and I got there and I went in the room and they were all sitting around in chairs, you know, and these were my peers. And I opened that door, I must have gotten there a little bit late, the meeting was all started, and you could have heard a pin drop.
They carried me with their eyes all the way over and sat me down, you know. And then once again, they all started staring at me, didn't say a word, they just turned around and stared. Bob, I knew they were looking at me. And I didn't know what to do. I passed out. Well, this really shook them up, you know, they knew I'd had this trouble with my heart and they said, oh my Lord, he's dead. One big old fellow had me up in his arms and he was pulling my collar loose and putting oxygen over my nose and I was coming in and out of consciousness, you know, saying, please let it be a dream, please let it be a dream.
Finally though, I woke up and I woke up in an oxygen tent and they had something hooked up to everything you can hook up something to, everything. And the doctors would come in and they'd listen to the heart and they'd look at the heart tracings, you know, and then they'd frown.
[00:35:01]
There wasn't anything wrong with the heart. I was a medical mystery. Well, I solved the mystery for them though, I went into the DTs. I heard things and I saw things, I straightened that entire 300-bed hospital out in about two hours, you know, and here we were coming up and down the halls, you know, it was me and the nurses and the nuns and the orderlies and the doctors and I had on that outfit that doesn't quite…
We'd come down this way and we'd go back that way and it was Christmas and there were Christmas trees and nuns and nurses and carols and angels and some of it was real and some of it wasn't. But it was all real to me. I woke up one morning though and I started getting my things together and the nurse said, what are you doing? I said, I'm going to go home and be with my children for Christmas. She said, you can't do that.
I said, now listen, I know my rights. This is a hospital and not a jail and I'm going to go home and be with my children for Christmas and you can't keep me here. She said, well, all right, will you talk to your doctors? And I said, yeah, get them down here. And they did bless their hearts at three o'clock in the morning. And they came down and they tried to reason with me, but there was no reasoning with me.
I had the obsession, the compulsion to leave as we get some time. I had the goings and there wasn't anything going to stop me and they knew that. So they went to the phone and they called my father and they said, you got to come get him. We can't do anything with him. He's dangerous. He's disturbing the hospital. So on Christmas day, my father came to get me to take me to the local drunk hospital. This was a man that loved me as much or more than any father ever loved a son.
This was a man that taught me about putting the heart in the heart of the practice of medicine. This was a man that taught me about compassion and about love and about always maintaining the rights and the dignity of every human being. And when I think how he must have felt that day, taking this, his only son, on Christmas day to the local drunk hospital, it's almost more than I can bear. But bear it I must and share it I will.
And I must also share with you my experiences in this hospital. I don't remember much about it because they did all the wrong things that you can do. They gave me more and more drugs and more and more medicine, and this was where I lost my mind. I don't remember much about what happened at that hospital. I remember entering. I never remember leaving. The things that I do remember, none of them are pleasant.
I remember being strapped down to the table all night long with a band across my chest and my legs. I remember being placed in a straitjacket. I remember the screams. I remember the fears. I remember waking up and looking at my hands and seeing the blood encrusted around my nails from where I tried to claw my way out of the closet. I remember the screams and I remember the fears. One night after the convulsions, which were so bad, the nurse called the doctor in charge and said, we cannot stop the convulsions.
What must we do? The reply was, let him die. He's a hopeless alcoholic. Let him die. Let him die. I remember the screams and I remember the fears. At times at night I would wake up and be drenched in sweat when I relived this, and may I never forget it. May I never forget it. And that is, of course, why I'm doing what I'm doing now, and this is why I can promise each and every one of you that I'll do everything that I can to keep you from going through what I went through.
No one should ever have to go through that. I did leave the hospital, though, and this time I was sent back down to St. Simon's Island. I say sent. There was no way I could have gone. I could have found my way home, even. But I went down there and I stayed with my sister, and it was in the winter and it was very cold, and the island was almost deserted. And I wasn't drinking and I wasn't taking drugs, I was just numb, sort of like a zombie.
But I would get out and I would walk, and I would walk along the sandy roads and I would walk along the beach, and something began to happen inside of me. And I became aware of the tremendous power present in this world, in this universe. Think about it the next time as you walk along the shore, when you listen to the mighty ocean
[00:40:01]
roar, what a tremendous force is present, but a controlled force, a divine order. As the waves go out in sequence, there's no question in your mind that another wave is going to come back in. And as the tide goes out and repeats its pattern over and over again, as the birds in flight and the fishes in the sea, or even the little fiddler crabs, something was beginning to happen inside of me. And as I would sit underneath the great oak tree, I became aware of the feeling of peace, a peace that I perhaps had never ever known before, or the same security that I must have felt when my mother held me in her arms.
And the best way that I can describe it is the absence of fear, the absence of fear. Fear, the one great common denominator of all alcoholics. I have never known an alcoholic yet that wasn't afraid, that didn't experience fear. But as long as I stayed there, I was safe. And oh, how I wished I could have embraced that oak tree and said, give me some of your strength, because I knew that it was there, but I didn't know how to get it.
I left after a period of time, though, and I came back, I came back to Atlanta to go back to work. To go back to work, I didn't know if I'd have a job. You know, it's not much of a secret what's wrong with you when you go into the DTs. And this is where my friends in the medical profession, though, almost killed me with kindness, because they welcomed me back, they invited me to come to the hospital, and they took over, and they said, I didn't have to say anything, they said, now, we know you've had this trouble with your heart, we know you've been taking all this medication, and we want, and we've been working all these long and hard hours, we want you to come back and come to work with us, but keep it under control.
Keep it under control. My friends, now I'm a hopeless addict to the drug alcohol, I couldn't go over two hours at a time without taking a drink. I never found a drug that would do for me what alcohol would do. The only reason I ever took other drugs were two, to keep my hands from shaking and the fact that you couldn't smell them. I was drinking every two hours, or I would begin to go into withdrawal.
This was the horror part of alcoholism, with all the running and the hiding and the lying, the living in fear, the feeling of doom and impending disaster. The next step that you take, you're going to fall off the cliff. The telephone rings and panic sets in. I mean, who is it? Who is it that you want? They've caught up with you now. Keep it under control. Living in fear, constant fear, that knowing awareness, being afraid and not knowing what you're afraid of, but that something horrible is going to happen, keep it under control.
I wasn't drinking because I wanted to, I was drinking because I had to. There was no control. I went back down to the hospital, they stopped me, they sent me home. The next day in the mail I received a registered letter I was fired. I was fired, humiliated, disgraced. Don't ever come back to this hospital. Once again, I went down to St. Simon's Island. I went down there this time, and this was where I was first introduced to AA.
My sister said, well, is it all right, we'll call him up, and I said, yes, and she did. This man who now lives in Jacksonville, Florida, I believe, came up to the island that day, a tall, bald-headed man, well, he lived at the island then, came over to see me. I guess he told me about himself, I don't remember too much about it, but he invited me to a meeting that night, and I went to a meeting that night.
I went to the meeting the only way I could go, just as high as the Georgia Pine. And thank goodness nobody sent me home. Thank goodness Alcoholics Anonymous is not just for sober alcoholics, because if you'd sent me home I'd not be here, I'd be dead today. I don't remember too much of what happened, though several people picked up these little white poker chips. After one fellow talked, a lot of people took one, I took one too.
I would have taken one of each color if I thought it would have helped, you know. I went home, woke my sister up, showed her that poker chip, knowing full good and well as soon as I left the room. She called back to Atlanta, our problems are solved, he's joined A.A. I didn't join A.A., I used A.A. I went to A.A. for all the wrong reasons you can go, purely and simply to get them off my back. My back. Because you see, they were talking about what they were going to do with me, and they were talking about for keeps, and I knew it. So I did go on and go to these meetings, but
[00:45:02]
I didn't drink, and I didn't take drugs, but I would sit on the bridge, and I would watch the boats as they went out, and the wind as it blew across the beautiful savannas, and I became aware once again that something was happening in me, and that I no longer wanted to live the kind of life that I was living. But I didn't know how to not drink. I no longer wanted to live the life that I was living.
When I came back to Atlanta, and I came back, eventually I went to work, I had to keep this thing up going to these meetings, and I went to the meetings there in Atlanta, and I met some people there. I went to the Decatur group, and the Skyland group, and different groups, and I didn't stop drinking. I didn't stop taking drugs, and so of course I didn't get any better. I didn't bother anybody though. My eyes crossed a little bit, and sometimes I staggered, but I don't think I bothered anybody very much. Several people tried to help me, and tried to talk with me, and I wouldn't let you know me. I wouldn't let you see inside, and see how miserable, and how rotten I was. No, I don't need you, you with all your your phony signs, and your slogans, and your handshakes. I don't need you to leave me alone. One night it got real bad, and this fellow came out to the house, and he's now my sponsor, and he's a real big guy. He's six and a half feet tall, weighs about 250 pounds, and he's also a finger pointer, and he came in the house that night, and that finger was coming down, and he was telling me all about it, and all the things that I was doing wrong, and I resented this, you see.
So I rose up all five feet, and I said, now listen here, you don't have any right to come in my home and talk to me this way. Here I am, a man with two college degrees, bank account in two different banks, two cars in the carport, an upstanding citizen. Remember that? He said, what did you say? I thought that sounded pretty good, so I went back over that, but I didn't impress him at all. He said, you remember that when the sheriff comes out here to get you?
Well, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Because I turned to him, and I said, you don't have any right to come in my home and talk to me in this way. I did not ask for your help. We can never ever really help anyone unless they want our help. But I didn't say don't try. But he hung his head, and he walked towards the door, and immediately I knew I had the advantage in this situation, so I was just like a little feisty dog.
I'd nip him every time he'd stop, you know, and he'd slow down. I'd grab him again, and finally I backed him up there in a corner in the kitchen. It must have been some sort of a combination of David and Goliath, you know, and here I went through all these things again, and I said, now why do you do this? Do you do this because you hate me? Now listen, because this is where this man brought me the 11th commandment. I refer to the 13th chapter of the book of John, the 34th verse, where it is written, a new commandment that I give unto you, that you love one another, or love thy brother. Because he said, no Conway, it's not because I hate you, it's because I love you. Because I love you. I wish that I could say that I stopped drinking at that time. I didn't.
It was two days later. Two days later I was there in the living room of the house. My family had all gone. They had to leave. They had to leave for their own safety and their own sanity, and there the vision cleared. And for a brief instant, all of my cell, brain cells capable of sane thought, enabled me to go through a complete self-analysis. And I became entirely willing and ready to turn my will and my life over to the care of God. A complete surrender.
A complete surrender. My friends, I think probably at this particular moment is the only time in my life I have ever been 100% honest. I fell on my knees and I said, God help me now. Oh, I prayed many a time before, God get me out of this. One more time, God please, if you'll do this for me, I'll never do that again. God, I'll live the life of prayer. Please God, help me. Bargains, pleadings, promises. No. A simple earnest cry for help.
Immediately I thought about this doctor I'd heard about down in South Georgia. I called him up. I told him who I was and he said, come on down.
[00:50:00]
And then I went down to live with Dr. John in his house in Statesboro, Georgia. There, in addition to him though, were people just like you. You didn't ask me who I was or where I'd come from or what I'd done. You knew that I was lonely. You knew that I was afraid. You knew that I was sick. You put your arms around me. You took me into your hearts. You took me into your homes. You held me up. You gave me a program to live by. You gave of yourselves and asked nothing in return because I had nothing to give. And oh, my friends, I needed that so much then. And I was ready for you to love me. But I want to tell you right now, I need it just as much today as I did that day.
Wasn't all a bed of roses down there though. This doctor did believe in withdrawing and I withdrew with just withdrewing. Second day I was there, he came into my room. He said, we're going to a meeting tonight. And I said, going to a meeting? Dr. John, I can't even put on my pants. We went to a meeting that night. There I picked up the white chip that enabled me to go on to the blue chip that I have today.
There were many other things that happened, too many to go into. One I will share with you is that while we were there, this, while I was there, this man came up from Savannah on Thanksgiving and he and I were driving down to an eating meeting in Meadow, Georgia. There's nothing quite like a South Georgia eating meeting. We were going to an eating meeting down in Meadow. And even though I felt better and I had hope and I believed that I could get well, I became aware of a tremendous emptiness inside of me. Then I finally realized that I was completely spiritually empty. I could not find God and I didn't know how to find my God.
I finally turned to this man after a long period of silence and I said, Cornel, I don't know if I'll ever be able to find my God again. I don't know how to find God. He turned to me and he put his hand on my shoulder and he said, Conway, God knows where you are. And these were the only words that we spoke on that entire trip. Well, the next day I was there at Dr. John's house and everybody had gone.
It was in the morning and I was alone. I think I've been alone all of my life, but that's all right. But I was standing there and I was looking out a pair of French doors and I became aware of the sunlight as it came over a little grove of pine trees and it filtered through the panes of the window. And as it did, the feeling, the sensation of warmth passed through me from head to toe. And accompanying this, and I knew then and I know now, and no one will ever be able to change me, was the knowledge that I was within the presence of God. And as long as I remained so, I would never, ever have to take a drink or a drug again. I was free.
As long as I remained so, I would never, ever have to take a drink or a drug again. My friends, from that time until this moment right now, I have never, ever wanted a drink or a drug of any kind. The spirit of the program of the Alcoholics Anonymous is the presence of God. I stayed down there only a little while longer. I left, I came back to Atlanta. I came back to go to work. I did get to go back to work with my father and I joined AA. I joined AA this time.
I did all the things you told me to do and I went to the meetings and I got active and then I got back into practice with my father. You know, I even got to be a member of that same executive committee I passed out in. Thank you for that. I won't leave it at that. I'll have to go ahead and tell you just for completeness sake, I later went on and got chairman of the board of trustees of that hospital. I usually don't tell that, but thank you very much. But anyhow, this is what my life, I'm living my life and I'm happy and my home's happy and my children are happy and I'm busy and then after a while I start seeing alcoholics in my practice and that's how I got into the medical treatment of alcoholism and my father got proud of this son of his,
[00:55:03]
not only recognized in the profession for which he was trained, but also in the field of addiction. He never could say AA, though it was always AA. I'm gone from home most of the time. I'm still gone from home most of the time. I'm busy and this is the way that I live my life and I love it. I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world. I remember coming home late one Sunday afternoon and my children were all out in the yard and they were playing catch and they were throwing the ball around and I went in and I changed clothes and I was going to a meeting. I went on the back steps to speak to them, you know, and they stopped and they looked up at me and they saw I changed clothes and they said, hi dad, where are you going? And I said, well, I'm going to a meeting. I saw them look at each other and then look back around at me and I knew what they were thinking. Why don't you come out and play ball with us, dad? Why don't you come on out and be with us? Go in the house and put on your jeans and come on out and be with us. We haven't seen you in, dad. Come play with us for a while. They didn't say that.
They said, have a good time, dad. I love you, dad. I'll see you in the morning. Well, I got in my car and I went on driving over to the meeting and I had to stop because I realized what these children had told me. These were the children that I had abused. These are the children that I had mistreated. These are the children that cried all night. These are the children that were embarrassed to have their friends come to the house. What's the matter with our daddy? Is daddy sick again, mother? What's wrong with daddy? These were the children that had to help their mother pick me up and put me in bed. Please don't let daddy come to school, mother. Have a good time, daddy. I love you, daddy. I'll see you in the morning, daddy.
Why? Because he's going to an AA meeting. They've got a daddy now. They've got a daddy. They not only love me, they always love me, but they're proud of me. They know where I am and they know what I'm doing and they send you their love and their thanks. And I especially want to thank you for the fact that my father lived long enough to see me back in the medical profession and he could be proud of his son.
As long as I live, I will never forget looking out the window of the house, the school bus parks down at the end of the street, and seeing my little girl get off the school bus. And she was about seven or eight, and she's a beautiful little girl. She's everything in the world to me. She won't ever be Miss America, but she is to me. But when I saw her get off the school bus, you know how you can tell when something is wrong.
And she had a little blonde ponytail and her blue eyes and a little blue dress, and I looked and her fists were tightly clenched. And she ran up the hill, tears streaming down her cheeks, making big blue circles on her dress. And she came in the house and I was there, and she came and she put her little arms around me and her body was racking in sobs. Then she said, Daddy, on the school bus they called you a drunk.
I live alone now, and she takes care of her, Daddy. And before I left, she came and put her arms around my neck. She said, Make a good talk, Daddy. Tell them that I love them. Thank them for giving me back my father. Message delivered. Thank you. But for the grace of God, but for the grace of God. What does that mean to you? I'll tell you what it means to me. A gift I did not deserve, because there's no way in this world I could have brought all this about. Oh, my friends, I consider myself well-blessed and filled with God's grace. What is my life like now? All the wonderful things that you can imagine.
All the love that I have and the joys that I share. All the love that I have and the joys that I share, material possessions far beyond my needs, because of you wonderful people and the program of Alcoholics Anonymous.
[01:00:03]
This gives me the right and the privilege to say thank God for this thing, this difference in me that I first realized when I was about twelve years old, that led me to the disease of alcoholism, to drug addiction, to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous and you wonderful people. For without that I wouldn't have and I wouldn't be what I am today. I'm a happy alcoholic. I'm a successful alcoholic. I'm a very grateful alcoholic.
And to this God of mine I say, how great thou art and God bless you all. I'm sorry to break the spell, but I have to announce that the convention site selection meeting will be in this room at four o'clock. Shall we close the meeting with the saying of the Lord's Prayer, please? Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen.