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Source: Tina A – Sunlight of the Spirit (2019) – Speaker Talk – Date Unknown.mp3 File: tina-a-sunlight-of-the-spirit-2019-speaker-talk-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 01:04:27
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Hi. My name is Tina A. A. I'm an alcoholic. A. I'm super grateful to be here A. be sober this evening A. welcome to those of you who are new to Alcoholics Anonymous. This has been the greatest ride of my life you guys. I love Alcoholics Anonymous A. if you're new or relatively new, into the mic, to the oh, if you're new or relatively new A. you don't hear anything else that I say this evening, I hope you hear that loud A. clear. I absolutely love Alcoholics Anonymous A. as Holly said, like I don't, she was talking about like not what God does for her or to her A. not for her A. that's very similar to what I believe about Alcoholics Anonymous. I love what Alcoholics Anonymous does to me, not for me. A. as a result of that, it's been my honor A. privilege to serve you A. do absolutely anything that you have asked me to do since the 10th day of October in 1984. A. I just celebrated my 35th birthday in Alcoholics Anonymous. In my home group, which is the Pacific group in Los Angeles, in Brentwood, our group custom is that our sponsor give us our first cake at our Wednesday night home group. A. so last Wednesday, I shouldn't tell you who my sponsor is because if I piss you off, people have a tendency to call A. rap me out. But Clancy gave me my first cake last Wednesday at my home group A. it was like just the most surreal experience. I was just telling Jennifer like somebody stood up for 25 years A. I go, I remember that like it was my last birthday. It was 10 years ago A. it seems like I just blinked my eyes A. the last 10 years have gone. A. I love, love, love Alcoholics Anonymous A. I'm so grateful to Dolly for asking me to come A. be here A. to all the committee members A. to Allison for hosting me. I'm not easy to host because I'm like blink A. I'm gone A. you go, wait, I lost the speaker A. I like just go A. I stay busy. But thank you to the committee. You guys have done such a great job. I don't know who all here has been on the committee but I know it's a completely thankless job A. I'm sure lots of people have told you everything that you've done wrong A. how you could do things better but they've never stepped up to help you. They just want to report on your shortcomings A. your failings because that's how we roll. Just for next year so you know. But you guys have done a great job A. I'm super grateful to be invited here. I love this thing A. what I love the most is that next week I'm going to go back to my home group A. my home group is not going to care that I've been in Painesville, Ohio at the Sunlight of the Spirit conference. They're going to care that at the break I'm playing whack-a-mole with the money A. I'm separating the fives from the ones. That's all they care about. A. do I show up early A. take care of my commitment A. are my sponsees at my home group A. will they be at the yard at Clancy's house on Saturday? That's what the people that are closest to me in my life care about. That I do the things that keep Alcoholics Anonymous running smoothly in my home group. So I was invited to share with you guys in a general way, thank goodness, what I used to be like A. what happened A. what I'm trying to be like today. A. a lot of people get stuck in the what it used to be like A. I think we all know what it used to be like but my literature tells me that I'm to share with you what I used to be like A. I can tell you that I needed a drink a long time before I ever picked one up.
I was restless irritable A. discontented from the time that I can remember. I was raised in this little upper-middle-class beach community in Southern California called Manhattan Beach A. I went to school with all these little girls that were five foot tall A. they all had long flowing blonde hair, sparkly blue eyes, bitchin' little surfer chick tans A. they all looked like prepubescent Pamela Andersons. Like they were perfect. A. I see a few of you guys in the room this evening A. you can stay because I've worked through my resentment. But I was five foot eight when I was in the seventh grade A. I had long stringy reddish hair, buck teeth A. freckles A. I would look at these little girls A. just think like oh my god if I could just look like you A. then I would look in the mirror A. I just felt like Pippi Longstocking on crack. Like just uncomfortable in my own skin, restless irritable A. discontented.
I knew there was something wrong with me A. I had no idea what it was. Later I
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found out that I was consumed with something that y'all called self-centered fear A. I didn't know that. I didn't think I was afraid of anything when I was a little girl. Like not snakes A. snails A. puppy dog tails. I wasn't afraid of spiders A. like nothing bothered me. I thought I was a tough chick but I was consumed with self-centered fear which our literature defines as fear that I'm gonna fail to gain something that I demand or that I'm gonna lose something that I possess. I demanded your attention A. your respect A. I was afraid that I was different from you A. I was just a just an odd weird little kid. I used to go to school in the morning A. I knew I didn't fit in with anybody. I didn't know how to play with anybody. I couldn't have more than one friend at a time A. if my friend got a new friend I had to beat up the new one because I felt like I was being replaced.
Everything was so focused on me like I was all I could see. I used to sit around the dinner table with my brothers A. sisters A. know that my mom loved them way more than she loved me. I'm an only child so there's that. There's something wrong with my thinking. I'm not good enough, smart enough, pretty enough. I used to go out with my friends A. we would go down to the beach A. I would rub baby oil A. iodine all over my pasty white skin A. I would get these third-degree burns with blisters that were just like so big they covered my entire back. My mom would lay vinegar on those blisters A. I'd have to go to the doctor A. I was super sick A. two weeks later I'm like well I burnt that time it's not gonna go like that this time A. I would go do it again. Not our literature but we A. Alcoholics Anonymous parrot this idea that insanity is doing the same thing over A. over again expecting different results A. I would present to you the the possibility as it was in my life that insanity seems to be for me doing the same thing over A. over again knowing exactly what's going to happen but I lie to myself A. tell myself I'm certain it's going to be different this time. Bill Wilson does A. as Bill sees it this writing on dishonesty A. he says that the deception of others is nearly always rooted in the deception of ourselves A. I have to lie to myself A. buy that lie hook line A. sinker before I can possibly hope to pass it off to you A. when I was in my active alcoholism A. drinking I did that time A. time again but recently looking back over a little bit of inventory work what I realized is like I had that self delusion long before I picked up a drink of alcohol A. it started when I was a tiny little girl A. I was just this odd kid A. I remember going to school in the seventh grade my best friend her name was Carrie A. she was my best friend because she was Italian A. her teeth were bigger than mine were so I was seeking lower companions my whole life A. Carrie decided that we were going to cut school one day A. we were going to go to her house A. drink scotch A. I didn't have anybody in my life that I could look at the effects that they got from a drink of alcohol A. realized that that might be a solution for me in my life but I went to Carrie's house because she said that's what we were going to do A. I walked into her living room that morning A. we cracked the paper seal off of a fifth of scotch A. A. I remember putting that bottle up to my lips my drinking career could have been written that day we drank straight out of the bottle with no glass A. no ice A. no mixer A. that scotch burnt all the way down A. it burnt when it all the way back up A. it burnt when it came flying out my nose it was just horrible nasty vile liquid A. I hated the taste of the scotch A. I remember watching Carrie take a couple drinks A. her face got pink A. she started giggling A. she wasn't worried about getting in trouble for cutting school so I took that scotch bottle from her A. I held my nose A. I started chugging the scotch A. A. I remember the first drink of scotch like it was yesterday that went down into my stomach A. actually stayed there like something absolutely incredible happened for me I believe in that moment looking back at it today it was almost like my hair straightened A. my teeth shrunk A. my boobs grew like everything that I thought was broken about me just seemed to melt into the background A. for the first time in my life I was not consumed with what you thought of me A. I felt freedom I felt like I was able to breathe A. uh A. I had no idea that I had been holding my breath for 13 years of my life but apparently that had been the case A. A. I loved that scotch A. A. we drank as much as we could that day the school called about noon because I was cut in school A. they called my mom because I wasn't there A. my mom came right to Carrie's house so I don't know how she knew where I was but she came banging on Carrie's front door A. we jumped out Carrie's bedroom window A. climbed over the backyard
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fence A. I was off on Pippi's first grand adventure A. I had so much fun that afternoon we climbed the water tower in Manhattan Beach we were running through your backyards A. hiding in your dog houses A. I was running from the cops A. they weren't even chasing me like it was so much fun A. I don't know if you guys can relate with this but I felt so incredibly different on the inside that I used to dress the outsides up because if it's all jumbled in here A. out here looks kind of alright it just doesn't seem to reconcile for me so I would cut off all my hair A. dye it obnoxious colors before it was cool A. A. I would put safety pins in my ears A. rip up all the clothes my mom worked to buy me A. A. I would run around middle school with this Iggy Pop album cover saying ridiculous crap like anarchy in the UK A. God save the Queen A. A. like it was the Pippi goes punk phase right A. A. then I would go home A. I would listen to John Denver A. Helen Reddy A. I would I'd just cry like I am woman hear me roar like it was bad but I was at Carrie's that particular day A. A. I had a I had my hair ratted up in this big aquanet pitchfork A. I had you know how you don't do the back A. it just kind of hollows out back there so you get extra height in the front A. I had this black eyeliner on A. I was wearing Dickies A. little Crips lips A. I was running all over Redondo Beach scribbling La Flaca R13 all over the walls A. pencil cuz I was a was a little gangsta A. Pippi goes chola I don't know if you have those in Painesville Ohio but we got him in LA A. I was drunk as a skunk A. we had so much fun that afternoon A. A. about four o'clock I knew I couldn't go home cuz I was in trouble so I stole this bicycle from the continuation school that had no seat on it A. I stole a butcher knife from Carrie's kitchen for protection A. I wrapped a chain around my neck A. I put Carrie's nine-year-old brother on the handlebars of a stolen bicycle A. we ran away from home because it just seemed like the solution A. I didn't want to go home I was in trouble A. I'm not one of those get in trouble by yourself kind of girls I need somebody to come along with me so you soak up some of it A. A. I peddled Sean A. I all the way up to East LA where left lock I didn't fit into well either A. A. I called the cops for the first A. only time in my life on myself A. they came A. picked me up A. A. my mom was mortified A. she was crying A. snotting all over the window her friend had to drive her up to the police department it was the first time I got drunk A. A. I destroyed that little woman A. she was crying on her way home Carol's smacking me in the backseat A. my mom's crying saying Tina how could you A. I don't know about you guys I hate that question because I don't have an answer for it A. for a moment I felt horrible A. a couple minutes later I started thinking I am right here woman like you would you just calm down A. uh A. for the next eight years I I sang that alcoholic theme song that sounds like my drinking really doesn't affect anybody but me like I hurt myself way more than I harm anybody else when I'm under the influence of alcohol but I destroyed that little woman A. I did that every single day until I came into Alcoholics Anonymous A. I was running away from home on a pretty continuous basis because she wanted me to do crazy things like come home at night A. I had other plans A. so I would run away from home A. I would be gone for weeks A. weeks at a time A. she would hire these little private investigators trying to find out if her little 15 year old only daughter was dead or alive A. I was off doing my thing A. uh A. when I'd get tired I'd call her up A. she would let me come back into her home A. I would stay there A. take a little break A. then I'd take off A. do it again I took the California high school proficiency exam halfway through my sophomore year because I had three credits count them from a driver's ed class A. I didn't go to school A. my counselor called my mom in there A. suggested that I take this test A. I graduated from high school when I was 16 years old with that proficiency certificate it's similar to the GED A. uh A. I went to El Camino College A. I did the same thing there that I did in high school I was drunk A. loaded before first period I left campus before I got in trouble I had no credits A. I was dropping all of my classes A. when I was 17 years old I was working at Burger King because that's what you do when you have a California high school proficiency Certificate A. a 10th grade education A. uh…
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I turned around one day I was hanging out the drive-thru window A. I was drinking A. smoking pot with my friends because they would come through A. give me free stuff A. then I would give them free stuff because I fancied myself a little bit of an entrepreneur A. uh… I was all drunk hanging out the window A. I turned around A. there was a United States Marine standing at the cash register in his dress blue uniform A. I don't know about the rest of you ladies in here but I love a man in uniform A. there is something about a Marine Corps dress blue uniform that is unparalleled you know what I'm saying A. I gave this man my phone number because I lived according to the principle if you want what we have A. are willing to go to any lengths to get it a long time before you guys taught it to me A. A. this guy started calling me at ten o'clock every morning A. I had just crawled in the house or he was waking me up A. A. I thought like what do you want A. I went down to his office A. it turned out he was a United States Marine Corps recruiter A. I found out super quickly that Sergeant Dale Starkey was not going to allow me into his United States Marine Corps I told him this really sad tale of woe about why I was seventeen years old with a Proficiency Certificate A. he quickly took me next door to the United States Navy office A. by a strange series of circumstances A. misunderstandings I ended up in Navy boot camp on the twenty first day of December in nineteen eighty one A. I was drunk from the plane ride cross-country I was stealing all these little bottles off the flight attendance cart I got all the girls reporting to boot camp with me drunk too A. uh…
A. I was in charge I had all of our service records so we could all report together A. I was stealing all of us liquor A. we were hammered A. they poured us off that plane A. these little Navy motivators came running off this bus screaming A. yelling A. grabbing our stuff A. I was certain like a huge mistake had been made A. A. in the morning as soon as I could talk with whomever was in charge I would be able to smooth that over A. they would let me go home A. uh… Navy boot camp doesn't work like that I was five weeks enlisted I was seventeen years old I was the youngest kid in my company A. I was in trouble all the time uh… which meant you were in trouble all the time they would bellow my last name A. then you guys would do push-ups so I had a lot of friends A. uh…
A. I was five weeks enlisted on my work week A. somebody brought in a six pack of beer for me I'm like that Eskimo on the Greenland ice cap no possibility of coming up with liquor I come up with liquor A. I drank that six pack of beer A. I got caught A. I met my first commanding officer who was the CO of the Naval Technical Training Center in Orlando Florida I had my first captain's mask which is like a court if you're a civilian A. I almost got kicked out my CO took pity on me let me do this thing called a division sidewalk A. let me graduate with my company A. they sent me to A school in Pensacola Florida I was going to school to be a cryptologic technician which means that I was enlisted to be a naval intelligence which uh… should probably frighten you guys a little bit but whatever I had my second captain's mask at five months enlisted for drinking on a duty weekend A. leaving base when I wasn't supposed to I'm that girl that uh…
that drinks when I know I shouldn't drink when I know I've got absolutely everything on the line somebody presents me with an opportunity to pick up a drink of alcohol A. I take it A. what my literature tells me is that that I suffer from this thing called a mental obsession where all I do is think about the relief that I get from a drink of alcohol A. once I take a drink of alcohol it kicks off this thing called the phenomenon of craving which means that uh…
once I drink I don't stop like I drink until something physically separates me from liquor I pass out I end up in jail I get in a car accident like whatever I'm physically separated from alcohol A. I quit so I got in an accident on the three mile bridge when I was off base when I wasn't supposed to be I met my second commanding officer this time I lost a stripe A. half my pay for a little while A. I spent a couple weeks in the restricted barracks A. I was sent back into the class after mine A. I graduated A. during this time all my security clearances came in A. I had orders to go work at the United States Pentagon A. I ended up on ADAC Alaska instead because I made somebody really mad in 1982 it was the middle of the cold war era A. we were spying on Russia A. I was secretary to the commanding officer of the naval security group on this little Aleutian island off the Kamchatka Strait in Russia A. we were spying on Russia A. every piece of classified intelligence that we got
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from our communication station came across my desk A. I would type it up then I'd go have a couple Long Island iced teas on my lunch break A. I would come back A. start disseminating this classified information to the wrong people at the wrong commands A. the Navy frowns on that a little bit I guess because we're at a woman's thing might as well go here left! left! too late I was on this little island A. I was physically A. sexually assaulted by a civilian contractor when I was out drinking one night A. A. I went to sick call A. they sent me to the naval hospital A. I tried to take my life like there's times a super big blur you know what I mean like there's just a little bits A. pieces that I remember Jennifer was talking about locking stuff up in those padlocked metal boxes inside of your gut A. A. I remember turning that in A. I remember this naval investigative service that kicked off A. the people in my command looking at me with that look on their face that they used to look at you like in the good old boys navy in the nineteen eighties when something like that happened like what were you doing there A. you were drunk A. how you were you were wearing what?
A. they swept that assault under the rug A. they sent me to the psychiatric unit in Anchorage after that uh… suicide attempt A. they sent me to Alcoholics Anonymous for the second time A. A. they put me on an abuse A. A. I had this commitment to not drink A. try A. pull my career out of the fire you guys I loved being in the service A. I loved serving my country it's the first thing that I had ever completed in my whole life A. I had this sense of pride that was unparalleled A. uh…
A. they put me on an abuse A. a best friend of mine decided he was going to drink A. he was on an abuse too A. I'm like well let's just do that little experiment bill calls it the grand experiment A. I drank half a Heineken A. I puked for six hours A. A. I thought I was going to die A. then I was afraid I wasn't like it was horrible A. a couple weeks later I started thinking like I've been taking this an abuse for weeks A. I'm certain my body's acclimated to it by now A. if I had like a Coors Light which is not even like beer I would be able to pull it off A. I went over to the EM club A. as I was walking over there I started thinking like I didn't even catch a buzz before I started throwing up from that Heineken so I should probably have a little bit of Jack Daniels whiskey just in case A. I walked into that EM club A. I ordered a double shot of Jack Daniels A. a Coors Light A. the bartender's name was Bill he was one of these six little old guys that used to sit in those A&A meetings on the island A. he looked at me with that look a few of you have on your face right now A. he just shook his head A. he gave me those drinks A. I drank that whiskey A. I had a seizure A. woke up in the emergency room of the Naval Hospital A. they sent me to a rehabilitation program in Philadelphia where I drank on an abuse for the third time I hate it I don't know if you all say this back here but if you do you should probably cut it out in California a lot of times what I hear from podiums of Alcoholics Anonymous is just don't drink no matter what A. I don't know about you guys but I can't not just drink no matter what if I could do that I wouldn't be in Painesville, Ohio on a Saturday night well I might be because I kind of like it here but I I would just not drink no matter what A. I wouldn't come to Alcoholics Anonymous A. I would have all my time A. all my life to do whatever it is that I want to do but what my literature tells me that if I'm to not drink I have to have a sufficient substitute A. when I was new in Alcoholics Anonymous I thank God that I did not hear people tell me that because that would not have been an answer that I would have believed would have been sufficient for me A. I would have left you but I went through that rehabilitation program I drank on an abuse for the third time I was kicked out of the rehab A. sent over to the Naval Station A. I was discharged from the military A. I can tell you that I was leaving the hospital A. I told my little counselor that I was going to go to the neighborhood Alano club in downtown Philadelphia I was going to ask this beastly woman named Alice to be my sponsor because I'd been going to meetings A. listening A. I was going to do absolutely whatever it took to not drink A. save my career A. I swear to you guys with every fiber of my being that was what I was committed to do A. by noon I was at the EM club A. I was pitching quarters A. drinking beer on an abuse for the fourth time A. A. left to my own devices I don't have what it takes to not drink A. I was discharged from the military on the 15th day of July in 1983 is the worst day of my whole life A. I brought shame upon myself A. my mother A. my ancestors that I didn't believe was possible for me to bring upon them when I came to Alcoholics Anonymous I believe that was the one thing that I
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was never ever going to be able to amend A. for the next 15 months I drank every single day I drank every single day seemingly against my will I would wake up in the morning A. I would swear just one day just today I'm gonna give it my best A. by one or two or three o'clock I couldn't stand the way that I felt on the inside A. I was on the way to steal something A. I was a living in a 1971 MG midget on the tenth day of October in 1984 A. I had that acrid homeless stench that just takes months to wash out of your pores A. I was dirty on the inside A. I was dirty on the outside A. A. I just stolen a big 1.5 liter bottle of cheap vodka just like he was sitting in the in the seat next to me in my car I heard this little counselor say kid if you ever want to get sober call Alcoholics Anonymous but you won't you'll die drunk A. I got out of the car A. I put a dime in the payphone A. I called Alcoholics Anonymous A. this little old guy named Sam answered the phone A. he said Alcoholics Anonymous may we help you A. I said what I knew I was supposed to say like I'm Tina A. I'm an alcoholic A. I'm looking for a meeting A. he covered up the mouthpiece of the phone A. he told Eunice who was the central office manager we got a live one here let's send her to Birch A. they sent me all the way across town to the Southwest Olano Club in Hawthorne A. I walked into a 5.30 Wednesday night meeting the topic was relationships which was perfect because I was looking for a couple A. A. you guys were so incredibly kind to me I just sat down A. A. you took turns sitting next to me because I was super stinky A. you brought me coffee like a half a cup at a time with a lot of sugar in it A. the next day you guys started feeding me orange juice A. honey because I was starting to get super shaky A. super sick A. I would drink that coffee A. I'd throw it back up into my mouth swallow it back down you know how we do A. we're not feeling so good A. I just went to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous A. A. I didn't want to come in here A. get A. stay sober there was this old cat named Tom Woods he was like 92 or 106 or something A. he used to get up to the podium every single meeting A. he'd say I'd like to welcome our new friends to the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous A. let you know that you never have to pick up another drink for the rest of your life 24 hours at a time A. I would look at him A. think Jesus oh man you only got three days left it's going to be really easy for you to never pick up another drink for the rest of your life but I'm 20 like I'm the president A. founder of your never had a legal drink club A. I don't want to never pick up another drink I just want to not drink for a minute I want to maybe find him because AA is a good place to look for him or her whatever I just wanted to move out of my car I remember my first relationship in Alcoholics Anonymous that you guys told me I shouldn't have I got into when I was 30 days sober I took my chip A. we went to a dance A. he took me for coffee A. then he said like you can store some things at my house A. I thought he meant me so I went home with him A. imagine his grandparents dismay in the morning when they woke up A. found me in their house A. I live with them for the next seven months like it was you know what I found like because they told me don't get into a relationship in your first year sober A. I found out that relationships don't get you drunk in Alcoholics Anonymous they make you really thirsty sometimes but they don't get you drunk booze does that I was such a nightmare when I was new in here man I went to four meetings every single day I remember that first meeting A. you guys were so nice to me A. when the meeting was over you gave me a big book like 20 phone numbers of people that I wasn't gonna call to put me out if I were on fire I swore I was not gonna do it A. this lady followed me out to my car A. she took that big bottle of vodka that I had in my passenger seat she dumped it into the gutter A. I like thought I was gonna kick her butt A. I cried A. I thought about lapping it up out of the gutter A. then she just walked me back into the next meeting A. A. then after the meeting you guys took me to something that you called fellowship A. you trapped me on the inside of the booth right Dolly you wouldn't let me get out A. you sat there until 2.01 a.m. when I couldn't get any more liquor A. then you disappeared like cockroaches when the lights came on A. I had drank coffee until two o'clock in the morning A. I was vibrated behind the Alano club until six o'clock the next morning when the secretary came out woke me up by banging on the window A. brought me a toothbrush A. some soap A. he let me come in A. wash up in the bathroom of that club A. I could eat all the jelly doughnuts I wanted before he let you guys come in for your little attitude adjustment meetings Come in for your little attitude adjustment meetings A. you guys would come in all dressed
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up A. sparkly eyed A. then you'd go to work at Northrip A. you'd come back for your noon meetings A. you'd have lunch there A. you'd come back for your little 5.30 commuter meetings A. you'd bring your little alanonic wives back for the 8.30 speaker meetings A. like I just stayed sober A. I don't know how but like I ended up with 30 days A. I didn't even know I had 30 days but you guys did A. I remember falling in love with Alcoholics Anonymous at 6 weeks sober A. I was recently listening to this tape of Chuck Chamberlain, Love Chuck C A. what he says on this tape is, my obsession to drink beverage alcohol disappeared upon my moment of commitment to Alcoholics Anonymous A. thinking back on that day when I had 6 weeks sober so everybody at Birch was like 86 to 132 A. the Friday after Thanksgiving we had this old timers meeting A. everybody that participated had 20 years or more A. we used to put them up on the stage in their varying stages of decay A. my sponsor Paul had a cigarette with oxygen because he had emphysema A. asthma A. bronchitis which he passed of not too long after that A. my mama Helen was missing her cheek bone A. her eye because she had cancer A. my friend Bob had a prosthetic limb A. a walker A. this lady Helen Louise got up to the podium A. she was draped in this full length mink coat A. she had diamonds on all of her fingers A. she draped herself over the podium A. she looked at me in the front row A. she said, wear your sobriety honey A. I looked down at my little fishnets A. hooker heels A. I thought, well I am.
I love the Al-Anon women in my home group because they gave me all their Alateen's clothing that was too offensive for their teenage daughters to wear A. so I would come in in these low cut shirts A. these mini skirts A. fishnets with that 1980's flash dance hair going on. I was a nightmare A. I remember this guy got up to the podium A. he said, if you want what we have A. I looked at him A. I was like, oxygen walkers A. canes, oh my.
I don't want anything you guys have A. don't hug me because it might fall right off of you A. sitting in the front row that evening I realized I wanted everything you guys had A. it took me by surprise because I would have left had I known that was coming. But I realized that I wanted that sparkle that you guys had in your eyes, it was like diamonds. A. I wanted the ability that you guys had to laugh, like from the core of your being, it just rolled all the way up out of you.
When I was new in AA I laughed in French, like you would spill your coffee in your lap A. I would go, hee hee hee, A. I didn't know, like everything was at your expense A. I wanted the ability to breathe, just easy, like in A. out, like you guys had. A. what I wanted that I didn't know that I wanted was the ability to love you guys the way that you loved me when I was new A. Alcoholics Anonymous, it took my breath away when I was new, takes my breath away today.
A. I committed myself to Alcoholics Anonymous, I got a sponsor, you guys told me, men with men, women with women, men will pat your ass A. women will save it, so I asked this guy named Paul to sponsor me because whatever. A. he was a dictatorial beast A. I think he went to Clancy's Sponsorship School back in the 60s so he could learn how to be a feeling hurt A. jerk A. I asked him to sponsor me because I thought I could work him, you know how we do for a tank of gas A. some cigarettes A. he's mean, I might like do the crocodile thing A. he'll be all, honey, I'm sorry, A. no, size 11 straight up my butt for two years A. he was horrible.
But he took me through the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous in the only way that he knew how to take a young girl through the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous A. I thank God that I picked him. I think sponsorship is like a kind of a God-ordained thing, I think there's one person in one room that one person can hear A. I had a lot of people tell me that I made the wrong decision A. I shouldn't do that, but I can tell you that I could hear that old man A. I would do absolutely anything that he asked me to do, not because I wanted to change my life A. stay sober for 35 years but because I wanted that funky old man to look at me one time A. say like, I'm proud of you baby girl, A. so I would follow his direction A. it held me in good stead A. we went through the steps to the best he was able to take me through them.
I told you guys earlier that he was an atheist slash agnostic, when he could breathe he was an atheist A. when he was really sucking on the oxygen he became agnostic A. a little
[00:35:04]
bit more open-minded because you know how we do A. he passed away on the 10th day of October in 1986 on my second anniversary in Alcoholics Anonymous A. I thought I was going to have to leave you, I didn't think I could be here without him. He was the first entirely principled man in my life that wanted nothing but to see me get better A. was willing to do absolutely anything it took to have that happen.
He cared more about saving my life than he did sparing my feelings A. he would say what was necessary A. I stayed sober because I loved that man A. where I normally would believe people pleasing to be a defective character that I might want God to try A. remove so that I'm not running around trying to gain your approval. I can tell you that it held me in really good stead with that man for the first two years that I was sober A. I got another sponsor when I was two when he passed away A. I was with Connie for about 15 years A. I learned a lot of stuff A. I did a lot of work with these old ideas that I had about a power greater than myself A. I had an amazing life in the center of Alcoholics Anonymous.
I had kids A. I got married in that order because you know how we do A. I don't want a man, I just want a baby so I made me one A. then I got married to the Prince Charming in my fairy tale A. Chris A. I were together for 17 1⁄2 years A. I felt like the princess in a fairy tale every single day A. I would look around the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous A. I would envy no one their relationship with their spouses because I was so in love with mine A. we just had an incredible life A. we were raising these kids A. I gave my eldest born to the United States Navy when he was 17 because I'm quite creative with my ninth step amends process A. Matthew ended up in Iraq in just a hot minute A. I gave him to the Navy not the Marine Corps because I didn't want him to go to Iraq A. my little plans A. designs didn't work A. he ended up in Camp Bucca in southern Iraq, he was a prison guard A. I found myself watching Google Earth watching his base get bombed on a pretty regular basis before they started blocking it out A. my husband A. I, we bought houses A. cars A. motorcycles A. boats A. we had horses A. whatever A. we liked to ride Harley Davidson motorcycles A. I'm like 20 years sober A. Chris is about 18 years sober A. he starts riding his bike with some rather unsavory characters who like to wear red A. white deaf heads on their back A. when Chris was about 18 years sober he decided that the next step in his spiritual journey might be to prospect for the Hell's Angels Motorcycle Club A. he rode off into the sunset with a bunch of greasy bikers that I thought were all dudes A. I was wrong A. my whole sober life, you guys, at 20 years sober started circling the drain A. we've had some of our speakers this afternoon talk about what it looks like to stand in the middle of Alcoholics Anonymous A. suffer from untreated alcoholism A. I can tell you that at 20 years sober I was suffering from untreated alcoholism A. I copped this little resentment against this loving father that you guys had given me A. I thought if this is what I get for serving AA for two decades like screw this I'll fix this myself, I got this, I got this, I'm so good at I got this A. like if you guys will just do what I'm asking you to do I can pull all of this out of the fire A. nobody was listening to me A. Chris left A. my little guy started, he was 15 years old A. he was my varsity quarterback, my honor roll student, my wrestler, my point guard on the basketball team, like he started hanging out with these little gangsters A. doing drugs A. getting arrested A. I had two parts of my story come into life before my very eyes.
I got a drunken Navy Sailor son A. a dope fiend high school dropout son A. my whole sober life is circling the drain A. I can't do anything about it A. I'm resentful against God A. I'm like so full of self pity that I can't even see like this tsunami that's drowning me A. what I realized as a result of like rolling through that time sober is that it is never ever the things in my life, the changes that I find objectionable that create pain for me.
What creates the pain for me is my resistance to those things A. I was fighting you guys with all I had A. at 21 A. a half years sober I found myself, this is super sexy, I found myself standing on a bridge in Northern California thinking like that just looks like the easier softer way to me. I made a commitment when I was relatively new in Alcoholics Anonymous that I never wrote
[00:40:13]
or wanted to drink again for the rest of my life 24 hours at a time A. that commitment holds still today but I can also tell you that there have been times in my sobriety starting then A. rolling all the way up until relatively recently where there have been things in my life that I find so completely objectionable that I do not believe that I have the strength to walk through. A. I come into your midst A. you carry me.
A. that's been my experience since the 10th day of October in 1984 whether I want to recognize that or not a lot of times I don't, a lot of times I want to think like I pulled that one out of the fire but the truth of the matter is my knees buckled A. you caught me A. that has always been the case. My whole sober life fell apart A. I was standing on that bridge A. I said one more of those stupid foxhole prayers to a God that I no longer believed in A. I walked off that bridge not under my own steam I can assure you A. I went to one more meeting A. I read one more page A. I picked up one more phone call A. I listened to one more inventory A. I did one more of my own, most of them even were mine, I did those inventories A. I learned a whole new experience at 22 years sober in the inventory process.
How am I doing on time? How much longer do I have? My timers. I forgot where I was so I got to start over. But like I was walking through that time A. it was so incredibly painful for me that's what I was saying like I just, I went to one more meeting A. I sponsored one more girl A. I did one more thing, the things that held me in good stead in Alcoholics Anonymous when I was brand new in here worked then A. they work for me today.
Every single thing that I needed to know about how to stay sober A. be a member in good standing in Alcoholics Anonymous I learned in my first 30 to 60 days sober. My sponsor had me go to a meeting every day A. he made me serve those meetings A. I would bring him problems A. what he would tell me is go clean the bathroom A. I would go are you not listening to me old man, that man just left me A. he'd go right, go scrub the toilet A. I'm like oh my god.
A. I learned how to serve Alcoholics Anonymous A. continue to show up A. during that time I was living up north A. the husband left A. the kids were having problems A. I just, I was completely out of answers. I was sponsored by an old retired Marine Corps major named Bill A. I was bringing him inventory A. I'm like ripping myself to shreds in these inventories because what I learned was like for the longest time I believed that the inventory process sounded something like column one, who do you resent, Chris.
Column two, why do you resent him? He cheated on me, he hit me, he left our children, he gave our money away, he drove us into bankruptcy court, he destroyed whatever, blah, blah, blah. Like I love column two because it's Bill Wilson's drunk trap, it gets me to pick up the pen A. go to town on what you did to me A. I get to be like the consummate victim A. I'm so good at that. A. so I wrote that stuff out A. column three sounds like what does that affect?
Well it's like all of them, it affects my personal A. sex relations A. my fear A. my self-esteem, like absolutely everything. A. then I thought what column four said was what's my part? A. that what we think it says, what's my part in this thing that you did to me? A. that's not what it says at all. What it says is putting out of my mind the wrongs others had done, I resolutely look for my own mistakes A. I'm to look at where I placed myself in a position to be harmed A. I'm not supposed to look at my part A. why Chris cheated on me or my part A. why Chris left me for the Hells Angels, I'm to look at over the course of the last seventeen A. a half years that I was married to the Prince Charming in my fairy tale, where did I not honor the husband that he was?
Where was I selfish with my affection? Where did I manipulate him with sex because I wanted a down payment for a house? Where was I miserly with our finances? Where Was I Miserly With Our Finances, Where Did I Place Supermom to My Children Because In My Mind I Had to Be There Everything A. Rob Him of a Relationship with His Kids.
[00:45:03]
A. When I Finished That Inventory A. I Read the Back of That Page, What I Realized Was, A. He Had Told Me This A. I Couldn't Hear Him, Living in Our Home Made Him the Loneliest Man on the Planet A. I did that. I'd like to say I made those mistakes when I was drinking A. alcohol was responsible for some of the women that I was, but the truth of the matter was I made those mistakes with lots A. lots of years sober. A. sometimes there's no way to clean those things up. I did that inventory A. I decided later, it was like a year A. a half later, I'm going to make amends to that man A. I called him up A. I wrote out my eight step stuff A. I knew precisely what I was going to say A. it wasn't going to be like I'm sorry for this A. I'm sorry for that because I'd said that a lot of times.
A. I called him up A. I told him I have some things to say to you A. I need you please to be quiet A. listen to me. A. he goes, oh God, here she goes again. Because I was like I have a vicious tongue A. what I said was I was wrong when I did this A. I cannot imagine how lonely you felt when I did that. A. when I disrespected you to my friends I didn't honor the man that you were to me. A. blah, blah, blah. A. did I miss anything A. I did. A. he told me A. I said I'd like to know how I can clean that up. Here's the idea you guys, when I come to you with this is what I did wrong A. this is how I'm going to fix it, I presume to know everything A. it's not until I ask you how I can make things right that I know that I can make things right because I'm going to do what you asked me to. A. he said there's nothing you can do but thank you for the call Tina A. he hung up A. I thought well you bastard. Now it's your turn A. you missed the opportunity to give me mine. A. I went to sleep that night A. I can tell you guys that I woke up in the morning a free woman. The desire to jump off bridges was no longer there. The prayer that he burn up in a house fire was no longer on my lips. I had been saying it for a long time A. he didn't so I was certain that prayer didn't work anymore. But I was free as a result of making an amend A. see what I know is like it doesn't matter whether you accept it or how it comes across to you. What matters is that I do my utmost to clean up my side of the street. A. I can tell you that a year or so later than that he called me up. God this is crappy. He called me up on a Christmas Eve because I had sent him a bunch of pictures of the kids when they were little because I took them all when he left. I wasn't giving him nothing. A. I was trying to do right by him A. I sent him pictures of the kids.
A. he called me up A. told me his side of the amends process. He wasn't sober anymore he's a full fledged 300 pound felon alcoholic dope addicted hell's angel. But he called me up A. told me like that the greatest mistake he made ever was leaving. A. that it wasn't my fault. A. see here's the thing if we're not careful when we're in the midst of that back column of the inventory what we do is we take responsibility for the actions of other people A. we make them our own. A. then we carry those wrongs through our entire life. A. we look at the hurts that people have done to us A. we punish the people that we love in our life for the rest of our life that had nothing to do with the stuff. A. as a result of being free from that relationship what I thought was great God like now it's time for me to have like what's next for me. A. I spent the next 10 years like not being able to get a date for a damn cheeseburger. Like so unfair. A. I look like a lot of what we heard this afternoon from Holly A. Jennifer I always want to call you Polly from Holly A. Jennifer on the panel about being spiritually guided was about like what we do for other people. Like it's always what we do for other people not what it is that we're going to get. A. so I spent the next bunch of years thinking like I'm just going to like do what it is that's in front of me A. I'm going to do what I think God would have me do A. then like I'm going to get whatever it is that God intends me to have. Which has always
[00:50:01]
been the case but I take these things in my life A. I think to myself this is good A. this is bad. This is right A. this is wrong. A. the truth of the matter is like I am always incorrect in my assumptions. Like I looked at that husband leaving A. destroying my children A. leaving choke marks around my neck A. losing our home A. like ending up in a little freaking horrible tiny apartment A. like that is bad A. wrong. Like that cannot possibly be the will of a loving God. Like we are married A. committed for the rest of our lives. Even if they end early. A. today what I can tell you is like I look back at that period A. I realize like Chris leaving me was the most loving kind action that that man had taken towards me in the longest time. A. it was the absolute best possible thing that could happen to me because I was free of the life that he was getting ready to live A. I would not have left him. A. who the heck knows where I would be. I would be a old Hell's Angels old lady, right? Riding my Harley with those bad guys A. I don't want to live that kind of life you guys. I love being a sober, sometimes relatively sane member of Alcoholics Anonymous A. living right smack dab in the center of you guys.
I love coming into Alcoholics Anonymous completely broken A. letting you guys see that. Well I don't love that but I do it anyway. A. when I'm finished I love it because I know what you get from me is like absolute authenticity. I don't hide anything from you guys. I know the things that I hide from Alcoholics Anonymous are the things that are going to kill me A. I am not willing to pay that price today. The last couple years of my sobriety have been super weird like that whole ten year period or whatever of no dates A. whatever has left me abundantly clear about what I want in my life A. what I do not. A. for a long time I thought I'd settle for just about anything. I should look twice A. be halfway nice. A. today what I know is like I'm not willing to compromise my standards.
A. if I'm to be alone then I'm going to be alone. But I'm going to be the best alone that I know how to be right in the center of you guys. A. in the center of you guys I'm not alone anyway. That was my greatest fear A. I made that come to pass. A. that's never ever the case. I love this life. That little boy came out of the Navy way different than the one that went in there. A. he suffers from some post-traumatic stress disorder when he came back from Iraq A. he spent five years on the streets of Santa Barbara homeless doing a little bit of recreational black tar heroin to self-medicate some post-traumatic stress.
A. he came home A. he called me up. He was up north homeless A. the stripper that he was dating from the bunny ranch left him for the drug dealer next door because you know how that goes. A. he's like, Mom! A. I picked him up A. I took him on a camping trip with my home group A. he detoxed around the campfire with about 70 people from the Pacific group. A. I brought him back down A. put him on my couch A. he got sober in my home group. In September I gave him his five-year cake. A. I'm more grateful for his sobriety sometimes than I am my own. A. he is such a fine, upstanding member of Alcoholics Anonymous. He sponsors dudes A. picks them up A. takes them to meetings. He just moved up to Northern California A. I miss him. He lived with me for five years. He's such a good AA A. he calls me up A. he's telling me about all these meetings he's going to every day A. all these dudes he's meeting A. they're taking him surfing A. he's going here. A. he has such an incredible life A. it's all a result of your fingerprints on his life. I brought him to you guys when I had no answers left whatsoever. A. when you pried my clenched fingers off of him A. took him from my grasp, he blossomed in a way that I never believed possible. I'm so grateful.
I got Clancy to sponsor me about 13 years ago right after that bridge incident because I was spiraling A. I was dying in the middle of Alcoholics Anonymous A. I called this
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old man A. I asked him if we could talk A. he said, Tuesday 1130, kid. A. I drove 400 miles from Hollister down to the Midnight Mission A. I sat across the desk from that old man A. I told him, will you help me? A. if you're new, or my goodness, if you're not new A. Alcoholics Anonymous but you feel like you're dying in here, will you help me are the most powerful words we can possibly utter. In that, what that means for me is that I am at the end of my human resources A. I have not another answer left. A. as long as I got an answer left, I'm not going to surrender anything. My life at Alcoholics Anonymous has been a series of surrenders. I hit one when I was about 5 years sober that had me want to drink. I hit another one when I was 21 when I was standing on that bridge.
A. I hit another one a couple of years ago with some health issues. I came into Alcoholics Anonymous in 1984 with this big flag of white surrender A. I tore off the corner that was my alcoholism A. I offered it to you. A. that's all I offered to you was my alcoholism. A. I stayed sober for a little while A. I realized like I might offer you my career A. I might offer you my financial stability A. I might offer you my whatever but like I'm hanging on to the kids, I'm hanging on to the man, I'm hanging on to the house. Like I got this A. you can have that. A. over the course of the last 35 years, one thing after another, I've learned that I have to surrender to you. A. God, like 3 years ago, I thought I was all in. Like there is not another thing. The man's gone, the kid's gone.
Like what? Like I am so all surrendered. There's not another thing left. A. I went in to get a little facial A. my esthetician told me, you need to call your doctor before you leave my office. A. I'm like, yeah, I'll call her later. A. she's like, no, you will not walk out of my office until you make an appointment. A. that afternoon, there just happened to be an empty spot in my doctor's office A. the next morning, I was at dermatology, oncology having a biopsy A. I was diagnosed with a little malignant melanoma on my chest. A. I'm like, well, it's just skin cancer. Take it off. A. so they did A. then they took some more off A. they staged it A. they're like, oh, everything's good. So I'm like, well, great. So everything's good. A. about a year ago, my sponsor, as a result of one of those little iron cases in my gut opening up, that whole sexual assault when I was on that island came like rearing its ugly head 30 years later A. I realized I couldn't outrun it anymore A. Clancy made me go to the VA A. seek some help for that. A. as a result of that, I got a service connection A. some medical benefits that they should have given me a long time ago, but whatever. A. I went into dermatology A. for the last year A. a half, we've cut seven different spots off of me. A. in this moment right now, they're all good A. we'll go in next Tuesday A. we'll see what's next. So I've had seven different lesions of malignant melanoma, most of which they say are not melanoma. They're just funny looking moles but we're going to take them anyway A. they're all malignant. A. in my mammogram a couple months ago, the lymph node in my chest lit up A. I've got something on my thyroid. So not this Tuesday, but next Tuesday I have an appointment A. we're going to go in there A. see what's next. A. as a result of walking through this with you guys, that's not something that I envisioned for 35. That's not the gift that I wanted from my creator for my 35th year. But I'm going to go in A. we're going to do this appointment A. I'm going to treat my doctor like my sponsor A. I'm going to do what I'm told A. I'm going to show up where they tell me to A. I'm going to let them do what they want A. everything's going to be alright. Shit. Regardless of the outcome, everything's going to be alright. A. I know that that's the truth because I'm here with you guys.
A. I know that not only do I never have to drink again for the rest of my life 24 hours at a time, I don't have to walk through anything in my life 24 hours at a time alone again. Even though sometimes I choose to do that, I don't have to. I just do it anyway.
[01:00:00]
as Jennifer was saying, like I hate these women's things. You guys just seem to break me open in a way that I can't stand, you know what I mean? A. stuff comes out that I don't want to talk about. But I know on the far side of absolutely everything that I walk through with you is an ultimate healing A. an ultimate freedom A. that is only a result of the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous. My literature tells me that I'm going to lay hold of a set of spiritual principles that are going to solve all of my problems A. that has been true for me. I'm going to tell you a two minute story A. then I'm going to sit down. When I was 13 years sober A. fighting the idea of God in my life because I just love to be self-reliant A. self-sufficient A. do my own thing, I was on a cruise A. it was the night of my 13th birthday A. I was married to Chris A. I had taken my sponsor A. her husband on this cruise with us because it was her birthday also. We both celebrate on October 10th A. we're on this little cruise down to Ensenada, Mexico A. it's Saturday night. It's the night of the captain's table dinner or whatever A. it's the night of my birthday. I'm 13 years sober A. I dressed up in this lacy gown A. I curled my hair A. I put my makeup on A. I was on the arm of the most handsome man on the ship A. I felt just like a princess. We had dinner at the captain's table A. after the dinner I wanted to go to the Friends of Bill meeting A. celebrate my birthday with you guys A. Chris went to the casino which is a whole other 12-step program A. I went downstairs to the Friends of Bill meeting A. there was nobody there because it was a little three-day booze cruise. Who goes to the A&A meeting on the booze cruise? So I walked upstairs A. I was standing on the deck of the ship A. I was dressed in this formal gown A. I looked beautiful A. God bless it. I don't know about the rest of you ladies but I have a super hard time looking in the mirror A. thinking that about myself. Like I can look at you A. you take my breath away but I look in the mirror A. I'm like look at those freckles A. your hair. But I looked beautiful that evening A. I was so filled with gratitude for this life that Alcoholics Anonymous had given me A. I was standing on the deck of this cruise ship A. it was the most beautiful night that I can remember. There was a full moon A. there were a million stars A. there were these little wispy clouds A. the moon was like peeking out from behind the clouds A. it looked like every single one of the white caps coming off the side of the ship had a light underneath it. It was just so beautiful. It was a magical night A. I was standing on the deck of that cruise ship A. I was talking to all my old timers that had passed away A. I was telling them oh my God you guys, whoever would have thought that I could have a life like this. Just like they were all standing behind me I could hear them say we did baby girl. I know that Paul Matson looked at me on the 10th day of October in 1984 A. he saw a sober A. dignified woman in Alcoholics Anonymous A. I know that my mama Helen looked at me A. she saw a mother A. I know that my friends Frank A. Francie Priest looked at me A. they saw a wife A. you guys looked at me A. you saw a daughter A. an employee A. a homeowner A. a graduate.
You looked at me A. you saw all these amazing possibilities A. this drunken little homeless girl A. I believe that you breathed every single thing that I am into my very being like you guys have created me from nothing A. if I lived to be 100 years old A. I do nothing but serve you every single day for the rest of my life I could never ever repay you for the gifts you've given me but I promise you I will spend the rest of it trying. Thank you for having me.