Starting Over

I stopped getting drunk when I was 20. But for the next ten years, I had a little secret that I was keeping. Every time I got sick I would take a brand of cough syrup with 10% alcohol in it to help me sleep better. In November 2023, I called my sponsor and said I was going to take alcoholic cough syrup and he said, “We can never safely use alcohol in any form at all. You are playing with fire.” So I prayed and told God I not to take the easy way out. Even though for the past nine years I had only taken two tablespoons of the cough syrup, that shot of alcohol was screwing with my head, because I was thinking: “Are you really an alcoholic if you can stop and use alcohol for medicinal purposes?”