I was not scared sober. If the knowledge of the alcoholic death that awaited me was sufficient to keep me sober, I would have never even taken my first drink. I watched my father die an alcoholic death when I was 15... cirrhosis, the busted esophagus... I knew my chances. Hangovers were not enough to keep me sober, even the dumb things I did while drinking were not enough to keep me sober. I don't know how often I thought about it, but I knew of AA, and there was always a choice in my mind, AA... or follow my father's footsteps to the bitter end. I fancied myself smarter than old dad, and entertained the fantasy that I could figure out this drinking thing and enjoy it without it taking me down.
But when I came to my first AA meeting, it was not death I feared, it was life. I had spent a life in fear... mostly just fear of people, that anxiety and insecurity that I think many of us are familiar with, but never admit to. Alcohol didn't cause it - it was there long before I took a drink. No, alcohol was the ONLY relief I had ever known from this fear and anxiety! I feared living without alcohol more than I feared an alcoholic death.
When I came to my first meeting, it was not the graphic tales of jail, DTs, lost jobs, lost families, and death a hundred ways that kept me coming back. It was the wonderful spirit in the room of sober alcoholics, who were living life sober one day at a time. It was that life that I wanted, and never believed was possible - because I was born "different" and "unique", I could never be happy because I just knew to much about what was wrong with everything and everybody. But there you all were, coming from that same place, smiling and laughing, but I believed in my heart when you said you had all been to where I was.
Today it is not fear of death that keeps me sober. It is the love of the life that I have, not just the fellowship of AA but all of my life, my family, my wife. Choosing to drink is choosing to die... but it's knowing that before I die, I will throw away this gift of life that has been given to me. I don't think so much of my dad's last day, when his liver finally said enough, but of all of those miserable years watching everything and everyone he loved slip away from him. I stay sober because I love my life. Even when I have those old fears and anxieties... I find I love them too, because they are what makes me real, what makes me come back to AA and to revisit things like step 10, 11, and 12. I do not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it; to shut the door on it would be to deny what I am.
I hope this makes sense. AA has not put the fear of death in me. It has taken away my fear of life. I don't want to miss a minute of it.
Nor mine, good post, one I agree with, I think when I was drinking I had a "death wish" for the way I drank I was certainly commiting suicide, without alcohol I was terrified and didn't even know it, alcohol actually removed my fear and allowed me to be who I thought I was
All the car crashes, near misses, times in jail had no impact on my drinking, they just became an amusing story to tell
If anything would have made me "scared straight" it would have been this:
but the truth was even jail became just one more story to tell when I was drinking
I drank again after many years, and it wasn't so much scary as it was unspeakably tedious, I hear people share about how if they drink again they will die, when in fact what usually happens is they live....for a long time...getting more and more miserable...nothing to be frightened of, but something certainly to have a healthy respect for, me drinking just isn't part of my mindset, like playing with matches, playing dodgeball on the freeway with semis rolling by or drinking poison, I am no longer "The JayWalker"
-- Edited by LinBaba on Monday 22nd of November 2010 05:15:31 PM
Bari I was told early on that if I came to enough meetings enough times I would hear my story told by another...That has happened more than once and your retelling it makes my head nod with familiarity. One of the things I learned from drinking up to toxic shock was that it would be a quiet, soft way to end it all when I wanted to end it all. The depressive and anesthetic qualities of booze took me down at those times very softly. The allergy of it made the whole experience violently insane. It was the insanity that caused me to reach out...Help in emotional trouble, all at lunch. Suicide prevention center, all business no one to come to the phone. Al-Anon Family Groups a live voice who told me my life required that I stay on the phone. Fear isn't my motivation either. A God who I met in program and then came to understand in program was my motivation...I learned about fear later. Thanks for the share.
