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Sober-Talk - SA - Gypsy · Sober Talk SA

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Welcome to Sober Talk. I'm Dennis and I'm an alcoholic.
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Soap to dear thanks to Alcoholics Anonymous.
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If you or anyone you know is struggling with alcohol, please
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call Alcoholics Anonymous on 1300 double 22222.
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I'll visit their website ata.org dot AU.
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I'll just run through the preamble of Alcoholics
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Anonymous. Alcoholics Anonymous is a
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fellowship of people who share the experience, strengthen hope
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with each other that they may solve their common problems, and
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help with us to recover from alcoholism.
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The only requirement for membership is the desire to stop
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drinking and no dues of fees. Fair membership.
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We are self supporting through our own contributions.
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He is not allied with any sect in immersion politics,
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organization or institution, does not wish to engage in any
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controversy, neither endorses or oppose any causes.
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Our primary purpose is to stay sober and help.
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Other Alcoholics are chiefs of Brady.
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My name is Gypsy River Peace. I'm an alcoholic.
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I believe that I was born with a predisposition to alcoholism,
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addiction. My grandfather was an alcoholic
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and he was in a A and I have three sons with various school
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addiction. My my middle boy has actually
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just gone past one year in recovery from marijuana.
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And so it is a family disease and alcoholism comes in many
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forms, but for me, alcoholism was something that I didn't
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realise that I had until I came into a A and understood and was
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educated about the disease of alcoholism.
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And my sobriety date is the 1st of July 2016.
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And that's not, you know, because I'm looking great or
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wonderful. That's because something greater
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than me removed the desire to drink when I went to my first
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Alcoholics Anonymous meeting nearly not over 9 years ago.
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And, and because I, for the first time in my life, did as I
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was told and the suggested things that the oldest soda say
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and that is to get to meetings and pick up the phone before
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picking up a drink. But you know, and none of that
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stuff I had, I had no knowledge of alcoholism or any tools to
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handle life prior to a lot of the support and teaching that
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I've received over those last nine years.
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The first meeting that I went to, I was very nervous and I
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didn't know what to expect. The women especially caught my
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attention. I was sharing stories that were
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very honest and it was, and it was that honesty that caught my
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attention because I was raised with, you know, a lot of people
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experienced the old school thinking I was don't air your
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dirty laundry in public and what would the neighbors think?
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And problems would get swept under the carpet that that kind
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of mentality. And so it was stories that I was
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able to identify with with my drinking, 'cause my drinking
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started off as a teenager with my friends and we flogged my
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dad's port and we all sat around lounge room drinking that.
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And it didn't make me feel 10 foot tall and bulletproof like
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it does with some people. It actually made me feel really
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sick. After the initial euphoria wore
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off, there was a really, really sick and dizzy, and my friends,
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as inexperienced with drinking as I was, said they'd heard that
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if you drink, if you eat bread, it soaks up the alcohol.
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So I ate half a loaf of bread because I was really sick,
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thinking it would soak it up, but I ended up throwing that up
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too. And then we all sat around and
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watched Evil Dead. And that's all I can remember of
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that drinking because I am a blackout drinker.
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And right from the very first time I started drinking, I
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experienced blackouts. Since the second time I drank, I
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reckon I was about 16, I was at a party and I remember swimming
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in a swimming pool and gliding through the water, the bottom of
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all feeling really free and wonderful.
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And and then the next thing I can remember, it's like a flash.
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My memory of drinking was I was standing in a laundry bent over
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a sink, vomiting while this man was rubbing my back.
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The man I didn't even know who it was, rubbing my back, holding
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my hair up, saying you'll be right love, this is normal.
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And so that was my introduction to drinking and that was what I
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was considered normal and I drank like that right up until I
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came into a A at the age of 47. By looking around the rooms
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these days I've I realise I'm one of these people that's
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coming to a A rather late. There's quite a lot of young
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people in a A, which is wonderful.
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I wish that I'd come in in my 20s and then I would have had a
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good 30 years head start on life.
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As it is, I'm catching up. That's what I believe.
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And yeah, so every time I drank, I I went into blackout.
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And it could be, you know, starting off, it might just be
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that I'd forget a few things. You know, my friends decided you
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hear what you did last night, remember what you did last
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night. And it was all a big joke.
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Most of us forgot what we did. I was kind of tended to drink
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around people that drank like I did as my alcoholism progressed,
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because I've learned that in a a as well, the alcoholism.
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And as my alcoholism progressed from just to, you know, finish
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what I thought was a binge drinking party girl weekend
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thing started to progress. And the blackouts were getting
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longer and longer and alcoholism just started to really pick away
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at my life. I've heard in the rooms of IA
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that it is cunning, baffling and powerful.
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And it certainly is cunning because I didn't realize that my
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life was being picked off by bits like alcoholism was hitting
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my Achilles heel. And, you know, I was not
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enabling me to be able to do the things that I was watching my
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friends do, you know, get the white picket fence, the one
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fence, the one husband, the one car, the one job and, and the
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house in the same suburb for so many years.
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I, I didn't get all that. I had two marriages and two
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divorce, three children and different husbands.
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The third one was my domestic violence relationship.
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And I moved around Australia probably 80 times before I found
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a A and I was still very restless and unsettled when I
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came into a A. And I think I probably shifted
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around about 10 times, maybe more.
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I've experienced homelessness and sobriety as well.
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And I was also homeless towards the end of my drinking career,
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for want of a better word. I ended up living in a tent
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that's not really homeless by my standards, but but by some
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people's standards it is. And I'd end up losing
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everything, my job, my marriages, travelling all around
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with my son when he was 3 and living in a tent.
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He was still in nappies at that point.
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And I had three dogs as well. And I've heard in IA that that's
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considered a men, men an unmanageable life.
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It's the second part of step one.
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We admitted we were careless over alcohol, that our lives had
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become unmanageable. And I didn't understand what
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that second part meant. Unmanageable.
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Like as I as a child, I had long blonde hair and I remember my
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mum used to brush my hair into ponytails and she'd say, oh,
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your hair is so unmanageable. And that was the only time I'd
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ever heard that word. I never connected it to my life.
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It's only through now having a manageable life where my bills
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are paid and I have a roof over my head and I make decisions.
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I was thinking about them first, then I understand what what
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manager boards. And so there I was living in
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this tent and I'd lost my license four times to drink
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driving. The 4th time the magistrate
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looked at me, I was a 40 year old woman and said you ought to
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be ashamed of yourself. You're 40 years old in a
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domestic violent relationship with two children to raise
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before my third one came along and and out drink driving.
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If I see you in this court again, you're going to jail.
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And this is where I guess I learned about drinking against
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our will because people that aren't alcoholic, first of all
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probably wouldn't have got themselves in that situation in
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the 1st place. But someone who considers
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themselves maybe just having a bit of a drinking problem, not
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an alcoholic, would stop and would change their life with
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that kind of advice from a judge.
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It didn't stop me, it just made me more paranoid.
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When I drank, drove, I was in the rearview mirror with
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headlights in my rearview mirror, thinking I was being
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chased by the cops again. And it was a very lonely,
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isolating, frightening life. I, you know, 'cause I'd, I'd
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gotten out of that domestic violence situation.
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When my son was 18 months old, I sold my Harley-Davidson.
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Rather than sell it actually, I swapped it for a caravan, a
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little car and I took off in this rainbow van to Nimbin and
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still drinking and, and yeah, throughout a series of events
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ended up in that tent. But whilst I was on that journey
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to Nimbin, I can remember I rented a studio on this
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beautiful rainforest property. This lady had this lovely home
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and she was renting out various cabins and stuff in Nimbin and
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it was just a wonderful spot. And I can remember we get
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together most evenings and drink wine and smoke weed and play
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music and belly dancing. It was really, really great.
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I loved it. It was wonderful.
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However, excuse me, there was this gentleman.
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He had bright blue eyes and a long white beard and very
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handsome. And I, I remember it wasn't he
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looks that caught my eye. It was that whenever he came to
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these get togethers, because he was the lady's brother, the lady
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who owned the property. And whenever he came to the get
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togethers, he had a Diet Coke in his hand or on other occasions
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of coffee. And that caught my attention.
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I'd, I'd never, ever, not from my memory, been to a party where
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people drank soft drink or coffee, I guess, unless it was
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my granddad or my nan. And even then, you know, that
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happened to be a birthday celebration on Christmas.
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And yeah, so that caught my attention.
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And then on another occasion when I was on that living on
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that property, I was walking down the path and I had a red
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wine in my hand and my little fellow was following me and a
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man with the bright blue eyes wet past.
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And we started talking. And I remember him saying I, I
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don't drink anymore. They my family said to me, you
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know, you're causing too much trouble when you drink.
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You have to, to stop drinking. So it's Arsenal, the alcohol.
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And he said he chose the family. That was over 20 years ago, he
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said. And but he didn't tell me how.
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And I just remember saying feeling a bit embarrassed
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because I had this wine in my hand in the middle of the
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afternoon. And I just said to him, I'll,
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I'll give up one day. I'm on holiday at the moment.
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And shrugged it off. When I came back to SA.
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I did what I've now noticed. Step one, I was at a party and I
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drunk myself sober. I don't know if anybody can
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relate to their alcohol. Connor had stopped working.
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It stopped giving me that buzz. And I did go down the gateway of
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trying drugs for a while there, but fortunately I got into a A
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before that progressed any further.
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So I believe I'm an addict right across the board for everything.
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One's too many, they say, and 1000's not enough.
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And my friend saw her on Facebook that I was living in
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this tent and she let me rent her little unit by the Beijing
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moon to was really generous and just what my son and I needed at
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the time. And I'd come back from Nimbin
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and I had this box on top of my cupboard and I had a white wine
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in the fridge and a can of Jim Beam 0.
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These were the things that I brought back from my trip.
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And I took photos. I went on.
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I must have started questioning my drinking.
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And I took a flight and I put it on Facebook and I put on the
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post, do you think I'm an alcoholic?
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Because I had all this alcohol and most of my friends were
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drinkers. So I was kind of asking other
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people that some were Alcoholics for advice.
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And a lot of the comments were, how long have you had that
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sitting there? And I said to when one of my
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friends responded by saying, oh, you're not an alcoholic.
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If you were, you would have drank that by now.
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Momentarily satisfied with that answer, as most Alcoholics would
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be. But something was tapping inside
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of me my, and it was trying to give me a message and was
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saying, you know, that if a child's birthday party, you're
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going to drink that if the sun's shining, you're going to drink
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it. If someone upsets you, you're
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going to drink it. Someone tailgates you, you're
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going to drink it. Or if it's raining, you're going
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to drink it. I just knew on some level and I
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looked out to the ocean and talked about power better than
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me, which I still don't know what is to this day, but I just
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know that there's something greater than me.
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I did the first part of step set, Step 1 and I surrendered.
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I said I need help. I can't do this.
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I don't know how to stop drinking.
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I mean, I could stop for some short periods of time, you know,
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sometimes I'd stop for two weeks, sometimes three days,
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sometimes six weeks. But I couldn't stay stopped.
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I couldn't keep that momentum up.
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There was no life tools on how to handle life when emotions got
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too big. And so while I did that,
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surrender this voice in my head that sounded like my voice said
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try a a really thought much about a A.
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But I googled it and there was a meeting that night in Kadena,
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oddly enough. And so I decided to go along and
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that was when my journey began. And foremost, as if all the
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planets aligned. It was just that there was a
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massive shift within me that took place that night and and I
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haven't felt the need to pick up the drinks and the things that I
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heard I identified with. I almost wasn't going to come
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back because there was God written on the flags.
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There was God in the big book that we have, the Big Book of
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Alcohol. It's anonymous and which I now
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know is written in 1933 and I think 1933.
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And you know, back then it was, excuse me, in America.
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It was Christian based and the but I've been taught since to
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just read what I identify with and leave the rest.
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You know, I change him, which is written in the big book to her
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or it in my own mind. But I don't need to make a song
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and dance about it. You know, I get the message
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that's intended for me in that big book.
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But on that, on that, at that meeting, the lady said, the
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chairperson said at the end of the meeting, thankfully, because
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I wasn't going to come back, I thought, great, They're a bunch
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of religious freaks. And I was raised Catholic and I
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don't follow that religion. I don't follow any religion I
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believe in. You know, I'm a bit of a Pagan,
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like, you know, just one guy. I'm just Benatia, the ants, the
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tree sky, they use the planet stars.
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I believe that I'm connected to that and I'm connected to
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everybody else in that respect. That's my belief.
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And I don't have to push that on anybody and nobody else pushes
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their religion on me. And and that was good that she
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said that at the very end of that meeting, that you don't
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have to believe in a higher power.
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Tradition 3 states that the only requirement for membership is a
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desire to stop drinking. And I certainly had a desire to
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stop drinking. I had a burning desire to stop
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living that life. Waking up with hangovers and
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forgetting where my urse, my keys, my phone and the shame and
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the stuff that, you know, the core decisions that I made.
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Continuing to be in domestic violence relationship positions,
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which had a lot of violence and police and jail cells.
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And it's just a horrible way to live.
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It was another life. It feels like a lifetime ago.
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It feels like that was another girl that lived that life.
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And so when she said that, that meeting, I was really excited
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and it was like a flicker of hope lit up within me and I
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thought, well, good, I can come back then.
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If it's not a religious program, it's a spiritual program.
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I really needed to hear that. It was very important because I
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would be dead today if she hadn't said that.
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Because I had such a problem with the God Word and with
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religion. I don't have a problem with it
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today. I've let through my sobriety and
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through the big book. Be quick to see where religious
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people are, right? We don't discuss our our
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different beliefs in a a because our only our only connection is
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our alcoholism. And that's why it works.
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So that was very important for me.
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And yeah. So my, my drinking was very much
15:34
like everybody else's And, and in those rooms, I got to do
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shares, which is what I'm doing now and, and talk about my
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experience, strength and hope. And one of the stories that I, I
15:43
like to share is when I had lost my license for the 4th time and
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that judge that I spoke of who shamed me in the court took my
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license for a year and I got $1000 fine.
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And then I was told when I got my license back, I had to go and
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do a drug and alcohol course or some kind of some kind of, I
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can't remember too much about it.
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But I had to go somewhere in the city and answer all these
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questions about my drinking before they would give me my
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license back. And then when they did they,
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they passed me and then they said I had to have this get this
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drink driving device put in my vehicle and I had to have that
16:17
on there. I think at that time, 6 to 9
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months, nothing like that. And it was $90.00 a month at
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that time. It was 15 years ago and India,
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that device, this is how much denial.
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I was in Rocket. It was place where I used to sit
16:30
my port. And I do remember one time
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driving along and my port spilled into it and I just
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thought I'll stuff it. And I pulled over to the side of
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the road. The car just cut shut off
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straight away. So I veered off to the side of
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the road a bit like when you ran out of petrol and I just sat
16:43
there and got drunk. And on another occasion I was
16:46
setting up my campsite with my ex and my then 9 year old and we
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were camping in Manham and I had a half a cider.
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I was setting up camp and then we hopped onto the ferry to go
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across to the bottle shop and get more.
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And while I was on the ferry at my device went off in my car to
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blow in because you've got to blow and hum into this device in
17:05
itself and then it keeps your engine running.
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But that cider had registered some alcohol in my system.
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And so my engine shut off while I was on the ferry and I was in
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this bright purple car or burgundy coloured car covered in
17:17
butterflies and, and the engine shut off from the middle of the
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river. And so this is how much denial I
17:23
was in. I, I kid you not, the words that
17:25
came out of my mouth when I went over to the ferryman was, look
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mate, I'm not an alcoholic, but I've got this device on my
17:33
vehicle that won't start until the alcohol goes down in my
17:37
blood. I mean, how would that have
17:39
sounded anyway? So he just laughed and shook his
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head and said whatever love. So I got back in the car and,
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you know, become a very self-centered, selfish, immature
17:49
mother when I drank. And so I handed the device to my
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because I had one of those curly cords from memory, like an old
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phone cord. And I was able to stretch it
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across to the back seat. And I asked my 9 year old to
18:01
blow into it just so he can get the car going.
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And he was only 90 at the lung capacity.
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You know, I have a nine year old.
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So he's trying to blow into and of course it wouldn't work.
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The ex was already smashed, so he could.
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So there we were sitting in this bloody car, the river gone
18:13
across the river. All the cars were getting on on
18:15
the other side of the river. We trapes across to the other
18:17
side. Still not my blood alcohol
18:19
hadn't gone down and this went on for about I reckon it might
18:22
have been 15 minutes. We crossed that river back and
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forth with my car facing that One Direction and everyone
18:27
getting on behind me had to be directed to go around me to get
18:31
off. If that's not enough to send
18:33
anybody into recovery, but no, of course not.
18:37
I had to have a lot more rock bottoms and eventually my BA
18:42
went down and I was able to start the car Yippies.
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Oh, off we went over to the bottle shop, got more grog back
18:47
over to the other side of the river, continued drinking and
18:50
and the more blackouts, more violence, more police.
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It's just the same old, same old, you know, on repeat.
18:55
And that went on, you know, a lot percent for quad number
18:58
ears. And my children went through a
19:00
lot through that experience and I could never get those years
19:05
back and and and change what choices I made for them to, you
19:10
know, be exposed to violence against their mother and some of
19:13
that kind of stuff. I'll never be able to make that
19:15
up to them. But I have learnt in the program
19:18
to forgive myself because one of the most important things that I
19:21
was told when I came into a A is that who I am when I drank is
19:26
not who I am today. And that's not who I was.
19:29
Like alcohol robbed me of the ability to be a good mother,
19:33
good parent, a good sister, a good daughter.
19:35
I'm a trustworthy member of the community.
19:39
Alcohol removes everything. And I like one of the sayings
19:42
I've heard where a A delivers everything alcohol promised.
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And it is cunning, baffling, powerful.
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It takes everything from you without you even realising it.
19:50
You think that the problems that are happening outside of you are
19:55
all everybody else's fault. But I realize now I learnt that
19:59
it was the alcohol that was causing all those problems.
20:02
It was stunting my growth emotionally and spiritually and
20:05
wasn't giving me the ability to be able to make mature decisions
20:08
and live a health grounded life. So what to do?
20:11
How do I put this drink down? And fortunately I listened to
20:15
the older Sobers. I kept going back to meetings.
20:18
They said try and do 90 meetings in 90 days.
20:20
At the time I was living in Kadena, so I when I only went to
20:23
one meeting a week, I didn't realize there were more
20:26
meetings. Someone said to me, I said to
20:28
one of the other members at Kadena once, are there any other
20:30
meetings like this? And they just looked at me in
20:33
shock. Hasn't someone given you the
20:35
meetings pamphlet? We had a meetings pamphlet.
20:37
I'm not sure if AO was online at that point.
20:40
So I had this and it told me where all the meetings were.
20:43
And so they took me to Brompton Beginners on a Monday night and
20:45
then we went to Port Pirie and I'll just loved it like my it's,
20:50
it's as if my recovery took off on roller skates.
20:53
I just couldn't get enough. I've heard a Dennis often share
20:56
that he's a meetings junkie. And I get that.
20:59
I feel like I can identify with that because whenever I'm, I'm
21:02
running a bit rough, you know, and there's a tailgater behind
21:05
me, which really still irritates me to this day.
21:07
But there are times when I can handle the tailgater or the
21:10
dickhead driver on the road. And there are times when I can't
21:12
and there are times that I can't.
21:14
It's a good indicator that I need to get to a meeting.
21:16
The days that I'm allowing people like you know, to cut in
21:19
front of me and making space for other drivers and being a calm
21:23
present driver are the days when my meetings are working for me.
21:26
My spirituality is in place. And so in these, in these
21:30
meetings, I've learnt that you need to get a sponsor and if
21:33
you're female to get a female sponsor and if you're male to
21:36
get a male sponsor. That's not what everybody does
21:38
that that's what they, the large majority of AIA members suggest.
21:42
Because when, when I came in, I was still very immature when it
21:46
came to relationships. And I got into a relationship
21:49
with an older sober and I didn't have any skills to navigate a
21:53
relationship. I brought all my old behaviours
21:55
into that, into that term relationship and all my fears
21:58
from domestic violence. I come in on the tail of a very
22:01
violent relationship and I didn't really understand men or
22:04
how to handle anyone's mood swings and on my own.
22:08
And so, yeah, it was doomed from the start.
22:11
And I've been on my own for over six years or coming up six years
22:15
now and practice celibacy and all that time as well.
22:17
That's something that you never would have thought you'd hear me
22:19
say. I always had to be in a
22:22
relationship. I had codependency.
22:24
I thought it was yours to make me happy.
22:26
What a big thing to put on another human being.
22:30
It's just unfair. And I, I now understand today
22:33
that everybody has the right, the space within their own
22:37
relationship. And yeah, I'm looking forward to
22:40
one day getting into a relationship again where I can,
22:44
I can practice the skills that I've learnt about being on my
22:47
own, being independent, having a voice, allowing other people to
22:50
have their freedom as well, which sobriety has given me all
22:53
that, you know, it's maturity. It's something that I I bucked
22:56
against for a long time because I have a rebel and I always will
22:59
be a rebel and I rebelled about getting older.
23:01
But wisdom comes peace. And I'm not saying I've got a
23:04
lot of wisdom. I'm just saying that the steps
23:07
and the promises are working for me in my life today.
23:10
I've got a sponsor now, a female sponsor who I rely on from time
23:13
to time. When I can't, when I get stuck
23:17
on a decision about something, fortunately, I've learnt to
23:20
listen to that prom my the inner voice in the promises it says we
23:24
will one of the promises we will intuitively know how to heist a
23:27
baffle us. And that's one of my favorite
23:28
promises. It's in the big book.
23:30
And I do have an inner voice that I'm able to hear now
23:35
because the loud alcoholic voice isn't there anymore.
23:38
I don't have those hangovers or my head's not full of grog.
23:40
And one of the experiences that I had when I drank was in my
23:45
second marriage, I've got into a very bad fight with with my
23:48
ex-husband. And I decided that I was going
23:50
to leave him and the children at that point.
23:52
I had those two children and I grabbed one of the kids crayons
23:56
and I wrote on a piece of paper, I'm out of here.
23:57
You can raise the kids. And there was a few colourful
23:59
sailor words in there with it, left it on the dining room
24:02
tables the middle of the night. And I took everything at that
24:04
point in my life that was valuable to me.
24:06
And that was my ACDC collection, my Brandy, 1/2 a loaf of bread.
24:14
Is that half a loaf of bread again?
24:16
A butter knife and some butter. His credit card and his Ute.
24:20
And I was going to Queensland and I was going to do a filmer
24:23
and Louise without Filmer or without, without the wings.
24:25
I was just going to be Gypsy on the run.
24:27
And I took off and I remember stopping at this petrol station
24:30
and again, blackouts. So I can only remember 3 events
24:33
of that evening, three very significant events that still
24:36
didn't surrender me to the rooms, but it was part of my
24:39
part of my alcoholic journey. And I went to this petrol
24:44
station to top up EU. And I remember feeling really
24:47
drunk and I was wondering if the petrol station attendant could
24:50
tell that I was drunk. And my tongue felt like it was
24:52
tripping over itself. I was trying really hard.
24:54
I don't know if anybody can identify trying really hard to
24:57
sound normal, to sound sober. Anyway, I took off from there.
25:00
That's all I remember of that. Next thing I remember, I was in
25:03
the Ute and I don't know if the Ute was upside down or if it was
25:06
the right way up. I could hear trucks going past
25:09
me. So I knew I was on a highway
25:10
somewhere, had no idea where. I reached my arm up and I felt
25:13
the tarpaulin and of the of the Ute and there was a bit of give
25:18
in the Ute. So I thought, well, that's good,
25:19
I'm not upside down on the bitumen.
25:23
And I shifted to the handpieces and fly blown fleeces that were
25:26
around me. I was, you know, because I
25:27
obviously had crawled into the back of this Ute to sleep at
25:29
some point. And it's at the top all and up.
25:33
And there's the big orange in Berry, SA.
25:35
And I was so upset. I was really disappointed that I
25:37
didn't make it to Queensland. As far as I'd gotten was two
25:40
hours, which is from Borough SA to Berry.
25:42
That was as far as I'd gotten. And and back then there was his
25:45
little LG flip phones and I remember I turned it on and
25:48
opened it and there was all these missed calls and messages
25:50
from my ex-husband. He was furious and one of my
25:52
friends messaging me too telling me I was a Dick head and what
25:55
are you doing you Oddly enough ended up partnering with my
25:58
ex-husband later on many years later.
26:00
And unfortunately she died of alcohol.
26:02
Cat cancer related alcohol is 2 years ago.
26:06
So anyway I should check these phone messages Runway ex-husband
26:09
told him where I was. He was really angry.
26:10
He got a friend of his to drive him to the Ute and my my husband
26:15
drove the Ute home. His friend drove his car and all
26:19
the way home my ex-husband admonished me like I was a bad
26:22
child. I remember I had my arms
26:24
crossed, looking out the window, just hiding him, hating my life,
26:27
severely hungover. Oh, there's nothing worse than a
26:31
hangover in this world, I reckon.
26:32
I can still vividly remember the physical agony of hangovers.
26:36
A dry mouth, the head spins, the blurred vision, a bracing heart.
26:40
And now I'm enduring that while I'm being told what a horrible
26:44
wife I was and how useless I am. And, you know, both of us had no
26:48
idea that we that I was an alcoholic, that I was sick, not
26:52
a bad person, that I was sick with alcoholism.
26:55
And when we got home, we sat on the front porch and I was
26:58
looking at the trees. And I said, who's that in the
26:59
trees? And he said, there's no one
27:01
there. And I was.
27:02
So I had begun hallucinating. The next thing I remember, we
27:06
had another argument and I had I ran into the house and grabbed
27:09
his rifle. I'd locked myself into our
27:11
bedroom. I turned the butt of the rifle
27:13
around and I'd smashed a massive hole in the butt of the rifle.
27:17
Oddly enough, it had made the shape of a love heart without me
27:20
meaning to do that. I still remember that for some
27:23
reason, it's really weird. And I turned the rifle around
27:27
and he was, I could see his face through the lover and just said,
27:31
I'm going to kill you and then I'm going to kill myself.
27:33
And I'm really, really lucky to be able to be sitting here
27:37
sharing this story today because he's a farmer's son.
27:41
And if anybody knows farmers, they, they teach their children
27:44
and farmers is what farmers just have a habit, very safe habit of
27:48
storing bullets separately from their guns.
27:50
And I'm lucky that he did that because I would have killed
27:53
them, killed him and myself and my children would have been in
27:56
foster care. Good job.
27:57
So I didn't get in here because I tore my petticoat.
28:01
I got in here, I got in here because I pick up knives and
28:05
weapons and yeah, I'm just really, really lucky that AI has
28:09
changed my personality and give me the opportunity to make
28:12
amends to my children. And I'm actually homeschooling
28:14
my 13 year old at the moment due to him being bullied and just
28:18
wanted to finish on this. My an opportunity came for me
28:22
after my home was flooded in Barchtown.
28:24
Our son and I relocated to Salisbury and I became a bus
28:28
driver, got my HR license, but because of my criminal history
28:31
that didn't come to me easily. All the other drivers got their
28:35
licenses straight away. But I had I had to have a woman
28:39
working with children's check just like they did.
28:40
But mine took two months because there was a process when you've
28:45
got those drink driving charges. So I had to sit before a panel
28:48
of judges had an appointment that was made in Adelaide.
28:51
I think it was a judge, a lawyer and a police officer.
28:54
I had to sit in front of, I think I can't remember exactly.
28:57
And I wanted to know why they should grant me a bus driver's
29:02
license or any kind of heavy vehicle license with what they
29:05
saw on paper in front of them. And due to AA and due to these
29:09
shares, the confidence that you gain from being sober, I was
29:14
able to articulate to them that what you see on paper there in
29:16
front of you is not who I am today.
29:18
I was also given about 5 or 6 different reference references
29:22
from other IA members who put down on pen to paper their name
29:26
saying, you know, attesting to my character and my sobriety.
29:30
And what I saw on paper there made me realise maybe I'm not
29:33
such a bad person because of the things that they said about me.
29:36
I will love you back to life when you can't love yourself.
29:39
And that the judge said to me, you want to wait outside there,
29:43
We'll just have a chat and call you back in.
29:44
So I had 15 minutes to wait while they discussed whether or
29:47
they were going to give me a HR license.
29:48
So the heart was racing throughout that time.
29:51
I went back in after 15 minutes and they said to me, if you're
29:53
not, sit down with we've deliberated and if you, you
29:57
know, we believe that you, you've recovered and we believe
29:59
that you've turned over a new leaf and we've decided to grant
30:02
you a full license without any restrictions.
30:05
And so I just shook their hands, each one of them.
30:07
I shook their hands and one of my friends in AI Jade, he says
30:12
probably shouldn't mention those.
30:13
I don't think she'd find. She said.
30:14
That reminds me of that flash dance where the the lady had to
30:17
dance in front of three judges. Yeah.
30:22
So I was really happy. So, you know, today I'm a school
30:24
bus driver. I've had six months off due to
30:26
health, but I'm looks like I'll be going back to work soon.
30:29
I haven't really shared that to anybody yet, but I'll probably
30:31
be going back to work as my health is recovering another
30:34
miracle and to yeah. So today I'm responsible for
30:36
driving children and heavy vehicle and I get to look in the
30:40
parents eyes when I pick these kids up and and they know their
30:44
babies are safe with me. And you wouldn't have want to be
30:46
behind the wheel of anything back, you know, when I drank.
30:49
So a a does give you a life back.
30:51
It gives you a brand new life. And I'm I'm really, really,
30:55
really lucky that I got a really lucky.
30:58
So I'll leave it there. Thank you.
31:00
A A has more than two million recovering Alcoholics throughout
31:04
the world. In Australia there are about
31:07
18,000 members. They're made in over 2000 local
31:12
meetings spread around the country.
31:15
Meetings range in size from a handful in some areas to
31:19
hundreds or more in larger communities.
31:22
And once again, if anyone you know is struggling with alcohol
31:27
issues, please call Alcoholics announcing 1300 Double 00000 or
31:33
visit their website on aa.org dot AU.