The first annual Al-anon Family Groups conference in Reykjavik, Iceland

Now I'd like to welcome Alicia. Hello, family. My name is Alicia. Hi. It is such an honor to be here, and I, I can't believe it's already here.

It's already happening, and as you can tell, a little excited. I want to thank, Thor and and everyone on the committee who was involved in putting this together, and, my my travel buddy, artist who has taken me in and shown me your incredibly beautiful country. I was telling her that, had I got stuck in a hotel room or something like that, I would have not had the experience of Iceland. And I think I need to get a t shirt that says, I Survived Iceland. Because because we did Fast and Furious, but we saw it all.

Or at least a lot of it. And, she did a great job. But thank you so much for this opportunity, and, it's funny how God works, because I've I've had the opportunity to speak in a a couple of other countries and, my father lives in China and he was in town visiting and and he asked if, what speaking engagements I had coming up and and he said if asked if I was going out of the country and I said, no, it doesn't look like I'm going to this year. And it was a 2 days later, I had the message from Thor asking about this and I called my dad. I'm going.

So, it's amazing and when I think about my life in the past, and who I used to be, and the shell of a woman that I was, to think about how my life has changed, and that I'm now traveling around the country to carry a message of of God's hope to the 12 steps, of Al Anon and and other fellowships, it just blows me away. It's almost the how did I get here kind of deal, you know? And, just blessed to be a part of this. First time I told my Al Anon story, I was preparing for it and thinking about it, and I was like, Okay, I've married an alcoholic, well, I've married 2 alcoholics, well, my mother's an alcoholic, well, my uncle's an alcoholic, and it just hit me that I thought it was just my current husband that was causing the problem. But no, the problem goes way back to childhood.

You know, for my family and I'm from, a town in Texas and this lady and I were laughing that as soon as you hear Texas, you think everyone wears cowboy hats and rides horses everywhere and ropes things to get them, and that's not the case. But I thought that was funny when we were talking about it, okay? But I'm from Texas. And, I come from a fairly normally or a normal dysfunctional home. Whatever you wanna call it.

My memories of childhood are are very slim. I don't don't have a lot of them, but what I do know is that we were we were extremely religious. I went to private school for 10 years, raised in a Christian home. My father was a pastor at all the different churches that we went to. He's the leader, which is the musician, the song player.

And so the rules in our household and the God of our household, which is very strict and very confining and you must act this way or else. And, behind closed doors, our family was was crazy. But every Sunday morning, we'd put on the Sunday morning face and get dressed up and praise the Lord, you know, And smile and you be nice and you and yes ma'am. Yes ma'am. And then you'd get back in the car and get home and the insanity would begin again.

And, and this was with no alcohol in the home at this time. This was just dysfunction and I can recognize now that I started to learn from a very early age how to act like everything's okay and how to begin this denial of my life is normal, you know, and and just kind of this everything's great here. And I carried that throughout my whole life. I am a an incredible actress who knows how to play the part, to say the right things, to make you believe that I'm okay. And I learned it from childhood.

At about 14, my dad had an affair with the pastor's wife. Oops. Yeah. So things took a little turn and, my parents got divorced. We got kicked out of the church we were going to.

Got kicked out of the school I was going to. My dad went on his, little Christian path and kind of left us behind and my mother began drinking at that time. And, she had drank and and done other outside issues during, during hippie, hippie times, but I'd never seen her drunk in my life. And so as my dad left, the drinking for her had picked back up. And, I also qualify for some other 12 step programs, and I it's hard to tell my story without adding some of my own stuff in there.

But I began my mother began began to be my my party buddy. You know, the the mother daughter relationship took a big turn, and I became the mother, and she became the daughter, And I had to take care of her. And, she was the cool mom because, you know, my friends and I are starting to do teenage party stuff at the time and she was the mom who you could party with. You know? And, and so for a while it was fun.

It was like, wow. Look what a cool mom I've got. But as the disease of alcoholism progressed in her, it stopped being fun. It wasn't fun any longer, and we had hardwood floors at home, which, it's not a big deal around here, they're everywhere. But we had them in our hallway, and you could hear her footsteps.

And I remember as a little girl, trying to go to bed and just praying that mom would just go to sleep, and I would hear the coming down the hall and it was just, no, no, no. I mean, we would get in trouble for for not brushing our teeth long enough, and for, did you dental floss? And she'd be screaming drunk and it was like Mom and I used to hide dental floss under my bed just so I could show it to her as soon as she walked in. I'm scared today to dental floss my teeth. God.

But it was it was just things that it just started to go to go south very quickly and, you know by 17 years old, I'm in my own journey of alcohol and I had a car accident that I hit a telephone pole going about 45 miles an hour and I was in a blackout myself from drinking and almost died. Spent 3 months in the hospital, learning to walk again, and all kinds of things, and, what I'm told happened that night is that I came my friends brought me home and my mother was there and she was drunk. And apparently she and I got in a fight and I left and hit the pole not even half a mile down the road. And so my mother carried extreme amounts of guilt for that night, because only she really knows what happened. I don't.

And, I began to find out how this victim role works at an early age. I clicked into it that if I would say certain things to make people feel sorry for me, I would get something and it was like, you know? So I began to become a master at this victim role, you know? My first sponsor used to say my V is flashing because I would be blaming something on someone at victim victim victim because I'm I'm good at it and at 17 I began to use this car accident as my victim trump card as I like to call it. It was just when I'm about to not get my way it was like, boop boop.

Well what about my wreck? You know? And I learned this stance very early on and, and, and again I'm so selfish and self centered that I don't even think about the fact that my mother carries guilt of the coulda, woulda, shoulda's. You know, if she could've only stopped me. If she would've done something different.

She carried so much guilt, but I'm too selfish to care. I just know that when I play the victim, I get my way. And, so that began to add more fuel to our relationship and, you know, I go off to college at 18 and, my younger brother and sister are still living there with her. And they're about, they're 11 8 and 11 years younger than me. And so, I at least was a teenager when I got to deal with my mother's alcoholism.

They were children. And they got the brunt of this, and the most damage was done to them. And, you know, at one point in my my senior year, I had to run away from the house because one of her rages that she went into, and I went to go live with my sister, my older sister. And now I'm the older sister and my younger sister's calling me crying. I've gotta get out of here.

She's crazy. And she would come to stay with me. And so I'm I'm watching just the pattern repeated. And I'm seeing the effects of alcoholism on my younger brother and sister. My brother, the way he handled it, his coping mechanism was, anger and religion.

He would hide behind religion and act like he was great and everything was fine. He followed my dad's path and would smile like everything's wonderful, but inside was this explosive little boy that was so angry and you could just see it when you looked in his eyes. My little sister, she turned out to be, I was the caretaker for a while and then she took she took my spot and ran with it. She to this day, she's 21. She's 22 now.

She, to this day, is mom's biggest protector. And anything that goes wrong, she'll stand up for mom and cover up for mom and have some story or excuse and and yet she doesn't see that anything's wrong with her either. And, so we've all, all 5 of us, there were 5 brothers and sisters, we've all had different stages of her alcoholism, but I was able to get out of the home, so I didn't have to live it anymore. Well, I go to college and, I did, again, I've got my own disease going on and so college wasn't really important anymore. And so I drop out of college and I meet my first ex husband.

I've decided to quit getting married because I have to label my ex husbands. But, my first ex husband. He had just gotten out of prison, 5 years straight, alcohol and drug charges. Thank you. I'll just wait.

I knew he abused women because his I've been raised around him. His sister had been my best friend growing up and so he was the hoodlum of the neighborhood, always in trouble. So he abused women. He didn't take care of the 2 children he already had. He had no job, no car, no money, and he was all mine.

Thank you. Thank you. And I absolutely believe that some of you women would have fought me for him. No! He's too sick for you.

I want him. You know? I mean, I don't I don't know. I am a loser magnet, man. I just give me the sickest one in the room, in every area, and I'm going to attract him.

And, and that's what I did. And the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous talks about made some decisions based on self that placed me in a position to be hurt. And that's exactly what I did in this relationship. I made some decisions based on self. Let's see.

I don't like to be alone, so here we go. Here's someone to latch onto. Here's a hostage I can take. I was going to change him. Mhmm.

And my, my Wayward Souls program, praise the Lord, was gonna turn him around and his family would see what an incredible woman I was. I, again at the time, I'm, I'm doing my own disease and he's involved in that lifestyle and so I like that and the excitement that comes with it. You know? His bad boy. All this, all his prison tattoos.

It's like, God. So I hook up with this man. And, that began a a 6 month spread of probably the darkest time in my life. And, this is where I really began to become a shell. I began to lose everything that I stood for.

I began to lose my voice. I began to lose any self esteem I had left which wasn't much. The abuse started with him at 6 months and I stayed for 6 years. He almost killed me three times. There were scenes where I'm at the bottom of the stairs of our town home with my bags packed and my nose is bleeding and I'm bruised and he's not anywhere around.

I could've left, but I can't walk out the door. It was like like the I could so many people have heard that part of my story and go why? And it's like, I don't know the answer. I just know that I couldn't, and that would happen a lot. And my my changing him plan did not work, but at one point he got put back in prison and, I decided that if I married him while he was in prison, that would keep him sober.

You know? I thought if I became Mrs. Satan, If I became her then everything would change. The abuse would stop. He would stop using so much.

I mean this is what I needed to do. And so, when he was in jail waiting to be transferred to prison, I posed as a missionary intern, I lied and and got up to the 3rd floor of this jail that he was in and we had a quick little 60 second ceremony. He was in a lovely orange suit. It was very romantic. We didn't have flowers and candles like this, but it was a quick little ceremony and I am now Mrs.

Satan. And I really was under the delusion that our lives were about to change. This was it. This was it. I mean, how could it go wrong?

Well, when I left jail, that sounds bad. When I left, left the church and they were throwing rice. I'm just kidding. They didn't do that. But as I left, I go to my mom's house and here I've got my marriage certificate in my hand.

I mean I am just beaming. Look at what I've done. So proud of myself in la la land. And and I cannot figure out why but my parents were not very proud of me. You know, they've been raised around him also.

His name is Kirsten and they've been raised around him also. I mean, he lived across the street. He terrorized our neighborhood. He was a peeping tom in my window many times growing up as a child. They knew what he was like.

And so when I showed him this certificate, they just shook their head. And I was in such self delusion that I really didn't understand it and I was crushed that they couldn't support me in my decision. Well, he spends a year and a half in in, in prison this time and when he gets out, I have the I'm ready for him. I've gotten us a town home. I had it fully decorated.

I I mean, I had I had stayed sober myself for that whole time he was in there. I'd stayed dry rather. And, I've got this wonderful life planned for him. Now, I'm really fixing it. Okay.

I've got this. I've got this. I'm the happy wife now. He's gonna stay sober. Within a month, we had a glass of champagne to celebrate that he was out of prison for alcohol charges and, it seemed like a good idea to me And and that glass turned into bottles and bottles turned into the insanity that that we watch so much, you know.

And, my pretty picture, my happy family dream just down the toilet. By the end of that stint with him, we had lost everything to the disease. The couches were even gay gave, excuse me, given away at the end to support the habit. I'm I'm probably £40 underweight, sunken in eyes, hair falling out, bruises. I mean, I'm just dying, and I had a knife to my wrist, and I had a little scar to show for the night, because I was stuck.

I could not leave. I would look at myself in the mirror and just go, what is wrong with you? Leave. And I couldn't go. And the lies I told my family about, you know, where this bruce came from or what was going on now or why we didn't have rent money and why.

I mean, I was such a master game player that my my relations with my family had been kind of severed because they were so tired of my lives, you know, because I would get caught in them and just be like, oh, well I meant that we had and so I have no one, and I can't leave. Well, by the grace of God, I was able to leave one night and, actually went myself to a treatment center to get help for my own problem. But I get there to this treatment center and I decide that I really don't have a problem with alcohol and drugs. It was just him. It was the man I was married to.

So I decide while I'm in treatment that I'll find another hostage. And, and, I did. I found a 19 year old kid. And I was like, 'Love me.' You know, and I'm And here I am. I'm supposed to be at this treatment center for alcohol and drugs to try to get better myself, but, you know, Kirsten's been out of the picture for 2 days, and so What?

Is that That's long, isn't it? I know. It was tough. It was tough going that long. But he was only gone, you know, 2 days out of my life and and and I, I don't do well if I don't have someone to work on.

You know, I've got someone needs me out there and I must find who it is. And so, I took this kid hostage and, spent my whole 30 days in treatment wondering where he was, where he was going, what's going on. I, I was the model patient there even though I didn't have a problem. These people had problems. I was just there to get away from Satan and, so I spent my whole 30 days doing that.

I took notes in the doctor's meeting. I was voted most likely to stay sober. I was secretary of the community. I was great. And I get out of there and I decide to move to this small town.

It's called Kerrville, Texas. It's about 60 miles away from my hometown of San Antonio and and there's not a lot to do in this town. You you only do 2 things here. You either retire or you recover. That's it.

That's it. There's nothing else to do. We have a Walmart, which I think you all know what Walmart is. And that's, that's all. And so I think that this is a great move, you know, because San Antonio and the men there, that is the problem.

If if I move with my hostage Oh, he moved to Kerrville too by the way. Little incentive. But I moved to Kerrville, and I don't do anything for myself. I don't do any meetings. I don't I don't do anything.

I really don't have a problem. I just needed to get away from San Antonio. And, my whole plan got really ruined because my hostage relapsed. Poor guy. His name was James.

I need to give him a name. James relapsed And so here I am again. Now I'm in a small town with nothing. No God. No program.

No anything. And I'm just I'm miserable. So, what do I do when that happens? I find another hostage. My first husband went back to prison during this year, during this time and, we had lost everything so there was not a lot to split in the divorce.

So I just sent him papers and he signed it and I was free. Within a month, I meet my second ex husband. He was living at the men's halfway house, which actually, those were the only meetings I would go to because they were very spiritual. And they had a lot of men. But, I was like a predator, you know?

It's just hanging out at sober men's houses looking for dates. And, anyway, so I meet my second ex husband and, he was in relapse, then I was in relapse. He was an alcoholic. I was an alcoholic. So it was love.

I mean, just like that, it was love again. And, that began an insane 6 month, binge with this man, if you will, that, that my own disease took me to to new depths and new levels and new darkness. And little did I know that I had hooked up with with the chronic relapser. I had no idea. I he had been to, at that time, probably 20 treatment centers and, knew the big book from the title page to the period on 1 64.

He could quote it. He knew everything. He had a child that he had no rights to because of his disease. I knew none of this. I just thought it was cute.

You know, so I had no idea what I was getting involved with here and, in January of 'ninety nine, I don't know what happened. I don't know what clicked. I don't know what was different, but, I knew I needed to do something to get help for myself. And I walked into a 12 step fellowship and and by the grace of God, I've been sober ever since. And he walked in that meeting with me and we both picked up desire chips and this was it, my new happy family.

We were gonna go to couples' conferences. We were gonna sponsor couples. We were gonna travel the world carrying the message of Alcoholics Anonymous and I had another great plan, you know. He didn't follow my plan. I tend to write scripts that don't ever get published.

You know, people don't do what I want them to do and when I had about 2 months sober, he relapsed for the first time and, that began just an insane journey that, thank God, brought me to the rooms of Al Anon. You know, my first AA sponsor, when I had 2 months sober and he relapsed, she said, Alicia, leave him alone. Leave him alone. Let him go. You know, she knew his history and she was like, you need to leave him alone.

He needs to get better. You're gonna get in the way, and I'm so delusional that I'm saying, no, no, no. He needs me. You know? All these men obviously don't need me, but I think they do.

He needs me. I I'm gonna help him. If I leave, who's gonna help? I mean, all the the insanity began, and and so basically, she tells me to leave and it's probably a good idea and I say, no. I'm not going to.

And, made a lot lot of decisions based on self again. And, you know, when I had about a year sober, I'd kicked him out and let him back and kicked him out, and that was just a year of being with him. Then, when I had a year, I find out that I'm pregnant. And he was in treatment at the time, and, I was just terrified because all I've ever wanted to do was be a mother. That's all I've ever wanted.

But this was not the picture. This was not how I wanted it to happen. I was living in a garage apartment about the size of this podium. I mean, it was like this big. Bathroom, living room, kitchen.

It was teeny. I had a job but didn't have any insurance benefits. The father's in treatment, and I was just I remember just holding my stomach crying, going, No, God, no. Not like this. How am I gonna take care of it?

What's gonna happen? And, I remember God just kinda giving me a peace that that that we were gonna be okay. Regardless of what would happen to Shane, I was gonna be alright with this child and, he stayed sober through most of the pregnancy and so, my my denial begins to kick in that this is it. We are done. You know, the insanity is over.

The happy family is about to begin. And then shortly before I give birth, he's missing. And, my ex husband is the disappearing alcoholic addict. He he doesn't ever do it at the house. He's just gone.

You know? He's one day he I'm going to get a loaf of bread and 3 days later, he still don't have bread. And it's like, One time, bless his heart, he left to go get bread and came back with some dead flowers. He was like, I went to get bread and I bought you flowers, but then I smoked crack. It's like, He had great intentions.

He wanted to be there for me as a husband. He wanted to be there as a father, but this disease, he had no power to do that. And, so the birth of our child comes, they had to induce labor and and it it didn't work and so he went home to go take a shower and ended up it was time to give birth and I'm calling him. We lived about 20 miles away from the hospital and I'm calling him and he's not answering. It's like, no no no no no.

Not today. Not today. And I just keep calling. I'm like, okay. He's taking a shower.

He's taking a shower. La la la. I mean, I know. I know why he's not there. But my family's all around.

I must act tough. I must act like he's the good loving father. I've gotta put the front on. And so here I am on the the table about I had to get a c section. They're about to take me into the operating room and he shows up.

And there was a huge weight lifted because now I can act like, see I told you everything's fine, but I could see in his eyes everything was not fine. He was loaded, you know. And, god what a nightmare. You know, this is all this is this is not how it happens in the movies, you know. The baby is supposed to come.

Everyone gets cigars. Everything's great. And this was not how it happened. And, ended up having to get he stayed at the hospital with us for 2 nights and then went home to go take another shower. Damn showers.

And he never returned and this time there was no finding him and a friend had to come pick me up from the hospital and bring me home and and I get home and, you know, again, in in my la la in my fairy tale land, you come home to a welcome baby home party, and everything's happy. Well, I walk in the door and he's loaded on the couch and I'm just shaking. Just shaking. And I am so disconnected from God at this point because the effects of this disease have gotten me so blocked from God that I am just miserable. I'm a miserable human being and I can't even enjoy this experience of this gift God's given me because I'm so angry at him.

You know, then the baby would cry and I would just I would just lose it And, you know, by this time I've quit going to my own meetings that I need to go to. When I did go to meetings, I would talk about God and the power of God and how spiritual you know, I hate you and look what you've done to us. You know, I hate you and look what you've done to us and la la la. And I was crazy. So here I am.

I'm living a double life again. I'm acting as if I miss AA, but inside I'm dying. And it's around his disease. It's not even my own disease. And I'm crazy.

So the baby's here. The happy family's together, and I'm miserable. I think it took a couple more months, of insanity for me to finally walk into the rooms of Al Anon, because Shane said to me one day. He said, Alicia, you're not happy if I'm drunk. You're not happy if I'm sober.

And I just excuse me. Because here I've got years of sobriety now and I am miss Kerrville, AA, like it's a big town, but I am Miss Recovery. How dare you say that to me? But for the first time I heard the words, and I couldn't deny it any longer. My insanity had nothing to do with him, it was all about me, And it was a hard chunk of truth to swallow because it was like the little lie I've been living my whole life.

I blamed Shane for everything that was wrong with me. From headaches to stubbed toes to anything. It was all his fault, you know. And I'm, again, I'm the queen victim. I used to love to tell stories about how he had relapsed and what he had done this time.

You know, and poor Ethan, that's my son, and I would just vomit this stuff on people without them even asking. I would it was miserable to be around me. And so, for some reason, all of a sudden the blinders came off and the truth sunk in that this had nothing to do about him. It was all about me. And as I walked into the rooms of Al Anon, a lot of the ladies that were in this meeting, they also they had husbands who were in AA, so, we have open meetings in Texas and so they would come to those.

And so they knew about me and they'd watched me with with Shane for years. And so as I walk in, they just went, finally. What took you so long? And, I remember sitting in that first meeting and listening to these women share, because the Tuesday night meeting that we have is kind of a newcomers meeting and I, you know, I thought I'd been so crazy for so long and to to sit down in a room full of other crazy people, it was just welcoming. I wasn't the only one, you know.

I wasn't the only one who sat up night after night just staring out the window wondering if his car would come home. I mean guys, I would sit there and just do this. I'm sure some of you can relate. And, just thinking if I if I if I take my eyes off the thing, his car may not come, you know. I would sit there, you know, and the car would come go, Is it him?

Not him? Hours of my life wasted at windows. And I'm not even doing drugs anymore. It was not even that. It was waiting for him.

Telephone calls, the phone would ring, and if it wasn't him, I wouldn't answer. You know, the the isolation, I'd lost the friends. Fear driven woman, that's all I was. Knowing that I was about to get the call that he was dead and I would just pace around the phone just waiting to get it. I know he's dead.

I know he's dead. I know he's dead. I had no life and yet, I miss AA. You know, insane and, the sad part is is that my son began to get affected as a child because he would need my attention, you know. He would need mommy time.

He's just a baby and yet I I've got the stroller or the swing next the window so I can stare out the window or as he gets older and he's trying to talk to me and I'm going, stop it. Just just stop. You know, I mean, I'm I'm snapping at him because I'm waiting for this and wanting the voices to stop in my head but they wouldn't. Wanting the plan to stop. Wanting the what ifs to stop.

Because apparently, I am a master at what we call catastrophizing. Does anybody know what that means? It's like you you have a little stor something starts a little story and then you run it all the way out until, you know, you're dead and you're in heaven and it's like, wait a minute. You know, I can't tell you how many times I've run-in my head the story of Ethan graduating from college and he's having to share from the podium how his mother raised him because his father died from an overdose and it's like, dude, he's 2. He's in daycare.

It's like but I can't shut it up. It just keeps going and going and going. And so when I walked into my first Al Anon meeting and I heard a bunch of you weirdos telling the same stuff, I was like, thank God. I'm not alone. And after you shared with me how we were the same, you then shared with me the solution.

And I just wept because one of the things, and I'm paraphrasing here, but it talks about finding contentment and happiness whether the alcoholic is sober or not And that was the hook for me. That's what got me. That just gave me chills because I can understand being happy if he was sober, but you're saying even if he wasn't sober, I was still gonna be okay. I couldn't understand how that would happen, but I wanted it. And so I kept coming back and I kept coming back.

And, my sponsor, bless her heart, she would try to help me understand how to separate the disease from the person. And she would say, Alicia, anything that's negative and shame, you just say that's the disease of alcoholism and you let it go. And anything positive, you say that is god and that is good. And I would go, lady, the disease just stole my wallet. So I was a little slow learner, but, but I understood the concept of what she was trying to get me to see.

And what began to happen was a miracle. I began to see my husband as a dying alcoholic, As opposed to seeing him as the man who had ruined my life, I could see him as a dying alcoholic and I began to have this love for him that I had never had. Because it was eyes of compassion. I was seeing him as a sick person. I I I have the same disease and yet I would yell things at him like, why are you doing this to us?

Why don't you just stop? And it was like oh God. You couldn't just stop, but I'm such and I'm in such delusion that I don't get it. It's like he should be able to stop for me because I'm special, but I couldn't stop for my family, you know. So once once I started to have this shift of thinking around him, it was amazing what took place.

And and the promise came true that I was able to find peace and contentment or how it those good words it says whether he was sober or not because he didn't stay sober. He didn't. And, I live in a small town, so there were towns full of opinions on what I should do. Alicia, if you would just leave him, he would get sober. Alicia, if you wouldn't had a child, you know, you had a child.

That's too much pressure on him, so he can't stay sober. Alicia, if you would just do this and do that and it got to the point that I would just, I remember one time I sat in my closet so Ethan couldn't find me. I was bawling because Shane had relapsed. And I wasn't crying because he'd relapsed. I was crying because everyone I knew was going to be giving me their opinions on what I should do and I just I I knew it because it's what they did and they judged me.

I would walk into my meetings of my friends and they would just shake their head because they would walk. It was just it killed me, but I knew that I was seeking God through these steps. I knew I was doing what I needed to do and that God was gonna take care of me and that these people weren't walking in my shoes. They were just giving me their opinions, you know. Of course, they have no children.

They're not married. They don't have a clue, but they know what's right, you know? Which sounds like me. But, you know, as Ethan got older, he started to get affected by this disease and, I started to understand daddy wasn't there and, I remember one time I watched him before I'd gotten into Al Anon, he was about 2, I think, think and he's standing at a window and he's saying, daddy, where are you? You're hiding.

I find you. And I just started weeping because he's watched me. That's why he's doing that. And it was like, that's not right, you know. And so the amazing thing that Al Anon gave me, and there's a lot, but one of the things it gave me as a gift was the capacity to be a mother.

To be present, to be there, to be focused on him, to help him instead of being the way I was, to be peaceful and content and and not fear driven and I could be there for my son regardless if shame was missing, regardless if I knew the mortgage was not gonna get paid now because the checkbook was gone. I knew that I could be there for Ethan and I could focus and that's God. That is not me. About 2 years ago, I guess it's been about two and a half years, another relapse happened and and and, this one was no different than the others. It was a little bit different.

The car was gone this time and some some other okay. It was different. There was a there was a lot wrong. And I he had the keys and so I had to let Ethan was about 3, 3 and a half. I had to let Ethan crawl through a window to go unlock the door because we were stuck.

A friend had to give us a ride home. I just paid $700 worth of bills and he had taken the check and I'm just, and I remember sitting down and I was talking to my sponsor on the phone and something just, a week before he had relapsed and I was still in the deal. In sickness health. This is a disease. I unconditional love.

Blah blah blah. And then a week later a week later this relapse happens and all of a sudden it clicked. I don't wanna do this anymore. And, I don't know what what shifted or or what changed, but it was like I'm done. I'm done.

And, I began to, prepare to file for divorce and and it was, it was a total God deal because I could see on paper that financially I can't make it on my own. To be a single mother with a mortgage and a car payment, I can't make it. But I heard God say once again, I told you I've got you too. I've got you. And so, with the help of Al Anon and AA and the people I know in this fellowship, I stepped out in faith that regardless of what came up, I was gonna be okay.

And, that divorce was one of the hardest things I had to do because I loved this idiot. You know, I loved him, but I was done, you know, and, after we divorced, he stayed sober for almost a year And so I was sitting there going, they were right. If I would have just left, you know, then I felt guilty for not leaving sooner. But but he stayed sober for almost a year and that year he had an incredible time with Ethan. He was able to be a father.

He was able to be present. He would show up and get him. He had him every other weekend. We had split visitation. I mean, it was it was a great year.

And then it ended. And, this last year, I don't think he's been able to put more than 2 months together sober. He's attempted suicide. He, he's dying. And, one weekend he was around Ethan.

I wasn't aware of this he was using while he was around Ethan. And, the way I found out was, when I was around on that Sunday morning after Ethan had been around him he said, Mommy, Daddy was sick this weekend. And I said, what do you mean? And he said, his tummy was really sick. He was in the bathroom the whole time.

I'm not stupid, you know, and my stomach just flipped and I said, Ethan, did you see daddy being sick in the bathroom or did he have the door closed? And my 5 year old little boy looks at me and starts crying and says, Mommy, I said he was sick. Why are you asking me that? And he starts crying and runs into his room. 5 years old and he's covering up for daddy.

5 years old, he knows in his gut something's not right and he's already learning how to cover up. And I just, that's it. And, again, the power of Al Anon. I'm able to go in there and hold my son and say Ethan, Daddy loves you so much. He's sick.

He needs some help. Instead of going, your father's a piece of crap and he's jerk and he's never been around for us and I hate him, which is what my mother did to me about my father, you know, I'm pa I'm not passing that on. I want this child to know how much his daddy loves him and that if he could be there, he would be. Because that's true. This is a disease.

My ex husband is not a bad person. He's a sick person who needs to get well, but he's gonna need to get well on his own because we're getting out of the way. The big book says the alcoholic's like a tornado roaring through the lives of others, and I am tired of being in the tornado path. You know, it's time to get some shelter. So, 2 weeks ago Shane left for a year and a half.

Whew. Treatment center. I don't know if this is gonna work. I don't I don't know. It's a different deal.

It's not 12 Step. It's, a Christian based program where you're basically locked up for a year and a half, But he had to tell Ethan goodbye. Thanks. That's why I was telling Thor in an email when we were corresponding it was like, jeez, God keeps giving me current freaking experience to talk about. I was like, just stop.

I'm tired of being used. Just kidding. But, trying to explain to a little 5 year old who's looking up in his daddy's eyes going, how did we say it? Daddy's sick in his brain and he needs help, so he can make better choices, so he can be a good daddy. He loves you so much he wants to go away to get better.