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Sober Talk SA - Jeff T · Sober Talk SA

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  Welcome to Sober Talk. I'm Dennis and I've lived
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  experience of alcohol. If you or anyone you know is
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  struggling with alcohol, please call Alcoholics Anonymous on
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  1300 double 22222 or check out their website on aa.org dot a U
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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 men and women. We share their experience,
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  strengthen up with each other. They must solve their problems
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  and help others to recover from alcoholism.
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  The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop
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  drinking. There are no Jews of Feast for A
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  membership. We are self supporting through
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  our own contributions. A is not allied with any sect,
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  denomination, politics, organization or institution.
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  Does not wish to engage in any controversy, neither endorses or
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  oppose any causes. Our primary purpose is steer.
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  So many other Alcoholics achieve sobriety.
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  My name is Jeff and I'm an alcoholic.
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  I had my first real drink when I was about 14 years old.
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  Prior to that, I'd taste with occasional alcoholic drink.
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  But alcohol wasn't a big part of my family's life.
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  My mother and father were virtually teeto for us there
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  and. And I've been one of the very
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  few villages in England that doesn't have a pub, so I'd
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  certainly didn't have people around me that were saying
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  modeling alcoholic behavior at all.
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  I also think my parents might have been rather naive about
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  alcohol and what it can do to people.
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  But anyway, they kept a bottle of whiskey in a cupboard that
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  was there from additional purposes.
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  And that bottle of whiskey likes to years and years.
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  It's to say that from a fairly early age that was my favorite
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  medicine. But anyway, at 14 I went into a
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  pub with a friend for the first time.
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  I lived in a part of the world where pubs would probably gone
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  out of business if I hadn't allowed on your age drink, just
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  like toxin. But, and I think I drank 4 pints
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  of mild ale and went home feeling different from the way
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  I'd felt when I'd gone there, but not really sure.
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  Why? Or how I felt different.
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  I just knew that I wanted to do this again, and so I went to the
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  pubs that would serve underage drinkers with friends as often
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  as I could afford to do so. And that meant that I suppose,
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  that I wasn't really drinking that much.
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  And then when I was 15, I discovered, I'm not sure where I
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  got this from. I discovered that you could
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  actually make your own beer. So I did.
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  And 12 months later I I discovered that you could make
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  your own wine and I started doing that as well.
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  So by the time I was 17 years old, I was awash with my
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  homemade grout. And for any alcoholic, it
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  doesn't really get any better than that, does it?
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  It's like having the boost it way.
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  The golden egg. I couldn't make my own.
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  Then when I was 17, I went home, I went to Newcastle on time and
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  went off of England, Morphe to England.
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  That was a big city to a punctual boy like me, and there
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  were pubs everywhere, and I very quickly made friends with people
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  who drank like I did. And so going to the pub now
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  became the chief recreational activity for me and my friends
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  wasn't really bothered about doing much of anything else.
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  Except, no, the pub. And I in those days I didn't
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  have a great capacity for alcohol, so it didn't take a lot
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  to get me drunk. So I was usually drunk by the
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  time the pubs closed at 10:30. And I didn't really need to go
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  on drinking after that. But I had started to get myself
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  into situations where I was being thrown out of pumps and I
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  thrown out of nightclubs and chased them alleyways by police
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  officers. For various forms of antisocial
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  behavior. And indeed, at one point when I
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  was 19, the cops actually caught me and I very nearly got myself
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  into a lot more trouble than I'd imagined because of the nature
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  of the offense that I committed. But I was very lucky I didn't
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  end up getting prosecuted over that.
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  I was crossing them. Released, and you might have
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  thought, lesson learned. But Oh no, not yet.
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  A long way to go before I was gonna learn anything.
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  So I spent three years at college, and I spent most of my
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  money on booze and cigarettes and occasionally on cash, each
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  which I didn't particularly care for at the time.
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  I preferred drinking. And then I met a girl and I fell
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  in love and I got married. And that actually put the brakes
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  on things for me. Not that I knew that at the
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  time. So much of what I'm saying here
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  is hindsight. I wasn't aware of what was going
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  on, but I I managed to. I suppose I was a binge fit, and
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  is what I'm trying to say. Whenever I had the opportunity
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  to drink, I would drink and I would usually drink more than
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  other people around me and end up in a state where I was quite
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  obviously more drunk than anyone else.
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  But nobody seemed to mind, for at least I didn't think they
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  did. And it wasn't like I was
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  creating big problems for myself.
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  And as I say, it was, you know, wasn't happening that
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  frequently. But then when I was in my late
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  20s, I picked up cannabis again. And then to this day, I don't
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  really know why I did. But this time I got right into
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  it. I really liked it and I was
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  delighted to find that if I just put a bit of vising in my eyes.
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  To get rid of the road, Max and you know, and smoked a couple of
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  siggies. After I had a few bones, people
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  couldn't smell it. People couldn't see it in my
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  eyes. My speech wasn't slurred.
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  My movements were not clumsy and awkward.
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  Nobody knew. Nobody knew that I was off my
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  Nana. And so this was great.
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  And from that period in my late 20s, right through to my late
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  30s, that became. A principal drug for me, I was
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  still drinking and I whenever I had the chance to drink, I was
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  still drinking far too much to be getting piss.
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  But I I'd now found this other drug that must seem to make it
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  much easier for me to get out of it and and yet to function.
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  You might sign, but then when I was my early 40s, I think about
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  it in 4142. My wife had finally got sick of
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  living with somebody who was felt not really there.
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  And when when we had this, what do you call it?
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  A discussion about our future. I decided it would better if I
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  left than she agreed. So I moved out and I moved into
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  a little flat in inner city Sydney and I started to drink
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  every day. And whenever I ran out of
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  cannabis, I drank very heavily and I now found myself in a
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  situation where I started to delude myself that I didn't have
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  any problems with these substances because I was able to
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  put them down. So I could go without cannabis,
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  but then I'd have to drink and I could go without alcohol, but
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  then I'd have to smoke cannabis. And somehow I thought this was
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  great. I thought I was doing really
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  good job of balancing all of this out.
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  My wife was spiraling out of control at this point because I
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  was smoking heavily and drinking heavily.
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  I ran into an old friend called Henry who told me that he'd been
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  clean and sober for, I think at the time, three or four years,
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  thanks to A A and one night he took me to an A A meeting.
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  I thought I was taking him there.
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  I thought I was giving him a list there, but I now realized
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  he was trying to check me. Into a A and I I thought it was
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  all, you know, for him. I didn't really pay attention to
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  what the people were saying. And I figured it was all just
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  then they they were just all alcoholic losers, not me and I I
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  had not a problem, had I? I even remember one of one
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  member saying to me at the end of one of these meetings that
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  Henry calmed me into going to, he said.
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  How much did you drink last night?
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  And I said very proudly, oh, I drink a whole bottle of bourbon
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  last night and he said you're an alcoholic.
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  And there anyway, I gave him a quick carrot to rest and some
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  West and still had no idea, did I that there was a problem here.
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  And then things got even worse because my wife was still keen
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  to have me back and I managed to convince her.
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  That I'd stopped drinking and stopped using cannabis, and I
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  told her that I'd been going to a A and that I was now cured.
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  He didn't drink anymore. So the poor woman let me back
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  into the house. And now I had needed a bigger
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  problem because now I had to hide it.
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  I had to hide everything. I couldn't even drink openly,
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  let let alone smoked cannabis. And my life became anything more
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  difficult because I was always trying to hide everything.
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  And the stress of trying to lead this double life, that meant
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  that I just used more and more drums and more and more alcohol.
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  And then one day. And I'm first forwarding a
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  little bit now to when I was in my early 50s and I was now
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  drinking around the clock. And I was drinking when I was at
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  work and one day I finished and I had been in shift at I think
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  it's just before midnight. By which time I I consumed a
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  whole bottle of whiskey and on the way home I blacked out,
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  drove into a tree. Every member of the emergency
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  services that turned up at that accident told me I was lucky to
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  be alive, and I can't help but believe me that just every part
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  of the power had been absolutely smashed to pieces except
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  miraculous 1A small bubble of safety around the driver's seat.
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  I escaped for it relatively on Skype and you might have thought
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  that that would be a bit of a wake up call, but I just decided
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  that since I've been drinking whiskey and had this accident in
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  future, I would just think wine when I was driving and that
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  would be much safer. However, just a few weeks after
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  that, my wife finally called time on my whole thing and told
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  me she'd had enough and it was over.
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  And what I now realize was a desperate attempt by me together
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  to reconsider this. I went to a A I mean, this time
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  I actually went to a A I wasn't being dragged along there by
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  someone else, however well meaning in order to try and save
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  me. I was trying to save myself.
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  Or was I? Maybe I was just trying to save
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  the marriage. Anyway, I walked into my first a
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  a meeting in Bondi Junction and. The secretary of that meeting
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  was a man called Patrick, and he approached me and he said, are
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  you okay? And I burst into tears.
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  I couldn't say a word. And he said to me, you're in the
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  right place. And for the next 90 minutes, I
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  listened to men and women of all different ages and from all
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  kinds of different backgrounds describing their drinking, and
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  every single one of them sounded like me.
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  They were all telling stories about me.
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  It was as if someone had already told them about me and I related
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  to literally every single one of them because they all talked
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  about the way they drank and talked about their obsession
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  with drinking and how they couldn't go without it and how
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  much it consumed their lives. And I knew that this was the
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  place I needed to be. And when I left that meeting
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  that that I remember at the end of it, Patrick, that said you
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  can leave here today and never pick up another drink and be
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  here bad. And I thought, yeah, that's what
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  I want. I want to stop drinking and I
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  want to be happy about it. I got myself a sponsor, I got a
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  copy of the Big Book, I joined the Home group and I started
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  doing all of the things that they suggested I do if I wanted
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  to say so. It was an amazing experience to
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  go through the steps with the sponsor, in particular for me,
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  the Step 4 inventory. Acquainted me with aspects of
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  myself that I just did not know with that and whilst it was
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  shuffling there are times somewhat depressing.
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  I just knew that this was something in thought that I
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  needed to do because I knew I had to change and I knew the
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  change had to be something more than just not betrayed in the
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  book. In the big book about garlics
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  and All of Us by early on I think he describes this program
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  was a design for Bigam. And that's exactly what I
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  needed. I hadn't realized until that
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  point that I'd be made some sort of Gazan for living.
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  I had no moral compass. I had no foundation.
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  I really wasn't drifting through lights, and I was jolk and sound
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  all the time. So I stayed sober for 3 1/2
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  years in Alcoholics Anonymous. And then I started to get up
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  myself about it and think, well, I've got God on my side and.
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  I don't really need to go to all these meetings, do I?
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  And so. So I stopped going and I went
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  away for a trip, and seven weeks later I was pissed and sound
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  again and I was gone for about a couple of years.
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  People had told me when I just got sober that if I went away
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  things would get worse, that I wouldn't just go back to where I
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  had been. They were right.
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  Things did get much worse. I took more drugs, I dragged
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  more alcohol and I was more depressed.
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  And eventually I found myself killed up in the fecal position
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  on the floor in my house, boring my eyes out on a daily basis.
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  At this point, my house had an armchair for me to sit in, a TV
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  for me to shout at, and a mattress on the floor for me to
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  fall onto when I had enough trying to stay upright in the
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  chair. It was a miserable, miserable
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  experience, and I don't mean I've ever been more unhappy than
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  I was then. But I finally got myself
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  together enough to realize that there was a place I could deal
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  with. I have a solution, but I needed
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  to go back to Alcoholics Anonymous.
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  So I did, and I once again started going to meetings every
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  day. I got myself a sponsor, I
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  started reading the book, and I started going through the steps
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  again. I have not been able to adhere
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  to these principles of Alcoholics Anonymous faithfully
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  for all of the time that I've been here.
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  But I'm grateful for the sobriety that it's given me.
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  I'm grateful for the sobriety that I've got to doubt.
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  I would not be able to do this without Alcoholics Anonymous,
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  because I need some kind of a program to which I can
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  constantly return that tells me what to do.
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  I need a sponsor, someone who's been sober for a long time and
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  he knows this program inside out and they can give me consistent
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  and reliable and fights. About what to do with the
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  program. And I need the fellowship of
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  other members of Alcoholics and all this.
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  After all, if I turned up at a A meetings and I was the only one
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  there, I'd be in the worst trouble than that I am staying
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  at home. So I'm forever grateful.
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  I hope to the people who turn up at these meetings and are part
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  of this fellowship, this fellowship and the program, and
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  as as best I can manage it, some sort of service.
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  To the fellowship helps me to not only stay sober, but stay in
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  a better frame of mind, to be in a better state of being.
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  And that gives me the freedom I never had when I was drinking
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  and taking drugs to actually make sensible choices in life
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  instead of making stupid ones. So I'm a grateful member of
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  Alcoholics Anonymous today, and I couldn't always say that,
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  believe me. So thank you for listening to
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  me. Sure.
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  We have local meetings for the full week in the local area.
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  Monday is Gala meeting at 8:00, Tuesday is Elizabeth E at 8:00,
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  Wednesday is Elizabeth E at 8:00, Thursday is 2 Wells at
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  8:00 and Friday is Salisbury at 8:00.
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  There's a meeting at Devon Park at 12:00 and on Sunday there's a
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  maintenance Salisbury at 7:00 and many of the maintenance in
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  the area. For details of your local
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  maintenance, please phone 13 under 222222.
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  And once again, if anyone you know is struggling with alcohol
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  issues, police call Alcoholics Anonymous on 13 under 222222 the
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  website isaasa.org dot a U.