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We hope that you enjoy today's speaker. Okay, our speaker tonight is Cindy Murphy. And I I'll tell you, it doesn't take long for me to think of something to say about Cindy.

I get to carry the message with her at Salvation Army, and she's just she, you know, that not only does she um she's a pract Okay, now I just squared it up. Anyway, I was gonna say what Cliff always says. She's a student of this program, but she's also a practitioner.

She I mean, you can just see it after talking with her just a few minutes. You know, she's got this going on. Come on up, Cindy.

>> Well, good evening everyone. My name is Cindy Murphy and I'm a very grateful recovered alcoholic. And it's only because I was willing to quit doing it my way and follow the directions of my sponsor that I haven't had a drink since January the 18th of 2003.

And that is such a miracle. And you will see why it is such a miracle in just a few minutes. Getting sober was a very, very tedious process for me.

Um, I was one hard-headed person. It took me a very long time to surrender and to get to my step one. A very long time.

And I hope that that won't be true for some of you who are new. Um, but that just was the way that was the path for me. It just took a long time.

Um, but first of all, I I'll just tell you a little bit about myself. Um, I was born in 1952 in Greenville, South Carolina. And um you know a lot of people think in and out of the program of Alcoholics Anonymous that alcoholism is the result of of a bad childhood or things that just don't go right.

You know maybe growing up in the projects or something like that. You know let me tell you that's certainly not the truth. Um I grew up in a very loving wonderful family.

Um my parents were uh Baptist. Uh they had us in church all the time. They were tea toters.

Um, drinking was not part of our life. I never for one minute felt unloved. I knew my parents loved me.

They took great care of me. Um, they were not wealthy by any stretch of the imagination. My mother worked um teaching uh nursery school and she saved every penny of that money to buy a piano so I could take piano lessons and send me to camp um and give me things that that she hadn't had growing up.

I mean, I never felt unloved. Um, my brother and sister were quite a bit older when I was born. When I came along, my sister was 14 and my brother was 10.

So, I I think it's safe to say I was kind of a surprise to the family, but I still felt special. I didn't feel like a mistake. I was quite sure I was very special.

I didn't doubt that for a minute. And um and and all was quite wonderful. I will tell you that there was some abuse in my family and it didn't come from my immediate family uh off in the distance.

Um I was the victim. I really was a victim of some terrible abuse that was coming down my way. And the reason I share that with you is because that is not why I'm an alcoholic.

And a lot of people think that that's what causes alcoholism. And it does not. But I thought that for a long time.

I was quite sure of it. I used to drink and and say you would too if you had had this in your life. But really that wasn't that wasn't the the large part of my life.

That was just a little hidden part of my life because for the most part my life was pretty sweet. Um I did well in school. I had lots of friends.

I'm sure you know I I later on down the road I had a lot of therapy. Who didn't right in this group? I had a lot of therapy and I'm sure that my therapists all could could uncover it and say, "Well, there's all this dysfunction, but maybe so, but basically, I had a very loving, wonderful family and a and a good life." Um, I'm real grateful for the time that I was born because I got to be a witness to all kinds of interesting history.

Um, it was the time of of the civil rights movement and that I was living in the south, so that was real interesting. I got to witness, you know, the Kennedy assassination and and oh, just wonderful. I mean, that was a terrible tragic thing, but there were one it was a wonderful time to be alive, you know, it was a wonderful time for someone like me who liked to reflect and and and and study history to just sit around and look at all these things and and I remember during the Cuban Missile Crisis, my dad built a bomb shelter and I mean, I just love the drama of it all, you know?

I could write books about it later. Of course, I didn't, but I could have, you know. Um, so all went well and I and I I was a very happy kid for the most part.

Um, when I turned 15, um, oh, and church was a huge part of my life and I was I was solid on that that front. Uh, when I turned 15, um, my dad was transferred to another city and concurrent with that time, this was in 1967. At that moment in time, my brother went to Vietnam and my mother took to her bed with depression and we moved and my life kind of turned upside down at that time.

Uh, and I discovered alcohol. All that sort of happened that summer of 67. And um, I'll back up.

Alcohol in my family, as I told you, we didn't drink. No one in my family drank. Uh when I was a little girl, I remember our minister came over to dinner one night and and he asked my father in that real Baptisty way.

He said, "What do you think the worst sin is, Bill?" And my dad said, "Drink it." And the minister said, "No, greed." And I remember wondering, I thought, "What does greed have to I mean, how could greed be so bad?" And and and the minister said, "Well, greed covers drinking, too." And I thought, "How can greed and drinking be the same?" you know, I later learned, you know, you know, drink drinking can turn into a real greedy process. Um, so I remember that. I also remember when I was a little girl, um, my dad taking me to church one Sunday night and we had to park kind of far away from the church because there was some revival meeting or something going on.

And there were these men walking, um, into a building with trench coats and and hats, you know, back in the 50s, men always wore hats. And they were going down these steps into a building. And I remember asking my dad, I said, "Where are all those men going?" And he said, "Oh, they're the most pathetic men in the world.

They're in Alcoholics Anonymous." And I remembered that, you know, these are the nuggets that I really the drinking thing. And I remember I thought drinking was such a romantic thing. And my parents would always say to me, "Don't drink.

You just don't drink. We don't drink. And if you're ever with people who drink, you call us to come get you cuz that's just wrong." And and so one night I was spending the night with a girlfriend and her parents had a party and they were drinking.

The the adults were drinking. So I called my mother and I said, "They're drinking." And she said, "Who?" And I said, "Well, Mr. and Mrs.

Moses are drinking. They're having a party." And she said, "Well, I'm sure they can handle it, Cindy. It'll be all right." And I was very confused, you know.

Oh, it's okay if they drink. So I I remember these things, these little nuggets. Alcohol.

Alcohol just fascinated me from the very beginning. I remembered every little thing about it. I remember going to people's houses and they would drink out of cut glass crystal.

You know, the parents would and I just thought that was so cool and I couldn't wait to try it. Couldn't wait. So, in 1967, I had my first drink and I went out um on a date.

We had just moved to Charlotte and um I didn't know anybody. I hadn't started school yet. It was in the summer and I'd met the this lifeguard at the swimming pool and he was uh I was going to be a junior in high school and he was going to be a junior in college and um my parents finally agreed to let me go out if I went out in a group of people and all this, you know.

Well, we you know how we get around those things. Well, anyway, we went out and uh I had one and a half beers that night and my whole life changed. My whole life changed.

I fell in love with alcohol instantly. It was fabulous. I love the feeling.

And I always say when I talk about this, boys had told me I was pretty before on dates, but this time I believed it. You know, I knew I was pretty. You know what I mean?

This is cool. I loved it. And I couldn't wait to do more.

I just couldn't wait. I loved every second of it. And I did not get drunk.

I had one and a half beers. It was just enough to feel nice and I wanted to recapture that. And from that moment on, um, every time I got a chance, I would drink.

I believe with all my heart I was born an alcoholic. I I that's just me. I believe I was genetically born with the gene, you know, for alcoholism.

Um, I didn't drink to blackout that first night, but I did within 6 months. You know, I was drinking and blacking out. And by the time I was 16, I was swearing it off for the first time.

You see, I didn't ever want to be a drunk. Even when I was young, I didn't want to be that person. I grew up in this family where it was not done, you know, and I I grew up in a time period where girls didn't do these things, you know.

It was not done in my world. Girls didn't drink like this. No one I knew drank like this.

Boys didn't drink like this. I drank like that. I was throwing up on people, you know.

I It was not pretty. Um I was throwing up on my clothes. I was I was coming to with my front porch light going off and on with my parents, you know, at the door.

Um, one Sunday morning I remember I I couldn't remember what had happened the night before and I came racing down the stairs to try to act like I was fine. You know that deal? Like, oh, I feel great this morning.

And I fainted, right? And my dad said, "We're going to church." He didn't know how close he was to the truth about what I needed. Um, so that's what happened to me in high school.

Um, by the time I got to college, I discovered some outside issues and that helped me a lot with drinking. That's all I can say about that. Um, it helped me delay the drinking somewhat.

I mean, it wasn't so bad. Um, and so drinking kind of, you know, evened out a little for me. And, um, it alcohol is so cunning, baffling, and powerful in my life that, uh, here it was.

it it was taking me down really hard when I was younger and then it evened out a little while. It wasn't so bad. You know, I was able to control it or it seemed like I was able to control it for a while and it was constantly doing this with me, you know, up and down, up and down.

Um, by the time I finished college, I mean, it still wasn't too bad. You know, I was able to get through school just fine. When I finished college, I uh I had saved my money.

Oh, that's the other thing. My parents did a great job. Uh they had me working from the time I was 16.

I I worked every day after school and on weekends and I worked all through college and and I'd saved my money and when I graduated from college I went to Europe and I lived in Greece and then I drank uzo around the clock. You know, I don't remember much about it. I do remember that Nixon resigned and I felt like I better get home cuz my country needed me.

And that's the truth. Uh that's really the truth. And I don't remember anything about those those months in Europe.

I really don't. Um I was just I was drunk or hung over the whole time. It was a big fat waste of money.

Um I came home and and I didn't really know what to do with myself. So I decided I would get married and I married the guy that I dated in college and it didn't work out and I blamed him. You know the deal.

I was married for 9 months. Um and then after that I didn't know what to do and I was drinking heavily. you know, it's picking up, picking up.

So, I I did the only thing I know to do, and that was to go back to school. I have a master's degree, but the only reason that's true for me is because I didn't know what else to do. Not because I'm, you know, I have a plan, a master plan if I'm going to go accomplish things.

It's just that that's all I knew to do was to go to school or get married. I mean, you know, that's what I knew to do. So, I went back to school and I I worked as a house mother in a dormatory.

That's real good. I'm 22 years old, right? And I'm drunk and I'm a house mother in a dorm.

And um that's how I did that. Um I got out of there and um and then I started teaching school in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. And that's where I lived and that's where I met the man I'm married to today.

Um that's a miracle, too. We've been married 30 years. We had our uh wedding anniversary on the 29th and he's been with me through this whole rigomearroll and he is such a gentleman and such a prince.

Um, okay. So, when I met him, um, he's nine years older than I am and, uh, and really at that point in time, he was like more like 20 years older than I was. And he brought me to Dallas.

And in Dallas, you could drink liquor in the bars. And that took on a whole new meaning for me because in North Carolina, you could drink beer and wine. You know, when you bought when you drank liquor, you had to bring your own bottle in and have special per it was a whole different experience.

But here in Dallas, you could actually buy liquor with a credit card, you know? I mean, you could just buy liquor. You could order exotic drinks in Dallas, you know, like Rusty Nails, you know, things that I'd never heard of before.

And so I was like a kid in a candy store in Dallas. And um and every day he and I uh would get off of work and we would go out and drink every single day. And we got married.

And when we got married, he started trying to build his business up. So he quit drinking when we got married. He quit drinking.

I didn't I couldn't. He was a heavy drinker and he just stopped drinking, you know, because he had work to do and I couldn't. So, I thought, well, I need uh uh more things to do with my time.

I was working at the time, but that just didn't seem to be quite enough to keep me from drinking. So, I developed some hobbies and different things to do at night, but still, I couldn't quit drinking. Um I thought, well, if we bought a house and I spent my time decorating it, you know, in the evenings, then I wouldn't drink so much.

And that didn't happen. Of course, I drank and decorated the house. And then I thought, well, if I get pregnant, for sure I won't drink.

And I did get pregnant. And I did quit drinking, I was able to stop drinking. Mo mostly because I was very nauseated.

But during that pregnancy, I didn't drink at all. And I didn't smoke cigarettes either. And um and that was just by the grace of God.

I'm so grateful that I didn't. But I didn't drink during that nine months pregnancy. I did do a lot of macra and I did a lot of artwork and different things, you know, just to keep busy.

But the day those children were born, I had twins on St. Patrick's Day. My husband's Irish.

It worked out real well. Um that that day that those you will understand this women, I think when those children were born on St. Patrick's Day, that's the first time I really felt like I deserve to be married to this man.

I felt like I'd done something right, you know, and that's the truth. But anyway, um, excuse me. So, the day they were born, um, at Presbyterian Hospital, they rolled in a a margarita machine and, uh, they gave me an ashtray because in 1980, you could smoke in rooms and drink margaritas in the rooms.

And that's what I did. That's the truth. And that's I started drinking again.

Um, my husband traveled all the time in those days and um, every day I would stay sober during the daytime and I would get those little babies tummies so full at night with rice cereal so they would sleep through the night and then I would start drinking. And um, it occurred to me that that they might that I might set the house on fire. What if what if I caught the house on fire with a cigarette and and I killed these children?

So, I decided I better do something about it. So, I started thinking about that and what what's wrong with me? Why am I drinking so much?

And I read an article in the paper about Ruth Carter Stapleton. She was Jimmy Carter's pre President Jimmy Carter's sister. I think he was still president at the time.

Yeah, he was. And she lived down here. She lived in Ulysis Bedford.

And she would have these spiritual retreats at her house in Ulis. And um it was free. You just signed up and went.

And I thought, well, you know, I'm so arrogant. I'm thinking, well, the president's sister is having retreats at her house. I think I can go there.

That's that that's what I qualified for. So, I called and they said, "Sure, come this weekend." So, I went to this spiritual retreat at her house and and I walked in her house and she had this round library in her home. And I walk in and the very first book on the shelf that I see is this book called Alcoholics Anonymous.

Isn't that something? That's the book I see. I quickly walk away because alcohol was not my problem.

I'm trying to find out what my problem is, but it cannot be alcohol. My problem is I'm all I'm married to a control freak and he travels and it's not fair. Right?

That's my problem. My problem is I was sexually abused as a child and you would drink too. My problem is the world is just has too many sharp edges for the sensitive soul that I am.

I'm really a poet and no one recognizes my talent. I'm serious as a heart attack about this. These are the things I thought of.

These are the thoughts that are going through my mind. I'm just too precious for words. And alcohol is not my problem.

Well, as soon as I left her deal, and I didn't like her, by the way. Um, I went to 7-Eleven and got one of those big Fosters beers, drank it, and drove home. Um, I keep searching and searching and searching.

I in the meantime, I converted to Catholicism and I started teaching CCD classes. And I'm thinking, well, if I teach children CCD classes at the Catholic Church, Baptist wasn't good enough. Maybe Catholic will work out better.

No, that's not working. I'm I'm searching spiritually as hard as I can. I'm I'm searching artistically as hard as I can.

I'm searching every way I know and nothing's getting the job done. I'm starting to exercise. I join a health club.

I'm walking every day. I'm doing everything I know to get sober or to not drink so much. Just to not drink so much.

And nothing's working. Nothing's working. And I know in my heart of hearts that if I could just get all this stuff straightened out, I wouldn't drink so much cuz I desperately just want to be a good person.

I really did. I wanted to be a responsible mother and wife. I wanted my husband to be proud of me.

I wanted my parents to be proud of me. I I didn't want to be a drunk. I really wanted to be just a nice person and I can't quite make that happen.

Um, so finally I I'm reading the newspaper one day and um I see this Dear Abby column and some woman had written in that I drink a bottle of wine every day. What should I do? And Abby writes back or Annlanders or whatever.

Run, don't walk to your nearest AA meeting. And I'm thinking for a bottle of wine that's nothing. you know, I'm drinking liquor.

I'm drinking like a half a fifth or more, you know, at this point. I didn't know it could get worse. It can.

So, um, I'm I'm thinking about that and thinking about that and finally I decide I will get all dressed up and go to my first AA meeting. You know what I mean? I'm going to look like I don't belong there, right?

And so, I did. And I got to the my first AA meeting and uh this was my experience at my first AA meeting. Um, I walked in and I chose it because I like the name of it.

It I won't say the name of it, but I like the name of it. So, I went into this AA meeting and the topic was, "Is it okay to drink communion wine?" That was the topic of my first AA meeting. And everybody goes around and says something and then they call on me, the newcomer.

And I said, because I love to be intellectual, I said, "Well, I just converted to Catholicism." And what I learned is the wine turns to the blood of Christ, so it must be okay. And they let me get away with that. They did.

They said, "Good. Okay, that makes sense. All right." Nobody called me on that.

Nobody. And I thought, "Well, this is fun. I like it.

I get to talk, you know." So, I went back to a couple meetings, felt like I was fixed. I went public with my husband. And I said, "I went to AA today." And he said, "Well, you know, a lot of movie stars go to AA and we'll just switch to Pererry and it's going to be good.

You'll like it." Within a week, I was drinking again. By the fall, um, I was trick-or-treating with my kids. By this time, they're like, uh, this was 1982.

They were 2 years old. And I took them trick-or-treating. And, um, I fell down in the bushes drunk.

And the next morning, I woke up and I was totally humiliated and terrified. And um I went to my next AA meeting. This time I didn't plan to go to AA.

I I I went to church. It was November the 1st, All Saints Day. And I remember I'm trying to be a good Catholic.

And um I went to mass that morning and um I was on my knees crying and the priest walked in and he appeared to give me a dirty look. Now he probably wasn't looking at me at all, but that's how I processed it. And so I got up and left and I decided that I would go shopping because I had my kids at nursery school that morning and that would make me feel better if I went shopping.

And I pulled into a shopping center and my car just pulled right in front of a door that had a circle and triangle on the front and that was AA and I went to that meeting by then I started going to AA regularly. Um I was able to stay sober for quite some time. I always say that I was sober for seven years and I'm just here to tell you I don't know if that's the truth or not.

I don't know how long I stayed sober. Somewhere in there I started smoking dope. Somewhere in there I took Nyquil.

Somewhere in there I you know I don't know the truth. I really don't I know I picked up a seven-year chip but I don't know whether I really don't know the truth about that. Um because I was such a liar.

I was I was such a liar. Um and I didn't even know I was lying when I was lying. Um I thought that if you This is what I thought about Alcoholics Anonymous.

And I was I thought I was working the program. Um if you got up and said, "I'm an alcoholic." That was second the first step. I thought, you know, and I thought that was the extent to which one had to be honest, right?

My name is Cindy. I'm an alcoholic. I've taken step one.

I don't know how many fourth and fifth steps I've done in my life, but I've done a lot of them. And I up until I did my fourth and fifth step with Dara this time around, I thought it was confession. I really did.

I thought it was just all the bad, rotten things I had done in my life. and mostly all the bad and rotten things you'd done to me. That's what I really thought that was about was just getting all that stuff off your chest.

And I did a bunch of those. So, I did that at this particular juncture and trying to be sober. Um, I went to tons of meetings.

I listened to what everybody said and then I got real good at saying things myself. As you can tell, I love to talk and I got very good at it. Um, I ran into someone not too long ago and she said she remembered something I said in a meeting once and I said, "What was that?" And she said, "You said that I have a luxury problem today.

My pool's broken." >> I said that in a meeting. That's the truth. I was one of those people.

I was one of those people. I've made amends to that group. Incidentally, I did.

Um anyway, um I was sponsoring people, uh I was speaking. I was dangerous, but I didn't know any better is the truth. I really didn't.

Um I thought I was doing what I was supposed to be doing. Uh people I really thought fake it till you make it was a tenant of AA. I really thought keep coming back, it gets better was a tenant.

OA. Uh I thought things like um I have an addictive personality and I'm just sick as I can be, but at least I didn't drink today. And I don't have to get better.

I'm recovering. I'm just a little bit better day by day. I thought it was good enough and it worked till it didn't work.

Now, I don't want to argue with anybody about terminology or or or what works or what. I know that there are a lot of people in Alcoholics Anonymous all over the world who don't use the book. I know that there are a lot of people out there who just go to meetings.

I know there are a lot of people out there who don't work the steps. I know there are a lot of people who love discussion meetings. I know that and I'm happy for them and that's great and if it works for them, keep doing it.

All I know is is it didn't work for me. That's all I can tell you. It didn't work for me.

And it and and and it gets uglier because see somewhere in there I started drinking again. And then I couldn't get sober again. What?

Excuse me. Oops. What time is it?

I got to put my glass. >> Oh, good. All right.

So So I'm not getting honest with my sponsor, my group, or anybody. So, finally it gets so bad because now I'm drinking Nyquil. I don't know if any of you have been down that green liquid trip, but it's nasty and um and I'm starting to get a little bit crazy.

And and people would say, "Well, why are you drinking Nyquil? You don't understand. My whole family thinks I'm sober.

My whole world thinks I'm sober." But I'm able to convince myself if I'm drinking Nyquil, I'm not drinking. The alcoholics get that, right? Non-alcoholics don't get that.

My husband would say to me, "Why don't you just go by scotch?" You know, "Why are you doing that?" He said, I remember one day he said, "Cindy, you've had a cold for like years. What's up with this?" You know, and um I keep going back and I I got I got honest with my group. I got on when I got honest with my group and got honest with the women I sponsored.

One of the girls I sponsored had to have special meetings just for her because her sponsor went back out and and and it was all about her, right? And everybody was mad at me because I let her down. And I remember saying, "But you're sober and I'm drunk." What about me?

The baby. Um but anyway, I could not get sober again. I couldn't I could put together a few days, a few weeks.

I I couldn't even put together a month of sobriety and I was getting so hopeless. Not to mention, I was getting so fat. I was getting bloated.

I would looked horrible. I can't even tell you how awful I looked. I couldn't I It was just awful.

It was so ugly. So finally in 19 um sometime I don't remember now but I went to a treatment center in Oklahoma um and I thought when I got out I would be fine. Well when I got out um I didn't drink any more nightil.

I switched to vanilla extract. That's the truth. What I did first was I put coffee flavoring in my coffee and that was kind of expensive.

So vanilla was cheaper. So I put that in my coffee and then I left the coffee out, right? And that's what I did.

And I did that for a few more years and I just drank vanilla. Um in 1999 I I and and all through this time I'm going to psychiatrist. My husband bought me a Nikon camera to give me a new hobby.

I I was going to uh psychics. I was going to church. I was I was watching television trying to put my hands on the screen and get healed.

>> I mean, I'm telling you, and I'm going to AA, too, and all kinds of people are sponsoring me, and I'm having people tell me that I better hide everything of value because my husband's going to leave me. I have people I mean, I'm getting advice from all kinds of interesting people, and none of it has anything to do with the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. None of it.

and I feel like I'm losing my mind and it was horrible. It was awful. Um, in 1999 I um I went with my family on a vacation and this time uh we went to Montana and I stayed sober for 3 days and and I I was just holding on for dear life.

It was over the Fourth of July weekend and I didn't drink and I'm holding on and holding on and holding on and I'm miserable. And we got home and on the morning of July the 6th, I couldn't hold on any longer. And I got up that morning and I went to the bar in our house.

We had a we we never got rid of the bar. Um what good would that do? I know where to get alcohol, right?

So I went down to the bar and I took a big swig of uh Amordo. This is the first alcohol out of a liquor bottle I've had in years, you know. And I took this big swig of amordo out of the bar and um I went into an instant blackout.

And that's never happened. Just one swig and blackout. And I stayed in a black and I don't know how much I drank after that.

I don't know what I drank or how much I drank, but I was in a blackout for about 24 hours. And the next day I wake up and I've got a broken tooth. And um I hear my husband downstairs talking to someone about hiring a bodyguard just like out of the book, you know, cuz he's afraid I'm going to drive.

He's he doesn't know what to do with me. And um so my mind, you know how our mind races, you know that what am I going to do? What am I going to do?

And I'm thinking, thinking, thinking, okay, what do we I'll go to treatment. You know, that's what I'll do. I'll go to treatment.

I'll voluntarily go to treatment. Don't you just love it when you hear people say, "I went voluntarily to treatment." Yeah, right. And I thought, "Well, I'll go to Betty Ford.

That'll do it." God had other plans for me. Um, and interestingly enough, uh, I was desperate. I really was desperate.

Um, and I went to a treatment center that many of us had been to. And I don't promote any treatment center. I have no interest in doing that.

I don't even think Troy is a good idea, frankly. But but however, there was a guy there that we all know and he's going to be speaking here the last Saturday of the month. And he introduced me to the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous.

This is 1999. I've been in AA since 82. 17 years have gone by.

And I got introduced to the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous 17 years after I went to my first AA meeting. and he finally told me what was wrong with me in a meeting bigger than this. And I'm looking around and and some people are nodding off and not paying attention and I'm going, "How can you not listen?

This is unbelievable." And he explained he got he got us right in the book instantly. The first thing he read to us, which which was such good news for a drunk like me, he got us to the ford and he said, "We of Alcoholics Anonymous are more than 100 men and women who have recovered from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body." He said, "Recovered." And he didn't make any bones about it. There was so much hope for me because I'd just been recovering forever.

Recovering in my opinion, and that doesn't mean anything. I'm just going to share that with you is a therapy word. It's just a therapy word because that's intellectually that makes more sense to say recovering, right?

Cuz we're never cured. But what Bill and Bob in the first 100 told us is that we can recover from this. What good news.

Thank God I don't have to be walking around two days here, 5 days there. I can really recover from this. Right?

So that was really good news. And then he got us over to the doctor's opinion and when he said, you know, we believe and so suggested a few years ago that the action of alcohol in these chronic alcoholics is a manifestation of an allergy. Well, I had heard that allergy thing in meetings for years.

But nobody really told me what that meant. And I thought it was nonsense. I thought that was just a euphemism for when I drink I get drunk.

you know, just a nice way of putting I throw up when I drink, you know, but he said that the phenomenon of craving is limited to this class. And he explained that that that for me as an alcoholic, my liver and pancreas don't process alcohol the way other people do. And that's what triggers this phenomenon of craving.

So that's why I drink too much when I drink. It's not because I'm sitting there going, "Woe is me, I need more." My body is demanding more. My body's demanding more.

See, all these years, I think I'm drinking so much because everybody's mistreating me. Because that's the only thing that adds up for me. So, my mind's telling me everybody's mistreating me.

So, now I'm starting to make up stuff about how you're treating me. I'm making it up, right? I'm married to the sweetest man in the world, but to this day, I can convince myself he's a son of a you know what, cuz I can be a victim of anything.

I was a victim this weekend. I was till I found out I wasn't. Okay.

Okay. So, now I know why I'm drinking so much. I'm It's not that I, you know, when I would go to happy hour all those times, you know, and and you're out with your friends and you order a drink and and I always thought that the reason I kept drinking so much was cuz I changed my mind.

I think I want more. I thought I was just changing my mind. I think I'll just have some more.

This is so fun. No, my body is demanding that I drink more. And that's what the allergy is.

That's the reason I'm powerless over alcohol. My life, he told me, is unmanageable because I've lost the power of choice. Now, that's the death sentence for me.

I can't choose not to drink. And it took me all those years to realize that I had lost the power of choice and drink. Cuz see, people in AA would tell me, and this is the truth, and no offense, it's because we don't know the truth, but I had pe well-meaning people tell me that I needed to make better choices.

Just don't drink and come to meetings. Well, if I knew how to do that, I wouldn't go to meetings. I wouldn't.

No offense. Now, I'd come see you guys cuz I love you very much. But when I was going to those meetings, I hated them.

I wouldn't go there just because I liked it. I didn't like it. I was going there because I was trying to figure out how not to die.

How do you not drink? So, I couldn't choose not to drink. The word in these stories that hit me the hardest was the word suddenly.

Suddenly, cuz that was the word that kept me drunk. Cuz I made so many commitments not to drink and suddenly it seemed like it was a good idea to drink. I can't tell you how many desire chips I got.

I can't tell you how many times I swore I wouldn't drink. I so desperately wanted to quit. When I promised my husband and my three beautiful children that I wouldn't drink, I meant it.

I meant it with all my heart. I meant it. I will never do this again.

And I, you know, I I even, this is the truth. I even got a desire one time, drilled a hole in it, and put it in a chain around my neck. That's how badly I wanted it, and I couldn't get it.

And and that's why we have to go help other people get the truth because there's not much truth going on out there. I was at a meeting in Casper, Wyoming, and it was a pretty good group and there was a woman in there just like me and she was saying that I'm going to a treatment and I'm so sorry I let you guys down. I went up to her, you didn't let us down.

you've lost the power of choice and drink. You can't keep that commitment. It you can't.

And she didn't know what I was saying because we're so we're we're so conditioned to believe in life that if we just pull ourselves up by the bootstraps, we can make this happen. We're even conditioned in aa to be a winner, right? Hang out with the winners.

So, so the reason my life is unmanageable is because I've lost the power of choice. And that's the worst part of this disease because detoxing us from from the allergy, from the from the craving is pretty easy to do. I've been told that about 72 hours after your last drink, you no longer physically crave alcohol.

That's that's a done deal. What happens after that though is that your mind starts messing with it. Your mind starts telling you it's okay.

Here are the things our mind tells us, right? You've been making much too much of this. This isn't such a hard thing.

You know, when I went n months uh pregnant and didn't drink, I'm going, see, I went nine months without drinking. I can handle this. This is no big deal.

I went two hours without drinking. This is no big deal. Right?

I had a psychiatrist one time when I went into his office and I said, 'I think I'm powerless over alcohol.' He said, 'Well, you're not drinking right this minute, are you? You must not be powerless. Oh, okay.

That sounds good to me. Step one, we have to understand what powerless means. Powerless really means something big.

And unfortunately, we misuse that word so much. You know, when I was going to to sort of middle of the road aa, they use powerlessness to refer to everything in life. I'm powerless over my checkbook.

I'm not powerless over my checkbook. I mean, I might be broke, but but we can figure out a way to get money there. I mean, you know, it's not that it's not rocket science, right?

But I am powerless over alcohol. I am beyond human aid when it comes to alcohol. Well, you're powerless over people, places, and things.

No, I'm really not. No, I'm not. But I'm absolutely powerless.

Powerless means no power whatsoever. Not just I struggle with it means no power and that's a really tough place to be. We are absolutely beyond human aid and we have to know that in step one.

We have to know that. We have to fully conceive our innermost selves and fully understand that when I put alcohol in my body, I can't stop once I start. Even though maybe I was able to pull it off a few times because I did pull it off a few times.

But for the most part, I know without a shadow of a doubt, this is why sanity is returned to me. I know without a shadow of a doubt if I put any alcohol in my body right now, I won't stop there. I have absolutely no power once alcohol enters my body.

I don't care what form it's in, whether it's vanilla or nyquil. And later later on I found another one, but I'll tell you about that in a minute. Anyway, so I got the truth about step one.

And I took step one in 1999. When I got out of treatment, I came to this group. I was so fortunate.

I got I brought to this group and I got hooked up with a wonderful woman who was my sponsor. Um all I can say about it is um I didn't work the steps once I got started. Things became very important to me once I got here.

I really thought I had this thing down and uh I didn't work the steps very well. I didn't get a firm foundation. I became I I started teaching school and that became an obsession for me.

We really do work hard once we start working. Um I'm a great employee. You if you want your money's worth, hire me.

I I was teaching school making very little money, but I was up at 4:30 in the morning doing lesson plans and I wasn't going to bed until 10:00 at night. I mean I mean not finishing up till 10 o'clock at night. And I was wearing about a size two dress.

That's how hard I was working. I was insane. I was just going nuts.

And uh a couple of things were happening in my personal life that weren't too good. And I was getting resentments and I wasn't carrying the message. Um and in no time at all, I had a cough.

And I saw this cough syrup and it was robbitasen and it had only 1.5% alcohol. So I thought that would be all right and I took the robbitasin. It triggered the allergy and the next thing you know I'm walking like a space creature.

I went nuts. So I called my sponsor and told her what had happened. And at that point she had left this group.

She she left this group and she told me to come back here and that was the kindest thing in the world. She said, "I want you to go back to even though she wasn't happy here, she told me to come back here and she said, "I want you to find Darra Vasquez and ask her to be your sponsor." And that night I came through this door and I said, "About right where this guy is and and about right where you were, Daryl was sitting." I didn't notice Darla sitting there because I was terrified. And Daryl looked at me at the end of the meeting and and she said, "Are you ready to get serious this time?" This was January 18th, 2003.

And I said, "Yes." And she said, "Can you follow directions?" And I said, "Yes." And she said, "We'll see." I was sponsored from that very moment the way the perfect way to sponsor people. and that is it didn't matter to her whether I did it or not. That sounds a little bit cold when you're new to this deal, but it is the perfect way to sponsor someone because no one can bring you to the point of surrender.

Only alcohol can. Only we cannot sell anyone on sobriety. We can't convince anyone of their step one.

Either you are desperate or you're not. Either you have taken step one or you haven't. And step one means that you fully have conceded to your innermost self that your power is over alcohol.

You really get it. And when you fully concede to your innermost self your power is over alcohol, you're out of ideas. There's no more, well, you know what I think?

Who cares, right? And Darra has said that to me. Who cares?

Your best thought says suddenly it's okay to dream, right? You're out of ideas. You're ready to follow direction.

And see, years ago, I would have thought that that had to do with the sponsor's ego. Oh, you want you want to boss me around. No, that's my ego, right?

No, that's love. That's love to tell the truth. So, I'm powerless over alcohol.

So, what's next? I came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to sanity. Do you believe or do you not believe that's possible?

Well, I believed it was possible for her. That's all I needed to know. That's all I needed to know.

The chapter to we agnostics, right, covers step two. You may or may not be interested in that chapter right away, but I think it's a fantastic chapter and it was really great for me. Um, because it talks a lot in that chapter about the God of reason and that had been my idol or my God was my own ability to reason.

And as soon as I was able to let go of that, I believe that's when my spiritual awakening began. And I've never been able to totally let go of that. But a crack was made sufficient for God to be able to start coming through.

So I came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to sanity. And then you make a decision to turn your will in life over the care of God. That's step three.

It's very simple. You're just making a decision, right? We're just making a decision to go on with the rest of the steps.

I remember when we would have step three meetings in the past, we would always discuss our concept of God, right? In those discussion meetings as God as we understand him. Really, the the key part of that is making a decision.

That's the key part because none of us have a decent concept of this God, you know, none of us have a decent concept of a higher power at this point. Um, so making the decision is the important part. And if we've taken step one and we realize that we're absolutely totally screwed, we have no other way out.

It's pretty easy to make that decision. It's pretty easy to move on with the steps. Okay, I think I will close there.

Um, and we'll go more a little bit more into steps two and three. Um, I sure do love you guys very much and thank you for letting me be with you tonight. and unable uh to do anything about it without the help of a power greater than ourselves.

We feel that each person's religious views, if any, are his own affair. The simple purpose of the program of Alcoholics Anonymous is to show what may be done to enlist the aid of a power greater than ourselves, regardless of what our individual conception of that power may be. In order to form a habit of depending upon and referring all we do to that power, we must at first supply ourselves with some diligence.

By often repeating these acts, they become habitual and the help rendered becomes natural to us. We have come to know that as alcoholics, we we suffer from a serious disease for which medicine has no cure. Our condition may be the result of an allergy which makes us different from other people.

It has never been permanently cured by any treatment with which we are familiar. The only relief we have to offer is absolute abstinence. The second meaning of aa there are no dues or fees.

The only requirement for membership is the desire to stop drinking. Each member squares his debt by helping others to recover. An alcoholics anonymous member is an alcoholic who through application of and adherence to the AA program has forceworn the use of any and all alcoholic beverages in any form.

The moment he takes so much as one drop of beer, wine, spirits, or any other liquid containing alcohol, he automatically loses all status as a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. AA is not interested in sobering up drunks who are not sincere in their desire to stay sober for all time. Not being reformers, we offer our experience only to those who want it.

We have a way out on which we can absolutely agree and on which we can join in harmonious action. Rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our program. Those who do not recover are people who will not or simply cannot give themselves to this simple program.

Now, you may like our program or you may not, but the simple fact remains that it works. and we believe is our only chance to recover. There is a vast amount of fun included in the AA fellowship.

Some people might be shocked at our seeming worldliness and levity, but just underneath there lies a deadly earnestness and a full realization that we must put first things first. And with each of us, the first thing is a solution to our alcoholic problem. To drink is to die.

Faith must work 24 hours a day in and through us or we perish. Uh in order to set our tone for this meeting, I ask that we bow our heads and join in a few moments of silent prayer and meditation followed by the surrender prayer. >> Serendy prayer to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

I wish to remind you that whatever is said here at this meeting expresses our own individual experience as of today. We do not speak for AA as a whole and you are free to agree or disagree with anything that is said here tonight. In fact, it is recommended that you pay no attention to anything that cannot be reconciled with what is in the big book Alcoholics Anonymous.

If you don't have a big book, it is time you bought one. Read it, study it, live with it, follow the directions in it, and learn what it means to be an AA member. And if you don't have a big book, if you'll go ahead and raise your hand and John will bring one around to you.

Um, we you will want to have one because we will be going right out of the books tonight. Um, okay. Some of you are looking for a sponsor.

So, will everyone who has taken our steps and been blessed with a spiritual awakening please stand up so those looking for guidance can see who they can entrust their lives to. If you see someone you want to help, you catch them after our meeting. We are just glad we are all here and we are all here because we are not all there.

>> Okay. And our um speaker tonight is Cindy Murphy and I'm so glad she's feeling well enough to do this for us because she's just an awesome speaker and I really enjoyed her last week. Come on up Cindy.

>> Hi everybody. I am Cindy Murphy. I'm a very grateful recovered alcoholic.

>> And I had my last very nasty drink of it was robbitas and goth syrup, by the way. On January the 18th of 2003. If you guys were here last week, you know I qualify for this program.

I'm a I'm a real bad drunk. There's no question about that. Um and I won't go back over my story.

Uh if you weren't here, too bad. Just trust me. I belong.

Um what we're going to be doing tonight though is we're going to start with the steps with one, two, and three tonight. Maybe get into four. Um and step one says that we admitted we were powerless over alcohol dash that our lives have become unmanageable.

If you've got a big book in front of you, um the steps are listed on page 59. I believe that's right. Right.

Yep. Okay. Let me make sure I'm doing this right.

Okay. Um, why are we powerless over alcohol? What does that mean exactly?

Because powerless is a, as I said last week, that's a really strong term that we use very loosely in life. You know, we talk about how we're powerless over things. And and the truth is there are lots of things I might say I'm powerless over, but really I I'm not that powerless over.

I can find a solution somewhere for it. You know, I' I've said before I'm powerless over my finances, but I could go steal some money. You know, I could find a way out on certain things.

But the truth about it is with alcoholism, I couldn't beg, borrow, steal my way out of that one. And I looked for every solution I could under the sun, and I could not solve my alcoholic problem. I don't know about you, but Alcoholics Anonymous was not my first attempt at quitting drinking.

I tried everything I knew to stop drinking. Um, and and I mean everything. And I was using my brain to try to do it because that's how I tried to to do anything in life.

You know, we come into the world, we go to school, we we get up, we we learn these rational attempts at controlling our lives. You know, if you need to lose weight, you go on a diet. You study up on these things, right?

Then you and you come up with some formula for success and how to go about and do these things. Well, that's what I was trying to do with with drinking. I was trying to come up with some logical way to stop drinking or at least moderate, you know, and nothing was working.

And then I started seeking spiritual or o other worldly solutions because nothing rational was working. So I was trying other kinds of things. I mean, um, I don't know, all kind of psychic kinds of things and, um, vegetarianism.

I mean, you know, anything that that came my way, I was trying, you know, I met a guy one time, I remember he was my brother-in-law, and his name is Mike, and he's a vegetarian, and he has very long hair. He looks just like how you might picture Christ or someone, you know, he's very peaceful all the time, and nothing rattles him. And I and I said, "How do you do this?" this and he said, "Well, I'm a vegetarian." I thought, "Oh, then I'll become a vegetarian because clearly that's the answer." I mean, I was looking for answers like this all the time.

Anybody who seemed to have a better idea about living life, I was willing to try what they did. And I was trying and nothing was working. And if you're like me, I could try anything for a day or two.

You know, I'd be at it and then I'd go, "Screw that." Right? Huh? So, I couldn't find a solution.

Finally, after so many failed attempts, so many failed attempts, and the only thing that got me to a state of reasonleness was drinking enough alcohol. And I had so much to drink and so many failed attempts. And I was so absolutely miserable that I came crawling in this door.

And I didn't care what you thought of me. You know, when you come back and get a new chip, if you've relapsed as many times as I have, you you know the deal. You're you're ashamed the first eight or nine times, you know, you're embarrassed and you're scared that everybody's going to look at you funny or whatever.

By this point in time, I didn't care what you thought of me. I really didn't. I just didn't want to die from this disease.

And even more importantly, I didn't want to continue living the way I felt. I knew there must be a way out because a lot of you were happy. A lot of you were happy and I had some hope that it was possible to be happy.

So I came in through these doors and I became willing. And I found out what alcoholism is. That's the most important thing for step one is to know what your truth is, to know what's wrong with you.

Because if you don't know what's wrong with you, you can't apply the solution. So in step one, it says, "We admitted we were powerless over alcohol." Well, I knew I was powerless because I couldn't do anything about it. But what is alcoholism?

Okay, those of you who have been around a while know this, but some of you are new and you don't know what powerless over alcohol means. So, listen up. Two things have to be in place for you to be an alcoholic.

Remember when I first came to Alcoholics Anonymous in the 80s and I'd go home and I'd tell my husband I'd been to AA and he'd say, "Well, what makes you an alcoholic and and I'm not cuz I drank like you did. What? Why are you an alcoholic and I'm not?

So, I'd go back to AA and I'd say, "So, now why am I an alcoholic?" And people would say, "Well, you're an AA, aren't you? That's why you're an alcoholic." Non-alcoholics don't go to AA. That was the answer they gave me.

That's not true. That's not true. Plenty of non-alcoholics find themselves in an AA meeting.

Here's what makes me an alcoholic. I've got a body different from about 90% of the world's. My liver and pancreas cannot metabolize alcohol efficiently.

It just can't. And and I believe that that's a hereditary thing. In the doctor's opinion, he explains this to us.

And the what happens is because my liver and pancreas is different, I now have an allergy to alcohol. I'd heard that before, but I didn't believe it. I'd never really fully believed it because no one explained what an allergy was.

An allergy is nothing more than an abnormal reaction to something. It's just an abnormal reaction. So, my abnormal reaction to alcohol is when I put some alcohol in my body, I immediately want another one and another one and another one and another one.

I love CocaCola. I really do. But once I've had one or two Cokes, I don't want anymore.

You know, I've had my fill. The same with candy. I love sugar.

And I can eat two or three. Actually, I hate to admit this, but I really can't eat two or three crispy cream donuts in a row. I really can.

No problem at all. But then I really don't want anymore. You know, I'm I'm done after about two or three.

But when it comes to alcohol, after I have one, I drink the second one even faster and the third one faster than that. And by the and and now I can't get it down fast enough. I can drink alcohol faster than I can drink water, right?

You hit. And I'm talking about straight liquor. You know, I can drink it really fast.

I don't care what it tastes like. That's not an issue. You know me, I like Nyquil.

I mean, I can drink anything. It doesn't It doesn't bother. I mean, the taste, who cares?

I don't care what it tastes like. I love it when I go to treatment centers and people say, "I drink for the taste." H Okay. No, you don't.

You might like it, but that isn't the issue. You know, whether it tastes good or not is not the issue. I don't really like scotch, but if that's all you got, that's what I'll drink.

You know, doesn't matter. I'm drinking for a fact and I can't get it down fast enough. For a long time, I thought the reason I drank so much is because I was depressed, you know, and that and that I was drinking medically, you know, I'm drinking to to because of my feelings cuz I'm sensitive and things have been tough in my life.

You know, it was pointed out to me, what about all those women in Africa who've been brutally raped? you know, they're not sitting around drinking. You know, they've got a much worse life than you have, Miss Murphy.

You know, oh, it's not because of the things and the circumstances in my life. Those are the things I tell myself. I tell myself, I give myself these reasons why my life is hard and I have to drink so much.

I'm just giving myself reasons for it because I'm searching for rational reasons for doing irrational things. You know, I'm trying to make sense of it because it doesn't make sense to me either. Why am I getting so drunk when no one around me is?

Why am I doing this to myself? And so over time, I start believing it. I think I'm doing it because my husband's a jerk.

I think I'm doing it because my kids are out of control. I think I'm doing it because you fill in the blank. And I start believing it.

And I start believing that you're persecuting me, right? I start believing that everybody out there's out to get me. I start believing everybody out there is mean.

I start believing that I'm the only intelligent person walking the face of the earth, right? I'm the only real smart person out there. I should run for office.

You know, I mean, I, you know, delusional thinker. Oh my gosh. And I just sit and think and drink, right?

Isn't that what you did? Think and drink. Think and drink.

And I And I think that's why I'm drinking. But the truth is the reason I'm drinking so much is I'm setting off that allergy every time. But I'm making up this whole world that's not real.

this whole world that's not real and that's why I'm drinking so much. That's the physical allergy. Okay.

If all I had was the allergy, it wouldn't be such a problem because just like with any allergy, we just set it aside and say, "I'm not going to do this anymore. It hurts a lot." Alcohol started hurting me a lot when I was 15. I mean, I I set it aside when I was 15 and said, "I ain't never going to do it no more." and meant it and meant it when I was 15 years old.

I hadn't been drinking more than 6 months and it already was kicking my butt. So, I'm not going to do it anymore. I even go public with all my friends.

I say I'm never doing it again. Friday night, where am I? I'm doing it again.

I can't keep the commitment to stay sober. Can't. Why?

And that's because of the mental obsession. That's the second part that our lives have become unmanageable. The reason my life becomes unmanageable is because I'm unable to manage the decision not to pick up the first drink.

That's a very tricky phrase. When I was going in and out, in and out, in and out of AA for decades, I would go to meetings and pick up that chip. And you know, I was the one that was going around to every meeting in Dallas, Texas, because I was trying to not be recognized because I was picking up chips every time, right?

So, I was having to go to all these different meetings. And um when I would pick up a chip, they'd say, "Let's talk about step one." Because Cindy's new, right? And they'd say, "Okay, it's step one." And we'd go around the room and everybody would tell me how many times they'd been to jail, >> right?

I've never been to jail. I've never been arrested. I've never had a DUI.

Knock on wood. That's just I just got lucky. I'm just lucky.

Does that mean I'm not an alcoholic? No. If you get a DWI, does that mean you are an alcoholic?

No. All you have to do is go in a bar, drink too much, and get stopped by a cop to get a DUI. Why do we equate these things?

I don't know. I really don't. But then somebody gets a DUI and they send them to AA, you know, you don't have to be an alcoholic to get one.

And if you don't get one, that doesn't mean you're not an alcoholic. So, let's quit talking about that as is somehow the measuring stick of alcoholism. It's not.

So, I would go to these meetings and people would talk about how many times they've been to jail and then people would talk about how many times they shot up heroin. And I'm sorry if you've shot up heroin. That's a terrible thing.

I've got a daughter who's a heroin addict. I I my sympathy is with you. But I would sit there and think, well, I didn't shoot heroin, so I'm not as bad as you, so I don't belong here, right?

I I got a few more years left. You know, I just walk right on out, go back, dream. Now, I'm not blaming AA for my knuckleheadedness, but let's not give knuckleheads like me one more excuse to walk away.

Okay? Let's stay true to what's in the book. Okay?

My life is unmanageable because of the mental obsession. I'm unable to manage the decision to say no to the first drink. If I could say no to the first drink, life would be great.

My problem is not the allergy. I have the allergy to alcohol now. I will always have the allergy to alcohol.

My problem is not quitting drinking. I quit drinking a million times. Haven't you?

My problem is I can't stay quit. Can't stay quit. So, I've got to be restored to sanity.

The only insane thing I'm concerning myself with, the insane thing I do is that stone cold sober, after I've made that commitment to quit drinking and I'm detoxed and I'm good to go, I will walk into a liquor store or a grocery store or a drugstore or a baking aisle and I will pick up something containing alcohol and I will proceed to drink again. That's insanity. Okay.

And I'll say to myself, "It won't hurt me this time. It won't hurt this time. No matter what my past history has been, I'll say, "It won't hurt me this time." That's delusional thinking.

That's the delusional thinking of alcoholism. That's the insanity of alcoholism is that I will always tell myself it's okay to drink. Okay, let's let's read what it says in the book just to get real clear on it in the doctor's opinion.

Um, if you're in a fourth edition, we're going to look at XXV3, that's Roman numeral 28. If you're in a third edition, I believe that's Roman numeral 26. Down at the bottom, it gives us that that um cycle.

Says men and women drink essentially because they like the effect produced by alcohol. Yes, that's why we drink. We love the effect.

I love the way it feels going down. I love everything about it. I love the way my legs feel warm.

You know, it feels warm going all the way down. It says the sensation is so elusive that while we admit it is injurious, the injuries, everyone has injuries as a result of drinking, but everyone's injuries are going to look a little different. So, let's not dwell on injuries.

Everyone's are different. You know, if I'm talking to a guy, I shouldn't tell him how many times I got pregnant, right? He won't relate.

We all have different injuries, right? It says we cannot after a time differentiate the true from the false. If you cannot tell the true from the false, that's called delusional thinking.

That's crazy. The truth is when I drink, bad things happen. Bad things usually happen when I drink.

No matter how I carefully I plan it, at the very least I'm going to make some phone calls, right? I will lock myself up, but at the very least, I'm going to get on the phone and unfortunately at 2 in the morning, I might call my 80-year-old mother. You know, I cannot be trusted.

That's on a good night. Okay. To them, their alcoholic life seems the only normal one.

It became normal to me to live the way I was living. It was a crazy way to live. You guys all had different lifestyle.

We all did different things. But what was normal for me was every morning to come to drink something, throw up, right? then go get rid of all the empties, find a place to hide them because I just knew the trash men were looking in my trash can, right?

And and and I'd go put them in other people's trash cans. I did. And then I would have to go buy a bunch, you know, to have for the day so that that I'd have my supplies and I would drink some and then go pass out and then come to and then try to pull myself together enough to get my kids home from school and then I would try to get some dinner going.

I mean, this became normal. This became normal. And then to try to look real alert and happy when my husband got home, you know, trying to look real brighteyed, you know, like nothing's wrong, everything's fine, right?

And he goes, "What's wrong with your eyes?" You know, you know that deal. Okay? And this became normal.

So then we start trying to not do it. We're we're we're going, I can't do this anymore. I must stop.

Right? But then what happens? It says, "Then we're restless, irritable, and discontented." For a long time, I couldn't really relate to those adjectives, but I bet I know one you can relate to.

Nervous. Nervous. I can remember it now.

My stomach felt like it h was coming apart in the middle, you know, just inside interior, just nervous. Unless I can again experience the sense and of ease and comfort which comes at once. I know how to get rid of that feeling.

I know what makes me feel better. Here's how I cope. One of the greatest reliefs I ever relief I ever had was when somebody said to me, "I know why you drink.

You do?" And he said, "Yeah, to get through the freaking day." Yeah. That's why I drink. That is it.

I didn't know how to get through the day without it because I was coming apart on the inside. Just coming apart. And the only thing that would help me hold myself together was a drink.

Right. The problem is it says it says drinks which we see others taking with impunity. I could talk myself back into that one drink because I would look around at the world and other people seem to be drinking one drink.

Why can't I be like my friend Melissa? I had this wonderful girlfriend who would we would get together for drinks and she would actually use a to mix her drink. You know, she would p carefully pour her bourbon in this little and, you know, and I'd just toss the b the away, you know, put the CocaCola in the right?

I I don't get the thing. But anyway, and I'd think I'm going to be like Melissa. I'm just gonna be like her, you know, and she would get a little buzz on and then she'd be fine and then she'd go home and go to bed.

And I'd think, well, I'll just be like her. I'm just going to drink like Melissa and I'll fix me a drink with a But the problem for me was that I didn't comprehend is after I succumb to the desire again and the phenomenon of craving develops. I didn't get that.

I have the allergy to alcohol. I'm not going to be able to successfully drink one drink. I will never be able to successfully drink one drink.

Ever. Ever. Ever.

Ever. Once I drink one, I need a hundred. I I'm going to drink until there's no more.

And what's so cunning, baffling, and powerful about this is that there were times when I didn't do that. And those were the times I would hold on to, but there weren't many times like that. 90% of the time I'm going to drink till infinity, right?

Okay. The phenomenon of craving develops and then I'm going to pass through the well-known stages of a spree. That means getting really loaded, right?

Emerging remorseful. Who in here doesn't know what that feels like? Emerging remorseful.

That's the worst feeling in the world. That's what gets us here. There's no worse feeling than emerging remorseful when you come to and you're wondering who saw me, right?

That's the worst thing. Who saw me? What did I do?

Where are my clothes? Where is my car? Where is my wallet?

What I mean, fill in the blank, right? Where are my children? Where are my teeth?

And it gets worse, right? As the years go by, it gets worse. It does.

It gets worse. And things that you never thought you would do, you do. You know, I remember the time when I thought I will never drink and drive.

I remember those days. I will never drink and drive. And then I will never drink and drive with anyone in the car.

Then I will never drink and drive with children in the car. And then I will never drink and drive with someone else's children in the car. And then we just keep going, right?

It's it's just awful. It's awful. With a firm resolution not to drink again.

And here's the worst sentence in the book. This is repeated over and over and over and over and over. And if you're a real alcoholic, you know that it just keeps going.

And just when you think it that you're done, I mean, I'll have people come up to me and say, "Will you sponsor me?" And I'll say, "Sure, let's talk." And they'll say, "See, I can't drink anymore. I must stop. I can't drink anymore ever again." And my reply is always, "But you will." Yes, you can.

You absolutely can drink again. We all can. You got to know that.

No matter how much you think you don't want to drink right now, suddenly you'll want to drink again. We are beyond human a left to our own devices. No matter how much I don't want to drink at that moment, I will drink again.

I've already proven it. Add infinitum. And unless this person can experience an entire psychic change, there's very little hope of his recovery.

That's alcoholism. The first part is that I'm pyro over alcohol because of the allergy and that my life has become unmanageable because of the mental obsession. I'm unable to manage the decision not to pick up the first drink.

So there's a mental a physical component and a mental component. The physical component is the allergy. I will have that till the day I die.

But as long as I don't pick up the first drink, I'm good to go. It's just like if you're allergic to shellfish, if you don't eat shellfish, it's not a problem. You can live happy, joyous, and free as long as you don't eat shellfish.

As long as you don't eat peanuts, you can be happy, right? Not a problem. The deal is for me is how do you not pick up the first drink?

How do you not want to drink? That was my question because I don't want to white knuckle it. If I have to walk around hoping I don't drink today.

You see, I'm gonna I'm gonna just share something with you. I wouldn't plan it. When I first came to AA, and I bet this is true of a lot of people in here.

How you sobered up is they told you don't drink for 24 hours. Anybody ever sober up that way? Yeah.

They said just don't drink for 24 hours and that's how you sobered up. I couldn't do that. When I came and got sober this time, my sponsor never once told me not to drink.

She told me to work the steps. Cuz see, I don't know how not to drink. Something else has to do this for me.

If it's up to me not to drink, we're all in trouble. cuz I can go some period of time without drinking, but I never know when I'm not going to be able to do it. I just don't know.

You know, I have uh two children. I have three children, but I have two kids who are 28 now. They'll be 29 in March, and they live in New York, and they're both in the program, and they go to AA, and um they go to a group where they actually work the steps.

But how they sobered up was that staying sober for 24-hour chunks of time. And that's how they they did it. And I had to bite my tongue cuz I can't tell them how to do it.

They've got sponsors and I have to stay out of it. But also they are in the book and they are working the steps. But that's a hard thing for mom to stay out of their program.

I'll tell you what. But they are learning. They are they are learning from me.

I have to go to Allen on some. Anyway, um, so that's step one. That's step one.

I'm screwed. If I can't make the decision to stay away from the first drink, if I can't be trusted to stay away from the first drink, if I'm going to pick up the first drink sooner or later, and if once I start to drink, I have no control over the amount I'm going to drink, I am really screwed. That's step one.

I'm in deep, deep trouble. I'm terrified. If you are new to the program and you're not scared to death, then you really haven't taken step one.

And that's just the truth. I was absolutely terrified at that point. I knew I was screwed.

I knew that I would drink again. I didn't come in here this last time saying, "Oh, thank God that's over." It was like, "Oh my god, I'm going to drink. I know I'm going to drink.

It's just a matter of I got to get help. I got to have God's help. I got to have some kind of help.

Something bigger than me has got to step in because I will drink again left to my own devices. Um on page 28, it says, "We in our turn sought the same escape with all the desperation of drowning men." I was a drowning person. I knew that and I was seeking that escape.

And so when I walked in here and I said, "Please help me." I wasn't questioning anything. I wasn't saying, "M, I don't like the color of that life preserver. Give me a different one." And and see, up until that point, I was questioning everything.

You know, I was saying, "Well, I don't know if I really agree with that." Or there was no argument left in me. It was, "What do I do? What do I do?" And that's a really good place to be.

Step two says, "Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity." For many years in AA, I really thought that the insanity they were referring to was all the crazy stuff we did drunk. And so therefore, if we were restored to sanity, that means we're sober and we're not doing crazy things anymore. I really thought that.

That's not it at all. The sanity we would get restored to is that we're no longer reaching for that first drink. Because remember, the only insane thing we're talking about is being sober and thinking it's safe to drink again.

Does that make sense? That's the only really insane thing an alcoholic has to worry ourselves with is that sober we're going to go try it all over again. That's insanity.

And so I did see that it worked in my sponsor. I saw I believed that it worked for her. Now, I was kind of questioning if it was going to work for me because I had tried so many times and it didn't.

Some of us come in here and and we we we say came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. We all talk about how that's just a higher power, right? Well, you're not fooling us, are you?

We know what we're really talking about here, right? We're talking about god. True.

And Because in the third step, if you read ahead, we're going to see that word, right? And everybody goes, "Oh, no. We're not really talking about Yes, we are.

Yes, we are." And a lot of us come in here as agnostics or atheists, which I think is kind of an advantage. The the the most difficult problems though are for people I think this is just my opinion are people who think that they and God are just like this because that's the people that get sorely disappointed sometimes um because they're the least teachable for me. I was very very very angry with God when I got to this point because I believed in God.

I absolutely believed in God because I was afraid not to. I was afraid that I would go to hell if I didn't believe in God. I was terrified not to believe in God.

I was raised on God. But I was afraid that he didn't want to do business with me. I afraid I was afraid I'd used up every bit of grace that he might have for me.

And I was afraid I had lost it because I knew what grace was. And I've heard you guys talking about grace in meetings about how by God's grace I've been kept sober. And grace really means that it's an unearned gift.

That's the definition of grace. And so how come I'm not getting that unearned gift? How come you guys are getting sober and I'm not?

Why doesn't he love me? He seems to love you and you're as big a loser as I am. What's up with this?

and I'm not pleased. And um I I was beginning to think I was a really bad person and I and I couldn't quite put it together and I didn't know what I was going to have to do to get back in God's good graces. How is this going to work?

Um so there's a wonderful chapter for people like me and it's called we agnostics and it starts on page 43 or 44. I love this chapter. I I used to when I was in a the first time I never looked at this chapter at all because I didn't think I was an agnostic.

There were a lot of chapters I didn't read basically none of them but I certainly just passed right over this. Let's just look at this chapter. Lots of times when we do the steps we kind of pass by this chapter.

But this is such a fabulous chapter. At the beginning he's going to review alcoholism. And this is really important.

And he says, "In the preceding chapters, you've learned something of alcoholism, we hope we've made clear the distinction between the alcoholic and the non-alcoholic. If when you honestly want to, you find you cannot quit entirely." That's the mental obsession. We can quit, but we'll talk ourselves right back into it again, right?

Or if when drinking you have little control over the amount you take, that's the physical allergy. Can't control the amount, then you are probably alcoholic. If that be the case, you may be suffering from an illness which only a spiritual experience will conquer.

To one who feels he is an atheist or an agnostic, such an experience seems impossible. But to continue as he is means disaster, especially if he's an alcoholic of the hopeless variety. I was an alcoholic of the hopeless variety.

I tried everything I knew and now I'm going to have to go have a spiritual experience and I'm not even sure that this spiritual stuff is going to work for me because I'm too bad. How egotistical is that? I I am so bad that God doesn't want me, you know.

And somebody said, "Well, I think God even loves Hitler. Why would he hate you so much?" Um, I'm so awful. Um, down at the bottom of that page, it says, "If a mere coat of morals or a better philosophy of life were sufficient to overcome alcoholism, many of us would have recovered long ago." Well, this is good.

See, if if only better behavior would have gotten it done, a mere code of morals or a better philosophy of life and that that might even apply to to church or religion. You know, if only if that was enough to get get it done, I might have recovered long ago. But we found that such codes and philosophies did not save us no matter how much we tried.

We could wish to be moral. We could wish to be philosophically comforted. And in fact, we could will these things with all our might, but the needed power wasn't there.

I tried so hard to be a good person. I tried so hard not to drink. I tried so hard to be unselfish.

I tried so hard to be loving and giving and wonderful and precious and all these things. But I couldn't do it. Our human resources as marshal by the will were not sufficient.

They failed utterly. Lack of power. That was our dilemma.

We had to find a power by which we could live. And it had to be a power greater than ourselves. Obviously, but where and how are we to find this power?

That's the question. How do I get connected to this power? 90 meetings in 90 days.

Guess what it says? Here's the answer. Well, that's exactly what this book is about.

Who knew? I thought if I went to enough meetings, glitter was going to come down from the ceiling. One year, Melanie, my good friend Melanie gave me some glitter for Christmas.

Cuz I really did. I thought if I just sit here long enough in these meetings, a speaker will come in who will inspire me to be wonderful. you know the right person or the right words will be said or something magical is going to happen and I'll become good you know cuz I ke I kept thinking that well the book is going to show me how get how to get connected to this power that's going to relieve that mental obsession and restore me to sanity that's what this program is all about my problem is lack of power my problem is not alcohol that isn't that crazy I thought my problem was alcohol My problem is not alcohol.

I live in a house right now. I'll just tell you right here and now. I have a fully stocked bar in my home.

I'm not suggesting all you guys run out and have a fully stocked bar in your home. I'm just telling you that's the case at my house. My husband has clients over.

There are people that are in and out of our house drinking. There is a fully stocked bar at my house. I don't drink that alcohol.

It wouldn't matter if there's alcohol there or not. As you all know, I know how to get alcohol if I want it. It I mean, I don't even need a liquor store.

Alcohol is not my problem. Lack of power to say no to it was my problem. That's my problem.

And I've got to find a power greater than myself that's going to relieve me of that obsession to where it's a non-issue. Right? That's the joy of this program.

I don't think about it. It's not an issue. Cuz if I have to hold on and hope I don't drink today, it ain't going to work.

If I wanted to drink right this minute and it was up to me just to be a good girl and not drink, I'd be so drunk. I assure you, I don't know how to do that. I used to go to AA meetings and the first thing this guy would always ask me, "Were you a good girl last night?" No.

I bet you'd wish you were with me. Good girl. Please.

I'm 40 at that point. Okay. Um All right.

One of the things that really helped me a lot with this God thing is it it down at the bottom of that page 45 it says, "We know how he feels. We have shared his honest out and prejudice." The word prejudice is used seven times in this chapter. Prejudice means that you think you already know something before you know it, right?

You've already judged it, taken it to the bank. You think you know all about it when you don't know anything about it. Some of us have been violently anti-religious.

To others, the word God brought up a particular idea of him with which someone had tried to impress them during childhood. Perhaps we rejected this particular conception because it seemed inadequate. That hit me between the eyes.

You see, I have thought so well of myself and my ability to reason. My concept of God was simply inadequate. I had been inadequate with my concept of God.

And that's what my problem was with God. I was inadequate. God wasn't inadequate.

I had sold him short. I tried to make him some middle manager or something. I don't know.

I was just simply inadequate in my concept of God. And that was very humbling to realize that due to my own prejudice um on page 47. Well, we'll we'll do that in a minute.

Let me let me go right on over to um 53 because this is about my favorite part in the whole book. In the middle of page 53, it says, "When we became alcoholics, crushed by a self-imposed crisis, we could not postpone or evade. We had to fearlessly face the proposition that either God is everything or else he is nothing.

God either is or he isn't." What was our choice to be? That's all I needed to to cons to concern myself with when it came to this. God either is everything or else he's nothing.

If I try to describe God or define God or figure out God or any of those wordy explanations like I used to do on bar stools, all I'm doing is putting him on an org chart. You know, God is everything. And that's that was my choice.

I'm going to just say he's everything. It says, "Arived at this point, we were squarely confronted with the question of faith. We couldn't duck the issue.

Some of us had walked far over the bridge of reason. And notice that's capitalized. It's capitalized for a reason.

I My God up until this point had been reasoning. The bridge of reason was my God. My ability to reason anything was all I ever considered in my life.

If it didn't make sense to me, it was crap. Right? If I didn't think of it first, it was crap.

You know, I had to originate it. I was so arrogant. Okay.

The bridge of reason. Some of us had walked far over the bridge of reason toward the desire shore of faith. The outlines in the promise of the new land had brought luster to tired eyes and French courage to flagging spirits.

Friendly hands had stretched out and welcome. We were grateful that reason had brought us so far, but somehow we couldn't quite step ashore. Perhaps we've been leaning too heavily on reason that last mile and we did not like to lose our support.

That was natural. But let us think a little more closely. Without knowing it, had we not been brought to where we stood by a certain kind of faith?

For do we not believe in our own reasoning? Did we not have confidence in our own ability to think? What was that but sort of but a sort of faith?

Yes, we had been faithful, abjectly faithful to the God of reason. So, in one way or another, we discovered that faith had been involved all the time. I had always worshiped this God of reason.

And now I have Dara and all these other people, you guys, standing over here who've worked the steps and who are sober and you're stretching out your hands and welcome and you're saying, "Come join us. It's great. Just do what we say to do and your life will be wonderful." And I'm saying, "Well, let me think about that.

I got to think about that." And you're saying, "All you have to do is work these steps and then go help other people." Well, well, you see, I really need to spend time with my husband. I really need to start cooking dinner. Now, I'm not really saying this, but this is the kind of thing I could have said.

This is the kind of thing I hear women say all the time. Well, I've got to go with my boyfriend to a cocktail party for his business. Are you kidding me?

I got to talk my children in tonight. You know, this is reason. This This sounds reasonable, right?

I I I haven't I've been drunk all these years. I need to start doing these things. That makes sense at a reasonable level.

But what we're asking you to do is leave reasoning behind and step out on faith and do something that doesn't make sense to you. Right? Come join us.

Friendly hands stretching out. Come on, just try something that doesn't make sense to you for once. But so many of us want to just stay where we are.

That's why you have to be convinced of step one. You got to be convinced of step one. You got to know you're screwed.

You got to know your ideas don't work anymore. And then if you're willing to step out on that faith and leave your old ideas behind, you get to have a life that's better than anything you ever imagined possible. I um then we get to step three.

We make that decision to move forward in the steps. Is it 8:20? I have a few minutes.

In step three, we make that decision. and and and I've spent a lot of time on step two because it kind of bleeds over into step three. But in order to make the decision to move forward, we got to be armed with facts.

And the facts are we're screwed in step one. That only a spiritual solution is available to us at this point. And I'm going to have to have the help of other people to do it.

Now, I don't know what it's like with men. I don't know that men have this problem quite as much as women, but women have a real hard time trusting other women. Am I right?

>> I don't know why. I think it's cuz we we aren't trustworthy ourselves. But we've been we don't know how to form good relationships with other women, you know, because we've been screwing each other around for years, you know, that's just how we've been.

It's it's hard and it's hard to trust other women to with our lives. So, that's another way that we have to step out on faith and let other women into our lives and let other women help us and guide us because we're so sure that somehow that other woman's going to lead us into something that's not fun, right? There's we're so afraid they're going to make us do something that our mothers would make us do or something.

I don't know what the deal is, but it's hard. It's a very hard thing for women. very hard.

But that's another way that we have to let go and we have to work on that faith thing and we have to step out on faith. It's kind of like you're stepping into a room that's absolutely dark and you're just walking through and just doing it. Stepping out on faith.

I'll give you an example of when I stepped out on faith when this became real clear to me. Um, when I was about 6 months into the program, um, we needed to sell our house. Um, I mean, we really needed to sell our house.

It was it was real serious. And, um, and our house was a very unusual house. I'll just say that.

And, and it wasn't selling. And, um, there weren't many people who would be interested in it and not many people who would need this kind of a house. And um I would call Dara every day and I'd be so upset about the house and she'd say things like, "Well, I'd be afraid too if I was depending on you to sell it." And that kind of thing.

And um so one day finally this it was a Wednesday morning and and and the real estate agent called and she said, "I've got somebody interested in your house." And I was going, "Thank you, God. This is wonderful." So, I called Darra and I said, "You know, I'm supposed to go to Timberlaw this morning, but I'm going to stay home and clean up real fast cuz somebody's going to come look at our house this morning." And she said, "What?" She said, "No, ma'am. You're going to go to Timberlaw.

You get your She This is what she said. You get your ass to Timberlaw." I said, "I don't think you heard me. Some people are going to come look at our house today.

I've got to get it all pretty." You know, I'm I'm picturing buying chrosanthemums and putting them on the front porch, you know? like that'll make a difference. And um she said, "No, you're going to Timberl." I said, "All right." And so I went to Timberlot and when I came back, we had a contract on the house.

That was the day I stepped from the bridge of reason to the shore of faith. I'm not going to rely on what I think makes sense. I'm going to follow the directions of my sponsor.

Even though she's a woman, I'm going to follow her directions and that will take us into step three. I made that decision to turn my will and life over to the care of God. I don't know how to turn my will in life over to the care of God.

And this happened after step three. That was just an example of faith. But we don't know how to do that.

Um, we don't know. I love what Meyer says about we don't know how to throw more self at self. We don't know how to do these things.

So, what we're doing is we're only making a decision to go through with the rest of the steps. In step three, it talks about how we are selfish and self-centered. And most of us when we begin this journey at step three, at least I know this is true of most women.

We don't believe that we're selfish and self-centered. I know I didn't. I remember telling my sponsor that I am not a selfish person.

You don't understand. and I have been a giver my whole life and my biggest problem is that I'm a people pleaser. And she said, "Cindy, look around.

No one's pleased." And that was the truth. And I began to see that was that that statement hit me so hard because it started to crack that icy intellectual picture that I had. You know, I think the world is a certain way.

All these years I'm thinking I am this wonderful person who's just been a victim of circumstances and she's starting to rattle the cage a little and I'm starting to see that not only am I a jerk but there's some freedom in that. You see? Oh, because see if it's not just all of your fault then maybe there's some hope for me.

Cuz see, if I'm just a victim of all of you, then my life just might as well be over. But if it's if I've got some part in this, then maybe there's some hope for my life. So, I began to see that in step three.

You know, I'm selfish. Well, maybe that's a possible concept that I'm selfish. Maybe this maybe that's possible.

I'm not convinced of it, but I'm starting to get a little inkling that maybe, just maybe, I'm a little bit selfish. So the decision in step three is to go on with the rest of the steps and that's what I did. Um next week we will go to step four and move quickly from there.

I sure do love this group so very much. Thank you for letting me be with you this week and I'll see you next week. Awesome.

Thank you so much Cindy. No one does we agnostics better. I always love it when she's carrying the message.

I'm like, "Oh, good. Cindy's doing we agnostics." Okay, where am I? Our book is meant to be suggestive only.

We realize we know only a little. God will constantly disclose more to you and to us. Ask him in your morning meditation what you can do each day for the man who is still sick.

The answers will come if your own house is in order. But obviously you cannot commit some cannot transmit something you haven't got. See to it that your relationship with him is right and great events will come to pass for you and countless others.

This is a great fact for us. Abandon yourself to God as you understand God. Admit your faults to him and your fellows.

Give away clear away the wreckage of your past. Give freely of what you find and join us. We shall be with you in the fellowship of the spirit and you will surely meet some of us as you trudge the road of happy destiny.

May God bless you and keep you until then. That's Big Book, page 164. >> Thank you for listening to Sober Sunrise.

If you enjoyed today's episode, please give it a thumbs up as it will help share the message. Until next time, have a great day.