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Sober Talk SA - Sam · Sober Talk SA

0:00
Welcome to Sober Talk. I'm Dennis and I'm an alcoholic.
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Soap 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.
0:17
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 alive with any sect, denomination, politics,
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organization or institution, does not wish to engage in any
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controversy, either 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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Yeah, hi. My name's Sam.
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I'm an alcoholic and I'm, yeah, very grateful to be here
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tonight. Up until very recently, this is
1:17
my Home group and I've had to take a sabbatical for a little
1:20
while because I've got a commitment on Wednesday nights.
1:23
But yeah, so it's, it's lovely to be here tonight.
1:27
But yeah, I still find it hard to believe that, you know, I'm
1:29
having my third birthday. It's it's incredible for me
1:33
because I first came into AA in 2007 and I was 37 at the time.
1:39
And I stuck around and I did everything right for 16 months.
1:43
I got to 16 months sober and, and then I stepped away from
1:48
meetings and I was drinking within a month and I didn't come
1:53
back for nine years. So there was a lot of, I guess,
1:57
you know, a lot of shame around it, but it didn't do me very
2:02
good. It didn't do me any good at all
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because by the time I did come back into the ruins, life had
2:08
changed a great deal. You know, everything that I had
2:10
regained and rebuilt, I had lost and, you know, even worse.
2:16
So I guess the one thing I've done right this time around is
2:20
just to keep coming back no matter what.
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And luckily, you know, that that's, you know, I guess that
2:28
that's worked for me, that's kept me sober one day at a time.
2:31
But I know in my early days, this time around, I don't think
2:36
I've ever been in a worse position, you know, mentally,
2:39
emotionally, physically, spiritually, basically.
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And I came to this meeting as my Home group.
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I just knew this is where I needed to be.
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And I think, you know, sometimes having this Home group for me
2:54
just really saved my sanity because I, I came back initially
2:59
in about March and it was basically after the longest
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drink I'd ever had because I was never a daily drinker as such.
3:09
I was a Bender drinker and you know, for a great many years,
3:12
even in my years outside of IAI, would pick up maybe twice a
3:17
year, you know, two weeks. I'd drink terribly, always end
3:21
up in hospital in a real mess, and then I could be sober again
3:27
for a long time. But I could never really get
3:30
past that 7 or 8 month mark. That was the way it seemed to
3:34
go. And of course, without a program
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for so many years, it just was, you know, fighting an uphill
3:40
battle. So there was madness, you know,
3:43
between my ears in between. But yeah, I continued that
3:48
pattern until about COVID. And during COVID, I found that I
3:54
just had a license really, you know, to be isolating.
3:59
And you know, that just, I found that all of a sudden that
4:02
pattern went out the window. So instead of having months
4:05
between my drinks, I was having, you know, weeks between my
4:08
drinks and things just got worse and never really recovered from
4:12
there. So, so late 2022, I picked up a
4:18
drink and I literally didn't put it down for three months.
4:21
And I had never drunk longer than three weeks before.
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I think once I drank for three weeks and I just destroyed my
4:27
life completely during that time and really became totally
4:31
suicidal. I couldn't leave my house.
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Yeah. It was just a nightmare.
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And it was really only bumping into another member, funnily
4:40
enough, in a detox unit that really just between the two of
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us, she, she was able to come and pick me up and take me to my
4:47
first meeting. And you know, that was really
4:52
the best thing. But you know, that saved my life
4:54
really. And I managed to muddle on for
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three months. You know, I was staying sober,
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but I had one more drink in me and it luckily it turned out to
5:03
be the shortest drink I ever had because I drank half bottle of
5:07
wine that day. At three months, I think I'd
5:09
just turned 3 months. And you know, I got a call from
5:13
my counsellor. It was a good job, really ended
5:15
up, you know, getting some help, spent a bit of time in hospital
5:20
and I've never looked back since and which I'm grateful for.
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And so coming, you know, coming to this meeting has helped me,
5:29
helped me immensely because I, I had always believed in higher
5:33
power and yet I came to see that I had no trust whatsoever.
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And I really needed desperately to work on my spiritual
5:44
condition. And this meeting has just been
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fantastic for me because I have learned so much from just
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listening to other people talk about their spiritual journey.
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And that has helped me immensely.
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And my spiritual journey has really changed a great deal.
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You know, I probably started out with a very traditional view of
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a higher power and that has moved a great deal and to
6:08
something that fits me a lot better and that I'm a lot more
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comfortable with. Today.
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I try to have a very strict, I try to have a very strict
6:19
meditation and prayer program for me.
6:22
I know that that's just critical.
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If I leave the house in the morning without having done my
6:30
that part of my program, nothing seems to work as well.
6:35
You know, it's like I've got the wrong fuel in my car or, you
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know, in me. I just haven't got the right
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fuel. And, and sometimes I think it's,
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it's just simply the practice of actually sitting and putting
6:49
aside that time and, and having that discipline.
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But I always seem to read something.
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I've got 3 little books I read and I read something every day
6:59
that I need to hear. And most days I have to revisit
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that, you know, at any point during the day.
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But I think that's, you know, some of the, the best things
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I've got from this program is learning to be able to do that,
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you know, to stop and restart the day, pause when agitated,
7:17
all those little things that will pop into my head because
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they've been programmed into my wiring.
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But yeah, just to go back to the beginning, I grew up in a family
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of four. I had great parents.
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My mum's still still around today.
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Yeah. I had a a fairly idyllic
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childhood. My parents sort of education was
7:40
really big for them. They, they basically made a lot
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of sacrifices for, for us to all get what they believed to be a
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really good education. And I became a single mother at
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the age of 19. And my parents continued to
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support me to, to be able to, you know, continue my education.
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And I wouldn't know, I wouldn't have managed without them.
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They were incredible and life was pretty good.
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You know, by the, the time I was 24, I was, I moved to Canberra.
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I, I went over there to do some postgraduate work.
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So by the time I was 24, I had a master's degree.
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And yeah, you know, life was good.
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My parents were proud of me. Within a couple of years, things
8:23
had changed. I met the wrong person, let's
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just say. And even though I believe I was
8:30
born an alcoholic, that's when my drinking really took off at
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the age of 25. I took it to it like a medicine.
8:39
I still remember the first time after an episode, one of his
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episodes, I had this, I was shaking so much.
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And I had this memory come in of watching movies and people
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having alcohol to, you know, calm down.
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And that's what I did. And I that was it.
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Then I learned how to, you know, cope.
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So, you know, the next 12 years it was became a battle.
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You know, the benders started off, you know, being, you know,
9:05
maybe 24 hours and, you know, a couple years later they were
9:09
three days. And then a couple years after
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that they were up to, you know, a week.
9:13
And, and then eventually the hospital visit started and, and
9:18
things just went from bad to worse.
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And, and as I can look back with clarity now, I can also see that
9:23
because I, I was drinking on all of my problems, it created a
9:27
condition where I was it, it made me incapable of getting out
9:30
of the situation I was in. Because I can look back now and
9:34
think, oh, my God, how did I, you know, But I ended up being
9:38
in that relationship for 12 years.
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And I can see now that, you know, yeah, a lot of things came
9:46
in, you know, hiding the drinking, hiding what was going
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on. There was a lot of shame.
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I was living in another country. I was in New Zealand at the time
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and it was really hard because I had this amazing job.
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I was working in our High Commissioner over there and I
10:01
was really, really happy in my work.
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But I had this horrible home life and my family were all over
10:08
here in Australia. And I just kept all these
10:10
secrets. And of course, the more secrets
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I kept, the more drinking I had to do.
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And it was just, yeah, it was just a living hell.
10:17
Finally, you know, I came back to Australia and by that stage I
10:21
had two more little kids and, you know, things just didn't
10:26
really. Then things got better for a
10:28
while, but once I got back here, there was no more hiding my
10:31
drinking. My family was here and there was
10:33
no more hiding my drinking. There was no more hiding what
10:36
was going on. And yeah, things changed.
10:41
And so eventually, with a lot of help, I was able to get out of
10:43
that relationship, but I had to crash and burn beforehand.
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I, you know, I ended up my drinking ended up taking me to a
10:51
suicide attempt where I caused a house fire.
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I was lucky, very lucky to get out with my life, but I also got
10:59
out with a conviction for us. And even though that wasn't my
11:02
intention, you know, that's what happened.
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And so I was very lucky. I got a suspended sentence and I
11:10
kept my nose clean ever since. But having that hanging over my
11:14
head, even though it was a very long time ago, it's I've had to
11:18
answer for every time I've tried to get a clearance for anything
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or, you know, I mean, that's pretty much now I'm, I'm OK.
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But the first time I just know all that embarrassment and shame
11:31
coming back and having to, you know, just sit and discuss what
11:34
happened, why it happened. Yeah.
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Yeah. It's it's, it's made me just
11:40
have to really look back, you know, just not just haven't gone
11:43
through the steps to be able to assess everything that my
11:45
drinking and my alcoholism has has brought into my life and all
11:50
of those that I love. But, but having to actually
11:55
outside of the IO program answer for those things as well.
11:59
But yeah, you get a lot of clarity.
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And even though I still carry a lot of shame around that stuff,
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I also recognize that, you know, that was that was the way, you
12:14
know, I acted while I was in active addiction.
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And I haven't actually, you know, that was in 2007.
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And despite all my drinking since, I've never lost my
12:25
license for drinking. I've never doesn't mean to say
12:28
that I didn't drink drive. I did.
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But yeah, I'm very lucky that I've, I've managed to, to have a
12:37
clean record since but but yeah, so I, I had a great family, but
12:42
you know, I ended up losing it all after I caused the house
12:47
fire. I lost my children, my ex
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partner took them to New Zealand, so I had to fight an
12:54
international court case. It was just honestly, it was
12:59
just a nightmare and I was estranged from my mum and my dad
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and my brothers for years, absolutely years.
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And even though I did get my children back, they had to be
13:13
removed from me a number of times by family after that.
13:16
You know, every time I relapsed, it wasn't something I could ever
13:20
hide, not the way I drank. So, yeah, my kids have been
13:24
through an awful lot. And it's a miracle, you know,
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that I have them in my life today because when I crawled
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back in here three years ago, I didn't have anybody but one son
13:36
talking to me. And I didn't.
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I didn't think anybody was ever going to talk to me again.
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Yeah. So my, my youngest son's only 16
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and he has been through so much. He spent many, many years being
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raised by by his auntie because, yeah, I mean, in between my
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drinking bouts, I was capable. But children don't need that.
14:03
They need, you know, they need consistency.
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And so with my last drink, he just stopped talking to me at
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all. You know, it took him nine
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months before he'd even answer a text message.
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And I just, yeah, I just thought that that was it for me.
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And I, So coming to meetings every day was really just what
14:27
kept me signing and kept me putting 1 foot in front of the
14:32
other. But I, I can see that if I
14:34
didn't have these meetings and I didn't have, you know, I, I was
14:37
very lucky. I had Megan, Sharon, my
14:41
neighbors, and they took me to so many meetings that I probably
14:45
would have found it difficult to get to on my own.
14:47
And just a constant encouragement and from the other
14:51
beautiful people that I and friends in the rooms.
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And I just, yeah, and, and I guess, you know, my faith in
14:57
higher power, just put 1 foot in front of the other.
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And yeah, it was, it was incredible.
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But coming here strengthened my, my faith and also, you know,
15:10
just the tools, just listening to other people.
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And I learned my ears were open, I think more than they'd ever
15:17
been open. And I think I had the gift of
15:19
desperation that I'd never had before.
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And I think, you know, sometimes when you, you don't have enough
15:26
faith, you know, in yourself and you feel like there's no hope,
15:31
you find hope in these rooms. That's what I found anyway.
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I didn't believe in myself for a long, long time.
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I didn't think I could stay sober at all.
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But I got hope in these rooms on a daily basis.
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And it was what I needed. And that just grew.
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That just grew slowly. And, and then things started to
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happen. You know, I started a new course
15:54
of study. And then when I was six months
15:56
sober, I, I got a new job and, and my son, I just rang up one
16:03
day and said I'd like to start coming for weekends.
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My other son, who's now 24, he had already, he was the only
16:09
person left talking to me and I was grateful for that.
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And, and my son's been back with me ever since my youngest town.
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And I just know that when I have birthdays, I don't like to make
16:24
a fuss about them because I just am so grateful.
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I just everyday I'm grateful. But my boys who still live with
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me, honestly, they celebrate these birthdays like nothing on
16:36
earth. They really do because they knew
16:39
a mother who was ironically sober for most of the time, but
16:44
I wasn't consistently sober. And so they to have me sober for
16:50
three years is just, to them, that's a miracle.
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Yeah. So there is so much that I have
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to be grateful out for. And, and I think that's one of
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the things that I just, I find is actually the most central to
17:06
my sobriety is my gratitude. There's not a day that goes by
17:11
that I don't, that's not the first thing that's running in my
17:14
head because, yeah, it's just when I think of how much I've
17:19
got to be grateful for, I realise that I don't need to ask
17:24
for anything else. You know what I mean?
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I just, there's nothing I need to ask for.
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I asked for the, you know, to stay sober each day.
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And I asked her to try and be of service, you know, to try and to
17:39
make sure that I, you know, my, I don't do any damage, you know,
17:46
either with my, my mouth or even just my thoughts, you know,
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because I work, you know, I work with people, some of whom can be
17:56
quite challenging and you can get a bit short at times and you
18:02
can get away with it because they're not going to remember 5
18:04
minutes later. And it's really important never
18:08
to do that, never, ever to do that.
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So I pray a lot on that every day that I will go to work with
18:14
a smile and I'll keep that smile and I'll carry that, you know,
18:17
that attitude. But but grateful.
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And I remember when I first got sober, I, my sponsor said she
18:26
would like me to write out five things every day that I was
18:29
grateful for. Well, you should have seen me.
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I couldn't come up. I could not.
18:34
I could watch Master 1:00 and after that I struggled.
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I really did. And then I had to text these to
18:39
her every day. So I was having so much trouble.
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She decided the best thing she could do is get me to do 10
18:44
every day. And I, Oh my gosh, I hated her
18:48
for that, but she taught me a lesson.
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She said, Samantha, you need to dig.
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And I did. The more I dug, the more I could
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see, you know that. And it started to flow after
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that. So even in the worst that I
18:59
could imagine my life could be, I began to find that I had
19:04
plenty still to be sober like, you know, to be sober about and
19:08
and grateful about. And so these days I have
19:12
absolutely no problem. I could probably list 100 every
19:14
day, but I know this program, you know, there's just so much
19:21
that I have learned that has really just not only, you know,
19:26
saved my life, but saved my sanity on a daily basis, even
19:29
when I'm not even thinking about drinking or likely to drink.
19:33
It's my thinking as I know that is my my problem.
19:37
And one of the things I've worked on really hard in the
19:40
last 12 months is probably meditation because I felt like,
19:44
you know, I had a pretty good program with prayer going, but I
19:47
still suffer a lot of fear and anxiety.
19:50
And so I was lucky enough to meet a lady at my work actually,
19:55
and she was, she was doing some meditation classes and she
19:59
wanted me to help her. And, and that's where I really
20:03
learned that, you know, through if I work on my meditation, I
20:06
can work on my breathing. And when I work on my breathing
20:08
I can slow everything down. And I can relieve that anxiety
20:13
when it arises, and I can do that anywhere at any time.
20:16
And that's just been a revelation for me.
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But also it's taught me to be able to stay in the moment.
20:25
And that's been just critical for me because I can be in the
20:27
past feeling guilty. I can be in the future being
20:30
Angus anchored and anxious. And I never was seen to be right
20:35
in the present. And so I do use meditation now
20:41
to just drag me back, you know, and mindfulness, big fan of
20:44
mindfulness. Doesn't matter what I'm doing,
20:46
dishes, walking the dog, anything at all, just trying to
20:51
be, you know, mindful and in the present.
20:54
And that's just really changed things for me.
20:56
It really has. So, you know, I, I wish I could
21:00
have started that a lot more. I mean, I was doing it in the
21:03
beginning, but when I think of how it has really helped me with
21:06
anxiety, I just wish I was, I'd been able to stick with it.
21:11
You know, I found it frustrating in the beginning and I would
21:14
just give up too easily. But like everything I've learnt
21:19
to and the sponsors really taught me this one as well.
21:22
Just about baby steps, plodding. You know, she's got this saying.
21:26
She says, you know, easy does it, but do it.
21:29
And, and also about focusing on the second-half of the serenity
21:33
prayer. And I realized I needed to do
21:36
that too, because it was so easy to just accept my powerlessness
21:39
over everything, which is important to do people, places,
21:43
things. But it was also really, really
21:46
important to, you know, to have the courage to change the things
21:50
I could. And that's something that's
21:52
really opened my mind because there was a lot of fear around a
21:56
lot of things for me. And I would have the tendency to
22:00
just run away from, from it. Now I find that if there's
22:08
something I don't want to do, I usually should do it.
22:11
And I usually need to do it. And I try to have that attitude.
22:14
And and so the serenity prayer has been really important for me
22:18
because it it does, it reminds me of that, you know, the
22:21
courage. And I, I was listening to a
22:24
speaker probably about two years ago in a meeting that just
22:27
something that stuck with me too.
22:28
And she was talking about, you know, when we find out that God
22:30
is doing for us what we cannot do it for ourselves.
22:34
But she also reminded that God will not do for us what we can
22:37
do for ourselves. And that was her take on things.
22:39
And I just that really spoke to me.
22:43
So now, yeah, I do. I try actively to face any fears
22:47
that I have around things and take action.
22:49
And I know that that's important too because this is an action
22:52
program. So I feel like I've veered all
22:56
over the place here. But but yeah, so, so basically
23:01
coming in at the age of 37 and finally getting sober at the age
23:04
of 53, I think I'm just a very lucky lady that I'm still alive
23:10
to tell the tale and to have another opportunity.
23:14
And that would be my advice to anybody is just don't ever
23:18
leave. Because like, if I had just kept
23:23
coming back every time I relapsed because I was only
23:26
relapsing for one or two weeks, you know, if I just got back in
23:29
the ruins, that's probably the smartest thing I could have ever
23:33
done. And I realized that picking up a
23:36
drink was probably not the worst thing I did.
23:38
Looking back, leaving the program was the worst thing I
23:40
did because being in active addiction on your own or even
23:47
being sober and still having alcoholism as we know, is also
23:51
very, very painful and incredibly lonely.
23:56
And so, yeah, I would not advise that for anybody.
23:59
So anybody who's new or struggling, just honestly, yeah,
24:03
don't, don't leave. Just don't leave.
24:06
Because, yeah, I can see from my last drink how bad things got.
24:11
And I never thought anything could get that bad.
24:15
You know, I think if it wasn't Mick and Sharon picking him up
24:17
for meetings, I think I would have struggled to get to
24:19
meetings because I would have struggled to leave the house.
24:23
Yeah. It took me to a very, very dark
24:26
place. And I still have a lot of fear
24:29
around that. And that's healthy fear.
24:30
And I hope I always have that healthy fear that if I get too
24:34
far away from things, that's where I could end up back, you
24:39
know, And I, you know, we, we come across people who relapse.
24:42
We come across, you know, all the time and I think the only
24:46
thing we can get from that is just that, that healthy
24:49
recognition that we're only ever that far away from a drink, you
24:54
know? So, so, yeah, it's for me, it's
24:59
just really important. Having a Home group, having a
25:02
sponsor. Yeah, I'm really grateful to
25:05
have a sponsor. I, I had a few sponsors in my
25:08
first 18 months. Didn't always choose wisely, but
25:16
for the last, you know, couple of years I've had a fantastic
25:19
sponsor. I don't talk to her as much as I
25:21
should these days and I need to, I need to, to fix that because
25:25
it took me, I took it a long time to go through the steps
25:28
this time around. I'm glad I did.
25:32
And I think I did it on a anything deeper level than I had
25:37
done before. I try to be fearless and
25:40
thorough. But of course, I don't know if
25:43
anybody else is like this, but I find I sit in meetings and I
25:47
things come back to me from what other people say.
25:52
Yeah. And I think things do come up to
25:53
me come back. The longer I'm so that things
25:56
come back in my memory and and I'll just think, oh, my God, you
25:59
know, there's another thing I have to make amends for.
26:02
But yeah, talking to talking to someone else who's a closed
26:08
mouth friend and is deeply committed to the program, I
26:12
think it's just one of the best assets we can have.
26:15
Because I know that anytime I think I've got a good idea, I
26:19
really need to run it past my sponsor.
26:22
Because the amount of good ideas I've had that really aren't good
26:25
ideas. And a lot of the time I can see
26:27
that 24 hours later. But that's why it's just you
26:31
really don't act on impulse. Yeah.
26:34
And and that is just. Yes, so, so important to know
26:38
that, you know, she's at the end of the phone and and she's
26:41
really rational, really rational when I'm not feeling rational.
26:47
So, you know, that's been a godsend.
26:50
So, so many gifts, so many gifts inside the room.
26:52
So many gifts outside the room. Yeah.
26:56
And it is so worth it. It's it's obviously sad times.
27:00
It can see so very, very hard. I know when I was, I mean, this
27:04
is how crazy my thinking was. I felt so much guilt and shame
27:07
when I first came back into these rooms.
27:08
I was, I would leave this meeting on a Wednesday night.
27:11
I had no car, no law. Well, I had a license, but no
27:13
car. And I would walk to the bus stop
27:16
in the middle of winter. Luckily it was just not too far
27:18
away, but and I still be freezing and it was wet and it
27:21
was cold. And I told myself this.
27:23
I deserved it. You know, this was like penance.
27:25
It was ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous and completely
27:29
stupid. I mean, what self pity, you
27:32
know, it was just, and then one day Pete, you know, and Wayne
27:36
said, oh, we're going to take you home for now.
27:38
And I just thought, you know, what a gift, you know,
27:41
absolutely what a gift. There's kindness.
27:43
There's so much kindness in his rooms.
27:44
And I didn't have the ability to treat myself kindly at that
27:47
stage. And that's a thing.
27:50
I can see that, you know, sometimes we just, you know,
27:53
other people might feel hopeless or just really hard on
27:57
themselves. And I think, you know, we can
27:58
hold the hope for them because everyone's had a day one.
28:02
Everyone's had a day one and we wouldn't wash that wish that on
28:05
our worst enemies. But we've all had it.
28:08
And yeah, I don't want to ever forget how bad it got.
28:12
I really don't want to ever forget how bad it got.
28:16
But yeah, life is good today. I've done an awful lot actually,
28:20
in the last three years. It's it's a bit of a miracle.
28:22
I, I started a degree many years ago and I'd, what would happen
28:29
would be that I would, if I picked up a drink, I would then
28:33
drop my studies. And so I stumbled along, I'd,
28:38
I'd get leaves of absence. So when it came around, you
28:42
know, that I, I got sober finally, you know, I thought it
28:46
was a bit time had passed, but my daughter kind of insisted
28:51
that I talked to the university. She said, because I'd done
28:53
really well, you know, when I was at uni, I'd done really well
28:55
and I had really phenomenal marks.
28:57
I so I spoke to the uni and they said, look, you know, we think
29:02
you can keep going, but really, I think you've run out of leaps
29:05
of absence. So I knew that I had to keep
29:08
plotting. So I've, I've done that.
29:09
I've just done one subject per semester and, and again, just
29:14
plotted, I've plotted my way through and I'm close to
29:18
finishing now. I've got a couple more subjects,
29:19
but but yeah, just all the things that my drinking cost me,
29:23
all the opportunities that I had and, you know, career choices,
29:28
relationship choices. Yeah, it took everything, but it
29:33
also it took it with my Commission and my complicity.
29:36
You know, I had to forgive my ex partner a long time ago.
29:41
I knew I needed to do that for my sanity because, you know, I
29:46
didn't drink before I met him and I know that I, it was self
29:50
medication, but he never held me down and poured it down my
29:53
throat. These were choices that I made.
29:57
And obviously the powerlessness of alcohol, you know, my choice
30:00
was for the first drink after that, as we know, got no power
30:04
whatsoever. But you know, it was, it's been
30:08
really important for me to do that, but also to, to have
30:12
outside help because for years I didn't have outside help.
30:16
And I think a lot of the time, you know, I was, I was relapsing
30:20
on that stuff and the outside help helped me a lot, you know,
30:25
because I think there were times where I just thought that I, I
30:29
could fix every problem I had, you know, and there were
30:33
problems outside of alcoholism that I needed extra help for.
30:37
And, and I think recognizing that and getting that help is
30:40
just being really important for me.
30:42
So, you know, life is different now and, and I hope that I'm
30:47
different now because I know when I was younger, I was always
30:52
responsible, reliable. I was a good kid.
30:55
I was a good mum, you know, for a long time before the alcohol
30:58
really just invaded my life and I didn't like myself very much
31:04
at the end, you know, I couldn't have said much good about me.
31:08
And I, I'm hoping that, you know, in the last three years
31:11
I've regained, you know, a lot of that things that I can, I can
31:16
like about myself. I can't say that it's come
31:18
quickly. I do tend to focus too much on,
31:22
you know, what happened in the past.
31:24
And, and that's where, you know, it's been really important for
31:28
me to just learn, you know, to stay in the present moment and
31:31
to remember how much living amends are worth.
31:35
You know, I've got this 16 year old boy now and, and I'm just
31:41
there for everything, you know, it's, it's great.
31:45
And he, I can see it on his face because I wasn't there for so
31:48
many years, you know, I had to watch other people attend
31:53
things. I didn't want me there.
31:55
And so, you know, now to be, to be able to attend all that stuff
31:59
and it just comes naturally. And it's just what you do, isn't
32:01
it? Because you're a sober parent
32:04
and you're a present parent. And yeah.
32:07
So, you know, there's, there's many gifts and, and all four of
32:10
my children back in my life. My mum is, I've had a good
32:15
ongoing relationship now with my mum for a good, you know, 2 1/2
32:19
years. And I spend every Tuesday with
32:23
her. I Tuesday's my day off and I go
32:25
and pick her up, I take her shopping and we go and have
32:27
lunch. And I mean, that didn't happen
32:29
for years, right? For years and years and years
32:31
that just didn't happen. She didn't want me to part part
32:34
of her life. And yeah, so, you know, this
32:40
program has given me so much, and it is this program that's
32:43
given it to me because even, you know, all the time I was sober
32:49
when I was outside of this program, I didn't get any of
32:52
that. I could not accept
32:53
responsibility for things. I blamed a lot of people for
32:56
things. I was a victim.
32:59
And yeah, I was a victim. But the point is that, you know,
33:04
I don't feel like that anymore. I and I don't blame other people
33:08
for it anymore. And I had a lot of anger, a lot
33:12
of anger towards my mum. I really did for a lot of years.
33:16
So we were quite the pair, happy enough to talk to each other.
33:20
And now when I think of her, I just all I can think of how many
33:24
years, you know, wasted years. So you know that there's so many
33:29
miracles, so many miracles. And yeah, so I would say to
33:33
anybody, you know, don't ever doubt, no matter how bad your
33:35
life looks, you know, if you can just put 1 foot in Prairie, the
33:39
other, you know, stay sober. You know, it's the greatest gift
33:42
you'll ever have. So I'm going to leave it there.
33:45
But thanks for asking me to share.
33:49
A A has more than two million recovering Alcoholics throughout
33:53
the world. In Australia there are about
33:56
18,000 members. They're made in over 2000 local
34:01
meetings spread around the country.
34:04
Meetings range in size from a handful in some areas to
34:08
hundreds or more in larger communities.
34:11
And once again, if anyone you know is struggling with alcohol
34:16
issues, please call Alcoholics announcing 1300 Double 00000 or
34:22
visit their website on aa.org dot AU.
34:28
Sober talk is heard on community radio right around Australia.