Bob B. and Linda B. from Minneapolis, MN answering questions on step 4 through 9 at an AA and Al-Anon workshop titled

one of her

all right we're gonna do some questions and answers

how did you make amends to your children about your views of

your visual behavior towards them and you become aggressive after that and how did you explain that to your children I'm thinking about

your children six to seven years I I assume that means six or seven years of my sobriety and I'm sure

I

made apologies and some members of my children

regularly and was not able to change my behavior early in that process

sure you could tell that you make amends and then you do it again or you say you're sorry and then you do it again

when I finally made amends I didn't make

the demand I made was stopping the behavior

I have had enough conversation I didn't want any more conversation about

if you ask my job with my one child with a little boy who was the one that was most difficult and he and I were nose to nose kind of like my father and I were nose to nose

he and I when I noticed that his behavior towards his younger brother was similar to my behavior towards him

we went to a psychologist he and I and the two dates a day worth of work

about such

I think if you're still my boys up and asked many questions and said this is finished I think they would say yes and finished I'm not positive about my youngest boy and I'm I'm going to take a look if there's anything in that that I have to do that has not been an issue for

fifteen you know fifteen years or ten years or whatever it has been

the

so I made a man's annex I did have trouble after I promised him I would change the behavior like a lot of us doing promising the sometimes we're not able to do

and if you ask me if it was complete with my children today I'd say we were just all on vacation together the three boys and Linda and my daughter and her daughter in law and I say it's complete and a channel and are there are no outstanding issues between my son and myself if you agree with that do you think that's what I would definitely agree with that but I also made amends especially to this one son Peter the one that we're talking about and I said to him you know I was wrong and maybe I should have done more to make it safer for you to protected you maybe I should have left

and he got very very upset with me and he said you mean you would want me you would want to leave my father

and I said no I didn't want to do that but maybe so anyway he and I've had conversations about that also and I would definitely say I think it's too bad I think the relationship is very very good among

the five of us

do you do of course have regularly

or do you inventory through ten eleven on a daily basis

I am not one of those people that does the first of every year the last four step I did was

two years ago January

I have maybe do

and and that was the reason I did that is because my sponsor had died in in September and I had

was able to fortune of having a sponsor and she and I did a first step to a fourth and fifth step together to sort of get to know each other on a different level

for the whole

well in in that one and also with met the marriage when I did I did the inventory in in a pie shape and I can I picked reasons of my pie

and then I checked in with my sponsor and well I can tell you what the one

I have it right here

the one in marriage I had

eight pieces of the pie

Zacks parenting finances chores

recreation Alleman A. A. toys

and friends

for toys for Bob's motorcycles

and I and I did it you know so I do four steps probably I would say it it's been running every three to four years

and yes you know every day I look at the day and see what I should have done and what I could have done better and what I liked that I did do so that's my answer to that one

on the subject of money if you have dug yourself a hole deep hole that is impossible to get out of in your lifetime how do you

treat that issued your start

do you start your

debts taxes personal loans bank loans from prioritize

you don't know what god will make available to you in the process of doing your match

it is a I want to have near bankrupt in nineteen ninety

to

I lost eight million dollars in three years

from nineteen about five years in nineteen eighty six to about nineteen ninety two

and gained forty pounds I was going to write a book about how to lose a million dollars in game four

I have trouble finding a publisher

we have and we had to go **** on our way out of bankruptcy we have millions of dollars worth of debt related to real estate investments some of the personal some of it not personal we were able to afterwards

Asian people back on things that we did not have to

that were unexpected and we thought we'd never get to a point where we would be restored or we could retire and we've gone well past that point prosperity has been has been returned I I I think that if you open yourself up to eight nine with a good heart

you will know what to do you want to hear and have conversations with people who are if you have large debts you need to find yourself a person with a good program who's investigated also in business to give you some balance you know some deaths can be discharged in bankruptcy and I don't think we need to be attended to others need to be attended to but I know people who have paid back hundreds of thousands of dollars when when they did their list they haven't not near the income to deal with those issues I know people who have paid back twenty thousand dollars a year for fifteen years

and then when they were done they had an extra twenty thousand dollars a year for themselves

and I did it a country to turn out to be a drain that actually turned out to be a blessing because

what they did so I do not limit yourself do not not through your eighth and ninth step because you say I owe too much money I can't do that do the a step which is not based up is not about making a mint it's about doing a complete list of being honest taking a look at the character the character of it and become willing

become willing to make a

and then the nine step is about making amends and you may have there may be you know you made some counseling in that process but I don't think you can assume I that's what I think is part of the wonderful about eight nine I think powerful things are available in the it's a nine step that are beyond your expectations

I think you should do

Bob so much smarter than Linda

a few days ago thing popped up in my mind about

eight years ago I broke a window in a bus and I really haven't decided if I should do a nine step on it what is your opinion

for the window

it is not

that's yeah okay

do you believe that your carrier cited diction if you have one through the eight program

yes

and I don't believe I can answer that question for you I can answer it for me I have a serious gambling problem and eight years of sobriety by using the program I was able to

stop gambling I'm not gamble since my eighth year of strong I

health walks two or three times in the last twenty four

twenty nine years

been with my wife and we put twenty dollars for the quarter is on the machine or something like that I don't other than that I don't gamble

hi sponsor man with thirty two years of sobriety is an active member of G. eight

and it was necessary for him at twenty eight years of sobriety to become an active member of GA or he would not have been able and he went to treatment for gambling twenty eight or so fifty percent of the members and J. in our area are recovered members of all college towns

it is rampant we have groups

we have rules of behavior that are compulsive and obsessive okay

the physical partner alcoholism went away thus the mental and spiritual goes underground and almost all and expresses itself in our lives usually in an excessive or compulsive manner in one or two areas proud to say I had two or three but a lot of people only have one or two but everybody's got something that they have to handle in sobriety

most people and and and again my story sometime between five and ten years of sobriety you gotta stand up and do it again there is I think you don't get it all done in the first three or four or five years I think somewhere in your middle sobriety you've got another layer of kind of honesty and inventory that you got to do to take a look at

the some of the manager bill is if you can identify in your first couple years of sobriety

and that's not an unusual circumstance its usual and a lot of times people like me when was over seven or eight years I think we're doing a terrible job because our pants are on fire at seven or eight years of sobriety

and that's not unusual

I find when I start talking to people that that's more common

they're not

show I think all right certainly is the same god is the same staff the same program what you get in a second program is fellowship and a specific conversation around that addiction

but if you if you if you don't

treated seriously enough then it's kind of like a self improvement program

and I don't expect much to come out of the self improvement

as I do the traditional relationship with the twelve step program

in Allentown in Iceland there there are some who use the big book and some who use translations of path to recovery what do you use one sponsoring and what is your view and Alan and literature

I like the literature very much I like the book pastor recovery there's another book that we have it's called

it's a navy blue book and it's called Alan and how it works and I like that one the pastor recovery alike also because it has the list at the end of the chapters the questions do you know the big book is not

of literature for Allen and and in our group at home I which I just did just makes me crazy when I can even go there but the group that I go to a home we have voted to set the big book is part of our Allen and literature and so we use the big book we use the columns sweet you know read the promises and we get I mean for me that's our basis I can't understand why would you like to use it I love it okay but I mean I oh yeah oh yeah

no it's another issue

okay

how can you when you're how do you know when you're acting in god's will not your own how do you know when god has answered your prayers if you're asking that question with your heart rather than your head you'll know

get off

you know when you're doing your will I'm not doing god's will I mean there's when you're looking for god will there's a humility and a sense of obedience in the process and I don't think you have to wonder if you're going to hear you're going to err on the side of doing

do you think is best whenever you have that attitude you're not going to be in trouble and I believe we have ways of knowing hell of a lot more than we think we know and most of the profound knowing about their hips

what I do in that instance when I've you know I've got an area where I'm not sure about I sort of put my idea out there you know like I'm going to take a trip to Iceland

yeah is that god's will or not that's well in the way I look at it as I always say you know god if you want me to go allow it to fall together if I'm not supposed to call put up roadblocks and then I try to watch for both of them

that is very helpful to me for help you at all that does help me

another one I recently started an Allen and and

something we need to make amends to myself how can I do this I think I think we make amends to ourselves by getting healthy we make amends to ourselves by you know living in integrity we make amends by working the staff working with other people I'm getting out of ourselves

in reaching out to someone else with a lot of

we make amends by treating other people the way we need to be treated

is it possible to be recovering alcoholic in relationship with an active alcoholic drug or drug user yes is it a good idea if you had a chance to go into a relationship

knowing that the person you're going into the relationship

I was an alcoholic not just a user I think that would be not smart love has a way of confounding common sense lost also has a way of

confronting him since but

yeah I mean there are some wonderful people who have the problem of alcoholism drug offenses there are people who are attractive you know who we are attracted to and and and that will happen and I don't think that I mean I know people

I just Marvel at it at the Allen I'm just stay with practicing alcoholic most of us would kill each other okay but there is a type of love and acceptance that is

profound in that process

I can't

the only two left

in Iowa a common symptom that hinders recovery else

is denial of being of being an alcoholic all part of how the brain of an alcoholic works yeah I think tonight was part of any problem in the problem

is an illusion the problem is something that we keep inflation doesn't jive with reality which is why it's a problem in the bigger the more that we are unwilling to accept the reality of the issue in our lives the bigger the problem

and there was a way we keep faith

it is with denial and suppression

you know and why I like playing happiness is knowing who to blame

do your search yourself for potential nine steps or simply go to them as they come up I search myself for the list of eight nine when I did eight nine I don't do that I'm going the like Linda does

and I just wait for them to come up either the next time I do it nine or in the process of

of living my day in my early part of sobriety I regularly ran into people on the street

or have circumstances article

okay I think we're done there's just one question from somebody if they would like to come up and talk about it's about grown up children of alcoholics and I can understand the question so if the person feels comfortable come up we'll talk about it if not they can maybe put it back in the basket again and

I don't know a it isn't like it's written wrong I just can't quite get the question out of it

I don't know if that's not the goal could prove to me yeah closer closer closer is abominable popped in all kids off from it can you go excellent because not all the old order but this girl

okay so what do you have the whole total after

because of all the all because the pope is speaking to close only thought if you don't want to hello this is okay let me make up

we thought the comes because the growth okay