Category Archives: Alcoholism

September 9, 2025 · 6:00 am

HOW IT WORKS – if you work it

The point of the 12 Steps is ego deflation. Granted, ego’s a necessary part of the psyche that aims to get our needs met. We couldn’t survive without it.

But what if ego runs our lives? “Selfishness — self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles” (62). Ego distorts our outlook so that we base all our decisions on flawed thinking. We make a mess of relationships, and often finances, driving, and the law as well. Then our daily lives become so riddled with tension, guilt, worry, and hurt feelings that we reach for booze or some other mental oil slick to blur our troubles so we can slide past them and just not care – for a little while.

When I came to AA 30 years ago, I felt damn sure there was nothing wrong with my thinking. I dismissed the 12 Steps at a glance as nicey-nice instructional platitudes; that is, simplistic admonitions with way too much “God” in them. Nothing was wrong with my beliefs about who I was in the world. I just needed a little help moderating my drinking. 

Humility opens the door to freedom. Bill W., Dr. Bob, and the first 100 discovered humility’s portal to peace and alignment that empowers us to live differently. Ego shrinkage allows guidance from a higher power to shine into our thinking and influence how we navigate from minute to minute, as well as how we regard fellow beings. Life seems to change drastically, but what really happens is we gain a compass.

My best thinking and efforts brought me utter misery, but the 12 steps have transformed me into a person I like and respect.

 

Almost every AA meeting opens with a reading of “How it Works.” Perhaps you’ve wondered why everybody sits there while the same words are read, meeting after meeting. The reason for this is two-fold. 1) Time spent in passive listening is as close to meditation as a lot of us are going to get; 2) emphasizing the need for rigorous honesty, the text sets up the 12 steps for spiritual progress, followed by the leak-proof logic of the A, B, Cs: neither we nor any other human can solve our problem, but a higher power can, if we seek it.

Now we arrive at Step 3: Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of god as we understood god. This means our ego has to abdicate the director’s chair. We have to accept that we’re neither the script writer, nor the director, nor the star of life. We have no clue what’s best for us or others.

WAIT, WAIT!! Our ego insists it DOES knows what’s best for all concerned. I can remember reaching this step and objecting, “I barely have any contact with this god thing! How the heck am I supposed to turn my whole freaking life over to it?” This is where key phrases like “Good Orderly Direction (GOD),” “next right thing,” and “still small voice” come in. So does that great Al-Anon directive, “Don’t just DO something; SIT there!”

Among the greatest tools sobriety has given me is the PAUSE. While pausing, we try to calm down and connect, however faintly, to something beyond our initial impulses. Is ego masquerading as care for others while actually intent on grabbing what we think we need? “Is he not really a self-seeker, even when trying to be kind?”

I can confidently declare that most people, whether addicted to substances or to some other coping mechanism, are so accustomed to living in fear that we’re not even aware fear is driving our choices. Like an emotional tinnitus, fear of losing or not getting Thing X nags at us so constantly, we don’t consciously register it.

Ego is not so much about bragging and grandiosity as it is about “a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity.” We’ve all had some painful stuff go down, and based on that ego projects a hostile world from which I “can wrest satisfaction and happiness… if [I] only manage well.” But if I don’t manage well, fear says, I’m gonna be screwed again.

Here are a couple of fundamental truths that no amount of “wresting” can overcome:

1) We can never know how another person perceives a situation because we haven’t lived their life; 

2) therefore, other people are always gonna do what they’re gonna do for reasons we can’t know.

3) We can choose only what WE think and do.

The 4th Step .

If we refuse to write a 4th step or keep postponing it for no good reason, we clearly have not taken Step 3. Go back to “Rarely” and start over. And if we think there’s no need to write one, we’re withholding from Step 1.

We write a 4th step as grist for a 5th step process which will, with the guidance of a good sponsor, unveil ego in all the choices that have steered our adult lives off-course. The first 2 columns are easy; we get to name all the people and institutions we resent and list all the stuff they’ve done to hurt us or piss us off.

Childhood. One exception to any 4th column inquiry is harm we suffered as children. Our kid selves certainly did not set those “trains of circumstances” in motion; our parents did. The unfortunate fact is, Nature neglected a ‘got your shit together’ prerequisite for eggs and sperm to be viable. No training course exists, no bar exam before any random person can take responsibility for a budding life. Thus, everywhere are wounded people who in turn inflict wounds on their children. “Pain travels through families until someone is ready to feel it.” (Stephi Wagner)

I didn’t fully understand this until I gave birth myself. Having worked the steps, I did my best to break the chain of family dysfunction. Every time I pushed myself to be extra honest and open and respectful with my boy — rather than trying to seem powerful and confident — I threw light on how my parents couldn’t or wouldn’t do the same for me.

THE COLUMNS. The more honest we can be in our columns, the more growth we’ll harvest from our 5th step. In column 2, we have to get down to what really bothered us, no matter how petty or elusive. In column 3, we have to really FEEL what the situation threatened.

  • Security — our basic sense that we’ll be okay, not just a roof and food, but well-being
  • Self-esteem — how we see ourselves
  • Personal relations — how we think people in our social / professional circles view us
  • Sex relations — how we feel and think others perceive us relative to romance and sex
  • Ambition — who we want to become or what we want to achieve
  • Pocketbook — finances

That last one isn’t on page 65, but I was taught to include it.

I myself (Louisa) created 2 extra columns that sponsees from decades back still tell me opened their eyes more than anything else in the inventory to what was really at stake for them. These ain’t in the Big Book, but they might help you.

Column 3.5 — Name the Diss

In this column, we try to put into words what the person’s actions seem to be saying to us, or what we take them to mean about us. If someone lies to us, not only do they affect almost every category above, but the diss is: “You’re gullible and easily manipulated.” Maybe it’s”You’re stupid,” or maybe “You’re not worthy of my honesty.” If someone interferes with our romantic desires, they might be saying, “I’m hot/ beautiful-handsome/ interesting — and you’re NOT!” Someone who fires you says, “You’re incompetent.” Someone who ghosts in friendship says, “You’re not worth my time.” A big one for me, having grown up in a dysfunctional family, was, “You’re not quite worthy of my love.”

Column 3.5 is the best way I know to get at the core of what hurts. It’s far from accurate regarding the other person’s actual motives; what it’s trying to pinpoint is the voice of ego. As we sense the inaccuracy of the diss, we start to distinguish our higher self from ego — a lifelong process.

A standard 4th Column attempts to turn the tables, to reveal how we were selfish, self-seeking (indirectly manipulative), dishonest, and frightened. It’s the key to liberation.

Again, for my sponsees, I added another column:

Column 4.5 — What The Other Person Should Have Done

Reading this extra column often brings laughter or tears, depending on how much of our ego or genuine heart is invested in our expectations. “They should have seen how awesome I am and hired / fallen in love with / chosen me!” We can laugh about these. But what about “They should have honored our relationship.” In this type of Should Have, we’re often led to an unexpected “Dishonest” notation in the standard 4th Column.

Often, we sensed somewhere in our core that this person lacked the integrity, emotional maturity, or wisdom to do the right thing, and yet we masked our intuition with unrealistic hope. We tried to will them to be who we WISHED they were — but weren’t. And how can we be angry with someone for simply not having qualities that, deep down, they too wish they had? These people just plain aren’t there yet. Maybe they never will be (sick man prayer time). So instead of lasting resentments, they become…

Teachers!

When we experience first-hand the pain inflicted by another’s lack of integrity, emotional maturity, or wisdom, we understand why these qualities are so essential to living an honorable life. We gain a better sense of who we do NOT want to be, and thus a better sense of how to live.

A good sponsor will work with this material in hearing your 5th step, and help you see the truth about yourself — that you are a loving, vulnerable, often frightened child of god who has been unwittingly either sticking their foot into power lawnmowers or letting their foot rest in the wrong people’s lawnmower path, even though you’ve seen they won’t swerve. We learn how to move our feet away from what hurts us and stand tall with our face raised to the sunlight of the spirit.

As for how we hurt others — that’s the grist for Steps 8 & 9.

.

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April 9, 2025 · 6:00 am

Struck Sober – part of my story

What follows is an excerpt from my Near-Death Experience (NDE) memoir, Die-Hard Atheist: from NDE-Denier to Full-on Woo-Woo. The year is 1994, twelve years after my NDE, which I’ve long since dismissed as nothing but a hallucination. I’m 34 and living as a reckless pseudo-nihilist.

.

This one particular night begins like countless others. I go to a kegger near downtown Olympia, a ton of young people, loud music. The cool boy was there, I’m told, but he left. Shit! He might come back, though, so I drink.

I fall down multiple times. There’s a goddamn step somewhere in the middle of the basement, where the keg’s at, that keeps tripping me. Each time I’m going down, I hear that chorused “Whoa!” from everybody nearby – as if it matters whether one’s body is vertical or horizontal. People make such a big deal.

Now it’s late. My friends Megan and what’s-their-name get in my car and drive me to a house one or two blocks up the street, where they put me in someone’s bedroom. I’m supposed to sleep there on some stranger’s bed. Driving’s what I’m not supposed to do – they’ve taken my keys. No, no, no driving, Louisa! You’re so shitfaced you can’t even walk!  But as soon as they leave, I decide, fuck this. I get up and stagger my way to the stranger’s kitchen, where they’ve foolishly left my keys right there on the table.

Ha! Tell me what to do!                               

In the car, I’m able to figure out which key is the one but not able to find the thing. I stab again and again at the steering wheel shaft, but the goddam ignition is nowhere. It’s AWOL. I feel with my fingertips for about ten hours because it’s too dark to see and my eyes won’t focus anyway. Finally I get it and the engine starts. Yes! I’m such a rebel! No pleasure but meanness – I just don’t friggin’ care. I might die. That’s fine. I’m so fucking tired of everything.

I’m speeding down the two-lane highway that winds into Thurston County, 80 mph in a 50-mph zone. Smack into a tree – that would be best. First prize is a Get-Out-of-Everything-Free card, and second prize I end up just crippled with brain damage. Finally no one will expect me to do stuff or be likable. “Such a shame,” they’ll say, “she had potential” – but at least they won’t expect me to function. My parents – well, they have three other kids, right?

What’s this? Here come reflectors for a skinny bridge over some railroad tracks. I see the diagonal black and white stripes, but they’re tripled or so, so they blur across the whole goddam road. I just kind of shoot for the middle, sort of like bowling.

Whoosh! It’s behind me!

A few minutes later, I roll into my driveway and marvel at my drunk driving skills, how I’ve made it home alive. The night is clear, the sky starry. I slop out of the car and, hanging onto the open door, look up, thinking: “Damn, I’m a bad-ass!”

But something hits me, hits my brain, my mental arena. ZAP!!! It’s like a voltage shot into my consciousness, a bolt of intention powerful enough to blitz everything else from my head:

This is the last time I can help you!  And you DO know right from wrong!

The blast of this knowing – out of nowhere – astounds me. It’s like getting struck by lightning, but the lightning is thought. It seemed like it came from that starry sky, so admonishing it’s as if somebody meant to physically slap my face: Wake up!

I feel shaken, bowled over, my billowing ego punctured.

I wonder in a sliver of thought: Is that God?  Is it you who were with me in the light?

The next morning, I find the kitchen a mess and can’t say how it got like that. A carton of milk – mine, not my roommate’s – is sitting out warm on the counter. Oatmeal’s dribbled on the stove and half eaten from a saucepan. All this I must’ve done in a black out. Yet so clearly, so vividly, I remember that moment of whizzing between the bridge reflectors! So perfectly, I remember getting shocked by that thought bolt, that pronouncement, that powerful knowing I did not make.

What the hell was that?   Who was that?   How could that happen?

In the weeks following, I can’t get drunk enough to stop wondering. You DO know right from wrong!  It comes back while I’m drinking, when I’m hungover, if I’m trying to impress people I know are shady. And trailing after the memory is a weird, implacable sense that, yes, someone has been helping me, saving my life time after time. And now they’re sick of my stupid, dangerous games. Go ahead and die: they pretty much straight up told me so.

For me to hit rock bottom takes about a month. I’ve lost all fight, all rebelliousness.

I’ve sunk.

…………I give up.

…………………I just can’t.

On January 29, 1995, I resolve to take one of two possible actions. Either 1) buy a gallon of vodka and chug it down as fast as I can before I pass out and or 2) call the phone number a sober friend has scrawled on a scrap of paper when, as I exited her house, I mentioned being super hungover and conceded that I might possibly have just a tiny bit of a maybe slight potential drinking problem.

I know where the paper is, next to the wall phone. The allure of suicide gleams brighter, though, that absolute freedom of throwing in the towel. You’ve been rescuing and rebuilding a card house that keeps partially collapsing, and finally, instead of trying to prop it up yet again, you just flatten the fucker on purpose.

That’s my life. I’ve tried and tried. No one, I believe, really cares about me, in part because no one’s ever seen past that “like me!” tap dance I trot out to please every goddam asshole. I hate that fuckin’ dance. I hate being me.

But I guess I have to call AA first, in part because, out here in Olympia in 1995, you can’t really buy a gallon of vodka on a Sunday. Liquor stores are closed. So, fuck it. I’ll call the AA number first and figure out the gallon thing second.

I call.

So much kindness from the woman who answers floods me with feeling. She tells me a meeting time and place, yes, but it’s her sweet voice, her grandma way of assuring me that, as I insist, this meeting will be far enough from town that nobody will know me. She calls me “honey,” tells me “don’t you worry!” I want to weep so badly, so gut-wrenchingly, but my eyes are broken.

At that first AA meeting of my own, I feel contempt for everyone as I’m clearly much too cool to be here. And yet… there’s something in the room, some energy I can’t put my finger on. It feels good and warm and safe, a lot like that grandma’s voice.

….and I’ve not had a drink since.

Available on Amazon – Kindle or Paperback

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January 22, 2025 · 6:00 am

Broken Brain vs. Inspiration: Which do I rely on?

Going to AA meetings and working the 12 steps with a sponsor can transform our lives. But in my experience, having taken the 3rd step involves conceding the fallacies of my own “reflex” thoughts on a daily basis. My mind is still set to certain defaults established in childhood or whenever, and those patterns are frequently, though not always, the first inclinations that come to mind.

Yeah, yeah, as I come up on  30 years’ sobriety (on 1/29), the 11th Step promises have mostly come true. That is, “we find that our thinking will, as time passes, be more and more on the plane of inspiration. We come to rely upon it.” But keep in mind that such reliance is possible only because we’ve made a habit of “ask[ing] God for inspiration, an intuitive thought or decision” (86-7).

In Step 3, I acknowledged that my own brain, when detached from god, is busted. Let’s remember where my own best thinking and determination to seek happiness and thrive on my own terms led me again and again: incomprehensible demoralization, deep despair, and suicidal ideation. Drinking was only one of many great ideas my thinking espoused for how to best navigate life. And it’s STILL busted, my brain. What I’ve “come to rely upon” is guidance from a higher power, not my ego-tainted perspective.

So here I am on my beautiful 5 acres in rural Oregon. Everything my angel foretold has come to pass. Somehow, my city house sold in three weeks – for less than I’d wanted, but within 24 hours of the deadline set in my contingency offer. Naïve about closing costs, I found myself many thousands short of the new house price, but my mother’s estate, which had been hung up in probate for over a year, came through 6 hours before I’d have lost the new house.  These are little miracles. In other words, I’m pretty sure I’m where I’m supposed to be, but by none of my own doing — other than moving ahead in faith.

Those of you who’ve moved after age 50 know this shock of not knowing where you are. My mental map of Seattle was incredibly detailed; here, I knew the way from my home to the store, beach, and a few trails.

But that’s where Step 3 comes in. For vague reasons, I felt hesitant to show up at any new AA meetings. I would look them up online, even put them on my calendar with great resolve, but once it got pitch dark out – and I do mean pitch dark – I’d be scared to leave my cozy little house. So I didn’t go to meetings for a month. Not even Zoom ones.

 

 

ISOLATING. That’s what I was doing, with my 2 cute dogs, a fireplace, deer outside the window, and coyotes and raccoons I’d sent packing, while I threw myself into UN-packing, putting off AA always just one more week. By grace, I knew this was my alcoholic brain’s will for me, not god’s direction for growth. Meanwhile, my addiction was rubbing its evil hands together in anticipation of a relapse.

So I did what I could: I called a friend from my old home group and confessed all the above. She made me promise I’d go to an AA meeting the next day, so I promised. Then I broke that promise… because yada, yada. But after she texted me, DID YOU GO?? and I had to sheepishly reply NO, my ego, I suppose, got prodded from the other side. I’m supposed to be all wise and shit, but here I was acting like a backassward chickenshit. So the next week, I set out in utter darkness and sheets of rain, relying solely on my high-beams and GPS to get me somewhere. Eight miles later, I walked into a cozy room with a fireplace, Christmas tree, and cushy chairs filled by six fellow alcoholics.

I was home. I was safe. And before I even spoke a word, I was loved.

I thought, “Of course! Of course! How could I have been so timid, so stupid, so gullible as to isolate for over a month?!” But I also knew: fear had taken me offline. Fear had slid me backward into my own reflexes. Louisa’s broken brain had been telling me that staying home alone was playing it safe.  It was wrong — as always.

Well, those alcoholics had me download an AA app very that night and recommended three more meetings nearby. I started going, meeting more alcoholics, making new friends, being of service, even going out for coffee! My routine now is three AA and one Al-Anon meeting per week, all in person. For my 30th sobriety birthday, a woman I’d never laid eyes on in November is bringing a homemade carrot cake for the celebration, and everyone’s excited for me.

What’s more, these people possess a mosaic of experiences that mirror everything I’m struggling through. They remember being new here, wanting to isolate, feeling baffled by power outages, wells, and septic systems, and many feel shocked to find themselves at various thresholds of old age. Not only have they told me about gym facilities, parks, trails, garden clubs, community email, and less expensive stores, but at every meeting I hear profound insights that allay my fears and enrich my experience of living.

 

Pick one.

Whenever I don’t WANT a new sponsee, don’t WANT to drive someone to a meeting, or chair one, or stay after to break down the room, etc., god’s inspiration reminds me how I didn’t WANT to go to AA in the first place, didn’t WANT to get a sponsor, REALLY didn’t WANT to throughly work steps 4 through 9, or to change “everything” about my approach to living. But going against my own thinking has brought me a joyous life I could never have built myself. Day by day, I can either screw it all up by trusting my defaults, or reach beyond them to continue on this amazing spiritual path toward new adventures.

 

PS: Just for fun…  Deer and coyote from inside my house.

 

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October 7, 2024 · 6:00 am

Layers of Emotion

Exactly what factors bring on alcoholism remains unknown, although genetics, trauma, and alcoholic role models often play a role. At some point in our early years, many of us were dealt more pain than we knew how to process, so when we discovered a “Get Out of Pain Free” card – aka alcohol and drugs – we rolled with it.  We drank or drugged away difficult feelings, muting them, taking the edge off. But over time, this card not only quit working; it morphed into a get out of happiness, dignity, human connection, and desire to live card.

That’s when we faced the two exclusive alternatives: “One was to go on to the bitter end, blotting out the consciousness of our intolerable situation as best we could; and the other, to accept spiritual help” (p.25)

Coming up on 30 years sober, I’ve found that I eventually reach this same T in the road with every difficulty, except that now I find other ways to “blot out” what’s actually going on for me. Used to be infatuation, sex, self-pity, and jealousy topped the list. Today it’s anxiety, anger, and many forms of pointless distraction like online shopping, posting stuff, scrolling, etc.

Whatever. You get the idea. I stack secondary preoccupations and emotions on top of unwanted feelings about whatever bump in life has come up. 

Exhibit A is my life these days. Call me woo-woo, but I have an angel who gives me guidance.

Angel

Angel story’s in my book

About two years ago, he directed me that once my mom died and my son moved out, I should sell my home of 25 years and buy land in a place where I could create an animal sanctuary and retreat site for alcoholic addicts. Mom died. My son will move in with his girlfriend after graduation. So I said, Okay, I’ll do this thing, however difficult. 

As I write, I’m in the first stages, having rushed to get my house listed in time to meet the terms of my offer on 5 acres in rural Oregon. I’m between homes, living with my two dogs in an idyllic rustic cabin with a beautiful view of Puget Sound and distant mountains, surrounded nature. I got Starlink and built a foundation for it on the roof, though the trees around me mean it quits every 10 minutes for about 10 seconds, so I have to teach from outside the local store. No laundry or drinking water, extension cords everywhere, and I bathe in rust-water from the 15-foot well. But I’m set. I’m doing it. Hopefully, the next pieces will fall into place.

So what have my primary feelings been? Accomplishment? Excitement? Savoring all this beauty and simplicity? No. Try anxiety, constant fretting about the dogs, financial insecurity, criticism of my listed house, doubts about the new place, and just a general, pervasive sense that I’m doing it wrong.

Anxiety reached such a peak that I can’t leave the dogs in the cabin, even if I turn off the gas and unplug everything, because I’m STILL TORTURED with worry that the cabin will burn down while I teach, attend an AA meeting, or visit the post office. I also eat enough sugar-free cookies to hurt my stomach. With no one to talk to, I waste hours online and get riled up about the news.

Roommate #1: Beverly
Roommate #2: Alice

But as I’ve continued to pray for relief from these unwanted feelings, something’s slowly shifted. I was scraping moss chunks off the roof the other day when I suddenly felt tears rising. Out of nowhere, a sob wanted to come up my throat. So I let them through. I set aside my tools, turned off my podcast, sat down on the shingles and ugly-cried – at first not even sure why.

But then it came: My home! My mom! Raising my little boy! My ex lost to alcoholism! My youth and its expansive, limitless future of dreams. All are passing from my life, and I loved them, I miss them. I don’t know anything – who I’m going to be, what my life will look like. Yet I need to grieve the life I’m leaving. My angel told me, You have a chapter left, so let’s use it for good. But who wants a goddam coda, however meaningful?

For me, the gift of sobriety is learning to recognize that it’s not about the cabin burning or Netanyahu kindling world war. It’s never about the big tizzy, whatever form that tizzy may take. When illusions fall away, it’s about facing the vulnerability that 99.9% of what happens is outside my control. It’s about knowing my fate is always in god’s hands more than my own, and trusting that god’s goodness makes up the foundation of what happens despite my human ignorance of the why’s and how’s. Faith and courage — these are all I EVER have to draw on. Ever, ever, ever. 

I remember the predawn hours after the first night I’d spent sober, when I felt so terrified of living with or without booze that I dropped to my knees by the glass doors and begged god for a sign. Across the near-dark patch of grey sky in front of me flew a lone bird, silently navigating from hither to yon with almost no light. I realized then that nothing thrives without faith in something, whether conscious or unconscious of that faith. My faith had lain in booze and ego, both of which had failed me. Now it was time to hand it over to god — the same god guiding that bird.

That was 1995, and it’s still true for me today. Over and over I wander from humility, forgetting, thinking this life is my show, but eventually I’m led back to that touchstone, and that has made all the difference.

 

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June 13, 2024 · 6:00 am

Why do Sober Alcoholics Relapse? How can we not?

Recently a visitor to my AA homegoup shared that at 19 years sober, he’d joined coworkers at a business conference and, since cocktails were free and everyone at his table was ordering, decided to have just one. Six long years later, after losing his job, destroying his marriage, impairing his health, and

Sleeping Dragon

Alcoholism only sleeps; 1 drink awakens it

having scrabbled at the brink of sobriety in baffled despair as he fell back again and again into drunkenness, he somehow made it back. Sober again four years as he spoke to us, he’d gained a profound respect for the insanity of alcoholism. 

Why does this happen? How can we avoid it?

I myself have never relapsed since my first AA meeting on January 29, 1995, so I cannot speak directly to the inner experience of deciding to drink. Instead, I asked a friend in my homegroup who knows the cycle well to offer you guys some insights. Here is Clark’s story. He left out the trauma of his childhood with a Vietnam vet step-father, but trust me, there was plenty.

“I got my second DUI in back 1982 when I was 19, but I really didn’t want to be sober. I was court ordered to go to AA, so I gave it a half-hearted try, but I wasn’t willing to follow directions. Both my mom and sister were in the program, but I’m incredibly stubborn. I thought, ‘AA is for weak people.’

“By my late 20s, I was making great money. I had a wife and kids, a lakefront home, a speedboat, a Harley, all sorts of toys — and all of it felt meaningless. I was miserable and wanted to kill myself. Booze had quit working. My cousin and best friend were doing heroin, though, so I thought, I’ll try that! In a way, it saved my life; heroin kept me from killing myself; but it also took my addictions to a new level.

“I’ve never officially counted how many times I’ve relapsed, but I’d guess about 20. Every time I was in pain or something bad happened, I’d run back to AA because deep down I knew that was the solution. But again, I wouldn’t follow directions. In 1986 I found crack cocaine, and it completely destroyed my life. I checked myself into treatment and stayed sober about 3 months, but my wife gave me a hard time about being away from home for meetings.

“The main recurring theme of my relapses has been that I forget. I forget how bad things got, and I remember the good times — ’cause there were good times. In 1990, I’d left my wife, stayed up all night smoking crack with a girl I knew from high school, and to get money for more crack we decided to rob a gas station. After I eventually got caught, I went back to AA to avoid jail time. That time, I stayed sober about 6 months, and it was some of my best sobriety up to that point. I actually got a sponsor and cracked open the [Big] Book. But then I met a girl in AA, we were both new, and we got drunk.

“In 1997, I started selling crack myself, but pretty soon I became my own best customer, and before long I ended up in prison. I got clean with my second wife, until she died at 26 giving birth to our daughter. After that, I didn’t even try to get sober for years. I just had too much pain.

“Still, the cycle kept repeating. One thing about relapse, with me anyway: it starts days before I actually take a drink or drug. My thinking gets bad, I’m frustrated about something, in some kind of pain. I wasn’t good at reaching out to people, so I’d convince myself that THIS TIME, things were going to be different! I’d manage it. I’d control it. I’d keep it to weekends.

“This last time, I had a cocaine-induced heart attack, went to the ER, got shocked back to life 6 times, and stayed in a coma for 2 weeks. My poor sister, who is not religious at all, went to the [low-bottom AA hall] and asked them to pray for me. I came out of the coma, but within 2 weeks I was back to drinking and smoking crack. Right about then I got a pretty sizable inheritance, so I proceeded to smoke it — about $500 worth every day. I wanted another heart attack. Dying, I’d not gone to the light, but to a darkness completely painless, and I wanted that again.

“I’d wake up mornings feeling I absolutely could not stand another day. The book talks about ‘the jumping off point’ when we can’t imagine life with or without alcohol. I saw a choice between getting sober and dying, and I chose dying — because I didn’t think I could get sober. I’d tried so many times and failed. I never left my place except to meet the drug dealer in the driveway or to get cash at 7-11. I wasn’t showering; I wasn’t eating. I was a wreck, utterly isolated and alone.

“But… my sister kept coming over. She has 38 years, and we’d always been close. She had me write a will; she made me write a letter to each of my children to explain why I was dying. I could see the pain in her eyes. And I decided, for her sake, I’d give this thing one more try.

“Thank god, two or three days later, it dawned on me that I’d never given AA a fair shot. There’s that line in ‘How it Works’: Those who do not recover are people who cannot or will not completely give themselves to this simple program… That was me. Every time, I’d do a little bit of this and a little bit of that, I’d grudgingly drag myself to 2 or 3 meetings a week, but I’d never given it the whole deal. And this time, I decided to give it the whole deal. And it’s been the difference of night and day.

“I went to 2 or 3 meetings a day for 16 months. After about 90 days, my brain began to clear, and I decided I was going to pray, I was going to get sponsor, and I was going to work the 12 steps out of the book with him. And I did all those things. I’ve prayed every day since. I can’t point to one of those three things because I think they’re all integral, but my life has changed because of that decision. I’m so grateful for what I have today that I keep doing those three things. People I’d known in AA for over 40 years, they always welcomed me back. Given a choice, I wouldn’t pick me as a friend because I was so slippery. But they were always there for me.

Port Angeles

“Today at 2 years and one month sober, my life is completely different. I just got back from an AA Roundup in Port Angeles, and I loved it! I went to meetings, fellowshipped with friends, went out to dinner, walked on the beach. It’s a blast. I’m still kind of shy about making new friends, but I feel I belong.

“I never had a higher power before, but praying and really listening in meetings to how other people were approaching the higher power thing, that opened the door. I have some decidedly un-Christian views (pro-choice, pro-gay rights, etc.) but I’ve found a liberal church where I’m welcome and we don’t talk about those things. Prayer centers me.

“If someone wants to get well, I would say, ‘Give yourself to AA completely. Do the work laid out in the 12 steps.’ Not in your first week! But you can’t keep putting it off, either — working the steps with a good sponsor to the best of your ability.

“My happiness and equanimity are at a level I’ve never had in my life. Ever! I have so much gratitude. Finally being done, having a life that is manageable, friends who care about me, being able to look at myself in the mirror, not feeling like a piece of shit, sleeping good every night. I have a life today that I never could have imagined. I still go to a meeting every day, sometimes two. I walk my little dog — she loves me. I’ve steered away from relationships so far, but I figure when I’m ready, God will give me one.

“Every day is an amazing journey.” ❤

Me, Sweet Pea, and Clark

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March 6, 2024 · 6:00 am

Third Step: Next Right Thing

The first three steps of Alcoholics Anonymous are pure logic:

  • Step 1: “I can’t” (drink in moderation, manage my life, etc.)
  • Step 2: “A higher power can” (restore me to sanity)

Therefore

  • Step 3: “I choose to let it” (by turning my will over to HP)

In Step 2 alone there’s plenty to ruffle our prideful alcoholic feathers, right? Not just the higher power thing, but this insinuation that we’re currently not sane. Hmmph!  For years, maybe decades, we’ve defended our passionate reliance on alcohol by assuring everyone, including ourselves, “I’ve got this!” I can remember thinking, “And even if I don’t quite have it, I’m saner than most people.”

Of course I had no clue how insane I was: I wasn’t SANE enough to! Today, however, I can affirm with perfect certainty that I was bat-shit crazy and had been for years. Confusing self-poisoning with self-care on a daily basis was only the tip of the iceberg.

But then there’s that whole “God” thing. Many newcomers choke on the word, so they never really nail down this crucial foundation of Steps 1-3. Religion’s claimed monopoly on spiritual life is largely to blame. It has bamboozled so many into thinking a higher power must involve religion.

freedom-of-religion-gettyimages-517212696 copyQuite the opposite, in my opinion. As Carl Jung observed, “One of the main functions of organized religion is to protect people against a direct experience of God” (emphasis mine).  Religion miscasts god/HP as an external authority figure, when in fact god is “living” us 24-7, living the trees and grass and little rolly-poly bugs and bunny wabbits. God loves us all sooooo powerfully that we’re animated by it. That wondrously complex arrangement of hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, and trace elements you see in a cold corpse is inexplicably enervated with god’s love to become… YOU!

God speaks within us, not through any text or religious authority. Disagree if you want, but I guarantee you, no religious authority can keep an alcoholic sober! Only we, waking up to god’s guidance through Step 3, can manage that one day at a time. In fact, the more religion has been forced on someone as a child, the more difficult finding god within can be.

duckling-grace2

God at work!

My ex-boyfriend recently drank himself to death with beer — Indian Pale Ale, to be exact. He’d gone through detox and treatment to emerge gung-ho sober, but multiple handicaps blocked him from tapping into a power greater than himself.  A) He’d been raised Catholic; B) he was left-brained to an extreme, having impaired his brain interconnections with binge drinking as a teen; C) he felt extremely awkward and uncomfortable in socializing, also due to B.

A made him keep reverting to seeing HP as an authority figure; B kept him from feeling his connection (8:00) to everything else, and C kept him from hearing or seeing god through his fellow alcoholics.

Below are his last texts to me. Before you laugh at the ‘Subaru’ thing, recall that while sober this man could carry in his mind the full schematics for a Boeing 787. These texts are crippled with drunkenness because… he was less than a week from dying.

Gerard combined texts

You can imagine how often I weep that I didn’t agree to that last call, as I might’ve if I’d not been sitting right next to my Al-Anon sponsor. But in truth, I didn’t want to witness him in that state, slurring his words, awash in vague emotions, making little sense. It was too painful. Besides, I couldn’t have helped him find his HP any more than you could. A week later, on his 60th birthday, he died of a gastric hemorrhage.

“Do the next right thing” was one of those resonant 3rd Step sayings Screen Shot 2024-03-05 at 11.38.13 AMI heard early on in AA. Strangely, “right” did not equate to “most desired.” It steered me away from what I thought would feel good, make me look good, or bring temporary relief, and toward a deeper sense of right and wrong. **

We all carry that sense within. It’s a feeling in our gut. We often have to quiet the chatter of our thoughts before we can make contact with it, but it’s there. Initially, I grasped only few “next right things” like so many flimsy reeds: go to a meeting; stay out of bars; don’t meander toward the store’s booze section or hang out with users.

Today, though, I have a huge, rich bouquet of next right things to choose from every day: practice gratitude; call a friend (instead of texting); exercise/ hike/ do yoga/ walk the doggies someplace new; do service work or donate; tidy or fix something; meditate; notice beauty; be kind, be kind, be kind.

Princess and GoblinOn my favorite sleep podcast, in a book entitled, The Princess and the Goblin, I recently listened to a description of how a child princess, who has discovered her own magical great, great grandmother in a remote tower of the castle, is led by the grandmother’s wisdom even in her absence. When afraid, she’s supposed to put a ring the grandmother gave her under her pillow and feel with her index finger for a gossamer thin thread connecting the two of them. It’s a perfect metaphor for always being connected to our higher power.

But here’s the cool part. The thread at her fingertip doesn’t just lead to the safety of her grandmother. It leads her deep into the goblin mines, into terrifying pitch darkness, across underground streams and through narrow passageways where she’s filled with doubt and urgent desire to turn back but can’t because the thread leads only forward. To her amazement, it leads her to her friend, a courageous boy the goblins have all but buried in a cavern, shows her the way to free him, and guides them both back to daylight and safety. In fear for herself, she’s led to rescue someone else. While boy insists her idea of “grandmother’s thread” is nonsense (right up til the end when he finds it himself), she trusts it beyond her own thinking.

So, I find, goes life after one makes a solid 3rd Step. We are led forward, often scared, but guided to greater outcomes.

I alone can sense where my “god-consciousness” leads. Many don’t understand why I’m about to move away from this city where I was born 63 years ago — to I don’t even know where. I’ll find out soon enough. I trust my thread. It’s just the next right thing.

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** As I describe in my Die-Hard book –> the first two communications I heard from my post-NDE guardian angel, having just driven home horrifically drunk, were: “This is the last time I can help you; you DO know right from wrong!”  Hearing him opened space for what has unfolded as 29 years sober.

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February 25, 2024 · 10:28 am

15-Minute Guided Meditation for Sober Alcoholics

Hi alcoholics and addicts!

AA’s Step 11 reads, “Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God,” but many newly sober alcoholics – and people with time – have trouble knowing where to start. I was moved after my morning meditation to record a spontaneous YouTube meditation for this blog, so I did. Such reflections free me from my fears and self-criticisms (see bedevilments, p. 52, Big Book).

Close your eyes and hang out.

This is a shareable (but unlisted) link. Feel free to share it with anyone you think might benefit or post it on recovery pages. Please let me know in the comments if you’d like me to make more.

No hair combing, zero make-up, not trying to look presentable. House jammies and bedhead and reflecting glasses. The focus is inward toward source and outward toward you.

Here’s my sweet Alice a month after being rescued from starvation in the Rio Grande Desert. Her stunted body did catch up with her head and paws a little once she got regular nutrition, and she is often happy. 

Alice after rescue

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September 8, 2023 · 6:00 am

“Just Beer” Takes Another Life

NOT an alcoholic, my mom died about a month ago at 97. Residents in the assisted living facility where she’d spent her last year insisted on holding a memorial service for her. It was attended by about 40 people — everyone recalling how she’d touched their lives with her humor and knowledge. My sister and brother-in-law presented a beautiful slide show of Mom’s life – travels abroad, outings in nature, parenthood, family and friends. Without question, hers was a life well lived. (Mom’s blog is here.)

Vassar graduation 1946, honeymoon on Appalachian Trail (stick selfie), watercoloring at 96

Definitely an alcoholic, my dear ex-boyfriend also died two months ago. He collapsed on his 60th birthday from a GI tract hemorrhage and bled to death alone. For some of you, 60 may seem old — but it’s not. I myself am 63, and when I think of all the living my mom packed into the last 37 years of her life, I feel the waste, the loss, the tragedy of an alcoholic death.

I can say “my dear ex” because I loved him — just not the disease that altered his behavior once he relapsed. Alcoholism did to him the same thing it did to me in my 14 years of drinking. At first I was tipsy most nights, then drunk every night, then bumping up Happy Hour earlier and earlier: by the end, noon seemed fine. In the same proportion, my morals declined. I lied. I emotionally cheated on partners. My selfishness grew like a tumor around my heart, blotting out whatever love it could still generate.  

So I understand why my ex lied to me. I understand why he cheated, first during work travels and later with a pudgy alcoholic girl who spent nights at his house on the weekends I spent with my young son. I have no doubt that, beneath that tangle of deceit, selfishness, and relentless pursuit of pleasure that dominated his thinking was the sweet, shy man I’d fallen in love with. But for the past 8 years I communicated minimally, texting only at birthdays and New Years, because he was toxic.

Back when we were together, he was always talking about how he couldn’t wait to retire and start doing whatever he wanted to do. But here’s what happened once he actually retired in 2021; he started doing what alcoholism wanted him to do: Drink.

In 2022 when his sisters met him for coffee, they found him rail thin and shaking. His sister called me and brought me onboard along with his daughter for an intervention. He went to detox and treatment for 30 days. He got better. For three months afterwards, he stayed sober.

But then came the insidious insanity of the first drink. At a convenience store where he was buying cigarettes, the person in front of him bought some kind of Budweiser beer & tomato juice combo he’d never tried.  He told himself the tomato juice would dilute the beer enough that he’d be okay. (And if THAT doesn’t sound familiar, you should review “More About Alcoholism” p.36.)

So he was off again, no brakes, no meetings, no prayers. When we texted two weeks before his death, he told me he could not find a higher power or a sufficient substitute. He asked if he could call me, but I was, ironically enough, in my AA homegroup meeting, so I said maybe later. That was the last I’d ever hear from him (on this physical plane, at least).

Drinking only beer, albeit high-alcohol Indian Pale Ale, couldn’t hurt him much, he assumed, but he fainted from a ruptured GI blood vessel — a common danger for heavy drinkers — and bled out. When he failed to answer any of our birthday texts, his sister had a sheriff make a wellness call. Whoever removed the body also removed a six-foot square of carpet surrounding it.

It’s so sad!

Glacier NP thru-hikeHawaiiStuck in tent in rainWas on his mantlepiece
Sperry GlacierSummit Mt. BakerSummit Mt. WhitneyFeather in his cap

My ex, whom I’ll call G., was born a middle child. When he and his sisters were 8, 11, and 13 respectively, their mother, a warm, loving Irishwoman who fed the family mainly from their garden and domestic goats, suffered a stroke that left her half paralyzed and totally aphasic (i.e. dumb). Their Type-A father merely divvied up among the children all the chores their mother had performed and soon moved the family to town — no mourning allowed, no counseling, no talking about feelings. In fact, G. was certain his father shot his dog the a few days before they moved. “Musta run off” was all he told 12-year-old G when his beloved Cool McCool failed to show up at the school bus stop as he’d always done to walk G home.

G. learned to drink. He found ways to get the the money for it, mainly trapping animals for their pelts, and to keep his pain at bay he stayed drunk throughout his teens. As soon as his mother regained an ability to express herself, she stopped the killing of animals. But his daily drinking and the deep loss that drove it — those she remained powerless to touch.

G’s mother before her strokeG as a boy

When I met a 43-year-old G in my sober hiking group, One Step at a Time (OSAT), his wife had kicked him out for drinking and his license was suspended after a third DUI. Neither is uncommon for a recovering alcoholic, so I assumed his boozing days lay behind him.

We shared five intense years while he was sober and a few sort of okay ones after his relapse. Most of the high points of my life came during adventures with G., thru-hiking first in Glacier National Park, then along the PCT, especially the John Muir Trail. We rode our bicycles 1,000 miles from Port Townsend to San Francisco. We took a ferry to Alaska so he could bicycle home through the Canadian Rockies.

I loved him despite his being on the autism spectrum. Because he had trouble conversing with others, I felt from him that strange authenticity of those who simply can’t pull off affectation. He was earnest. But that same acute shyness teamed up with his lifelong history of drinking to alienate him from the AA solution, even when he truly wanted it. We need fellowship and service, but he couldn’t connect with a group. Instead he isolated in his rural home, he and his dog Miley.

I know he is finally free now, having at last shed the pain of his childhood. He’s with his sweet mom and his loyal Cool McCool. I miss having both my mother and G. on the planet, but I know my mom, despite her own difficult childhood, enjoyed a long, full life, whereas I mourn the precious decades stolen from my onetime sweetheart. 

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December 31, 2022 · 11:03 am

“Why is Nothing Working? It Must Be Me!”

Have you ever heard this saying around the rooms of AA, “Alone is a dangerous place”?  I got another lesson last night in how true this is.

As someone coming up on 28 years sober, I’m usually in pretty good place.  Those demons of shame, not-enoughness, loneliness, self-pity, envy, awkwardness, self-loathing, and many others that fueled my drinking and nearly killed me — they still live in my head, but their megaphone batteries are weak, and I’ve made friends with most.  When they show up, I try to A) view them as familiar characters and B) invite them to tea, as Buddha invites the demon Mara in the brilliant Buddhist story. In other words, I acknowledge I’ll never be rid of them, but each is a voice from my psyche trying to help me, though their methods are flawed.  The difference between befriending and believing these voices — that’s the key to emotional sobriety. 

Shitty Committee

But last night, no such serenity! I tripped over all their wires, bought all their Brooklyn Bridges, and was, in effect, sucker punched.

What happened? Over Christmas, Alex, who normally makes coffee and sets up the meeting space for my AA homegroup, Salmon Bay, was visiting family on the east coast. I volunteered to cover for him, in addition to my normal “cake person” duties. Maybe 8 years ago I’d been coffee maker here, and in 28 years I’ve made a lotta coffee for a lotta groups, so I was sure I’d be fine.  Alex handed me his key to the church.

coffee brewer

    But WAYYY older

Last night, I got there 45 minutes early, had little trouble unlocking, grabbed the big storage tub from the closet, and fretted a bit about how much coffee to put in. As an avid tea drinker, I had to Google the matter, but everything was “per cup” with nothing about 2.2 liter airpots, and I felt somehow too flustered to do the math.  So… I dumped what looked like a good amount into the filter, placed it in the brewing basket with the airpot below, and hit BREW LEFT.

Nothing happened. 

A light was flashing at the top of the machine: READY TO BREW.  Under that was an ON/OFF switch. I pushed both of these and BREW LEFT for short and long periods. Maybe I should try BREW RIGHT.  I moved everything over and repeated the process. Nothing.  I searched the kitchen walls for instructions, checked the power, whether it was connected to water.  The tea spigot water was warm, but not hot.

Meanwhile, time was ticking away: no coffee, no room set up, just an increasingly freaked out alcoholic.

I called Alex in Virginia where it was past 10:00 PM.  He didn’t answer.  I sent an email to the entire homegroup with the subject line, HELP!  Then I put a large tea kettle on to boil, said f*ck this, and went out to set up the meeting space.  

Something was wrong here, too. We normally have several big round tables off to the left and a U-shape of rectangular plastic tables in front of the secretary/chair table. But the room was filled with 7 round tables, two of them plastic. Why couldn’t I remember those plastic ones?  Where did they go? 

stove burnerI was dragging the wood ones to the left when I smelled smoke. I ran to the kitchen where a dirty burner or drip pan was billowing clouds of smoke that filled the kitchen. I turned on the fan and propped open the church door, but it was bad. While I was in there, just for fun I spent another minute pushing all the goddam buttons on that bratty piece of shit coffee machine.  Nothing.

At this point, I reached a FML peak of frustration. In my 10 years at Salmon Bay, except at the pandemic’s height, there had always been coffee, decaf, and tea at this meeting. Always. Now, for the first time ever, there’d be none. That and the round tables looked all wrong, too crowded.  I hadn’t even begun to set up the U-shape.

WHY couldn’t I DO this???  WHAT the goddam hell was WRONG with me?!  What a ridiculous embarrassment, to be such an incompetent idiot!  What would everyone think, especially that person who always seems to not like me?  

FML

I heard the door.  Phil, our outgoing secretary, came in. He’s still recovering from a near-fatal episode of a kink in his intestines, so quite fragile, but I don’t think I said hi or asked how he was feeling, never mind remembering he had 10 years sober this month. “I can’t figure out the f*cking coffee maker!” — that was my hello. “What’s with the smoke?” was his answer.

Phil went in the kitchen. He said a bunch of things, pushed a bunch of buttons, and then delivered this Earth-shattering pronouncement: “It’s broken.”

I showed Phil the round plastic tables. “They don’t belong here,” he said. “We can fold them up and put them aside.”

The smoke had mostly cleared out by the time people started to show up. Many tried the coffee machine and shrugged.  Someone poured the smoke-producing but boiling kettle water into an airpot, I set out the tea things, and we alcoholics had ourselves a wonderful meeting — complete with birthday cake.

When I got called on, I told the tale above. “I was going crazy until Phil got here, and then all of a sudden, nothing was a big deal anymore. To me, this just shows how much we need each other.  Alone, I can catastrophize anything.  It just takes one person facing the same predicament to make it okay.”

mara

                The demon Mara

Maybe when Alex gets back, he can show me how to slap up that bitch machine to make it work.  Til then, I’m happy with the magic of AA, shared community, and friendships. I’m even grateful for those 30 tormented minutes, because they reminded me how my whole effing life used to feel before the steps showed me what was broken, what useless buttons I kept pushing in life. Those demons and I, not only did we have tea, but we were joined by every tea-sipping member of my homegroup.  

Happy New Year, Alcoholics!  

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PS: It WAS broken!! We could tell because the following week it was A) spotless B) devoid of the filters normally on top.

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November 13, 2022 · 9:36 am

AA Banquet Talk: Transformative Steps & My Story

I recorded this on my phone last night — and I’m really glad I did.  Speech / elocution-wise, I learned that I’m too shrill and often speak too fast to be understood, so I can work on toning both those things down.  Content-wise, I hope some of you might get something useful from it. Plans to time myself were technologically foiled, so I was shocked when the moderator held up 10 fingers, and the end is hella rushed. But I guess that’s how it was meant to be.

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