Rediscovering the Program for the First Time

First, I must confess months of lurking here. Actually, you can't really call quiet seething an internet lurk. Lurking requires the act of reading the object of the lurk. I stuck the link on my newsreader and carefully placed the feed among my most ignored information sources. It sat between "Wicked Local Marion" and "NYT International". If you follow either you know that one has general overload and the other fits and starts.

Then one day, after months of so-dry-iety (I just heard that one last night from the podium), I got buzzed. The following several weeks of "controlled" drinking allowed for a sense of empowerment. I started every day with what I called 2 beers, though both were perhaps a bit larger than the conventional idea of “a beer”. Story continues, blah, control, bloody mary, blah, white russian, yada yada. Fast forward to Thursday, January 15. That first 9am beer (that's normal, right?) turned out to be the tiger by the tail. That day lead me around the classiest drinking establishments New Bedford has to offer. I do remember a “sports bar” on Union St., which qualifies as such only if drinking is a sport. The nice homeless men were a pleasure to rub elbows with. I also recall my final spot, a place we used to go in High School, where they would serve anyone who dared cross the threshold. I call it the “Blue Moon”, but it goes by some other cute name now. It sits across the street from the bus station. Obviously a fine, discerning clientele can be found here on any given weekday afternoon. The best thing about the place, I confess, is the cheap, stiff drinks. I must point out the irony here. My romantic notion of alcohol, from a very young age, involves liberal doses of sophistication and cool factor that naturally flows out of the consumption of top shelf booze at the finest locations. What more could we ask from life than to be discovered drinking a grey goose & red bull at the yacht club? Well, there I was, drinking two dollar bud and rotgut vodka white russians made with non-dairy creamer, across the street from the downtown New Bedford bus station. Absolute height of glamour, wouldn’t you say?

Sadly, this is where my memory fails me (blackout sounds so alcoholic). The next morning my wife informed me that I had finally exhausted her tolerance. That was it. I had snapped my marriage over my knee like a stick. Apparently there was much sadness and alcoholic terrorism throughout my blackout. Crying children, maniacal behavior, physical restraints, the usual. I am told that I berated and taunted my loved ones for being upset by my destructive, tornado-like behavior. That’s it. I acted as I never imagined I would or could. Yet I have pulled that crap countless times before, always swearing it off after the smoke cleared.

The next night, a Friday, out of the usual desperation, I went to a big book meeting. I discovered a passage in Chapter 2 “There is a Solution”. Bill describes the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde personality of a puzzling fellow on page 21. I have read the book before, and not just once. I have attended more step meetings, big book meetings and open speaker or discussion meetings than can be counted. I have maintained up to 3 years of continuous sobriety. Yet, I have never so identified with anything as I did with that passage. I have been given a gift and I had it on my bookshelf all along. I got my first big book when I was 16 years old, but it took all the relapses and recoveries up to this point for me to get a bolt of lightning. Every answer lies between the covers of that book: Die an alcoholic death, or live on a spiritual basis, Real or potential alcoholics will be unable to stop drinking on the basis of self-knowledge. The original members, as I have come to understand, did their step work promptly upon mental and physical stability, and proceeded to help others in order to stay sober. Granted, setting up chairs and making coffee may be helping others, but what Bill and Dr. Bob focused on was service directly related to relaying the message. If I don’t go through the process of the steps in a searching and fearless manner, I have no business helping anyone recover. Yet none of my sponsors had ever worked the steps as laid out in the Big Book. Keep it by giving it away. And none of this is possible without a power greater than myself.

Those first few nights, alone and filled with self pity, approached lunatic proportions. Suicide was at the top of the list of alternatives. Today, my higher power has relieved me of the bondage of self because I asked for that. I got on my knees, holding the hand of my sponsor, and recited the 3rd step prayer, him, both of us, and then me alone. Since then I have been granted peace, provided I continue to work toward recovery. Not to end only my suffering, but so that I may relay the message, so that that power may build with me what it will. Take away my difficulties so that victory over them may show others the power of that universal truth. Without this aid, I would be dead or drunk. Has my wife, sober 17 years, come back into my arms? Hell no. Do we speak to each other, spend time together and continue to raise our children together? Yes, and no one has removed their rings, yet. Am I sober to save my marriage? Not today, for I have zero control over pretty much anything and everything, save for one thing. I have control over weather I ask God for help today. I do that, and everything else trucks along just the way it’s supposed to. Thy will, not mine, be done.

Chris S.