The 12th annual CDA Serenity by the Sea in Rehoboth Beach, DE

I'm John and I'm an alcoholic and drug addict. It's a Hi, group. It's good to be asked to lead a meeting, not only speak at a convention, but lead any meeting. And the reason why I say that because I know that I'm clean and sober today and for that I'm grateful. And I'm grateful to CDA and I'm grateful to you people that I'm here.

And everybody asks you, are you nervous? And of course, I said no. And I'm not really nervous, but you as soon as you get up here and they start introducing you, you get a little queasy. But, JW kind of broke the ice. He said, now I can see the paper tomorrow.

Jailhouse John in Las Vegas speaking at the sands. And, I kinda got a little laugh. And, it's really good to be here though. It really is at the convention. And, I wanna read something first before I start.

And, I'm gonna do something a little different. It's a while, you know, you hear the drug logs and, I'm gonna tell you a little bit about it. But I'm not gonna go to more than 15 minutes in the and, what it needs to be like because when a person is sober 7 almost 17 years, 16 and a half years, they they should have a recovery story. And, so I'm gonna share that with you mostly. And, but I wanna read this first, and this is real special.

Here at CDA, we had a scholarship that Terry put on to get people to come to the convention that didn't have the money or the means and and, he did some special events to to get some money, for this so they could have it in. We got a letter here and, it says the staff and consumers wish to thank you for the kindness and extending the offer of scholarships for us. We are happy to have the opportunity to participate in this event. As without your kindness, most of the consumers would not be able to experience this opportunity. Again, thank you for your kind consideration.

Sincerely, Norma l Knowles, Northgate program coordinator. And that's great. You're welcome. When you think about it, that's what it's all about. It's giving it away.

That's what it's all about. And I welcome everybody that's that's here for the first time at the convention. I welcome everybody that's new, expected the one that got the big books and, you have no excuse now. All the information is right in there. And, and that's really neat.

And it's a really a good turnout. And, you know, it's funny. I look out there and I I know probably 80 to 85 to 90% of you. And that's that's pretty overwhelming when you think of that. That's overwhelming.

When I first came here, I didn't know hardly anybody. And, I didn't, know what to do. I was lost. And, for that I'm grateful that I got a chance to to know you people and you got a chance to know me. And, I enjoyed the speakers Friday night.

You know, I leaned in time and, I enjoyed, I tell you, today was was great, you know, with my one of my buddies that I sponsor spoke and his wife and Jay and Michelle, and I did a wonderful job. And that that's really neat, you know. And, this program has offered me so much, so much. But I tell you, my story as you all know is in the big book of chemical dependent anonymous. And, when I did that story, the hardest thing I had to do is what was gonna be the title?

Didn't know what to do about it. And I always thought that I was no good, I was worthless, I never amount to nothing, I was nothing but a con artist, a crook, a thief, anything you want, it didn't matter. And, I remember when I came in here that, I've heard that before that, you know, God doesn't make junk and I wasn't a piece of junk. And I said that's the name of my story. God doesn't make junk.

And I believe that today that he doesn't make junk. And, I thank God for that. I thank God for you people, like I said. And, I tell you, I grew up in a family and, and I was the youngest. I have a sister about 17 years older than I am.

And, this August, 3 years from this August, I will be 60. And that's kinda hard for me to comprehend. But there's a few of you in this room right there with me. So don't be I know who you are. I'll point you out.

Our birthdays are real close. And, that's overwhelming when you think about it. Overwhelming. But I remember taking that first drink. I was about 4 years old.

I did my parents, they were I came home came from an alcoholic family. And my father always said, get me a beer and I drank the beer and and, he would say, open it and he'd give me a sip and when he had a little left, I would take it. And I remember stealing it when I was about 70. The first time I remember getting drunk was about 7 years old and, I started drinking that and, throwing up, getting sick And, I tell you, from that point on, I had the disease of addiction. I really believe that.

And at 18 years old, I went to prison for the first time. Used to motor vehicle and did a year in that. And, the bad part about it is I didn't even steal the car. I didn't know the car was really stolen. A friend of mine got it and I was thinking it was his, it was okay, and I was going somewhere.

Of course, I don't I want to be honest with you. I was going somewhere to break in a place with this car that I didn't know that was stolen. And, I got caught and, they took me to the highest school precinct and, at 12 o'clock at night. And, at 9 o'clock in the morning, I went in front of a judge. And at that time, I don't know what it was.

I was 18 years old, and I don't know if you made a phone call or what, but they said you're going to court in the morning. I said, well, I'll be I'll be found not guilty. I didn't do nothing. They just called me in the car. The car was stolen.

Well, I didn't know. So the judge said, you wanna be tried now by tried by, you know, another quarter. How do you wanna do it? And I said, I wanna be tried right now. I didn't do nothing.

And I says, of course, but nowadays you couldn't do that. And, he said, how do you plead? I said, not guilty. Of course, police officer gave him. I was riding through the road.

He pulled me over. The car was stolen such and such. And the judge looked down and said the court finds you guilty and I've sent you to 1 year in the Maryland House of correction. Never been in trouble in my life till that point. And at 12 noon, I was eating lunch in jessel.

Parents didn't know where I was. Took them 2 weeks before they finally got a letter from me. And, they were heartbroken. And I'll tell you what, that was the time that, my life started of the day of crime. And for that point on, I didn't do nothing but do anything to get money.

And I remember my cell partner was a safe cracker. And it fascinated how you get over these face. And, so I went out and started doing that, started breaking in places. In fact, me and a couple of guys that, used to come to Atlantic City before it even had the gambling. And we used to knock off probably every gas station there was on the way to Atlantic City on route 40 to get money to come down here to drink in the bars.

And I remember doing all that kind of insane stuff. And one of the worst things that happened to me, of course, I got busted 1967 for for a burglary. And in 19, and I got 3 years for it and I went to Hagerstown. And in 1972, I had a shootout with the Prince George's County Police on Kenilworth Avenue. And I just got through breaking in the house and I was drunk.

And it was a bookmaker's house and I remember that. And, this guy owed me some money on a bet never paid and he said I owed it. And he usually keeps a line where he says, well, I know what you bet. I know what you did. I got it on tape.

And and the bottom line was that I thought I won and I was mad at him. I said I'm gonna break in break in his house and steal all his money. So I end up breaking in his house. Thought it was his house. I was drunk and I looked out there and the man pulled up in a telephone truck.

I said, what the hell? That man ain't no telephone. He's a book miker. He ain't no damn telephone man. And I was in the wrong house.

I was in the house next door. So I run out the back and he heard the door shut, run out after me and he pulled up alongside a little pickup parked a couple blocks away and I got in that truck and rode down Kenilworth Avenue and it they must have radioed and he must I don't know. He pulled over, went to a pay phone and called the police and said I was on my way down Kenilworth Avenue. I'll be down Riverdale Road. And right there at the McDonald's there, there was police, I guess they were eating lunch or something and they were coming out there and they had me surrounded.

There must have been 10 or 15 cop cars right there Kenilworth Avenue and Riverdale Road. Probably the busiest intersection in the world. And they stopped. I had a 22 pistol on me. I said, I'll get down.

I pulled the gun out to shoot them and it went off and I shot myself and the lady. I fell out of the truck. Y'all shot me. And they didn't fire a shot. They took me to PG Hospital and they removed a little slug was a 22.

We all know that police don't carry no 20 twos. And make matters worse, I shot me in the leg and it come right out the back of my butt almost. I didn't quite get out and my ass was burning. So the doctor was, boss, damn, get that thing out of there. So we finally got it out and he took me to jail, took me up in Marlborough.

I went in front of the judge and they put me on out on some crazy bond, a 100, $200,000 bond because I had a gun. I don't know what it was. I couldn't even think about getting out on bond. And, I stayed there about a year. It was about 11 months actually.

And I went in front of the judge there and, he said how do you plead? I had a lawyer, you know, public defender and I denied this. This guy just chased me, got me mixed up with someone else and the whole deal. And make a long story short, I had a jury trial, it lasted a couple of days. I was trying to finagle when I told them to someone else and they end up, finding me guilty and he says, you got anything before I pay a sentence on you?

And I says, you know, said, yeah. I said, I want you to be as lenient as possible on me. And I said, I'm married and got a couple of kids. And I, you know, I and he said, do you have anything else to say? And I said, yeah.

I got one other thing to say. I think the jury made a wrong decision in this case. Well, he didn't like that idea. He didn't really like it. And he said, well, I have nothing to do.

That's the jury's decision. And they found you guilty. He almost chewed me out like he would have found me guilty too. And he says, I I sent you to 10 years in the Maryland House of Correction. In fact, at that time, it was Department of Correction.

I went to the Maryland Penitentiary. I was on diagnostic there. And, that was a tough road. And, I stayed there for a while. I did about seven and a half years on that 10 and when I got out, I said I know what I gotta do.

I gotta move out of the area. I gotta move to Frederick County. There's nothing up there but farms and cows and you can't get no trouble up there. With my addiction took me up there within a year, I had about 17 burglary charges on me and I'm broke in every place in Frederick County and, the judge says, how do you plead? I said, not guilty.

He said, I'll tell you what I'm gonna do. And before what happens, I work to deal with him because I, you know, he said if you play guilty and and all that stuff and then we worked it out, it's a plea bargain deal. He said I'll give you 3 years in the Frederick County Jail. And I agreed to that because I thought he was gonna give me 10 or 15 years to send me back down to the state system. But I it was a neat little old jail, old country jail.

I said, hell, I can get out of that thing. So what happened was he gave me 3 years and I did 3 years day for day in that county jail. That was one of the worst times. That was worse than that 7 years, 7 and a half years I ever did in that county jail. And when I got out of there, I moved back to the Silver Spring area and, you know, my life just got, it got worse and worse and I started shooting dope and doing all the crazy things I had to do and and and all that and, it never got any better.

That was my whole life. And I got busted again into a couple years and, I remember one time I was in Jessup and my, mother would never come visit me inside the institution. She said it just breaks her heart to see her little John in jail. Little John John, she called me. I was about I looked like I was acting like Charles Manson out there.

She called me little John John. And she says, I come to visit. She she wrote me a letter. I'm gonna be up in mother's day and I I really wanna see you. And I said, good.

I'll be glad to see you. Well, a couple of days before that, me and myself, Art, was making wine, and they called it jump steady. Anybody who's been to jail know what jump steady is? And we started, making this wine and we put too much yeast in it. We're about 3 o'clock in the morning.

I heard the cell doors open up. The wind then exploded and run out on the tear. The the guards come in running in there. There ain't but 2 of us in the cell. He said, whose wind is it?

I said, it ain't mine. And my cell partner said it wasn't his and he put us on lockup. And I got 90 days on lockup And I remember that weekend, my mother come to visit me on Mother's Day. And it wouldn't let her in because I couldn't get new visits. And she wrote me a letter and I never forget that letter to this day.

She said, dear John, she said, you can't even be good in jail. How true that was? How true that was? See, the problem remember I remember coming back to my cell and I caught this guy breaking in my locker, 29¢ bag of cookies and and, my cell was right near the end It was about number 38 at that time and it was about 45 cells I think on that tier. And he got up real front.

Soon as the doors opened, he knew I was in back coming back from the town hall and he went and got in up, saw him open my door, open the doors altogether and I got down there and he was breaking in my cell and he was, I mean, he was in my locker, breaking in my locker with a 29¢ bag of cookies and we started tussling in there and I always kept a tobacco can, a Buickler tobacco can sharpened underneath, my bunk. And he hit me. He had some kind of rod and he hit me and he knocked me down. He really stung me. And when he fell down, I fell down right at the end of the bed.

And I remember that for some reason, my hand reached underneath that mattress. It just fell at the right place. I knew I had it there and I found that bugger back there cam. And, I started cutting on him. And it was like a razor.

I cut him from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet. And I remember the guards came in to pull me off of them, threw me down in isolation. The next day they come up, I had a hearing. They said I was definitely, in a lot of trouble. And the next day, it was 2 days that went by, they came to come out.

You gotta come out here. Step out here. They made me step up, put my hands behind my back, the handcuffs, put shackles around my waist, shackled my feet, said you're going somewhere. I didn't know where I was going. They put me in a car and they took me a couple miles away.

They took me to a place called Clinton T Perkins for the criminally insane. And I stayed there about 4 months and they didn't know how to control me. And I was in a place with some nuts. Let me tell you, these people were out there. I don't belong there.

But they must have thought it did because I was acting out someone was doing something crazy and, wanna urinate on my feet. I said, he ain't urinate on my feet. And I started I got in a couple of scuffles in there and they said, well, you you know, we need to do something. So they put me on Thorazine. Liquid Thorazine.

He used to go in there and crack nasty stuff. And my big event of the day was going down to Chowdhury. It would lock the rooms. You couldn't get down there. You couldn't get in your room because you had to go out of the hall.

The only thing you could do is play ping pong and cards. You can play cards and ping pong. That's all you could do and sleep. You slept all the time because the doors didn't knock you down. I'd be laid up in the I corner corner somewhere where another nut wasn't and I put myself down there and I'd go to sleep.

And then some nut would kick me to my turn in that corner and I'd get up. And then I heard someone say chow time and I'd get up and I'd go down to the chow hall. And it would take me at least 2 days to get there. I remember that walk to that hall. And then I heard the people say hurry up and eat, you know.

Know. We gotta go back. 10 minutes later, I'm doing this. Of course, back in my corner. But you know what the best event of the day was?

Around 3 o'clock in the afternoon, they give you another cup of Thorazine and they open the day rooms up. They open the rooms up where your bed was until you can go in your bed. Thank God for that bed. I was back in that going to bed. That went on for 4 months.

4 months. When I think about that today, I can laugh about it. But man, I was screwed up. They had me messed up. They had me hired.

I was in some kind I don't know. I spoke PCP but I ain't never been like that. Slobbing all down my mouth, you know, just shit dripping. Crazy. Thank God that experience and it came in after about 4 months.

I went to the psychiatrist and they, of course, they asked me all kind of questions, you know, like, Perry, we talked about the inner child and I didn't even wanna talk about the inner child. I didn't wanna talk about no child. I wanna get out of here. And they said, well, you got a serious problem. Damn, I got a serious problem.

You've got these people giving me this medicine, got a serious problem. I said, you know, the bottom line was that, I went back to Jessup and, they put some charges on me, kept murder on the guy that I cut. And this was 4 months I was there. When I went back, he was still in the in the sick bay hospital there. He must have had 10,000 stitches in it.

He said, you know what he yelled? He had nerve enough. He put me on lock up and I went past him. He said, I'm going to get you. I said, honey, you don't get me.

You'll be lucky next time, I'm a kill you. And you know what? I never saw him after that because he transferred him out and, they sent him to the Maryland Penitentiary. And, I never did see him anymore after that. And what happened was that I went to court and, I worked a deal with him when he gave me a couple years and he ran it with the time that I was doing.

And, so that was that was great, you know. That that was that was wonderful. And, I had no, I didn't have to do any more extra time. So for that I'm real grateful. You know, I'm real grateful that I didn't.

And I tell you what, in 19 85 after all the craziness of incarceration, of course I was married with 3 kids in and out of prison and and all that. I ended up, going to, jail again up in Frederick County. It was for my 3rd DWI and they asked me they asked me. The judge says, you know, you need to be in some kind of treatment center. You got the worst criminal record I've ever seen.

You definitely got a problem with drugs and alcohol. I mean, how would you like to go into a treatment center? I said I would. Well, he gave me a year in jail for the 3rd DWI and gave me a $500 fine and and he said we're gonna see if we can get some kind of program for you. But that woman came over from the Frederick County Health Department and they interviewed me and said you definitely got a substance abuse problem and you'd like to go in treatment.

And at that time I'll be honest with you, I said sure I would love to go in. And, really I wasn't thinking about going in. I just wanna get out of that jail, to be honest with you. But I just wanna get out. And what happened was that, they sent me to a place called the MASA unit in Cumberland, Maryland.

And I went up there and, I realized that, I knew I was an alcoholic drug addict 20 years before I got here. I didn't have a problem with that. Problem that I had, I didn't wanna do nothing about it. I didn't like getting straight. Who the hell wanted to be straight?

I like getting high. I like what it did. And, for the first time, they took me to meetings outside and and one of the meetings was called, was a meeting. My first meeting since I got out of incarceration was the CDA meeting actually. But my first meeting inside inside there when I was in treatment was an AA meeting up in Cumberland and it was called the smokehouse.

And the reason why it was old teeny church in Cumberland. And the reason why they called it the smokehouse because everybody in there had a cigarette and they were all smoking. And you couldn't see the speaker. So much smoke in the room. And I remember guys were picking up chips and all that and and, you know, 30 days and 60 days, and I thought they were lying, you know.

I thought that how you gonna stay straight for 30 days 60 days. And then I heard 1 guy, I'll never forget this as long as I live. There's 1 guy, it'll look like he had a piece of chew in the back end and side of his lip there and his, cheek. He said, my name is Henry and I'm a grateful recovering alcoholic and I'm one drink away from being drunk. I thought, damn, well Henry you can't drink too much.

How the hell did you want to drink away from being drunk? Didn't have a clue. But you know today I want to drink away from being drunk. I know that today. I learned that from Henry.

I haven't seen Henry. I don't know where Henry is, but I know one thing. I learned that from Henry. And I I tell you what, when I got out of there and went back to jail and I did a couple more months and they gave me time served. And I had an opportunity when I got out of there, they ordered me to go to health department and counseling and therapy and meetings and everything else.

And the first meeting I ever went to was a Wednesday night meeting. It was a CDA meeting over in belt I mean over in, over Colesville Road in Silver Spring. And it was about 5 or 6 people there at that meeting. And, 4 or 5 of them are in this room right now. And everybody was at that meeting when I went, are still clean and sober today.

And there's one person who isn't with us today, and that was Fonzie's adult who died. That was Mark Rude's adult. Everyone else is in this room and I never forgot that. Then they told me about a meeting over in Greenbelt. And, it was over in, Saint Hugh's church.

And I went over there and I saw this guy. He looked like the salesman and, the model. And who the hell is this guy? He looked familiar. He looked familiar.

He said my name is Ron. I didn't ask him what his name was. He said, I know you. Now you don't know me. Now you know me.

I've been in jail all my life. He said, I remember you. And what it was, he he played sports on one team and I played on another team. And later on, he's always said that, I was always scared of you. And, he said, you were crazy.

Y'all had a heck of a good team. Good football team. And my and I always played sports. And I love football. I love to hit people.

If you could hit people and get away with it. I love football and I love baseball. In fact, how that's how I've probably surprised, you know, survived in those institutions. I was always the the good athlete and always could play ball and always could play football and and all that. And I survived in there because of that.

I I believe that. And, and they always the guy could choose up and of course, at that time, I don't know what it is now. It was probably 85% 80 to 85% black in those institutions where I was in there. And all of them guys, I'll take that whiteboard out. Not be on the team.

Of course, they knocked me next to last, but that was alright. But, I had an opportunity to survive in those institutions because I could play sports fairly well. And, thank God when I came to CDA and, of course, I asked Ronnie to be my sponsor and, he gracefully said yes. And, we've had a relationship for the past 16 and a half years because of it. And, I had an opportunity in this fellowship, to kinda get involved especially early on.

It was kinda exciting. The reason why it was exciting is CDA was only about 5 years old, you know. And there's another thing that's real fun. My birthday is August 17th. And you know when CDA started?

August 17, 1980. And I remember that one couple of years there, August 17th, so on the day they had the annual picnic. There's a 150 people. I think they're there for my birthday. They're there for my birthday.

And, that's neat. Didn't I did not know all those years, you know, that, August 17th was the day the CDA was born. And I was and I used to study the book a lot and read it. And it's a fantastic book. We always hear about the big book of alcohol and illness which is a wonderful book.

CDA is not a bad book either because it really makes sense when you think about it. When it started on August 17, 1980, in Rick and Ellen's house, there was 12 people at that meeting. And I think 12 people with the 12 steps. And the next meeting after that was in Annapolis. I think it was the Saint Anne's.

And I remember I've been to Saint Anne's. I think it was on Duke of Gloucester Street in in downtown Annapolis. And I've been to that meeting. So I can say that I've been to the 2nd CDA meeting ever. And that's wonderful when you can say this part of history.

But what's more exciting than that is that, when I came in and it was a few years, I did I had 18 months at that time and they were getting ready Willy and they were all both going and we're getting ready to put out a big book, chemical dependent anonymous. Someone asked me, would you be willing, to share your story? And of course I did. And, my story got, put in the big book and, that's when I had a problem. Didn't know what to name it and, of course, it came up God doesn't make junk even though I thought I was a worthless person and I was bad and I was no count.

God created me bad. He created some people good. He happened to be the one that created me bad. I really believe that. That's hell that's hell.

You know, this disease does to us. And I didn't have a relationship with God, didn't know anything about God until I got in here. And I heard about God and, and I went to some good schools too. I went to some Catholic schools that were good schools. And I had some nuns that really try to do the right thing with me, you know, really try to help me along and tutor me and spend extra time.

And I just wanna do it my way. And that my way, of course, took me to the penitentiaries and all that. And, so I had an opportunity to be a part of that CDA big book and that meant a lot to me, you know. And not only that, after that I thought about it because we were having softball and I got to play on the softball team with Mike. Mike s was the coach and of course we won the championship.

I think it was about 1987. That was really a neat thing. That was really neat. And, before we did that, I wrote something I didn't know because I couldn't hardly I didn't learn how to spell it. I was about 18 years old or even read till I was about 18.

The only thing I read was a crime section. And the reason why I read the crime section is because I read the metro section. I wonder where all the dope was, where were they dying at so I could go down and get it. So I learned how to read through that and also reading sports. That's the only thing.

I sure I don't know how they got me through 9 or 10 years of school. And, I remember writing stories and one of the best things, you know, we talk about the big book was, and I was having so much fun playing ball and where there's a chapter in there is having fun in recovery. And that means more to me than my story in there. Because that tells the new people that we can have fun in recovery. That is one of the greatest things that I think has happened to me since I've been clean and sober.

Just having fun and recovery. And there's a million stories in there. And and I'm gonna read a couple of the stories, not in-depth. Just a couple of things about fun and recovery and some of the names you'll remember. And some of them are here tonight.

Big Al hits another one over the fence. Coach Mike s jumps for joy when Tim makes another another double play look easy. John throws another pitch. Not as good as Jamie but, good. Marlene cheers the CDA fun bunch to the 1987 softball championship.

Volleyball. Willie sends the ball right on our way for the slam. Rhett taps it over the net for the point. Perry spikes another one. The CDA volleyball teams wins it all.

Gratitude breakfast. Brent speaks from his heart while Candy and Heidi and Marie listened to finish their coffee. Sterling smiles and laughs at the speakers as they share their experience, strength, and hope with each other. White Water Rafton, Kevin and Gwen and Big Rob share their experience at the campfire meeting. Danny is at the annual picnic and enjoys a ride home on his big motor.

New Year's dance. Bucky, Beverly, getting down on the floor. That's fun. That's fun in recovery. And another thing about this book, this is the hardbound copy of the CDA big book.

It's probably worth $20,000. I think I got the only one left. The rest of them gave them away. I bought 5 of them. Got them all.

See me after to meet Ronnie. They cost $50 a piece at that time. Right, Willie? $50 a piece. Red skin colors.

Secret. Look, I had it covered and everything. This is the first time I bought it out. It ain't never been red. I just first time it's ever been red.

One of my trophies. That's wonderful. I showed a couple of people from Delaware so they'd be the 1st to see the big CD 8 first book. Didn't they, Sandy? Show it to them.

And, you know, the story get touching, some of the other stories. Here's another story. There's a guy in prison, someone I had dealt drugs with. I was all excited about being straight. He was all I was all excited about being straight.

I sent him the acceptance pamphlet. I wrote him a letter. Man, I haven't used drugs in over a 180 days. I got a new way of life and I want to share this with you. I'm sure he was thrilled to hear my news sitting in the penitentiary while he served 5 years.

But 4 years later, I got a phone call from this guy who was once called the biggest PCP manufacturer in the United States. But this year, he'll be celebrating 2 years in the fellowship, and that was 15 years ago. And those 2 fellows are in this room right now. It's a miracle. That's a miracle.

It's a miracle. Here's another story. Right after my 5th anniversary, I went to onto a CDA camp out with my girlfriend. I had decided that this might be the right time to pop the question. 2 years before I had not even considered marrying, but one night as we walked on the beach, I just looked over to her and said, I'm making this walk toward God and I wonder if you would like to come along with me.

She knew exactly what I meant and she answered, I would. 6 months ago, I had the privilege of walking her down the aisle. This was an extremely important step in my life because I think I finally understood now what love is. Marvelous story when you think about it. And I have children that, using and I I have a son, the youngest son and and he's been doing real good.

He's been doing good for a while and, he's involved in a church and he does really good. And the other 2 have been dabbling and, and it kinda makes you disgusting. But I've turned them over to God. There's nothing I could do. Not powerless over it.

And what I'm at 5 years and the other one, said she had 2. I don't know about that but she said she had 2. It just breaks your heart. And, the person I talked about who read that story had older son about my son's age. He goes to the same thing.

We all have that. We have children and we have friends and, you know, and I think we really learn about powerlessness more so with other people than we do ourselves. You know, I've done myself. I really learned about powerlessness. You know, because when I looked at me, I didn't think I was powerless, you know.

I just didn't wanna stop. You know, I didn't really look at it till I came in the program and realized that I was powerless over alcohol and drugs. But I was more powerless over other people, especially your own kids. Growing up to be a good person and not a drug addict and alcohol because they're raised in a good Christian home. Makes all the difference in the world.

Makes all the difference in the world. It's not they don't go away, but they got shot. And that's what we have in this program. I know myself. We have a shot.

We bring our kids up right and try to do the right thing and not take the path that we took. We have a shot. And, thank God for this program. And, I tell you what, it saved my life. It saved my life.

And I moved down here a few years ago and me and Diane and, I've been through some hard times in sobriety. I haven't been through some easy times. I've been through some hard times health wise and I went through an awful divorce. I didn't know how to deal with it, you know. I didn't know how to deal with it.

And, I don't wanna say nothing bad but I don't know I didn't know how to deal with it. A lot of anger, a lot of craziness went in my head. And, of course, that would've took me back to the penitentiary probably on death row. So I did with it the only way I had to deal with it. I got on my knees and asked God what I'd do.

He said, well you can't do what you're thinking. It's the only thing he told me. And the reason why, because you had 3 children and you're talking about these kids' mother. And he was right. He was right.

So I did the next best thing, I moved to Delaware. After I got a divorce and finally after a year I said I'm never getting I'm not getting mixed up. And I was married 27 years. And I've known Diane for a long time and we got, married. A year after my divorce was fine.

She's been the love of my life. She's my soul mate. We have a great relationship. Kinda crazy at times, you know what I mean? Laugh and joke and talk about this craziness of growing up and her father and and and my father and what they did.

A little insane things, you know. And I met my father used to him and my mother you know, my father was a really most of my mother and father were decent people. They really were even though they were drug drug and alcoholics, you know. And I think my mother was dabbling with the pills a lot. But they were they were decent people.

They did the best they could. And they did show tried to show love. They really did. They tried to do the best they could. My father had a good government job and he was always teasing my mother.

He was corny. He saw these corny jokes, you know, real corny stuff at the dinner table. My mother's name was Jane and my father's name was Ray and my mother my father would look over and say, Jane, we'll be eating liverworts, which I hate today. I eat it once in a while but I don't like it. It stinks.

He would ask my mother, how's your liver? Worse? What the hell is he talking about? That kind of corny stuff. Would he eat kidney beans?

How's your kidney? Bean. And I, you know, I grew up in kind of craziness. And I find myself doing that with my kids today. A little crazy.

I say, how's your liver worse? And you know what? The sad part of it is my liver is worse. And, I found out after a few years in this program that, I got hepatitis c. And, I tell you, I went to the doctor to see if you can do a couple of things.

He said, you cannot do anything about it? He said, but it looks like it's getting pretty bad and we need to do something. So I had a liver biopsy and the whole deal and, they put me on interferon and, stayed on that and they put me on Pegatron and I tell you what, I was sick as I've ever been in my life. I stayed on it 7 months. The type that I have, my genotype is a 2.

And it don't respond to medicine any better after 6 months, you know, than anything. Some people genotype is 1 and they can they have to stay on it a year. And, I was so sick I had boils. In fact, I had marks on my arms right now where it's starting to heal. I never suffered from depression.

I started getting depressed, suicidal stuff. This craziness, very irritable, sick. I felt like I was real sick. I had the flu, I've just I've never felt that sick in my life. And I went to the doctor, I tried to call him and Diane, came home one day and she said you gotta do something, you gotta get out of that bed.

I couldn't get out of bed, I didn't wanna go nowhere. I was sick. And I probably was close to death and didn't know it. She said, you look awful. So So I finally went to the doctor and he said we've got to take you off this medicine.

How long have you been like this? I said, great. As long as you can give me the medicine. He said you wouldn't like this last month. I said well, I started really getting sick about a month ago.