From Bars to Sobriety: Rudy's Journey Through Alcoholism

Alcoholics. Quality of Life. Perfect. All right. I thank Lisa for asking me to come out and speak. Like Eric said, it's an honor and a privilege to do anything in Alcoholics Anonymous. I didn't always feel that way, but today I do. Let me get the statistics out of the way. My sobriety date is March 23, 1999. My home group is the Bellflower Big Book Group, and I have a sponsor named Larry T. For those three things, I'm

grateful. Without any of them, I wouldn't be standing here before you. I want to thank Angie and Eric for the 10 minutes. If you're new in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, they basically said everything you need to hear. Get a sponsor, work the steps, and find a higher power. Those three things are essential for recovery. Both of them did an excellent job. I don't know, about six months, I'd have the nerve to come up and speak in front of a group like this. Angie, I give you a lot to do.

That's impressive. I'm going to tell you a little bit about what I was like, what happened, and what I'm trying to be like today. I grew up in a loving home. My father was one of us. I have two older brothers. My mom was a hardworking woman. My dad, from a very early age, my dad died when I was seven or eight years old.

I remember my dad's job was, he was a bookie. When my mom was out working, he was out doing numbers. He used to take me to bars with him in East LA. When I was four or five, he would take me to bars, and I loved the smell of a bar. The sound of the glasses clinking. Everyone seemed to me, when they were in the bar, they were happy.

That's how I looked at alcoholics. That's how I looked at people who were drinking. Like I said, my dad died when I was seven or eight years old. My mom was a single mom. She never remarried. She took care of us three boys. Like I said, my mom was a hardworking woman.

With three boys, my oldest brother was eight years older than me. Then I had my middle brother, who's six, and then there was me. We were a handful.

Luckily, we had a big family. Whenever we had family parties, I had a lot of cousins, uncles, aunts. Everyone would come over to the house. We'd have like 30, 40 people at the house, and everyone drank. Everyone looked like they were having a great time.

When I started my drinking, that's what attracted me to alcohol. Everyone that drank seemed to me that they were having a good time.

I don't know what happened.

They went home, or when they were driving away from the house, or when I was asleep. I don't know what happened to them, but it seemed to me they were always happy when they drank. I always equated when you were drinking, life was good.

I was just talking to my friend recently that I didn't realize I started drinking at a very young age. I think I was in fifth or sixth grade. I started drinking a couple of beers because that's what everyone in my neighborhood did. Like I said, I had two older brothers. By that time, they were doing it.

They were smoking pot. They were drinking all the time. They were in gangs. All the guys that I hung out with from five to the fifth grade on up, they drank, they smoked, and they just did things that kids do in my neighborhood.

It was a normal thing for us to ditch school, drink, smoke pot. I didn't do it every day, but it was fun.

I remember my first time we drank, like I said, it was in fifth grade. I had one of my friends who lived three or four houses down from me. He had an older brother. He was in his 20s. He used to leave beer around all the time. On the way to school, he got a couple of beers. We drank them on the way to school, and I felt great. That's how I wanted to feel all the time.

Like I said, I didn't drink every time after that.

But it showed me where I wanted to hit the mark. Like I said, drinking was fun for me, even towards the end. It might not have had the consequences I wanted, but it always did the job for me.

Whenever I drank, it did what it was supposed to do. I never thought I had an alcohol problem. I thought I had a people problem because people are always telling me what to do. People are always telling me, you shouldn't be doing that. You shouldn't be doing this. You should be doing this.

And it didn't dawn on me that alcohol was my solution. I just felt that whenever I drank, I felt better. And I didn't realize until I come into the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous and get a sponsor and work the steps that I found out what my problem was, and that was me.

The problem is always me. Even today, the problem is always me because of my head. I always have great ideas, and when I don't run them by my sponsor, those great ideas always get me to do a jackpot.

It's just Wednesday. I'm at work. My boss calls me up. We call our one-on-ones at work, and I'm not having a very good year at work right now. Things are tough.

After I get off the phone with my boss, he's basically telling me, just do my job. Do what you're supposed to be doing. Go to work. Basic things that everyone does who doesn't expect to have a standing ovation when they do them.

You're doing your job. Right away, I get off the phone, and I was pissed because he was basically telling me that, in my mind, that I'm not doing my job correctly.

So every Wednesday, I meet my sponsor at the Pacific Group, and I sat down and talked to him and told him what was going on.

And he's all like, so they told you to do your job, and you're upset about that?

But he's all, they told you to do your job, and you're upset about that. I go, but you don't understand.

And at 19 years of sobriety, that's where my head takes me.

Because I want to think that.

I'm doing this great, awesome job where people do great, awesome jobs every day.

And I expect, like I said, a standing ovation for it.

So that's where my head takes me all the time.

Like I said, I started drinking fifth, sixth, seventh grade.

Started doing other things, smoking pot.

And by this time, my older brother goes off to the Army.

So now it's just me and my middle brother.

I said, my mom never remarried.

She always took care of us.

And.

But we always had a large family.

And I remember when, you know, I mean, my mom did an awesome job with us.

And my family actually did an awesome job with us.

We used to go on vacations all the time.

And they did, you know, look at the time.

I didn't think it was anything special.

I thought, you know, we were poor.

We know.

But, you know, my mom took us on family vacations all the time.

My uncles and aunts went with us.

And I remember.

We used to go to Vegas a lot.

And my uncles and aunts used to used to have judge how, you know, they would they would buy like a 12 pack.

And then and then they would every like we would stop in.

We lived in Pico River, California.

And then by the by the time we hit like Covina, we'd have to stop again.

And then by the time we went like 30 miles down the road, we have to stop again because they always had to have alcoholic in the car.

I'll call in the car and beer in the car.

So that's how that's how I was raised.

And I love.

I love that.

By the time I got into into high school, things started progressing for me, started doing a little bit more drugs, drinking a little bit more often.

I always played sports, but when I started when I started drinking and using sports, this didn't seem that important to me anymore.

The things I was doing seemed more important to me.

And, you know, I was I was a big baseball fan.

I played football.

And I went to I went to Catholic school in Bellflower.

And my sophomore year, I was put on varsity and I was I was I was playing with the guys who were like twice my size.

I think I was this height when I was when I was in high school, but I only weighed like one hundred and fifty pounds.

I couldn't tell my coach I was scared to get hit.

I couldn't tell my coach that I was fearful because I couldn't I didn't think I could make the team.

I don't know those things then, but I know I'm now looking back and going through.

Going through an inventory process.

And I don't know that I'm fearful and scared and and and all those things that I learn when I come to Alcoholics Anonymous and going through the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.

So right away, I decide, you know what, I'm not going to play anymore.

I'm just I'm just go out and do what I want to do.

And I did graduate from high school.

I went to college.

But again, I just didn't I didn't have really any ambition when I was out there using using drinking.

I didn't care.

I just wanted to do what I wanted to do.

And that was my that was my mantra.

Let me do what I wanted to do.

My mom always my mom was always she was a big enabler for me.

And I was able to get a job.

I think it was like six months after I graduated from high school.

I worked for an aerospace company.

And man, once I once I got my first real job, man, it was on because I had the money to do whatever I wanted.

I was living at home.

I wasn't.

I would pay my mom rent.

But by Sunday afternoon, I'd ask her that rent back because I got paid every Friday.

But Sunday I was broke.

Every Sunday I was broke.

So I always asked for that money back or I would steal it from her.

And that's just the son.

That's kind of son I was.

I didn't care anything about her.

I didn't care.

She was a single mom.

She had raised us basically by herself, you know, financially.

And I didn't I don't look at those things that I'm looking about me.

I'm selfish, self-centered.

And I could care less about you.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

And.

I started getting consequences for what I was doing out there when I was drinking and using.

And I had that job at that aerospace company for a little over six years.

And what happened was, like, when I was going there, I was having a good time.

I started selling other things in that facility.

And some of the people that I was selling to work for security.

So they work for DoD.

And they basically told me, hey, look at this.

This is what's going on. You're being investigated by the Department of Defense. I had a top secret clearance at the time. And so what I did is I just quit. Instead of getting busted, I just quit. And that was in 1989. And from 1989 to 1999, I didn't have a steady job for more than six months.

Because when I left that job, I had put into my 401k, I had a good significant amount of money. And that money was gone within six months. And I was basically just doing whatever I wanted to do for that six months with as much money as I wanted to do it with.

And this whole time, my mom kept asking me, what's wrong with you? Why do you do these things? And I didn't tell her that, you know, it's because I'm fearful. I'm frightened. I don't know what I need to do.

I don't know how to ask for help. I just because I want to, Mom, why don't you just leave me alone? You don't know what you don't know. You don't know what you're talking about. And by this time, my older brother, he's married. He has a couple of kids now. My middle my middle brother is married, too. They seem to be having a good life. They're married. They have kids. They're good providers, things like that. And then there's me. I'm still living at home. At that time, I was I would think I was when I left Northrop, I was like 20.

He's 28, 29. And for 10 years, I went on a run and just did whatever I wanted to do. There would be times in between there. What I would I would say, you know, I'm not I'm not going to drink. I'm going to try to, you know, try to get in. I was always able to get a job, but I was never able to hold on to that job because either I got drug tested or I just wouldn't show up because of the weekend and I couldn't show up until Wednesday.

So what started happened to is I started being I wasn't able to get jobs as frequent as I did before.

And and then towards the end, I just it just wasn't I just didn't care about getting a job.

I was I was getting money any any way I could. I'd rob, steal, do whatever I needed to do to get to get what I need to do to to party.

And I was going in and out. I would I would periodically go back to my mom's house and she'd let me back in.

And it was one time she's like, you know, she's old again.

Why do you do the things you do? And you go, why can't you just be like your brothers?

They both have families that, you know, one of my brothers had a house at that time.

At that time, they were both employed at their job for like well over 10 years now.

And I I could couldn't even get a job at that time.

And she was just telling me that, you know, basically what I thought she was telling me is I'm a disappointment to her.

I I'm the the one in the family, the black sheep in the family.

I can't I can't do anything right.

I just life was life was was closing in on me because all the friends that I have, they actually had partied like I did.

But it seemed like they had jobs.

It seemed like they were doing other things besides what I was doing, which is drinking and using all the time.

And so I told my mom, you know, mom, I'll try.

I'll try to do what you want me to do.

And what happened was I had I had a cousin who owned a company in the Inland Empire.

And and my mom, my mom talked to my aunt and talked to him and they said,

hey, can you give Rudy a chance?

I was my cousin.

Like I said, when I was younger, me and my cousins were pretty close.

And so what they did was he gave me a chance.

He goes, hey, I'll hire you.

You come out of here.

What he did was he got me an apartment out in the Inland Empire.

He got me a company car, company credit card, basically gave me everything.

And when I went out there, I told myself, you know what?

I'm just shoot straight.

I'm not going to do nothing.

I'm not going to drink.

And I actually.

I actually did that for six months.

I was able to control the urges I had.

And just because I wanted to please my mom so bad because so so bad because I didn't want to become that loser son that I saw a couple other people in my neighborhood become walking down the street homeless.

And I didn't want to become that guy.

I didn't want to become that guy to my mom because every time my mom looked at me, her face was just it was it would break my heart.

But I just at that time, I just didn't care.

So, like I said, I was doing good.

He got me that that apartment.

I go to work every day, come home, cook, watch TV and go to bed and just do it all over.

Didn't really make any friends, probably for the first three or four months.

And then I started meeting people within the complex just to say hi, you know, things like that.

And then I think it was around the fifth month.

One of my neighbors asked me that, hey, you want to go across the street?

There's a bar across it.

I'm like, no, I'm good.

Thank you very much.

But I got to work early.

And I would pass that bar.

For the first six months that I lived there, because there was a little small market there where I got my groceries and stuff like that.

And every time I walked by that bar, you hear the laughter of that in the bar.

You hear the clinking of the glasses.

And I heard the I heard the attraction of alcohol for me, because, like I said, when I was young, I always heard that.

And, you know, he'd ask me like the week later.

No, I'm good.

And then like the six it was six months.

There was nothing really wrong going on.

I didn't have a bad day.

I didn't have it.

It was just a normal day.

And he can't.

I was walking in into my apartment.

He was coming out and said, hey, you want to go have a drink?

I go, I could have one.

You know, I've been good for six months.

Things are good.

I can have one.

We walked across the street.

I had two beers.

Nothing happened.

I didn't.

You know, it was OK.

I went back.

I went back to work the next day.

Things were good.

This lasted for like a week.

I'd go with him every day after that, have two beers and then go home and just just things were going good.

I was like, man, this is great.

I'm not getting in trouble.

I'm not having any women problems.

I'm doing what I'm supposed to.

I'm paying my bills.

Everything is great.

And then that's that Saturday.

He asked me, I'm OK, let's go.

And that Saturday I never went back to work again.

What happened for me was they had brought some some other things to the to that bar, started started doing some other things.

And next thing I know, I'm gone.

I'm off and running.

I had like I said, I had that truck.

I had a bunch of equipment in that truck.

I had a company credit card and I was off and running, man.

And it was fun.

I had a great time when I did that.

That was that was in nineteen ninety nine.

I was off and running and I ended up meeting her, met her.

She partied and drank just like I did.

And like I said, I had a great time until he cut the credit card off.

He cut the credit card off within like a week and a half.

I'm surprised he left it on for a week and a half, but he left it on for a week and a half.

And then after that, I started selling the equipment.

And then after that, I sold the truck and I was off and running, was able to get another small car.

We were I never went back to my apartment.

I was living with her in motels, just moving from one motel motel.

And then she was.

She was.

She was.

She was.

She was a heroin addict and she was on the methadone.

She would get methadone treatments all the time.

So I'd have to take her back, get the get the treatment and come back.

And we at this time, she she we were living in Paris, California.

I don't know if you know where Paris, California is, but man, that place is a pit.

It's worse than Palmdale.

And and man, she was she knew how to push my button.

And she was the first woman that I ever wanted to hit, never hit her.

But man, I came close to hitting her and she just she knew it, too.

And she would do these things to me that just it just pissed me off.

But what happened was, you know, we were going back and back and forth to the clinic and she found out she was pregnant.

And that that when that when the doctor when she told me that she was pregnant, it hit my head.

My mom said, Why can't you be like your brothers?

Why can't why can't you be like your brothers?

And right away, I was like, man, you know, so we kind of I think this happened on a Tuesday or Wednesday.

I can't remember now, but we made a deal that, all right, this will be, you know, we're going to go into rehab and we're going to stop drinking, stop using all that.

And so we made a plan that we'd go into rehab that following Monday.

And so we'd have basically a week, four or five days to do whatever we wanted to do.

And we did whatever we want to do for those days.

And when when Sunday rolled around.

I turned to her and said, Hey, you know, do you still want to do this?

And she says, No.

And for some reason, what I don't know what it was, a higher power, what it was.

But you know what?

I was tired of the way I was living.

I was robbing people.

I was stealing.

I was doing all the things that I was not brought up to do.

And I was just tired out there.

I think I weighed 140 pounds.

I was sucked up and I was basically just tired.

And for the first time in my life, I called another human being and asked for help.

I called my sister-in-law up.

She lived in Timberland.

I was in Marietta, California, which was only maybe like a half hour, 40 minutes away from where I was at and said, You know what?

I can't stop what I'm doing.

And that's the first time I said that out loud.

I thought it a couple of times, but that was the first time I said that out loud.

And what happened was she came and picked me up.

She made a couple of calls.

She came and picked me up on that Sunday, made a couple of calls and found a place, a treatment center for me to go in on that Wednesday.

So for two days, I detoxed.

I was in the Cedar House.

The place was in Bloomington, California.

It's called the Cedar House.

And I remember going in there doing they do an intake for you and ask you when was the last time you used or drank and all that.

And I told them it was Sunday.

And they go, Well, we still have to put you in these docs room.

Just part of our rules.

So they put me in the detox little room and there were three other guys in there.

There was six beds in there.

There was four of us when there are three of those guys were detoxing from heroin.

And I don't know if you've seen any detox from heroin, but it's not pretty.

And right away in my head said, You know what?

I made a big mistake.

I'm not as bad as them.

I shouldn't be in here.

But what happened was the guy who gave me the intake gave me this book and said, Why don't you read the doctor's opinion and maybe that'll help you out through the night.

And that's what I did.

And I didn't become all spiritual.

I didn't become Mr. AA.

What I did was I just basically gave up.

And for the first time in my life, I wasn't I wasn't living in a car.

I wasn't living.

I wasn't living in a motel anymore.

I was getting I was getting meals on a regular basis.

And I think I just I wanted to see if I could live, you know, the way that my mom wanted me to live.

And they would bring in panels that would bring in other other meetings.

There weren't all AA.

There was other other things there and they suggested I get a sponsor, didn't know what a sponsor was.

I ended up getting a sponsor there.

And like I said, we were going to.

I was going to other meetings besides Alcoholics Anonymous.

I was in that treatment center for 72 days.

I got kicked out of that treatment center for having a cell phone in there because I still had my old thinking.

I was I was I was selling calls to the other guys in the place because I needed to make money.

You know, what I would do is because they wouldn't let you have any soda in there.

No sweets.

It was all just like healthy stuff.

And I was sneaking sodas.

I was selling sodas.

I was selling the phone calls.

So I was still.

I was still trying to come up on people still had that same same thinking.

And unbeknownst to me, at the same time, my middle brother was was also in the treatment center in Orange County, California.

I called my wife.

I was back in touch with my family, like I said.

And my brother had I think I had at that time.

I think I had like six months.

I was living in a sober living house.

I was able to get a job.

I was working every day, going to different meetings, different fellowships.

And just didn't seem to be clicking on anything.

I was just doing it because everyone else was doing it.

And my brother, my mom called me up and said, hey, why don't you come down for the weekend that Monday?

I didn't have to work.

So I came out.

I came out on Saturday, hung out with my family when I was supposed to go back on Tuesday.

My brother asked me if he wanted to go.

I wanted to go to a meeting.

And he my my sobriety is March 23rd.

His is March 27.

So I have four more days now.

He took me to the Belfer.

We're a big group and we have a beginner's meeting that starts at 630.

And for the first time in my life, I felt welcome there.

When I walked up there, people reached their hand out like you guys did here.

Welcome me to alcoholics.

The means I was going to Albany Lampire weren't doing that.

There was people, you know, talking, smoking.

They were, you know, they really weren't welcoming you into into the rooms.

And that's why it's it's so impressive when there's meetings that do that, because that's how I felt.

I felt like I was welcome.

And when I was going to means that.

I didn't do that.

I just felt like I wasn't a part of and my brother had told me to that day.

He goes, why do you need to get a sponsor?

And he pointed two guys out.

There was one Larry T and Johnny H.

And I thought he was poking this, you know, pointed to Johnny.

So I got John.

I had Johnny in my first my first 11 years of sobriety.

And man, that was a mistake.

Johnny, you know, I went up to Johnny and said, hey, Johnny, I need a sponsor.

He goes and he goes, are you willing to do anything?

Did I tell you anything to stay sober?

I'm like, yeah, he goes there.

Here's what I want you to do.

I want to go to all the means that I go to.

I want you to call me every day because I want you and then we'll talk about getting into the book.

So I did those things.

I followed that man around for 11 years and he got me into working the steps.

Like I said, I was going to a bunch of meetings, you know, started getting better jobs and in my in my in my life.

And.

Oh.

That girl, I told you that I met that, you know, she was going to she was going to have have the baby.

She was pregnant.

I found out when I got out of that treatment center that she OD'd so she she had she was got back on, you know, she was still partying the whole time, didn't stop and she died.

And there wasn't a day that I knew there wasn't a day that I was in that place that I didn't want to go out and get her.

But I knew if I did go out, I wouldn't be back.

And so for some reason, I just didn't do it.

I just did what they told me to do in that recovery center.

I did woke up early, did my chores and all that.

And like I said, I was with Johnny for a little over 11 years.

Life got good in Alcoholics Anonymous.

I was able to get married in Alcoholics Anonymous.

I met the love of my life.

Things were going good.

We were able to buy a house out in Santa Clarita and I was still going to meetings in Belfast.

So when the PG.

I was still doing all the things that I was doing and then I lost my job and I was like, ah, so I started cutting back a little bit on my meetings because I figured I didn't have enough money for gas and blah, blah, blah.

And what happened for me is I started backpedaling away from Alcoholics Anonymous.

Then my wife lost her job and we ended up losing the house in Santa Clarita.

But we both got jobs back, moved, removed to Palmdale, California.

And yes, I know.

I moved to Palmdale.

Like I said, I slowly started backing away from Alcoholics Anonymous and I was going to maybe one meeting a week and then I was going to one meeting a month and then I didn't have a spot.

I wasn't calling Johnny no more.

So basically it was sponsorless.

And what happened was I started taking shortcuts.

You know, that new job again, I started taking shortcuts, started lying to my wife, just started reverting back to my old ideas.

And I knew a guy out there, Mark.

I had known him for a good majority of my life.

I had known him for my sobriety already, so I reached out to him and said, Hey, I need help, I need to get plugged back in.

And what he did is he he introduced me to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous in Palmdale and around a couple of weeks after I started going to meetings out there, I called Larry up and said, Hey, I'm in trouble.

I need help.

I didn't feel like I didn't feel like drinking.

I felt like killing someone or maybe killing myself.

And that's just from being a dry drunk.

And so I know I know I know how it is.

I think it was almost seven.

Seven, eight months sponsorless, you know, going to very little meetings and just not being honest, had lost my spiritual contact with my higher power.

And it was just it wasn't a good it was a good deal for me.

So I got back into going meetings, started going back to Bellflower, started going back to the Pacific group.

I go to a Friday night meeting up where we're at.

I have a couple of sponsors.

Well, I have one now.

The other one reached out to me on Friday or didn't even reach out to me.

His wife reached out.

And so I kind of I know I know I know where that's going to lead.

But you know what?

That's his decision.

I'm not going to go chase him.

If he doesn't want it, he doesn't want it.

It's not me to push him back into Alcoholics Anonymous.

So like I said, I started I started working with Larry again.

I'm following Larry's direction, doing things like that.

And, you know, life's good right now for me.

You know, I got a job.

I pay my bills.

You know, I, you know, I like to think that I'm going to be a part of it.

I like to think that I'm going to be a part of it.

I like to think that I'm going to be a part of it.

I like to think that life's tough for me.

And, you know, I'm having a bad time at work.

To be honest with you, man, I could be out there under a bridge sucking on a bottle, just not caring.

And the life I have today is just amazing.

You know, it's because I follow this now.

I mean, I'm totally immersed in Alcoholics Anonymous.

Like I said, that last week when my head started thinking, my first thought wasn't I'm going to go drink.

My first thought was I need to talk to my sponsor.

Because when I talk to my sponsor, I'm grounded now.

I have to get, make sure that I am, I am right size with God.

Because there's a lot of times that I think I'm doing great.

And I think I take credit for that.

And I got to remember, it's not me.

It's because of the, the rooms of alcoholics, my sponsor, getting a conscious content with a higher power.

And that's all it is, basically.

The only thing that we promise here in Alcoholics Anonymous is that you get sober.

It doesn't mean you're going to get, you know, a husband.

A wife, a great job, all these things.

What happens is you basically come up to a basic human being.

That's what you do here in Alcoholics Anonymous.

No one promises you that you're going to be rich.

No one promises that you're going to have hair, be skinny.

You're sober.

That's all there is.

And it's up to you to expand on that.

You have to do the footwork in order to, to get things that you want.

You can't just sit back and say, hey, you know, I want a great job.

But you're going to sit back and wait for someone to give it to you.

That's not how life works.

That's not normal.

People don't do that.

They go out and work for it.

That's what they do.

And we think we're special because we're in Alcoholics Anonymous.

At least that's what I think sometimes, that I deserve this because I'm sober now.

Hell, I have to work twice as hard as a normal person because I know, I know where I came

from and I know where I could go.

And it's just, you know, I'm grateful that I know today what my problem is.

Like I said, for the newcomers, man, Angie and Eric said it all, man, get a sponsor.

Work the steps with you.

Make sure your sponsors work the steps because that's important, you know.

If you have someone who really hasn't worked the steps, then they're basically useless to you.

Find someone who is doing more than you in Alcoholics Anonymous because that's what I do.

My sponsor does, he's in Oklahoma right now, you know.

And, you know, he has commitments in all his meetings.

And so I have commitments in all my meetings.

It's pretty simple, you know.

Follow someone who's come before you, who's done this deal before you.

Because, you know, for me, when I was out there drinking and using,

I didn't want to hear what you had to say because you're always telling me I'm doing it wrong.

At least that was my perception was I'm doing, I'm doing life wrong.

And now, you know, if I do what's laid out in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous,

I might have some tough days, you know.

I might think that my boss is telling me something that I don't want to hear or someone

in a meeting is doing something that I don't think is right.

But the bottom line is I'm sober, you know.

I try to, I try to act better than I feel.

It doesn't work all the time.

I'm not perfect.

I make mistakes.

I yell at my wife sometimes and that's a big problem.

But I always go back and apologize.

You know what?

At the end of the day, you know, the 10 step.

I don't want to wait to the end of the day to do my 10 step because I know when I'm wrong.

I don't have to wait until reflect back on my day.

I don't flip people off on their freeway anymore because I don't want to have to,

I don't want to have to act that way anymore.

You know, it's, but it took me a while to get there.

I did that all the time when I was new.

But now it's like, if you want to come in front of me, go ahead.

I don't want to, I don't want to have, I don't want to have to hang that, that resentment in me anymore.

Because I know that when I was new, I hung on to things and I hung on to them to the point where it made me miserable.

And I don't want to feel like that anymore.

I was like, so my, my mom, my mom passed away around three years ago and I was lucky enough to make amends to my mom.

And I was able to, my mom had cervical cancer and breast cancer and she passed away three years ago.

And I was able to go over there every weekend and hang out with her and show her the son that she wanted.

And that meant a lot to me.

I mean, like I said, she, she just wanted me to be happy and I was able to give that to her at the end.

And, uh, I was there when she passed away.

And then, uh, just this year, my brother, my older brother passed away from cancer too.

And I was there for him.

I went to go see him every weekend.

Uh, and, uh, I was there for my family.

If I was out there drinking, using, I wouldn't be around.

Alcoholics Anonymous.

They just gave me that, gave me the respect back of my family.

They gave me the, uh, the ability to show up for people, to be an, uh, an employee, to be a good friend, to be a good husband, to be a good brother, to be a good son.

There's, there's nothing better than walking into a family party and people greeting you just like in Alcoholics Anonymous.

And, uh, you know what, if it wasn't for rooms like this and people like you, I could have missed it all.

Thank you.

Thank you.