Retread - someone who got sober, stayed sober over a year, went on the booze and then came back
Golden Slipper - someone who manages to get sober and stay sober for anything up to a few months, goes and does some more research, then comes back
Fallen Warrior - someone who gets sober, stays sober a long time and then goes back to the bottle and doesn't come back, ends up in a box.
Sometimes they keep coming back and keep going out again. Are we helping telling them to keep coming back or should we be saying hey, y'know what, if you want to stop and stay stopped for the rest of your life, c'mon in. If you want to keep going out and doing the research, well thanks, but that's not our business, go get on with it?
I got more time for the Golden Slipper, who is often trying but hasn't reached the point of desperation. The fallen warrior i have time for too. At least they do the research for me and some of us have to die to teach the rest of us a lesson. well even the re tread deserves every chance.
I dunno, the human body and the human psyche have immense capacity for suffering. The retread, God bless her, has lost her home, her husband and her kids. Her sanity and morals are on the slide too and it still don't hurt enough.......Rarely have I seen someone so distraught with her life, but the only solution she has is Vodka.........I got a couple of sponsees who are golden slippers........I get frustrated with them and fall back on if you wanna drink that's your business, come back when you want to stay stopped, I don't talk to a bottle these days.........I've known a few fallen warriors and I'm grateful to each of them, especially the lady who took me under her wing when i started, bullied me into buying a big book, conned me into reading it, fed me on friday nights, pushed me into getting a sponsor, taught me about prayer in her own way and then God bless her, when her higher power went down with dementia (there's the error, she made her old man her Higher Power) she couldn't cope, wouldn't cope and gave up on herself.
So we don't shoot our wounded but do we enable repeated returns to the bottle? What does KEEP COMING BACK really mean to you?
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It's not having what you want, it's wanting what you got. BB
Was reading in a paper the other day about a living fallen warrior. Admittedly, booze was not his primary drug. Clean and sober for 20 years. Built up a career, repected in the community.
Goes back on the drugs and booze and commits a terrible crime in coke-induced psychosis. That crime will permanently scar another person and that person's family. He pleaded guilty and is now doing an indefinite sentence for public protection -- and sounds like he's going to be ice cream for freaks when he's in the can.
When I read that, I had a whole new appreciation of the meaning of a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition.
I was that person -at one time in my life, not for today though -thanks be to God. Alcohol does funny things to people, just ask the retread -they know. I chose to self medicate for so many years and now choose to remain sober; thanks be to God, AA and this forum -one day at a time. Thanks...for reminding me of how precious our sobriety truly is and what can ultimately lie ahead for any alcoholic if they choose to ignore the obvious -once again.
The only lables I've ever heard affixed to an alcoholic who returns to drinking is a 'slipper' or 'retread'. Anyhow, there's many out there who have slipped and I personally know of a few with over 25 years of sobriety who have fallen into that category. "What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition...." pg. 85
It seems the longer I stay sober, the more drawn to the big book I become. Don't believe there's one thing in those first 164 pgs that hasn't been included for the disease of alcoholism, issues in sobriety, etc.... If I concentrate (meditate) on just one sentence in the big book, it's amazing how much clarity I can gain from ANY situation. However; the absolute 'best' part of the entire book (in my humble opinion) is found in the first three words at the top of page 12, 3rd edition...)
I know people who have gone out and came back 6 times, now they have been sober for 15 years. I understand the frustration but everybody has their own bottom. Keep comig back to me means just that, keep coming back whether you have got it yet or not. Mostly for the ones who get it to keep our heads screwed on half way straight.
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The smallest of good deeds is greater than the best of intentions.
Anonymous
Aye wolf, I know a man who's been sober since 1983, but who took 7 years to get there. I heard another guy say that it took 10 years of coming to AA before the penny dropped. Keep coming back means just that. It's the ones who don't come back that are the heartrending ones. Maybe there are some folks out there can do this program without meetings -- I can't and I've not met one yet. If I stop coming back, I will stop working this program sooner or later, and when that happens, I will drink. I am an alcoholic.
