The topic of "The Family Afterward" at the 24th Tumbleweed Conference in Hobbs, NM

Hi, everybody. My name's Polly Pistole, and I'm an alcoholic. Alcoholic. And we would just love to thank you very much for allowing us this opportunity to, to share with you. And we're gonna try to tell you what it was like, what happened, and what it's like now.

And, and we're gonna try to be as honest as we can be about the all three of those things, and, try to share with you some of the things that we've done as a family to try to heal, from the disease of alcoholism. And James and I are very much into the chapter, the family afterwards. And we're gonna try to, refer back to the book so that you will also know that we are using the book. And what we'd like to do at the end, we don't know if that'll work, and we don't know how long winded we're gonna be. But, if you'd like to ask questions to us, because sometimes if you ask a question, that'll bring something up we never that we do, but we didn't think about to say.

So but what you have to do is you have to be not shy, because you have to walk up here and use his mic to ask the question. So if you have a question and you wanna do that, please come to the front and do that. Okay? And, and I'd like to introduce that you've already heard him this morning. My gorgeous son, James.

Hi, everybody. James Lee, alcoholic. Hi, James. We have done this, my mom and I, once. We had we really didn't plan much.

Just sort of we just started talking and telling our our story, not like my story or her story, but our story. I think that's what we're gonna do. Is that what we're gonna do? Because we haven't even talked about it. So, but but, as she said, we're gonna refer back to the big book.

And the big book, chapter 9 is the family afterward. And my opinion this is my opinion, but in my opinion, that chapter holds so many, principles of living a sober life. And that's what we wanna hopefully get to. But we need to start about with what it used to be like. And what it used to be like is she used to drink a lot, and you're gonna find this out tomorrow when she tells her story.

And it's what I alluded to this morning is my response to that was I checked out. And I can describe that to you telling this story. I don't know. I must have been 13, 14 maybe. And this is at the when it was getting really bad was is my mom was getting ready to start going into treatment centers trying to get sober.

1 morning, I woke up. And by the way, by this time, I pretty much saw to it that I got where I needed to go all by myself. So I got myself ready for school and got out to school and so on. And this morning, I woke up and I walked into the kitchen. And, my mom had passed out on the floor, with the drink in her hand, which spilled all over the floor.

And here was my reaction to that. Here's what I did. I looked at the situation, and I stepped over my mom, got the the cereal out of the cabinet, got a bowl out of the cabinet, poured the cereal in the bowl, poured my milk on top of that, I stepped back over her, I sat down at the breakfast table, and I had my breakfast. And that's what it was like in our house. My brother, on the other hand, was the, the classic caretaker.

So if he had woken up first, he would have picked you up, put you, you know, put her in bed or whatever. But that's not what I did. So my role my my reaction to life was exactly like I described. And that is not a way to live. I guarantee you that.

I started drinking prior to, both of my children being born. I started drinking at age 18. And, one of the things that James has also not he didn't say in his story, but we were a military family. So add alcoholism with never being in the same spot for a very long period of time. So relationships for the kids, you know, we as adults would make relationships, and we kind of stay friends with those and then make new relationships.

But the children were in a constant state of making new relationships in a very, you know, chaotic house. And, my alcoholism started to really, progress, probably about the time that, the kids that James probably started middle school. But it always had been there. And I was a person who used a lot of barbiturates, tranquilizers, and alcohol. So consequently, I would I would pass out to the stage that it looked like death.

And, the terror was, with the lot, with the kids, was that that they would see me in that state. And, James got to the point that he paid no attention to it, And my other son was always screaming and shaking me, and you know, are you dead? Are you dead? Are you dead? And that was kind of the, what happened with the kids.

Now, bear in mind that these children had a father, but their father was a member of the Strategic Air Command. And he was, he flew B 50 twos. He was gone all the time. So the children were with me. They had no real presence of a father.

So here they are, no presence of a father and an alcoholic mother. And there was 2 things going on with me. Either I was passed out incapable of taking care of the children, or I was screaming, and raging, and hitting, and whatever. Go We preferred passed out. So this was so one of the things that I think that we talk about that should the care that should be in a family is that, the security.

Children need to be safe. My children were not safe. And the big book on page 123 says, the family of of an alcoholic longs for the return of happiness and security. There was no happiness and there was no security. My children were not safe.

They were not safe with me. The other thing is is I look at my at my grandchildren that are James's children, or my other 2 grandchildren that are 11, 8, and 5. Now my 11 year old grandson has no idea what it's like to get up at 11 years old, because my alcoholism was bad by the time James was 11 years old, and certainly bad by the time his brother was 13. And they would get up, get themselves dressed, and get off to school because their mother was incapable of doing that. And they made their own lunches.

They there was no because there was no one there to do that for them. Their father was gone and their mother couldn't get up in the morning. So those children had no consideration. And the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous says talks about consideration. He may be so in thrall by his new life that he well, when we got sober, he that I don't wanna talk about that.

That's that's in a minute. That there was no consideration of these children's feelings. And the other thing was the responsibility of a parent. The big book talks about responsibility. I could not be a responsible parent.

And I was incapable of taking care of my children. And the other thing is, is because of that, my children never brought their friends home, because they didn't know how they would find their mother. By then, by the time that, we had the end of our the air force. He had congestive heart failure. He was very ill.

And, so he stayed in his bedroom all the time. And, I stayed passed out on the den sofa. So the children would not bring friends home, because, first of all, our house wasn't right. The daddy was it's sick, the mother was passed out. So there was no peril, parental responsibility.

Formulated a lot it formulated a lot of ideas of abandonment. And through this program, James has been able to heal that for himself. And I was so grateful to an AA speaker that I heard early on in my sobriety. And it's helped. I still have had to I've had a lot of problems with the guilt of being an alcoholic parent.

Because one of the things is that James found the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. My other son, is not an alcoholic. And, but he's got a lot of mental problems. And, because this disease does a lot of stuff to people, and he has a lot of those problems. And I'm grateful every day to the program because it's I can get to see James recover.

I am ever reminded of the disease of alcoholism because my son, Russ, doesn't have that, And his life does not get that much better. And, so I'm I'm so grateful for a speaker once that said, you know, I looked at my my children and I said, all my problems, all your problems have my name on them, but all your solutions have yours. And what I have finally been able to let go of is that, I don't have any control over the solution. And so when you come out of an alcoholic family, it becomes the challenge to do whatever you need to do to to heal from what happened. And that becomes their challenge, not mine, because I can't do anything about that.

And I guess the best of all is us watching Ryan grow up, because, he's deaf and he has challenges. And we have to watch him do his struggles, and, go to school, and and, be the only deaf kid in school. And I know that that's probably how my kids felt, because I'm sure they're thinking nobody else is living like this. That there's not not anybody else living like that. And, so that's kinda like how it was.

And my reaction to that was, I was an alcoholic. So I I would see what was happening to my kids. I would do some really horrible things to my children. So what you need to hear from me is is that the hardest character defect I had to face as a sober, alcoholic mom is that I'm a child abuser. And I'm telling you today, women like me would not be able to take care would not be able keep their children.

Because my children, from a very young age, were not cared for. They were not taken care of. They, like James said, just stepping over mom. They didn't that's what they did, except my son, Russ. I mean, I he has he did things that little kids shouldn't have to do.

And he picked me up, put me in bed, and take care of me. That's what he would do. And James was perfectly willing to let him do it because he just he just looked at it and walked away. But that's what happens to little kids in these kind of families. And, today, I am a I am a parent who neglected her children.

And my daughter-in-law that James is married to is a social worker, and she has had to remove children from homes from parents like me. And that's what happens because little kids are running around not being taken care of. And that's what happened for my children. And, one of the things that they say, you know, it'll either you'll come out of that, you're gonna either make you everything disease. And I get to see the two reactions to the disease of alcoholism.

And, I'm in a way, I'm grateful because I'm a member of both programs. So Russ keeps me active in the rooms of Al Anon. So that's probably a good thing because, I am, I'm active in the rooms of Al Anon. And it's the only thing I know to keep to to help with that kind of family illness is to because if you are the parent of children who are suffering, then you know what I'm talking about. And at my oldest son is 44 years old, and I guarantee you, I have learned one thing that the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous talks about.

And that at 44 years old, to help my son, I am powerless. I am powerless. There is nothing I can do to help him. So, that's the way it was. I'm a let James go on to the next phase.

You wanna add anything to that? I have to tell you guys, it's really hard to maintain this aura of being hips looking cool when you hear stuff like this being talked about yourself. But the book talks about what we're actually doing right here. It talks about, first of all, on page 122, there's a line that says, the doctor said to us, years of living with an alcoholic is almost sure to make any wife or child neurotic. So I I'll sign up for that that right there.

The the the entirely entire family is to some extent ill. I agree with this. And I agree with that, in my family too with my kids. Because I'm an alcoholic. And while I'm not a practicing alcohols alcoholic, I still have alcoholism, which means I'm still affecting my children as well.

I don't agree with I when my mom says all your problems have my name, all your solutions have yours, I'm not sure I agree with that. I do agree with all my all my solutions have my name on it. But I think that my problems are based on my reaction to my reality. Mhmm. K.

That's that's the root of my problems right there. My self centered reaction to my reality. However, it's hard to live in an environment like that and not be affected, and that is the reality. So while I do not hold anyone responsible other than the disease of alcoholism, really, and my reactions to it, I understand how that helps you frame the situation. So what I wanna say is while I understand what she's what my mom's saying about that, I do not think that my problems have her name on it.

K? If that's the case, then her problems have, you know, someone else and so on. So, but I do agree that any recovery that I personally have is is up to actions I take. Mhmm. There's nothing that she can do, and she had to watch and she tried.

Remember some of the things you did? She's sober in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, and she'd say to me, James, we're saving a seat for you over at the group. Now when you're 16, 17, you don't wanna hear that. Alright? But they're safe.

And she said once, James had this great sponsor picked out. I wish you'd hurry up and get here. You wanna know what my reaction to that was? I'll show you. I won't need this thing.

K? So if you're a parent out there, you're thinking about picking sponsors for your kids, you may wanna think twice about that. Anyway, so what we're sharing here is the past, which is uncomfortable in a in a way because it is it was painful. But what the book says on page 124 is the alcoholics, we we, hen I'll just read this paragraph. Henry port Henry Ford once made a wise remark to the effect that experience is the thing of supreme value in life.

That is true only if one is willing to turn the past to good account. We grow by our willingness to face and rectify errors and convert them into assets. The alcoholic's past and the family thus becomes a principal asset of the family and frequently is all it is almost the only one. So the reason we share is because our past, I believe, is our principal assets, like the book says. Alright.

Let's say let's just say for argument that my mom is right. That every problem I have has has her name on it. Here's my reaction to that today, my response to that. Thank you. Thank you.

Because everything that I've experienced, got me ready for AAA, which got me a seat in Alcoholics Anonymous, which got me, this many years later sitting here. So if my problems have your name, I'll thank you, but they don't. Okay. Your turn. Okay.

That's the next thing that I wanna talk about is kinda kinda give you an idea of of what it was like. And that what's what it's like. Most of you, a lot of you, I don't know what it's like to grow up in an alcoholic home. I did not grow up in an alcoholic home. But, then recovery started, and, I got sober.

And I've also, between that, put well, one of the things that happened after I got sober, and I did not get sober easily. I was not one that walked into AA and said, that's it. I was going to treatment centers and, of course, my little kids were being dragged into family groups, and this thing, and that thing. And, I was being found in motels with other men. And, I mean, it was it was pretty bad because I just I was desperately trying to die.

And I was I was I was on during a time from about January to April, when I got sober, January of 76 till I got sober in April of 77, I had, 3 suicide attempts, And my children were involved in all of that. And also, I would be caught with other men, and just just some disgusting things that kids are put through because of the disease of alcoholism. Well, I get sober. Now, when I finally got it, the 3rd time around, when I got sober and I started in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, I got it. You know, it's just like, I got it.

And I fell in love with Alcoholics Anonymous. And what began to happen is, is that I never I didn't drink in bars, and I didn't do those kind of things. I didn't start having all these men around, till I started going to treatment. And that's when that all started. I would run we'd run off and get drunk together.

And, but when I got sober, I got it. But I'm here to tell you, I did some stuff sober that was just as bad. And then it was, it's one of the things I want to talk about is consideration. And on page 126, this is where I want to talk about the consideration. He may be so enthralled by his new life that he talks or thinks of little else.

In either case, certain family problems will arise. With these, we have had experience galore. And I can tell you that I was so in love with Alcoholics Anonymous, I was desperately trying to get him sober. Just knew I had the answer for him. I was dragging him off to open AA meetings.

I was making him go to Alateen. And, I was told, you make them go to 9 meetings of Allatine, and then they can make their own decision. Well, James found a whole crew of a whole crew of dope smoking alatine, so he loved alatine. They were made to go too. So they loved Alateen.

Russ went to 9 meetings and said, I'm never going back there again. And here I was, talking AA, doing all this stuff in AA. Well, guess what's happening to my family, and their opinion of AA? They hate it. They hate me being an hate me going to a meeting every night.

They hate me running around, doing all the stuff I'm doing, and I wanted to be in everything. I'm in love with AA. So what I do, is I did just what the book said. I started hanging out in AA, and the book says, if you're doing that, we might as well just be hanging out in bars, because we are no more used to our family than we were before we got sober. So I wasn't doing much else.

Page 127, it says, responsibility. The head of the House ought to remember that he is mainly to blame for what befell his home. He can scarcely square the account in his lifetime. And I have to remember that. That, you know, I'm not gonna square this account in my lifetime.

Account squared. Account squared. But he must see the danger of over concentration on financial success. Although financial recovery is on the way for many of us, we found we could not place money first. For us, material well-being always follows spiritual progress, it never proceeds.

So here I'm doing 2 things. I'm needing to work because my husband is medically retired. So I've got my, you know, I'm gonna be working, I'm doing all this stuff. I'm going to AA meetings, I am doing nothing in my home. I am not a participant in my home.

I'm a participant in Alcoholics Anonymous, and I am a participant in my work, and little else. So I had to learn a really magic word that's in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. And I don't know if it's a magical word for you, but it's called balance. And I didn't know how to do family, do work, and do AA. I used to know how to I used to know how to get those things together.

And I'd go home, and the families, you know, they're just like 3 pitbull. Because I'm, are you going to AA again? And, yet I knew, because I'm a real alcoholic. I am a real alcoholic. And I'm the kind of alcoholic that needs a lot of meetings.

I'm 27 years sober, and I still need a lot of meetings. I am a real alcoholic. And when I first got sober, I went to a meeting every single day for the first five years of my sobriety, and sometime, 2 and 3 meetings a day. That's the kind of alcoholic I am. And I just couldn't seem to get it all together.

So what happened was, is we had a lot of problems in the family, sober. So just because AA came to be, things didn't get better. So I'm gonna let him go from there. Just to set the record straight though, it was way better than you being drunk. There's no question about that.

And at this time, I kinda started my career. So I started to really, get out there, start doing my deal and working out my story. And, and you know, they say the big the alcoholic is the big book that another person I mean, maybe the big book the only big book another person reads. Right? What that's what people say all the time.

And mom was my big book, so I started reading mom. And I have to tell you, the first 3 years of reading that big book, it read like a towards sex novel. Do you wanna tell them about that? There we go. But, and I got some old ideas about Alcoholics Anonymous, some of which I shared earlier.

And that was I would go to meetings, and I would get the sense that an alcoholic someone who, you know, did the jails, treatments, and so on. But here's what I believe, and that is I am grateful to have been told to go to those 9 meetings of Alateen, because I did get involved. I can remember I went, jeez, 1978, I went to the Texas Alatine Convention, is what it was called. And, you know, bunch of Alatine's from all over Texas. Hundreds of kids there, hundreds of them.

And there's this god as we understand a meeting on Sunday. In that meeting, God showed up. I'm telling you, God was there. And that was my first, non drug induced spiritual experience, I believe. And, I mean, that that was it was unbelievable.

And so here I am about 15, 16 years old, and I'm going to this convention. And all of a sudden, God has entered this room. And there's no question about it in my mind that of his presence. And so here is this choice, and it reminds me of the choice, very beginning of the chapter through the agnostics. There's this line.

I love this line. And it says, here, I'll just read it because I I don't quote the big book very well. Here it is. This is the choice the alcoholic has to make. To be doomed to an alcoholic death.

I knew if I was an alcoholic, I was gonna die. I just knew that because I watched her die. So I knew that was my future. To be doomed to an alcoholic death or to live on a spiritual basis are not always easy alternatives to face. But you love that.

Only alcoholics would that be a hard decision to make. So here I was 15, I'm making this choice. Here's God. I feel God in my life. I know this is the solution.

Here's I'm weighing over here. Weighing over here, alcoholic death. So here I'm 50. How painful is this alcoholic death? And that's the choice I made.

Because on the way home from that Texas Alatine convention, we were us we were getting loaded. And that was the choice I made. But as I as I shared earlier, I've I'm truly grateful that I was exposed to that. Because when it was my time on that day, all those memories came back to me. And I knew this that this was the answer.

I knew it. So my experience I would never give anyone advice. My experience is this. If you're if the fact that my mom encouraged me to go to Allentine has ended up being a good thing. Very good thing.

So, that's my experience there. James was talking about when he first came to the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, it looked like it read like a torrid sex novel. Well, what happened for me is I have a sick husband, I've been alcoholic, passed out all, and I get sober, and, and I just, you know, I just started some behavior. I got married when I was 18 years old. And, I'd been with this one man, and I got sober, and I just I don't know.

I just turned into a 17 year old kid. And I just started acting out in ways that were very unbecoming to someone at that time who was 36 years old. And, I started doing things at Alcoholics Anonymous. I was not a good example of Alcoholics Anonymous. And today, I have it's really important for me to be principled.

And it's important for me because of my behavior the first three years of being sober in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. Because I was just, I just wanted to be loved so bad, and I didn't have a relationship with a higher power, so I was acting out sexually. And I was doing things in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, and my children saw that. I mean, I I wasn't really hiding a lot of stuff. And, my marriage I mean, there's no question about my marriage was in the toilet.

I mean, it was gone. I mean, we occupied the same house, but there had been no marriage there for many, many, many, many years. And so when I got sober, I just I just acted like I wasn't married. And I didn't even act like I was sober in as far as my behavior went. And, so today, I feel like that was another responsibility.

First of all, I give my children a very bad look at Alcoholics Anonymous. Well, what is this? You get sober, and this is how you behave? And, so that's what I did. And for that, today, now when I work with women, I try very hard, and I said, if you wanna bring shame on yourself, you walk into the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous and you behave that way.

And and I really try to help them remain principled. And it's really important today for me, for my children, for the women I sponsor, my husband, but most of all, myself as I answer to my God, that I behave like a sober, married alcoholic. And at, 3 years of sobriety, I remarried. So not only had alcoholism been there, but I also ended up putting my children through divorce. And, my oldest son, Sil, today says, the worst thing that ever happened to me is my mother and daddy divorced.

And he's 44 years old. And he says, today, that's still the worst thing that ever happened to him. And, and I know those are traumatic things. So what I was still doing, sober, was selfish and self centered. I was, well, I'm sober.

And I need to go to these meetings. So even in sobriety, I'm not giving my family any consideration. So I wanted to point that out, and I kind of like to read what the big book says about spiritual pride. Assume, on the other hand, that father has, at the onset, a stirring spiritual experience. Now, I didn't have a stirring spiritual experience.

I didn't think. But I was sober. And I had tried everything on the planet he is a different man. He becomes a religious enthusiast. I was very religious about AA.

I just wasn't religious or didn't have any responsibility about my behavior. He is unable to focus on anything else. As soon as his sobriety begins to be taken, as a matter of course, the family may look at their strange new day with apprehension and then with irritation. There is talk about spiritual matters. Morning, noon, and night.

Human beings demand that the family find God in a hurry. Every Sunday morning, I made my family go to this meeting in Fort Worth, this AA meeting. They all had to go. We all piled in the car and we went to this AA me on Sunday morning. Now the religion is AA.

He may tell mother, who has been religious all her life, that she shouldn't that she doesn't know what it's all about and that she had better get his brand of spirituality where there is still yet time. They had to do it my way. When father takes this tack, the family may react unfavorably. They may be jealous of God, who has stolen Dad's affection, in this situation, Mom's affection. While grateful that he no longer drinks, they may not like the idea that God has accomplished the miracle where they had failed.

They often forget father was beyond human aid. They may not see why their love and devotion did not straighten him out. That is not so spiritual after all, they say. If he means to do if he means to right his past wrongs, why all this concern for everyone in the world but his family? What about his talk that God will take care of them?

They suspect Father is a bit balmy. Don't you love the words that Bill uses in the big book? Ball me. Ball me. So sobriety wasn't looking all that great for my family.

They didn't think it was all that big a deal. Well, you know, now you're just, you know, your actions are terrible, and you go to AA all the time. So, you know, we're not all that impressed with your AA. Okay. Your turn.

Yeah. Well, it was really freaky. It was one day I went to the, that Sunday morning meeting. It was at and I saw my hockey coach there. That that explained a lot of behavior on during practice time.

I guarantee you. But anyway, so it's true. The first 3 years, as I like to joke, read like and towards she her big book, read like a torts. But after that, things changed. And, she and Dave began to be the examples of Alcoholics Anonymous, that literally that literally sold me on AA.

I I there was a, after a period of time after they got married, they ended up in in, Santa Monica, California. So I moved out there. And I started living with them. And I was a practicing alcoholic in a big way. And, one of the stories is, she worked at this hospital.

I used to stuff envelopes, you know, for for money. That was that was kind of a side job I had. And she always wondered, how do you do that so fast? And then one day, she walks in the room, and here's a picture of her and Dave, very nice picture, sitting on my bed with a razor blade and a little roll up $20 bill. And, she had no clue as to why I got this stuff enveloped so fast.

But I tell you, you were doing what I was doing. You're moving fast. Anyway, so I'm living with them and I have this behavior. And to their credit, they were, you know, they were not trying to sell me on anything. They were just loving me.

That's what they were doing. And one day, I'll Al Anon. There you go. One day, I I was I was ripped. I was ripped this day.

I don't know what I had done or how much I drank or whatever. Dave and Polly came in the to my room. They said, we're gonna go to an A meeting. Dave's talking. I'm like, great.

See you. And they came back. And Dave came in, in my room and talked to me. And there's something about Dave. There was something about his eyes.

They were lit up. He was on fire. And in his eyes, I saw what I wanted. And that is how I believe we sell Alcoholics Anonymous to our family. My experience this is my experience.

Parents can't get their kids sober. But they can live the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. And that's what, Polly and Dave were doing at that time. We need our I well, that's what you say. We can't get our kids sober, but we we can get each other kids each other's kids sober.

And that's how it worked for me. But, while it was there was a rocky road in the beginning, some corner got turned. And, they began to sell Alcoholics Anonymous to me. They were the big book that I read for about three and a half years at that point. And, that's why when I when that moment came for me, I knew what I knew what the answer was.

Because they had lived it. One of the stories, Dave, James talked about that this lady, Barbara, was such an influence in his life because he called her to take this woman to a meeting. Barbara, it's just it's it's how God works. Because what happened was, I 12 stepped Barbara into AA, and Barbara 12 stepped James into AA. And that's those miracles that we keep that keep happening.

So, now I'd like to, go into, what was going on with you. Let's skip those early years of my sobriety. We'll move right on to what I was Well, I just wanna talk about those of you who, are alcoholic or alanon and have, had this troubled life, and then you have these kids. I just want to tell you that I understand what it's like to watch your child die of the disease of alcoholism. And the prayers and how you, you know, how you don't quite go to sleep until they come in at night and all of that kind of stuff.

So, I just want you to know that we've walked that side of the road as well. And I've also walked the side of the road with, psychiatric hospitals, and suicide attempts, and mutilation, and stuff like that with my oldest son. So You should also mention Dave's kids too. Dave's kids. Because you walk that with Dave's kids.

I wanna we have, we have 4 children. And, 3 of them are alcoholics and drug addicts. And and Russ has the psychiatric problems. But both of Dave's children, were were dying as well with James. And, in fact, his daughter we had not seen his daughter till 3 years ago for 15 years.

She was on the streets of Denver doing what women have to do to support an alcohol and cocaine habit. And, Dave did not see her. His son got sober at, when he when he got sober and then he ended up, Dave's son was is was gay, and he ended up with, being HIV. And, his, the HIV, manifest itself into lung cancer. And Mike died at age 42 with 8 years of sobriety.

And, and he was a beautiful, beautiful he was dying, right before he died, Kim showed up, and she was 8 months over. And, Dave gave her her first cake at Seal Beach, her 1st year birthday cake. So it's kinda like all our kids are home. They're all home. But there's been there's been a lot of heartbreak as parents watching children die of the disease of alcoholism.

So Dave and I have both been down that road with, with our 4 children. And, so I just wanna just kinda throw that in for for that part, because you're not going to know that unless you've experienced that. Because I didn't understand it till I experienced it. And, now I'd kinda like to go into, what it's like today. How much time do we have?

You're the keeper of the call. I figure we'll go about 20 minutes and we can ask for questions. Okay. Why don't you start, son? Alright.

This is my experience. Once again, my opinion and experience. I believe what the family afterward is all about is about steps 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. And of course, every day, do that. So that's step 10.

So I believe that that for me for me to have a relationship with my family members means that I am constantly looking for my part in situations, sharing that part, taking responsibility for that part. Sharing that part with my sponsor. Asking God to to identifying character defects. Asking God to remove those character defects. And then making amends.

And I believe through this so when I'm look so let's say for instance, this never happens. Let's say mom does something that kinda makes me mad. Never happens. Okay? Yeah.

Right. My job is not to say, mom, you did this. How could you? It's to say, okay. Where was I?

Why am I resentful? You know, what does it affect? And do the essentially do a 4 step on what's going on with me? Then share that with my sponsor or someone appropriate. Identify my character defects, and what I did in this situation, what needs to be rectified, making amends.

And here's the amazing thing. When I do that, forgiveness comes. And so for me, it what recovery in the family is all about is about, inventory, amends, and forgiveness. It's all about that. You've heard, my mom describe a lot of these the things that happened when we were kids.

I have absolutely no bad feelings about that at all. As a matter of fact, as I shared earlier, I'm grateful. My feeling is I'm grateful for every time she detorted to control me, yanked me by the head of the hair. Remember you used to do that? Yes.

Yes. Yeah. I but I do believe that as a result of her pulling on my hair so many times when I was a kid, now at 42 it's beginning to fall out. For that, I have a resentment of that. But other than that, I'm very grateful for all the Eagles' experiences.

Now there that was not the case, when I was a kid. When I was a teenager, I was angry. And when I was newly sober, I was, entitled to I was mad. Way to say that. But today, I have no anger about that.

It's all about forgiveness. And then I get to put her through a similar thing. And so what I did was I as I'm working the program, and and you know how we do in the early years, do the best we can. I remember I I did my 4 step. Made my list.

Strange thing. I had she was on my resentment list. Can you believe that? Anyway, so I do my inventory, and then, of course, she's on my 8th step list, so I make amends. And it here's how those amends went.

I'm really sorry for all I did. I know I hurt you about that flat. Because I really could not I was doing the best I can. There's no question about it. In making those amends.

But I could not connect with what I actually did. And I think that for for me, over time in recovery, I began to sort of get in touch with, on a gut level, what I actually did, and how harmful that is. And I think that was mainly as a result of having children myself. So having kids myself, I kind of can only imagine at this point what it must be like when my son my son's Ryan is 11, you know. In our neck neck of the woods, that's about the time kids start, you know, in junior high, smoking pot or whatever.

And so I can only imagine I was talking about this earlier. I can only imagine what this is like or will be like. Well, we'll see. But it was near 2000. It was, during summer summer of 2000.

I had started to realize on a gut level what this what I had done. I mean, really, really feeling the remorse that's appropriate for my behavior. And so what happened was is, July 4th weekend in 2,000, Dave and I flew up to Minneapolis for the international. And I sat with Dave, after a meeting. And I sat sat down.

I said, Dave, I just I want you to know, I I really get it, what I did. And I really under I can get to a degree how much I hurt you. And I'm I want you I'm so incredibly sorry about that. And his answer was, you know, essentially, you don't have anything to apologize for because he had forgiven me. And I came home and, sat with my my mom on the porch.

And I said the same conversation. I said, mom, I get it now. I'm really, really sorry. Like, in my gut for what I've done. And that moment, it was it was gone.

Mhmm. So it's about inventory, asking God to remove defects, making amends and forgiveness. And that is a miraculous it's such a simple thing. You know, it can't work like that, that, can it? It's too simple.

I want complicated alcoholic. I want something I want, you know, 164 pages. Forget it. 1,000 pages at least for me. But anyway, so that's that's my experience with, the steps and family recovery.

When I got sober, I had a wonderful sponsor. Monsignor Priest. And, he'd also been a captain in the Navy. And, so it was a lot of stuff because I had been married to an officer. And, I mean, it was just all of this stuff.

We had he was he was a healing force for me. And when and he loved me so much that he'd get in my face and tell me the truth, whether I wanted to hear it or not. And he told me, he says, Polly, you're a child abuser. And he says, and I want you to go make amends to those boys. And I don't want you to be saying things like, I'm sorry I hurt you.