The topic of "Convincing the prospect" at the Nosara Big Book Workshop in Nosara Playa Guiones, Costa Rica

Oh, wait. Well, good morning everyone. My name is Marsha Stone and I'm an alcoholic.

Hey, it's so good to be here in Costa Rica and celebrate my recovery with all you find people. Thank you, David for putting this together and thank you, Chris and David for asking me to talk this morning. Can everybody hear me?

So anytime I'm asked to speak, I'll always try to get along with my creator and and ask God to speak through me and, and ask him for for willingness to be able to articulate a message of experience, strength and hope. And a lot of times I'll go to our basic text, the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous and, and see where I feel led to to talk about. So I'd like to read just a chapter from the family afterward this morning on page 124.

And on that page our book tells us Henry Ford once made a wise remark to the effect that experience is the thing of supreme value in life. That is true only if one is willing to turn the past to good account. We grow by our willingness to face and rectify errors and convert them into assets. The Alcoholics past thus becomes the principal asset of the family, and frequently it is almost the only one. And that certainly rings true for me.

You know, it's kind of

joking around with David this morning when he was asking me if I was nervous about talking and I said, well, yes, the story of how does a girl like me end up in a place like this? And I'll tell you a little bit about that and then talk specifically more about sponsorship.

I A sobriety date is May 6th, 2008.

I was gratefully separated from alcohol and other issues on that day. It certainly wasn't the first time that I tried to quit drinking and using,

but thankfully my spirit has been awakened and it's

my last, God willing. I grew up in a small town in South Georgia.

I was an only child and I had a large extended family. My parents divorced when I was three years old and my mother remarried her divorce attorney. And he was not a nice man. He was an abusive man. And I used that for a really long time to excuse the way that I drank and to to rationalize my behavior and lots of other ways.

My whole family lives in that town. They still do, actually, except for myself and a couple of cousins that left.

That's OK,

I'll try to talk a little louder.

Should we move around?

We're all having fun, so

you all going forward.

Now I really have a photo.

Is that better?

Too loud.

So I don't know what you what you didn't hear, but I'll just kind of start where I was.

So my parents divorced when I was really young and I had a large extended family. We all lived in the same small town in South Georgia. I was literally related to almost everyone in the town

and my mother remarries her divorce attorney. I was three years old and he wasn't a nice guy. You know, he was abusive. And in part of my

part of my history with my alcoholism is I used that as an excuse and sort of a trump card to to drink the way I did and to behave the way that I did. You know, looking back and with the help of some inventory and some good sponsorship,

I see that he was, you know, a spiritually sick guy. And I see that my mom was doing the best she could staying with him, you know, under the delusion that if she was married to this wealthy man, then, you know, I would be given opportunities that I wouldn't otherwise have been given.

You know, like I said, my my grandparents on both sides live there. My whole family live there. And so I bounced around a lot seeing with different people. And, you know, the fact was that there were a lot of people that love me. The feeling was that I didn't belong anywhere. And,

and that sort of conditioned me for how I would live my life until recovery.

I started drinking in high school, like most people did not any consequences. And when I started to apply to college, I, I chose to go to the college that was farthest away from home. I was running, I was always running and I was always very driven. You know, if there was an activity, I was involved in it. If there was a school trip, I was signing up. I was. I was busy doing anything I could do not to be inside my own body,

inside my own mind

back then. You know, I don't know if you guys can relate to this, but back then, if you were drinking and driving, you know, you got pulled over and and the cops kind of wag their finger at you and told you to go home. And and that's how it was for me. You know, my aunt was a judge. I was, you know, I knew everybody in that town. So I was well insulated from any consequences that might have happened. I go into college and

some of you guys heard Jonathan's story the other night about my ex-husband

that recently passed away. I met him in college and, and he he was well into his drinking career and I was more than willing to participate in that. So that starts taking off and I end up leaving college after two years when when he finishes with five years of his College of choice. And

I was 17 years old when I started college. So I was 18 when I met him and 18 when I left and I ended up

moving in with him, eventually marrying the guy when I was 20 years old. And by the time I was 24 I had three children and got to be a little too much for that alcoholic to handle him. So he leaves and goes home to live with his mom.

By this time, I was at the stage of my alcoholism where I could control it when I wanted to. I wasn't one of those Alcoholics. At the very first time I drank, I was blocked out and it was off to the races. That wasn't my experience.

I was full of fear. I was self-centered in every respect of the word and I was very driven to to find some sort of ambition and security. You know, looking back on it, I've really been seeking power my whole life.

But the way that I saw power was through men, through relationships, through money, and through some form of prestige in the community. I was deeply concerned about what you all thought about me.

But I was 24 years old. I had three children under the age of four, and I found myself a single mom living on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, broke, hopeless and terrified. So, you know, my sponsor thinks that this is a very interesting part of my story because I had some, you know, fear that I was going to be able to provide for my children

beside no education, only had two years of college and I was kind of working as a waitress and stuff like that, like you do in in beach resort towns.

But I got the idea that I wanted to, to go law school

and I was joking with somebody the other day, you know, single mom, three kids living on food stamps and welfare was really sort of the poster child for pathetic. So I thought maybe I can get a scholarship, you know, and, and I did. And so I, I started applying, I went back to college and, and went to law school with these three little babies. And my drinking really started to escalate at that point. You know, I remember very clearly

standing in my kitchen in Durham, NC, in 1999

because by that time, I was drinking at least a couple of bottles of wine a night. And my son, who's now 20 years old, walked in and he had on, like, a little shirt that wouldn't go down to his pants. And he had on pants that wouldn't go to the floor. And I remember feeling extremely guilty that my son didn't have clothes that fit him. But you know, that alcoholic mind is so cunning. And

immediately what it told me was that anyone with the stress I had, anyone with, you know, all this

school load and, you know, financial stress and all these things and this husband that was in and out of our lives. And anybody in my situation would would drink like I drank, even if it meant, you know, carving money out of a budget that wasn't there. And I,

you know, my whole core belief system was that if you had my life, you drink like I drank and you'd use like I use and you'd behave like I behave. And I really held on to that delusion for a long time. I ended up finishing with law school and moving back to my hometown down in South Georgia. At that point in time, I because of my family connections, honestly, it wasn't that I was a stellar student.

I got a job as the first female prosecutor in the Southern Judicial District.

And, you know, that part of South Georgia is really sort of stuck in a time warp. There aren't many female attorneys. And, and, you know, all the people of color live on one side of town. And, you know, it's, it's it's really sort of stuck in the 1950s.

You know, our book says that the alcoholic, more than most people leaves a double life. And that was certainly true for me. You know, I wake up in the morning, I'd put my suit on and I'd go to court and I would literally put people in jail for, you know, drinking offenses for drugging offenses,

doing the very same things that I was doing when I left work at 5:00 and went home. And, you know, I, I thought about it and I understand the progression of this disease very well, but also understand that for me, the more money I have, the more drinking and using I do. And and that's sort of what happened, You know, things begin to stabilize financially. The, the husband ended up

coming home and,

and things really went from bad to work.

Not only was there a lot of alcohol and, and drugs going on in our house, but there was also a lot of violence and a lot of abuse. This, this drivenness that I described really took off to a whole nother level. And, and I started trying to to to focus my attention on fixing what was going on out here. You know,

I had this delusion that that I was going to be happy and satisfied

if everything out here was lined up like it needed to be. So I started throwing my efforts into starting this, this battered women's shelter in South Georgia, this child, this children's advocacy Center for abused children. And again, this double life was just so prevalent in in my story because everything that I was fighting during the day was my experience in the evenings.

You know, when I look back on being the tornado,

umm, in my family's life, I'm real clear that the people that suffered the most from my children, you know, by this time they were in elementary school and you know, I wasn't present emotionally ever. And a lot of times I wasn't present physically. You know, I was the type of alcoholic that if I got enough juice in me, I don't know where I was going, but I was going somewhere. And you know, I would tell them, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to run down to the store and get y'all some Taco Bell or whatever.

And, and then, you know, three days later, mom would show back up. My daughter's 21 years old right now, but, but she's, she was a mother figure for her little brothers for a really long time.

Things went on like that for a little while and then, umm, I ended up having a car accident and umm, my family intervened on me and I was sent to treatment for the first time in 2002. Umm, you know, I really had no idea what alcoholism was in my hometown. The, the Alcoholics Anonymous meetings were held in the same building as the VFW. So I had some sort of notion that alcoholism had something to do with veterans of foreign wars. And, you know, I,

I wasn't sure how that fit together,

but I was sure that they didn't look like, you know, a 32 year old white chick with a law degree. I was sure that those two things didn't fit together. But nevertheless, my family was convinced that I needed some help. And I thought that this would be a great opportunity to sit alone with a therapist and tell them, you know, about all my trauma and all my abuse and you know, this bastard that I was married to. And, and that's what I proceeded to do. And, you know, unfortunately

I didn't have any idea that, you know,

like our book says that my own selfishness, my own self centeredness was my problem, that I was really just, you know, propagating these these relationships in my life and, and creating my own misery. I had no idea about that. And a lot of well meaning therapists honestly didn't have any idea either. And so I spent 90 days there,

fallen in love with Jonathan and, you know, complaining to a therapist about the sad state of the affairs of my life. And she readily agreed.

She was like, wow, you know, with your genetic components and all this Trump, you know, no, no surprise to me. You have the disease of alcoholism. And when I heard that alcoholism was a disease, it was like green light for further drinking and bad behavior. It was like, I can't help it, Jeez, you know, So, but, you know, Jonathan, you guys heard his story. He'd been trying to get sober for God seven years by that point. And he was real serious about it. And I was real serious about him. So, you know, I kind of went along for the ride and,

you know, he, he knew how to get the in North Carolina that are called the where and wins. I don't know if they have those all over the world, but you know, and he knew how to get that where and when and, you know, plan which meetings we were going to go to. And, and you know, they not so lovingly asked us to leave when we refused to stop breaking the rules. But they did give us our continuing care plans or relapse prevention plans is what they called them. And it was like, get a sponsor, go to meetings, don't drink and have fun.

I was like, I can do that because at this point in time, it was, you know,

clear to me that my family was really the problem, but alcohol and drugs were a close second. So if I could get away from both those, then I would be fine, right? So, so we rode off into the sunset and, and went to a lot of meetings and, and I got a sponsor and she was a really nice woman and we had a lot in common. You know, she hurt her children through her drinking and, and we went out to lunch a lot. We went to shopping, we had sushi. She threw me a a baby shower when I eventually got pregnant

and you know, she had a fabulous life of, you know, fellowship based alcohol AAA and it worked for me for a while. You know, the book talks about fear will sober you for a bit. And and that's what happened. You know, things were really bad when I when I left Georgia and eventually when we got to North Carolina, the the the kids came back. I got my law license in North Carolina, so now is barred in two States.

And Jonathan started practicing veterinary medicine. And we said about the business of recreating our lives based 100% on self-reliance.

And it worked for a little while. And, you know, I mean, I get drunk every now and then just to be annoying, I guess. But I didn't know anything about the mental obsession. I had no idea. I just thought, I feel like drinking some wine today. So, you know, then Jonathan will like, get mad and make me go stay in a hotel for the night. Then I come home and

all this kind of stuff, but I didn't really see it as that big of a deal.

So we're busy, you know, treating this internal condition with all this stuff. You know, it's like there was, there was never enough. And the more money we made, the more money we spent, the more trips we took and the more stuff we bought. And we've got this big, beautiful house overlooking the Blue Ridge Parkway. And, you know, all the kids were in school. Everybody's got nice cars and nice clothes and, and it all looks fantastic. But inside I'm dying and I don't even know it.

One day I'm sitting in my office,

February 2007 and

wasn't a particularly bad day. Like nothing happened, you know, I was just sitting there interviewing the client and turns out this guy didn't have enough money to pay for whatever

charge he had. I don't remember now, but back in those days, sometimes I would barter for stuff if people one time I took a car title and, you know, if they didn't have enough money for representation. And so he tells me, you know, miss, don't I don't have enough money for my for you to represent me. I was like, he's like, you know, are you interested in trading, bartering? I was like, sure, what do you got?

And I swear, guys like this, this kind of thing only happens to people like us, you know, because this guy looks at me, he goes, what about an 8 ball?

I was like, don't mind if I do. You know? Suddenly the thought occurred to me that cocaine was never my problem. It was the vodka that made me have the car accident. You know what I mean? It was, it was those massive alcohol hangovers that that made me not able to go to work and disappear and not function as a mom.

So we, we made that deal. And you know, I'd always heard that even if you're not drinking and even if you're not using, your disease is progressing. And I never believed that to be true. But now I have experienced that certainly is the case because that one conversation and that one transaction kicked off a series of events that was absolutely

devastating to to my family. You know,

I pretty much didn't stop drinking or using until I was

physically separated in the fall of that year for a little six weeks spent at a waterfalls massage. More therapy,

organic food, yoga. I look fantastic when I left, but you know, I was still spiritually asleep inside. And you know, I'm one of those people too. I don't take direction very well. So I get out. Jonathan goes in for his six weeks stand and and when it's time for him to go, the the counselors start saying things to us like, you know, you guys really don't need to live together.

And Jonathan really needs to go to sober living. And, you know, I'm so selfish and self-centered. I'm like, what the hell is this about? I got to go home and take care of the five kids while he gets to, you know, Shangri-La down here in the in the waterfall area with the sober people. No. And, and on top of that, you know, I was able to convince him, look, you know, this sober living stuff that that's good for those people. But we've got a family, you know, I mean, jeez, you've got a hospital to run. What are you talking about?

So

I remember that day when I was walking out of that treatment center and the counselors named there was Shannon. And,

and I was always leaving. I had my, you know, purse on my shoulder and stuff. And this one is that tears rolling down her face. I'm like, Jen, what's wrong with you? I'm going to be fine. And she was just shaking her head and she said, no, no, you're not, you know, And, and it's so clear to me that that this desire to stop drinking is of no avail.

But I didn't know that at the time. You know, I didn't know anything about the loss of power, choice and control. I really believed that if I made-up my mind hard enough and really tried that, I would be able to overcome this problem that I had with alcohol.

It's probably not hard for y'all to predict, but that certainly wasn't the case. You know, Jonathan was on for like 2 days and you know, we had this plan that we were only going to use on the weekends and only when we could get the nanny to stay over for the weekend and and get away to a hotel or whatever.

It was like a Tuesday and all of a sudden it, it had to happen that night.

Things got from went from bad to worse really, really fast. And, and, you know, literally within a span of, of a few months, everything was gone. You know, that was a really dark time for my family. I remember,

I remember our son was two years old at that time and I can remember him, you know, coming up and knocking on the door. And Jonathan and I have an argument about he was going to have to get up and attend to him. And, you know, remember my children slipping notes under the door that said, you know, mom, are we going to have dinner tonight and things like that.

Alcoholism and addiction is, is sad and tragic. You know, certainly there's funny moments to it, but

but the ripple effect and the severity of the harm that I caused is something that I can't even

conceive of until well past the time that it's over.

A my children by that time were in high school and they've been bounced around from school to school to school. And so, you know, they knew the signs of, of when mom was spinning out and, and they saw this happening. So they ended up calling my mom and she came up to to North Carolina to get them.

And you know, I remember the first time when when an honest sponsor said to me, marshalling your own power, you are an unfit mother. And that's the very thing that's the most objectionable to me. You know, I remember when I had those children, there was nothing in the world I wanted to do more than love them and protect them and be everything that I saw

my parents not do so well at. And when I think about the power of, of this disease of alcoholism,

I can't help but think about that's the only thing that ever separated, you know, my intentions of motherhood with my actions of motherhood.

Umm, so the truth is, on my own power, I am an unfit mother.

And the truth is, when I saw my mom driving down the driveway with those children in the car, I wanted to cry. But inside I was relieved. I was relieved that I didn't have to look at their faces anymore and feel that guilt and that shame. And I was relieved that I could really get down to business and drink like I wanted to. And it took me years to be able to identify that truth and be able to be honest about that.

But that is the truth of an alcoholic. Anything that stands in the way between me and what I need to fix, this thing inside of me eventually leaves my life. Whether it's a husband, whether it's a job, whether it's a career, whether it's children, if it's standing in the way of Marsha and that bottle it's leaving eventually.

Umm, you know, I never saw running out of money as the end of my drinking and using, but that certainly was the case

fast and

I am. I lived in Asheville, NC And what ended up happening was I got a call from a judge's secretary who told me that the Chief District Court judge wanted to talk to me about a case, and

I believed her. And so, you know, put on a dress that by this time was hanging on me. I probably weighed about £95 and

actually made it to the courthouse that day. I had to get a ride, but I made it to the courthouse and, and I walked in and here's the judges and here's these two guys that work for the PALS. North Carolina Bar Association has a thing called PALS Professional Assistant Lawyer Services, I think is what the acronym stands for. But anyway, it's pretty clear to me when I walked in there that we weren't here to talk about a case. God knows I couldn't have talked about it anyway. I had no idea what was going on

in my business by that point. So there's like a bottle of water

and a thing of Kleenexes and, and, you know, I knew that this wasn't going to end well.

So,

so, you know, I'm so sick. At this point, though, I'm just, you know, I'm sitting there listening to them and they're, you know, pleading with me and telling me, you know, Marsha, you know, you are dying right in front of us. We've known you for years. You, you never show up unprepared for your cases. You, you don't, you know, call in sick all the time. You've lost 20 lbs. Your children are gone. You know, we're afraid we're going to read your obituary in the newspaper and, you know, talk about minimization.

I mean, really, my first thought was these guys are really overreacting to us. My problem, you know, I mean, and why are they trying to get in my business? I was really angry. And and my thought is who called them? Who told them to do this, right? Like it wasn't really obvious. And I remember I was texting Jonathan like, this is not about a case. This is an intervention. Get up here and get me and

and it took him like 45 minutes to get there. I don't know what he was doing but I can imagine

anyway.

So as of that day, I never went back to work. And and Jonathan and I were

near the end, as they say, I ended up sort of getting kidnapped by these two paralegals that used to work for me and this Suburban with a tinted windows. And like they I was like at a gas station and you know, they've been hunting me, looking for me. I had no idea I was in there, you know, ordering a sub or whatever. And I come out of the bathroom and these two women are like, Marsha, do you need a ride? Because this by this time I have no car, I have no cell phone, I have nothing. And

they throw me in the back of the Suburban and all of a sudden click, the door is locked and I'll look over. There's a strange man sitting beside me and I'm just sitting there like, oh, my goose is cooked now. They say, drive me down to Atlanta. And what it ended up happening? I found a piece this all together later. Was that the Bar Association

paid for me to go to treatment? I didn't have any money. And I went down there and, you know, I was just so drunk all the time, I didn't really even know what was going on. But I remember waking up in that detox in the suburbs of Atlanta, GA,

almost literally beating my head on the metal of the bed. Like, how did I end up here again? What is wrong with me? I'm not a stupid girl. I'm not a mean girl. Why do I keep doing this time after time after time when I know,

but the consequences are going to be only later did I find out, you know, that the big book's so clear about that, that I'm unable to recall was sufficient force. The memory of the suffering and humiliation of even a week or a month ago, No matter how bad it is, no matter how much my children cried, no matter how much you know, I feel that shame and that regret and that remorse.

That's just what I do. That's just what I do.

So I end up going to

to this long term treatment center in Atlanta. And I think I may have said this, but May 6th is my sobriety date. But I'm always talking about May 20th as my surrender date because, you know, it took about 14 days for for the cobwebs to kind of clear out of my head. And, and when I really realized that

that this was going to be a long venture,

it was very depressing to me. And the reason it was depressing to me was because, you know, I didn't know much about the big book at that point in time. But I've been to enough meetings that I've heard that term constitutionally incapable. And, and I didn't hear the last part of it, which is of being honest with myself, but what I heard was constitutionally incapable. And I convinced myself that I was constitutionally incapable of sobriety based on the fact that I kept going to treatment. And I've been to 1000 meetings and I had a sponsor and I did what you people told me to do, but I kept getting loaded.

And so I went next door and I told my, my roommate Shannon or my housemate Shannon that, you know, I, I had this realization that I was constitutionally incapable and I was never going to be able to get sober. And So what I thought I would do just to, just to, uh,

help everyone else out in my life so I wouldn't continue to disappoint them, was I was going to call my mom, sign my children over to her. I was going to call the bar associations and, and, and surrender my licenses. And I was going to call Jonathan and go ahead and give him a divorce or whatever. And I was going to leave there on the streets of Atlanta and

do what I do until I die because I didn't see that there was any real solution or any real hope in all this game. I've been playing this game for six years. And Shannon

said, you know, Marsha, have you prayed about that? And I looked at her like, that is the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life. What do you mean? If I prayed about that? What is there to pray about? This is logic. This is common sense, right? She's like, well, it's late, you know, it's dark out. So why don't you just kind of sit on this till tomorrow?

That kind of made sense to me. So, you know, I went in my room and and I was just, you know, Bill talks about quicksand stretching out all around him. And I went in my room and I remember there was this nasty mustard yellow shad carpet and I just hit my knees and I was just sobbing in a way that I'd never cried before. And I just cried out, you know, God, I, I don't know what to do. I've done what everyone's told me to do, which wasn't true by the way, but was what I thought. And

if you're, if

I need help, I need help, I need something to happen. And I was, I was based on the carpet like this. And I kind of turned my head to the side and, and these two women that had kidnapped me, I, I called them up and you know, in a rather demanding way said, you know, you've sent me here. So could you please just do me the favor going to my house and getting my pajamas and, and my big book? Because I did have a big book. And they said, sure, but they didn't know what the big book was. So they sent this book on relapse prevention

by Terrence Gorski. So when I looked over to the side, I saw this book that had never been cracked and,

and something that saw me just set up in that book. And so I went over and I opened the book and when I, when I looked at it, I just turned to a page and, and I looked at it and it said, if you have decided you were constitutionally incapable of recovery, that is a liver disease. If you find yourself in a treatment setting, roll up your sleeves and do the work. And I'm telling you, all chills ran all over my body and I just started weeping because, you know, I've never had a problem believing in God, but I just thought God was super busy.

And, you know, there was like famines and global warming and, you know, children starving in Africa. And, and I felt like God gave me a brain to use and I needed to use my brain on this alcoholic problem. But for the very first time in my life, it felt like that this God that my grandmother talked about and all my aunts and uncles talked about might have some personal interest in me and in my recovery.

It was a very profound moving moment for me. So I decided that I would take that as a sign

and do what it said, roll up my sleeves and do the work. So, you know, the next day, the way that the treatment centers are set up there, you're like, you live in a place, then there's like a center that you walk to. So the next day I like put on my backpack and, you know, got dressed and put on my pants and rolled them up so they weren't like hanging on my hip bones. And I walked down there to to the center and I and I walk into the director's office

so full of ego and entitlement. Her name was Kendall. And,

and I told her what happened last night and I said, so here's the deal, Kendall. I'm still going to negotiate, right? I'm going to do everything you tell me to do. I'm going to stay till you tell me to leave until you say I'm well. And I'm going to do whatever aftercare plan you tell me to do. And if it doesn't work

that I'm going to leave here and I'm going to move to Tortola and I'm going to drink and use until I die. She literally stuck her hand out and and shook my hand and she said that's a deal.

So for me, like, looking back, you know, I mean, this was a clinical place. They did kind of a cursory nod at the 12 steps and they encouraged spirituality. But I didn't know that effectively, I had worked the first three steps that night. You know, that was the moment that I surrendered and conceded to my innermost self that something was wrong with me that I couldn't manage, that I couldn't take care of with my own thinking.

And I'll work my butt off there, guys. I mean, you know, early for every group. I mean, if they would have told me to wear a pink birthday hat and a, you know, polka dot bikini to the groups, I would have done it because I so badly wanted something to change. I was so tired of this, you know, same old, same, all of, you know, sober here, detox there, in trouble here, trying to get out of the scrape there. And more importantly, I was just tired of feeling that

incredible shame

that comes within stage alcoholism.

So I stayed there for seven months and, you know, my kids were so done with me. I've got letters and emails that were just absolute gut punches. You're, we never want to see you again. You're the worst mother in the whole world. I mean, things that just break your heart. But looking at it from their perspective, they had every right to feel that way and to be 100% doubtful that anything would ever change.

I did a four step while I was there and you know, I was so numb to everything that was going on in

it was the first comment. It was the first time I'd ever done a fourth step that included a fourth column. And I remember sitting across from that woman and, and telling her everything,

everything. And she's got tears rolling down her face and I'm just sitting there with my paper in front of me looking at her because I can't feel anything yet. That's going on.

Edema, 6th and 7th step. And you know, I didn't know about the hour that I know about now, but I knew about these defects of character because she told me about them.

And I think, you know, I think God is such a gracious God because even though I didn't know how to work the steps, like I know how to work the steps now. I believe that God honors our willingness and honors our surrender.

And I made that eight step list and and I didn't know you were supposed to ask your sponsor before you went out to make your amends. And I mean, I just was trailblazing, you know, I mean, I, I'm, I was like freaking Doctor Bob on this, you know, I mean, I was calling everybody. And when I got to go home for like they call it TL therapeutic league,

I made a miss to my mom and all my kids. And, you know, I'm sure, I'm sure I completely screwed it all up. But, but I somehow knew that if I didn't take this action, that nothing was ever gonna change, 'cause that's what these people were telling me. I'm really glad now that I did it that way because my mom ended up dying before I got to see her again. And,

and I'm grateful, you know,

then she got to see me sober. So I remember I was sitting in a meeting in Lawrenceville, GA and the topic was step six and seven. And you know, I don't know if you guys have this experience, but I sat in meetings for six years and, and never heard about God. They talked about God, I'm sure, but I never heard it. I never heard about helping others. They talked about helping others, but I was asleep and I remember the topic was six and seven. And we were reading that 7th step prayer and when it talks about so that, so that

to take away my defects of character so that I can to benefit others. And it was like, it's like a cartoon, like a light bulb. I just went off above my head and my eyes got real big. And my friend said what? And I was like, I just got it. Like this whole thing is about helping other people. This whole 12 step process is about having this conscious contract with this power greater than me because I don't have the power to stay sober. And then the way that I increase that conscious contact and improve my spiritual condition

is by bearing witness to other people. And my friend looked at me and she's like, wow, that makes perfect sense. You know, I mean it was almost like my recovery was piece meal.

Meantime, I was getting jealous because Jonathan was in Mark was a in Marks place down in Texas and he was writing me these letters because, you know, Mark Houston never let anybody talk on the phone for more than 10 minutes. That was a rule. So we were busy planning when we were going to see each other. We were talking, but he was writing me letters. He was talking about this big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. And it's like I could see over the progression of time that his spirit was waking up.

And I wanted some of that. I wanted some of what he had because although I was having my own form of spiritual awakening, it seemed to me that he was progressing at a more rapid clip.

So I went out to to visit him at family weekend. And the residents there have this six CD set that they listen to as part of their programming. And I already made amends about this at Mark's funeral. Like, I announced it to everybody. I stole a set of CDs and smuggled them back to Georgia. And I started listening to this guy that I didn't even know, you know, and he was just crusty old guy from, you know, Colorado living in Texas. And he's, you know, got this.

Real gravely voice. And

for the first time, I started like going through this book and, and, and looking at the doctor's opinion and beginning to understand, oh, this is an allergy of the body. Oh, that's why I keep putting stuff back in because I have this obsession that I can't control. Okay. Oh, now I see why I felt like that when I was such a little kid, that it was a feeling of not belonging and it didn't line up with what everyone else was experiencing in that moment. And it began to explain to me how I was bodily and mentally different from my fellows

in my spirit for the first time connected with this message. And I got on fire. I actually got in trouble for like passing those CDs around. And, and now there's like a little hotbed of enthusiasm in, in Atlanta. These, these girls that I was in in treatment with started this, this big book meeting there, which is pretty amazing. The ripple effect of a message of depth and weight.

But ended up moving to Texas. And you know, one of the things that my oldest son said when I made amends to him,

when I asked the question, how what can I do to make this right? He looked dead at me. And he said, don't leave us and don't get back with Jonathan. And I couldn't, I couldn't pull that off because I prayerfully and with much counsel from Kendall and the other women at the treatment center, decided that that was where I was being moved to go.