The 1st European Regional convention of Cocaine Anonymous in Birmingham UK

Votes before personalities.

So,

you know, when I was asked to host this meeting, what happened was I I was already aware of who was going to speak. Now you hear a lot of meetings about people being affect, being moved by the reaching out statement. And the next speaker moves me beyond that. Now, what happened was this person called me every day for nine months. I had never been into a Cocaine Anonymous meeting. He caught me every day for nine months. And he said to me,

I don't want to talk to the addict, put my brother on the phone. Doesn't tell us to do that in our literature, but that's what we've done.

You know that man

I shared a house was growing up. He's my brother.

We never used together because he was a low bottom heroin addict and I was a high class cocaine addict.

I shouldn't have said that because he's going to speak after me.

But what I always thought was I thought that he was the person that needed you guys. And the truth is, is he showed me that I needed you guys as well, you know, and what I seen was I seen a man model recovery. Now what I do is I I judge people on what they do with their feet, not with their lips. It's easy to sit in a meeting and share a black belt about how spirit you are and then go home and be arrogant and selfish and and be verbally abusive to your partner and mistreat your children. But what I saw was a man

turned from a man who you would cross the street

to avoid to a man you would want your daughter to bring home. Oregon. Your son, if he's gay

and

you know, that's, that's what I saw. Now you know, nothing, nothing gives me more pleasure than to be able to say that my brother today is a recovered addict and a recovered member of Cocaine Anonymous thanks to you guys that went before us. Now it leaves me with nothing more than to say, Mikey, it's your town, bro, Mikey Williams.

My name is Mike. I'm a recovered addict.

Everything he said was lies.

Do you know what? I got asked to do this chair about six months ago. That's what it feels like. And I've done about a million different chairs in my head. And when he first told me, listen, you're doing the opening speaker for the first European Convention. I didn't get asleep that night till about 4:30 in the morning. And all of you left here crying have been heard. The best chair that you'd ever heard before

Bill Wilson. I've shared this in a thing before Bill Wilson turned in his grave. Like, fuck me, the stuff he's working.

It was amazing, that first chair, absolutely amazing. So I'm just going to, no matter what I do tonight, I'm going to live off the back of that first chair.

No, do you know what, seeing my little brother up here and all of the stuff that he does, he says about how I've helped him, he helps me immensely. And I will talk about it a bit in a minute about some bereavements that we've experienced. And what I would like to do first is I would like to dedicate this because this is one of my greatest achievements in recovery.

I would like to dedicate this to the loving memory of my mum and my dad.

And I know that my mom and dad would be proud. They would just see my little brother announcing me to come up and do this in front of all you people and try and help just one of you. If I get to help one of you out of this speech, I will be absolutely blessed. I'm going to tell you a little bit something about my brother. No, I'm going to get on to my story.

I'm going to get on to my story and it talks about it in a big book. It says resentment is the number one offender. Yeah,

he knows what's coming.

I was about four or five years old and

yeah,

I was about four or five years old and I had this little robot. This robot was amazing. It was see through it, see all the wires. It had 9 little buttons. You pressed the button and it played a different tune. I was absolutely besotted, obsessed with this robot and come home one day and they've been a big pen stuck stuck through it.

So it is Ricky Williams fault that I'm an addict.

That's why he says nice things about me

getting onto my chair. You know what I used to think that I was born an addict. I don't know if I was or if I wasn't. I don't know if it was him stabbing my robot. I don't know. I don't know if it was my mom and dad give me too much Calpol to get me to sleep. But I have no idea. What I am grateful for is I'm grateful as he mentioned, is in that that reaching out, reading that somebody was there to show me exactly how to recover from the three fold illness that I didn't even know that I suffered with.

I'm grateful for that stuff,

but but having these, I had this feeling from as young as I can remember and loads of people relate to this stuff and I, I know that I felt this and it was a conscious thought that I was waiting for this thing to happen. For me, when this thing happened, I would be alright, Everything would be alright with the world. And for a 5 year old kid to be feeling that discontent with himself, he's not right. I didn't know it then, I know it now

and it happened for me.

It happened for me when I was 11 years old and I went to this, I went to this 11 year old girl's birthday party. I was 11 as well. I went home with.

I'll just get out of there.

And

the 11 year old girl was the best looking girl in that year. And I was standing at the back fence and I was, I didn't know it. I was frightened. I was the hardest boy in the year. Why was I frightened? But I was frightened of how they perceived me. I was frightened if they liked me, if they didn't like me, all of that stuff that was going around in my head. And

at every 11 year old pie, the mum come up to me to give me a can of beer. She said

if you had to kind of be able to drink it. And I was looking into some stuff it talks about, I don't know, We, we relate to the 4th dimension in it. The third dimension was opened up to me. It changed everything to turn dark to white. It turned truth to to light. It changed everything for me. And as soon as I drank that one can of beer, I was relating to everybody. I'd give the best looking girl in a year a big old love bite on her neck.

I didn't know it was me for 15 years but I did do it.

I actually see now we was at a wedding over the weekend. She isn't the best looking girl in our year.

I'm so glad she's not one of us. Because you tell me say that,

but I didn't consciously think I'm going to be an alcoholic and an addict. That wasn't a conscious thought in my head,

but I kind of found that thing, that thing that I've been looking for from the age of five or felt that I needed from the age of five. I'd found it. And yeah, my mom would ask me to go to the shop. And I'd go to the shop, of course I would, but I would steal a pound and I would somehow run around and get another can of beer. And I was problematically drinking from the age of 11.

It wasn't every day, but it was whenever, whatever chance I got. My school life was chaotic. As a result of that stuff. I got kicked out of school, I was home schooled and I was just discontent with everything that went on

at the age of 14. I never usually talk about my substances, but tonight I'm going to.

At age 14, I started doing heroin and again, that that third dimension stuff, it did stuff for me that I couldn't do for myself. My head would tell me that I needed to stay up. I had a really pretty young girlfriend. I needed to be up all night shagging. We're not going to

cozy up.

Everyone made me stay up all night shagging. I'm really good in bed. So my Mrs. over there. So I get my ideas, ladies. All right, babe,

all right.

Just not. Just not.

And

so there's some stuff that I'm talking about. Like for me, it got really problematically, really quickly. From the age of 16, I got put in, I got put in a sweat box. I had this bright idea I was going to rob the Conservative Club and I got caught pretty quickly. I didn't even spend a penny. Ridiculous. And I went to prison. Now, my ego at the time would tell everybody, yeah, it was a bad man. As soon as I got in there, everyone feared me and all that stuff. When I was in the sweat box, I cried my eyes out,

but then silent Christ, because it was other people on there. I think I want nobody else to hear me. I think that I was weak and I was muffling that cries. I didn't want no one to hear them, but I just wanted my mum or my dad. I just wanted someone to wrap me up and tell me it would be OK and it wasn't. But as soon as I got to prison, this is the insanity of it. I felt at home. I felt at one of these people and it talks about it in Bill's story, a camaraderie with these people. It was messed up.

All in all, there was 11 years of prison

in my story.

I'm not going to talk about all of it because I've only got 5 minutes left.

No, I'm not going to talk about all of it. I'll talk about two things. The first one was my dad. My dad was my absolute everything. Can people have heard my chair before that they'll I mentioned my my family is very heavily talked about in my chair. It was one of the biggest regrets that I used to have. But my dad for me was

he was my absolute everything. I used to call him on Muhammad Ali. He was my idol. Anything that he did, I wanted to do,

constantly wanted to make him happy and proud of me and are constantly disappointed in and

still not big enough,

constantly disappointed him. And when I got into heroin, he didn't talk to me. Three years. And the experience that I had with that is that my brother's, I would come in and I'd go, you right dad? And you'd just groan over me.

And that was the most I was going to get. And my brothers would come in and he would talk to him lovingly and openly and it would be some gay and I would be in resentment. Gary treat me this way. How dare he treat me this way, forgetting that I have sent this ball into motion. His oldest son, he wanted to see prosper and do good things. And I was ruining my life.

But my dad, I got out of jail and he was really, really sick. And I overheard a phone call and it said

he's got tumor at the bottom of his brain, top of his spine. Instantly my best thinking told me he's going to die. What you need to do is not go to the hospital. If you don't go to the hospital, he'll come home.

I've got to see my dad once. The next time I was supposed to go and see my dad, I was in the pub. I'd walked into a pub and my friend was there and he was like, what you doing here? You finally go mental, You better go and find him. And I was told that my dad had died and my illness is talked about in the book is selfish and self-centered. I went back to my mom's house and my mom had lost her partner. My two brothers have lost their dad and

and I needed some money to get some ease and comfort to help me with this situation and a way that life was going. All these events, I needed something to help me with that stuff

and I used to say really when I was really, really early on that I didn't care about my brother's feelings or my mum's feelings and that isn't the truth. I've got an illness that doesn't allow me to care. It just tells me you need to go and get the next one or the next one and the next one and I would get given this money. I get given this money after my daddy's. A few hours passed with a pitiful look.

The next one is is my mum. My mum again. She was my everything

and we get given a few people in this life that I would call confidence. People that are always there. They don't judge you for the actions that they do, the actions that you do. They judge you for the person that you are. My mom was one of them. She always loved me, cared for me, give to me, done for me. She always was just there. She was my everything and I was in jail and the chaplains come to see me and

I've gone and I've taken this phone call and I've spoken to my mom and she said, Michael, I've got 80 miles left to live.

I had 21 months left of the Britain sentence left to do. Now any normal person, probably none of using it, but

but any normal person would start that grieving process. So I didn't. The first thought that ended my head was I need to get something

to help me with the weight. I feel stuff that's going on. And I went around and around the wing and I got this thing and went back to myself and I did it and it was like a debris. And in both those situations, one of my mum and the one with my dad, I was hiding from the true reality of stuff. I was hiding from life.

My mom, she was one of us. She never had the greatest sit in one of these chairs.

She was really, really, really shocked. She was one of the strongest women I've ever met and

she was telling anybody that would listen, I ain't going nowhere till my Michael gets out. And when I got out of prison 21 months later, she was still there, live and kicking, and I sat at her bedside and then the free fold. Illness was all evident in just this one situation. I was irritable, restless and discontent. And I would just simplify that by saying I was angry, pissed off. I couldn't help the woman that I loved. There was nothing that I could do

and I didn't want to be me because I had to deal with the feelings that I was going through through watching her die.

And she like said she was one of the ones that she said, Michael, just go now. She said something beautiful to my little brother.

The last words that she spoke to my little brother, he might treat different ladies in my perception on it. And it's my chair, so shut up.

She said something really beautiful to my brother and what she said to him was you're an able, intelligent, good looking lad.

If you stop your drinking the world is your oyster. She doesn't. Fucking liar. No joking,

I get you,

but there's some beautiful words to hear from your mom on a deathbed.

The last words that I heard my mom speak was

Michael, just go. You'll do this when you're ready.

Verbalise that I said no mom, I wanna be here. And I did with every fiber of my being. I wanted to be at best height.

I don't know, the middle of session kicked off and had this thought that overrode any other four. And it says just go, you'll be back in a few hours. And I said, mommy know what I'm going to go and I'll be back in a few hours. Now with disregarded that I've never gone for an hour or two hours or three hours like my brother. Not so eloquently quote. I'm a low but I'm cracking heroin addict.

The truth? I will get caught running out of Asda with a joint

that never happens. It didn't happen.

I never go for an hour or two hours or a day or a week. I go into the police, get hold of me until you're under arrest. We've got warrants for your arrest. That's the only thing that stopped me. And as I walked out of my grandmothers front door because my grandmother and my little brother was looking after my mom's,

I confirmed to myself I'll be back in a few hours

and

I'll go and put one inside me. Physical allergy kicks off. And that's it. All bets are off. I get a phone call three days later. You better get back here before the body's gone. And yeah, of course, I've got pedal bike to be there in a minute. And I get back there, the body's gone. I've got my grandmother grieving. She's lost her daughter. My aunty, she's grieving. She's lost her sister. My two brothers. St. Michael's staying. We need you. They're crying.

We need you. And again, I care.

I love these people dearly, but I've got an illness that override even my feelings

and at page 24 describes it so eloquently. But I'll paraphrase it. It will not allow me to bring into my consciousness with sufficient enough force, the pain and misery that I caused my family.

It won't allow me to do it. It'll just say, just do it one more time. It'll be different this time.

And they give me that money again with a pitiful look. And I've left my brothers crying. They need their Big Brother. I've left my grandmother, she needs her grandson. And I go, what can I use? And I get this thing that we call ease and comfort. I call it hiding from reality

and all the relationships in my life, and that's why I think it's a big part of my story, is all the relationships in my life played on the exact same lights. Children disregard it. I had a son that was holding onto my leg. I've just done a two year prison sentence

and he's crying. Daddy, don't go. My son is alright. I'm just going to the shop and if I would have gone through a lie detector at that point, I was just going to the shop and I'll be back and the next time he sees me, he's two years later.

Every relationship played along the same lines.

I don't know if she's in here. I hope she's not

what I went into this crack house.

Do you know what in that crack house there was, I truly believe it was a vessel of God. There was. I was going to do a different chair at the beginning and I was going to mention some people that passed the result of this illness. I'll probably mention them at the end, but there's one that I'll mention now. Vinnie Barlow.

We went to this flag and there's a crack house, but it was the best crack house I'd ever been in. Yeah, I had a telly had carpet

and a three piece suite and it was a Levar and I was sold.

But also there was this crackhead girl that was in there and she'd had a bit of recovery before I I had never heard of recovery. She'd had a bit of recovery and she was, she was basically 12, stepping us over a crack pipe.

It didn't work for me.

But I I meet myself at home and for me, I I'd met loads of addicts of my variety before,

but I'd never really stuck around them. And what happened is I went back to jail again, as I usually do, because I'm actually shockingly bad criminal. And nearly two of the

but she started to send me in letters. She went to treatment and she was sending me letters or lovely letters and I won't really read in it. I was still on substances and whatever, but I got out of jail and I went around to her house and

there was a vision in front of me, a vision that I'd always wanted

from the age of 24. This is what my illness told me. I've got a head that tells me I'm useless, I'm nothing, I'll never amount to anything. I'm going to die lonely addict. That's what's going to happen and I'm content with that.

So when I see this girl and she's clean, she was sober, she was a productive member of society, she was, it was amazing to see it, something that I'd always envied in people. Not jealousy, just envied because I thought I'd never get it.

And So what are you doing? She's like, I'll go to the CA Meads. All right, he'll come with you. So I went to the CA meeting and I've got this ego, this false perception of myself that tells me I'm a gangster. I've done loads of jail. No one can touch me. So I'll go to the CA meeting. I'm going to go with that ego, that false perception of self, and I've got my arms crossed

and I'm staring at people.

Don't come nowhere near me.

You're not the ladies, but fellows don't not come there when they're.

And

yeah, internally it was screaming out. I was dying. I needed some help, but I had too much pride to ask for it, too much pride to ask for it. Then I went back to jail again. Something happened to me. There was, I started coming to these meetings and I started feeling a little bit regret and a little bit guilt about coming to these meetings and disrespecting what you people were doing. And I didn't believe everybody. There was a few people I thought he's definitely fucking using, looking to stay away.

There's no way he's six years.

No way.

But yeah, it's like feeling guilty about stuff and I got told to find a sponsor and he had to be black.

Some about this already. We had to have two gold teeth. I didn't have one, but yet to have a couple

and yet to have nice trainers, he had to have nice trainers.

And he had to have had a carbon copy of my life to understand the complexities of who I really AM.

And after two weeks, I didn't find him.

So what I did was I thought, you know what? I'm gonna do this myself. And I got a phone call in that time. Yeah, another touch of step Another got a sponsor. I've got a phone call. It's from a friend who just got out of jail from an arm robbery charge. My best thinking told me what you need to do is you need to go and see him and show him the power that you've got.

Brilliant.

So I sat down next to him when I was like, yeah, two weeks doing so far.

You can do it too.

And he said, shall we get something? Yeah, let's go.

Really good idea,

I talked about it in the book without defense against the first one. It isn't the first one that caused me problems is to thinking before it that precedes it.

What happened for me though is I went back to jail

and

I've done, like I said, I've done 11 years behind the prisoner cell door. President didn't faze me. I was in this delusion that prison was OK. I was OK with prison but I went back to prison right before that whilst I was at two weeks clean.

I was going to see my my brother, the good looking. I'm not that one.

I was going to see my brother and he's got a family, he's got a job, he's that productive member of society that I've always looked towards and wanted aspire to be.

And I was going to his house and he was telling me the woes of his life, about his married life and about the kids doing his Eddie and bills and all of that stuff. And I was just talking to him and just like really trying to just help him the best I could. And I remember I was on benefits. I hadn't even got a gyro. I remember skipping along the road with a purpose for the first time in my life, a purpose that I've never had before. I've been getting in the user of a substance.

I can't I can remember it now like it was yesterday. So then that thing happened with the old armed robber friend and I was back in jail. And,

and I don't say this for effect, that's good truth. I was there

and I was suicidal. I wanted to kill myself,

not just myself, my bad mate, because it was his fault.

I've got to take someone with me

now. Spiritual experience happened for me in that cell. And I'm not going to say I don't care if you believe it, because I do. Of course I do. But more importantly, I believe it. What happened to me is I'm sitting in this cell and I've got this suicidal thoughts, how I'm going to kill myself. And what happened is this

little clear perspect window equipment.

And it was like the wreckage of my past in a flash was shown to me that it wasn't anybody else's fault when I get to that in a minute, but it was all my fault. And what am I going to do? And I don't know if it was God, if it was that knot in my stomach that I call my spirit. It was its last dying attempt to not die, to not give up. I don't know what it was, but for whatever it was,

I was aware of it for a second and I would love to say that that's when my star, my stories started and I was clean and sober from there on now. But it wasn't like I was in jail for another nine months after that.

And when it talks about using against your will, I know what that means because I've experienced it. I was walking along the landings and my thinking is telling me you don't want to do this.

Not, not. I don't. You don't. That's fucked up.

You don't want to do this. Who the fuck said that?

Well, it comes out another one. We shouldn't do this.

So let's say you don't want to do this,

don't want to do this. And I'd walk in long and I'm feeling so depressed. I don't want to do this. I don't want to do this. And I get it. And I'll be walking back to myself and I'll be going I don't want to do this and I would do it. And I said, what the fuck did you do that

against my will? And that happened for nine months. I used against my role and

yeah, for me it was that little cracker that I met in that flat, the one that I got clean and sober. I got back out and I went to hers and she put things into place for me to go into this dry house. And it didn't happen straight away. I was bombarded with my thinking, obsessing about this and that and how to get and all of the other stuff. And

I put some action in it. I phoned the markets listening. Can I come in? I was like, yeah, come up on Monday when I left her front door. It was the first time I'd ever put some action into finding out the reason to that question. Why am I so fucked up? Why do I keep doing it? And I went to a meeting and the meeting I went to was Perryvale meeting on Friday night, 7:00 seven, 3730.

Amazing meeting. I'll get to that in a minute

but I went up to a man

and he couldn't be further removed from the sponsor I talked to about a minute ago. The black Dew with a gold teeth and a nice trainers. This fella had flip flops, the tweed jacket, big thick glasses.

I'm not going to say what I usually say in my chairs. No, I'm not saying it. I'm not saying,

but that man lovingly put his hand. I went up to him and like that pride that I had before I went up to him. So can you help me? He said just like

and I went through the steps. It wasn't with that man. He told me that he was an ex police officer

so it was like yeah isn't going to work mate.

Then I've got a new sponsor now. This sponsor had everything that I wanted, everything. He was driving a nasty Martin get an Armani suit on. I think he might have 2 watches on, I'm not too sure.

Little did I know that he was using during our journey and that's his stuff, my stuff. But when I was going halfway through my step four and he then comes out and tells me, yeah, you have to get responsible. I've been using. I was like, my God, the contract. There's been no one that's going to kill him. He's going to kill him. I can't shame my step forward. No one. But then I found somebody else. This man was of my variety. He do you know what I want to talk about all the steps. I was fearless and thorough and honest through all of my steps

until I got to Step 4.

But when I sat down and I was doing this fire with this man,

it was like, no shit. He was like, I'm not giving you an hour to consider proposals. What have you not told me?

Yeah, there's these two things. And I told him. Then two things from there on out. My steps were fearless, far off and honest. And I I'm not going to talk about those steps. Talk about my step 8. How long have I got

cool?

Step 8 for me was a magical moment. Step 9 for me was a magical moment. I read these letters to my mum and my dad. Now my mum was somebody that was always there for me. Like I mentioned after my dad died, this is just one of the experiences. After my dad died,

my dad proposed to my mum, asked her, asked her to marry. That promise lasted for 18 years.

Only my brother's laughing at that. I'm going to try and get away with it. I'm only joking, babe.

So he proposed to my mum and he give her this engagement ring. It was a lovely ring and about two weeks after my dad had passed away, my mom went away from when she come back in that period I'd had this for. What I need to do is I need to go and pull in this room and then I'll bring it back. I've got enough time to go and get it back and bring it back. And she got back off her little holiday through her grieving process.

And she says, Michael, have you stole the ring?

And she didn't kick off or scream or hit me like she used to. And I would swear that I see her heartbreak as she turned around and walked off and away from me.

Now when I was going through these steps, my,

my head will tell me that I can't be forgiven for that stuff

you sold the promise that you made, that your dad made to your mum,

you'd be forgiven for that. Your mum is never gonna forgive you for that.

And I was writing these step 8 letters and I was admitting my part, not their part, because learning about you. But I was still in the back of my head thinking it was because she was an alcoholic. That's why I'm an addict. It's because I was raised in the council estate. But when I truly, honestly looked at it, they did the best that they could. They raised me to be a decent, caring, kind human being

and I went to the graveyard and made these amendments. Now, like I said, I was a logo on cracking heroin addict

and I had one of these plastic folders. No fuck, I got it from, but I had one and it was in June. It was a nice hot, hot summer day. And I went there with these two letters, feeling proud of myself and doing this deadline stuff, putting the action in. And as soon as I get to the side of the grave, it's like the heavens opened of rain and the wind was blowing a Gale. Now I've got these two letters in this plastic wallet. I didn't see the experience I was having at the time

and I was able to threw my tears and through the rain and the wind to read these letters and honestly and sincerely

say I'm sorry. And as I walked away from the grave and I stood at the side of the crematorium waiting for my taxi, the sun shove again, I didn't see the experience. I truly believe at that moment when I was at that graveside I was forgiven.

My mum and dad were crying that they've got their boy back.

It took me a little while longer to forgive myself for that stuff,

but today I do. Today I know it's because of

a powerlessness over my thinking that I will disregard and steal and do all of the stuff that I do.

I wasn't a bad person. I was a sick one.

So I'll come into fellowship and I'll come into it ferocity. There was only one reason for that, if the truth be known as I fuck all else. The truth. I didn't have a family that wanted to talk to me. I didn't have no friends. I didn't have nothing,

you were my friends. Use all the ones that are saying how you doing mate? You're right. Do you want a cup of tea?

I want a cup of tea.

Can you make that coffee?

So I looked up and I asked why do people that was going before me. I didn't look up with jealousy or even envy. I looked and I thought right how am I going about this thing because I'm not stupid person.

So I was looking at people and what they're doing and it told me about commitments like Cool H and I. I did a little tea commitment. I loved it. I was on a gyro and I'll go and I'll spend about £20 on biscuits and fancy coffees. Then I would style for about 6 days, but

that was all right. They had nice biscuits

H and I, for me, was a pivotal moment in my

using. I was in Bedford prison and it was a woman in there and she bought a in there. I know it's a different fellowship, but this is my story. They brought a in there and this man, he talks and stuff and I didn't understand the word that he said, but I knew that he'd come out of his way to do some stuff and she'd give me a little big book. And this little big book, I didn't know the importance of it.

I read it about four or five times after it, didn't understand a word of it. But there's another fellow that's in this fellowship as we speak. His name is Bennell. He's not in this room. I don't believe if he is putting on that. You owe me 5 lbs. And I'm joking.

I went back into that cell and he said what he saw was somebody that was lit up with something that he'd never seen before. Because I was a horrible, horrible person, but he'd seen something that he'd never seen before. Somebody lit up

with possible way out. I can only imagine.

So H and I went along to H and I meet and it was in London district and I was like, I want this commitment. There was like, you've not got long enough, You're only six months. So I put into what can I go along there and do some stuff, speak to them. And I was like, yeah, cool. If you want. They just want to get rid of me, I think. And that's six months. They kind of said, yeah, do it. Just go away

please.

I pestered and badgets my way into loads and loads of circles.

When I got through the steps I didn't have a sponsee for about 3 months and I was all clearly missed a call about it. That's cool, it's cool. And there was this one fella that got one, he was really scrawny little fella. I don't know why that affected me so much,

but when he got a Swansea I started praying for it. I was like if he can get one, I give him come on, give me this one see And God inundated me responses and again I was in a privileged position. I had nothing can, no one to to look after, no responsibilities and I was able to try and help these people as they was coming through,

coming along my path. It was beautiful. I wouldn't change it for the world. I've not been out of service in all the time that I've been in, and that's nearly seven years.

Like there's no other way from me.

Do you know what this, this convention here is even more special 'cause I go to all the convention, I absolutely fucking love em. I love em. These conventions even more special for me. My little brother and me went to Denmark for the regional assembly. Like when I say my little brother Spike inspires me, he does because he goes to all of these things. He's out in America and all of this shit. I think I have to stick my game up.

And so yeah, me and my brother went along to Denmark. Dinner, Ricks.

My Mrs. weren't too fucking happy.

Why can't I come?

Because you can't.

You're sitting pretty close to it, Eric.

So we went along to the regional assembly and about the stuff that he knows around this stuff that he knows more than around the traditional stuff than me. But again, I sat there with pride, looking at my little brother putting forward a proposal for Central Area to hold this convention. And I was full of pride for my little brother, absolutely filled with it. Another blessing that I've had.

He talked about that story. I'll tell you the true story.

He I will phone him up. And at first I did.

I tried to bash him in a big book and I did say to him, I don't want to talk to the addict, put Ricky on the phone. I did say all that stuff and my then sponsor was in this room. He said to me, you can't do that. You need to attract him into this stuff, not promote it to him.

All right, I'll do that. And now there is nothing that I've experienced worse in recovery than speaking to my brother after he expressed that he tried to kill himself that night, knowing that I can't do fucking nothing to save him.

All I can say is, do you think that is normal? Yeah, I went OK

and a few weeks later he phoned me up and he was like, I need some help now. I'd heard this repeatedly, loads of times. I put measures into place for him to be helped and

he'd always get upset. I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it.

Fuck you too.

And this one time he phoned me up on his lot. I need some help and I was like just phone me when you're ready. I'm ready

and

I got him on the Tuesday

and I went out, did some stuff, come back he thought he had. What was it,

you know, for his bipolar?

And I brought him to his first meeting. And at that first meeting, I picked up my 9 of Keybury. He picked up his white key ring. And that meeting again was the paravale, 7:30 on Friday night. Absolutely powerful meeting. Yeah, I'm representing. You owe me some money.

But I've heard my brother talk loads of times, but there was one particular time that I'd actually heard what he was saying