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About this recording
- Topic
- 1 Clif G. (AA) Lori G. (AFG) Oklahoma City, OK Finance, Romance & What did you s
- Speaker
- Clif G. and Lori G
- Date
- 2020-08-20
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Source: Clif G. and Lori G – 1 Clif G. (AA) Lori G. (AFG) Oklahoma City, OK Finance, Romance & What did you s – 2020-08-20.mp3 File: clif-g-and-lori-g-1-clif-g-aa-lori-g-afg-oklahoma-city-ok-finance-romance-and-what-did-you-s-2020-08-20.mp3 Duration: 00:59:18
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and the way we usually open this meeting is with the set aside prayer and there are lots of different versions of that but uh anyway the one i usually use is god i ask that you now help me set aside everything i think i know about you everything i think i know about my fellows everything i think i know about myself in this program so that i may have a new experience with you with my fellows and with myself and as dale always likes to say too i'm just channeling i'm here from the shower um try to conduct yourself as if your sponsor's sitting on your left and your grand sponsor's on your right and uh in a minute we're going to turn it over to our uh dynamic duo there but until then um was angela angelia are you the one that was reading or have i forgotten that already who did i ask to read the daily reflections okay can you unmute yourself and help an old woman remember who you are i'm going through names i need to write things down okay oh oh someone's waving yeah it's me okay um i'm the one yeah you asked me nan to read okay yes the daily reading for today and i thank i bless you and for and for asking me to read okay today it's been the 20th and this is from the daily reflections release from fear the problem of resolving fear has two aspects we shall have to try for all three the freedom from fear that is possible for us to attain then we shall need to find both the courage and grace to deal constructively with whatever fear remains and that comes from as bill sees it and that's on page 61 most of my decisions were based on fear alcohol made easier to face but the time came when alcohol was no longer an alternative to fear one of the greatest gifts in aa for me has been the courage to take action which i can do with god's help after five years of sobriety i had to deal with a heavy dose of fear god put the people in my life to help me do that and know through my working the 12 steps i i am becoming the whole person i wish to be and for that i am deeply grateful thank you karen well well said um good reading okay well it is time to turn it over to uh cliff and laurie and i'll tell you i love the name of the conference for today and what did you say so and i'm real anxious to uh hear what you guys have to say so turn it over to you thank you so much i'm hi everybody i'm cliff good and grateful alcoholic sober since august the 15th of 2001 i'm laurie gooding my recovery day is July 1st 2001 i'm a grateful member of alan well nobody's more excited to see what we have to say today than us i can tell you that and uh you know uh laurie and i've been doing workshops uh for a few years and uh when um was it jackie right jackie who was it yeah jackie reached out to us to say to ask us to do this today and talk about what we were going to do it took us a bit to try to figure out what we were going to do to make four hours we did a sex workshop for the alanons earlier this summer that uh uh that was a four-hour deal and who could think you could talk four hours about sex uh any man would but anyway um so when we're trying to figure out what we're going to do today i you know we kind of came up with some just some topics uh to kind of me and i really think in a setting like this the best thing to do is just have a conversation we're just going to have a conversation we're going to meander through these topics and we're going to we're probably going to talk about a lot more than just finance romance and what what did you say which is really intended to be communication because it seems to me that those are three areas that really people struggle in a lot um and uh as strange as this may seem we're probably going to talk about goblot even uh uh because he seems to be a pretty important part in this this uh drama that we're playing out so you know we just want to have a conversation today and we're always going to leave time for questions that laura's going to be able to answer and and uh we'll just kind of meander through this uh this time we got together and uh so i you know i think it's always important when
[00:05:03]
we do when they just a bit disqualify for just a second so people know that they got the right people here i i uh i would i'm a reluctant recovered alcoholic i didn't plan to get sober when i went to aa i don't want anybody to be fooled to think that uh i suddenly had this great awakening and thought oh my god i need to go to alcoholic tsunamis because i got a problem i i was i was as surprised as anyone when to find out that i needed alcoholics and honestly and that's not because i had hit it so well i mean i had not worked for three years i had i had uh three failed marriages and was teetering uh laurie and my relationship was teetering um i she had thrown me out of the house and i've gone to alcoholics and i was not because i thought it was a good idea but i thought i could go there pacify her get back in the house and slowly just get back to living the way i wanted to live and i'm a real alcoholic i drink every time i want to what's happened for a guy like me is since since something but something happened to me on august the 15th i came to aa in june i sat here as long as i could i had to go drinking i mean i'm a i know i'm real alcoholic because when i stop drinking and i don't do anything else my life does not get better it gets worse and uh eating and drinking and uh when i came back on august the 15th of 2001 um that was the day that i had that implosion of self and that this power that i've come to call god and alcoholics anonymous entered my life and things have been significantly different the obsession to drink was lifted from me immediately and um i began this journey and uh in that journey what i've learned is is that alcoholics anonymous we could probably they could the first 100 could have easily named it grow up they they could have they didn't have to wait to uh they uh got a book and named it after the book they could have just called it grow up because that's what i've had to do in alcoholics anonymous is i've had to learn how to grow up and uh i didn't understand that the real root of my problem was selfishness and self-centeredness when our book talks about that uh drinking is but a symptom you know it's a it's the flower it's the bud on the tree it's just it's the entry fee to alcoholics anonymous but you know on page 19 of our textbook it says that a man is unthinking or he says a much more important demonstration of our principles lie before us in our respective homes occupation affairs and over and over our book talks about you know it's more than just not drinking and that's borne out by our literature that we quit talking about drinking on about page 51 and so uh coming here and trying to figure out hey how do i do this life thing that's the real problem that i have i don't know how to live sober i do not know how to do that that is a that is a rubik's cube for a guy like me again i don't know i'm selfish and self-centered if you the day i walked into alcoholics anonymous if you said write out a hundred uh a hundred problem problems you believe you have i'm going to tell you selfishness self-centeredness would have never made the list because i'm a giver and i know you people know that i'm a giver but always with a hook there's always a hook to my giving and so coming to alcoholics anonymous and learning that my problem is me and that i've always been the problem was quite a quite an interesting tale if you're new or you're nearly new in alcoholics anonymous when you're here today when i got to aa they told me they said to me listen drinking is not your problem living for your problem if you're new or nearly new don't go home and tell whoever sent you here that that that drink is not your problem that will not be well received it certainly wasn't well received in my home uh so just let them believe that drinking is the problem for now they'll figure it out later um but what what i've had to learn in alcoholics anonymous is how to how to uh how to allow god to undo me and allow more him in and and be of more service to you people and and really the important part of that in on page 19 of our book where it says a much more important demonstration lies before us in our respective homes occupation and affair because that's the homes i believe are the toughest place for the program of alcoholics anonymous to shine although it should be the place that it shines the most you know i don't get sober to hide out in alcoholics anonymous my great grand sponsor is a guy named tom i in southern pines north carolina and tom before he was sick uh his big deal was you know we don't get sober to hide out in aa we get sober to be back in
[00:10:01]
the stream of life to get back to our rightful place in society to go out and be a productive member of society and so i've always tried to remember that that i just don't get sober to hide out here you know i have us an entire life that that i have it like what kathy h says uh in alan on you know and i'll put the aa spin on it aa is not my whole life but i have a whole life because of aa and i think that is critical for a guy like me to remember i have this whole life uh that i that i participate every day that's built around alcoholics anonymous everything in my life is built around aa so getting sober and trying to come here and trying to figure out how do we practice these principles well before before i got sober i had decided that lori had this great job and i had been evicted uh from my law firm the building that i'd in and 30 people lost their job i was in debt to irs i owed a bunch of money and and i became what bill described as an unwelcome hanger on and i kind of got passed from law firm to law firm and uh eventually i ended up in a little bitty closet however big your biggest closet is that's probably where i was and uh i had a phone line but i didn't go there very often but lori had this great job um and by this time we had been living together and were married for a couple years um uh or we've been living together uh for a couple years that's right and then all this came down but she had this great job and she had this great job and um so i became what i like to describe as a functioning alcoholic i had a wife that worked and uh i became a real go-getter i would take her to work and go get her it's what i would do but i just i couldn't get out of my house i mean i could not leave my house i'm a guy that when i start drinking it's just three ways i stop pass out blackout run out till then i'm drinking i'm getting the job done people would bring me things to my house i didn't have to leave so for the last three years of my drinking i just i never drew a sober breath i worked a lit but not many and lori was the breadwinner at our home she had taken over that responsibility in the chapter the family afterwards it talks about by force of circumstance by force of circumstance the spouse takes over responsibilities that they had not intended they didn't sign up for and certainly she took on the responsibilities uh in our household that i that she thought was going to be a partnership uh that ended up being a sole proprietorship that she was in charge of and uh i became another child that she had to take care of and just kind of moved me around and so the financial burden of our household fell mostly upon her and uh you know i remember one day i was out and i ran into a guy that i had not seen for some time and this is about a year or two before i got sober and he said uh cliff where have you been he was a practicing lawyer also he said where have you been and so you have to make these snap second decisions about what you're going to say to a question like that when when in your mind you know you you're just a no good drunk but you've got to make a snap decision because you can't say things like that so i just came the snap decision i made was i'm semi-retired this is the crazy part about alcoholism as i as those words left my mouth i thought yeah i really am i'm kind of semi-retired i'm uh i'm semi-retired and i begin to believe that that i just was semi-retired now i'm just i just can't get off the couch because i'm drunk but the delusional thinking of the alcoholic is unbelievable and and uh i had come to believe that that was my lot that i was you know i can't differentiate true from the false and in that what happened is is that laura just became the breadwinner and she became responsible for everything and she began to juggle all this financial burden and and i just need you to know that those in those three years that i didn't work i had a mortgage payment of course all the attendant bills that go with that car payment um child support payment i mean all the things that go with uh a long-term drinking career and i can't make any of those i ain't working and that fell upon her she made those payments she paid my child support for three years she paid my house Child Support for three years. She paid my house payment. She did all that. She paid all the bills
[00:15:02]
and she had to learn how to, she had to juggle all that with absolutely very little help from me. If you ever get, if you're an alcoholic, I think one of the funnest things to do is to get your social security statement and count the zeros in the years that you were unable to work. You know, I've got some on mine. They're just, I've got these great years and then zeros. And so, uh, that I just, I just, I can't do it. And so, and because of my own selfishness, self-centeredness, my alcoholism, that fell to her. And, um, you know, what, what's happened for us out of that, you know, it, it took a while for me, you know, in the chapter of the family, after it talks about that father suddenly becoming awake, you know, I need, I need to know what's going on. Like, you know, I need now to participate in that, you know, working out those things in relationships are sometimes difficult. The alcoholic comes awake and suddenly, uh, wants to participate in life. And part of that is participating in the family.
And, uh, so I, for us, what had to happen was we had to discover some ground rules about how does that work? You know, how does that work in terms of, and it was about a year and a half after I got sober somewhere in there that I was really able to return to what I'm going to call really working. I mean, I mean, I'd have a few things here and there, but not really working. I mean, I had some Bill says in his story, he said, you know, I found hardly any work for the first year and a half. And it was good because he had a year and a half to work with drunks and really get alcoholics anonymous kind of formulated. And, you know, looking back today, even though it was a difficult time, it was, it was really good because I had a sponsor that just took me everywhere. And he was retired and I was semi-retired, uh, unemployed. And, uh, so I just went with him everywhere. And by the way, if you're a newcomer and alcoholics anonymous, and you meet Mr. Or Miss right within your first 30 days. And they say something when you ask them, what do they do? And they say, I'm self-employed. No, that just means that they don't have a job and they got to pick up. That's all that means they are not, they are not really doing anything. So just know that up front, but anyway, Don just took me everywhere and, and he, and he showed me alcoholics. Now he didn't just teach me AA. And I'm one of these people that believe that there's a, there's a product of teaching that goes on in sponsorship that I don't know how to do this. Somebody's got to show me and we call them sponsors, but John was a teacher. He taught me life. He began to teach me how to do life. He began to teach me how to do things. I remember I was early on. I, I, I think maybe the first six months I had, I went to this place that was my office, this closet I had, and I remember calling him and I was just confounded. I was in overwhelm. And he said, what's the problem? And I said, I have to write three letters and I'm just wrapped around the axle. And I, and that confounded me. And, uh, he gave me some simple instructions. He said, I want you to take the first file, pick it up. I want you to write the letter and call me back.
And I did that three times. I called him every time. And you know, of course it took about 30 minutes to do that. But early on to look at that was overwhelming. I don't know how I'm gonna get this done. I mean, I'm looking at the whole puzzle, not one piece at a time. And that just showed how much I didn't, how, how difficult it was for me to get back. But eventually I got back and I began to, I began to contribute again to the financial, to the financial aspect of our household and, and begin to contribute again. And, um, there's difficulty in, uh, that getting back into the stream of life, getting back into participating. And, uh, you know, it seemed to me that Lori was not really wanting to share that much information with me. Um, uh, I remember early on, I would have to go to AA. I'm a person that believes the first day you come to AA, you can put all parts of our triangle into your life.
We walk in the door, we say, we, you know, they're doing what I cannot do. I learned about the traditions because my sponsor on the second day in AA, the basket comes to me
[00:20:03]
and I pass it and he pushes it back. Cause I don't put anything in, he pushes it back. And he said, I noticed you don't put anything in the basket. So I go into this explanation about how I haven't worked in three years and that, uh, of course I don't have anything to put in the basket. And he put, and they pass it at halftime at this particular meeting with that. And he pushes it back harder and gets louder. Cause everybody looks, you know, I don't know about you, I always follow the basket when it's being passed. Cause it's like a squirrel, you know, just focus on something else. And, and so I know everybody's looking, he pushes it back and he goes, he goes, let me tell you something. Alcoholics and Namas is saving your life. I don't ever see this basket come by you again, that you don't put something in there. And I knew he was serious.
And I learned about the seventh tradition that day that we're self-supporting that night. I'm pulling up cushions. I'm looking through my car for change, nickels, dimes, pennies. You know, I would, I finally got the courage to ask Lori for some money. It was a while before she would trust me with folding money, give me some quarters and send me on my way. But, but there was, I mean, I had breached, I had breached all trust financially. There just wasn't any there.
I mean, I had worked out how to figure out how to get a thousand dollar cash advance off a Texaco credit card. I became a master of just finding money anywhere and using it to my benefit, you know, cause I don't have any and I need some. And, uh, but after about a year and a half, I'm back at work and I'm, I'm beginning to contribute. I just needed a little information. I mean, Lori had taken over the checkbook years before because I was totally incapable of doing anything. And, you know, we, you hear people say all the time, not necessarily an alcoholic synonymous, but people generally, or at least I did. Maybe you didn't hear this, but people say all the time that marriage is 50, 50. It's a 50, 50 deal. Here's my, here's my discovery since I've been here. Marriage is not 50, 50 marriages, a hundred percent, a hundred percent. I have to be all in a hundred percent. You know, I can't, if I'm 50, 50, I'm in big trouble. I got one foot in and one foot out. I got to be all in on my marriage. Just like I'm all in on my recovery.
I have to be committed to the relationship. I can't be, you know, there's just no such thing as a 50, 50 in America. If it's 50, 50, what happens is I begin to keep score. I'll make sure I get my hat. Is she keeping up with her hat? I need to know. So I start tracking her, figuring out what she's doing. Is that more than my, is she doing more or less than my 50%? Where is that? I, for me, what my experience is, is that I have to be a hundred percent committed and I got to quit keeping the score. You know, I got to quit keeping the score. I get guys all the time calling me and say, you know what she did? And I listened for about two minutes and I had to stop. I go, I don't sponsor her. I sponsor you. And I don't care what she did.
Here's our responsibility. Here's what we're responsible for. I'm not responsible for her or what she did. That's what Don taught me because I would call him and I'd complain about Lori and he would say, I don't sponsor her. Let's talk about you. What did you do? What is your part in that? You haven't worked in a year and a half. So she won't give you 10 bucks. Big deal. You ain't worked. You ain't done nothing to deserve the 10 bucks. I mean, whatever. And so I learned here that I have to be all in. And you know, the strange part about that is I don't, I don't think if I'd have come here on day one, on day nine and got everything back, I'd have jumped off a building on day 10 because I couldn't have handled that. Been too good. Life would have got too good, too quick.
And so I can't, my expectations for being sober and being in a relationship is a growing process. It's this, you know, every trouble that Lori and I've had, every problem we've had, it's a net loss unless in that I have found some way to turn this problem into a gift. It's always a net loss if I don't learn something from it always. And what we've had to do in building, you know, cause the truth is I'm drunk and she's crazy when we get together.
And so we, I guess, so we're, you know, we're really, I mean, I think she's really pretty, but we really don't know each other cause I'm drunk and she's crazy. It's like an arranged marriage almost. We just pop into this thing, you know,
[00:25:03]
wake up one day and look at you and say, what's your name? I don't know, but we're trying to piece this together. And I think it's, and again, I'm only going to share my experience for what I've seen. Difficult, I'm blessed because Lori was in Al-Anon and she stayed before I got sober. What Al-Anon did for Lori was give her the tools on the day she needed to tell me the truth, was able to tell me the truth and do what she needed to do. And I'm forever grateful for the Al-Anon family groups. No doubt about it, Alcoholics Anonymous saved my life, but the Al-Anon family group probably saved our marriage because it gave Lori the tools to put me on a, on a path. It got, she did what she needed to do. And that sent me back to AA. And that's when the miracle of Alcoholics Anonymous happened. So through this, through this dynamics of, of sobriety, we had to learn how to put our finances together. And, you know, did that, we, we talked about this a couple of months ago, Lori brought up, we, we still keep separate checkbooks. Not, not, it's just the way it's been since forever. And the other day she came with this idea that maybe we need to put our checkbooks together. And I'm like, okay, but we got a significant problem about that. I never checked my bank account. I never look at my statements. I just don't, I've got like a running tally in my head. I kind of know where I'm at all the time. And she goes, and she's in here. If she's a penny off, she goes through eight bank statements to find it. She's going back, trying to figure out where I go. That'll never work. That's a good idea. We'll be divorced in six weeks. It just won't work because she'll want, but here's the beauty, here's the beauty of all that. We know that today. We know that today.
You know, I know it would, you know, when she said that I thought about it, I said, we can never do that. I'll, I will drive you crazy trying to keep up with, I said, it'll make you nuts because I don't write anything down. I just don't. And it will make you crazy. And so, you know, symbiotically we've got our own deal. Now our, we can both see our finances. We bank at the same bank and I can see hers and she can see mine. Although I never look, I know it, you know, it's there. We're transparent. That's the point. We're transparent in our financial dealings today. And, and I grew up, you know, I think when we come to Alcoholics Anonymous and probably any recovery program, the book talks about, we come here with prejudices, which is a really dressed up, nice name for old ideas. You know, we come here with fixed notions about how principles, principles of how what governed my life. My mom and dad were depression babies. They grew up saving everything they could, you know, everything. And I've got that, they passed, that's one of the old ideas they passed me. If I go, if I decide that I'm going to go buy some new shirts, I call Lori and ask permission. I don't know why I do that.
I'm a grown man, but I'll call her and say, Hey, I'm going to go buy some new shirts. Is that okay? Now I have my own account. I've got, and I ask her permission. I can't tell you what that's about. I, I have a, it doesn't bother me. May bother her. I just know that about me. On the other hand, boxes will just arrive at my door. And I'm just like, I'm like the UPS man hauled them in. And I just look at her some days when I get into some financial insecurity, I look at Lori and say, Hey, can we have a kind of a truce on the boxes for a few weeks? Let me just kind of get grounded back with God again. And then the boxes can come again, but we have an understanding with each other. And I think that communication on finances is so important. Some agreement about what that is and what that looks like, you know, knowing each who each other are, you know, I trust Lori implicitly. She is my office manager at my law firm. And, uh, you know, we've got eight employee, non-employees and, uh, I can't tell you what the bank balance is there. I don't need to know she got God and Lori takes care of it.
And I trust her, you know, I, I just don't worry about that. I know if there's a problem, she'll tell me if there ever is. And, you know, for the, for the, how many years she's been doing it, there's not been a problem since I've been back to work and work. And it seemed to have all worked out financially for us. I mean, not that we've got, not that I'm semi-retired. that we've got, not that I'm semi-retired or anything, but we've got a nice life today.
I'm able to, I'm back in the stream of life.
[00:30:04]
I'm back doing what God intended me to do and come to find out when I'm not drinking and show up, I'm a decent lawyer. And people actually want to hire me from time to time. And so because of that, we've been afforded a nice living. You know, we've been afforded a nice living because of that. And, but we communicate about that. We talk to each other about what's happening. All right, rebuttal time.
All right. So when I got here, let me just say this. I didn't grow up in an alcoholic home. And like Cliff's parents, my daddy, my daddy was as old as everybody else's my age's grandfather. And so my daddy was in World War II and he was a depression kid. And so I grew up knowing, you know, we grew up saving and my daddy was very tight with money. Let's just say that. And we did stuff like rinsed off the aluminum foil and reused it.
And when we started to get sandwich baggies and you'd clean those and dry them out and reuse them and stuff like that. I mean, that's just the way we grew up. And I grew up knowing that we work. You work, you just work. You do what you gotta do. You're responsible for your own stuff. And that's just the way I grew up. And there was no waste. There was no, and unlike Cliff, who still does that, that's the last thing I'm doing.
I'm not re-rinsing a tin foil today. I'm just telling you right now, it ain't happening. But I grew up with those values and those principles of work hard and take care of yourself. You do what you gotta do, you know. And those are good. I will tell you that some of those go into the defects of character where they go to one extreme or the other, which is we don't ask for help. We don't take hand out.
Any kind of help from anybody. I mean, there was no asking for help. So, like I said, didn't grow up in an alcoholic home, didn't know anything really about AA or alcoholics or anything like that. And so when Cliff and I got together, I didn't know what was going on with him. I never saw him take a drink. I never saw him, you know, when we'd go out to eat or we were at the house, he never drank. He never got a beer.
Now, there were a couple occasions that he would drink a glass of wine if we were at my parents' house. My stepmother had learned how to make her own homemade wine and Cliff seemed to like that. And I was told it was really good. And unlike Cliff, I have never drank in my whole entire life. I mean, never. I've never drank. I've never done a drag. I've never done anything like that. I know it's shocking to the people who are AAs right now.
They're like looking at me like I'm crazy. But I just never did. And so I didn't know anything about that. I didn't know anything about alcoholism. I didn't know anything about AA. I didn't know anything about any of that. And so I never really saw him drink, but I knew there was something wrong with him because he didn't sleep for days at a time. And then he'd sleep for days at a time. And so, you know, I was trying to figure that out and I was trying to fix that.
And that started a rollercoaster ride. It just did. And as I tried to fix him and try to figure him out and try to get him help, we started having, obviously we started having problems. And, you know, I didn't know that I was codependent. I didn't know that I was enabling. I didn't know anything about that. I thought I was just helping. And when I got into this program, there's a lady in my home group and she says, helpfulness is the sunny side of control.
And I didn't know that. But I have always tried to be in control. I will just tell you, I've always tried to manage and control since I was a kid. I could manipulate. And I mean, since I was a kid, I remember my brother was six years older than me and he was my best friend when I was a little kid. We used to play football in the hallways and we used to play tag football outside. And we used to, you know, climb trees together and run around together.
And I mean, he wanted a little brother because we have two older sisters. He wanted a little brother so bad and he didn't get one. So he just tried to do the best he could with me. And, but when we used to play football, he was, he had these two helmets. One was red and one was white. And we would put on these helmets. And of course, because I was a little girl,
[00:35:00]
I always wanted one with color. So I wanted the red one. The white was just too plain and too boring. I always wanted the red one. And we always had to take turns. And sometimes I didn't like to take turns. And so I would do stuff. I mean, and I'm, we're talking little. I'm talking like three, four years old. And my brother had always kind of gotten in trouble a lot. He was always doing something. He was always pushing the boundaries.
Shockingly enough, grew up alcoholic. And so, but he, I would be my turn to have to wear the white helmet and I wouldn't want to wear the white helmet. So I mean, at three or four years old, I would start with this. If you don't let me wear the red helmet, I'm gonna tell mama you did so-and-so. I mean, nobody taught me how to do that. It just came natural. I just knew how to do it. I mean, nobody sat me down and said, okay, here, this is what you do to learn how to blackmail your brother.
I just, it's just a gift. I don't know. Just, but that, so I've been doing that stuff my whole life, way before alcohol ever entered the picture, way before Al-Anon ever even, I knew what it was. So I've always been like that. So when Cliff and I get together and I'm, and he doesn't sleep, of course I start asking questions and I start, and he tells me that he's got a sleeping disorder. And then later on we go to a counselor.
He's convinced he's bipolar. All this stuff makes sense to me, but it's not, nothing's changing. And I am trying to figure him out. And I, and he's now been put on medication. Everything is an excuse why he doesn't eat or sleep or drink or whatever is because of the medication and because of this or that. And I'm believing it. But I know there's something else going on, but I honestly have no idea what it is.
Because again, I don't see him drinking. I don't see him drinking. I don't see him doing drugs. I don't know what's going on, but I'm pretty sure something's going on. I think he's having an affair. That's what I think. And you know, I'm gonna catch him. Because that's what I like to do. I like to seek and destroy. And because I like to find out, catch him and punish him. Because it's just a thrill for me.
And so I'm waiting and watching and looking and trying to figure out what's going on so I can catch him. My deal. And you know, this goes on for a while. And you know, through a series of things, again, we're just, you know, I'm trying to figure it out. And he's right. He didn't work for three years. Now, it's not like he never ever did any work and never contributed any money at all. But it was not a lot.
It was very little and it was very sporadic. Really sporadic. And I did, I had a really good job. And you know, when people, you know, when you come to this program and people keep telling you you're an enabler, you know, for me, because I didn't know what the issue was, I didn't know that I was an enabler. I was doing what I've been taught to do, which is be responsible, take care of your staff, pay your bills, work hard, do what you gotta do.
And so it didn't really bother me that I paid all the bills. Actually, I kind of took that as a point of pride because I could handle it and I can take care of everything. And I can still, you know, I can make sure that everything's covered. And you know, when I look back on that, when I figure out how much all those bills were and all the stuff that I had to pay and my salary at the time, there's no way that I know that God wasn't involved in that because, you know, whenever something was going on and I was really worried about how I was gonna pay whatever that week or that month, there would be some contest at work where I could earn bonus money.
And I'm gonna tell you, I was in the top, I was always in the top five of my sales, but every time we had a contest, I promise you I was one or two every time. And people were like, God, you're so good at contests. What is that? How do you do that? How do you do so many sales? And I look back and it's because I was desperate. I had to have that money. That's what I know now. I didn't know that then.
I'm real competitive. I've always been real competitive and I know, but when I have to do something, I figure it out. I think, again, that's a lot of us, especially untreated alanines. We've always figured it out and we've always worked hard or figured out or been able to because we've had to. I mean, it's just, I think it's something that we really do grow up with. Even if your parents weren't like my parents, you figure it out however, whatever it is.
Whatever it is. So what happened was,
[00:40:01]
is one day we had gone to, we'd been going to a counselor. She had sent us to another doctor because she'd been sick of us. And we went to this doctor and she kind of hadn't figured out. And I didn't know that, but she did. And she had given me these pills, these tranquilizers. She had written a prescription for tranquilizers for me to give to Cliff. And she told me to give him one at six o'clock. And then if he wasn't asleep by 10, to give him another one.
And I did that. And the next morning I got up and he was asleep in the guest bedroom, our mother-in-law room on the other side of the house, which was not uncommon at this time. I mean, a lot of times he was either passed out on the couch or in this other room. And I got up that morning to wake him up. And when I went to open the door, it was barricaded shut with a love seat. And the other door was locked into the room that goes into the other room from the bathroom.
And he had never barricaded his self in before that was named. And I'm just going to tell you again, untreated Al-Anon of my type, if you're anything like me, a love seat is not going to borrow us from anything. You can get in anywhere. I mean, we are good at tracking people down and getting in anywhere. I say this all the time. I say, if there was a drunk in Fort Knox and we needed to get to him, we could.
And we can find you anywhere you are. I mean, it's not like you can hide from us. We're really good at seeking. And I always say this, if you would have told a group of untreated Al-Anon that Osama bin Laden was a drunk and his family needed him at home, there would have been no need for military action because we would have hunted him down and found him. We would have found, I promise you we could have.
It's not an issue for us. Again, I think it's a gift we're born with. But I broke in on that and that door and he was passed out in bed. And next to the bed was an empty bottle of wine and empty bottle of vodka. And on top of the adult videotapes that had ran out was this little clear package with some white substance in it. And that's when I figured out what was going on. And up until then, I really did not know.
Again, I thought he was having an affair. I knew something was going on, but alcohol and drugs were not real. It was not what I was thinking. It just wasn't what I was thinking. And I hit him as hard as I could hit another human being. He bounced out of that bed and I shook. He looked at me and he looked back at that package. He goes, I don't know. And again, another fight ensued and that's when I kicked him out of the house.
And that's when that started me on my journey. I got invited to an Al-Anon meeting and I started going to Al-Anon. And with the finances, here's kind of what happened. He's right. I had been running things, which again, that's just how I am. I've been running things the whole time. I had been taking care of everything. I've been paying the bills. He didn't really care as long as stuff got taken care of.
He didn't even care if they didn't get taken care of. That's the truth. He just didn't care. And so when we start, when I figure out what's going on, this whole thing starts happening with me, this whole cycle of things. Up until this point, it hasn't bothered me a bit. I'm real proud. I'm taking care of everything. Look how great I am, blah, blah, blah. And then I start thinking about it and I find out that how much money he's been spending on drugs and alcohol and how much over the three years, two or three years that we've been going to counseling and to doctors and how much money we've spent going to them and the medication that he was on that he didn't need, how much money we spent on that.
And I start thinking about, and I am now pissed because I'm like, all that money was just wasted because you were drunk and you didn't tell the truth. And I am livid now. Now I'm livid. Now I am livid because I've been killing myself trying to make all these payments. And now I find out there has been tons of money spent on drugs and alcohol, tons of money spent on doctor's appointments we didn't need.
I mean, I am livid. And so he's right. He started going to meetings and he didn't even ask for money for a while, but when he did, he got, he doled out about 10 bucks a day. That was for him to eat lunch and to put money in the basket. And that was it. And I was going to Al-Anon, but I hadn't got a sponsor for, I didn't get a sponsor for several months. I can't remember how long. I can't remember how long it was before I finally got a sponsor.
And in that time, you know, I'm doing all the stuff that you're not supposed to do.
[00:45:01]
You know, like, okay, well, I gave you 10 bucks this morning. Well, how much did you spend at lunch? Why didn't you just go to McDonald's? Well, how much did you put in the basket? Well, how many meetings are you going to today? Why do you need another $5 tonight for another meeting? I mean, I was doing all that. And then I was doing stuff like, which by the way, I don't suggest this at all, but I'd call his sponsor because I didn't have one.
And so, you know, I needed to know some stuff and we'd get an argument. So I'd call and tell Don, I'd report to Don while he was doing. And sometimes I questioned Don, did y'all go to meeting day? Did y'all go to lunch? Did he pay for his part? Because I need to know, because I gave him 10 bucks this morning and he's out of money. And, you know, just stuff like that. Don't do that by the way. Thank God Don was so kind to me and was really patient.
Just let me do it. And it would answer my questions, which is really crazy. Every once in a while, he'd say, have you found a sponsor yet? And I'd say, no, but I'm working on it. And then, you know, two days later, another fight would ensue and another call to Don. Anyway, so that's, you know, so that's what happened with that. You know, and it took me a long time, not a long time, but it took me a while to really trust him again, because it had been damaged and shattered.
I mean, I didn't trust him with anything or anyone or anybody. And I, you know, I questioned the crap out of him for months and then I finally got a sponsor and she told me I couldn't do that anymore. So, and I started trusting him, you know, and that's a gradual deal. I mean, you know, it's hard when you have been, when that trust has been destroyed with money or with lying and all that, but, you know, it takes a while to earn that back.
It always amazes me that when somebody gets sober and, you know, they have stolen everything from everybody in their family and they have lied about everything for years and, you know, they've hawked things and everything and then they get sober and like two weeks later, they're like, what do you mean you don't want to trust me with the checkbook? I got two weeks. I mean, it always amazes me. They think they should instantly get it all back.
And that takes time and it did. It took time for us. Now, let me just say this. Since all that has happened, he's right. We are completely transparent with money. He does ask me to buy anything and, you know, and I was the exact opposite. I never asked him about anything. I just did it. I didn't ask him about anything, which, you know, when it was little stuff, like if I'm buying a shirt or whatever, who cares?
I mean, I'm not going to ask him about that, but I was to the point that I would, you know, I'm purchasing major things for the house and never giving him a, giving it a thought and never asking him or considering him at all. And, you know, at some point I, you know, he wanted to be included in the decision-making, which I thought was a little nuts. I mean, you know, one day he wakes up and all of a sudden he like cares what brand of potato chips we're buying, which we'd been buying the same brand of potato chips for, you know, four years.
And all of a sudden you want to say, you don't like it? What do you mean you, what do you mean what kind of brand of potato chips? I mean, I'm like, what do you mean? What do you care? But he apparently he did, but he gets a say today because he's trying to be a part of, and he's doing his part and I have to allow that to happen. And so, I mean, this is no joke. I could go buy a brand new car and not say anything to him.
And he wouldn't say anything. He wouldn't care. And today I try not to do that about, I don't know, three years ago or whatever. We needed a new headboard for, it was longer than that. We needed a new headboard for our bed. And it's been a while. I mean, I don't remember how long ago, five, six years ago. And I was looking through and I was getting ready to buy one. And I thought, huh, you know, he sleeps in this bed too.
It's kind of his room. Might want to ask him if he even likes this or if he has an opinion on this. Because I was so used to not ever asking him or just doing whatever. And he never said anything. I mean, it's not like he ever came home and said, oh, you bought a new table. I mean, he never said, he just, he wouldn't say, how come you didn't ask me? He didn't say, well, what if I don't like that? He never said anything.
He just let me do whatever. So I remember taking a picture of this headboard and sending it to him and saying, okay, I was thinking about getting a new headboard. What do you think? Do you like this? Do you want a different color? Is there something you, you know? And I think he was kind of shocked that he was actually asked. And then, and you know, we had to get a coffee table not to about, I don't know, three or four years ago.
And I remember sending him the pictures for that. And we, you know, anytime that I would buy something for the house, I would say, I'd start asking him. I'd start including him because he gets his say today. I mean, he's been sober 19 years. You know, you would think probably should have done that a little sooner, but it took me a while.
[00:50:00]
But here's the other thing about that. All that money that was spent on drugs and alcohol and doctors and all that stuff and all the stuff that, you know, was going on. He has made amends for that a hundred times over. I promise you. And I could, I always never, I always could never figure out why we always ran out. We always never had any money. And when I pay bills and then I'd have a little extra and we'd put it aside.
And then all of a sudden he would need it for something. You know, that he needed something for the office and he didn't have any money down. I mean, I never could figure all that out. And when we bought this house, this is another still when we bought this house, we picked it out. This is before we were married and Cliff wanted me to look at it. We weren't even engaged yet. Maybe we were, I can't remember, but he wanted me to look at it.
And he was like, I want you to come look at these houses and I want you to help me find one. And I was like, why? I got an apartment. And he was like, well, you know, I think one day you might, we might be, you might want to look, you might live here with me. And I'm thinking, probably not. But, but I was like, okay. And so we, so we were looking at house together and we picked this house out that we have.
And, and I, and as soon as I saw it, I said, this is your house. And he said, and I said, but it's going to need a lot of work because it needed updated so bad. It was a repo from the bank and they had put this white carpet throughout, this cheap white carpet throughout the whole house. They had put like plants in the corners that had leaked. And so there was these huge stains in the corners of the carpet.
There was this ugly wallpaper in every room of the house, big old bold stripes with like, it was awful. Anyway, it doesn't matter. It was horrible. And so I said, look, this is your house, but we got to update it. We got work to do on this house. The kitchen cabinets had been painted with appliance paint, white appliance paint. So every time you just touched it, it would just, it was awful. Anyway, and he said, this is what he said, give me, he goes, okay, give me six months and you can do whatever you want.
And I was like, okay, six years later, finally, I think I finally got to start back. In the meantime, the kitchen was bothering me so bad because the kitchen is kind of like my room. I mean, it's one of my favorite rooms in the house. And I always, we're in the kitchen now. And so it was really bad. And so I had stacked back some money, went out a little at a time and I had got this guy who was a retired guy who I wanted him just to help me update the kitchen.
And he came in and he gave me a little price and we didn't do much. We put new countertops on because the appliance paint was bad and I couldn't do granite. So we did the kitchen and I think we put down a new tile. I think, and I had put some money back for that. And so, of course, I didn't ask Cliff because he was drunk. I didn't know he was drunk, but he was never available. So what happened was I paid this guy to do it and Cliff all of a sudden gets livid.
Why are you doing this? Where'd you get this money? How come you didn't tell me you had this money? Why? And I told him I've been putting it back because I was wanting to get this done. It's been way, I've been waiting for this to be done. And he's like, I don't know. I've been putting it back because I was wanting to get this done. It's been way, I've been waiting forever. And by this time we've been, you know, it's been like four years, five years in, three years in, I don't remember.
And I couldn't understand why he got so mad. And I got, I kind of updated the kitchen a little bit so I could live in it and it was okay. But he was so furious about that. And then I found out later, it's because he could have been using that money for drugs. So I didn't understand that. But since all that, he's right, we're transparent. He's a signer on my bank account. I'm a signer on his. He can look at anything that he wants to look at in my online.
He can look at my, I got no secrets today. I have no secrets about anything. You know, I used to, you know, I used to, I'd feel guilty if I went and bought a shirt or something, even though I was paying for everything, I'd get a new outfit or something. And I would do stuff like this. I would say, I would go get it. And I would go and I'd hang it in the closet. And then I'd wait a week or two and then I'd wear it.
And then he would say to me, is that a new shirt? Or is that a new jacket? Or is that a new whatever? And I would say, it's been hanging in the closet. Cause that's how I, that's what I do. I, again, I justify, manipulate. I, that's how I do. I rationalize every decision. But today I don't hide anything. He knows everything. He can see everything. You know, I can see all of his stuff. He says he does the look every once in a while he looks, just to see, he'll just ask me a question.
I think just to see if I, if I, if I, if I,
[00:55:00]
just that he knows that I know, but very rarely does he even say anything, but you know, I don't have any secrets today. I just don't, I don't care. I just, I'm not going to live like that. I'm not going to, I'm not going to live like that. And he's right. I order, I'm not, people think that I'm a big shopper. I'm not, I don't like to shop at all actually, but I'm a big buyer. Amazon is great. And I will just order stuff online and have delivered the house.
He's right. Boxes come all the time. Usually most of the stuff I think he's now figured out is usually for the house or for, you know, general purposes. Like it's not, I don't buy a ton of stuff. Just come shows up that are, you know, just clothes or shoes or whatever. Although I used to, one time, this is no joke. And I have a lot, I love Zappos. And one time Cliff was, no, I was here and the UPS man came and I walked out because I just happened to be walking out about the same time he came and he handed me a Zappos box.
And as he handed me the Zappos box, the UPS man says to me, I don't think you need another pair of shoes. That might be giving a good indication that you might be, I don't know. And then a couple of weeks after that, Cliff was outside with one of his friends and we were all getting ready to go to dinner and the UPS man shows up and his friends asked to get UPS. He goes, so what, you deliver here what, three or four times a week?
He goes, if we deliver it on Sunday, it'd be every day. So that kind of gives you an idea of what I do and how I, you know, it's gotten a little better, I will say, but he's right. When he gets financially insecure or gets a little scared or gets a little worried about money, he will say, hey honey, do you think we could like not have some boxes show up for a while? And I'm like, sure, no big deal.
Because usually it's not anything major. Usually it's, you know, and that really hasn't happened in a while. He hasn't really gotten scared in a while. But we've had those moments. I mean, we've had those times. I mean, we've had embezzlement happen at the office that was pretty major. And we've had times when we've had slow times at the office and, you know, you get worried and, but for the most part, you know, we've done pretty well and we've been really blessed.
And I think that that's just because, you know, we also have always, he's right. We've always given to the seven tradition. We've always, always done it for others. We've tried to always give back to others. I clean out my closet at least two or three times a year and I give all of my stuff away. I donate it to causes. I do stuff like that. I try to give back as much as I possibly can. If somebody needs something and they, you know, and I know that they're trying and they're doing their best.
And if they need something and they need help, we try to help. I mean, and I think that that's what we're supposed to do. We're supposed to, you know, be there in a healthy way for other people. Now, I'm not going to be giving money to drunks. I'm just going to tell you that right now. I've learned my lesson. But I do try, we do try to help other people who are trying to help themselves, who are doing what they can.
And if, you know, we give to our, if there's a, you know, if there's a fundraiser for something and it's something that we believe in and we're, you know, we feel comfortable when we do that. And I believe because that we don't, we try to do what's right every time. You know, it seems to me that God's always taking care of us in that way. And, but we do. Our financial situation has gone through the whole thing, but I trust him today and he trusts me today and we don't have any secrets.
And I think that's the biggest key. I think you've got to be transparent no matter what. I think that they, you got to talk about that stuff. If you're, if you can't talk about it and you're hiding something, it goes back to the, our secrets keep us sick. And that's the truth. So he can ask me anything he wants. If he wants, if he looks on my account and he wants to know, you know, what this is or what I bought, he, that's fine with me.
He can ask me anything he wants to, I don't care. Because again, we're transparent and we don't have any secrets today. Right on. Well, why don't we take about a 10 minute break. Did it, that'll work for you?