Steps 1&2 at the Carry This Message group in West Orange, NJ

I'd like to now introduce our guest speaker for the month of may may

the end should be speaking on the steps one to two

one flying from that means anyway I'd like to thank our speaker Jean

we haven't

anyway this is gene from sea girt and he'll be speaking on sept one two this evening I believe right

it's not right we'll fix it thank you come on up to you sorry for all that nonsense

here we go

Hey all my name is Jean and I am grateful alcoholic

I don't think Mike Mike and Kathy first for asking me to do this all right thank you group for opening this room to me and to people like me you know who need a place to go this is a real experience it truly is I can't say that I've I've had the privilege of of speaking at some

state conventions and I've had the privilege of speaking at some local conferences but I can honestly tell you I've been asked to do this for four weeks

the fact that I am terrified has nothing to do with it

absolutely nothing every time I get ready to speak I I feel like I'm going to throw up

and I get terrible butterflies right here

and wonderful lady by the name of Geraldine Delaney told me a long long time ago

that the day that I don't feel like I'm going to throw up on the day that I don't have the butterflies in my stomach is the day I have no right to get behind the podium

because I have once again become the god in my life and then of course I try to become the god in your life and anybody else's life the guy who happens to walk by me today I want to thank you for sharing that was just really cool I really did identify and it's very difficult to get across a really important point in a short period of time he did a marvelous job he really did all trade now you can come

as I understand it tonight I'm going to talk about my experience strength and hope I'm going to tell you about my story and how I got here and hopefully somewhere along the line when I get into my early recovery of you will all find how I relate to steps one and two and how important they are in my life and then portent my life on a daily basis

I still find every morning when I wake up that I I need to do one two and three I need to refer to I need to bring it to my attention before I even moved you know because if I forget that I'm powerless I forget that my life was unmanageable if I forget that there is a god in my life who can restore me to sanity and if I forget to turn my will and my life over to that god I'm in deep trouble before I even moved out of my bedroom I really am I'm in great trouble I like to start off a certain way it sort of gets me going is sort of takes care of these things that are going around down here and I'd like to tell you that there are a couple of questions that you might ask me to find out exactly where I am in my sobriety

and the first question you might ask me is what is your sobriety date

hi my sobriety date is may the twelfth nineteen eighty three

and god willing I live to Monday and I have every intention of doing so I will celebrate twenty years of continuous sobriety

and that is a miracle that is a true miracle in my life but what I realized when my only most recently like you had these these recollections and I had this wonderful

experience I guess is what we might call it's probably spiritual experience where I am I realized that twenty years of time had passed

but I truly have learned how to live one day at a time because I don't even realize it I mean honestly I feel like I just walked in the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous and I was beaten I was downtrodden and I had no home and

my family wasn't speaking to man where was I going to go what was I going to do one day at a time here we are you know whoever got up earlier this morning has more sobriety than I do and I overslept I didn't get up till seven twenty so if you got up before seven twenty this morning you've got more sobriety than this person standing here and probably some other people in the room to

are the next question that you might want to ask me is

what is my home group

my home group is sick or Thursday night we meet every Thursday night at St mark's church in secret corner of crescent third at eight o'clock we're open speaker meeting and if you're ever in the area please come by and see us it's a real small town you know secret it's nine o'clock

I got to get it right this time it's eleven blocks north to south nine blocks east to west it's very difficult to get lost

you can find us you can find us and as far to the best of my knowledge as of tonight anyway I am still a member in good standing of the higher power hour in Mount Pleasant South Carolina and they meet every Monday and Wednesday night seven o'clock at the corner of Pitt and queen in St Paul's Lutheran church and they'd love to have you visit if you're ever in the Charleston area I go every time I go back to this

the next question you might ask me is who is my sponsor

I have two sponsors I have one sponsor in right here in New Jersey the same sponsor I've had since the day I walked in the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous

and now she celebrates thirty three years of sobriety this year and now and I had was very very instrumental in my early recovery and and walking me through a lot of stuff that I needed to walk through

and my other sponsor whose name is also gene lives in Mount Pleasant South Carolina although she got sober in New Jersey and she what's up

the AP I think for potential I'm not sure but that's immaterial and she just happened to move from the Edison area actually down to Mount Pleasant South Carolina and of course because I don't have an ego I know she moved there at the exact moment that I needed her

and I really do believe god sent her to me and fact I know god sent her to me I she's been very sick this past year and not

wild horses have kept me from going back going down there to take care of her and and and help her recover because she has been so good to me

so good what a woman what a woman

and now I have a a service sponsor

are not necessary for everybody I don't think it's necessary for everybody but for this alcoholic if it's necessary I love service work I enjoy the service work I was very involved when I lived in South Carolina and I still have my service sponsor from there and if I ever have any questions regarding my service in Alcoholics Anonymous whatever whether I should or shouldn't

I I usually call Patty and Patty gives me the answer because she has the answers and that's why I have her and then I have last but not least

hi I have this ugly Irishman I mean he really is he has an ugly son of a guy he stands about this high

he can beat me into the ground faster than anybody I know

and I love him dearly and here I do I do he is so I call I guess my spiritual advisor

when I really don't know

when I'm really looking for some answers and aren't sponsorship related and maybe our our life related and I just I just don't know I I called him up and I remember the very first time I ever did that I called him up he said John

where's your big book

and I said in the car what's your big book going in the car

and I said I'm at work

you don't have a pocket edition that you carry with you I said no I don't you will have I'm sending you one tomorrow

and I've never let it out of my pocketbook sense

because I know that he's going to say to me some day I you should turn to page such and such and redid gene and he usually says to me read it seventy time

and I always say I don't want to do it seventy times and he tells me seventy is going to do it then call me back

and so far it's working now so I don't I don't want you know I don't like to rock the boat if it ain't broke don't fix it and now and my life seems today to be going along pretty well so I just sort of leave well enough alone

and the last question that you might ask me is what step

are you are trying to live today

most of the time today and in my sobriety and recovery hi I'm somewhere around the eleventh between the eleventh and the twelve steps I vacillate back and forth I don't honestly know that I have meditations down Pat or that I even know how to do meditation if that's what you do hi I know it's listening and I know I have to be quiet and I know that I should listen for god to speak to me and and but you know so I can't shut my mouth long enough for turn my brain off long enough to really have it down Pat so I do work on that

and I'm in the twelve step because I firmly believe in in giving back what has been so freely given to me

I believe that god has a purpose for me and done with me yet when he is he'll let me know

and I do believe that carrying the message to other alcoholics as it is very very important you know when I got sober somebody was standing at that door and they put their hand up and they welcome to me when I walked in the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous

and it's because that person was there that I returned and they made me feel welcome and therefore now that is my job

you know that is my job in my home group and in other places I go to make other people feel as welcome as I've been made to feel and so the twelve step that's what usually where I find my someplace in their course I still have to make a lot of the men's and I have to do a lot of other stuff too

however when I'm prepared when I was preparing for for tonight as as when I'm asked to share any time I find myself in the third stop

and I'm turning my well in my life over to the care of my goddess I understand god

and I'm asking him to please

just allow me to get out of myself long enough to tell the truth

because sometimes I don't know about anybody else in this room because I can only speak for myself but I know for me that sometimes I want you to think with a little more exciting a little more glamorous a little bit more you know really neat things that happened and the honest to god's truth is when I get into my story

and what happened to me I wish I could stand here and I could tell you that I I had some good times with alcohol but the truth of the matter is when I drank I got drunk I blacked out I did things I don't remember when I came to somebody was always mad at me I was in the dog house and nobody was speaking to me

you know and that and that is not fun you know so I honestly can't say that I ever had any really I mean I don't even remember in high school having really good times I remember setting out to have a good time that I remember you know I sat out with every good intention but usually I was there not very long at whatever party we were at and I had had my bill and I was passed out in some bed somewhere and I missed the whole party and that's the way alcohol affected me in the very beginning

I did not get here because I ate too many strawberries I'm sure somebody told me I would if I eat strawberries I would die I would have eaten strawberries

many times I heard how alcohol would kill and I still continue to drink alcohol

I grew up a little bit

north I guess of here I grew up a little and that nice little town called mountain lakes

I grew up in the fifties because I'm not very young

chronologically

emotionally is another whole story about where my head is

and my father was an affluent attorney

my mother was a stay at home mom

and we lived in a big house on the lake

and materially we had just about everything anybody would ever want

I grew up with twin brothers who are three years younger than I

and both I and my father was a periodic

and my mother was a daily talk

and I honestly do cannot tell you who took care of me when I was little I I can't tell you because I don't know obviously somebody did because I'm here

but I do know that as those boys grew older and my parents had their hang overs or my mother who now I never saw my mother before noon to the day she died I don't ever remember seeing her before noon and then it was but it was my job to take care of those kids it was my job to keep them quiet so that they wouldn't wake my parents you know because of my parents were waiting and they had hangovers and they weren't feeling well you just never knew who was going to get it I mean you just never know

I grew up in a house with a lot of anger and rage screaming and hollering and yelling

and I spent a lot of time hiding in my room with a blanket over my head and I heard the door slam and I'd wonder who left this time and were they coming back

now my brother's remember it differently and I believe the reason that they that they remember differently is that but by the time they were twelve they were in my mother's way and they were sent away to prep school never to return again

they went to prep school and I went to summer camp and I went to college so you know their recollections of those years are a lot different than mine if you accept all three of us down in a room we all have a different idea of what happened in that house

I never brought people to my house

I couldn't bring people to my house because I never knew what was going to happen I never knew what was going to be there what what it was going to be like

so you just didn't so I left my house very early in the morning as a teenager and I would come home as late as possible around dinner time just to avoid being around

when I was in high school and it's been said many times and I got I just repeat the things that I've heard when I was in high school I felt like I was on the outside looking in

I just didn't I just didn't fit

I wonder why I thought that was really what was wrong with me why couldn't I have what they had you know why did I have as many friends why couldn't I do this well I among other things I couldn't participate because I couldn't reciprocate unknown if you can't do that to sort of learn to isolate and I had a couple of girlfriends but you know I still have that even in the very beginning of that putting that wall up and not allowing you to get in because if you really knew who I was and you wouldn't like me and you would like

I had my first drink my first drunk my first black out when I was fifteen years old I remember it like it was yesterday

I went with my boyfriend into New York City hall there was a gang of us when it

and we went into and then those that I don't know if there I have been in the city in so long so I couldn't tell you if the still even exists but they had a bunch of these jazz bars and you went down the stairs down below and it was smoky and the lights were low and the chance was fabulous I mean it was just wonderful not everybody was ordering drinks and I don't know if this is the first drink I had but the first one I remember and they were ordering drinks and I honestly didn't know what to order but somebody ordered a seven and seven and that sounded good to me so I ordered seven inside

and as I stand here tonight I can tell you that if I took that step I still remember the burning sensation as it went right down my throat and it just went right down there and boy it got down and miracles happened absolute miracles all of a sudden I didn't feel less than

all of a sudden I thought well maybe there was a possibility all of a sudden I could dance I could talk

now

what I know about that night as they went to New York with this boyfriend with some money and whatever when I when I got home well actually he lead me up the stairs and plopped me in my room in my bed you know

because I couldn't walk too well and I woke up the next morning and I had no money and I didn't know what happened to the money and I found out later I had bought drinks for everybody and that was to be yeah and that was to become a pattern you know that was to become a pattern enough that was what I did so you would like me I you know I bought the goose

and I graduated from high school I went to college I went to college with one

idea I was going to get my MRS

and I met my first husband within ten days after I got to college

three years later I got my MRS

and my married an only child

who had no idea how to share at all in any way shape or form

I'm married a man who's so well nobody would've ever been good enough form and his mother really didn't like me

are out too much you know

I married a man whose whose whole sole purpose it seemed to me as the years went on a lot his sole purpose in life was to climb the corporate ladder

and that's the climb that corporate ladder and became more and more successful and I stayed home and I had two beautiful children and I kept that house and I did all the things that you know a young corporate wife is supposed to do and every time you got a a promotion we moved in every time we moved as always very interesting to me that my children went to school and had their friends and my husband had his business acquaintances and I sat in the new house

and my phone didn't ring

yeah and then I had to do the one thing that I really hated to do I had to put myself out

and how do you do that you know I went to alcohol Mr doors and I had a love affair

I can honestly tell you that alcohol was a problem and in our home in the in the early years you know but I what I do know is when I drank I got drunk

I passed out and I came to and somebody with me

and of course I always said I'm never going to do that again because I felt so awful and the next time the opportunity arose there I was

of we moved all around the country

and as we moved around the country might alcohol ism progressed my progression was very very slow in the beginning it really was very slow

I think I was in my mid thirties must've been

when I landed in outside of San Francisco California we lived a little tiny town called Morocco my husband at that point in time travel to probably

four out of seven nineteen oh four hours seven days a week so he would pack and he got on the plane and he will call my children would go to school and

and and I got I did get very involved I got very involved in bridge clubs and and our bridge clubs would start our wine drinking about eleven you know and that was okay you know because see if you were a drunk you would drink Scotch or something

black wine was okay

wine was just fine and I was in California that I started drinking wine very early in the morning

because all of a sudden when I woke up I needed the work skews me I needed the wine and and so I would watch carefully as my children went out the door and then I would take my coffee mug and I would reach under the sink and I would grab whatever one I had there and I would just you know and I would drink it down and I thought that was a that was okay to me that was okay

I am

we moved to New Canaan Connecticut in the mid seventies my children were now in high school

my husband was really up the corporate ladder he's traveling the world

and he's and I'm living on sixty three acres of land in a twenty some odd room house with a brook that's going through the front yard with an Old English sheepdog and the family station wagon

and I'm miserable

I'm absolutely miserable

and it was during this time in the mid seventies my mother and father had retired to Florida

my dad is still this periodic my mother is a trunk and my mother was diagnosed with massive stroke cancer

and so I started to commute back and forth to Florida to take care of my mom

and now

I was sneaking drinks I remember doing that

but I remember going to that hospital and not

over the years

you know she was my mother she did the very best that she possibly could and I knew that I knew she did that as I got when I got into recovery I know you know she did the best she could should have a very good role model herself so she didn't really know you know how to be a mom and not

but over the years we have developed a pretty good report

and of course the more I got into my alcoholism the easier it was

and she would always kick me and she would say to me you know mom she would say you know team when if god forbid if the time ever comes that I'm incapacitated I want you to promise me that you will pull the plug and I would say sure mommy today yeah

well you know I remember the morning that I went to the hospital in vero beach Florida and I remember they had taken out part of her voice box and then I remember when she

I wrote on the blackboard to pull the plug

and I couldn't do it

yeah and that was sometime in March of nineteen seventy six and I can tell you that until may the twelfth of nineteen eighty three and never grow grow drew another soap opera I did not I could not do it I went home went back there I got drunk I stayed drunk

my dad called me six weeks or so later he told me my mom had died

and we all went to Florida and I am

I do not remember anything about it I just don't remember hi I wish I could

I wish I could sometimes you know

but I don't remember and then and I stayed drunk had about ten months later my dad got remarried

our total family friends and we were all really happy for him I'll never forget he used to say to me after my mom died that regardless of her alcoholism he used to say to me you know Tina go to bed to nothing and I get up to nothing

and he was a very lonely man

and that they've had known this woman for years I've known her for years so he got married he got married on February the twenty second of

nineteen seventy seven

and on February twenty fourth at noon he dropped out of a massive coronary

and not allow remember anything about his job I don't remember one thing I have the newspaper clippings because he was a I think that he was a

very well known attorney in his field and I and I don't remember and I just got drunk and I just took

because that's the only way I knew to cope you know I didn't know and I had no other coping mechanisms

and

and and life went on sort of

you know my my mother in law had a stroke at my house you know and I ended up with my mother in law the woman's name never had cared for me so

that was very difficult you know just trying to keep things in my disease had progressed to such a point that I needed to drink all the time I just needed to track this is no more no longer a a I want to drink or it would be nice to have a drink this was I needed to write

and in nineteen whenever it was eighty one I have to stop thank

my husband moved us to a beautiful home on the ocean and seeker

because he'd worked hard he deserved it

because he forgot the fact that he moved me five blocks from his parents

that my children were in college now and you know nobody needed me who needed me nobody needed me and that's exactly where my self esteem had taken me I mean I have done more I was just eight I was a hollow shell that's the only one you're just doing the footwork one day after another I had to stay sober when my husband was home on weekends well I had to not drink that doesn't mean I was sober I had to watch it when my children came home from college but I am now into a full blown alcoholism

and my husband is traveling the world and my children are gone and my parents don't need me nobody really needed me and

thinking at home got expensive

I was having a really hard time with the half gallons of drawers

I have one hidden in my closet and I would drink the bar Scotch but see I knew because I was so paranoid I knew that he was mark in this bottle

I knew it I knew it

in my head I knew it and so I would get the this is have sex this is this is sick so I would go get the bottle the half gallon from my closet and I would take it and I would decant it into the bar bottle up to where I thought the line once but sometimes I put in too much

so I had to drink it yeah but then sometimes I drank too much so you know we just we sort of played I mean this game went on and on and on and I had a bar at the linq Yankee clipper which is no longer on the on ocean Avenue in sea girt and it was exactly two doors north of my front porch

well now let's see if you have children in college and a husband who's not home and nobody was paying attention to you where would you go

I went to the Yankee clipper

sounded like a good idea

and then one thing lead to another and I became a bartering

I am not proud of that I'm really not I mean I had materially again just like growing up I had everything sold here the motion only I had nothing absolutely not

and I became a bar drinker and I can tell you every bar in Monmouth County

hand in ocean county that opens at six in the morning at seven in the morning and those that are open till two and three in the morning and I can tell you that because I was there

and that's how I started my day

toward the end of my active alcoholism I would

come to

I would crawl on my hands and knees to my kitchen

I would open up underneath my sink and I would grab a half gallon of wine white wine and I would get a coffee mug and I'd get some ice cubes and I would you know

the man and I would pour the wine and I would drink it down

and I would throw it up and I would drink it down I would throw it up because I knew eventually it would stay down and wanted to stay down then my shakes would stop and if the shakes would stop then maybe I could get a shower and put some makeup on because god forbid people should know that my insides didn't match my outside in any way shape or form every hair had to be in place the clothes had to be impeccable everything had to be under control and then I would get my car and I would go to the start to visit the bar

I'm not proud of that I'm really not proud that my morals went out the window and I didn't care I just didn't care I had reached a point in my own alcoholism where I needed it and I didn't care how I got it it didn't make any difference

the consequences I never thought about it never dawned on me what this was costing me

but that bottle of Dewar's made every decision that I made for a lot of years a lot of years it was not nice and it was not pretty

my last drunk took me to Hoboken

this is Hoboken before Hoboken was the way it is today I'm going back remember twenty years

I had an unemployed house painter that I moved into my house because that seemed like the thing to do

I mean he paid attention to me nobody else did but he did you know and I moved him and moved him into my house and my husband was in Europe and

my husband came home

he was not happy

and I didn't understand it that is honestly how sick I was today of course I laugh about it and I and I think how ridiculous the the scene had to be

but it wasn't you know I just could not understand I mean after all look at how he treated me if you had my problems you would have done the same thing

and so I took my job

I'll cut Bob I hope you're listening maybe if you're still alive I got a friend dying of

whatever it is some kind of cancer

and if you were in this audience right now he'd be starting to laugh right now he would be starting to laugh and I can hearing I can just hear in my head

so I gathered up my gold in one hand and I gathered up my papers in the other

and I stood at the bottom of the stairs of my million dollar house on the ocean in sea girt with the unlimited checking account and all the credit cards in two cars in the driveway and money in my pocket and I said I'm not going to live like this anymore

the truth of the matter is I haven't

that is the truth I haven't

and I took off with my unemployed house painter and that's about the last that I remember

I know that we ended up in Hoboken I remember a long limousine and some not so nice looking people in these black shiny coat

handing me boost under dollars and the key to an apartment on Madison Avenue don't ask me why I don't know and so we went to that apartment and then I would I would we went around hope we did something on hold while I was in some I was with some kill I hear later I was with some murderers and some hit man you know some really classy people you know that's not what the lady from singer with the house on the ocean that where she belongs you know and

and I know we ended up in in one of the bronze works but I don't know which one it was it some hall someplace where you where you get a job you know we're like carpenters and painters and people call you know and we went to a bar there and then I know that we ended up in a motel room on route nine

my guess is somewhere between hall and and Lakewood I'm not exactly sure where

I can't tell you don't know but it was a real classy joint I want you all to know that it had no telephone you know so that gives you a general idea of the class of the splice

and what I remember is I woke I came to I didn't even wake up but I came to and I had an empty half gallon the doors and I was alone

and I had alcoholic pearl

and I crawled on my hands and knees for two days there was no way to get any help I had there were no cell phones this one did not have a phone I would've opened the door if I could've you know and that's and that's where alcohol took me that's where it took me

that was my bottom and I remember being on my knees that morning and praying to the god that I truly had never left you know but I would always pray for for those things god if you will get me this then I promise you I will whatever

and DA and I just pray to this god and I just said god please just help me

get me I don't I didn't know where I will

I cannot tell you how I made it home to my house I don't know I have no recollection I have a recollection of my husband meeting me at the front door

I remember I have a recollection of him

telling me that he had gotten me a plane ticket to send me to my brother in Nebraska because my brother in Nebraska has his doctorate in I don't child psychology or so anyway he he worked with juvenile delinquents and I was no better than a juvenile delinquent and so he

Dan didn't know what to do with me so he just

took me out there

you know but what bothered me were really bothered me still bothers me today

and this is just an aside and probably has nothing to do with nothing works but this was an only child you know who never had any siblings or brothers or sisters or you're out of here and so when he was so upset he called his children out of college he called his children to come home from college to help them find their mother reporter why did he do that I can't ask him I wish I could you know I just didn't understand that but you know he did what he did he was terrified he didn't know where I was he had absolutely no idea

so he sent me out to my brother Neil and my brother Neal said to me honey you are very sick

and he said to me yeah I really think you need to go to a rehab and I will help you find we have

and I said okay and I said so how long do you think this will take and he said to me well I think it'll probably take about four months

and I said well where else was I going to call you now hi the collected to add that when I got on this plane to go to Nebraska my husband handed me a letter to tell me that he had sued me he was suing me for divorce and that I was no longer welcome in my home and so packed it wasn't my home anymore and so you know when he said the three have in this form of this just sounded like well that's up like a four month reprieve you know give me four months before I have to figure out what I'm doing here

and so there we were and I called home and I told my husband I was ready to come back and go to rehab and whatever he said that's fine he said doctors like come back because you're going to carry a clinic on Monday

which was the fifteenth of may in nineteen eighty three and he said to me and I said well how long the program is this and he said well it's twenty eight today and I remember turning to my brother Neil and saying

I'm going to rehab it's only twenty eight

I stand here tonight and I tell you that I was in rehab for four months and ten days

so see he did no better than I did and I did go to carrier clinic and that was the very first place that I was ever introduced to the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous that was the very first place that I ever learned that alcoholism was a doozy I didn't know that I was sick I thought I was crazy I really did my behavior had become such that I really believed that I was not

and I found out I wasn't not you know I wasn't I was just a trunk that's why I was just drunk a garden variety to rock and if I talk to people that were there during those twenty eight days and not many of them had done most of the things that I had done some I had done more to somebody done last you know but we were just all garden variety drunk you know trying to get well that's all we were doing it was there that I was introduced to the twelve and twelve you know I thought they were speaking a foreign language when I first went there I don't know about anybody else if you came in through the doors or if you went to rehab but trust me to me it was a foreign language well we're going to talk about the promises today how we got the the big book of we've got you know that blue book and we've got of the twelve and talk or what the twenty four hour what are they talking about you know I just didn't know what I learned you know because I knew this was the end of the line for me this was the end of the line I had no place to go

and it was somewhere there in those first twenty eight days that I really believe that I got into the first step and then I accepted that I was powerless over alcohol

took me a little bit longer to understand that my life was unmanageable