Barnagate saturday night speakers meeting in Barnagate, NJ

And I don't know his name,

but hey, you welcome.

Wow, hi everybody. I have no idea how to speak in front of a non podium. So that's going to be a

my name is Dave Phillips. I'm a recovered alcoholic. Welcome. Some things that I've learned. I just think it's it's just out of this world that this group asked how many people have been through that has the working knowledge of the 12 steps and available for sponsorship. Because if you're new and sick, you're scared to death. If you had looked up at at that one second, that one instant, there's somebody in front of you with their hand up,

that could save your life, avert misery and death. Which if you're an alcoholic of my type, which I'll get into and hopefully it won't be a whole long time of getting into what it was like. That's where alcohol took me to. And by the way, I never signed up to that. I don't remember that being on any job description in high school. What you want to be when you grow up as a drunken junkie, drug addict, alcoholic, you know, But that's what I became,

you know, very early on. Oh, cool, There's a watch up there. Let me read one thing in the book.

Take them to death. They got first edition big books here. You know, I just, I was just up, I spoke up in Massachusetts two weeks ago Tuesday and asked me if I would go up to New Hampshire and speak there to the very next day. And so me and my wife treated it like a vacation. And they they made me aware. They said, hey, you're only 80 miles from the Wilson house. And I was like, what's that? He said Bill Wilson's home, you know, house that he grew up in as a kid and from the time he was 11 when his mom divorced where he came back and there's a library there

and it's only it's only 80 miles from where you're going to be speaking. Why don't you go spend the night up there? And I was like, they turn it into a bread and breakfast. And so I talked my wife into his spend another day. God, what a wonderful time. But that exact edition Big book was sitting up there, not the coppy facsimile an actual 1939 copyright first edition Big book. And then there for those that may not know it, it doesn't say stuff like it says in here like X problem drinker says X alcoholic,

you know, and

I just tickled to death when I found that out. And I just read the other day. And if you're interested about the definition of that term, it's in our actual service manual in the bylaws. Bill Wilson wrote a definition of what an ex alcoholic is because that's what doctor he got the term from Doctor Silkworth and Doctor Tybelt. They listed it in a a comes of age. And I was reading I was like, ex alcoholic. What the hell are you talking about? You know, and came to find out when I read that in the Bible. So I was like, wow, somebody who no longer imbibes alcohol

and who lives the 12 steps that are outlined in this book,

which may be a problem for some because I know a a modern AA, my favorite AA is the Burger King. You can have it your way. Good luck with that. If you're a real alcoholic, you can use me as an example of what not to do for for many, many years in a a,

it says. Unlike the feelings of a ship's passenger, however, our joy and escape from disaster does not subside as we go our individual ways. The feeling of having shared in a common peril.

Alcoholism

is one element in the powerful cement which binds us, but that in itself would never have held us together as we are now joined. The tremendous fact for every one of us, that means all of us guys, not me, not you, all of us, is that we have discovered a common solution. We have a way out on which we can absolutely agree. Which means I'm not supposed to be arguing about the terms and stuff in this book. That'll kill you, by the way, if you're doing it. I did that and I nearly died the last time,

and upon which we can join, and brotherly and harmonious action. This is a great news this book carries to those who suffer from alcoholism

and I can tell you from my own experience,

Sobriety Day is July 22nd of 2001. That's so you know, I have one that that was my last one. Hopefully that's the last one I'll ever have,

but this is my fourth time, fourth time in Alcoholics Anonymous. Now, I sat in a meeting not too long ago in my local clubhouse where somebody had the audacity to just say two seats down for me. So of course it kind of like upset me that, that we have newcomers in here and he, he would say this nonsense, but

he, and he didn't say in his experience, he said he didn't think there was no wrong way to do this. And I was like, wow, okay. And then it was, I shared and I said, you know, I, I, I kind of find fault with that. If there's no wrong way to do this, then how come in 1990 two 1995 sober 2 1/2 years I got drunk

is the end result of AA to end up drunk again? Do I see any heads going this or no? No, the answer is no 1995 to 2004 1/2 years sober sober actually had people that were trying to do they were doing what was outlined in the book. They were trying to give me what was outlined in the book, but I didn't wasn't willing to go to any lengths. I had bulky ideas, which means I do what I want and I take what I want and I leave the rest and I end up drunk again. Second time, third time, I only lasted

four days. Within two days from that period, I was pounding my fist on a bar down in Chestertown, MD. I had no money. It was payday. I had a paycheck. My coworkers had taken me in there. We worked on a roof on a building on this hospital. And it was probably 120° up on that roof. And the material didn't act right. And all they wanted to do was go get a couple drinks. And they knew for a fact I was trying to stop drinking. So they wanted to go have a couple of beers. And they said, Dave, we ain't buying no alcohol, but we will buy you Pepsi.

Well, I'm an untreated alcoholic suffering not from being drunk because I was like, I don't know, five days sober. I was suffering from lack of power and I had fear. I knew I planned to go to a a that night. I'd been to a a four times that week. I went to to be the Little League coach the very next day at my son's Little League game. And it they have lines in the big book that like consummate actor. I don't know for you, but I would smoke crack till 5:00 in the morning and then go coach Little League Saturday morning,

pick up the damn ball, you know, So it's it like, you know, I'm trying to be the actor, but that's kind of hard, you know, and like the parents are like, oh God, he's coaching again, you know, But as I stood in front of the bartender, out of my mouth, didn't say, can I have Pepsi? It said, F it. Give me a Budweiser.

And he didn't look to my guys that were paying it. And then once I got that one down, well, you're buying. Guess what? You're really going to buy. And that's what those guys had to do because alcohol demanded not only for me, but everybody around me. See, I don't know what your experience is, but I'm here to tell you what my experience is of trying to prove through every form of self deception that I could drink normally. And while I succeeded, if drinking normally is falling face flat in a urinal because I'm too drunk to stand up,

you know, might be alcoholic, I don't know, you know, I mean, if some of my experiences with not normal drinking, I'm have you ever helped a bartender clean up after the bar close 'cause you ain't done yet? My whole object was to sit there and drink, you know, and you come across that occasional cigarette butt, you pick it up, but you still drink. I'm sure none of you ever did that, you know. But that was my experience, you know, over and over and over again, you know, I do not, I do not even process

alcohol scientifically. They say I don't even process it normally. And I definitely like the effect that alcohol produces in me. My problem has never been alcohol. I thought that's what it was when I came up, you know, because of all the prices I paid. But why is it that I would always return to that, that that which enslaved me, that alcohol? They use a term in the big book,

a rapacious creditor. I know what that's like when alcohol is demanding me to continue drinking,

you know, And so I would just spend, you know, in and out, in and out, in and out of a, a sober on my own, sober with church, sober without church, getting baptized as an adult, speaking in tongues. I don't know what all that about. But I went through that period and it lasted maybe about 3 months. I tried to live by these moral and philosophical convictions galore. The book says I tried that. I ended up drunk, you know, and it just

alcohol, King alcohol. Shivering denizens of his mad realm.

You know, I mean it just it freaking tortured me. I remember the the other week I said in the meeting that

I said, you know, alcohol raped me and molested me. And a lady took offense to that. She made me know it. Afterwards I was like, well, let me ask you a question. This is my understanding of the definition, legal definition of rape. Now I'm married to a woman and she said no to me, but I I had sex with her anyway. Now she said no, she meant no, but I went ahead and forced myself on her. That's rape.

How many times have all of us sat in here, the real alcoholic, and said no to alcohol? But alcohol made me go like this as easy as I'm drinking water right here and just and I can't sit down. I'm just drunk. I'm just nuts sober. How many times has that done it to you? More times. It's done it to me more times than I can freaking count. More times than there's fingers and toes in this room

because at the end alcohol see

everybody like I, I misinterpreted step one. I had an old timer come up to me. Where are they at? Right there. And he said read step one and I said, we admitted we were poured over alcohol and our lives have become unmanageable. Is there an and in there he said, do you even see what you're reading? And then I read it, but he goes, what's that in between? Do you even know what that that minus sign? There is

no see. Nobody ever took the time, even good sponsors, they never took the time to explain this thing to me.

I've heard the rehab definition of unmanageability. To me, unmanageable is like I can't, I'm showing up to work on time or I'm not paying my bills on time or I'm not. I think it's a life thing that the unmanageability that our founders were trying to they don't talk about any of that crap and there's a solution and more about alcoholism. There's in the doctor's bin, which is all about step one and getting done. They don't mention any of that stuff. An old timer told me he said, son, that's a hyphen and it means continuation of thought.

And what the founders when they wrote in his experience what he thought they meant and it matches up with what's actually in the definition of that is continuation of thought. My life is unmanageable because alcohol at the end is managing my life for me. Now, how does it do that? My sponsor asked me to or yes or no questions when I got here. He said, Dave, when you start to drink, can you predict with any certainty, once started, when you're going to stop, yes or no? And running out and passing out doesn't count?

No. OK. Have you ever stopped before?

Yeah. Has it been more than once? Yeah. And I thought it was kind of rude when he said that because he knew me my second time sober. Like when he asked me, you know, I St. my first time, he goes from a point of being stopped. Can you predict with any certainty, any certainty at all when you're going to get started again? And I thought about it and I was like, no, he said, but you have every attention to to when you stop to quit, That's it. You're not going to do it anymore. He said, Dave, if you answer no to both those questions, what the big book says is that your

alcohol when you're drinking it, you got the allergy, but you're also power server alcohol when you're not drinking it. The unmanageability in step one's got nothing to do with you paying your bills, being a good father, being a good husband, being a good employee, none of that stuff. It's got to do when alcohol is managing your life for you. And at the end, alcohol is now your God because it will demand stuff from you and you willingly give that because you ain't got a choice in that matter,

you know? And at the end, that's what, that's what my experience was. I remember some old timers tried to tell me once that I chose to go drink.

You know, if you're telling newcomers that stop, if they're alcoholic, they've lost the power of choice. That means that you're not going to be able to bring in the consciousness, the forefront of your mind, the memory and suffering of even a week or a month ago. You're without the fence against the first drink. I don't know why on earth we use carnival tactics in a a, in a life or death situation. Why on earth any of us, including me, would tell somebody, think to drink through,

you know, this big book, the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, doesn't give me any way

to stop drinking, doesn't give me any cheap carnival rehab tactics that, you know, oh, keep everybody. All this other shit that I heard from rehabs, it doesn't work. Not for the real alcohol, not for me. It didn't work for me. I tried it. It didn't work. It worked for maybe a day or two, and then I'm off to the races again because I'm one of the real ones that they talked about. You know, once I arrived at that point where I'd gone beyond the power of choice,

I don't get it back. And now, once I've reached that point, now I've got to, I've got to. I got two choices that big Books says One, to accept spiritual help.

Whatever that help is, I don't get to dictate it or to continue to drinking the blot out my miserable existence.

You know, and I tried that more times than I can count. You know, I showed up in Alcoholics Anonymous doorstep out of result of going to a DUI program again. No wonder drink and drive, you know, God, and they got repetitive. You know, it's like you fail the first one because they got that stupid thing, 'cause you got to go to a A and I'm not going to go to A because I've been to a, a 1970s. I went to a A,

you know, they had a bunch of old people in there. They were like 30, you know, I didn't know any better. I'm like 1516 years old and buddy, that's old.

30 years old is old. You got a Gray hair, you know,

You know, no offense, but the women didn't even have teeth back then. If you like, back in the 70s, you know, if you were like a woman and you had two teeth in your mouth, you were doing real good. Some of you guys know that, too. You had none. You know, there were so just people I didn't like. How am I going to identify with these people, you know, And plus I'm tuned up at the time,

you know, Christ, I mean the state of Delaware because I I drank alcoholic back in the 70s decided the kind thing was because I was self-employed, self-employed. My sponsor tells me I have to tell the truth. I stole for a living that self-employed, you know, they put me in a mental institution in Delaware City

called Governor Bacon. And so here I am, I'm locked up and it's a Coed mental institution. I got my nut girlfriend, you know, and

when you act up in there, they give you drugs that that are like way beyond heroin. You know how the all Thorazine, you know? And so when you act up, they have rules and like, it's like, I don't know about you all, but being strapped down to a bed and peeing yourself because they ain't letting you up because they've shot you up with Thorazine again or Haldol is not appealing. And so I escaped.

Three days later, they caught me because I had been stealing buns outside of McDonald's at like 4:00 in the morning. That's what I was eating, you know. So I had a sponsor, You know, he was an older guy. He gave me my first tattoo. He said, yeah, here I I'll tell you how to get that. He said, go to rehab and you can escape from there and they won't even chase it. I was like, well how do you do that?

He said. Tell him you're a heroin addict. I didn't know what that was. I became 1 immediately. Sure enough, 2 weeks later or so I'm, I'm in a rehab in downtown Wilmington, DE.

They're talking about scrubbing toilets with toothbrushes and hollering at me. Very, very rude, you know, And three days later, I walked away from the place and guess what? They didn't chase me and I got away, you know, and so, you know, I, I, I've been there, you know, I went to rehab, I went to a, a in the 70s, you know, I think I know. And that can be a problem for a real alcoholic.

You know,

make a Long story short,

I lost a military. I didn't, I gave away a military. Let me see. I'm trying to tell the truth. I gave away a military career for the price of what alcohol did for me. I gave away a career in the Delaware State Police, which I got accepted because what alcohol could do for me. Yeah. I I was going to be. Can you imagine me being a cop, Mr. your license, getting drugs?

Well, I got to answer that question. You know, I took the, I sent off the application and they accepted

1983. I'm like, I just got honorably discharged out of the military. I can do push ups until the cows come home. I'm in the best shape I've ever been. I can run 2 miles and under under 12 minutes and I smoked over a pack of cigarettes and I can still do that. I can do as many sit-ups as need be. I can shoot fairly accurate because I'm an ex infantry. I apply for the Delaware State Police and they accept it. And then my buddy asked me, he goes, how are you going to arrest people for what you like to do?

I did the alchemet no

had AI was in the Air National Guard. I took a flight aptitude test got offered a chance I passed. They offered me to get a chance to go fly helicopters down in Fort Rucker AL become a Warrant Officer and what that said my ego filled my house. Can you believe this? I was full of ego back then was I remember they they first Sergeant that slighted me numerous times and when I was stationed in Hawaii and it meant if I was a Warrant Officer, he would have to salute me so that my plan. I didn't care about the flying helicopters. I wanted the the respect and I was going to go all the way

back there to make his butt salute me. I think they call that a resentment.

I became self-employed again, and the federal government had a problem with that, and they sent me off the federal prison for seven years, 1985. I got out in 1989. I should be safe in federal prison, right? Should be. Alcohol shouldn't be really effective. Guess what? They make booze. I was in a Coed federal prison. I was let out on overnight furlough. You know

they had rules. Don't drink, don't do drugs, and stay in town.

Well, shoot, I can do that. You ever do the Alchemath

32 hours? I can get drunk give a clean breathalyzer. So I did. I gave a clean bathrobe the next day. My buddy bought some of that unlicensed pharmaceutical agricultural product and we debated drunk how much I could actually inhale and give a clean urine. The next day,

10s, five, seven. I said four, OK, let's do it. Two weeks later, here they come. I was in a Coed. There's women there, no fence,

you know? And now I'm shackled on the way to upstate New York and my cellmate is now godfather of Rochester, NY. True story.

You know, I'm with with guys that like, you know, that you mobsters and stuff like that, you know, real criminals. I'm not like that. I'm like, Oh my God, you know, and I mean it. It's like a different atmosphere because like, the guards were coming in there and bringing him food, saying Mr. Endeavino,

because they respected this guy and that's my cellmate. And I'm like, Oh my God, what have I done now? Not once in there does it occur to me that alcohol might be a problem.

You know, I get out on parole and and you know, I get my, I get out of the halfway house and the first time I'm out on an overnight furlough, I just want to hook up with her. I don't know who her is.

I didn't, but I was looking. Somebody handed me a beer and I don't make it back for the curfew call. Bam, automatically, 2:00 in the morning, getting rousted by the halfway house guards going back to prison offered a price of what alcohol is demanding from me. See, I don't know about you, but it's alcohol is not supposed to do that to me. You know, doesn't say somewhere in the book of being free from alcohol for a period of time he believes he can drink. Isn't that something like that in the book?

So I start paying some heavy, heavy consequences for the price of what a drink can do for me.

And at the end, guys, at the end it was so bad. I just I and I'll wrap this up 2000 I left Alcoholics Anonymous thinking I must have been a junkie because when I stuck a needle in my arm when I was 15, couldn't have been alcohol. And I left a a 4 1/2 years sober. Five years sober. I'm sitting across from my non alcoholic weight. She likes to abuse alcohol. You ever been with an alcohol abuser?

Come on, you ain't never drank with a normal person.

They order a drink this big and they might drink that much and you're focused on that freaking drink the whole meal because the ice is melting. It's going to finish that. You know how much that costs.

Took me a long time in sobriety to quit asking my wife that, you know,

but I'm sitting in front of her and I asked her. I said, you know, I had this thought, God forbid, you know, I had this thought that like, I really wonder what it was like. They had Zima out. Oh, red dog, Jack Daniels got wine coolers out. I sort of liked their whiskey. I wonder what their stuff tastes like.

And this is what's going on in my mind. No effective mental defense against the first drink. Quit telling newcomers in a A to think the drink through. That's not a solution. It's only a solution if you're a problem or heavy drinker, not for the real alcoholic, because they can't do it. So why on earth as a fellowship are we telling it? Because I can't bring that. It says I'm not going to even be able to bring the consciousness what one beer will do to me because one beer guarantees that another one's coming and another one's coming. Another one's coming. I just, you know, Dave Perry, I love him. He says,

you ever hear Dave Perry say, here's my law degree, give me a give me a shot. Here's my law degree, give me a shot and A and a backer. Here's my marriage. See, I know what he's talking about because I've experienced that. That's not made-up BS. That's that's from his actual sphere. Alcohol did the same exact thing to me. So here I am five years sober and I take that sip and I did, I, I only drank socially twice.

I did it when I was 5. And now I'm, I'm doing it at, at at like

373637 years of age. I took a sip. I could feel a little bit of effect, but what I said to myself and my mind, and I didn't let my wife know it because I don't know about you, but saving face is kind of important.

I care about what people think of me. I said to myself, David, that's the stupidest thing you've ever done. You just threw away five years sobriety. Why?

So what's they do? Dave starts drinking on the weekends. That works so well. How about during the week? So our poem nooners at work now. Just the alcohol by itself ain't enough. I don't like to get spinny drunk.

There's chemicals out there that'll make those spins go away, Be able to drink maybe a little bit longer, you know? And that stuff has a life of its own. You know, when your kids are begging you, Daddy, put some food in the refrigerator this week. You want to eat?

There's a line in to the wives. It says

armored car could not have brought the paychecks home safe enough. Why is that? Because my wife's got to go to bed sometime, you know? See, I don't know about you all, but when when that when that obsession hits me, I'm gone. It's not because I'm picking and choosing between the love of my wife that I love, the life of my kids that I would die for. But when alcohol says go, son, you go. And I can't bat an eye, I can't say. Yeah, but

because my mind doesn't function that way. And every time I go back from being sober, it gets worse and the big book covers it. We continue to do terrible, terrible things. And so I'm I get on a ride that I never signed up for, I heard it best and I'll steal it. Guys names Herbie. He's one of the youngest looking old guys down in Baltimore, sober over 40 years. He he looks like he's 50.

He's lived the life behind his wildest dreams. He said it best. He said it was like he sold his simple human dignity for the price of a drink. And he doesn't know when that happened. Weigh in. That's me,

you know, and, and so I'm dying again, you know, and, and it gets really, really bad, you know, and

let's get sober because it's top of the hour, you know, July 21st of 2001, I came up with a plan. It was a good plan. You all ever have a plan? God, I love plans.

If you're on a crack bins for about two or three days, you may not be thinking right, but the plan seems good, you know, and it was. I'm going to rehab. That was my plan. I got insurance.

My wife is handicapped. On the last job she had before her disability got too much for her to work, she got COBRA insurance and we were paying it,

you know. And so my plan was, I'm going to go to a rehab. They got a chef. It's all in the water. I heard they got slabs there. Oh, God, they got to take me. I got insurance. So I called them up 8:00 in the morning. They said, what's your insurance? And I gave it to him and he came back on the phone and he said, Mr. Phillips, we got a problem. Like, what's that?

You can't come here? I was like, well, how do I get to go? There He goes. You got to go to outpatient therapy and fail. I don't know about you guys, but I just felt like somebody just kicked me right in the stomach

or down below Southern route.

I'm dying, and as crazy as I was, I knew I was dying. I'm dumping enough narcotics in me to kill me, you know,

and I can't. I'm begging God to kill me and he's not.

And freaking yeah. You ever get to the point where like the birds are are there and you're cussing the birds? Oh, God, I hated that. Well, that's that's what's going on in my mind, you know, And I said to the buddy, I said, I said I can't fail.

And then he asked me something. And I always remember that. I don't tell what rehab told me this, but it's pretty effed up. I heard Frankie Lynch won a Clarence Snyder sponsor say rehabs are about money. It's a it's a business. They like repeat business. I'm not here to put rehabs down because there is a purpose for them. But he asked me something. He goes. You got any money

now? Let me just go ask my crack dealer. I put an addition on his freaking wing on his mansion. I'm sure he'll give me a loan.

I remembered I came to a A in June of that year. I did the math 2 1/2 years. 4 1/2 years this time. I'll be here the rest of my life. I'll get at least 10 years Within two days. I was pounding my fist on a bar. Wonder how the hell it could have happened again. But something happened in that meeting. A guy came up and he gave me a phone list. He said my name's Dicky and he made sure I knew where his name was. He said if you ever want, if you ever want help, David,

please call me. Doesn't matter what time or day or night, just call me. See, he knew I was dying. He's free.

You people give this thing away for free and for fun. There's no cost on it.

You have the ability to avert misery and death. Rehabs can't do that. Doctors can't do that, Psychiatrists can't do that, religious people can't do that. But a recovered alcoholic armed with the facts about themselves can do that and does it countless times throughout their lifetime until God calls them home. And that whole scene of him coming up to me as soon as I hung up the phone, dejected from that rehab, it was like watching a maid for TV movie.

And nobody can't tell me there's not a God because I was not in my right mind, but I seen it just like I was watching a movie.

And so I called him up and I met him that night. That guy saved my life. He didn't take me through the steps, but he saved my life. He made sure that my paycheck every Friday got into the bank and he met me to make sure that it got in the bank. Y'all ever get to the point in your sobriety when you knew and money's a problem, you got money you're going to go use? Like I made sure that that money got in there. You know,

I was told things that did not work, Like read the first three steps out of 12 and 12, Folks, there's no directions in the Big Book. I mean, in the 12 and 12 foot of steps, that's Bill's interpreted comment there. I read the 12:00 and 12:00. I love the 12:00 and 12:00. I love Bill's interpretations. I love the traditions and stuff. But if we're going to do the steps, do them out of the Big Book. Because I was reading the Big Book while that was going on and I got up to AB and C and then there it says if you're convinced and I was convinced and some old time or something, keep reading the first three steps.

I don't see that, you know, the foolishness in that is, and he's given me the best he's got. But can you predict with any certainty when you tell somebody to wait to do the steps when on Earth, the mental obsession that will cause them to go back to drink is going to happen to them? Can anybody in here predict when your next mental session is going to happen? Because you are your God

and that's what they're fighting against. That's the rush to get through the steps. The founders and most of you know this, the founders didn't wait to take them through the steps. Hell, most of them until they did that. They did that third set prayer. They were. They weren't allowed in a meeting till they did that. They didn't wait months to do the steps. Some of them were doing the steps in a week.

Read a comes of age. It talks about Clarence Snyder, man, that Plain Dealer thing hit and all of a sudden you got people that are only a week sober, buddy, you've got to get through the steps. We got a couple hundred people to take through the steps. You don't have time because they're going to die if you don't. And that success rate from that book before it was before it was adulterated by our GSO and change had a 90% success rate that's listed in our A, A literature. And some of your shaking heads because you know what I'm telling is true.

You know,

a month over, I get a sponsor. I didn't pick my sponsor. I was in a meeting sort of like this. There's a lady 3rd anniversary and she carried a message of hope. I didn't identify with her drinking, but she hooked me with something she talked about in the eyes prior to coming in and they connected me. A woman did that for me, not a guy, not her drinking, but something about her eyes that she talked about.

And I'm telling you, I had an experience and that I was like, you know,

I went up and asked this old Gray haired guy for a sponsor after the meeting. I didn't even ask him for a sponsor. I asked him this, would you please help me? And he gave me a sponsor that night. I didn't know that guy from from sin. I didn't know him six months over. That guy was he asked me, you know where the doctor you got a big book. That's the first thing he asked me. I lied. I said yeah, my wife had one. She's not even one of us.

My big book, the first one I had 92 to 95. The dog used it as a chew toy. I still got it. The 1st 80 pages are missing. You know you're screwed if that's the book you want to recover by because that's like how you get well up to step 9, you know, still got it. It's constant reminder of of the dog found better use than I did, you know.

But anyway, goes, you know where the doctor's opinion was. Folks, I'd read that big book for years. I thought he's talking about Doctor Bob's story, and he had to explain to me. I'm like Roman numerals. I've been to college. You know the reason? Roman numerals, you know, I don't know, but he explained it. He said read it three times and show up the next day. You know what alcohol did for this alcoholic You ever meet? You ever anybody here sponsor other people? Let me see a show of hands. How many people here have taken people through the steps? How many of you have heard the Yeah Butts?

And if they're not saying it, their actions indicate that

because their actions are what what a recovered alcoholic looks at. Guys, they ain't looking at your God. How do you know an Alcoholics line or lips move? My God, they're freaking delusional. They're not in denial, God. And Can you believe they put that story in the big book denial and they're trying to claim the same thing as delete. Oh, God, man.

My opinion there. I'm sorry. Anyway, he asked me to read it and he asked me to show up and I did. 38 miles from my house, the yeah, butts were gone. I didn't argue. I didn't fight. They asked me things like, Dave, do you like your booze watered down? No,

God, in the military we used to bypass our company because they bought this thing called Olympia beer. It's a oh, God, it's nasty because Bravo and Charlie company got Michelob and Budweiser. Budweiser, you know. So let's go. No, I didn't like booze. Water. Down he goes. Did you? Did you do drugs? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I did. Drugs, He goes. Did you like your drugs? Cut

now know about you all, but I used to bypass dealers to go get because if it's closer to kill me, I like it even better. You know,

go figure drink because we like effect, right. I might like the effect of other stuff too, right. So I said no, he goes then why on earth would you want your directions that your life depends on cutter water down. Why don't we do just what's outlined in a book? And that's what we did. He gave me the best of what he had. He missed some of the directions for the four step. See, an old timer told me, don't ever let anybody read your big book for you. And I let my first sponsor read the big book for me. And I miss some vital directions in that four step.

The new sex. I didn't have a new sex ideal. I didn't know that there were three prayers in the four step.

There are three pairs. 676869 Here's a new sex ideal. Seems like you know I know about you all. I've had the privilege of taking men and women. I sponsor both. I'm not. I'll take any sick and suffering person through the steps. I get asked all the time and I don't distinguish if they're male or female because my sole purpose is not to hook up with anybody in a a other than to get you hooked up with God. That's my responsibility as a recovered alcoholic. My life was averted. Misery and death, that's what I'm responsible to do.

You know how many people I'd sit there and watched and they fail at doing the steps because they don't live up to that last? It's like I heard it best in in Texas. My friends call my current agnosticism and their definition is areas of my life. I'm still playing God. I'm willing to allow God to have you can have my resentments. God, you can have my fears. I'll keep my sex.

I've seen people get drunk over that shit. You know, I didn't know. I didn't even know 2 1/2 years a two years over. My wife chose to leave. And I won't go into particulars because it's not really, it's not really prudent. But boy, over six months did I play God again, judging her. I'm a victim,

you know, It was terrible, you know, and I used a A as group therapy and in my local a A, you can do that. Oh God, man, it's like, that's not what A is for, but that's what some of us use it for. I hear things like a problem shared as a problem. Half crap.

That is crap group therapy. I was molested as a kid. Guess what? I went to a ton of group therapy. It didn't work. I played a victim into my 30s. Not until I went through the steps and seen what my part of that was. Because I did play a part in, God forbid.

Maybe I didn't 'cause it, but what did I do during it, especially what did I do afterwards, You know? Well, you'd be drunk too if you had my childhood Victim, victim, victim A. A taught me not to do that.

2 1/2 you're sober. I go through the steps again with my now sponsor and all of a sudden, wow, there's his prayers in the four step.

I wrote some inventory on it. My sponsor in doing my fifth step, turned and looked at me. He said, Dave, you've been raping your wife.

And he explained that to me and I was like,

I almost turned pale

shot and all of a sudden I seen it. It's like no wonder if she left.

I play God with my wife and kids to such an NTH degree.

It's just terrible. How on earth would somebody be able to put up with that sober?

Sober. You hear things in A and I'll mention this like I didn't drink today. It makes me a winner. I'm two years sober, my first time in a A and I'm walking across a threshold with a gal. I meant an A A to go have sex with her.

I'm married, guys. Does that make me a winner? I don't have to talk about your dirty lonely. I'm talking about mine. But I'm talking about the nonsense that we hear in meetings that doesn't line up with our book

when we're all what did I read in the beginning? We're all supposed to be on the same page. Absolutely agree. Just 'cause I'm not drinking does not make me a winner. Let me tell you something. Just because I was locked up in federal prison, I didn't steal anything, I think

didn't make me attorney general. The state of New York, you know,

so let's get to the reality of things. And I'm looking at this stuff with my sponsor and it's like, Oh my God.