The Two Stages of My Alcoholism (there is no 3rd Stage)

Over the last couple of weeks, I've been realizing that there really are only two stages in my alcoholism: the first stage was when I could stop and the second stage is when I couldn't stop.  For me, there was and is no third stage.

My first stage started from the time when I took my first drink, I was probably 17 years old.  When I took that drink, strangely enough, I took it with the clear intent that if I was going to do this, I was going to do it without becoming an alcoholic like my dad.  When I was 21, my dad's drinking took off downhill and he gradually descended into a lonely and isolated existence and eventually death.  My way of proving to my self that I was not an alcoholic like him was to demonstrate the ability to stop drinking.  And whenever my drinking looked like it was coming close to alcoholic, I would stop.  The only problem to this strategy was that I would always reach a point in time when I'd realize that I had "really" stopped and therefore, I was not an alcoholic.  And inevitably, whenever I proved to myself that I wasn't an alcoholic, I would drink!  Isn't that the perfect test for alcoholism?

That first stage lasted almost 30 years.  It ultimately ended when my son entered an adolescent chemical dependency program when he was 15.  In order for him to get into that program, my wife and I had to agree to a couple of conditions, the most crisis-invoking for me was the one that "strongly suggested" that I stop all alcohol and drug use while my son was in that 3-6 month outpatient program.  That's the moment I moved into the second stage of my alcoholism, the "I can't stop" stage.  I knew as soon as the counselor (a recovering heroin addict now psychologist...) asked me to stop that there was no way in hell that I was going to be able to stop.  And I knew equally well that I could not tell them (my wife and son were also in the room) that I could not stop.  So I lied and convinced them that I would certainly stop if it would help my son learn how to "live life without chemical assistance" as they referred to their plan for him and now his mother and me.

I hid my drinking successfully from everyone but me and the strangers who saw me drinking for another 10 months.  At the end of 5 months, my son experienced some sort of change and things all clicked for him.  He's been clean now for almost 10 years.  I watched him from a safe distance for another 5 months and then one night I went to pick him up after his Friday night Marijuana Anonymous meeting (he went to every 12 step program there was before ultimately finding a home in NA...) and he smelled liquor on my breath.  He asked, without anger, if I had been drinking and I lied.  I wanted to tell him the truth -- not only had I been drinking while he was in that meeting, I had done the same thing for almost 10 months while he was going to 10 to 14 meetings a week.  I drank almost everytime after dropping him off at a meeting.  But what kept me from telling him the truth was that if he knew I was drinking, he would begin expecting me to stop.

And I simply could not stop!

He accepted my assertion and left me to my misery.  The next morning, I woke up at 6am with the clarity of thought: I can't stop drinking!  I'd had that same thought every morning for 10 months and for many mornings before that....  But that morning, a second thought came to me: not being able to stop is called alcoholism and alcoholism is a disease.  My body is different. 

All of a sudden everything I had been doing in relation to my drinking made perfect sense!  I couldn't stop because my body was different!  Wow!  What followed then was another thought and that was, I can do something about this.  I can do what Pat has been doing.  I can try to stay sober for one day.

You know, when I hear people talk about the day or moment that they were finally able to stop drinking, I cringe inside.  You see, I have decided not to describe what happened that morning of October 20, 2001 as the morning I stopped drinking.  Not even for one day.  What happened that morning is that I "stopped stopping" and starting putting effort into staying sober a day at a time.

So now whenever I hear someone come back into the program, full of shame and guilt for having drank "again", I suspect that much of their guilt and shame is based on the false idea that they are the only one in the room "who can't stop drinking."  What I try to do, as gently and as kindly as I can, is let them know that they are not alone in the room.  You see, I can't stop drinking either!  And the solution I found over nine years ago was that instead of trying to stop, I just redirected my attention toward the goal of staying sober today.

For me, there is no third stage of alcoholism.  This is a physical, permanent and progressive disease.  That doesn't go away, doesn't get cured.  What happened for me, as the result of some moment of grace and the impact of witnessing my own son's recovery from this same hopeless state of mind and body, is that I woke up and accepted who and what I was: an alcoholic, pure and simple.  Once I passed into the second stage of this disease, the only possible outcomes were ever increasing suffering and isolation, death or recovery.

Recovery has involved much work, but within a fairly short period of time, the process seems to have taken on a life of its own.  I don't do things with the intent to stay sober or to avoid the first drink.  I do the things  because they fill my life with meaning, peace, joy, purpose and love.  My life is full, if not overflowing.  I am connected to a large web of other recovering alcoholics and much of my day is spent doing something to help another alcoholic in a myriad of ways. 

Take care!

Mike L.

Prerequisites to Critical Moments

As I've mentioned several times recently, I've been chewing on something I read recently and I just can't let it go:  The one obstacle to grace is control.  Ever since I read that line in David Richo's book, When Love Meets Fear, I've seemed to have this truth front and center in my consciousness most of the days since I first read it.  As I've been doing this "fear work" that I also mentioned in my last blog entry, the connection between the felt need to control things in my life and fearfulness is so close as to make them indistinguishable.

This morning as I was thinking about three of my sponsees who are all seemingly stuck in a very early recovery, I had a series of thoughts that sort of came pouring out: 

• the prerequisite of grace is letting go of control
• the prerequisite of letting go of control is willingness
• the prerequisite of willingness is not wanting to do something
• the prerequisite to doing something that you don't want to do is hopelessness or despair.

It's very hard to watch people holding on to control as though their life depended on their holding on to what they are holding on to.  It's especially hard when you know that the solution is not in holding on, but in letting go.

I just left a men's meeting at Old St. Mary's Church in downtown San Francisco.  The man who led the meeting read something from page 164 in the Big Book, including the most humble of all lines in our Big Book: "Our book is meant to be suggestive only.  We realize we know only a little."  I am truly aware of my own ignorance when it comes to what will work for another person.  I barely know what works for me and oftentimes I only learn that after thousands of failures and deadends and lots of pain.

So what do I know when I suggest to another suffering alcoholic that they consider trying what worked for me?  Nothin.  If anyone had suggested that I "let go" a moment before I did on the morning of October 20, 2001, I would have told them to go to hell and I would have stomped off without a clue as to what else I might try.  I let go only when there was no energy left to hold on and no other options.

I suppose that will happen with these guys also.  Or at least, I hope so.  There's always the other alternatives of jails, institutions and death.  Once again, I have to let the disease do the hard work of sponsoring the guys dumb enough to ask me to sponsor them.

Take care!

Mike L.

The One Obstacle to Grace

This morning, the chairperson at the meeting was telling her beautiful recovery story when she got to the moment where for some strange reason she too was able to stop drinking.  It happened one morning in January 1999.  It was seemingly no different from any of the mornings over the last few years since she really started trying to get and stay sober.  During those two years, she'd started going to AA and she kept going back even after she would drink again.  Then came this one morning where she woke up and something different happened.  Something changed.

As she talked more about this particular morning, she wondered aloud,"I don't know what was different on that morning."  Nothing, as far as she could tell, had changed.  It was a morning like many many others that followed another attempt to drink like a normal person.  That history notwithstanding, that morning she was struck by a new resolve born of desperation:  she was going to do "whatever it took" to stay sober that day.  Now, 11 years later, she still really doesn't have any idea what really changed that morning to allow her sobriety to take hold and to last--at the very least--until this day.

As soon as she talked about that special morning -- I became entranced with my own memories of my special morning almost 9 years ago.  You see, I had that same identical experience of having many months of waking up confronted by the same idea: "I can't stop drinking!!"   And like her, on my special morning something changed and I knew it as soon as it happened.  For some reason, that morning I had a second thought follow the first: "Not being able to stop drinking is called alcoholism.  And alcoholism is a disease."  Wow.  Or rather, Duh!  A 1st Step moment.

What's a little strange is that I had already known the fact about alcoholism being a disease for many years--at least at a head level, but it had never sunk to heart level until that special morning.  I suppose that in the past, I'd always thought I could either overcome that inability with even greater willpower or I could just give up trying and just do my best to not get caught.  It was a disease that would or could go away.  Not one that would always be a part of me.

Today, when the chairperson wondered aloud that she didn't have a clue as to what happened that morning, I realized that something I had read last night that seemed to hold the answer to this question, at least for me.  Last night before going to bed, I was reading another book by David Richo, this one called When Love Meets Fear. In it, he said something along the lines of this:

The one obstacle to grace is control.

That's what happened to me that special morning of October 20, 2001!  On that day I gave up trying to control my drinking.  I realize now that trying to stop drinking is yet another attempt to to control not alcohol, but to control alcoholism.  Prior to that morning, I was trying to stop drinking only as a means to avoid being an alcoholic.  And in my insane mind, stopping drinking was the only way to avoid being or becoming an alcoholic.  And I just did not want to be an alcoholic like my dad (or even my son!). 

The thought or desire to be someone other than who you are is insane.  And that's why I'd never been able to stop drinking: because as soon as I'd convince myself that I had stopped, then I'd say to myself, "Well, you've stopped!  Therefore, you're not really an alcoholic!"  And inevitably, like most alcoholics who finally convince themselves that they are really not an alcoholic: I'd celebrate by drinking!

What happened to me that special morning was that I unknowingly (but willingly) gave up my control over my alcoholism and my never-ending problem with stopping drinking.  And as result, I think, grace was able to step into the process.  Grace: an unmerited gift.  As a result of grace, I was able to stop stopping.  As a result of grace, I was able to start trying to stay sober, as an alcoholic, one day at a time.

What I'm focusing on today is the fact that control has many forms and manifestations in my life today.  Control will lead me to believe that a particular feeling, say anxiety, depression, sadness, or loneliness, should be allowed to be or to surface.  And as a result of that decision of control, I then choose to seek some alternative or escape to the undesirable or unwanted feeling.  I run.  I go to a meeting.  I get up and do anything other than just sit.  I try to use some AA tool, like writing a gratitude list, as a surefire means of avoiding the feelings that want to see the light of day.  True, these are all better choices to drinking!  But they are similar ways of controlling life as life is.  Not something I want to do.  [I know, grace is not retroactive -- it's always right here, right now--so I don't need to waste time beating myself up for all my past attempts to avoid reality or to run from feelings.]

Over the next week, I'm going to try and become more aware of these moments which tend to lead me to unskilled attempts to control what's coming up naturally from within.  I'm going to try and let those feelings be just as they are for at least one minute more than I would habitually do previously.  I'm going to try and be open to moments of grace.

And I'm apparently going to do that while I'm in Las Vegas, Nevada where I'm heading now for a five day business conference!  There's something hilarious in this plan to be sure.

Take care!

Mike L.

Raising Our Hand

Every once and awhile I hear someone say that one of their motives for staying sober is that they don't want to have to raise their hand again.  Raising our hands and declaring that we are in our first 30 days of recovery seems, for many of us, to involve some amount of guilt and/or shame.  And even more so when we're doing that "again" (or again and again...).

This week, I was blessed to see a friend of mine raise his hand again and declare himself to be back in his first thirty days of recovery.  In fact, it was day three for him.  He'd not raised his hand at the beginning of the meeting when the secretary had asked if there was anyone in their first thirty days.   He'd actually been to several meetings since his relapse over the weekend, but he'd just been unable to raise his hand and let people know.  I think it was his second relapse since first beginning his recovery several years ago.  Before he used and drank this last weekend, he'd had just gotten to two years of sobriety a few weeks before.  He was having a hard time disclosing the fact that he'd relapsed, but for some reason, he kept coming to meetings.

On Wednesday, he was unable to raise his hand when the secretary had asked.  But then what happened was that while "How It Works" was being read, he was struck by the repeated use of "honest" in the first paragraph of that reading.  Somehow, he realized that keeping his relapse a secret from us was going to get him drunk and he needed to fess up.  So he raised his hand shortly thereafter and said, "I'm Mike and I'm an alcoholic.  And I've been lying to you.  I even lied to my sponsor as I walked into this meeting today.  I drank this weekend and this is Day Three for me."

He briefly explained what had happened.  It'd happened so fast.  He'd taken a week's vacation with his daughter and had a wonderful time.  And then when he came back, he dropped his daughter off with her mother and he went to house sit a friend's house for a couple of days.  Something about being alone in that house triggered some pains from the past and before he knew it he was going through the friend's medicene cabinet looking for drugs.  He found them and took them.  And the next thing he knew, he was getting drunk.  That was a Saturday. 

On Sunday, he awakened to waves of guilt and shame.  And then he went to a meeting.  While he didn't raise his hand, he kept going to meetings for the next three days and he didn't drink.  Ultimately, the secret became too much of a burden and he spilled it all out for us on Wednesday.  I thanked him for what he disclosed because, among other things, he showed me that it's possible to come back and raise your hand again --- and that everyone welcomes you.  No one judges you (at least out loud) or condemns you.  How could we???  We'd be condemning ourselves!

I understand why people talk about not wanting to raise their hand again, but for me, I think it's a misplaced fear.  For me, the day I first raised my hand and disclosed, "I'm Mike and I'm an alcoholic!" was the best day in my life to date.  I haven't had a better day since.  I've had lots of great days since that first disclosure of who I was as an alcoholic, but none better than that day.  As I've mentioned before, the first time I really raised my hand to disclose this truth was the morning of October 20, 2001: I was in bed next to my still sleeping wife.  I'd awakened to the same thought I'd had every day the last ten months: "I can't stop drinking!"  And then a new thought followed, "Not being able to stop drinking is called alcoholism.  And alcoholism is just a disease!"  And then I saw myself sitting in a circle of people at my son's rehab and instead of lying like I had for the last ten months, I shared with them the truth: My name is Mike and I'm an alcoholic!" 

When I did that, even though the people and situation were all in my head, I experienced a freedom I'd been seeking for years.  A freedom from the compulsion or obsession to drink.  A freedom from the need to put effort into "not drinking".  A freedom to be me.

I don't fear raising my hand again.  If I drink again, I know what I'll need to do to get back into the mode of recovery.  I'll need to return to the rooms and let my friends know what happened and that I'm back to begin again.

It's funny, a few nights ago (after this guy raised his hand on Wednesday) I had my first drinking dream in several years.  I was sitting at a table and there was a pitcher of lemon aide and Vodka sitting in front of me.  I poured a glass from the pitcher knowing that it was full of lemon aide and Vodka, but it didn't dawn on me that Vodka was alcohol.  Strange, huh.  Anyway, I poured myself a glass and then began drinking it.  It's the first time that I've had a drinking dream where I actually remember the act of drinking!  Anyway, I was drinking this and then I started feeling a slight buzz.  And then the idea came to me, I'm getting a buzz because this has alcohol in it!  Fuck!

I woke with a start and my heart beating rapidly.  Feeling as though this had actually happened, I was disappointed that I had drank, but the very first thought was that I needed to get up and go to the Concord Fellowship 6:30am meeting and raise my hand!  Now!  Within a few seconds, it became clear that it was just a dream and that I didn't need to raise my hand as being in my first 30 days.  But I knew that that would be what I'd need to do if I did drink.

I've been thinking a lot about how much weight or importance we put on long term sobriety --- I wonder if we go a little too far in that regard because it seems to set an unrealistic goal for most of us alcoholics.  Takes us a little off the more secure path of One Day At a Time mantra of AA.  I don't possess 8.5 years of sobriety.  It's not something I own.  I can't sell it.  I really can't lose it.  I cherish it.  I feel tremendously grateful for it.  But my focus needs to remain with today.  I can be sober only one day: today.  I can't be sober tomorrow (that can only be a hope or a dream).  I can't be sober yesterday (that is only a memory).  I can stay sober today.

Take care!

Mike L.

"I Just Can't Stop Drinking!"

I suppose that since I've always gone to many meetings (over 1 a day average over 8 years) that there are few things that can be said in an AA meeting that really bother me.  That said, there are a couple of statements that always have a visceral impact on me when I hear people say them in an AA meeting.  One is when a newcomer comes in to the rooms and says something along the lines of "I realize now that I need to stop drinking... for the rest of my life."   It's the "rest of my life" comment that makes my stomach twist and tighten.  Another comment is when people describe their moment of clarity as the point in time when the were finally able to stop drinking and they say something like, "I stopped drinking...".  In that phrase it's the "I" that ends up causing an immediate visceral reaction in me.  I not only don't relate to people's plan to never drink again for the rest of their lives or to alcoholic's claim to have stopped, I get concerned, if not outright nervous, that such approaches to sobriety are shaky foundations to longer term sobriety.

Yesterday I was at the 6:30am Concord Fellowship meeting and at the time when the secretary asked if there were any newcomers, a guy raised his hand and said that he was an alcoholic and had only a few days.  He wasn't sure how many days, but he looked pretty beaten down.  I'd seen this guy come in and go out of the meetings many times in the last 3-4 years.  Everytime he came back in, his life situation got worse and worse.  He would get a sponsor and begin the steps, but it seemed that he'd always disappear again within 3-6 months.  Yesterday seemed no different except for the fact that his life situation was even worse after this last relapse: ex-wife was dying of cancer and older son was facing 25 to life for abusing his son -- the newcomer's grandson.

After the chair had shared his story, he eventually called on this newcomer and asked him if he'd like to share.  The man told us of his worsening life situation and ended with a heartfelt admission that he "just can't stop drinking!"   As the meeting went on to other shares, I couldn't stop thinking about that comment, "I can't stop drinking!"  It was the one thing that I most related to in the whole meeting that day.  While I suspected that the newcomer felt he was the only one in that room that couldn't stop drinking -- I knew in my core that that was really the one thing that this guy had most in common with everyone in that room --- or at least, I knew that he and I both shared the same basic inability to stop drinking.  I eventually shared that view with the group, in a subtle form of crosstalk directed at this newcomer, and told him that I thought the idea that we are the only ones in the room who "can't stop drinking" is a mistaken belief.  In my view, the one thing I most have in common with other alcoholics, most particularly those in recovery, is the inability to stop drinking.

In fact, I think that's the good news of the AA program from the beginning.  In AA we discover that we can't stop drinking because we are powerless over alcohol.  We are powerless over alcohol in the sense that our bodies process alcohol differently than non-alcoholics and because of the nature of that particular disease, we are unable to change or alter that fact.  Our only solution then is to give up trying to stop drinking (as that's impossible for us) and to begin trying to stay sober today.  Just for today.  Not tomorrow.  Not for the rest of our lives.  Just for today.  And if today's too much for us, we can narrow the scope down even further: Just for this hour.  Just for this minute.  Just for now.  And now, just for now.

As I was talking, I glanced over at the newcomer and tears were falling down his cheeks.  And I knew that I'd touched something in him.  And then I stopped.  To go further would be to lecture. 

After the newcomer had originally raised his hand at the beginning of the meeting, the secretary had asked for members of the group who were willing and able to sponsor men to raise their hands.  Because I already have at least a dozen active sponsees, I didn't think I could take on another sponsee at this time in my life.  I was tremendously proud though when I looked across the room and see one of my sponsee's raise his hand and offer his service in this regard.  I've always thought that he would make a great sponsor despite my poor example.

At the end of the meeting, I did go over and hug the newcomer and tell him to hang in there.  Things were going to get better (and worse) if he found a way to stay sober today.  That said, it goes without question that if he's unable to stay sober today, things would continue to get worse and worse and that that progression downward would pickup more and more steam the longer it took him to get and stay sober, one day at a time.  I also suggested to him (and to my sponsee) that it might be a good idea for him to get into a detox facility sooner rather than later (he was addicted not only to the drug alcohol, but to some other very powerful drugs that make his situation all the more tragic/urgent).

I wish him well.  This is not a pretty disease.

Take care!

Mike L.

Three Stories About Hopelessness

For some time now, I've been a firm believer in the synchronisticy of life events.  Some people refer to them as coincidences.  This last week, I knew that I was going to be chairing a meeting on Friday and during the week, I was on the lookout for a topic or a direction for that chair to take.  By the time I was sitting in the chair at noon on Friday, I knew that the topic had to be hopelessness.

On the previous Wednesday, I been in San Francisco for the day and was able to go to an afternoon meeting at Old St. Mary's Church.  The meeting format was for a woman who had just reached her 6 month sobriety milestone to tell her story for the first time, for her to pick a topic and then for people to share.  The chair would pick one person to begin the sharing and then it would just go around the room until everyone got a chance to share briefly on that topic.

The woman was so relieved by the time she finished her chair that she couldn't think of any topic, so she made the topic, whatever you'd like to talk about.  I didn't really have anything going on, so I just listened to each person share about what was going on with them.  After each person shared, I felt a connection with each one of them and I also came up with something relevant to that person's comment and that relieved me of the temptation to think about what I was going to share and thereby not listen to the next person who shared.  Anyway, that happened each time that someone shared.  I identified with them and I remembered a story from my own life that related to what each person was struggling with in their lives.

By the time it was almost my time to talk, I had no idea which of my stories I wanted to share.  So many stories, so little time.  I'm not a short story sorta guy.  In fact, I'm realizing now, that I wanted to tell three stories about Hopelessness and I'm not even done with the first story and I've gone on too long already for one blog.  Oh, well.

Anyway, the time came for the woman two seats to my right to share and I could tell she was very troubled.  She'd come into the meeting a little late, shortly after the time had come and gone for newcomers to raise their hands so that we could begin to get to know them and be of help.  She shared with us her name and said that this was her first day back in meetings.  She'd relapsed and it was horrible.  She cried.  She couldn't say anything more.  She looked around the room quickly and then shrugged her shoulders and said, "I'm hopeless!".

Well, now I had a story to tell.  I didn't even try to listen to the man's share next to me.  I just began trying to piece together my own hopelessness story in the hope I could tell it well enough to be helpful to the woman to my right.  I knew instinctively that she believed that her hopelessness was bad and a clear sign for all of us to see of her failed attempts at life and sobriety.  I wanted to gently let her know that things were not so bad, in fact, she was experiencing the most important event of her life.  A new beginning possible only from a moment of hopelessness.

I shared my moment of hopelessness which came after ten months of being unable to stop drinking.  The ten months had begun when my 15 year old son reached his own moment of hopelessness and began his own journey of recovery from addiction.  My moment of hopelessness came the morning of October 21, 2001 --- the night before my son had almost caught me drinking.  I'd successfully lied my way out of his discovery, but I'd gone to bed the night before feeling like shit.  Pat was 5 months and 10 days sober: how come I couldn't stop drinking and support him in his recovery?

Anyway, my moment of hopelessness occurred the following morning.  I woke up at 6am with the clearest of ideas greeting me:  "I just can't stop drinking!"  It was a thought that I had had most mornings for the last couple of years of my life.  What was different that morning though was that this first thought of hopelessness was followed by a second thought: "Not being able to stop drinking is called alcoholism and alcoholism is a disease."  For the first time in my life, it was perfectly OK to be an alcoholic.

I then looked at the woman to my right and said that some years ago I heard the greatest line I'd ever heard.  It was at a meeting when the chair shared what she considered her favorite line -- she'd stolen it from her sponsor years ago.  Her sponsor had said that she'd gotten sober "at the corner of Grace and Willingness."  I loved that line from the get go.  I went up to the chair woman after the meeting, thanked her and let her know that I too was going to steal her sponsor's line about the corner of Grace and Willingness.  She laughed.  I asked her to chair a meeting for me in two weeks at the Lafayette Hut and she graciously accepted.

As soon as I left the meeting, I realized that while it was a great line, it didn't describe where I'd gotten sober.  I had surely gotten sober as a result of Grace: my sober moment was not the result of my effort or thought process.  My sober moment was a gift from something or someone outside of myself.  It took me about two weeks of chewing on this question.  Eventually it came to me two weeks later, just as the chair woman walked into the Lafayette Hut.  She sat down next to me at the head of the table and I leaned over to thank her for coming out to chair this meeting.  And then I reminded her about her line about getting sober at the corner of Grace and Willingness.  She smiled and then I told her that while I loved the line, it was not where I got sober.   She smiled and asked, "Well, then, where did you get sober?"  "I got sober at the corner of Grace and Hopelessness!  It's about a half block down from the corner of Grace and Willingness!"

I then looked over at woman to my right in her first day of sobriety --- she was laughing and I think things were now becoming "right" in her world.

Thank God for Hopelessness!  It gives us the ability to accept things as they are without any need to change or pretend to be someone we're not. My problem wasn't that I was an alcoholic.  My problem was that I was an alcoholic who was trying (hopelessly!) to be a non-alcoholic!

Take care!  I will tell you my third story about hopelessness in a day or so.  My wife and I are getting on a cruise ship later today for a two week cruise to Alaska.  I'll try to get that blog published before she throws me overboard.

Mike L.

Grieving: Part of the Healing Process

A young woman with 60 days shared at a meeting yesterday that over the last weekend she and her husband had done some things together (planted a tree in the backyard, watched a football game, etc.) and that something really strange had happened to her. She paused and then looked around the room and said, "This is getting really hard!  I guess I've been on some sort of pink cloud until now.  This is hard!"

Anyway, during the weekend she and her husband (a non-alcoholic it seems) did some things together that in the past would have involved both of them drinking (her to excess, him not). Each time she realized that fact, she would start crying. Eventually it got so bad, that she went to her bedroom and laid down and sobbed. And sobbed.  Then she went out to cuddle up next to her husband in front of the TV and she sobbed some more. He tried to comfort her.  At one point, her 4 year old saw her crying and said to his Daddy, "Mommie's sad!". She'd never cried in front of her son.  She cried some more.

She got up then and called her "sister in sobriety" (they both have same sponsor) and the friend listened and understood.  She encouraged her friend by saying, "Just don't drink today. You just have to not drink today. This will pass...."

Then she called her sponsor and shared what had gone on that day.... The sponsor listened.  At the end of the story, the sponsor explained to her that she was grieving....   Grieving!  And then it all made sense to her. She was grieving the loss of being able to drink "like normal people.?

Before she had even shared what her sponsor had told her, I too had the clear thought that this woman was grieving a very deep loss.  Grieving is so important in our recovery and I think most of us go through it without really knowing what's happening. 

As she continue with her story, I took out a piece of paper and drew a tombstone and engraved on it the following:

R.I.P.

"Shannon-the-'nonalcoholic'-who-could-drink-like-a-normal-person"

Died: 2/__/2010

May she rest in peace!

I gave the drawing to her at the end of the meeting. And she laughed and laughed as she read it. Then she shared it with her sober sister, and they both laughed and laughed.  And then I got two great hugs.

I did whisper to her later as I was leaving the meeting, that in regards to this false self (it's what people in AA are referring to--even though they don't know it!-- as the "ego")  that she needs to know that this "dead ego" may not really be dead: it can wake up at anytime and start whispering, "It's ok, you have just one...."  It's ok and she needed fear it's coming:  if she doesn't feed it, it will go back to sleep.

Sometimes, it takes a while before they really go in peace.

Take care!

Mike L.

Powerlessness

Powerless to stop
Even when I stopped.

Powerless to stop
Before I'd even start.

Powerless to stop
Then.

Powerless to stop
Now.

Powerlessness accepted
Freedom.

Powerlessness embraced
Strength.

Powerlessness found
Life begins.

Again.

Willingness: Not an Action

Willingness is not an action.  It's a state of mind that precedes certain types of actions that are called "intentional acts".  Willingness does not precede some action that is accidental.  Willingness can also precede non-action.  For example, I can be willing to make a particular amends but choose not to make that amends because I realize that it might very well harm that person (or someone else) more than help them.

The amount of willingness that is required to perform a particular action will increase in proportion to the level of unwillingness that I have toward doing the contemplated action.  This imbalance is probably the reason behind my not finishing my 4th/5th step process until I was almost two years sober.  I have no regrets about that, it's just they way it happened....and it worked.  This imbalance, with the amount of unwillingness being far greater than the amount of willingness, also was behind my inability to get sober back when I was able to stop drinking for significant periods of time, even though I had strong reasons to suspect that I, like my father before me, was an alcoholic.  The willingness "to stop forever" was never there for me because I could hold on to the belief, supported by the facts it seemed, that I could stop...if I really wanted to.  My "problem" was that I never really wanted to stop!  That is, until the day came when I simply couldn't stop. 

And when the day came that I really, really wanted to stop: I couldn't.  My willingness was far exceeding my unwillingness I believe ---- but was keeping me stuck was the firmly held belief, also supported by the facts as I understood them, that I could not "not drink".  I couldn't imagine me "not drinking" for any significant period of time.  It seemed impossible to me.  So, in a growing state of desperation and despair, I continued to drink for the next ten months.  At the beginning, most of me wanted not to get caught drinking: I didn't want to get caught because then other people would begin expecting me to do what I knew to be impossible: stop drinking!  But at then end, probably for the last month or so, I gradually began to sense a growing hope that someone would catch me in my deceit and confront me on my actions. 

And then the night came when my son almost caught me: he came out of a meeting and walked over to the car where I was waiting to pick him up and take him home.  He asked me if he could go get something to eat with his friends and I told him that it was OK with me....   He started to walk away and then I think he was confronted with something he didn't really want to do either: confront his father after smelling alcohol on his breath just then.  I can't imagine that the prospect of confronting your dad, with only 5 months and 10 days clean time and a history of screwups, relapses and run-ins with the police: and accusing him of drinking...how that would be something done lightly.  My son became willing though and his willingness saved my life.

He walked back to my car and asked if he could ask me a question.  I said yes.  So he asked, "Have you been drinking?".  My life came to a standstill.  I wanted to tell him the truth so badly!  I knew that he wouldn't get mad at me, yell at me or condemn me.  I'd seen him handle other situations like this with his friend's dads who'd been doing what I'd been doing (except for the not-getting caught part): he was always kind and gentle.  He accepted them as fellow addicts and asked them if they wanted help.  No strings attached.  No expectations.

But I couldn't tell him the truth.  What kept me from doing that was the idea, "if I tell him that I've been drinking, he'll then begin expecting me to stop!"  ---- and I can't fucking stop!!!  That's impossible.  Looking back, it seemed like I had a lot of willingness/desire at that time: but it was blocked by the certainty of the desired action being impossible. 

What happened then was I did lie to my son.  I answered, "No, I haven't been drinking."  I said it as defenselessly as I could.   My lying skills have always one of my strong points: he accepted what I said without question.  He just said that he had to ask because he smelled alcohol around my car and he couldn't not ask me this question.  He then let it go and went to have something to eat with his friends.

Me?  I sat there all alone.  Alone.  Isolated.  In my own personal hell.  I'd missed my golden opportunity to escape that hell and I was doomed.  After about an hour later, my son returned and we headed home.  We had our usual back and forth conversation that would follow me asking him "How did the meeting go?".  Just like always, he'd tell me stories without betraying confidences.  I'd listen --- feeling a growing sense of shame for my inability to face this problem with the kind of courage and persistence that my 15 year old son and these other young people were demonstrating on a daily basis.  We got home and I just walked by my wife and said that I was going to bed: I was very very tired.  It was a Friday and I'd had a very long week.  If only she knew how true that was.

I went right to sleep and then next thing I knew it was 6am the next morning and I was completely awake.  The first thought that came to my head was "I just can't stop drinking!"  It was the same thought that I had been waking up to for the last ten months, if not the last 30 years.  Then, a millisecond later, I had a second thought and that was, "Not being able to stop drinking is called "alcoholisim" and alcoholism is just a disease and I just happen to have it!"  Wow!  I just have a disease!  My body is different than those who are non-alcoholics!  In an instant, it seemed like my whole past life flashed before me and I understood everything that I had done over the years in terms of drinking and not being able to stop.  But this morning, another though followed and replaced the "hopelessness" that I had always felt in regards to the idea of "stopping" and that idea was I could do what my son had been doing: instead of "trying to stop" I could do what he had been doing, "trying to stay sober/clean one day at a time!".  In an instant my whole worldview changed.

What then happened, not that I knew it at the time, is that I became willing to try and stay sober one day at a time.  I stopped trying to stop.  As someone later told me, "I stopped stopping!".  Willingness only became effective for me after I came to a complete state of hopelessness: another state of mind.  Hopelessness is the state of mind that precedes giving up on something you want to do, but something you believe to be impossible.  I reached a state of hopelessness in terms of my belief that I could continue to drink and not be an alcoholic.  Once I was convinced to my core of the hopelessness of that, then all it took was a very small amount of willingness to try and stay sober one day, to try and do what my son had been doing successfully for over 5 months.  With willingness, I then took my first step.

Take care!

Mike L.

Does a Relapse Always Require a 1st Step Redo?

I've recently been working with a couple of guys who've been struggling with relapse and it's gotten me to rethink the issue of the necessity of reworking a 1st step after a relapse. While I think there's much wisdom behind the conventional wisdom suggesting that a person take a harder look at the 1st Step after a relapse, assuming they'd taken a gander at it before the relapse, I wonder if it's not possible that some people get stuck in the 1st Step and fail to stay sober because of their not moving forward to the 2nd Step.

In both cases that I'm dealing with, I believe both men have a good understanding of the basic tenets of the 1st Step, but for some reason they've both had problems translating that mental understanding into their heart of hearts.  Or maybe it's something as trivial as having the -ISM in alcoholism: incredibly short-term memory.  Regardless, I'm thinking that either or both of these guys might want to move on to the 2nd step and begin asking for help from something or someone greater than they are, as well as begin considering what alcoholic insanity is for them.

For me, it was helpful early on to begin asking others for help.  It seemed to happen quite naturally for me as soon as I walked into my first meeting.  I had a sense, I suppose from watching my son get clean as a result of going into these 12 step rooms, that I would find help within these rooms myself...if only I would ask.  If only I would accept the help so frequently offered to me.  For me, the 2nd step didn't really need to get to the thornier question of whether there was a God or not, or if there was a God, what that God was/wasn't like.  For me, the powerlessness found and accepted in the 1st step only called for me to accept help from all sorts of sources outside and even within myself.

The 2nd step has become much more one where I have come to understand the insanity of much of my life, both drinking and non-drinking.  The insanity that I have discovered in the 2nd step has to do with an awareness, gradual to be sure, that I spend much energy trying to be someone I'm not.  In terms of my drinking career, much energy was spent over 30 years or so trying not to be an alcoholic "like my father" --- well, trying that AND trying to drink "like" a non-alcoholic.  That was my alcoholic insanity.

The 2nd step has given me much freedom in my life: freedom to be who I am.  Who "that" is is always going to be somewhat mysterious and unknown, but I have developed a greater comfort in the knowledge that I am perfectly OK who I am, even if I'm not all that sure who that is.  It's beyond a simple "I'm OK, You're OK" --- much more to the truth of the matter, it's a "I'm not OK, You're not OK and THAT's OK!"

I know that all have their own path and I'm not one to know what another person's path is or will be.  I will raise this issue with these guys though and let them chew on it for awhile.  A 1st step is never really something that's completed and done with, so if they want, they can continue being with the 1st step as they continue moving on through the next steps....whether that be 2 or 3 or 10, 11 or 12.  I'm not a big stickler on doing the steps in order to be honest....  Whatever will work, I'm for.

Take care!

Mike L.

The Three Ps of Alcoholism: My Answer

Several people tried their best, but no one was able to come up with my answers to this riddle....except me.  Funny how your own riddles are easiest to solve!  Anyway, without further ado, here are my answers to the question/riddle in regards to the Three Ps of Alcoholism and how all of them end up being summarized by the one word, Powerlessness:

The disease of alcoholism, as described in the long version of the first step (p.30 of the Big Book), is:

1.  Physical or Physiological in nature:  "Most of us were unwilling to admit that we were real alcoholics. No person likes to think they are bodily or mentally different from their fellows."  One of the most important aspects of this disease to me was that it was physiological in nature.  My disease was not a moral failure on my part.  My past actions in relation to alcohol weren't due to a weakness of moral fiber or willpower: everything became clear to me when I woke up and realized that my body processed alcohol differently than those who were not alcoholics.   Ahhh, that's why I did that and felt that....  When it says here that "no personal likes to think that they are bodily (physically) or mentally (here you may think this is not physical, but I'd challenge you to think about what organ in the body does all the mental stuff (the brain) and that the brain is physical!) different from their fellows." --- I take that to mean that we didn't like to think that we alcoholics were physically different from our non-alcoholic fellows: but too bad!!!  We are different!  And that's ok.

2.  Permanent, not temporary:  "We alcoholics are men and women who have lost the ability to control our drinking. We know no real alcoholic ever recovers control. All of us felt at times that we were regaining control. But such intervals, usually brief, were inevitably followed by still less control which led in time to pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization."  When I was younger, I learned somewhere that alcoholism was a disease but (and I didn't realize this until after I was sober...) somehow I thought that this disease was something more akin to a bout with the flu.  It would come and go.  In this framework, I was able to think that I had a few "alcoholic incidents" over my first 30 years of drinking but that I was always able to recover from those drunken and shame-filled incidents with a new and powerful resolve "never to do that again" -- and I wouldn't!  I would never again drink 151 rum!  I would never again drink beer, then tequila, then scotch, then more beer! (I would, of course, drink tequila, then beer, then more beer, then scotch!)  It was a real awakening to truth the morning I woke up and realized that this disease was no intermittent or temporary: it was permanent.  This was the way my body works and that will never change for the better.  It will, however, change for the worse....which leads me to...

3.  Progressive:   "We are convinced to a man that alcoholics of our type are in the grip of a progressive illness. Over any considerable period of time, we get worse, never better."  This physical and permanent condition is not static in nature: it's progressive.  Progressively worse, not progressively better.  That is, the way my body processes alcohol is such that once I've started putting alcohol into my body, my body will act as though I desperately need more...and more....and more.  There is no amount that will ever be "enough" for any period of time.  What might be enough when I was 20 was no longer enough when I was 30.  And by the time I was 48, I knew that there was really no quantity that would ever be enough.  I was hopeless.

Well, I was hopeless until I discovered through watching my son and two other young people get and stay sober for 5 months and 10 days.  When their success blinded me to my own delusions, I woke up and saw myself as I really was: an alcoholic, a man whose body process alcohol differently than non-alcoholics, whose body would always process alcohol differently and who disease would continue to get worse and worse as long as I kept putting alcohol into this same body.

So when I'm reciting this long version of the 1st step, the most important part of the reading comes in the middle: "We learned that we had to fully concede to our inner most selves that we were [Physically, Permanently and Progressively] alcoholics. This is the first step in recovery. The delusion that we are like other people, or presently may be, has to be smashed." 

Well, this delusion of mine got smashed October 21, 2001.  The Powerlessness referred to in the Reader's Digest version of the first step found on p.59 of the Big Book, does not get me thinking about me vs. a glass of scotch.  No, powerlessness gets me thinking of the Three Ps: that my Physical body processes alcohol the exact way an alcoholic's body processes alcohol; that my body will always--Permanently--do that and if I were to put alcohol into my body now, this disease would reactivate and begin its Progressive destruction of me, body and soul.  I'm not so much powerless over alcohol as I am powerless to be someone other than who I am: at least in regards to alcohol and other outside solutions to inside problems.  Thank God or Whoever.

If you feel any sense of disappointment that you couldn't figure out my riddle, please don't feel bad.  The only reason that I think this became so clear to me is that I decided to add this long version of the 1st step to my daily routine of reciting things to myself while I drive to/from work every day.  I suspect that I have recited p.30 to myself probably close to a 1,000 times in the last five years.  You try that and you will find things within such a passage that you never saw before.  You'd be amazed at what I've found in How It Works after reciting it a comparable number of times AND hearing it in probably 700+ meetings each of the last almost 8 years:  and I'm still able to hear one "new" word in that passage now that I never saw before!  Shaking my head...  Some are sicker than others.

Take care!

Mike L.

A 1st Step Puzzle/Riddle: The Three Ps of Alcoholism

One thing I often recommend when someone is working a 1st Step is that they first carefully read and re-read what I call the "Long Version of the 1st Step" found on page 30 of the Big Book.  It's the first page of the 3rd Chapter, called "More About Alcoholism".  On that page is the statement, "We learned that we had to fully concede to our innermost selves that we were alcoholics.  This is the first step in recovery."

The challege then, is learning and understanding what an alcoholic actually is.  If you don't have a good and accurate perception of what an alcoholic is, then I suspect that your 1st step will not be as effective as hoped.  An example of a poor understanding of what an alcoholic is can be found in my own history: for years I "knew" that alcoholism was a disease, but I thought that disease was one that was temporary or one that could be cured. 

Every time I had an alcoholic "incident" in my life, I would be baffled as to why I did what I did (because it seemed to be something very close to what my dad had done at some point...and he was an alcoholic!) and I would then swear "never" to do that again.  According to this plan then, while I may have accidentally acted "like" an alcoholic during that unfortunate incident, it was within my power to change my behavior in such a manner as to avoid actually being an alcoholic.  Truly a delusional and self-serving view of this disease.

So, what I ask my sponsees to do is to read this page very carefully to discover what it holds for us in terms of more accurate information about the disease of alcoholism.  I then ask them to figure out what I am going to call "the three Ps of Alcoholism".  Hidden in that reading are three very important characteristics of the disease of alcoholism: each characteristic begins with the letter "P". 

Before they begin, I give them a hint in the form of a riddle: None of the three P words are "powerless" BUT all three of the P words can be summarized by the word "Powerless" or "Powerlessness".

Anyone want to take a shot at what the three P words are which describe critical characteristics of the disease of alcoholism?  Bonus points will be awarded to those who can then explain how all three P words can be summarized by the word "Powerless."  Good luck!

Take care!

Mike L.

My Name is Winnie the P., And I Am An Alcoholic

I was reading a great book while I was on vacation, called The Dark Night of Recovery by Edward Bear and in it the sponsor (wrinkled and crotchety 30 year sober guy) recommends four books for the new sponsee (15 years sober, dry as a stick attorney): The Big Book, the 12x12, a book on Winnie the Pooh and The I Ching. I couldn't find the book on Winnie the Pooh at the eclectic book store near where we were staying, but I did find a great book called the The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff which was more than sufficed for my purposes. The sponsor in the Dark Night book would give reading assignments to this guy, Big Brain that he was, and have him report back in two weeks with a report on how these readings helped him understand the step they were working on... Fascinating book.

As I read The Tao of Pooh with the hope of finding more 1st step wisdom, I came across a song/poem of Winnie the Pooh's (original author was A.A. Milne...how serendipity is that?!) called "Cottleston, Cottleston, Cottleston Pie". According to the author of the Tao of Pooh, this poem captures the essence of Taoism in that it basically is saying that we are already perfect just as we are, we don't need to change anything. In his view, one could replace the "Cottleston" verse with "Inner Nature" or "what is, what is".

Anyway, as I'm apt to do, I decided to memorize the Cottleston rhyme two days ago and after saying it over and over again the last two days, I began to understand the truth hidden deep within it and how much it spoke to me about my recovery and my alcoholism. Especially my 1st Step and how I got sober and how I've been able to stay sober. Yesterday, I started trying to take this rhyme and revise it in such a way that it spoke more clearly of my own truth and within a few attempts I was able to come up with my own version of the Cottleston rhyme that speaks more truthfully of my own experience of getting and staying sober. It's an AA poem of sorts: I say that because 2/3s of it are stolen from someone else's spiritual writings. True AA.

My name is Winnie the Pooh, and I am an alcoholic.

Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie
A fly can't bird, but a bird can fly
Ask me a riddle and I reply
Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie

Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie
A fish can't whistle, neither can I.
Ask me a riddle and I reply
Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie

Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie
Why does a chicken... I don'know why!
Ask me a riddle and I reply
Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie
　
It is or it isn't; I am or I amn't
A drink can't drunk, but a drunk can sober.
Ask me a riddle and I reply
It is or it isn't; I am or I amn't

It is or it isn't; I am or I amn't
A drunk can't drink, and neither can I!
Ask me a riddle and I reply
It is or it isn't; I am or I amn't

It is or it isn't; I am or I amn't
Why does an alcoholic...i don't know why!
Ask me a riddle and I reply
It is or it isn't; I am or I amn't

Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie
A fly can't bird, but a bird can fly
Ask me a riddle and I reply
Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie

Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie
A fish can't whistle, neither can I.
Ask me a riddle and I reply
Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie

Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie
Why does a chicken... I don'know why!
Ask me a riddle and I reply
Coddleston, Coddleston, Coddleston Pie

My name is Winnie the Pooh, and I am an alcoholic.

Take Care!

Mike L.

The Last Roadblock to AA

I've been watching several people hovering around their bottom recently and it's given me an opportunity to remember back to the time just before I was struck sober and what was going through my mind when I was becoming truly convinced that I was totally incapable of stopping drinking. I remember the time well.

I was totally isolated and alone. Take that back: I was isolated, but I was rarely alone. There were people all about me during most of my days: at work, at home, my wife, my kids. No friends though. There were people all around me though: but I didn't connect with a single one of them at any point in my day. I was totally isolated in my "self" --- I was constantly thinking of when the next opportunity to drink would present itself and what I could do to make that opportunity happen sooner rather than later.

This state of affairs was most painful in two areas: my relationship with my wife and my relationship with my son Pat. My wife and I had been married for about 20 years at that time and there was a part of me that needed and wanted to confide in her what was going on with me. But I simply couldn't. If I told her anything even close to the truth about what was going on with me, it would eventually lead to her coming to the door which led to my drinking. I couldn't tell her how depressed and unhappy I was because she'd want to help me get help. But I was already getting the help I thought I needed and had to have: alcohol. Her kind of help would probably be a therapist any therapist would eventually ask me why I didn't stop drinking and when I answered (should I actually tell the truth---which would be unlikely) with "I can't" he'd naturally conclude that I was an alcoholic and that I needed to do something about that. Like Stop Drinking!

The hell of my existence though was that I couldn't tell people that I couldn't stop drinking because as soon as I did that they'd naturally expect me to....stop drinking! Fuck!!!

So I didn't really talk to my wife for those ten months before I got sober. I mean to talked to her, but I never said anything of significance or truth in terms of what was going on in my head or heart.

In terms of my relationship with my son, who was just beginning his own recovery from his addiction to drugs, it was almost as painful, if not more, as my (non-)relationship with my wife. I'd take him to and from his meetings almost every day between January 2008 and the time of my getting struck sober. While he was in the meetings, I was supposed (so my wife thought) to stay parked outside to wait for him and to make sure that he stayed in the meeting. The trust level between us and Pat was at an all time low.

But it was clear to me that Pat was really trying to get and stay clean and sober. Although there were many relapses in those first 4 months of 2008, something clicked on May 10, 2008 and he's been clean and sober since. But back then, I rationalized with myself that sitting outside of the meetings waiting for Pat and checking to make sure he stayed in the meetings was somehow "disloyal" and "un-trusting" of Pat. So I used that rationalization to make it OK to drive off and find a bar where I could drink while he was in the meetings. Perfect solution to all my problems.

That system worked until it didn't work. Toward the end, I was feeling more and more isolated and in pain. In the short time periods that I was able to drink without getting caught, I wasn't able to get enough alcohol in me to take away the pain. In those first ten months of 2008, I think I only really got dizzying drunk maybe three or four times (typically when I was away from home, but not always).

Toward the end, I would be sitting outside my son's meetings "wishing" that I could go in there and get better like he was getting better. What kept me from doing that? Well, that's the major roadblock that I found blocking my entry into the rooms of AA. The roadblock was that I got it in my head that the people in "those rooms" were people who could stop drinking and that I couldn't go into those rooms until I could stop drinking. That thought kept me out of AA for some days and weeks.

Ultimately what happened was that I woke up one morning after Pat had almost caught me drinking and as soon as I woke up I realized once again that I simply couldn't stop drinking. But for some reason, I then realized that "not being able to stop drinking" IS ALCOHOLISM! And that alcoholism is a disease. It's not my fault. It's just the way things turned out to be. What happened that morning is I truly and completely accepted the truth of my alcoholism and instead of continuing to "try to stop drinking" I began a new strategy: I began trying to stay sober, one day at a time.

That's when the roadblock disappeared for me. I didn't go to AA for another few days because I had some business to take care of first: (1) I needed to tell my wife what had been going on and what I was going to do about it and (2) I needed to tell my son the same thing. Both accepted me without condition and I then went to my first meeting of AA.

I didn't realize for some months what my last roadblock was and I still remember the day and the meeting that this realization came about. I was sitting in a meeting and that morning a young woman came in and raised her hand as being in her first 30 days....again. She'd been a part of that meeting for some time apparently and I could see the shame written all over her face when I said that she'd drank again and was back. I watched her during the whole meeting and I was searching for something I could say that might help her. Toward the end of the meeting I discovered what it was: she was ashamed because she couldn't stop drinking and because she was thinking that the rest of us in that room were able to stop drinking! So I raised my hand and welcomed her back and told her that she wasn't alone in this room, that she wasn't the only person in the room who couldn't stop drinking: because I couldn't, no, I can't stop drinking either! I can't stop drinking either.

Even though I was some months sober, I still perceive myself to be someone who can't stop drinking. What keeps me sober is (1) remembering that I can't stop drinking and (2) that I can try to stay sober today. That strategy had worked then for several months and it's still working today.

Take care!

Mike L.

The Step's Hidden Principles

We've all heard many times the last seven words of the 12th step, "practice these principles on all our affairs" --- but has anyone seriously asked, "What principles?" I suspect most if not all but me members of AA assume (which is to conclude without having asked the question) that the "principles" are equal to the preceding 11 or 12 "steps."

Well, I don't think so. And anyone who knows me will not be shocked. I haven't had a conforming thought for my entire life! I think that the principles are something more than the steps. I think that they are something different for each of us and we discover what these principles are by working or, better yet, being worked by these steps. The principles are hidden deep within and are meant to be discovered.

I remember once being at a meeting at the California state capital building one Friday noontime and the speaker shared with us a little wallet-sized card that listed the 12 Principles of AA's Steps. Someone had given it to him years before and he passed it around for each of us to look. I remember that I was so overjoyed that someone had discovered specifically what the damned principles were that were alluded to in the ending of the 12th step. Until that time, I had always held a resentment that Bill did not explicitly state what these principles were. In my mind, I thought that he should have included a parenthetical comment at the end of each step and summarized the principle for each step. The card listed 12 principles corresponding to each Step: Step 1 was Acceptance. Step 2 was Faith. Step 3 was Surrender/Trust.

I wrote them all down on the back of a checking account deposit slip and I've kept it in my wallet ever since. I'm not going to list them here because I eventually came to believe that this list has absolutely no "authority". It wasn't, as far as I know, something that Bill Wilson later wrote down or that has been adopted by the AA Fellowship. More importantly, I realized that what I was searching for, the authoritative list of AA principles, did not, could not and should not exist.

The unnamed principles referred to in the 12th step are known only to those who have worked these steps. Remember, this list on page 59 of "How It Works" -- which summarizes the 12 Steps of AA --- begins with the statement, "Here are the steps we took which are suggested as a program of recovery." As it says in the pamphlet, "A Member's Eye View of AA" these are not "commandments to be followed but reports of action taken."

The summarized list cannot list static statements of principles because these principles are different for each person working each step. The principles should not be definitively listed because that would only mislead those who've yet to take these steps. If you want to learn the principle underneath the 1st step, then you must work that step. You don't have to work that step or any other step: remember, it's only suggested that you work the steps. But if you want to know the principle underneath or within any of these steps, you must work them. It will do you no good to be told what the principles are: you must work these steps before you will know these principles. And you must know these principles, before you can practice them in all your affairs.

I think I came to understand this whole philosophy of the steps very early in my recovery. I somehow discovered that the steps were something I needed to do honestly and without compromise. I needed to work them without pretending. Without faking it. Ok, there's really no mystery for me as to how I came to understand this rather unique view of how to work the steps. It was all a direct result of having encountered a man named Dr. Earle. He gave me that freedom. He taught me, with his actions, the "no bullshit program of AA."

Today, I heard some one's story and I was profoundly struck at how much emphasis she has come to place on the 1st Step in her own program of recovery. She's been in (and out) of AA for 15 to 20 years and is now celebrating 6 months of continuous sobriety. In the room, her younger brother sat and listened to his sister --- he'd never been to that meeting before and he was truly surprised when his sister went up to sit at the table in order to share her story with us. He too has been in (and out) of AA for almost as long as his sister and I suspect from the carefully chosen words he used during his comments this afternoon, that he has something less than 6 months of continuous sobriety.

Anyway, as she shared her story today, she talked about the importance of the 1st step in her program today. A half-measured 1st step has apparently been something that has repeatedly tripped her up in her attempts to get and stay sober. While there were periods of time, months and sometimes years, where she would seem to "get it" --- there had always come a moment when she'd forget...and then she'd drink and/or use...or use and/or drink. But, she had always come back to AA. She has been a persistent one and it was a pure joy to listen to her today.

At some point in her share, she mentioned something I'd never heard before and that was the "Three 'A's of AA: Awareness, Acceptance and Action". For her, all three were important in her working of the 1st step: becoming aware of who she is as an alcoholic, accepting who she is as an alcoholic and acting on or in conformity with that awareness.

Although I doubt she understands this, I'm looking back at her share this afternoon realizing that she's coming to understand the principles hidden in her 1st step: awareness, acceptance and action. And I can certainly identify these same principles in my 1st step: waking up one morning and becoming aware, once again, that "I can't stop drinking!" And then, for some reason, carrying that Step Zero thought one step further, I became aware that "Not being able to stop drinking is called 'alcoholism' --- that alcoholism is a disease and I just happen to have it!" That awareness was then followed, in a nanosecond, by the utter and penetrating acceptance that having this dis-ease was perfectly OK! Ahhhh!

The action for me is sort of odd in that I did it without moving my body. The action occurred that morning when imagined myself sitting in a big circle of people at my son's recovery program. It was at one of the Thursday night "Multi-Family Group" sessions. I'd been going to these Multi-Family Groups for about 10 months as my son was beginning his recovery and as I was falling farther and farther into my disease.

The parents of the kids who were in the Adolescent Chemical Dependency Program would sit in a circle, along with their recovering ones, as well as any other siblings who wished to join us for these sessions. The sessions were designed for us to talk about whatever was going on in our families as we were attempting to support the member of our family who was trying to get/stay clean and sober. At the beginning of these sessions, we'd start off by going around the room and we'd check in. Checking in for the parents meant saying along these lines: "I'm Mike, I'm here for my son Pat and we have had (or have not had...as the case may have been) a clean and sober house this past week. And I do (don't) have something to talk about tonight." If we did have something to talk about, the leader would make note of that and then the next person would check in.

Checking in for the recovering addicts meant saying, "I'm Pat and I'm an addict. I've been clean for X days/months. I haven't smoked cigarettes for 15 minutes (this program wanted the addicts to also stay nicotine free for 90 days in order to "graduate" from the program--my son, with his sponsors and parent's support, decided early on that staying free of alcohol and other drugs was big enough of a challenge at this point in his life without having to worry about dying of cancer later on... He'd deal with that later.). And I do (or don't) have something to talk about tonight.

For the past ten months, I'd lied every time I checked in to that Thursday night meeting. I lied when I said that we had a clean and sober household. It was a lie, not because of my son; it was my lie because there were only a handful of days/nights during those ten months when I walked into our house without alcohol in my body. But the morning of October 20, 2001 --- something different happened if only in my mind.

After waking up to the awareness of my incapacity to stop drinking and the acceptance of this physiological disease of mine --- I took the action of checking in to this imaginary group of people and raised my hand and said, "My name is Mike and I'm an alcoholic." When I took that action, albeit in my mind while laid there next to my sleeping wife of 20 years, something miraculous happened. I experienced a freedom from the obsessions (1) to drink and (2) to not be an alcoholic like my dad, that had plagued me for 30 years. I was free. While I couldn't stop drinking, I could try to stay sober one day at a time.

I floated in that freedom for three days before I attended my first meeting of AA. The first two days were just simple bliss, but I began to realize that this gift of sobriety was something very fragile. It wasn't the result of my thinking or figuring something out. It was a gift and I needed to nurture it. I quickly understood that I needed to do what my son had been doing. I shared my truth with my wife on the following Monday night---had I shared that with anyone before her would have hurt her even more deeply than the real daily betrayals I had been making with her in terms of my drinking for the last ten months.

After sharing this truth with my wife, I then shared this truth with my son who was then 5 months and 10 days ahead of me in this journey of recovery. His reaction my confession of absolute failure as a father and human being was astounding: "Gee, Dad, this is Great! We're both addicts!" I shook my head in disbelief and told him that although I wasn't all that thrilled about being an addict, I was overwhelmed with joy over the fact that we were going to be able to share our recovery with one another. Sharing that recovery wasn't something that I was able to do with my own father (he'd died of alcoholism some years before) but that I could share it with him was the best thing that had ever happened to me in my entire life. Then I took my son to his NA meeting and I went on to my first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous.

The principles of my 1st step now include Awareness, Acceptance and Action. What an amazing program!

Take care!

Mike L.

Alcoholic's Greatest Problem and Greatest Solution: The Ego

As I've mentioned in other recent blogs, two of my friends in AA have recently relapsed and while both are sober again each seem to be having their own struggles with the fact that they relapsed and with coming back into the rooms of AA and raising their hands, disclosing that they are once again in their 1st 30 days of sobriety.

I remember once listening to an old, now deceased, circuit speaker named Chuck Chamberlain. In his pitch, he said that the greatest problem and the greatest solution for the alcoholic was the Ego. Then he laughed and asked, "What's the Ego? Well, the best definition I've ever heard for ego is "The conscious feeling of being separate from. Separate from what? Separate from other people, separate from things, separate from God, separate from ourselves." When he wrote his book, which seems to be a verbatim transcription of his standard pitch, he included a drawing of this ego: it was a little stick figure (representing "me") standing alone and outside a big circle. Inside the circle were the words, "God, Other People, Things, Ourself".

I was immediately taken with this view of a person's total isolation and loneliness. Totally disconnected from anyone and anything. Alone. That was me toward the end of my drinking. Isolated and Alone. I couldn't let anyone "in" or within touching distance because I simply couldn't accept myself for who I had become: a drunk just like my dad.

Chuck C. refers to this isolated and lonely existence as the result of an unhealthy Ego. This sort of ego is one that separates us from others and from ourselves. For the alcoholic, it spells death because it's an existence that's provides the disease of alcoholism full reign over our body and choices. I understood immediately why Chuck characterized this as the alcoholic's greatest problem.

What was never clear to me though is what Chuck meant by his comment that the ego was also the source of the alcoholic's ultimate solution. It didn't seem to make sense and I listened to his tape multiple times trying to find out where he explained this strange and perplexing concept. I also bought his book and couldn't find any answers. So, I've made up my own.

The way I understand this healthy ego is by considering several concepts used in AA for a long time now: the deflation of the ego or ego deflation, and getting right-sized. Some people seem to take the approach that the ego is bad and must be demolished or annihilated. What little psychology I've had tells me that the ego is a essential component of being human. The unhealthy ego, it seems, is the sense of self that extends beyond who I really am and is used to keep others from getting close to or hurting "me". The healthy ego though, is more right-sized in some way and is not used to keep others away as it is to keep a healthy boundary between me and others. It accepts that human be-ing means getting close to others, touching, hurt, pain, love. It permits connection without loss of self.

A healthy ego does not cringe when someone gives them a compliment or expresses admiration. A healthy ego does not need to put others down in order to make themselves feel better or superior. A healthy ego can accomplish a moral inventory without over-exaggerating the good or the bad. In fact, the healthy ego doesn't have much use for such distinctions between good and bad. Whatever is, is. We see things clearly and try to find ways to do better in the future.

For the alcoholic, the healthy ego is one that accepts the truth of addiction and all its ramifications. It looks back to past actions when we were drinking and sees things for what they are. It sees the compulsion and the obsession underneath the behavior. It sees the craving, the need for more and more and more. It understands the need for abstinence. It understands the permanent and progressive nature of this disease and what will happen should I put alcohol or other mind-altering drugs in my body.

The healthy ego also has the ability to feel compassion toward others who share this disease, both when they are drinking and when they are striving to get and remain sober. The healthy ego has the ability to empathize with other alcoholics, to identify and connect with another person's struggles, confusion and fears. They can say with total honesty and compassion, "I understand. I've been there. Here, let me help you. There is a solution. Let's find it. You don't have to do this alone."

Take care!

Mike L.

Anthropomorphizing Alcohol/Alcoholism

"Remember that we deal with alcohol: cunning, baffling, powerful."

"I've been sober for "x" years, but I know that the disease is out there waiting for me to let down my guard. If I do, it will come at me with a vengeance..."

"My alcoholism is still in me....waiting. Lying in wait."

"My alcoholism is still there in me, even when I'm sober: it's like a sleeping tiger. One drink and the tiger will wake up and take back everything that I've gained during my sobriety."

"We admitted that we were powerless over alcohol."

All of these are just a few examples of how we often "anthropomorphize" --ascribe human qualities or characteristics to inanimate objects or other things that are not human -- the chemical "alcohol" and the disease of alcoholism. While I've nodded my head in apparent agreement with those who do this, I truly wonder if it's really helpful to portray alcohol or alcoholism as things they are not. In fact, I am beginning to think that such fantasy can actually become quite dangerous for the recovering alcoholic.

I say that because I think that the end result is that we ultimately begin to think, consciously or not, that our problem is "out there" or "not us." We mistakenly think that our recovery needs to be defensive in nature as though there's something out there that has the ability to trick us into taking a first drink or use some other mind-altering drug. That there's something in us that's really not part of "us" that has somehow invaded our body and who's there whether we consent to it being there or not. Something "foreign." All this leads us to expending large amounts of energy building up our defenses and other walls to this supposed outside problem.

And when do that, we ignore the fact that part of the essence of who we are is "alcoholic" --- there's nothing, not even alcohol itself, that can attack us or get us drunk.

Alcohol itself is not cunning, baffling or powerful. It's a fluid with certain physical characteristics. It doesn't smile, wink or smirk at us from behind the bar, the bottle or the glass. What's cunning, baffling and powerful is our mind which can look at alcohol or other drugs (or anything else "out there") and can see something that can fix our inside problems. That's what's cunning, baffling, powerful! Our mind. Our body. Our memory (or lack thereof).

Alcohol didn't "stop doing something" to or with me on October 20, 2001. What happened on that morning is I had a moment of clarity where, for the first time in my life, I understood that I simply couldn't stop drinking and the reason for that was the fact that I was an alcoholic. That understanding gave me a clear understanding, albeit brief and fleeting and shallow, of my entire life up to that point: everything thing I had done in terms of my drinking and my attempts to control it and use it --- all without becoming an alcoholic like my dad --- became perfectly clear to me. Ahhhh, that's why I did that! And that! And that! etc.

The only thing that alcohol was "doing" in my body at that moment of time the morning of October 20th was continue to dissipate. The physical chemicals making up alcohol continued to dissipate over the next few days, maybe weeks. They went away naturally because they are not me. For me, they are a type of poison or allergen. If I don't put them in me, I'm not bothered by them. From that point on, my struggles in recovery haven't been with the chemical alcohol, they've been with my thinking, my habits, my memories, my feelings, my character, etc. My struggles have been in and with "me!"

When I admitted that I was powerless over alcohol, for me, it wasn't a powerlessness over something "out there." Alcohol can't attack or rape me or make me drink. It's an inanimate object. It doesn't have life or the capabilities of living beings. My powerlessness is that I can't change my reaction to alcohol once it's in my body. My body is allergic to alcohol and once it's in me, I start having an allergic reaction. I start thinking that I can control how much and when I will drink. I start thinking that I will be able to stop when I'm ready. I start thinking that I can get sober tomorrow, or even better, the day/week/month/year/decade after. I start thinking that I will able to get sober before I die. Once I start, I don't seem to have the ability to choose when or where I'm going to stop.

I heard once that we alcoholics, maybe like all human beings, have a tendency to want to find outside solutions to inside problems. What I've been learning during the last 7+ years of recovery is that the solutions to my inside "problems" are to be found within. There's no threat out there that I need to be concerned about. I need to look within. And the paradoxical truth, for me, is that the only way I can find the solution within, is to reconnect also with those who are without: others. Other people. Other alcoholics, drunk, dry or sober. Maybe even an "other" that's beyond all understanding.

Take care!

Mike L.

Surrender Isn't Such a Bad Word

When I first got sober, I often heard people talk about the benefits of "surrender." Surrendering to the disease. Surrendering to the program. Surrendering to the will of God. Surrendering to the direction of a sponsor.

To be perfectly honest, I hated the word itself. Surrender was a word I heard a lot when I was growing up in the South. It was used in connection with a certain brand of Christianity which encouraged people to "surrender to the Lord" and to demonstrate that by walking up to the front of the church for some nice "laying on of hands" by a minister so that the Spirit of God could then enter and take charge of this new convert. Scared the life out of me.

So when I heard this word in the context of AA recovery, I recoiled as though from a hot flame! I came up with a long list of alternative preferable words that I could use to signify the same concept, but without using the word "surrender": giving up, letting go, stop fighting, etc. But never the word "surrender"!

Until one day when I was at a meeting and the person telling their story was one who shared my strong dislike of what he considered to be the "religiosity" of all the surrender talk in AA. He went on at some length about his dislike of the word and while you might have thought that would have made me close friends with the guy, I didn't. You see, I'm a contrarian. I have to disagree with everything. Ask anyone who knows me well, my wife in particular. The more he talked about his dislike of the word "surrender" the more I began to think of ways in which this word was a good one, if not an essential part of any one's "kit of spiritual tools!"

As I was doing that mental rebuttal, I remembered someone saying that "surrender is simply giving up a battle that can't be won." I then realized how appropriate this word was to my own miracle moment when I awoke from my last drink: for it was that morning that I surrendered in my hopeless battle "not to be an alcoholic". That was the battle that I began from my very first drink: I knew even then that my father was an alcoholic and that this disease was supposedly genetic in nature. I drank anyway because I thought that alcoholism was a "choice" and I was going to drink and "choose" not to become an alcoholic. I was going to drink "like" a non-alcoholic! The silliness of this strategy has me rolling on the floor laughing my ass off (ROTFLMAO) now, but it was a serious and strongly held strategy way back then and for the next thirty years.

So I did surrender on the morning of October 20, 2001: I gave up the battle of trying to drink like a non-alcoholic. I gave up the battle of trying not to be who I was: an alcoholic. I surrendered. Strangely enough, the obsession to drink left me that morning and hasn't returned since. I think that's a blessing without question, but I think it's also a direct result of what happened when I finally surrendered. You see, it takes a huge amount of effort and willpower to try and be someone you're not.

The effort required by this program of recovery is real and substantial, but it's simply nothing compared to the doomed and "negative" efforts used by me when I was trying to be someone I wasn't. The effort in my recovery has been directed more positively at staying sober, learning new ways to live life, new attitudes, new habits, new practices, new ideas. It's not a battle to be me.

I still don't agree with those who use this word to characterize their relationships to God, to their sponsors, to the program, etc. But that's ok. If the word doesn't work for me, I don't use it! Guess I'm surrendering to yet another battle: the battle to make everyone else just like Mike! Ahhhh. This is much easier!

Take care!

Mike L.

Either You Is or You Isn't; Either I am or I amn't

Objectively speaking, that is.

Unfortunately for the one who is wondering what's wrong with them and if what ever is wrong has something to do with their drinking, the most clear cut and objective tests for alcoholism can only be done in the late stage of this progressive disease, oftentimes after the patient is dead or (wet) brain dead. Before that point in time, the tests for alcoholism are more subjective in nature and require the alcoholic themselves to make the final determination.

That said, once the alcoholic is or becomes an alcoholic--in fact--they no longer have any "choice" as to being or not being an alcoholic. The only choice at that time is a subjective one and the choice has to do with what kind of alcoholic they are going to be at any one moment in their remaining life. As far as we know, the disease itself will never go away nor will it get better. Alcoholics then have four choices as to what sort of alcoholic they can be at any one time:

1. They can choose to characterize themselves as a non-alcoholic. True, this does not change the fact that they are, in fact, alcoholics---but they can choose to think of themselves as non-alcoholics. They can claim to others and to themselves, the facts not withstanding, that they really are not an alcoholic. Personally, looking back, I see that I did exactly this for the thirty years of drinking I did before getting sober. And for the last ten years before I got sober, I would characterize myself as a "periodic alcoholic": whenever I would have an 'incident' ending in guilt and shame over what I did while drinking. The incidents got worse and more frequent.

2. They can choose to be a practicing alcoholic: they can give up the fight and just resign themselves to being themselves, i.e., drunks! This was certainly my mode of existence for the last ten months of my drinking career. I consciously began drinking every time I could (without getting caught) once my son began his recovery in January 2001. I didn't discover a solution to that nightmarish existence until I woke up after my last drink on October 20, 2001. That morning I discovered and accepted the objective reality of my being an alcoholic.

3. They can choose to be dry alcoholics: they can, for various periods of time (at least in the early to mid-stages of the disease) do without alcohol. In my case, these dry periods were always periods of time that I endured to prove that I wasn't an alcoholic. To prove I had control over my drinking. Once I did this for 18 months. No meetings. No AA. No help from anyone. 18 months. 18 fucking months! But these dry spells always ended the same way: I would become convinced that I had been able to stop and if I was able to stop, I wasn't an alcoholic! They can't s6op. I can. The inevitable problem with stopping drinking is that it always leads to me starting again. Always. The distinguishing characteristic of all dry alcoholics? They are all VERY thirsty and as a result will usually resort to drinking or using some other drug at some point in time. Or commit homicide or suicide.

4. They can choose to be an alcoholic practicing recovery. That practice (practice means "to put into action") can mean a variety of things for different people, but I think it always involves accepting the truth of this disease and finding some way to deal with life without resorting to the use of alcohol or other mind-altering drugs, one day at a time. There are comparable stages to this recovery, early recovery, the "middle years" and "long term" sobriety.

The important thing to notice about these four choices is that an alcoholic can avail themselves of any of these alternative views of self, at any time in their alcoholic life. On any particular day, they can pick and choose to live any one or gray area mixed combinations of the four. For example, I often hear members come into the rooms of AA sharing that they have just finished living some sort of "dry spell" and are now trying to get back into active recovery.

The most dramatic example of a dry drunk getting sober was seen by me a few years ago when I saw a guy come into one of my regular meetings: he was 25 years "without a drink or drug", but hadn't gone to meetings, worked the steps or worked on his recovery since he completed the first year of his recovery. For the first year of his recovery, he had done all the basics: didn't drink/use, went to meetings, got a sponsor, worked the steps.... But then for the next 24 years, he became a workaholic and withdrew from the fellowship and from an active program of recovery.

Then the inevitable night came: it was 10pm and he was just getting ready to leave work, when he called his wife of 20 years and let her know that he was wrapping things up at the office and would be home shortly. Then, before hanging up and for a reason he still doesn't quite understand, he decided to ask his wife: "Are you happy?"

Her response was silence for several long seconds and then she said to him, in effect (I'm paraphrasing): No. I'm not. And I want a divorce. And when you get home tonight, I'll have your bags packed and waiting for you at the front door. Find another place to live beginning tonight.

Somehow, this man did not drink that night. Instead, picked up his bags, moved into a motel and then he returned to the rooms of AA the very next day. I remember being astounded that this man didn't drink, given what happened to him and that he'd been so disconnected from the program for so long. I talked to him afterwards and shared with him that while he miraculously didn't drink, it did appear to me that he was awfully thirsty! He laughed and we became AA friends from that point on. For the last three years he has been practicing a rigorous program of recovery...and knows very well the difference between "dry" and "sober". It's been inspiring to watch him soberly and honorably walk through the pain of a divorce and the joys/pains of new relationships.

I've been extremely lucky to have spent most of the last 7 and a half years as an alcoholic practicing recovery. It seems to be the easier softer way that I was always looking for!

Take care!

Mike L.