So I'm driving the 300kms home after dropping my kids at their mum's at the end of their near month long summer holiday with me. It's a great day. 40C and blue, blues skies. I'm driving past wheat-field after wheat-field, and the long straight country road shimmers and merges into the heat.
I get an idea. I'll have a couple of beers when I get home. Actually I'll have more than a couple - I'll have 8. No. I haven't drunk in a while so I'll make that 6. 8 might make me sick. OK. 6 it is.
A part of me is vaguely worried about this and is trying to bring up memories of the bad times my last drunks brought me, but they're fuzzy and incomplete. They feel like the memory of a dream that is fading away no matter how hard you try to hang onto it. Quickly that part of me is silenced by the thought of a cold beer on a warm day; of beaches and girls in bikini's; of hard earned thirsts and wiped away sweat.
I say to myself a little shakily: 'This is a really bad idea. You have no idea if you can stop at six. Do you really want to throw all of this away?"
But I can't take that thought seriously. Things are different this time. If I can go two years sober then I can stop whenever I like, right?
So now I have to figure out where I'm going to make the purchase. I live in a town of around 10,000 people. Big enough to have a bunch of different pubs and shops that I can get some beer from without having to see anyone I know, but small enough that there is no way I can be sure I can do this and not have word get around. Still, I'm going over and over all of the places I know. "That one? Nah. So and so works there and they play golf with X. That one? Nah, Y lives a couple of houses up and will see my car. That one? Nup. That's on the main road. Anyone can drive past."
And so it goes, but I can't think of any place safe. I also don't want to lie to my AA friends. After all I'm only having six tonight and tomorrow I'll stop and go to AA. I don't want to lie and I don't want to tell them I busted. I don't want to be known as the town drunk again (coz that's what they'll say even though it's only 6), and I can't lie to my friends. This business of drinking is harder than I remember. It used to be easier.
I'm driving east and the sun is setting over my shoulder. "OK" I think. "I'm not going to drink today". Just like that, and just like that everything changes. There is a flash of light in front of me, off into the sky like lightning but it's a summers day and there isn't a cloud for 500 miles, and I REALLY don't want to drink anymore. My mind which had been savouring the idea of a mouthful of beer recoils and I feel myself gag as I can actually taste the horrible stuff. I realise that I know a place I can grab some alcohol without anyone I don't want to know knowing but you couldn't drag me in there for any reason. I can remember my drunks in vivid detail and they are horrible. I am an alcoholic and I so very much do not want to drink today.
The rest of the drive happens in a calm daze, and this one thought is going around and around in my mind: God is either everything or He is nothing.
I'm shaken and humbled. And awed. Mightily awed. I know that the kid changovers are so very dangerous for me, and I need to work on a plan to combat that, but right now I can only think of the lightning flash that came on a day where no lightning should ever have been, and how for one second my destiny hinged on a simple yes or no, and I chose the right one.
Wow. I have been there. Your description is right on. I don't know why, but the strength you showed ends up being cumulative. That episode made you stronger. Great share Frodo.
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"You're in the right place. That's the door right there. Turn around."
That was a great share! I am amazed and awed too... after all the amazing deep understandings of this disease you've displayed here, that you could actually have even considered a drink at all, so it's nice to know that I am not alone in that regard. It's nice to know that no matter how much I think I know, I don't - He does - and that I am not alone in that aspect with this disease. That I am not alone in that I still have moments where it just happens that I am not prepared enough to fight off a disease that uses my best thinking against me, and that only a HP of my understanding can get me through... which you described so eloquently here : )
I have had what seem to be magical spiritual moments too btw - so I believe every word of what you wrote ; )
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Thanks for everything. Peace and Love on your journey.
Great share Frodo ... your description of the drive is so 'spot on' ... 1st, wouldn't it be great to have a few, then 2nd, where to get the supply without being recognized (hiding the action), then 3rd, AA will be there tomorrow, so I can go right back in ... Then something happens to snap us out of the insanity that we can drink again, even if we only plan to do it once ...
That happened to me a couple times this past summer ... but my end thought was, I know where it always takes me, AND I seriously don't think I have another 'detox/recovery' left in me ... I am certain it will kill me ...
Pappy
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'Those who leave everything in God's hand will eventually see God's hand in everything.'
Great share Frodo! That peculiar mental twist that leads to the first drink. Without help(The 12 Steps of AA) it's to much for me. Unaided by a Power Greater Than Myself, I'm screwed. Glad to see you were close enough to God to see and embrace the light. Thank you for the reminder.
I'm the bloke in the middle with that curious black spot the book describes.
I know (or at least think I know) what I'm doing before these things come at me. There are a couple of similarities between this and the last time, and suffice to say that it can be summed up as 'stinking thinking leads to drinking'. That I'll work on with my sponsor, group, here and on my own to try and work out a safer and better way, but not in this thread I think. This one can be just for that magical moment of deliverance.
I have days where my faith can move mountains - one rock at a time - and other days where I just don't trust God and I insist on taking control. Today was one of those days. Today God was less than everything for me while I let my ego rule the roost. Fortunately God had far more faith in me today than I had in him. I still don't know why me. Others must be more worthy or in greater need, but for whatever reason today I was reminded yet again that these 24 hours are a miracle and for that to happen God must be and is everything.
I am on the go, but I enjoyed that share Frodo. I know the specific line in the literature is something along the lines of "There comes a time in all our sobriety where all that stands between us and the next drink is the power of our relationship with our higher power." I think you just did an awesome job of detailing that experience. Also, I think that there are probably multiple times this can occur for us.
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Keep coming back. It works if you work it. So work it. You're worth it!
That was masterfully written and totally captures the mental battle that goes on in my head before I drink. I'm glad you were string enough to overcome it. I usually am not...and then it's right back to the beginning with the lying, being a person of low character, the guilt and remorse. Where would I be today if I had the ability to stay sober? Who knows?
Well SmC I'm just glad that I was half an hour out of my home town rather than five minutes. That gave me a chance to do all those mental gymnastics in the middle of nowhere rather than as I was driving past pubs.
I wasn't strong either. If I had have had a beer in front of me when the idea hit then I would have drunk it. Today I could have fifty in front of me and they wouldn't even be looked at, but right then at that moment I had no defence at all. Resentments are killers, and I'd given a doozy of a resentment 3 hours free time in my head. I was just bloody lucky, and I've got to work on some rather large forgiveness because next time I might not be so fortunate.
Without help(The 12 Steps of AA) it's to much for me. Unaided by a Power Greater Than Myself, I'm screwed. Glad to see you were close enough to God to see and embrace the light. Thank you for the reminder. 