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SOBER TALK SA - Leah · Sober Talk SA

• 0:00
  The feeling that it gave me. Yeah.
• 0:04
  I just, you know, I sat there and I waited for him to want
• 0:07
  another to, you know, I kept asking, do you want another
• 0:10
  beer? Because I wanted to have another
• 0:11
  drink. And, you know, I ended up really
• 0:14
  sick that day. My parents were going to a party
• 0:16
  and I was throwing up in the back of the car.
• 0:18
  And. But it made me feel good.
• 0:21
  It made me. Yeah.
• 0:23
  It gave me that warm fuzzy feeling.
• 0:25
  And yeah, then, you know, I started drinking at the age of
• 0:30
  13. I'd spend all my pocket money on
• 0:33
  alcohol. And, you know, as a blackout
• 0:37
  drinker, from day one, I'd, I'd drink, drink a lot and black out
• 0:44
  and not remember getting home. And then I'd be, you know, I'd
• 0:49
  get grounded forgetting coming home late.
• 0:52
  I'd be chucking up and it just caused problems at home.
• 0:56
  So eventually my parents said, oh, you know, when you get a
• 0:59
  job, you can move out. And that's what I did.
• 1:01
  I couldn't wait till I got that job and I could move out and
• 1:06
  yeah. And I didn't have to answer to
• 1:07
  anyone. And then, yeah, I moved out on
• 1:13
  my own. And the drinking got worse
• 1:15
  because I didn't have to, you know, I didn't, you know, I
• 1:19
  could drink more. And it got, you know, it wasn't
• 1:21
  just weekends, it was during the week.
• 1:25
  And I just thought that was normal for somebody my age.
• 1:28
  I thought, you know, everybody parties that hard at my age.
• 1:32
  And I thought, oh, when I have kids in the family, I'll settle
• 1:34
  down. And, you know, I didn't didn't
• 1:37
  work like that. Got myself in lots of trouble,
• 1:40
  car accidents, hit and run accidents, assaulting police
• 1:45
  officers, you know, driving around with a, with a bottle of
• 1:50
  alcohol in my car, turning up to to work drunk in a blackout, not
• 1:54
  knowing what I'd done or you know, what time I'd left work.
• 1:58
  And, you know, it was just, it was a real problem, but I
• 2:02
  couldn't see it. Everybody else around me could
• 2:04
  see it. And you know, my parents, you
• 2:06
  know, my parents expected to get a phone call one night saying
• 2:09
  that I'd been in a car accident and I was gone.
• 2:12
  And, you know, I put them through true hell.
• 2:16
  And yeah, I just, I just didn't know how to stop, did not know
• 2:21
  how to stop. And, you know, I had kids and it
• 2:27
  just gave me more of a reason to drink because I didn't have to
• 2:31
  go to work. I was at home.
• 2:32
  I was drinking daily. I'd probably go through at some
• 2:36
  stages, you know, my, I'd swear off of it and I'll, I'm not
• 2:40
  going to drink. And it was like, you know, binge
• 2:43
  drinking and then other times it was daily drinking.
• 2:47
  I'd go through a bottle of vodka every day and, and, you know,
• 2:52
  and medication as well. Like I just didn't, you know, I
• 2:55
  thought I had agoraphobia. I thought I had anxiety.
• 2:59
  So I was going to the doctors and asking for medication.
• 3:02
  And that was, you know, that was another problem as well.
• 3:07
  But it was the end. It was the alcohol that was
• 3:11
  causing the anxiety and the depression, and I just didn't
• 3:14
  know what was wrong with me. It was like, what?
• 3:16
  Why am I feeling like this? And, you know, I just felt
• 3:19
  alone. Just felt really alone.
• 3:22
  All my life, I could be in a room full of people and just
• 3:25
  feel totally alone. And, you know, I had the family
• 3:28
  and support, but I just pushed him away.
• 3:33
  Yeah, just just didn't, just isolated towards the end, you
• 3:38
  know, I'd have alcohol stashed all over the house and people
• 3:41
  would say they're coming over and I'd have a drink hidden in
• 3:44
  the bathroom. I'd have 1 hidden in the kitchen
• 3:47
  just in case I couldn't get to 1 of them.
• 3:49
  And I just could not drink. Normally we'd have people over
• 3:53
  for a barbecue and I would have my normal drink sitting outside
• 3:57
  and then I'd be inside scaling out of a bottle.
• 4:00
  And, you know, to me, I didn't see there was a problem with
• 4:04
  that. And yeah, it wasn't until I went
• 4:09
  to my first parent teacher interview with my daughter's
• 4:14
  teacher, and I had to have shots of vodka to build up the courage
• 4:19
  to go in. And I didn't.
• 4:23
  Yeah. It was just, you know, she would
• 4:25
  have smelled the alcohol on me. And I just, you know, I started
• 4:29
  thinking, I don't want that sort of life.
• 4:31
  I want a better life for my kids.
• 4:32
  And yeah, I remember we were, I got sober two days before
• 4:38
  Christmas. We were going to a Christmas
• 4:41
  party and we got out at the bottle.
• 4:44
  Oh, and the guy behind the counter said, oh, anyone would
• 4:47
  think that you lived around here.
• 4:49
  And I just went all quiet and went and sat back in the car.
• 4:52
  And I just felt totally ashamed. And my partner was like, what
• 4:55
  was all that about? And I said, I don't know,
• 4:56
  because I thought I went to different bottlers and did all
• 5:01
  of that. Anyway, we went to the Christmas
• 5:03
  show and I had probably, I drank 1 vodka cruiser while we were
• 5:08
  there. And that was the last drink I
• 5:11
  ever had. And I decided to, you know, I
• 5:13
  went home that day and I got online and I did, went to the a,
• 5:17
  a website and did the little quiz that they had online and
• 5:22
  decided, well, maybe I might be an alcoholic.
• 5:25
  And then the next, you know, I googled a meeting that was close
• 5:29
  to me. I went to the they go to the
• 5:32
  hospital meeting and sat in the car, nervous, shivering,
• 5:36
  shaking. And you know, what if I see
• 5:39
  somebody that I know, what if you know, what if they know that
• 5:44
  I'm new or whatever, like, you know, that fear.
• 5:47
  And, you know, I walked into that meeting and, and I just
• 5:50
  broke down because I heard people's stories and I heard,
• 5:54
  you know, they were telling my story and I just felt it was
• 5:56
  nothing what I imagined an Alcoholic Anonymous meeting
• 6:02
  would be. And, you know, I just, I just
• 6:05
  found that I, I felt at home and I'd found a solution to my
• 6:09
  problem. I just the years I was going to
• 6:12
  counsel as psychologists and doctors.
• 6:15
  And you know what's wrong with me?
• 6:17
  Like, I blame it on my upbringing.
• 6:19
  My parents divorced, you know, but there was nothing wrong with
• 6:24
  my upbringing. It was just the fact that I was
• 6:27
  an alcoholic. And you put alcohol in my
• 6:29
  system, and I just cannot stop. I don't have an off switch.
• 6:34
  And, and it helped me escape. And I heard from that first
• 6:38
  meeting that, you know, you'll learn to live again.
• 6:42
  And I thought I knew how to live.
• 6:43
  Like, everything looked OK on the outside.
• 6:46
  You know, the house was clean, the kids were fed, the house,
• 6:50
  the car. But on the inside, I was just
• 6:53
  dying. I was a dying mess.
• 6:55
  I couldn't even go to the shops without a drink, couldn't even
• 6:57
  go out to my letterbox because I didn't want to see my neighbors.
• 7:01
  I didn't want to have to make a conversation with anybody.
• 7:04
  You know, I needed the alcohol to leave the house.
• 7:06
  And yeah, so I found Alcoholics Anonymous.
• 7:11
  And I haven't, you know, I haven't picked up a drink since.
• 7:13
  But the journey hasn't been easy like I, I did.
• 7:19
  I had to learn how to live again.
• 7:21
  I had to learn how to deal with my emotions.
• 7:23
  I had to learn how to deal with other human beings.
• 7:27
  I had to learn, you know, day-to-day things because, you
• 7:31
  know, even the gardening, I would have a few drinks to do
• 7:33
  the gardening or to do the housework and, you know, cooking
• 7:37
  and all of that sort of stuff. I had to learn to do it sober
• 7:41
  and it was raw or I got accepted into my nursing six months into
• 7:45
  my sobriety and I had to learn to deal with other people in my
• 7:50
  class and, you know, and learn to catch public transport.
• 7:54
  So. And yeah, that was hard.
• 7:58
  I, I got, I had a sponsor, I had somebody to guide me.
• 8:01
  I was ringing my sponsor daily and sometimes a few times a day
• 8:05
  because I didn't know how to deal with certain situations or,
• 8:09
  you know, I just needed that advice.
• 8:11
  I really did have to learn to live again.
• 8:13
  And, you know, today I have faith that everything's going to
• 8:18
  be OK. Like a, a showing me it's a
• 8:21
  spiritual program. And, you know, I have a higher
• 8:24
  power. I believe in a power greater
• 8:26
  than myself. And, you know, and that that's
• 8:29
  got me through a lot of the days as well.
• 8:30
  Like I'm not alone. Like I go to a meeting and
• 8:34
  there's like minded people that I can relate to and I can share
• 8:37
  about what's going on on my mind.
• 8:39
  Like, you know, for years my parents paid for psychologists
• 8:42
  and, you know, and I just didn't get anything out of them.
• 8:46
  I can go to a meeting today and I, you know, I leave with that
• 8:50
  piece. And, you know, when I first when
• 8:54
  I was drinking, I just had a head that wouldn't shut up.
• 8:57
  Like it was just continuous and negative.
• 9:00
  And, you know, slowly but surely I've nearly got 7 years up of
• 9:06
  sobriety and, you know, just a day at a time.
• 9:09
  But you know, slowly my, my mind has eased and I'm learning
• 9:15
  things about myself and, you know, about my behaviors and
• 9:19
  about other people. And, you know, because when I,
• 9:23
  when I was drinking, it was all everybody else's fault.
• 9:26
  I never looked at me like, you know, I was always pointing the
• 9:29
  finger at everybody else. If you didn't do this to me, I
• 9:31
  wouldn't have done that. And you know, that blame, But it
• 9:36
  was me, you know, and I, I've learned to set boundaries and
• 9:41
  I've learned to, you know, not people, please.
• 9:43
  I've just learned how to live life without alcohol.
• 9:47
  And you know, not every day is a good day, but it's a lot better
• 9:51
  than what it was when I was drinking.
• 9:53
  I don't have to pick up a drink today to to get through the day
• 9:58
  or, or a drug or just anything. Yeah.
• 10:03
  And I'm a part of my kids lives today.
• 10:06
  I can do things with them. It's about, you know, it's not
• 10:09
  just about me. It's about other people and, you
• 10:12
  know, giving back. And, you know, I was
• 10:14
  self-centered when I first got sober.
• 10:16
  It was, you know, whatever it was about me.
• 10:20
  But it's not today. It's about others.
• 10:22
  And yeah, I don't know, I've just got a laugh today.
• 10:29
  I can be a part of the community like I was never a part of.
• 10:33
  You know, I can go to the gym. The first time I ever went to
• 10:35
  the gym, when I was drinking, I'd, I'd had shots of vodka and
• 10:39
  it was sweating out in my system.
• 10:40
  You can probably smell it from a mile away.
• 10:43
  And you know, I just, I couldn't, even when I first got
• 10:46
  sober, I couldn't even make conversations with people.
• 10:48
  Like, I just didn't know, you know, I could say hi, bye, but I
• 10:53
  didn't know how to hold that conversation.
• 10:55
  And now, you know, I've learned to learn to communicate with
• 11:00
  other human beings and learn to, you know, live, live, live a
• 11:06
  normal life. And, you know, I'm grateful and
• 11:10
  and you know, there was that shame around my alcoholism when
• 11:13
  I first got sober. Today.
• 11:15
  I'm not ashamed of it. You know, I work.
• 11:18
  I work in a doctor's surgery and one of one of the doctors today
• 11:22
  gave us all a bottle of wine and, and only a few people know
• 11:27
  there that I'm a recovering alcoholic.
• 11:29
  And but, you know, I said to the doctor, I don't drink.
• 11:31
  I said I'm allergic to alcohol. And, you know, some people don't
• 11:36
  get that, but I am I, you know, yeah, soon as I have a drink, I
• 11:41
  can't stop. And it sets off that compulsion.
• 11:44
  And, you know, so for me, I can't have that one drink.
• 11:48
  You know, I will never be able to have just one drink because
• 11:52
  that one drink is, you know, the first drink that does the
• 11:55
  damage. I'll have that one drink and
• 11:56
  I'll continuously, you know, I won't stop.
• 12:00
  And yeah. But yeah, I don't know.
• 12:06
  Yeah, I just don't don't have that off switch with alcohol and
• 12:11
  I know that it's not going to make anything better.
• 12:14
  So yeah, I think, you know, I don't know.
• 12:20
  I think I'll think I'll leave it there.
• 12:23
  What do you think was your rock bottom?
• 12:27
  I, I guess, you know, not not being able to leave the house,
• 12:32
  like, you know, a family member would say that they're coming
• 12:35
  over and I had many rock bottoms.
• 12:39
  But I guess towards the end, I was just sick and tired of
• 12:42
  feeling depressed and anxious. And, you know, and I just, I
• 12:48
  just come to a, you know, I didn't know what was wrong with
• 12:51
  me. I didn't want that sort of life
• 12:52
  for my kids. You know, I wanted them to have
• 12:55
  a better life. I didn't want to always drink
• 12:57
  driving with them in the car, you know, just to go and visit
• 13:00
  people. I'd have to get a six pack of
• 13:04
  alcohol and, you know, just to get that courage to get out.
• 13:10
  And I, I just didn't want to, didn't want to live like that
• 13:13
  anymore. What do you think's been the
• 13:16
  most helpful part about Alcoholics Anonymous?
• 13:21
  I, I guess the support and other people's story because I can
• 13:26
  relate and I don't feel alone. Like everybody understands how
• 13:32
  you feel and you know, and the more you know you share, the
• 13:36
  better you feel. So I guess it's about more being
• 13:39
  open as well about what's going on inside of me.
• 13:45
  My sponsor taught me like you're only as sick as the secret you
• 13:48
  keep. So it's about being honest with,
• 13:51
  with yourself and with other people.
• 13:53
  So. When you said you went to a
• 13:55
  psychologist, how did you find that?
• 13:57
  Did you find that they encourage you to stop drinking or was it
• 14:02
  just change your ways or something?
• 14:07
  Well, I, I guess I probably wasn't being honest about how I
• 14:11
  was drinking either. I'd say that I'd have a few
• 14:14
  wines that I wasn't being, you know, I'd lie about how much I
• 14:17
  was drinking because I was in denial.
• 14:19
  And, and I guess a lot of the time, you know, I've been to
• 14:22
  many psychologists and counselors and I guess they
• 14:26
  don't understand the addiction or the alcoholism.
• 14:33
  And it wasn't until, you know, a lot of doctors don't understand
• 14:37
  it either. But you know, some, some do.
• 14:40
  But it it's just, yeah. And I've learnt more in a A than
• 14:43
  what I have anywhere else. As regards Alcoholics Anonymous,
• 14:49
  do you get a lot of support from ladies in Alcoholics Anonymous?
• 14:54
  Is there? Is there AI?
• 14:57
  Suppose you couldn't see a good movement of women in Alcoholics
• 15:01
  Anonymous at meetings and things.
• 15:04
  Yeah, there is. Yeah.
• 15:05
  There's a lot of women at the meetings.
• 15:08
  It's not just like all about or, you know, it's not just all men
• 15:12
  and everybody's supportive. Like from my first meeting,
• 15:17
  people gave out their phone numbers.
• 15:19
  And you know, you generally, like the women help other women
• 15:23
  and the men help the men. And because you can relate to
• 15:26
  stories and they also have women's meetings as well, which
• 15:32
  is good because you can share a little bit more than what you
• 15:36
  did than what you do at any other meeting.
• 15:39
  And it's just, it's just the support and the understanding of
• 15:42
  of the other members. How did you find going in the
• 15:47
  early days with your kids, with the young kids?
• 15:50
  Did you find that difficult debatons?
• 15:54
  Were you embraced at meetings or.
• 15:57
  No, everyone was supportive like with the kids.
• 16:00
  And because I understood it, you know, a lot of people, you know,
• 16:03
  people have kids and your sobriety comes first.
• 16:05
  And if you don't have a sober life, you won't have, you know,
• 16:08
  you'll lose your kids basically, or some people do.
• 16:13
  So, no, everybody was supportive and my kids like, you know, they
• 16:18
  enjoy going to the meetings. They get their biscuits and they
• 16:20
  get to, you know, sometimes there's other kids there.
• 16:23
  And, you know, to start off with, I would, because they were
• 16:26
  quite young, I would take them and give them their iPads and
• 16:30
  put their earphones in because I guess I, I had a bit of shame
• 16:34
  around the alcoholism and didn't want them to hear everything.
• 16:38
  But today they know that, you know, we're going to a meeting
• 16:42
  and and I guess they they get a bit more of an understanding of
• 16:46
  it as well, Not that they need to take on like grown-ups
• 16:50
  problems, but a bit more of an understanding of a higher power
• 16:52
  and to have faith. And it's just just a different
• 16:55
  way of life. And they do camps and stuff, you
• 16:59
  know, a a camps, which is good for the kids and allotene.
• 17:03
  So the kids can, you know, develop a faith in a higher
• 17:06
  power and hopefully, like, steer them in the right direction
• 17:11
  because I do believe that alcoholism is a family disease.
• 17:15
  And you know, if I can help them in any way, but like by example,
• 17:22
  then I think it's good for them and for me.
• 17:25
  How old were your kids when you went to a?
• 17:28
  A OK so my son was just about 1 and my daughter was 4 so she
• 17:36
  just started school. Do you think her starting school
• 17:40
  was part of the the trigger because you had to?
• 17:43
  Yeah, I guess so, because I had to be a part of the have part of
• 17:47
  society. I had to like, you know, leave
• 17:49
  the house daily to drop her off and you know, I had to be around
• 17:54
  other humans. I couldn't isolate and hideaway
• 17:57
  anymore. And and I guess I had AI had a
• 17:59
  little bit of a scare like my son.
• 18:01
  I had him in a a carrier thing and I was vacuuming and he was
• 18:08
  only young and I was drinking, obviously going to vacuuming.
• 18:13
  And I looked down and it was like he wasn't breathing.
• 18:16
  And I like put him on the bed and blew into his mouth and he
• 18:20
  sort of started moving around. So whether something like, you
• 18:23
  know, whether he wasn't breathing or not, he could have
• 18:26
  just been asleep. But it was just scary.
• 18:28
  It really scared me. I just thought, no, I can't, you
• 18:31
  know, I can't. I can't do this anymore.
• 18:34
  So that that really scared me as well.
• 18:36
  Like, yeah. How difficult was it for you to
• 18:41
  not drink after that? Well, I guess I, I went to other
• 18:47
  substances because I just have an addictive personality.
• 18:51
  But it was always, I always came back to alcohol.
• 18:54
  But yeah, like I, I, you know, until I, I, I just realized that
• 19:00
  I needed total abstinence from any, anything because I've got
• 19:03
  an addictive personality. And it wasn't, you know, I got
• 19:06
  to as many meetings as I could to stop the craving of alcohol.
• 19:12
  And, and they teach you in Alcoholics Anonymous, it's just
• 19:15
  a day at a time. So instead of like, you know,
• 19:17
  thinking about, you know, I'm not going to have a drink for
• 19:21
  the rest of my life, it was just, you know, just for today
• 19:26
  and the, you know, the slogans, First things first.
• 19:28
  Like some days I get up and and, you know, it's the next best
• 19:33
  thing. Like, you know, just one foot in
• 19:36
  front of the other. Like it's not easy because I
• 19:38
  always have the alcohol there to get me through the day, but I
• 19:41
  can't do that now. But it's a lot easier than what
• 19:43
  it was. I don't feel, I don't wake up
• 19:46
  feeling depressed and anxious. And who did I ring last night?
• 19:51
  Who did I abuse? What did I do?
• 19:53
  How did I get home? Is the car in the garage?
• 19:56
  Is the, you know, the kids OK? I don't have to wake up.
• 20:02
  You know, I can wake up feeling fresh and, you know, knowing
• 20:07
  what I've done the night before and, you know, not none of that.
• 20:12
  Yeah. None of that guilt.
• 20:14
  I don't carry the guilt around anymore like I used to.
• 20:20
  Yeah, and it's, I don't know, Alcoholics Anonymous just
• 20:23
  changed me. It's helped me become a more of
• 20:27
  an honest person. And, you know, I didn't like who
• 20:31
  I was when I first got sober. I couldn't, you know, I couldn't
• 20:34
  look people in the eye. I couldn't, you know, just
• 20:37
  because I didn't like me, I couldn't walk into a room with
• 20:39
  my head up. Like now I can, you know, I can
• 20:43
  have a conversation with people. I can be, you know, as normal,
• 20:47
  as normal, you know, as I can be out there and I can go to work
• 20:50
  and I can, you know, be a part of it and not, not have to hide
• 20:56
  away from anything. I don't, there's no, yeah.
• 20:59
  I don't have that shame anymore. And the anxieties, you know,
• 21:05
  it's lifted some. Some days you feel anxious, but
• 21:09
  it's nothing like it used to be. Like, you know, I thought I had
• 21:12
  agoraphobia when I was drinking, Like, you know, I can't leave
• 21:15
  the house. But it was it was what the
• 21:17
  alcohol was doing to my nervous system.
• 21:21
  And I was just full of fear. I was scared of everything and
• 21:23
  everyone. And today it's not like that.
• 21:28
  So yeah, it's definitely made a difference in my life.
• 21:31
  And I try and get to as many meetings as I can.
• 21:36
  When I first got sober, I just couldn't sit with me.
• 21:39
  I didn't like who I was. And then some days if I didn't
• 21:43
  have the kids, so I'd get to two or three meetings a day and, you
• 21:47
  know, traveling around. But I think that's what kept me
• 21:49
  sober today. I've sort of, you know, I've got
• 21:54
  an all or nothing personality. So I go from one extreme to the
• 21:58
  other until I find that balance. And that's with everything that
• 22:00
  can do with exercise, food, whatever.
• 22:02
  But you know, and that's what it was like with my drinking.
• 22:05
  But yeah, now I get, you know, 234 meetings a week.
• 22:09
  Like I don't, you know, that that's what helps me.
• 22:11
  I, I go to a meeting if I'm having, I go to a meeting
• 22:14
  regardless if I'm having a bad day or not.
• 22:17
  But you know, I go to a meeting and I leave and I feel like I'm
• 22:22
  in a natural high. Like it, you know, it just helps
• 22:25
  getting all your feelings out. Like, and I, and I do say today,
• 22:27
  like, meetings are my medicine because they help with my head
• 22:32
  sometimes. And yeah, because some days my
• 22:35
  head can be, you know, I'm more positive than what I used to be,
• 22:39
  but some days my head can click into negative mode and I've got
• 22:42
  to readjust it. And yeah, and it's easier to do
• 22:46
  that now that I've been sober. It wasn't as easy to do that
• 22:49
  when I was drinking. Thank you for having me.
• 22:52
  Welcome back. We have a number of local
• 22:55
  meetings in the area. There's a meeting every night in
• 22:58
  the Salisbury area. There's one Monday night meeting
• 23:02
  at Gawler at 8:00 PM Tuesday, Elizabeth E at 8:00 PM
• 23:07
  Wednesday, Elizabeth E at 8:00 PM, Thursday at 2 Wells at 8:00
• 23:12
  PM, Friday in Salisbury at 8:00 PM, Saturday at Devron Park at
• 23:17
  12:00, Sunday in Salisbury at 7:00 PM.
• 23:21
  And for further details of your local meetings, please call 1300
• 23:26
  Double 22222. Once again, it's up to anyone
• 23:30
  you know struggling with the alcohol issues.
• 23:33
  Please call Alcoholics Anonymous on 1300 Double 22222 or check
• 23:39
  out their website ata.org dot AU.