Big Book workshop in Conyers, GA

I, I was thinking about this yesterday

and not that it's wrong or bad or anything like that, but just you're set aside prayer. Wow, I I actually, that's the way I learned it. But maybe in the

fighter or pain in the ass that I am, I, I change things.

But

it's, I love that prayer because it's, it's, I always tell my guys and, and the people that I work with that prayer is not set in stone. The words don't matter. The meaning does, you know, and I alter that prayer all the time. You know, I walk into a meeting and I ask God to help me to set aside everything I think I know about this meeting and help me have an open mind so I can have a new experience with this meeting and these people and help me to hear the truth,

you know? Because you know what if I walk into a meeting that I know

is quote UN quote dark tunnel meeting, yeah, I'm blocked, I'm closed and that's all I'm going to hear is the crap. If I walk in after saying the set aside prayer and really digesting it and experiencing it, you know, I'll hear that one guy in the room who actually shared something good, you know, or those two guys or five guys. I have. I, I, I, I do.

But we're, you know,

this Dell of whatever has kind of got us to this place right now. And the thing that jumped out at me this morning was this line or paragraph on page 151. It says now that now and then a serious drinker, being dry at the moment, says I don't miss it at all. I feel better, work better, having a better time. As XX problem drinkers, we smile at such a Sally. We know our friend is like a boy whistling in the dark. To keep up his spirits.

He fools himself inwardly. He would give anything to take half a dozen drinks and get away with it. He will presently try the old game again, for he isn't happy about his sobriety. He cannot picture life without alcohol. Someday he will be unable to imagine life either with alcohol or without it. Then he will know loneliness, such as few do. He will be at the jumping off place. He will wish for the end.

And, and I guess my question here is, is, you know,

if you could drink and get away with it, would you? Yeah. When I was when I was new, when I was first going into the steps, my answer was absolutely, you know, if I could avoid these consequences, the, the, the first question was if you could drink like normal people, would you? And, and no, I wouldn't. You know, I don't want to drink like normal people. I want to drink like an alcoholic and not have the consequences. But that question, if I could drink the way I want to drink and not have the consequences, would I? And in the beginning, yeah, absolutely. You know, I, I, I, I loved

did for me. It fixed me. It solved my problem. And you know, the consequences were the work. I knew how to get what I had to get. That wasn't the work. It was dealing with a wreckage. That was the work. And it was, it was kind of difficult to get to this point.

But today, if I was, if I had a way to magically not have the consequences, I I have no desire to drink. I don't want to drink. I like my life,

that's the thing. I'm happy with my life. It's got its ups and downs and it sucks sometimes, but life sucks sometimes, you know? It's just life, but I'm happy. You know, I read a I read a bumper sticker years ago and I know it's kind of poofy and fluffy and whatever, but it illustrates the point is serenity is not the absence of chaos.

Serenity is peace amidst the chaos. And, and that's,

you know, that's kind of what I got. You know, I'm OK in here. All that shit out there can, you know, can crumble, it can fall apart and I can still be okay in here. And, and I think that that's, you know, what's important because without, without that, I'm always going to be looking for that magic bullet. I'm always going to be looking for something to make me OK. And and there's nothing that will except my relationship with God and me.

So say something. And so we we wanted to end like I get the way that we, you know, approach this entire weekend was about, you know, living service, you know, creating a vision of what you know, of what God wants you to be. And how are we going to get there, You know, access that power more than you know it. You know, more than just

saying, OK, well, you know, I'm in AI, everything's good.

But you know, like, how do we, how do we, how do we become more effective in all the areas in our life? You know, how do we

become, you know, 'cause ultimately, if you don't want what you have now, you know, at some point you're going to want a better deal it, you know, and, and, and there's that, there's that, that statement in the book where it talks about it says, you know, have you a sufficient substitute, you know, for alcohol? You know, is it, you know, did, did your, your use and abuse leave this huge

hole in your life? And is, are you less of a person or are you less fulfilled in your life? You know, without it, you know, do you have something, is your life better today and more fulfilling today than it ever could be? You know, and for most of us, you know, when you're doing, when you're doing this deal and you're truly living this program, the answer is, yeah. You know, you know, because our life is full. It's full of people, it's full of love, it's full of service. It's full of, you know, compassion. It's full of you know,

you know, 12 step work. Is

it it's interesting. It it's one of those things would like, you know, you never really know what you're going to get. And you walk into a situation and you think it's going to be like, oh, this isn't, you know, just normal going to sit down and read the big book. And then all of a sudden, like, you know, things go kablooey. And you know, you're you're dealing with and going with things and all of a sudden like you're, you're like, you feel this, this, this sense of power flow into you and you're saying things that you didn't even know you knew and all of it. And it's like this magic,

you know, so when you're doing this deal, you have all of that stuff and it's incredible, you know, and, and, and I think to myself, it's like, well, if that happens to me when I'm sitting reading this book, where else can it happen? You know, where else can I bring that same magic in my life? Like, why, why can't I have it in all the areas? Why can't I have it at work? Why can't I have it in school? Why can't I have it with my family? Why can't I have it with my friends? Why can't I have that same energy

all places, You know, because service isn't always just about sitting down and reading the big book.

You know, service is it is a holistic thing. It is all about who we are as people, you know, And of course, you know, we're all I was, you know, we're always taught, you know, I my problem, you're my solution. And that is an absolute truth, you know, but why limit service to one aspect of it? Say, OK, well, this is what I do. I help drugs and I'm going to grab newcomers and that's what I'm going to do. I mean, that's wonderful and I do do that. But there's more to it than that. We can we can get

more and be more if we expand our horizons or expand our vision of what service really means this making sense to you The original 12 steps said having had a spiritual experience as a result or as a result of this course of action. We carry this message to others. Okay, if we're focused on the booze, then we can't carry this message to others. That's not the message that that this book is is implying or or or transmitting what the what the message in in my

and what I see the message that this book gives us is this reliance independence upon God. Yeah, this this this world of the spirit and living a life of service. Okay. And that doesn't mean that I'm subservient, but I live a life of service. I bring this thing that we do this this practice

into all of my affairs. There's not an area of my life. And now I'm not telling people that they need to do what I do, but I just

what I do. I don't have anonymity, OK, in my life, I've never felt the need for it. I've never, I've never had it. There's no, I'm not on television, I'm not in there. I'm not on radio, I and I'm not in the newspaper. So I adhere to the traditions and, and currently the change with the Internet thing. So my Facebook main page title page doesn't say I'm an Alcoholic Anonymous.

I'm in Alcoholics Anonymous on the web

throughout, you know, stuff like that, but my public profile isn't. But my public profile in my community, there's no anonymity. I, I, I'm, I'm a member of my community and people know what I do. They know who I am. I've, you know, we the, the best example of this is we lived in Harrison, NJ for, I don't know, about five years

and we had a house meeting going on and it started off real mellow. It started off with like four people, six people, something like that, this little step study meeting there.

And then all of a sudden these guys were getting excited and they were getting involved in the work and they were finding newcomers and bring them. You know, our only rule we had, we had children. Our only rule is don't bring a sloppy drunk. Yeah,

or a pedophile. You can bring a wet one, but he's got to be contained. You know, He's got to be kind of sedate or whatever. You know, I got no problem with it with an active junkie sitting on my couch because he's, you know,

you know, that sloppy drunk. I didn't want my kids around. We made a rule that the kids don't have to interact with sloppy drunks. And, and, and what would happen is they'd start to bring these people and they'd start to bring these people. Then these guys would get into it and they'd start to bring people, you know, and we're not talking long stretches of time, we're talking weeks.

You know, over the course of weeks, this thing grew. And then all of a sudden we had 25 members of people showing up at our house, you know, and then all of a sudden, the neighborhood started to find out what we were doing, 'cause, you know, there's 25 people sitting on our steps, smoking cigarettes and hanging out and bullshitting on the, you know, and, and we're in a community at this time. It's one of those neighborhoods where there's no space between the houses. You know, you got just a little alleyway to get to your backyard and your backyard is this little patch of grass, this big it.

And we're all hanging out on the on the stoop, smoking cigarettes and talking and everybody's got big books. And, and people found out now in the neighborhood new and across the street was, was low income housing. And, and, and all of a sudden the word started to spread around there. And people who were struggling in our community found out who who we were. Yeah. I'd go on to go pick up my son from kindergarten and somebody, a woman

from our community who I was 12 stepping at the time, yells across the park, across the playground.

I got my kids back. I stopped smoking crack.

My sons kindergarten teacher. I'm like, I don't know.

Then later I said

I have no problem people knowing I'm an alcoholic. But probably for you, you might not want to yell in front of your kids, friends, parents about smoking crack.

You know?

My, you know,

I, I was in a meeting about six months ago and, and I was talking about this and the guy, this guy raised his hand and he asked me. He's like, I, I have no idea. That makes no sense. He's been in Alcoholics Anonymous for eight years and his family doesn't know he's in recovery.

And I'm totally baffled. You know, I'm not saying you got to live like me, but there's got to be some kind of integration in your life with this program, you know, and with this, with this way of life. Because if it's not, it's like it's trying to, trying to intentionally live schizophrenic or something. You know, it's, it's, you know, it's how do you, how do you have one area of your life be a certain way and one area of your life be another way? It just doesn't make any sense to me

on again, like I said, not everybody has to do this. I have a friend of mine who his job, you know, he doesn't he doesn't let anybody know in his job. You know, his boss has come to find out, but you know, he's quiet about it and his Facebook, he does nothing happens on it because they look at it and people know and and and that's OK, but he's not afraid to give it out. He just doesn't offer it out,

you know, and, and I think that that's the key, you know, with us, we

lived in such a way where it was acceptable. I was, I was a contractor, you know, you know, nobody cared. You know, people were actually grateful, you know, that I wasn't drunk and that I'm living sober. And, you know, you know, my theory was is they see me laying in the gutter, you know, why would I hide the fact that I'm not anymore,

you know, but when we're, you know, so one of the things and, and, and again,

I think that, you know, sometimes, sometimes

like as an alcoholic, I get very laser focused, a very tunnel vision with things. And I and, and my, and I get a conception and I create an identity on this conception. And I'm so attached to this identity that I fail to see

other possibilities in my life, you know, and, and you know, when we had talked about like the two stepping, you know, about, about, you know, people who work the, the steps and they do it once, you know, 25 years ago. And they, they just stick with 12, you know, 12 stepping in service and this, that and the other thing. And, you know, and, and you know, the message that they're carrying has less depth and weight every damn year because they forgot what it was like to make amends. They forgot what it was like, like, like

rate in inventory because the last time they wrote it was a decade ago, you know, and so, you know, we, and then there's the other side where you spend all your time navel gazing and thinking about your own feelings and resentments and trying to hump them into submission and inventory them away. That we, we fail to be of service because we're so busy working on ourselves. We forget part of working on ourselves is helping somebody else.

And there's that balance, you know? And so like we, we were thinking about when, when Tarik asked us like what we, you know, what's our specialty?

Well, when I get called in to do, you know, big book workshops, there are a couple things that I usually get asked. Like, can you do this? Usually the woman's perspective of the four step, which is, you know, full of prostitution and drunken rods and shame and fear and all of those wonderful things that we like to talk about. You know.

So we have that one, we have the, the more integrated living service because of the way that Adam and I conduct ourselves and our family with the, with the application of the traditions in our relationship.

And just the way that we have, you know, the way that our life has been shaped by this process and our approach to it. And, you know, and, and of course, the other thing is I, you know, I get called in to do stuff on the lost chapters, which is directly related to this living service thing.

And, you know, because, you know, a lot of times people stop at working with others and they say, oh, this is all I need to know about, you know, everything else is Al Anon. So it's irrelevant to me. Guess what, Alavon? Al Anon's very relevant to Alcoholics because you know what? None of us would be sitting here without those people. And, and, and, and how many of you don't associate with Alcoholics? Yeah, By the way, we all,

we qualify for Al Anon. You know, you don't have to be a wife or a husband or a or a family member.

Yeah. To to need the the tools that Al Anon offers. We deal, at least I deal with Alcoholics on a daily basis. And sometimes my codependent issues come up and they,

sometimes my codependency comes up

and, and I, you know,

I, I get jammed up. And what addresses this stuff? The stuff that addresses it is the, the, the latter chapters of our book, the Al Anon principles, you know, and I was, I was told by my son, I was actually ordered by my sponsor at one point that I needed to start attending Al Anon, you know, and The thing is, is what we don't realize. And of course, you guys probably all know this, but I'll be redundant nonetheless, that for the 1st 13 years

that this fellowship in this program was was in existence, there was number al Anon that you were expected to bring your family. You were expected to bring your wife. If you did not bring your wife to a meeting, they went and got her, you know, because their theory was like, well, you know, the alcoholic will probably drink. But if we help the wife, maybe he won't. Maybe maybe if he does drink, we'll be able to get him back. So it was get him fast, get him hard, get his family, get him now. I mean, one of the things that I do is for example, when I get called out on a wet drunk call, I mean, I almost always have al Anon

in my car and they always, almost always have al Anon contacts. You know, I have people that I know who are strictly al Anon because and who do who work within the program of al Anon. So when I get called into a 12 step call in which, you know, I have family members, I give them information too,

you know, because it's one thing to help the alcoholic, but why not help the family? Because again, you know, if we can help the mother, father, sister, brother, the people involved in this, the Alcoholics life, we're going to have a better chance of keeping their ass in this chair. Just just a good word of advice here. If you're, if you're an experienced 12 stepper and you're experienced with wet drunk calls and and going to people's houses and things like that, get your newbie guy that's coming with you to work with the drunk, because the Al Anon's are much harder to deal with. They really are.

Yeah. They got that victim persona. Yeah. No, they're really hard to handle. And, and, and the newbie, the guy who's just fresh going on a wet drunk call or been to one or two, whatever, he can handle that alcohol. He knows the deal. You know, he's excited about it. He's on fire. But, you know, you need somebody with a little tax.

Yeah, the Allen animal spin them like a top. Because you mean because that's The thing is like, you know, it. It's very easy for the alcoholic to say, OK, you know, I'm sitting here in a, you know, a pile of my own vomit. You know, I just trashed the house and I drunk dialed everybody on my cell phone. I think there. I think I have a problem here. There seems to be some sort of unmanageability,

you know, for the people in the Alcoholics life. I mean, it's to them the unmanageability is the alcoholic, you know, and to get them to the point where they realize, well dude, well, if, if the unmanageable is the alcoholic, why are you sitting here? You know if if if the problem is the alcoholic, why is problem still the alcoholic?

Why are you still allowing the alcoholic continue to be a problem? There's something to that. We need to take a look at that. And it's funny because I,

I went to, I did it. I don't like doing women's conferences, no offense, guys. I hate women's meetings. I have not set foot. And I don't remember I said 12 years, but I really don't know. I think it's got to be like, I don't, I think they threw me out of it. I think that my first year they like, they threw me out of the woman's meeting and I never really went back. And I don't think I've ever sat in an, an actual woman's meeting since I was about a year, a year and a half sober. And like, they drove my what you did the woman's comp, the woman did the woman. So I did that. They had these women, women, women and women conferences.

This is this thing that you know that that that's this movement going on. So they invited me to this woman to woman's conference. And I was like, shit, I got a woman's conference. I hate women and it's in Kansas. Fuck,

I like woman

women's Conference in like, you know, LA maybe, but Kansas, Really, What are we doing there exactly?

So I, I'm like,

and then I find out that it's Alanon and AI and then I'm like, I'm not so bad about that 'cause I'm like, OK, I get some Al anons there. They'll be interesting. Yeah,

because I love. No, really, I love picking Alan's brains. I asked him all kinds of questions. I've done the Allen down four step. I mean, I'm all about like, and what do you do with this and what about that? Because those people, they deal with us.

If I want advice, I'm going to talk about alcohol, Al anons in recovered al anons. They deal with us. If I want to know how to handle a situation in a relationship as the element, they're professionals. So I love this. I'm like, oh, this would be great. I'm going to steal the material. I'm going to get some, you know, there's soak some stuff up

now. So it's mixed And the one of the other speakers there and her name was Marie and she was like wonderful. Her husbands an alcoholic, She's an Al Anon. She's incredible big book thumper. Her husband was sponsored by Don P. You know, she's from Colorado. So I'm like love this. I'm she's my roommate. I'm happy as a clam. Right. Well, I kept noticing that all the Alcoholics were scattered and like the smoking area all along the periphery. And these women kept following me around

all weekend long like little clusters of ducks and, and, and I'm looking and I'm like outside smoking, just trying to be quiet. I hate people. I don't interact. Like I just want to smoke. Leave me alone

and they're fucking following me and I'm going and like trying to sit at a table quietly in the home. What do you think about this? And I'm looking and I'm going. Every single one of these are on al Anon. The Alcoholics are scattered. Being antisocial like myself,

I mean, all anons are like hunting me down

and I'm sitting here, I'm like, this is really interesting and I'm like, Oh my God, I'm there drug. Holy shit, that's what's going on.

I'm fucking drugging. They're following me.

I wasn't called the first time. I really got what it was to be an aluminum because I'm watching this and they were just like getting close. They're touching me. I'm like, don't fucking touch me.

Very nice, very sweet, gentle build, old ladies. And I'm like, you're touching me, Stop touching me, New York. Just don't touch me. Get away from me. Don't make eye contact with me. What is wrong with you people?

And I'm like, holy shit, you know, stealing and that's The thing is like they and I'm like, wow, they like my alcoholic crazy energy. That's what's going on here. Oh, that's it, man, because they recovered Aladdin on. So they're, they want to be by the recovered Alcoholics, but they still like the crazy alcoholic energy, you know,

so, but The thing is, is, and this is The thing is that these very same principles that these people are using in their lives, the very things that we need to be using in ours, because they're one, they're the same principles that that we are applying, but they're more detailed and more dealing with personal interaction, you know, and it's the interpersonal interaction where Alcoholics, we often stumble because we are blocked by our fear, because we have all these insecurities, because we have this natural state of unworthiness that we come and drag around with us and we do this work and we get this, God,

this, this connection and this stuff. And we're really rocking and rolling. But really all of us are still awkward teenagers. I mean, think about, think about all the Alcoholics, you know, right, And how wonderful they are and all the 12 step work they do and how great they could be with the book and how great they could be working with a newcomer. And then think about like watching them like, you know, like at a dance or like at a club. And they're like awkward and weird and they'll make eye contact and they twitch a little bit, right? We all do that,

you know, would not meant necessarily amongst each other, but like when we're separated from the herd, forget it. Like we're like, you know, I would love in that area or we do that bravado thing or like we act like we swagger, but deep down inside we're like, you know, you know, we swagger, but we all know we're compensating for something, right?

So The thing is, is that, you know, the we have that natural state and it does get better. I mean, over the past 18 years, it's certainly gotten better. I certainly couldn't have sat up, you know, I couldn't be doing what I do with the big book in the workshops and the conferences if it had on some level, you know, gotten better. But we still are working at some on some degree of the deficit because think about how badly how much we hump inventory just to be OK.

You know, I was like, I don't know how many times people have come up to me in the years.

Somebody asked me just recently, no, no offense, but what type of inventory do you use? The big book man? Like, well, what version of it? Well, that's like, you know, like all different kinds of like whatever, you know, whatever inventory fits that specific resentment or that specific circumstance or that time frame for that matter. You know, it's like I like, I have a lot of tools in my box, like I can use all different kinds of stuff, you know, but it's like we, we want to find that perfect inventory. We want to find that magic bullet that makes

normal guess what? Don't happen.

You know, I've met a lot of these, and you guys have met them too. A lot of these, like the big book gods that my heroes. They're awkward, weird dudes. Seriously,

they're creepy. Some of them, they're weird. They're awkward. You know? He thought Mark Houston was a newcomer when he met him,

tried to 12 step him in the lobby of the what was it? The Hill? You know, the Marriott? The lobby of the Marriott by La Guardia Queens. Dude, you look scared. You were right,

you know, that's what I used to. You know, I mean, I think about this is how many, how many big book demigods have you met who are on their like third marriage?

The interpersonal relationships are the things that we struggle with the most, I think.

And I think, you know, in terms of sponsorship, it's a lot easier to, you know, won't because the sponsorship is, you know, we have that, we have those set roles. We have, we have, you know, I know what's expected of me and you know, what's expected of you. And we work within time, the framework of those of those roles in that relationship. I I, I was told, I was told, told, told by my sponsor we were

five years sober that I was not allowed to celebrate at my Home group if I didn't bring my family.

Yeah. Then we brought our family Do that again. Yeah. He understood why I didn't bring my children to the meeting again because he ran up my, my son Sheamus ran up to, to it was Dave ran up to Dave, grabbed his leg. He's like 6 foot 5 and was hanging on to it for dear life, you know, and would leave him alone.

But but the, but the idea behind it, the idea behind it, I don't, I don't bring my children to meetings.

My children know about going to meetings, what they know about Alcoholics Anonymous. We have meetings in our house. We have step work done in our house. Our kids know what are going on. You know, I was telling somebody this yesterday. I remember years and years and years ago, we caught my daughter teaching my son how to meditate and pray.

Yeah, you know, because they see us doing this. And the idea is, is we we don't necessarily have to insulate them from all of this.

Yes, we want to be good parents and we don't want them to have to deal with wet, sloppy, violent drunks. We can,

you know I had a wet one. Is this chronic

water? I can't call him a chronic relapse because he never really stopped. He wanted it all the time so he'd show up at my house shit faced all the time. Eddie and and and I get a phone call from her.

Eddie's here. Yeah. I come back from like picking up my kids from daycare or from my daughter from preschool and food shopping and there's a sweat sloppy drunk on my porch.

I need your help. So I I come home, she's got Eddie sitting in the driveway. He can't go in the house

because the kids are in the house and, and, and not in a, not in a, in a, in a mean way. You know, it's not like, no, you're not allowed. You're nasty. No, it's not like that. It's, you know, here, let's sit in the chair.

They played it. They played in the backyard. They were doing their thing. And we sat outside because, you know, if he got violent or if something happened and I'm in the house with the kids, I can't necessarily control the situation.

But I'm outside with the set, with the with, with my cell phone in the house phone ready to call 911 if something's up and I can get my kids away and in the house as something goes down.

Eddie was Eddie had his moments, but he wasn't typically jumped out of a moving truck. No, he wanted to, he didn't do it. He he, he opened the door, but he didn't actually jump.

Yeah, I'll add this is all. This is really important.

I, I didn't understand the concept of going on a 12 step call with somebody else. Yeah, I, anybody called me, I was there in a heartbeat. No problem. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And I, I went on wet drunk calls by myself all the time. OK. And it's not a good idea. It's not a good idea. And Eddie's a good example of that. We're doing 60 miles an hour down the highway

in my van. Go into a detox. He realizes he's going to detox and changes his mind

and he goes to open the door, going 60 miles an hour down the highway.

I, you know, I'm driving a work van. I gotta, I can't reach him, You know, I'm, I'm, I'm gonna crash, You know, it's like I gotta try and grip. If you got somebody else, they can wrangle that guy. Yeah. My old sponsor talked about walking into a wet drunk call and the guy sitting there in a chair with a bottle and a gun. Yeah. What do you do when you're by yourself? Well, the other thing too is, I mean, I've walked into it and this this was just happened to be

a coincidence or a like, you know, I got one of Adam's guys that worked for Adam also went to our Home group

and I got a wet drum call and he was working with Adam and he brought Adam brought him back to the house and I was going to drive him to Home group and I got a what drunk call. One of my, one of my sponsors sponsees was, you know, messed up. And she's like, look, you're in the area. Can you scope her up and bring her to the meeting? We'll meet her there. We'll figure out what to do with her. No problem. So I have I have them in the car and I'm and I pick up my sponsee and then I have my sponsee

are his employee and myself. We go to pick up this woman

and I come, I pull up and her her boyfriend's beating the shit out of her on her front lawn. And so now we got a domestic abuse situation. We got the cops called, you know, I got this guy he he's trying to kill her. And of course I'm not going to let that happen. So I smart me, I get in between, you know, I'll put myself in between this. So I'm trying to I'm trying to separate these two as you know, and get

he grabs, he goes to the guy and says, come on, let's go over here. I know she's a bitch, but let's, let's let's go talk about how she's a bitch. Let me get her,

you know, and I gave grab her and I'm like, yeah, he's an asshole. Let's go over here. Let's separate these two, you know, And so, you know, and it was like, so me, when I go into a situation, when I go into a wet drunk situation, I always bring a man

and I always bring them in because I was like, if I didn't have that, I got a mouth. The 2nd that guy decked her in front of me, forget it. I was going to get this face and I was going to get my ass kicked. But, you know, because I had a guy, because I had a, I had a man with me, you know, I had, I had like a bouncer, essentially a bodyguard. And he was able to come in there and take care of it. And I was able to get her out of there, you know, and we got her to the meeting. We got her to a detox and all was well, you know, and that's the other thing too. Is it up by us? We hear people,

there's like a drunk person showed up at an AA meeting. How dare they?

We had a great

conscious and threw them out. Yeah, yes.

Oh,

these are my blood. Like these drinks used drink together a lot. They're strung out on films and best.

It depends on the pills. Depends on the pills. I'm, I mean, I'm a drug addict, alcoholic. I'm actually a pill head. That's my speciality.

So for me, I can work with those people no problemo, you know, drug seeking behavior. Oh God, do I know that

you know, So for me, I work with them very well because I have the common peril, common solution. So

I did some of them. I detox sometimes symptom and then my detox at my house. It depends. It depends on it depends on the substance. Some substances you're really, really can't detox. The heroin detox and opiate detox, they're annoying and they're miserable bastards, but it won't kill them. What they're easy. I will not detox. I will not detox

or assisted detox with anybody who's detoxing off of alcohol or benzos because those, those are where you're actually literally in medical danger. And because we have with the insurance system up by us really sucks. And of course, you know, the, the relapse rate in Alcoholics Anonymous and the, and the, the use of rehabs as a, you know, get out of jail free card

has made it so that, you know, insurance companies are really unwilling to pay. People are not able to go to detox more than a few times. And of course, we sometimes we need needed more than a few times. So what's what's been happening a hell of a lot. It's like, you know, our, our, we don't have indigent rehabs. We don't have detoxes. The few that we do have are very far away. So we end up with a lot of people without insurance or within or without the ability to get into a rehab or a detox

who need a detox. So one of the things that we do is we bring them to the local emergency room. If they're drunk, we get their, we get their blood alcohol, we get them drunker, we get them drunker.

The idea is you don't. You don't bring an alcoholic who's only half drunk

and bring them to a hospital. They'll get turned away. What you do is you get them a bottle of 151 and you get them fucking plowed

And, and then what you do for them into the details, you bring them into the emergency room and you tell the nurse this guys prone to seizures. Yes. Or they tell him you're suicidal. Yeah. Well, suicide. I don't, I don't like, I don't like that. I, you know, I, I know it works in a pinch, it'll work to tell him you're suicidal. But the problem is if you tell him it's you're suicidal, you're detoxing on the flight deck. Well, the other thing to you know what we're being, we're being terrible because we're telling you how to manipulate the system. So

please ignore this,

but we bring them, we bring them to the local hospital. We have them evaluated. We have. We

abandoned them. Don't stay

blood alcohol level starts to drop. They'll make it take back up on you. No, you leave them there because if they don't ride and they can't walk, they have to keep them. So that's one of the things that we do, especially without alcohol with, with benzos,

I won't detach. I'll do the same thing with the Bendos. A lot of times I'll have them drink only a little bit because benzos and booze together can actually kill you. But they have to have some alcohol in their system as well. So I'll give them a beer and throw them to the detox and I'm talking a beer on the ride too and bring them to the hospital. But I, I won't detox those two things. But if I have a junkie, you know, or you know, opiate addict,

I'll, I'll, I'll feed them on my couch, give them, you know, tomato soup and let them whine like the bitches they are.

No, I,

the last one we detoxed on my couch, stole my, my engagement ring in my wedding ring. Yeah, that's, that's that's another thing here. And I want to,

I want to talk about this one a little bit, you know? You know what, to be perfectly honest, I don't care,

you know, I'm fine with it. You know, I was pissed when I realized it. You know, we've been we've been robbed a number of times. But yeah, we don't figure it out for a little while. Yeah. We're not that bright. We don't know where shit is, you know? But but when I finally figured it out, you know, I was every piece of my yellow I have,

I like white gold or platinum, But you know, I had like, you know, quite a few pieces of yellow gold. Like back when he used to make a whole lot of money, he made a whole lot of money at one point I had a lot of jewelry. It was sort of an investment and every single piece of yellow gold was robbed from me. I and I figured it out like, like the Christmas actually, because I went to go put on my jewelry and I didn't have any

but, but the, the, the, the point, the point I want to make on this though,

is the benefits that we get from doing this far outweigh any of those financial repercussions. Can happen, You know, it's, it's happened, you know, 3 * / 18 years. Twice was my engagement with two engagement rings. Yeah. You know, I don't know what's that? The only one that I held on to for a really long time. I had to write a lot of inventory on it. Was

that this fucking crackhead stole my daughter's Piggy Bank. Yeah, you know that bothered me. That really did the jewelry and, and all we're

making this decision. We're signing up for this type of lifestyle. My kids didn't, you know,

that's when we started to make started the rules and we started with the boundaries. And this is what we're talking about the communication, you know, OK, something happens, we make a bad decision, or maybe we make it uninformed decision. So then we can make, we can say, and it's not that, you know, we make, we say, OK, well, this, these, these are the qualifications. So not everybody who calls me up and says I need a place to stay, I need to detox, can detox at my house.