Recovery in the Rockies VIII in Park City, UT

Name's Craig. I'm an alcoholic and a drug addict. You're a drug addict. You know, my sponsor told me a while back that when you speak at something like this, there's generally 3 groups of people. There's the people who will like you no matter what you say.

There's the people who will not like you no matter what you say, and then there's the people who really haven't made up their minds. And those are the ones you wanna try to piss off if you can't. I'm always a little amazed to be flown someplace so that somebody can listen to me talk. Because before I got sober, there were people who were willing to fly me someplace else so they wouldn't have to anymore. And it just it just never ceases to be astonishing to me.

Thank you for having me up here. It's an honor. Some of the very first memories that I ever have are I never felt comfortable long before I ever took a drink or a drug. I never felt comfortable. I always felt, shy, introverted, afraid, insecure, like I didn't fit in.

I, I was always afraid to fight. I was I I was always, I was really intimidated by confrontations with people. And, I had all these wimpy feelings, you know, not the kind of feelings that other people around me seem to have. I'd look at the even other little kids, you know, and they seem to have they seem to just be doing what they were doing without thinking so much, like I did. And, the way that I dealt with that, and I was never honest with anybody about any of this stuff, I looked at how I perceived they were, and then I began to make up a person that fit what I thought other people were like.

And, from and I would watch a television show, and I would take a little piece of this person, and I would see a movie, and I would take a little piece of that, and I take a line that I heard from somewhere, and I take, you know, the one cool kid at school said something, and I would take that. And I would take all that stuff, and I used it to construct a person, and and that was who I became. And part of this person was was this tough guy. And, that was problematic because as I went through life, I began to run into people who really were tough guys, especially in the circles that I ran in. And when they saw somebody like me, was a wimp but when I would drink and do drugs, I would forget that.

I'd start And that was that was part of the magic that happened with me with alcohol and other drugs is that that when I would drink, even though I knew I was a phony and a fraud, that the person who I was pretending to be, I would become that person when I was loaded. And I didn't need to go to school to learn anything because as far as I was concerned, I knew everything. And I didn't need to to, make sacrifices to learn lessons because I didn't need to. I had it. And I had it simply by taking a couple of drinks, doing a couple of and starting a few lines of cocaine.

I didn't have to do any of the work that other people had to do. I could get it by magic through chemistry. But underneath it all, when the when the drugs and the alcohol and everything wore off, there was still that shy, introverted, afraid, intimidated, scared guy that knew he wasn't for real. I remember, I live in Phoenix, Arizona now, but I used to, many, many years ago, live in Long Beach, California. You can call what I did there a living.

And I'd gotten arrested for a DWI there, and, and I was in a holding cell with this other guy. And they, as they took him out of the holding cell and started to walk him down the hall, to take him to the drunk tank. God, that it sounds like somebody that I sponsor in Phoenix, And it makes me homesick, you know. As they started taking him down the hall, he cracked off something to the guard. I I don't to this day know what, and the guard just beat him like a drum.

Now I was drunk and and loaded too, and, and this but this scared me. And so when the guard and I became I instantly transformed myself into, you know, the James Bond that I became when I was loaded. And so when the jailer came back to get me, they had this off. I I I felt it only fair to warn him that I had a black belt in Kung Fu and he'd better not try that with me. This is this was not a good idea.

This is the way I handled stuff. You see, I I I would think if I pretended long enough and hard enough to be this person I wanted to be, I'd become them. I was as he was escorting me down the hall, all I did was just turn my head about 3 inches to the right, and that was all he took. He had me in what's called a choke hold where they actually choke you until you go unconscious. And I remember just when I realized that I was about to pass out, I wanted to tell him, wait a minute, I I don't really have a black belt in Kung Fu.

I I've just been afraid and insecure and frightened and shy my whole life. And I've been a wimp, and I and I just put on this act so people will won't hurt me. And I and I am just real but it's hard to get all that shit out when somebody's choking you to death. So and I woke up in a drunk tank again. It had become pretty common for me.

I don't like to talk an awful lot about what it was like, for the main reason that a lot of the stuff that I remember the best never even actually happened. I, I do know that there were some statistics compiled by, people other than myself, and I tend to rely on those. And so I know, for example, that, I went to jail 53 times, 9 major felony arrests. I had 6 DWIs. I went through 10 wonderful treatment centers.

I went through the psych award on 3 different occasions. I was diagnosed at different times as a manic depressive, paranoid schizophrenic, neurotic, suicidal sociopath. Every time I took an MMPI, I came out a different kind of nuts. And, every car I ever owned died of alcoholism. I have hit everything with an automobile that you can hit.

I mean, I've hit trees, telephone poles, fire hydrants. I mean, I'm bald now. You can see, like, my head is kind of a first step up, like, all over this area. You know? All the scars and everything and, there's like this one big t up here that it where a tree carved its initial in me.

And, you know, I was like walking disaster area, and insurance agent's worst nightmare, you know. I was always the the county jail was the place, like, in cheers where everybody knew my name. That and the psychoward. I like the psychoward a lot nicer than the detox because they give you drugs and they, you know, call you mister shell and stuff and actually, I went through the hospital that doctor Bob, one of AA's cofounder started in Akron, Ohio. And and then liked it so much, I went back, I think, 6 more times to that place.

And a couple of times to their psych ward. At one time, my ex wife was in the detox, and I was in the psych ward. And then another time, she was in the psych ward, and I was in the detox. Remember we had this I don't plan on talking about this, but the there were, like, 2 wings of the building that came out, and they opened up the windows so that we could have, like, this sicko Romeo and Juliet balcony scene across the courtyard. Of course, they didn't really my window actually had this, like, half inch thick steel mesh on it because I was in the psych ward, but but hers, she could lean out of.

I'll tell you about my, typical day. By that time what the hell is that? This is a strange place. My typical day, I get up in the morning and, and I remember as I opened my eyes, the first thing that would greet me in one of my typical days getting high was just this sense of of disappointment. I was awake again.

I was not dead. Hey. Didn't somebody tell me they put a glass of water up here? There's there is no Sorry. Oh.

I didn't spill. Thank you. I'd get out of bed. By that time, I had gotten, you know, after all these treatment centers, I've gotten kind of part of the first step down. I knew that I was gonna be getting high, but I had made this I'd come up with the idea that have the federal government pay for it.

So I got on a federally funded, methadone maintenance program. And so I'd have to drive to the methadone clinic. That was the first stop in the day. Get that out of the way. I was chronically running late for stuff, so I had I had one of those little blue flashing police lights like the detectives have in their cars.

And to get to the Methanol clinic on time, I would put it on the roof of my car and drive down the freeway on a on a Toyota Silica. I didn't give a shit. People pulled over. I got to the methadone clinic. It's about the only thing I never got arrested for.

So I'd get my methadone, and when you're on methadone, you can't get high on narcotics anymore because you just can't. So, but you can still get just as high on cocaine as you always did. So then I would start the cocaine search, you know. I would start going to where, you know, go to Billy Bob's house and Jimmy's house and all over town and Smoot's house and and trying to to put the first, I'd have to get the money together. I visited a lot of grocery stores, and I would like buy a bag of Fritos and write a check for $50.

You know? That's the way that I looked at it it, you know I mean, I I did that when I could. If I couldn't do that, you know, I would rob people. I I was sorry that I had to rob you. And and I was, you know, and the only way but the only way that I could, like, overcome that guilt was to get high again.

Because when I wasn't getting high, was you know, and it was talking to me. So anyway, I finally get the cocaine. That sometimes took a while. You know, I I look back on it now, and I think I probably spent a third of my life before 1988 waiting in cars in parking lots of housing projects. You know?

Just waiting in car without knowing that whoever's in there, you know what they're doing. They're doing your shit. You know? And and you can't do anything about it because you don't even know which apartment they went into. Then like 2 hours later, they come back out with whatever's left, you know, And then I would go home, and, then I would do the cocaine.

And, and then the real evening's entertainment would start. My favorite sport after the cocaine was gone was the 50 meter freestyle carpet search. I love that. That was fun for me. I had this technique down 2 carpet fibers back, 1 over, 2 back, 1 over.

And and I had the, I had to clean this goddamn rug in Akron, Ohio. And I would do that like for hours and stuff, you know. I would, and then the worst thing that could happen is God help you if you actually find something in the rug, because then you know there's more there. I just have to be diligent and look harder. At some time during doing this shit, I can't really explain this today, but, you know, if you're in CA, you probably understand it.

I would get this feeling that bugs were crawling on me. This would require the removal of all my clothing. And, you know, so you picture this, you know, I'm naked, you know. My skinny ass weighs about a £135. I'm on the Peruvian diet plan.

And I'm crawling around on the rug with my smelly naked ass up in the air looking looking for just some little rock, some little piece that I missed. You know? I mean, I shot up stuff I knew wasn't even cocaine, but I just thought maybe, you know. Yeah. I had faith even then.

And then I would start the next part of the night which was the window peaking contest. And I I swear I had there was this one bush in my backyard that I knew was a bush. In the clear light of day, there wasn't any question that it was a bush. But at night, if you peeked out that window long enough, the bush was not a bush anymore. It was a person out in my backyard and every time the wind would blow it, it'd go.

After a while, this got me really crazy, you know. So it was time for the next stage in the evening which was night patrol. And you can picture this, I'm still naked, smelly, and tweaked out. Now I've got a loaded 9 millimeter automatic pistol, round in the chamber, hammer back, safety off, and I'm going out the back door of my house like this. Now, I have no idea why I'm doing it that way except I watch a lot of cop shows and that's the way they did it, And I felt like it was important to live the part, you know.

And I would I would creep over to the one tree, and I would look, you know, like this around the tree and there's nothing there, and then I'd creep around to get behind this sinister bush, and and and then I finally I'd make my way all around the backyard and then determine to my satisfaction that the bush was really a bush. And I felt a sense of relief until I got to the back door and realized I'd left it unlocked and they were inside the house now. So I'd start in the basement, and I'd work my way on up to the top floor into the attic, and then God help me if I miss a closet because then I'd have to do it all over again. You know? I was a very busy guy.

You know, I had a lot of stuff to do. I don't know how I found time to do any I certainly didn't work. I have a lot of respect for people who were cocaine addicts who worked. I did not do that. I couldn't do that, you know.

I mean, I worry if you call cash and hot checks work, I guess I did that. But then, one day, I came back to the house and, the door was busted open. And when I went inside the house, on the wall was nailed a, a document from the United States District Court in Cleveland, Ohio. It was a search warrant to search my house for guns with silencers on them, drugs, I'm just a lot of really ugly stuff, you know? And I I knew that they were there.

There they had been there. So it was time for me not to be. And I, like, got in the car and took off and I went to this hotel about 50 miles away. And, you know, and did what I did when I was at my house. Only now I'm doing in a hotel room, and it's even worse because there's like a window on either side of the hotel room.

And I'm peeking out the windows one day. I've been there a couple of days and I see I look out one window and I see these 2 guys moving across the parking lot towards my front door. And I run over the other window and I look out there and here's 3 more moving up that way. And I and sure enough, mister Shell, we have a warrant for your arrest. And they came in and, I was arrested by the, what was it?

I think the alcohol, tobacco, and firearms people, the ATF, my buds. I like to call it my federally funded intervention. But anyway, they like came in the door and and there's a lesson in this, and what that is is that if you peek out the windows long enough, one day they really will be out there. You just gotta stick to it, you know. So anyway, tell you about my first trip to detox.

I, I had wrecked the car again. I've broken my right leg again. I have a I had a bar, still do as a matter of fact, and my right tibia from motorcycle accident. When I wrecked the car, it bent my leg around into a u shape. Which didn't step back because there's a big metal bar down the middle of the leg.

That's how I look when they pulled me out of the the car, hospital. All I'm thinking of is this is going to be a dimmeral time for sure. You know, I'm not even thinking about what I've done to my leg. I'm thinking about what kind of drugs I'm gonna get when I get to the hospital. And I stay there for about 4 or 5 days on the medical ward.

And then one day the doctor comes by and he goes, look, oh, what I would do is I had this watch with a timer on it, and I knew they could only give me a shot every 3 hours. So I would, like, sit there and clock it. 2 hours 59 minutes 59 seconds. Beep beep beep beep beep. Nurse.

I'm in so much pain. I became so good at, anyway, at that kind of drama. Anybody here a dramatic addict? You know? So finally, after about 5 days of this shit, the doctor comes to my room and he says, look, we're not absolutely positive, but we think you're a drug addict.

I was like, I'm insulted by that. And he goes, well, what we're gonna do is either you're gonna go up to the detox ward on the 5th floor, in which case we will take you off the drug slowly, or we're gonna discharge you right now, and I'm not giving you any kind of medication to take home. I was like, it was a difficult decision. Let's let's see. Let's see.

Door number 1, no drugs at all. Door number 2, not as much drugs, but at least some. You know, it's like an easy choice. Yeah. I'd like to go up to the detox ward.

And I and I and I mean, it was weird, you know, and I'm going up. Now I had when I was in the hospital, oh, man. It was set up. I had, like there's, like, an IV running into my, arm. And while I was in the hospital, I would I would shoot cocaine and deluded into the IV.

And it was great. I mean, I wanted one to take home. And this is perfect. But then sometimes they when they took the IV out, I had to start using my arms. I had needle holes all over my arms, and plus I had a lot on there from from when I came into the hospital.

And, I got to the detox ward, and they're giving me the intake interview, you know. And and actually, this was Akron City Hospital in Akron, Ohio, which I later later found out that was the place where the very first 12 step call was ever paid. And, and that's my where my journey to sobriety began. And, and I went in there and the doctor interviewing me, and he's looking at all these needle holes. And then and I'm just, like, mystified.

I mean, we're going up in the elevator, and there's the door's open on this new way of life. And there's these little signs on the wall like, you know, keep coming back and the serenity prayer and let go and let God. All I remember is like, Christ, man, I need some real help. Fucking people have taken me to a gift shop, you know. What is this crap?

I don't need these little sayings, you know. And and he takes me in there and his doctor's looking at my arms and everything, and then he, like, he looks at me really seriously and he goes, and how is your penis correct? And I was, like, pretty loaded, you know, and and I'd like just trying to figure out what the right answer was and didn't have a clue and I go, what? I don't know, doc. Fine.

Thanks. How's yours? It's like, it's a weird question, but I'm in a new environment. I'm trying to play along, you know? And, he goes, no.

He says, no. I mean, did you shoot drugs in your penis? And I said, no. God, that is disgusting. And suddenly, even though I felt pretty bad, suddenly I was I was in I was heartened because I knew there was a whole group out of people out there in the world that I was still superior to.

All the people who shot dope in their penis, I hadn't, at least, I got harder as the years went by. But, but at the time you know, today there's probably some guy, you know, down in the homeless well, probably not in Park City, but, you know, down in Salt Lake City in the homeless shelter, pushing a shopping cart along going, well, it hasn't got that bad yet. I still have this nice shopping cart. You know, if I ever lose this, then maybe I'll need to go to the program. But, but that was as long as I could find somebody that was more screwed up than I was, I didn't need any help.

See, I had no idea what being an addict or an alcoholic meant. All I knew was is that I went through all these treatment centers, is they'd go around in a circle in group therapy, and and this guy go, I'm I'm Jim, and I'm an alcoholic, and I'm John, and I'm an addict. I'm Mark and I'm an addict, and when it came to me, I knew what to say. Craig, I'm an addict. Are you an alcoholic?

Sure. Alcoholic. Craig. Are you a codependent? I don't know what the hell that means, but sure.

I'm Craig. I'm a codependent. I'll be one of those. Now can I go have a cigarette? Because I don't give a damn.

All I wanna do is I wanna just tell you whatever it is that I figure that you wanna hear, so that I can get the hell on with life, and get out of there. And, I thank God that I had a sponsor who challenged me on that stuff, and asked me what made me think I was an alcoholic. In truth, all the stuff that I just told you about, it really doesn't have anything to do with whether I'm an addict or an alcoholic or not. All the things I just described, the trips to jail, insane asylum, the wrecked cars, the DWIs, those things are symptoms of the kinds of things that may happen to people who are alcoholics and or drug addicts. But there's people who get DWIs who aren't alcoholics.

People who get busted for dirty urines that aren't drug addicts. I was talking to Mark today about, friends that I had that, that they used to shoot dope right along with me. But I remember, like, Mark, Mark, this other guy Mark, he got married. And, and he slowed down quite a bit. We didn't see him as much anymore in the group I partied with.

And then he had a little boy, and then he stopped altogether. I Remember going by his house and ask him if he wanted to shoot a DeLadas, like morphine, and offered him a freebie, $40 on the street. And he goes, no, I don't do that anymore. See, but he got high right along with me. So if it's all the podium flash, if it's all the, you know, how many treatment centers to go through, how many times you've been arrested, how many dirtbag things have you done.

If that's what makes me an addict, then why isn't he an addict? Why could he stop? Because he's not an addict. He grew out of it. As I got older, I only grew deeper and deeper and deeper into it.

And at some point in my recovery, it became very necessary for me to discover exactly what it really meant to be a drug addict and an alcoholic. See, the first thing that happens is is that once I do any cocaine at all, I'm not gonna stash the rest of it for the weekend. If you're not sure, there's a test you can take. Get a gram of cocaine. Lay out 30 lines on a mirror.

That's a month's supply because you're gonna do one line. Okay. Then maybe you don't need to do that. But if you could do that, if you could do one line a day for 30 days, no more, just one. It's a month's supply, remember.

And you probably don't need to go to CA anymore. There are people who can do that. There are people that I know that bought a gram of cocaine for Thanksgiving and still had some left at Christmas. They're not like me. They're different than I am.

You You know, and the other part of that thing is that I have this mental obsession, is that no matter how badly I got burned the last time, I'm always right in line to do it again. Somehow, no matter how I mean, when there was nobody that went through treatment with me who was more convinced that they would never get high again as I was. And yet, as soon as I got a treatment, there came a day when it seemed like a good idea, and I got high again. And I was amazed when it happened. The third part of that is the unmanageability of the spirit, is that there has to be something in my life to replace everything that the drugs and the alcohol used to do for me.

You know that feeling I was talking about before about when I would get high, I'd feel whole. I'd feel like the the phony person that I'd made up to become. There has to be something that that pulls the parts of myself together that makes me whole, that doesn't have to involve chemicals. There has to be something that'll do that, and it has to be a power greater than myself. It's real simple stuff, but I never understood that.

I was so caught up for so many years in sounding good at meanings, and saying the things that I hear somebody say something, I'd go repeat it. You know, because they sounded good when they said it, if I say it, then I'll sound good. That that what my own personal truth was, what was really true in my experience, really wasn't that important to me. See, all I really cared about was how to look good, and that kind of thinking had to be abandoned. I kinda got off the track there.

I started going to AA in Akron, Ohio. There wasn't any CA there. And, I don't know if you have any meeting halls that are like the ones in Akron, Ohio or in in Salt Lake City, but they have they're all in these, like, yellow dingy little rooms. The the walls are stained yellow from the cigarette smoke. The, you know the type I'm talking about.

This is what AA was like in Akron, you know. And and they have the 12 steps and the 12 traditions hanging on the wall, and they're all stained yellow from the cigarette smoke. And there's like these 6 or 8 guys in their look like their nineties or early 100. There's and they're sitting around, they're playing pinochle, and they're all stained yellow from the cigarette smoke. And they would they would say shit to me like, at jails, institutions, death, or you can become like us.

I remember thinking, death. Or or what kind of death? I mean, could I get like a quick death? A painless death? Because I think I'd rather be there than be like you people.

And, you know, we don't wanna hear about your drugs around here. That was fine with me. I smoked a joint on the way home from every AA meeting I went to in Akron, Ohio. I didn't wanna talk about them there either. What else?

It's It's about time to get I remember I had all these strategies after going through treatment all these different times, you know, and and I became like a professional treatment center patient, you know. I'd like a $100,000 a year treatment center habit. I was either gonna have to get sober or I was gonna have to buy myself a treatment center. And, and one of them, we my ex wife, Debbie, who's now, she's sober about the same length of time that I am, about nine and a half years. My ex wife and I got this contract that one of these therapists came up with for us.

Idiot. And that's and the contract was you see, we had determined that why we kept relapsing, it didn't have anything to do with the point that, like, we'd never worked the steps or read the big book. It had to do with, we weren't being honestly sharing our feelings with each other. So one of the feelings that we were supposed to share was when we feel like getting high, we will share this with each other. And, you know, we printed this out and we both signed it.

And, I mean, it was a sunny day when I strode forth from the treatment center that time, and I and and I knew it was gonna be different this time. And then one day she came in and she said, Craig, I really feel like getting high. And I said, me too. Let's go. Yeah.

So much for behavior contracts. Anyway, doing the work for me. So part of it part of getting busted by the feds, they had me on the hook pretty good. I was looking at my options in life have been narrowed down to either getting sober or spending the next 10 years of my life in a federal penitentiary, probably married to somebody named Bubba. So I be I became in, then mister willingness.

I am willing to do anything. Oh, let's work them steps, you know. And I I was full of shit, but, you know, they knew they had me. So they they got me to do all these things. They got me to go to Phoenix, Arizona to go to this halfway house.

I've never been to a halfway house before. I'd always just done the treatment thing, and I know what to do when I get out of here. I'm just gonna go to meetings. And and, you know, when I go to this halfway house, and part of the, the therapy at this halfway house was this in the desert was that you had to, get a job, like a real, like a job, you know? And I mean, I didn't know anything about that shit, But, but I got this one job, and then it didn't work out.

It was awful. And and, it was like June in Phoenix. It's a 115 degrees in the shade. And I mean, I'm hating this whole idea. And so anyway, I moved up in the world.

I got a job at McDonald's. And so there I am. I'm 32 years old. I'm the McBiscuit cook at McDonald's. I'm making McBiscuits and and, McFries and McSalads.

Those are my specialty. Don't ever eat the chicken salad. Don't do it. It's it's really bad. And, and I'm making McChicken the salad, you know, and I'm doing all this stuff.

And and I'm and the people at McDonald's are like, they're enthusiastic about being McDonald's employees. You know? And they're going around and they're talking about these little McDonald's slogans and stuff. And I'm thinking, like, I need a gun, and and I need to kill all these people. This is this is, you know, it's but along the line, I'd gotten a sponsor.

That was the the one thing that I'd done differently. I actually had gotten the sponsors, an old AA guy. Okay. Prick. Anyway, just what I needed, but I got him by accident like every other good thing that's happened to me in my sobriety.

And, and anyway, one day the day I was about 90 days clean and sober, and this little manager from McDonald's, this little 18 year old bitch from hell, who's probably running the corporation by now, she sat me down and she looked at me very solemnly, and she said, Craig, I'm sorry, but you're just not the kind of material McDonald's is looking for. And she fired me. And so the first, thing out of the bag is, like, I get fired from McDonald's. I'm, like, screw this. I'm gonna commit suicide.

This is the only thing. So I called up my sponsor because I didn't want him to feel bad when I committed suicide. And I was just gonna let John know, you know, and I thought I was, look, I just don't want you to feel bad, but, you know, I'm getting ready to commit suicide and, you know, thanks for all the help and, you know, I wish it could've worked out. He goes he goes, you're thinking about committing suicide? I said, yeah.

And he goes, good. So and I I guess at some level, I expected a little bit of sympathy. And he goes he goes, that's a good idea. At least, Craig, for once in your life, you're thinking about trying something new and not just going and shooting dope, you know. He says, look, suicide for you might be a good idea, but why don't let's just wait, not so fast, and let me take you through the 12 steps first.

And then we'll be done in a couple of months, And after you're done working the steps, if you wanna commit suicide, I got a 357 over here. You come over and blow your brains out. No problem. And I thought that sounds reasonable. I mean, I is is intolerable as life was not drinking, not using, and not working steps.

As intolerable as that was. I thought I could maybe stand it for a couple of months after I got through the steps, at which point I was going to commit suicide anyway. So what the hell? I might as well hang around a little bit longer. And I did, and something happened.

And I don't know what happened. I have seen people that apparently from all outward appearances did the thing more sincerely than I did, and yet they're drunk or dead. I've seen people who who apparently, they certainly needed this program more than I did, and yet they're drunk or they're dead, and yet I'm still here. And they're not. And I don't understand why.

It certainly wasn't because I worked such a great program. That's ego. You know? For some reason, the grace of God has kept me sober nine and a half years. That's his victory, not mine.

You know, when we clap, when people get chips, I hope that it's directed above. You know, I mean, if I could do it, I was out in California speaking in a meeting, and they have this tradition out there that when you get up and take a chip, they yell out, how did you do it? If I could do it, I sure as hell wouldn't be here speaking of this meeting. I'd have been home enjoying my wife and kids and doing it. I can't do it.

I don't have the power to do it. One of the things that he got me involved with really early on was working with others. And, he had me doing an HNI meeting before I had even really finished step 4, I think. And I'm doing this h and I meeting, and, and I had gotten a couple of people to sponsor. You know, I mean, at some meetings you go to, they say you have to have a year to sponsor people.

That's not in the big book. To me, the big book is the great bullshit filter. You know? It's the great thing you sift everything you hear of meetings through. It's not in there.

It's just another alcoholic or addict idea that somebody came up with. It may be a good idea, maybe a bad idea, but it doesn't have anything to do with the program. Just some another idea. So anyway, I'm sponsoring this guy, doctor Bob. Here we go, you know, tangent time.

Doctor Bob had, I believe, 10 days sober when he went on his first 12 step call. You know? So where does it come off that you gotta have a year to sponsor people? You know, Bill Wilson had 7 months when he met doctor Bob. If Bill Wilson had followed that you gotta wait a year before he sponsor people rule, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

Because he'd have got drunk long before the year happened. I encourage people get out there. Of course, you might, you know, if you're brand new, you probably don't know shit, but the thing is they don't know that you don't know shit. And they may very well follow you along for a considerable period of time, and actually take some really great actions. Whether you know anything at all.

Matter of fact, you may be so annoyed at becoming a hypocrite that you begin to take some actions yourself, not because you need to, but because you need to teach it to someone else. That's kinda how I did it, you know. I mean, it's kinda hard to preach to somebody about get your goddamn 4 step done when you haven't done yours. Yeah. Good thing to get somebody through a 4 step is have somebody they sponsor start on 1.

Yeah. The hell was I going? Working with others. Okay. At about 9 months sober, the relationship that I had with my wife was about the only thing that I had left, you know, besides my big McDonald's job.

And I'd lost that And and about 9 months sober, my wife, a go figure, decides she's in love with some other person in the fellowship. And, like, she's living with me and dating this other guy in the fellowship while she's living with me. And I'm crazy, you know. And once again, I've been through the steps that the old I was at this meeting, and I had decided that as soon as the meeting is over, I'm going to go commit suicide. I've had it.

I can't handle this. 9 months, my I mean, I can't stand seeing my wife around at these meetings, and and and I can't It's just crushing. And, so after the meeting was over, I, I you know what I mean? You hugged my way to the door, you know. Like, because, you know, I'm trying to get to the door, and there's all these people in front of me wanting hugs and stuff, you know.

Like, hi. Yeah. I'm doing okay. How are you doing, Craig? Fine.

Thank you. You know. And I get to the door, and my plan is I'm gonna go take my car. I'm gonna drink, get drunk, and smash my car into a concrete embankment at about a 115 miles an hour. That's the plan.

All I gotta do is get to the door, and I'm home free. I'm out of the pain. It's all over. I get to the door, and here's this little guy that I sponsor standing there, and he's whining to me. He says, I like my keys in my car crane, can you give me a ride home?

The hell am I gonna tell him? No. I'm gonna go commit suicide in the car. You probably better get a ride with somebody else. Christ's sake.

I mean, I know I'm worthless at this point, but I still owe something to the program that saved my life. So I can't let this kid down. I go, yeah, I'll go ahead and give you a ride home. And we're I'm giving him a ride home and he lives like just like around the corner from my house. And by the time I drive and we're driving.

Oh, and he goes he goes, thank you. And I didn't know very much about what was in the big book really, but I knew, like, to quote little lines and stuff. So he goes, when you always say there's no mistake in God's world, Craig, what was the reason for me locking my keys in my car? Well, I don't know. Yeah.

And I knew. It's like the only way I was gonna get home. And after I dropped him off, hell, I live right across the street, and I was just too tired to commit suicide that night. And, I figured I'll just commit suicide tomorrow after I've had a little sleep. And, and the next day when I woke up, I was very dramatic.

Okay? I admitted to this earlier. And, when I woke up the next day, the thing that I thought was gonna kill me hadn't killed me, and it didn't hurt quite so bad. And a few days after that, it's it didn't it hurt less. And a few days after that, and a few days after that, and eventually I got over it.

Eventually I got into a much better relationship than the one I'd had with her. It's a strange paradox that usually if the drinking and drugging don't kill the relationship, recovery usually does. Recovery usually does. Although I don't think it's recovery, I think it's sobriety, you know, which, you know, can mean 2 different things sometimes. But, during this period after I got divorced from my wife, I started, dating girls around the CA campus, making myself available to carry the message to those wonderful newcomers with less than 30 days.

And this one guy, the speaker came one time and he and he was and he speak there's like a room, 400 people, and he goes, well, all the girls with 30 days or less, please raise your hand so Craig can get a look at you. He thought he was gonna embarrass me. He did not count on just how sick the Broads and CA are. They got laid by 3 of those women. Poor Bob never knew.

Yeah. Because they were like, you know, I was a challenge now. Oh, well, I'll get this one, you know. And, anyway, I had this one where I met the one, you know what I mean? You know, the one.

Oh, she's the one. My sponsor, I tell him that, now people don't need that. He's like, you met the one? Oh, I'm so happy for you. Send me a dollar.

He doesn't work. This is why. He makes all this money from people in AA and CA making meeting the 1 and getting a dollar from them. Anyway, I I go to see them and I've got this problem, and it's it's about her, you know. And I'm and I'm trying to explain it to I always thought that I had to tell my sponsor, like, all the different angles, you know.