My dad got sober when I was 10 years old.

My three sisters and I grew up in a good home environment and never wanted for anything. Dad was a professional, and Mom stayed home to raise the kids.

I tiptoed into the rooms of AA in January 2020, and to say my life was unmanageable is a major understatement.

At age 15 I got drunk for the first time and threw up on my brother’s good pants. I couldn’t wait to drink again.

Recently, I was in Oakville, Ontario and dropped in to visit Father Peter. He had baptized our son Peter, and he told his drinking story from the pulpit one Sunday, several years ago.

I grew up in a small town in Alabama in the 1950s and 60s. The town was filled with my extended family, so I got to hear about a lot of history.

Getting sober is real. Real hard. When I got to AA, I was crazy. I had racing thoughts, homicidal thoughts, suicidal thoughts, every kind of unprincipled thought.

I remember when I started working on the Steps, I was surprised when I got to Step Three. I was raised in a Christian home and did service at mass. The “God thing” was OK with me then.

A woman shared at last night’s AA meeting that her program of recovery required her to practice love and tolerance, and in the next breath lashed out at “bleeding deacons” and their lack of h

Some of my happiest childhood memories come from celebrating holidays. My large family would gather, eat delicious food, tell jokes and stories—and drink. And there was lots of drinking.

I remember when I was 5 years old and I would get my dad a beer so he could give me the first sip as a reward. That led to many more sips.

I’ve been sober long enough to realize some things about myself: I attract other drunks and alcoholics. I know, shocking, huh?

One time when I was 19, I thought it would be a brilliant idea for me and my girlfriend to hitchhike home after drinking all night at a bar.

Shortly after receiving my three-month medallion, I learned that my oldest sister had been killed by a drunk driver. I wanted to chuck my medallion into the garbage and go get drunk.

I knew I had to do something. I was miserable, hopeless, totally lost. I was 62, unemployed, seeing a therapist and drinking in the morning until I passed out around noon.

Believing in God wasn’t hard for me. Getting God to do what I wanted, now that was a problem. I would pray and pray and nothing would happen.

Thank God for Tradition Three. Without it, I probably would not be here.

Over the years, sadly, the meeting parking lot behavior has begun to bother me. I’m no angel; mine has not always been the best either.

At one point in my sobriety, I had an idea that it helped newly sober people to hear statistics that suggested that they had a small chance of staying sober.

A few years ago, I celebrated my AA birthday at my home group. A few days later someone asked, “What did you do to celebrate?” I thought briefly and replied, “Nothing special.”