vol 274. Drifting Back with Sean B.

SPEAKER_00 0:01 We believe that alcoholism is a disease and that Alcoholics Anonymous is one solution to that disease. I'm here to bring you the voices of its members. Everyone that comes on the show, including myself, is an active member and has found recovery in the rooms of AA. As you listen, please take what works for you and leave the rest.

SPEAKER_01 0:26 My name's Sean. I'm an alcoholic. I have a sobriety date of May 11th, 2018. I'm 42 years old.

And let's see, I guess we can go back all the way to the beginning. I come from a family where my parents divorced when I was young. My mom couldn't quite get it together, so I lived with my grandparents for half my childhood. I had a religious background due to my grandpa, which was good.

It was Mormon, which I'm not Mormon now, but I was Mormon until I was about, you know, in high school. And in sixth grade, I moved to Reno Sparks area. Sparks is a suburb of Reno to live with my dad just because things got a little too hectic living with my mom's side of the family, and it kind of broke my heart to do it because I had to leave my grandpa, and that was a big decision to make being in sixth grade and whatnot. So I came here and kind of felt like an outsider from the beginning.

It's like the third day of sixth grade, so I was like walking around the playground by myself for the first few days, but I ended up making friends and stuff like that. Fast forward to early high school, start hanging out with some different kinds of friends. Before that, I was hanging out with Mormon kids and being a Boy Scout and things like that, being a dare kid. You know, I hated drugs just because I was supposed to.

And then I started hanging out with, I guess, the wrong type of element. Even though I'm friends with some of those guys still to this day, and those guys actually still drink, two of them. I don't, I'm the only one who doesn't. So anyway, yeah, I'm in high school.

I started drinking, and pretty early on, I was a problem drinker. I it's like a perfect picture. I was 16 and we got drunk, and then we went and drove the go-karts. From then on, I would always kind of just get in trouble, like once a year at least, related to alcohol, always.

Always related to alcohol. I mean, it wasn't the alcohol's fault, it was the behavior behind it as it always is. But you know, alcohol was always a factor. And so carried it on into college, and it took me eight years to graduate college because I was dicking around.

I would take some time off, I would take winners off to like snowboard and things like that. And I was just kind of an underachiever. I was actually looking at my transcripts recently because I thought I was a 3.3. I thought I graduated with that.

I graduated with like a 3.06, and I got some really bad marks that I I didn't realize. And now looking back, the receipts, it was like, oh, I was even more of an underachiever than I thought. But I somehow managed to get my undergrad and then continue to drink. I would still just kind of hold down waiting table type jobs, bartending.

And then I ended up getting into grad school and I decided to go. It was a big decision. That was in my early 30s when I decided to do that. And I was still bartending and waiting tables, drinking all the time, getting in trouble here and there.

And so I moved down to Orange County to go to a film school for an MFA program for screenwriting and film production. And I kind of thought that would solve my problems, but my problems came down with me, and I ended up getting two DUIs. By the end of the summer of after graduation from the program, I had two DUIs under my belt. I got sentenced to 30 days, but I only did four.

But it was at the gnarliest men's facility on the West Coast, the Twin Towers, and then I got transferred out to Wayside and I was in a dorm. But it was like kind of a spiritual experience for me. The people I spoke to, and it was almost just like God put me in touch with these kind of people to see what my life would be. So when I got out, I was real serious about changing my life.

That was when, you know, right around the time I kind of just decided, yes, it's time to take the program seriously. And at the behest of a friend, I went to a men's stag meeting out in Long Beach. That's where I was living. And I ended up going to meetings every day, every morning, sometimes even in the middle of the day, too, just because my schedule would afford that.

And it it was just great being a part of a community out there, and I really built that, and you know, the program helped me build it and got to really get to know a lot of men of different backgrounds that I found inspiring, some that maybe not so inspiring. But yeah, I got my sponsor and he took me through the steps and got my first year and had some challenges along the way, but ended up doing that, and right around year two, that's when the pandemic happened, and I kind of uprooted myself just because I was paying sky high rent in Southern California and everything was shut down. So I was like, this is kind of a good opportunity to just pack up and kind of see what's out there. So I went back to Reno for a little bit, and then I lived in Mexico for about six months, and I lived in Boise for a couple of years.

So when I was in Mexico, like right in the early pandemic, I was secretary of a meeting, and I did that for a year online, which was super weird. I felt like it was kind of unprecedented times. We were pioneers of sorts, but that kind of kept me anchored doing that. So when that was up, I passed it off, and I would go to my Long Beach men's stag Monday nights online wherever I was.

And I did that in Boise. I didn't have regular meetings out there besides that one, but it was Monday nights, and I would go to meetings throughout the week. And so then after that, Boise kind of got a little too expensive for me, and the opportunities kind of weren't there. I was applying for jobs, brick and mortar gigs in my expertise, which is marketing and communications, and I wasn't getting anything, but I also wasn't I wasn't really applying myself and I was resisting a couple things.

I can get into that a little bit later, but we'll keep it moving, just kind of going through that. So my landlord was gonna increase rent on me, and I decided I'm just gonna pack up and move to Colorado to be around my sisters. The plan was to ultimately be up in Cheyenne, Wyoming, just because I liked the prospects of there a little more than Colorado. So hung with sisters ultimately.

I've I came up to Cheyenne and I've been here since I've been in Cheyenne. I kind of fell off with my meetings. I wasn't going to my men's stag. I I just kind of stopped doing that.

And I was only doing meetings maybe a few times a week, and then I would go days or even a week or two with without a meeting, and so it was kind of brought to my attention, you know, that's not a great thing, and she'd probably tighten that up. And I think on one side I was kind of in the Bible a little bit more. I had recently over the past like year and a half, I had gotten more into that side of things, getting in touch with God and reading the Bible, and so maybe I use that as kind of an excuse to just kind of lighten up on the AA stuff. So recently, yeah, it was brought up to my attention.

So I'd rejoined my men's stag meeting, which I don't know why I left it, because it's so great. It's a book study, we're in the book, and uh so I've been back with that for about a month now, and we just read a chapter and then we talk about it, and there's about 12 guys, all from Long Beach, so it's great to check in with them, and then I go to meetings on the weekends out here in the mornings because I just got a job. I was actually so I was here for about five months and I was getting a little restless because I was applying to stuff and I was like, oh, maybe I need to pack up and move to Tennessee or something like that, which I'm glad that that didn't happen because I had an opportunity come my way, which I just I started uh at kind of a more career-oriented job, the type of job I've been kind of applying for for years and just hadn't been getting. So it's funny the chapter that we were on just happened to be two employers, and it was so funny because we were talking about that and just kind of thinking like what it was like before, right?

When I was employed and I was out there drinking, I was uh a liability first off because I was waiting tables and bartending, and sometimes I would drink on the job. It was kind of permitted at a couple of places, and sometimes you would think that it lubricated you socially, but then you you know, after like five or six rocks glasses of beer, you're not really capable of taking care of large groups of people. So I think there were a couple of those jobs that I got fired from, right? But it took them forever to fire me because I think they they understood the demographic, you know, it's college kids, so there's gonna be some fiasco and shenanigans, but I was also I was fired from from one for doing some shady stuff.

I was deleting on trades from tickets to make more money, so I go out and drink, and that that was during the times when I would make tips and I would blow all my tips that night on alcohol, and I'd go to work, do it all over again, somehow manage to pay my rent, whatever other bills. And it was just hell. I don't, you know, I had nothing to show for those times, other than my college degree that I ultimately got, which isn't nothing, but I could have set myself up so much better and I didn't. And so maybe that's kind of what I've been dealing with over the past several years, sort of an atonement for all that stuff, and now to finally have a job that's gonna take care of me.

I've only been there for a week, but it's a it's a challenging role, it's like kind of a leadership role. So they laid the gauntlet down on me, but I kind of responded to it, and kind of just using the principles of the program really kind of helped me with it. And I asked myself a pretty crazy question this past week while I was working. I was like researching something, and then I asked myself, is what I'm doing bringing value to this company?

I gotta tell you, when I was drinking and having those jobs that I got fired from, I don't think I ever asked myself that question, not once, never. And so we're kind of talking about that stuff during the men's tag big book study during that chapter, and it's I don't know, uh it's just such a shift, and it's not it's not me doing those things, it's the program in action, it's being in in touch with my higher power and maybe trying to get direction from there a little more than myself. The reason I kind of got the job in the first place was principles I learned in the program, uh, contrary action, like kind of doing what you wouldn't normally do, which is something my sponsor kind of hammered home in me and my granddaddy's sponsor. So for the longest time, I wouldn't make a portfolio of my work because I could just give them links and samples of my work.

Why do I need to make a portfolio? And I just had this shit attitude, and I wouldn't really research companies very well and and things like that, and of course I'm not gonna get the job, right? Sometimes I would still make it pretty far in the interview process somehow. But I kind of did all those things.

I made a portfolio and kind of researched the companies, and I used kind of more modern technology type stuff that I was resisting prior because I'm kind of a Ludite. And so I think by being a little more principled in my approach, had a hand in that. And one thing that I did in the program that I learned was kind of firing myself as the CEO and hiring a board of directors, and it's my sponsor, my granddaddy's sponsor, maybe a few other people professionally. And I think over the years I kind of benched all of them, and recently I I've started reaching back out to them again, and I don't know why I benched them in the first place.

I think it's me getting into their heads. I always feel like I'm bothering them. But now it's like I I'm kind of just I'm okay with just giving them a call, and I think more than anything they're happy to hear from me. I don't call them as much as I used to.

Early on in the program, I need their direction on everything. But I think seven years in and being you know, trying to operate on a spiritual plane and and knowing what they'd say in the first place on a lot of stuff, I don't have to come to them with everything. But I did realize recently that I had to fire myself again. And so it's been good bringing them back into the fold, going back to those meetings, getting connected out here.

So that's the next thing. I I don't know. I'm I'm not fully satisfied in the way I'm working the program now. I haven't had a sponsor, and it's been seven years that I've been in the program, or a sponsee, uh apologies.

So I haven't had a sponsee. There were a couple times where I thought a couple different guys would approach me, and it it kind of just didn't happen. It didn't work out that way. And then I kind of realized during the pandemic and the aftermath of that, it's it was probably pretty difficult to get a sponsee during that time, though not impossible.

But I think I was kind of not volunteering myself up, I was like very still kind of centered on my own shit, like trying to make my career happen, and kind of just working with my sponsor and my granddaddy's sponsor and the guys who I would talk to. There was one friend who reached out to me just knowing that I had years of sobriety, and he kind of said he was thinking about quitting. And so I told him I think he should do it and and kind of just see what happens. He ended up doing it, and you know, he was updating me a lot for the first 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, and then six months, and then before you know it, I'm not really hearing from him, but then I hear from him after a year, and he got a year of sobriety.

I I asked if he's in the program, he's not, but whatever. I mean, if he's able to do that, good for him. For me, I couldn't I couldn't do it without the program. What it was like trying to quit without it.

So when I was in Reno in high school, I never tried to quit. I was just trying to party. I think in college I never tried to quit. I would have to go to AA meetings because of the nudge from the judge type of situation.

So I would always appease that. Sometimes I would have to quit, and then I'd always go back to it. And I remember what it was like being in the meetings then, too. I wasn't trying to hear anything that was being said.

This was in like the early 2000s, and people were like chain smoking in the rooms. You'd come in smelling fresh, come out smelling like an ashtray, and I was just burning to get out of there. And I would even forge signatures, and I never got in trouble for that. I got away with it.

So, you know, I just get in trouble, do the the court thing, and then go back out and then repeat the process, rinse and repeat. And then, like I said, I think I just got beat to shit. And I I think those two DUIs just paying all that money, being in jail, and having to jump through all those hoops because you had to go to classes that you couldn't forge. For the second one, you had to go to classes twice a week for a long time.

I had an interlock device in my car for two two years and four months. So you have to blow in that every 30 minutes. Imagine taking like road trips and stuff. Yeah, I even went on a couple dates and I had to do that.

Just awful. But it was it was exactly what I needed because I I'll never forget that. I'll never forget that feeling. And that's a big part of why I think even when I wasn't working the strongest program, I think the trauma of that being in jail, going through those programs, having to pay all that money, and I just never want to go through it again.

And with the added benefit of the program, I think too, one thing I've done is be of service. I I did a lot, and I'll do it a lot if things are bad. My dog died around the first year sober, and I I was like, Alright, I gotta be of service. So I was walking people's dogs in the program.

And there was one guy who was like, Oh, great, you can uh walk my sister-in-law's dogs, and so I ended up walking her dogs, and she had all these conditions. I had to walk them separately, and it ended up being a whole fiasco. Sometimes being of service ended in interesting stories, but you you st you make yourself available for for people, and I do it in outside too. I do it professionally.

If somebody needs my help, I'll I'll help them out. And I'll be of service because to help them helps me. I learned that from the program. And I think by doing that, you do build a little bit more self-esteem.

And I do think that you or at least I got drunk and wasted because I had low or no self-esteem. Drinking, I could go out and feel like you or whoever else, right? Feel like somebody different. Not me, at least.

Yeah, I think when you feel that way about yourself, it is easy to get on a self-destructive path and to kiss to stay on that and to say fuck it and to be in that state perpetually. And then I think if if you're really working the program, like you go through the steps, you you try to clear some of the wreckage of your past, you relinquish control. That was the hardest one for me, was the first step, because it took me almost 20 years to admit I was powerless against it. You know, the other big one is getting in touch with a higher power again, and you know, admitting there's a power greater than yourself.

For me, I going to college, I kind of went the atheist route and then the agnostic. And over the past few years, I just kind of had a a sort of a spiritual awakening. And now, like, I will say I'm a true believer. I do pray.

I used to have a I guess a difficult time getting on my knees to pray to God, but I don't have a difficult time doing that at all. Now I pray most every day. If I don't, it's because I'm something's going on, like I'm in a rush or something like that. But I'll get on my knees and I'll say I have a long prayer that I say, and sometimes I'll just keep it to the Lord's Prayer and the Serenity Prayer, and I'll say the turn aside prayer a lot to just try to try to help me forget what I think I know about people, places, and things so I can have a new experience.

Like that's a huge one for me. So I can be cynical. And I have to use that in this job because a big part of that is playing nice, being reliable, and just being somebody who asks, is what I'm doing a value to the company? I do see the changes.

And even in those moments where I'm not really where I should be in the program, I don't know that I'm a danger to drink necessarily, but I'm only a step or two away from that. So that's why when it was brought to my attention, I sprung into action immediately. And that's another different thing. Because if something's wrong now, I try to fix it.

And that's program related to getting back into the book. I try to be uh have a bookmark, and the bookmark is the receipt from the last beer that I had, 511, 2018, Simsi's, East 2nd Street, Long Beach, holding it in my hand right now. But the page that it marks is page 86. It's upon awakening.

I try to read that most every morning. Whenever I read the Bible, I'll read this first, then I'll read some of the Bible just to get into this stuff, get into this higher plane, and and it kind of shapes my day. It does inform my decisions for the rest of the day. I notice that.

And it's it's it's a just a great resource to wake up and think about the 24 hours ahead and you know, ask God to be divorced from our self-seeking motives to ask to be placed on that higher thought plane. And then at the end of the day, when we retire at night, passage, constructively review your day without morbidly reflecting it. Because none of us are perfect, but it's it's the effort that counts. It's being in the game and and uh being a member of this program, being involved with it, trying to be a better person, trying to try to work on those character defects because you know, I think working on that spirit spiritual connection is very important.

You can go to meetings, you can go to meetings every day, and not be spiritually connected and maybe not even be connected to members of the program. Maybe you're just in your little bubble, and I do sometimes see people like that who can't string together very much time. It's none of my business, I'm not gonna do their inventory. Right now, for me, I'm going three days a week.

It's not as much as I'd like to. My job is pretty demanding right now. I think once I work and settle in and don't feel like I'm gonna get fired every other day like you do with a new important job. I think I'll work some more meetings into that.

But I don't I don't feel like I want to drink, and I do feel connected. And you just doing that over the past month, whereas how I wasn't, it's been great. It's been kind of revitalizing. I do find myself bugging my sponsor and my grandsponsor more, and maybe they're annoyed from hearing me, but that's what that's what happens.

So like I said, I I finished up this first week at work, and I I wanted to not only meet expectations but exceed them. And weekend I I have some pretty big responsibilities. There's no need to get into detail. We can share in a general way, but they're handing over kind of trusted things to me where it's like, man, if you guys only knew that seven years ago I was sitting at Simsi's, drunk at noon on the clock, too.

It's it's pretty crazy the gifts that this program can bring. And like I said, fairly recently I was thinking about packing up and getting out of here, and and a friend in the program said, you know, that's like obviously a geographic, it wasn't telling me anything I don't already know. But uh that problem actually got solved for me because I got this job and now I'm here. I'm here for the long haul, I'm strapped in, and it's not even wasn't even a decision because I got the offer and the answer was yes.

That's kind of great. God works in pretty crazy ways, and like I said, I've been looking for a job like this for seven years, and I haven't been able to find one, so I've had to work remotely, and that in itself has been kind of an isolating experience, and in those early years of that, I really leaned on the program. I went to meetings every single day, sometimes twice, and it was there for me. I know if that ever happens to me again, the rooms are gonna be there for me again, they're always gonna be there.

I can go to Mexico, I can go to Pocatello, Idaho, I can be in Cheyenne, Wyoming, and I can find a meeting. And even these days, like with modern technology, you can hit up a meeting in Singapore if you want. So the resources are there. My message to the alcoholic who still suffers if you're trying to kick this thing, just keep trying.

Because I think each time you're more likely to succeed. Each time you carry that experience of of what it was like to try to quit and going back out, going back on it, and then coming back trying to quit again. I think each time you're more likely to succeed in it, but don't use that as a crutch because for me, I was lucky enough to be involved with alcohol. I did it the old-fashioned way.

Some people I know are on fentanyl, like one I mentioned one of the people who I thought was gonna ask me to be their sponsor. It was a kid named Josh. He was uh 19, and he was addicted to fentanyl, and so he was in rehab, and he went through the program, and you know, he was getting to know me, and I was getting to know him, and there was a minute there where I thought he was gonna ask me to be his sponsor, but he didn't. He asked somebody else, you know, so it never happened, but the kid ended up going out again and he he odd and he died.

You're not always gonna get that second or third shot because me, I I was lucky enough to get shoot, probably a dozen times where I would quit and then go back out. And I think the most I could ever get on my own was 10 months, and even then I was still going to meetings just like periodically throughout that. So I was still using that, so it wasn't completely on my own. But I wasn't working a program at all, so it was easy to kind of throw that time away when the time came.

So then I, you know, I kind of worked through the steps, got a sponsor, you know, worked hard at it for the first two years, and now like being on year seven, I'm not willing to throw it away. It's something I've worked hard for. So I do think nowadays I am less likely to throw it away. I know it could happen because that's how insidious this damn disease is, but as long as I stay connected, stay honest with myself and tell on myself with other people in this program and make myself available to them.

And if the time comes when somebody wants to have a sponsor, and you know, I'm gonna raise my hand. I've been raising my hand at meetings lately, but I'll continue to raise my hand. So that's I don't know, that's kind of the best I I got as far as sharing. Hope there's something beneficial to somebody out there.

SPEAKER_00 30:28 Thank you, Sean. You talked about the fact that it was brought to your attention that perhaps you were not prioritizing your program. Do you want to tell us more about what happened? SPEAKER_01 30:47 Yeah, um, I mean, shoot, this program calls for uh rigorous honesty.

So we it was recording an episode. This what was supposed to be this episode, you know. And it I just word vomited, and I talked more about other stuff. I talked more about the Bible, I talked more about something else I was into at the time, which I'm you know still into, which is book binding, which that's how again that's what it's like now.

I'm obsessed with book binding. That's better than alcohol at least. So yes, uh I got a rude awakening at the end of that. I I mean I felt it.

I just felt like, oh my god, what did I just do? And uh so we had our conversation about that, and you know, you you were fairly gentle about it, but very, you know, you were stern, and I was like, shit, like that's something I need to look at right now, and so that very next day I hit up that good old men's stag, and it was just right where I needed to be, and but then right with you, like with that crappy share, that was right where I needed to be too. So sometimes I gotta fall flat on my face to be reminded. But you know what?

It's it's still a great thing, like that was almost the shame that I felt was almost on the level of like not necessarily going back out again, because I know that would make me just I would be in the depths of hell, but you know, that twinge was reminiscent of that, and to feel that way about something like that, at least it means that I'm taking this thing seriously, and so I I also want to thank you for bringing that to my attention. SPEAKER_00 32:48 I don't feel like I was stern, but but I do come out generally. Okay, I was probably stern, I was probably stern, rightfully so. Oh, that's funny.

SPEAKER_01 33:03 We have a podcast to to do here, and I wasn't this needs to be program related, it needs to be geared towards you know what it was like then and what it's like now, and I need to be speaking to somebody who needs to hear this stuff. I don't need to be talking about book binding, nobody wants to hear that shit. I don't know. SPEAKER_00 33:24 I don't know.

Maybe when you talk about what life's like today, talk about hobbies. SPEAKER_01 33:28 Yeah, I think for me, I for with alcohol, like I had all these aspirations and things I wanted to do, right? It wasn't book binding, but it was like you know, just things like have have a career, get a master's degree, uh um be this type of guy, you know, read books more and do all these things, like learn a martial art and things like that. And so when I got sober, that was a another thing I kind of did was I started practicing MMA right after because I needed something to substitute it, because I spent a lot of time in bars drinking and socializing, that was a big part of my life.

So I had to find you know different things to get involved in, in addition to meetings, and you know, learning different hobbies. But I think that's all right, as long as it's not taken away from from your practice or your career, you know, or the things, your responsibilities. SPEAKER_00 34:30 Yeah, yeah. And thank you for my my journal that you bound and sent me.

So I really appreciate that. SPEAKER_01 34:38 You're welcome. SPEAKER_00 34:39 And technically, you are episode 32, so this is like the third time we recorded. So I really appreciate your dedication and your willingness to uh I don't know, hear whatever it was I had to say that day.

I'm still gonna stand by that I wasn't stern, but but I think I just I think I just come out. I think I come out stern no matter what. I could show you stern. SPEAKER_01 35:07 I might have been sensitive in that moment and vulnerable.

That's true. SPEAKER_00 35:11 That's true, but but it it worked out. It worked out. So your program six weeks ago, your program now, and you talked a little bit about it, just getting back in touch with your sponsor and your grand sponsor.

What does your daily program look like besides the three meetings a week? Is picking up and reading page 86? Is that a new thing in the past month? Is there other things that you're doing that um have impacted your day-to-day over the past month?

SPEAKER_01 35:51 Yeah, so I do that reading in the morning. I try to do it at night. Uh, I don't do it every night, but that's an area where I can do that, and that's not a big deal, you know. It takes 30 seconds, and it's the perfect it's the perfect bookend for for your day.

So there's that praying in the morning, getting spiritually connected, yeah, reaching out to my sponsor and my grand sponsor. I mean, I talk to my sponsor weekly regardless. Now maybe it's like a couple times a week. That's kinda where it's at right now, and then going to meetings three times a week, like I said.

It's definitely not a it's not a perfect program. I I wouldn't wouldn't say. SPEAKER_00 36:43 You're plugged back in though. SPEAKER_01 36:45 I'm plugged back in, and that feels great.

And I mean I don't feel like I want to drink, but here's what I can say the meetings that I do go to, it's like I get to go to a meeting, and that's honest. I know like you're supposed to always say that. I don't always say that when I was going to meetings every single day in Long Beach. Sometimes I would get resentments on people because I would hear from the same people every single day.

So on the seventh day, seventh meeting, maybe I'm not feeling like I get to do this, but now every meeting that I go to is a I get to do this. But I can do more, I can always do more. If I'm being honest with myself, I can still do more. And even what I've done, the return on investment is incredible.

So why not do more? And it's because I'm lazy, and so there we go. That's what that's where I'm at. I'm still lazy.

I'm willing to pray for more energy. SPEAKER_00 38:01 Well, I'm willing to change. SPEAKER_01 38:02 I'm uh I'm willing to, you know, if there's a problem, I'm willing to fix it. SPEAKER_00 38:09 Yeah, well, I really appreciated you uh sharing.

And uh I recently had a similar experience that I I think I shared with you. I was the speaker at a 5 a.m. meeting, I think it was in Thailand or something on Zoom. Unfortunately, unlike us in our last recording, it wasn't pre-recorded, it's a live meeting, and I was the speaker, and I hung up from that chair, that meeting, and I felt the same sentiment that you said.

It had the same flavor of the shame and remorse of the morning after you woke up and you're like, oh my god, I did it again. I had I was in that same room with that shame, even though I wasn't close to it, and it felt awful. And I'm like, I have got to get my wit back together and get back on on track because it's uh I don't know, I it's so easy to get disconnected from the program. I just I never thought that I would get disconnected, and I was doing this podcast posting a news story every single week, and I was still disconnected.

SPEAKER_01 39:26 So it makes me so sad to hear that. Uh just because you always seem like somebody who has it several. You you do text me or call me on my sobriety date every year. SPEAKER_00 39:41 I am very organized, so that's probably why it gives the appearance of I have it all together.

SPEAKER_01 39:47 Well, it is. We also like putting on appearances, right? We're good at it. So that's part of the disease, unfortunately.

But you told on yourself to an entire group in Singapore. No, no, you said it was what the Philippines Thailand? SPEAKER_00 40:07 I don't know. I have no idea.

It was it was really early in the morning, and I I felt hung over. That's how emotionally it traumatized me. I felt like I went to a meeting, hung over, and shared and lied and said I was sober. Like that's what it felt like.

SPEAKER_01 40:26 Sometimes that's what we need, and uh the shame can make you do stuff that you need to do, right? It can drive you into action. So I'm not always anti-shame. Because shame has sparked me to change a lot of things and driven me to change.

SPEAKER_00 40:44 Yeah, I I think this was a perfect truth-telling share, and just the story of one alcoholic calling another alcoholic and uh being honest with each other. SPEAKER_01 40:57 When we recorded this initial time, it wasn't even like a share. By the end, it was just a dialogue. I'm glad you had that dialogue with me.

So, like I said, it was just I was right where I needed to be. And God gave me that, God gave me the program back, and then an amazing career and a place here, a home here. God will give you more than you could imagine for yourself, more than you have the sense to want for yourself. I've heard people say that in the program.

I've heard people in the room say that they're overpaid, right? Yeah, and I never felt like that. I was always I felt adequately paid, or maybe underpaid, you know, like maybe a lot of people do, underappreciated, but that's all the disease, right? You're adequately appreciated for the work you put in.

Yeah. SPEAKER_00 41:58 All right. Well, is there anything that you're thinking of now or that you left out that you would like to share? SPEAKER_01 42:07 You know, sit here for a minute and and pray for an opportunity to help an alcoholic who's still suffering.

So, yeah, that's that's I think I'd like to end on that. SPEAKER_00 42:20 Okay, but I have one final question, so you can't end on that. SPEAKER_01 42:24 Okay, two. SPEAKER_00 42:26 All right, and you kind of did this at the end of your chair, but we'll do it one more time since this is the official end.

What message would you like to leave for the listener that is suffering? SPEAKER_01 42:37 Yeah, just keep trying. Even if you can only get a day, or you know, you're you're getting a month, or even 90 days, six months, and you keep going back out, even if you get a year or multiple years and go back out, just keep quitting. Because I do honestly believe you're more likely to be successful each time you try.

And you know, don't give yourself too many tries, though, because nothing is guaranteed. So give yourself an opportunity. The sort of life that this program gives you when you're really working it and you're connected to it, like we were talking about. It's an amazing thing, it's a thing you won't want to be messed up for.

You know what I mean? It's a thing you want to be present for for all of it. SPEAKER_00 43:28 For more information, read the first 164 pages of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous or visit keepcoming back.net.