Multiple Speakers: Heiko and Dragon

Good evening. Welcome to the North Oakland Speaker Meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. My name's Tycho. I'm an alcoholic tonight, Secretary. Hi, Michael. Please turn off your cell phones. Please help me open the meeting with a moment of silence followed by the serenity prayer. God, grant me this serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdoms know the difference. Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength, and hope with each other that they may solve their common problems and help others to recover from alcoholism. The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. There are no dues nor fees for AA membership. We are self-supported through our own contributions. AA is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization, or institution. There is no wish to engage in any controversy that either endorses nor opposes any causes. Our primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics to achieve sobriety. All right, this is speaker meeting. I will speak for 10 minutes and then turn the meeting over to our main speaker. Dragging will share her experience, strength, and hope. Once again, I'm Heiko. I'm an alcoholic. Hi, Heiko. It's good to be here. I'm a bit nervous. It's a good day to be sober. I like being sober today. Welcome to the people that are new or the people that are coming back, the most important people in the room. this is my first I've relapsed three times and coming back to me it was without a doubt the most important thing I did and I'm glad I did that my life today would not be what it is if I hadn't made that decision a few years ago my sobriety date September 26th, 2007 I let me see right now I'm working on step 11 I just got a new sponsor, I've got a commitment here and I've yet to work with anyone, but that's something I'm looking forward to. Let me see. So I grew up here in California. I grew up in the North Bend. I'm from Wren County, rough and tumble, Larkspur. My parents are German immigrants. I got an older brother. I had, gosh, I had a pretty normal childhood. I found that things were good. We were middle class. My parents had a furniture store. I mean, they put me at work early in the furniture store when I was a kid. Besides the accents and feeling a little different, things were fun. I had a lot of friends, played baseball, sucked at basketball, you know. I pretty much enjoyed school. You know, everything was fine up until, like, around, I don't know, middle school were things. Like, right when maybe I noticed girls or something like that. Things were just, I felt a little different, you know. It was the first time in my life where I didn't quite know what was wrong with me, and I couldn't put this connection together. In retrospect, I think that's where my alcoholism first took effect. The funny thing is I didn't take a drink until I was a junior in high school, which I don't know how that wouldn't happen. I was a good kid, but I wasn't by any means a good two-shoes. I used to get in a hell of a lot of trouble. blowing up neighbors' mailboxes, setting things on fire, shooting things. Yeah. So anyways, you see, in high school, I went to a private school for a year, and then I transferred to a public school just because I felt pretty alienated. And the public school, I was just a normal kid. I played sports. I wasn't the most popular. I wasn't the biggest dork, and I didn't get put in trash cans. And, yeah, I found a little bit of camaraderie in playing water polo and baseball, and that's where I got exposed to drinking. And I remember I went to a party my junior year in high school, and I had two shots of Jose Cuervo and two Bud Watches, and it was fucking cold. It was like, it was just like I felt okay, and I felt better than okay. And I wanted to relive that experience as soon as possible. I remember thinking that, you know, and I've heard that before. And I can definitely feel that today if I really think about that memory. So for the rest of high school, I really tried to do that as much as possible. You know, I didn't blow my high school, but I definitely, my grades suffered as a result of, you know, just trying to drink every single weekend. And my expectations of myself definitely were lowered. You know, I mean, it's I my intentions were to go to the United States Naval Academy. And I ended up going to UC Santa Cruz. And that's a bit. It's a little bit of a slot. Nothing wrong with Santa Cruz. But yeah. So anyways, so I went to Santa Cruz, went there a couple of years. I dropped out quickly. I started drinking a shitload and I got on the drugs. You know, I started doing blow and I started doing a lot of amphetamines. And, yeah, drugs are part of my story, like almost everyone else today. So, yeah, so I've managed to fail my way out of Santa Cruz and I just kind of drifted along for a while. I moved to San Francisco. Funny thing is I've never, it's odd, I'm 34 years old and I've never lived that mistake. That's kind of funny, but it is what it is. So I moved to San Francisco, and I worked small jobs. I worked for my parents for a bit. I worked for Macy's. I sold women's shoes, as a matter of fact, for a couple years. And, yeah, not the worst job, definitely far from the best. There's no perks for selling women's shoes, by the way. So, anyway, that's where I really had my first bottom line. I was living in South Market in the city, and I was doing a lot of amphetamines. My life was just, it was completely chaotic. And I ended up, I got, I don't know, I think I just left at home one day, and I was at my brother's birthday at his house, and my parents, they had an intervention for me. And at the time, I was pretty convinced that I just needed to go back to college, you know, to get my life on track. And they thought that, you know, I needed help. And in my family, my family is very, I mean, we're very Euros. And it's just like, and talking about rehab or like doing anything that you see on TV or American or it's not, it's not really part of my family. So this is the whole intervention thing was kind of odd looking back upon it. But they offered me, they offered me an out and, and I took it and thank fucking God I took it. It was, it was great. I went to Serenity Knowles in Marin County and I stayed up there for three months. And like going to rehab was one of the best times I've ever had in my life. I heard someone say that at a meeting in rehab and I thought that was funny and fucking true. I had a blast out there. It was really nice. And it wasn't because it was posh or anything like that. I really love the people. I love the atmosphere. I love being sober and I love getting to know myself. And it was great. So I got out of rehab, got in the relationship way too fast. I wouldn't recommend that in retrospect, but it is what it is. And then I kind of went through this period over the next couple years where I would be involved in AA, but not quite. I'd be on the periphery. I'd go to meetings, but I'd have a sponsor, and I wouldn't quite be working the steps. I moved over here to Oakland. I was working at a really high-stress job. I was working on the Pacific Stock Exchange while it was slowly becoming an unentity. And I was dry at the time, and I was miserable. And the funny thing is I complained there was no meetings around there. And it's funny because I got to Dynamics. And, like, Dynamics is, like, it's a block away from where I used to live. And I don't know how I was complaining there was no meetings there. But so, yeah, and the thing is, like, by not working the steps and barely going to meetings or not going to meetings after a certain amount of time, I go out, and I did it again and again and again. so I did it in Oakland I did it up north because I moved after there I moved to Marin County and then I went to Santa Rosa Junior College so and then I would decide I'd have this crash and burn and then I would get my shit together and stay sober for a bit so anyways I went up to Santa Rosa I went to JUCO decided to get my life in order and go into college and did that for a few years but eventually I worked my ass off and I got here and I got into Cal. And then this time I was back drinking again. I thought I had it all sorted out. I was here at Cal. I was in the pretty fantastic major. I thought I had my life in order. Two dogs. I had a good girlfriend. And slowly things started to unravel. My relationships started to unravel. And I didn't see any of this as a consequence of my drinking. But it definitely was. I need to speed this up. All right. So the relationship fell apart. and I didn't have any sort of anything, any backbone to fall apart on. And I spent the next like seven months just crashing and burning. And one day I went out with some friends and I had a few drinks, not that many, and I just lost it. I ended up calling an old sponsor at 4.30 in the morning and said, Pat, what do I do? And he said, just go to a meeting. I went to a meeting, I don't know, Berkeley Fellowship, probably eight or nine the next morning. I haven't had a drink since. And I guess I've been serious this time. I, um, it's been good right now. I feel like I've got a community here. I know a lot of people are in and that's fantastic. I've never had this before. I've never been plugged in before. I've never been actively working the steps like I am before. I just got a new sponsor recently and I'm actually working a 10 step every single night, which is, which is different. And I haven't seen any of the results so far. I don't think that being said, I haven't seen them. I'm the worst at seeing any of the results in my life. I'm terrible at it. I really am. Other people always see these things before me. I've got a lot of problems right now. I've got a lot of health issues right now that I'm going through. And I'm going through them. And fuck, I don't know how the hell I'm going to do this or I'm going to figure it out, you know. But I know that I'm going to stick around here and I'm going to give it a shot here. I see other people recover here and, God damn, it gives me hope. And that's really why I came here to begin with. It's because I saw other people recover. And I want that too. and right now, you know, this is the first time I live, I want to help other people do the same and it's really good to be here. I love AA. I love a lot of the people in this room. Especially the people that are new here. Just give this a shot Give it an honest shot Anyways thank you so much for asking me to speak and good night Alright. Put this here because I'm honestly not feeling too well. Anyway, my name is Dragon, and I'm an alcoholic. Hi! And thank you so much for warming them up. So I'm an alcoholic. I'm from the Bay Area. I grew up in San Francisco, born and raised. Got sober in San Francisco in June of 1990. And a lot has happened since then. Okay, so we'll start with the experience. How about that? So let's see. I started drinking when I was about 12. My family, just to give a little background, my family, they were sort of hippies. They were sort of, they didn't do that right. They weren't really part of even the hippie thing. They were just their own little thing. There was lots of drugs in my house. and isolated and angry and tense. And I was a very isolated kid. I was very afraid of my mom. She was a rager. So my youth was characterized by, you know, really not fitting in, not knowing what was going on. And the alcoholic part of it is that I thought I needed to, and so I would just fake it instead of admitting that I didn't know what was going on. That started from my first day in school. I just started faking like I knew what was going on. And thus I never learned anything and it just sort of perpetuated itself. So, yeah, so socializing has always been a challenge. I guess I got kind of good at it because there are so many people in this room that I just, I love the pieces, you know, that friends that have collected over the years. Anyway, so back to when I was seven. No, anyway, so my family was crazy, and I was an abused kid, and I was kind of managing, you know, I managed to kind of muddle through, and I was just sort of starting to get the hang of it. my father uh right around the time my father discovered coke he was he's kind of a pothead and then he turned into he got wrapped up in that 80s coke thing and uh got really uh inappropriate my sister and i uh no money lies evil crazy yuck you know got really bad at home and uh I couldn't handle it. Uh, especially the, the sexual stuff was just, it fucking killed me. I couldn't deal. And, uh, um, you know, I already felt isolated from everybody, but when that happened, it was like the world's really, I remember being on the bus and some kids were talking about their early sexual experiences, you know, like with their cute little boyfriends or whatever. And I wanted to join in. I was like, I can't talk about this shit in the world. Just, I remember feeling like the world just shrink away from me. Um, so anyway, that, I, I don't, I bring that up because it, it really was the boom, the thing that really set me off, uh, on my crazy little alcoholic adventure in life. Um, up until that point, I was a really good kid. I cared about stuff. I was, you know, goody two shoes. I, I really was, you know, kind of really, I cared about stuff and was really earnest. Um, but at that point, suddenly the bad boys that were playing ACDC and cutting class, glass and smoking cigarettes and drinking whatever and smoke, you know, whatever, doing whatever the little rocker kids did back then. Um, they were just, I had to have it, you know, and, uh, had to, had to be part of that and, uh, never quite made it all the way to the really cool kids, but I found my own little crew, my own little ragtag crew of, uh, wannabe cool kids. And, uh, you know, we did all the same shit and probably other people were thinking, We were cold, so who knows. Anyway, lots of eyeliner. He's talking about that. So my first drunk was, for me, it was the closest thing I'd ever had, you know, at that point at 12, to spiritual experience. Because up until that point, my life was, I was an anxious mess. You know, I was afraid of everything. And I took the alcohol in and suddenly my heart opened up and I was laughing and I was happy and I felt okay. And, you know, I knew I was going to get in trouble and I just didn't, I couldn't care about it. You know, I just was like, oh, this is great. You know, I was stumbling around. And the only reason that that first time I didn't do what I did every other time I drank, which was black out and throw up and, you know, probably, you know, do a whole bunch of other stuff. was because there wasn't enough. It was just this little jar. Also, my thinking about drinking that very first time, I had never drank before, was that that little thing was not enough. I knew there were like 10 of us, and they were passing this jar in. And even though it was enough to get me drunk, I always had this volume issue. If I didn't have a bottle, I was afraid from the very start. So anyway, so it was the thing that I wanted to do whenever I got a chance. And I didn't get a chance that often. I was still kind of a good kid and afraid of my mom and et cetera, et cetera. They didn't have booze at home for me to steal. So I was an opportunistic drunk. You know, I depended on my bad friends to get me loaded, and I played bad friends. But anyway, so I'm in junior high, you know, so cut class a little bit, got drunk when I could, threw up every time I drank, you know, made a mess of this one poor kid. This nice girl invited us all over and my bad friend who, you know, provided this bottle of rum and I can I just proceeded to slam it five minutes after getting there blacked out. I don't remember anything. All the other kids tore this girl's house apart. She was just a nice little girl. We just wrecked her house. A door was taken off the hinges, and everybody's coats had my vomit all over it. It was awful. So it started a pattern. And anyway, by the time I got into high school, I was already trying to quit. um my mom you know who i like i really was kind of ruled by trying to not get her attention in a negative way she was really she was a rager and she was scary and uh i hated it when she yelled at me and she was starting to yell at me because uh you know we had the two teams in my house and i was supposed to stay on her team and the good team that my my sister and my dad were the fuck cuffs and that was okay. And when I started kind of going over that side, she came down on me like a ton of bricks. They got away with everything. And I was just like, she just, anyway, so I started to try and quit. And already I was having a hard time. It really wasn't, I didn't want to, you know, for one thing. And then, um, it was doing something for me that I didn't have a replacement. But I did eventually manage to stop, and then I was in high school. I was a non-drinker. I did not drink, and I was very ugh about it. I just threw all that alcoholic energy into school. I didn't have any friends, really. I think I had a boyfriend, and that was about it. It was a total pain in his ass. but um but uh so i would i would go to school i'd go home do homework go to bed you know it was just that was it that was my life through high school mostly um and i was a cranky miserable anxious mess and uh so so the point of that is is that i'd already become um dependent on alcohol for my social life that was the only way i knew how to be around other people really by the time I was getting ready to graduate my mom would rather see me drunk than how I was I was like a fucking wreck I was crying all the time because I got all stressed out about school and she started if I turned 18 she gave me the nod and I just started drinking again I don't think the words ever left in her mouth but like it came up it kind of gave me the nod and I started drinking again and it was like the school worked And then the fun went up again, and the vomit, of course, followed. I think I had a little bit of fun when I started up again that time. Anyway, so during that time, I wasn't drinking. I earned myself a scholarship to some kind of high-power college. That entire summer before I went there, my family was imploding. There was no money at all. I got this stupid job to buy my fucking plane fare so I could go to college. And I just drank the entire summer with these. I had a couple of friends. I met these people. I was vending on the street. And I met these homeless drag queens. Me and my sister would hang out with them. And we kind of, we would drink with them. And we even spent the night at their house, you know, under the playground. They taught us how to scam churches. My sister put a pillow under her. So I went. and then I went to this high-powered, like, kind of semi-Ivy League-ish kind of college, and by that, my personality had changed a lot by that time, you know, I was a lot, I was kind of ragged, you know, and I got there, and I wanted, I was still in party mode, you know, and all these people are like, yeah, I'm here trying to get an education, you know, I couldn't figure out why none of the men wanted anything to do with me, I was very, it was a hard time. Anyway, no self-esteem, just totally, utterly destroyed. And I drank for the first semester. By the second semester, I was trying to quit again. I had this, I came home for winter break for New Year's. I went and hung out with one of my friends, had a six-pack before the party. By the time I got to the party, I was almost blacked out. and then suddenly it the next morning and I wearing somebody else clothes And I thinking to myself hmm I must have had a good time And what I found out later happened was that I had gotten very intimate with a quote ugly old biker guy at the party In the back, he'd taken me off into some back room and the party got busted. And if the police hadn't come, I was going to get left with the old ugly buggery guy. So thank God the party got busted. I had this vague memory of this really handsome guy rescuing me from the room or something. I thought I had slept with him now. So I don't, to this day, I have no idea what happened that night. It scared the hell out of me because at that point in my life, that wasn't a regular occurrence. You know, later on, it was just an oh, OK, you know, whatever. I guess this is what I'm doing now. But at that point in my life, that was scary. So I quit again. And then I went insane. I was in college, in this like high-powered college. I didn't know why the hell I was there anymore. I wasn't drinking. I didn't know how to deal with any of these, you know, snooty kids. and I just kind of went crazy. I started having all these, like, I was, like, living half in fantasy land, and I don't know what that was. I don't know whether that had to do with alcohol or what, but I got loopy. And so when the semester, when the first year was over and I came home for the summer, got a little job and just decided not to go back, I thought, school's making me crazy. I'm not going to do it anymore. so anyway so my drinking I did this either I was drinking and having fun or I was like I was dry kind of all business except for that college I couldn't get into it but I came back here not drinking just worked and never spent any money I just worked got all crabby and mean again and miserable and empty My life felt completely bankrupt when I wasn't drinking. And when I was drinking, it was a mess. I would do things that were really not good for me. And just sort of fling myself out into the world. and meet these... I would always run into these crazy, semi-homeless young people, and we would go and hang out over here. It was just sort of like this free-flow adventure. Anyway, so that's how I drank. A lot of sexual acting out. That was ultimately the thing that made me want to stop drinking. because I had the history of my dad and I had remembered it, you know, right before I went to college, I think, you know, I was kind of processing that and then drinking and acting it out again and feeling horrible about myself and what is wrong with me and all this agonizing and hell-bent on destruction. I just, I don't know, you know, it was crazy behavior. It was a rough time. I mean, I look back on it and it was just like, God, it took so much work to make myself so miserable. And so burning through group of friends after group of friends with really horrible behavior and drinking patterns. And until I was 22, I kind of burned through all my lower companions, all the homeless, IV drug-using runaways were shunning me. Or at least I felt, you know, I didn't have the self-esteem to show up around them anymore. Oh, and, yeah, I had this boss. I was cleaning rich people toilets with this lady, and she had quit drinking and using drugs, you know, 12 years ahead and had gone to AA for a little while, so she was talking me up. It was the 80s, you know, it was late 80s, early 90s, so everybody was doing recovery, and there was John Bradshaw, the whole section of the bookstore on self-help and how to, you know, purge all that stuff and um so i started doing all that crap and it just made my drinking worse but uh i didn't connect the two up i really i didn't see the connection and so and one day you know and then it got to where my drinking got so bad dredging all the stuff up that my boss was like uh you know you really you know something's weird you know normal people don't go into a weekend say oh i'm gonna stay home and clean the house and you know maybe do the chill out and then come in on Monday morning and say, I went to this ranger and I blacked out. You know, I would tell her everything. I didn't have any shame as far as that. And she said, that's not normal. And I'd be like, really? I think so. And finally, finally, this I'm going to get sober now. Finally, it was 1990. It was June. It was the Hay Street Fair. My mom lived right there. and I was there, and I was ready to have a fun time, and I went and bought a little six-pack or something, and I was really kind of felt weird about it because I didn't, I wasn't in the habit of buying my own liquor, so that was kind of, that felt weird anyway because I had this, I had like kind of a little bit of recovery stuff in my head, and for some reason, like buying my own booze felt like being a real alcoholic, and then I couldn't get anyone to drink with me. I kept running into people. I had this one, there was this one guy who we, during this last period of my drinking, when we were both like, I guess, trying to quit. And so it was either I would not be drinking at the party and he'd be drinking and I'd shame him or he would do it, you know. I wouldn't be, I would be drinking and he wouldn't be drinking. He'd shame me. We sort of took turns for a little while and it was just his turn again. and it was just like I just I don't know it just just seems stupid all of a sudden I know I just felt utterly pathetic you know and uh so some and there was one more thing one more little worm in my brain that got me here and it was that uh there was this there was this there's this um very arrogant uh guy from my high school a little punk rock guy he's like a real super cool guy who had gotten sober a long time ago. I think Tracy knew. And so some of my bike messenger roommates told me that he would talk your ear off about AA and stuff. And so I was like, ooh, I got an in with this guy I'm obsessed with from high school. And so I ran into him that day at the history fair and said, I think I'm an alcoholic. And instead of doing what he was supposed to do, like take me under his wing and take me to my first meeting and introduce me to all his hot friends and all that shit. He was supposed to do that, but he just said, oh, good for you. I'm going to go get a sandwich. And he blew me off. and he saved my life because um because i took things like that as an invitation to start chasing so um i was like i'm going to a day i'm gonna let this dude down and all his friends and do what i know how to do and ruin everything and uh i called a i called a that night trying to get um the listing for a young people's meeting so I could start stalking this stupid. And the guy on the AA hotline, he said, well, you know what? There's a woman's meeting tomorrow night right around the corner from where you live. Why don't you go there? And I was like, there are women's meetings. But I went, and I figured I'd pick up a meeting schedule and chase him down. and what happened was is that I walked into this this AA meeting after having done some of the other 12-step meetings and kind of knowing the routine and had the expectation that it'd be just the same and sat down and was surveyed and um well the first thing that struck me is that you guys were actually interacting with one another like you actually liked each other there were people laughing and enjoying each other like there was there was actual fellowship here which I hadn't experience in any of the other programs I've gone to. The second thing that I noticed is that when I raised my hand as a newcomer, which, you know, was again, I know what I'm doing. I didn't even think I was an alcoholic at this point, but I raised my hand and everybody in the room turned around, looked at me, smiled at me and was like, welcome. And I just started crying. And then And the third thing that happened at that first meeting was that it was very animated, you know, kind of, she was a little toughy. You know, she was up front telling her story. And she was saying that she felt just as clueless and vulnerable and lame as I did when she was out there in the world. And I didn't think that was possible. I didn't think anyone else felt that way. I really thought I was the only faker in the world. and to hear it come out. So I didn't get it right then, but it put a chink in it. The fourth thing that happened was, the fourth thing about that first meeting, there was a lot of really cool young women with Mohawks and who looked like they'd be really fun to hang out with, and they were. So I kept coming to that meeting, and then I learned that there was another one. The other, you know, there were two meetings, one Monday, one Tuesday, and they were kind of similar. So I started going to those two and then, you know, I just kept leaping. So like I said, I was 22 years old. I was, the plan was to, you know, lay off for a month or a year or whatever and get my life under control again and whatever. And I think I verbalized that. It's kind of funny. You hear it. You get in here. You live a little bit. You hear it come out of somebody else's mouth. and you're just like, oh, no. So anyway, so a lot happened. That was like 19 years ago. And I've grown a lot in this program. And I can't think of any of it right now. No. Yeah I got into So the first phase of my sobriety was learning how to talk to people again learning how to go out and have fun again Because my only experience in not drinking was severe boredom and isolation and misery And I remember my first meetings kind of stealing myself for that. Okay, here we go. And then what happened was that I started hanging out with these cute punk rock hair dude girls. And we went out dancing almost every night. And we went all over the place. We had just like the best time. We'd laugh. We went on a road trip and hassled perverts. And it was just a fun time. We did. I don't even want to tell the story. It's too gross. But these girls were wild, man. And it was just what I needed to keep my, you know, I was just like, this is great. I didn't get really get my my first step until I was about nine months in I had been hanging out with these cool chicks blah blah blah you know just sort of going to meetings going through the motions doing what I was supposed to do and then I almost drank I was with one of my little sober buddies and we were hanging out with this whole circle of like even tougher cooler more mohockey girls and they all had a they all had a beer you know They were hardcore, and I was like, yeah, I want this, you know. And I wanted nothing more than my friend to go away so I could drink and join this, you know, elusive little club. And I got through it. I didn't drink. My friend didn't leave. And then I went to a meeting and shared about it the way you're supposed to. You know, my friends, like, okay, so we were dancing, you know, and having a great time, but they were telling me that the program, they were giving me little chunks, little bits and chunks of, like, what it meant to be sober, what you needed to do to be sober. And one of those little tidbits was if you almost drink, you talk about it. So I just raised my little hand. It was just like that first meeting. I'm just going through the motions, not expecting anything. And I said, I almost drank. And then this sorrow from the depths of my soul came up. And I was just so terrified about what I'd almost done. I almost gave it up. pretty much the greatest thing that had ever happened to me. I never felt, you know, it took a little while. I mean, my self-esteem was so damaged when I got here, but just those early friendships were probably the best relationships I had ever had in my entire life being in here because I was allowed for the first time in my life to be me, to really tell the truth and just be who I was, even though I was trying to be cool still. Anyway, so about nine months in, I really joined the program. I started, you know, being a little more willing to do, you know, the things like take on coffee commitments and all those things that almost got me drunk because I was wired so fucking tight. But customer service was not a strong point for me in my early days. When I get scared, I get angry. You ask me to do something, and I don't think I know how to do it. I just get mad at you. So it's something I've learned in the last, I finally figured out, like, probably eight years ago. Anyway. so let's see what else oh well okay so that dad that you know it's his fault that I'm an alcoholic all that crap it's not his fault you know of course I was an alcoholic to begin with if it wasn't for him I might have like I might have like been a scientist or something and just had like just sort of tiptoed into alcoholism and I might still be drinking right now you know I was like thanks to all that drama from my childhood, my alcoholism was fucking gross, you know, and I couldn't live like that. And I got to get sober. You know, I don't know. I don't know what my life would have been like without that. Also, my dad was one of us, you know, he was just one of us and he didn't get to get sober. And I remember when, you know, it was through the process of, you know, after doing, you know, five, four or five and get into some, uh, self-acceptance and, and, uh, forgiving myself a little bit for my faults. It's like, you know, how could I be mad at him for, you know, being, being screwed up? I mean, I don't even know, I don't know what he went through when he was a kid that led him to do what he was doing. And, um, anyway, so I had, I got to the point where I could forgive my father. I made amends for the reaction to what happened, you know, what he did to me. Because the reaction was, I ceased to recognize his rights as a human being. I wouldn't listen to him anymore, no respect, locked him out, you know, stuff like that. A lot of that he earned, but it hurt me. You know, I locked him out of my heart. And then all that bullshit behavior I was doing drunk was trying to get him back. You know, through the backwards, you know, looking for love in all the wrong places, that kind of deal. Well, I was trying to get, I was trying to reopen my heart to my dad, really, is what it was. I was trying to change what had happened in the, I don't know, it doesn't make any sense when I say it. But I was trying to work out stuff, and what happened when I was able to see him as a fellow sick and suffering alcoholic, I forgave him my heart opened up, I got my dad back I got the same sick fucker of a dad back but I got him back and there was a lot about him that was so beautiful and that I loved so much and I got to love that part of him even though he was still very sick he passed away, he was my buddy you know, like I I got to connect with him before he went away I got to show up and be an adult like the only one in the family. I was the only one that had a driver's license, so I'd take him to his appointments and stuff. And I think that's really been very profound. Also, I've always struggled with relationships with people. Other human beings have always been very difficult for me, and I've learned how to have friends in the program. I've learned how to work things out with people. I've learned how to take care of myself well enough that I can have other people in my life because that's a lot of what I didn't do. I would hide and contort to fit in and all this kind of stuff. And what happened was that this wasn't satisfying and then I blamed you for it and I didn't want anyone in my life. And when I learned how to, you know, take care of this, this is the one, this is the body I've been put in charge of. You know, this is the one I'm responsible for. And be honest, I found that people wanted to be around me more. You know, I'm better quality people. And I've got so many people in my life that I love, including my husband. Imagine that. So anyway, every step that I've taken in this program, every one of them, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, each and every one of them, I've taken not believing in it, not really, like, grudgingly, not until I'm forced by extreme pain. I just kind of went through the motions and then was just floored by the results. Things started shifting in my life. You know, I would almost get immediate relief in some areas. You know, some was harder. But every time I kind of submitted to the truth, submitted to the steps, and just worked them, it's been really a miraculous process. and so even if you don't believe in them try them you don't really have anything to lose I remember when I first got in here it felt like if I did those steps it was going to kill me if I took a commitment I was going to die it was going to be horrible and I don't know why I don't know where that came from anyway so submit it's okay it's really safe and then you know so I struggled with really not only do I have like a like a best you know like a crew of friends a room full of friends here a room full of friends um in Rochester where I'm living right now I have a husband that I love that I can I can be a good wife to that I can be I can be an adult in a relationship. I can be part of a partnership. I've got a great best friend that I just love the pieces. I can be a house guest and not be a panty ass. Those are our opening. You know, people are happy to see me. And, you know, going from that to the person that the, you know, runaway IV drug using, you know, rouseabouts didn't want to have run. That's a big deal, you know. I've been I've had big grown-up jobs it's just I can't I can't sell the program enough and I went and I and I do I like he was saying I just love to share it it's like I do the 12-step because it's a pleasure mostly you know and I love watching people get sober I like I like watching people come in and just be just so trapped in that old stuff and just bloom and become really great people. And then they turn around and save my butt. And the other thing is that a lot of people get really like, you know, you've got to reach out to the newcomer, you know, get them by the neck and pull them stuff down their throat. You know, follow them around and make sure, you know, it's like for me. For me, like, service is, when I'm having a hard time, service is admitting it and being sober and being vulnerable, you know, or when I'm not, you know, saying hi to people and checking in and paying attention to who's standing by themselves and stuff like that. Little things, being here, keeping showing up. You couldn't get me to stop going to meetings. Anyway, I'm going over, so I'm not going to keep talking, but thank you so much for letting me share. Thank you.