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 Whoops. Hi everyone. My name is Georgia. I'm an alcoholic. I'm grateful to be here and

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 to be sober and to be sitting down to talk. Usually you have to be at a podium, which

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 makes it feel like we're looking down at people. Thank you for inviting me, Karen. That's really

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 good to be back. I've been to this meeting a few times and see some friendly faces and

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 thank you, Monique, for your talk. Really great. I've been sober since February 1st,

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 1993. I just turned 30 years sober, which is crazy. I got sober when I was 24. I was

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 absolutely certain my life was over. It was just the opposite. My life was just beginning.

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 I was raised by a single mom. My dad died of cancer when I was six. It's funny, not

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 funny. My dad died. He was 54 years old. When I was in my teens and in my 20s, people would

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 say, "Oh, I'm so sorry that your dad died." I'm like, "He lived a really long life." I

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 just turned 54 this year and I'm like, "What?" Anyway, my mom didn't know how to drive when

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 my dad died. She had to work three jobs to keep the roof over our head. I've never been

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 grounded. I've never had any rules. She was not prepared to raise me by herself financially,

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 emotionally, in any way. She was mostly depressed and angry and worked three jobs, came home,

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 sat in front of the TV, didn't want to be bothered with me. I got a lot of, "Not now.

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 Leave me alone." I was a lonely kid. I had really big emotions. I feel like I was born

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 singing the blues. My emotions were so out of proportion to, it seemed, the people around

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 me. While the kids my age were wanting to play with Barbies and play games and stuff,

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 I was dealing with heavy stuff. I wanted to hang out with the adults. I related more to

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 older people. I started hanging out with the older kids in the neighborhood. They were

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 smoking and they were drinking. I was smoking and I was drinking. I'm so jealous of those

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 people who remember their first drink. "I took a drink. It went boom. I went off." That's

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 not my story. I started sipping out of the adults' drinks and then eventually just was

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 drinking more and more. I just kind of tapered on. Because I was so depressed and felt so

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 out of place and didn't know what to do with myself and because I didn't have any rules,

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 I think my alcoholism was able to bloom a lot earlier. Not having rules made it a lot

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 easier. A lot of my friends had curfews and had to be home at a certain time. While my

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 mom was just like, "If you're going to smoke, if you're going to drink, I'd rather you do

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 it here." I just turned my room into a party room and started filling it with teenage kids.

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 I was stealing my mom's car and cruising it around the neighborhood with your kids. I

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 was the kid in the neighborhood you don't want your kid hanging out with. I was arrested

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 for drinking in public by the time I was 11. By the time I was 12, I had my first suicide

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 attempt. At 13, I ended up pregnant and I terminated that pregnancy at the urging of

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 my mom and my boyfriend. Then I drank over that. I had so much guilt and remorse about

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 that. It wasn't until I got sober and I heard that we won't regret the past nor wish to

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 shut the door on it that I got any peace from that. It seems that God gives us just what

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 we need just when we need it and not a second before. For me, even with 30 years of sobriety,

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 things stay in a place of regret until I can either use that experience to help someone

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 else or use that experience to change something I'm going through. Back then, I was just collecting

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 regret. I had another suicide attempt at 13. I dropped out of school every year, either

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 went to summer school or continuation to make it to the next grade because this is where

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 your character defects work for you, is that there was no way I wasn't going to graduate

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 with my class. There was just no way that was going to happen. I got all the credits

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 you get in three years. I got one year so I could graduate with my class. My best friend

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 Diana graduated a semester early, moved to San Diego, was living a big life, and I just

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 continued to stay in and around our hometown circling the drain. My drinking, what makes

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 me an alcoholic, is not the things that happen to me. It's when I drink, no matter how much

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 I promise you, no matter how much I promise me even, every time I drink, I'm going to

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 get drunk. I remember going to meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous over the years for my

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 friends who really needed it because I'm a good friend. I would pop in from time to time

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 and I would hear people say things like, "It's the first drink that gets you drunk." I'd

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 be like, "What a bunch of lightweights." I didn't understand that until much later that

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 the only choice I have is that first drink. Once I take that first drink, I no longer

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 have a choice. I didn't know that for a long time. What happened was I went through all

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 sorts of different phases with drugs. It would get out of control. I could stop because there

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 was always alcohol. I had one more suicide attempt in my 20s.

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 Then what happened was my roommate had a brother who had a little problem with crack cocaine.

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 Spoiler alert, there are no little problems with crack cocaine. He moved in with us and

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 he and I hooked up. I couldn't be with somebody who had a different buzz. That was always

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 going to be something I wasn't going to do but I couldn't break up with him and he was

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 acting weird. I just said, "Give me some." I started doing that with him and within six

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 months I lost everything. I got evicted from where I live, fired from my job, and he sold

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 my car for a piece of crack cocaine which went for about $20 at the time.

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 At that point in my life, I had had great jobs, lost them, great relationships, lost

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 them, lots of friends, lost them because my drinking always gets in the way of any kind

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 of success in my life. I am a great starter. I'm a multiple restarter. I start a lot of

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 things. I just don't finish anything. So what happened is when I hit bottom, my mom had

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 claimed bankruptcy and moved away when I was 17. She moved up north to live with my grandma.

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 My mom and grandma were my only family. Now they're out of town. I've now hit bottom and

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 there's no place for me to go. It was my best friend's parents, Diana's parents who took

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 me in. They were the kind of family that I used to watch on TV that would sit down to

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 eat dinner at a regular time. They go on family trips. They seem to love each other. I watched

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 a lot of TV and a lot of movies. That's how I learned to live. I just always aspired to

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 find someone to love me. That's all I ever wanted. If somebody loves me, I'll be okay.

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 You know, in all of the movies, that's what happens. Once you find love, everything else

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 falls into place. I didn't think I needed a plan and it wasn't until I had double digit

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 sobriety that I learned that a man is not a plan, but for a long time it was my only

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 plan. And so when I had no place to go, Diana's parents took me in and I lived in their basement

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 for the remainder of my drinking. And so I'm like, okay, I've got a problem with drugs.

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 I'm just not going to do those anymore. It's just easy. I just make it happen. But what

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 happened was when I drink, I changed my mind. And when I drink, I break promises to you,

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 to me. And so I'm drinking and now I'm doing things that I said I wasn't going to do right

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 before I picked up that drink. And so even now, my life is messy again. I'm living in

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 a way that that last year or so, my drinking was some of the darkest and depraved drinking

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 that I can remember. And I remembered going to those meetings of AA and I just, the God

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 thing didn't really work for me. Didn't really believe in God, wasn't raised with religion.

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 If there is a God, don't care for his work so far, not really want to sign up for that

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 thing. And that, you know, the first drink gets you drunk. And then I always found reasons

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 that wouldn't work for me first. I thought when I went with my friends, I thought I wasn't

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 as bad as you guys. Now that I had the crack experience, I'm like, now I'm too bad for

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 you guys. Always some reason I don't fit in. So I thought, I'll just white knuckle it.

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 I can quit. No problem. And I tried, but I just couldn't. And when I wasn't drinking,

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 I was the most miserable I'd ever been. And I thought if I'm going to be miserable, I'd

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 rather be drunk and miserable than sober and miserable. And that seemed to be my fate.

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 You know, my fate was to live a miserable, lonely life. And so I poured myself a drink

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 and I didn't feel guilty for the first time about that drink. And I was just about to

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 take a sip and the phone rang and it was a guy by the name of Jeff Monahan. He was a

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 sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous, and he had been a member of the Pacific group

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 and then moved to San Diego and was working with my normie best friend, whose parents

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 I was living with. And so she learned that he was sober and started confiding in him

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 about her loser friend living with her parents. And so he offered to call me and he called

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 and he said, "I understand you have a problem with alcohol. And for whatever reason, I told

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 this stranger, "Yes, I do." And he said, "I want to give you the number of a woman to

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 call an AA." And he gave me the number of Pat Y. And I called Pat and she said, "My husband

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 Vince and I are going to a meeting. Why don't you come with us?" And so I drove to this

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 stranger's house, got in this stranger's car and they took me to a room full of strangers.

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 And I've been sober ever since. And when I try to articulate what God's grace is, I go

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 to that moment because there were so many times I qualified for this program from the

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 time I was 11, 13 sliding through the quad at school on my face and all the things that

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 happened over the years, all the times I qualified. So anyway, everything lined up in that moment

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 and Pat and Vince took me to the big Wednesday night meeting, which was different than any

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 other meeting I've been to. It seemed like people were happy and sober at the same time.

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 I thought it was an or conversation. I thought you were happy or sober. I did not know that

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 you could be both. And I felt hope for the first time. And Pat said the magic words,

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 "I'll be your sponsor until you find one." And started me on a really simple course of

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 action. But I was 24 and a half. And I'm like, "I've already wasted too much time. I've got

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 to get on the fast track. I've got to get a great job, quit smoking. Got to get a good

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 exercise regime, go on a diet. I've got to go to school. And now that I'm well, I'm for

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 a relationship." And when Pat got done laughing, she suggested that I just work on getting

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 a first year foundation. And this is one of the great things about being a member of a

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 home group is that everybody's saying the same thing. Everybody's doing the same thing.

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 And in my home group, everybody in their first year, getting a first year foundation because

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 that's what you build the rest of your sobriety upon. And I was told, "Don't rush into your

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 life. Don't rush into doing all this stuff. Take a year, get your first year foundation."

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 And so all that time and energy I want to put into going into school, put that into getting

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 my steps done, get a little job to go to in between meetings, no major changes, don't

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 quit smoking, and for God's sake, no relationship. And I was like, "What?" I've been in relationships

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 often more than one at a time since I was 10. But I made a decision that I would try

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 everything that I was asked to do. So when it didn't work, I could justify how tragic

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 my life is. So I started calling Pat and she started me on a really simple course of action,

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 going to regular meetings on regular days, and then getting commitments at those meetings.

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 And I'd never had structure in my life. I always thought structure was the man trying

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 to keep you down, people over 30 who don't understand freedom. And the thing was is I've

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 never had any structure in my life. I've never gone to school on a regular basis, never gone

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 to work on a regular basis, never been faithful in a relationship. I'd never had structure

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 in my life. So by having just a little bit of structure, little job to go to in between

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 meetings, regular meetings on regular days, calling Pat every day, just that structure

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 was like I could breathe. And the more structure I had, the more creative I was, the more structure

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 I had, the more time seemed to bend. It was like, the more I did, the more I could do.

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 And it doesn't, it was like, this isn't working on paper, but somehow it's working. And so

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 I began to thrive on that and, and really started just being like super newcomer and

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 trying to get through my steps and all that. And I did, I made it to my first year and

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 I stayed out of a relationship for a year and about an hour and a half. I take direction

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 really literally. And so I consummated a relationship with my new fella when I was a year and about

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 an hour and a half. It was at 1 30 AM. And we got engaged two weeks later and we got

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 married six months later and I was married to him my first five years of sobriety. And

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 those were great years because we always put AA first. We always stay close to our sponsors.

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 And so when it didn't work out, we didn't have to fight over our home group or be ugly.

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 I mean, I learned all that in AA. And when we split up, I got involved with someone else

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 right away. Although at that point in my life, I had begun to kind of be a service junkie

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 because that emptiness that I always thought if somebody loved me, I'd be okay. You know,

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 love me, love me, love me. I was learning that the only way to fill that emptiness is

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 by being of service. It's my loving you that fills me up. It's when I'm lonely, I've got

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 to pick up the phone. It's the actions I take that fill me up. Getting is good and getting

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 feels good, but getting's never filled that. And so I was beginning to learn that. So I

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 was like of maximum service all the time, taking people to doctor's appointments and

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 taking meetings to sick people. And you know, like I was just like 24/7 work all day, meetings

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 every night, doing stuff for people, taking class. My life was just going so fast and

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 got involved with this guy. Then I had to have back surgery and I had had minor back

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 surgery early in sobriety, but I had to have a spinal fusion and there were complications

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 and I ended up being bedridden for a year. And so all this action that I'd been finding

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 my usefulness and my joy in, all of a sudden I'm like this and I have to have babysitters

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 every night. I can't take care of myself and I have people babysitting me that I honestly

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 wouldn't have had a cup of coffee with. I remember they told me they were sending over

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 this girl to watch me on Friday night and I'm like, you mean the girl who used to be

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 a nun? No. Like what do we have in common? And I remember just like thinking, no, no,

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 no, I don't want to, I don't want these people coming over. And you know, Keith Carpenter

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 used to talk about the seemingly good and the seemingly bad. And now I look back at

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 my life and I look at all these seemingly bad times and they're some of the best times

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 of my life. You know, the times I felt most connected with other people that I felt most

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 alive. And so I, I built these relationships with these people who are taking care of me

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 and, but the guy that I was seeing came to me many months into this process. I was so

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 sick and I had to go to the hospital three times a week and it was my home group that

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 took care of me. And anyway, he came to me and he said he considered a relationship and

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 a commitment with me when I was well and he dumped me. And by that time I had gotten Marilyn

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 Slater as my sponsor. She's been my sponsor for the last 28 years. And I called her, I'd

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 been calling her like, I have to have back surgery. There's complications. I can't work.

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 I can't drive. I've got to give up my job. You know, all that stuff. And now I call her,

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 I'm like, and now I got dumped. And at the time she was learning to play guitar. So oftentimes

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 she'd be playing in the background and she said, and she sang a, she played a country

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 chord progression and she sang my blues and it made me laugh. And that's been one of the

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 greatest gifts of my sobriety is finding humor and everything. And having a sponsor who finds

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 so much humor in my darkest moments has been a gift. But she does, she makes me laugh.

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 And and that's been a great gift, you know, and Marilyn's my fourth sponsor. And I found,

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 I found a formula that works to let me know if I'm with the right person and that is I

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 must be able to answer yes to two questions. One is, do I want what they have? And two,

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 do I trust their judgment? And if I can answer yes, then I know I'm with the right person.

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 Now the disclaimer to that is when you're new, you don't know all of that. So whoever,

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 like I've never had a bad sponsor. I've never had anybody who's given me bad direction. I've

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 had just what I need, just when I need it. But anyway, I I was so full of uselessness

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 and self pity at that time. And now I just got dumped and and you know, we can pray for

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 character defects to be removed. But what normally happens is an assignment appears

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 and in my case that appeared in the shape of a man, a man named Mike Finch, he was a

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 member of my home group. He was 34 years old, and he'd been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's

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 disease. And I watched him go from walking and talking to being paralyzed from the neck

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 down. But the thing that never changed about him was his love for Alcoholics Anonymous.

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 He loved AA and he sponsored a ton of guys and he used to pack them in his handicap van

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 and they'd go to conferences and ball games and meetings all over the place. And I used

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 to call him the make a wish boy, which is a little distasteful. But he had a really

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 good sexy hammer. And his wife had also left him when he was sick. And so he and I became

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 friends. And then we became more than friends. And I was able to take care of him the last

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 six months of his life, which was something I did not know I was capable of. But just

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 like I said, God gives us just what we need just when we need it. You know, if when I

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 got sober, if somebody had said, these are all the things you're going to go through

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 sober, I would have said, Okay, thank you very much. I'd like another drink, please,

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 you know. But I think it's like when you're looking at the steps and you're on step one,

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 and you're looking at nine, and you're going, there's no way I'm making an amends to that

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 jerk. But by the time you do one perhaps you for two and two for three, and so so by the

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 time you get to nine, you're ready. And likewise, that's been my experience is things that I

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 think I could not live through or stay sober through I do. Thanks to this beautiful net

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 that is given me with God sponsorship, the steps and all the tools I've been given here.

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 You know, I get to love a man I know who is going to die. And it's it doesn't break me.

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 You know, I used to try to mask all the bad feelings, you know, I don't feel sad, I don't

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 feel mad, you know, I don't want any of those feelings, but I want all the good ones. But

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 what I know now is that all of my feelings feelings are a gift. And that because of that

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 beautiful net again, you know, I get to experience everything and I need not be afraid because

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 I don't do anything alone. And so I got to get to love this man. And, and it by falling

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 in love with him, I found something redeemable in me, because I did not know I was capable

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 of loving someone that way. Like I said, I always measured love and what I was getting

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 and this was quite an unusual situation. And so with a few of the guys he sponsored and

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 his family, we took care of Mike those last six months. And I was able to be there holding

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 his hand when he died. And it doesn't always happen that way. But I think it happens the

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 way it's supposed to. And that's how that happened. About a month before Mike died,

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 my grandma died. And my grandma was the meanest human being I'd ever met in my life. I mean,

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 bar none. She was she looked mean. And every picture where she's standing by me, she looks

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 like this. Photo albums. I'm like, Oh, my gosh, that woman hated me. And she had no

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 problem telling me what a piece of crap I was. And she drank, I would call her an alcoholic.

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 She used to say, you know, your grandma's not an alcoholic. I'm just a drunk. And I

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 learned later that those two words are the same thing. But anyway, something happened

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 early in sobriety. I'm going to try and think I have time to tell it. So when I was about

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 two weeks sober, a family friend came forward and told me all these secrets that my mom

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 and grandma had kept for me. As I said, my mom and grandma were my only family. I love

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 them, hated them, was embarrassed of them, blame them for my life was really happy when

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 my mom claimed bankruptcy and moved with my grandma because now the cuckoo town was all

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 contained and I didn't have to really look at it too closely. And but I had always suspected

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 that there were secrets in our family. And I'd been through all of their personal belongings

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 and never been able to uncover what those secrets were and kind of gave up that idea

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 until I was about two weeks sober. And a family friend came forward and said, I'm so stuck.

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 And I was like, Oh, I knew it, which is my favorite thing to say. And so I wrote down

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 everything he told me because when you hurt me, I like to be super specific when I throw

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 it in your face, which was my plan. I was going to throw it in my mom's face. But instead

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 I took it to Pat, who was my sponsor at that time. And I said, look at what, and she said,

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 it's so good. You have that written down. You're going to need that later. And she told

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 me to work on being a good daughter and granddaughter for the time being, and that we'd worry about

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 that later. And I was like, what, like, did you not hear me? But I don't know how to be

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 a good daughter and granddaughter. And so we came up with a formula and that's that

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 I call once a week, I'd write once a week and I visit as often as I could. And if I

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 were doing these things, I would know at the end of the day that I'd been a good daughter

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 and granddaughter. And this exercise was not for them. It was for me. It was so maybe just

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 maybe I could stay sober because where they were concerned, I felt like I said, such fierce

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 love and loyalty and responsibility and guilt and hate and all those feelings all at once.

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 And so I started taking these actions that I did not believe in. I just did it cause

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 I want to, you know, I didn't want to get in trouble. So I sent the card once a week.

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 I made the call once a week, super awkward at first, but eventually it got easier. And

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 then over months of doing this, I started imagining how they must be savoring these

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 cards and maybe even keeping them in a beautiful decorative box or perhaps tied with a lovely

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 ribbon and maybe even rereading them from time to time. And I made my weekly call to

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 my mom and grandma and my mom said, well, we've been getting your cards, but grandma's

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 been having to wipe them out to reuse them. And we're wondering if you could start writing

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 them in pencil. And so I did, I wrote those cards in pencil for over a decade. And the

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 most important thing about that is I now had a sponsor who told me I never have to go through

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 anything alone and I could take all my problems to her. I was having an experience of my own

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 higher power as a result of going through the steps with a sponsor. I had more friends

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 than I dreamed a girl like me could ever have. And I was learning that I had more tools than

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 I ever knew existed. And it may not be fair, but he with the most tools has the most responsibility.

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 And so I wrote those damn cards in pencil for a long time. And the exercise here was

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 to be a good daughter and granddaughter, not if they reciprocate, not if they respond in

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 a way I find tasteful, not if I think they deserve it. My actions define who I am and

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 I get to be whoever I want to be. And my, who I am is defined by my actions, not my

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 intentions. And so I was bound and determined I'm going to be a good daughter and granddaughter.

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 And so a real phone call went like this to my, this is like, I don't know, I'm a couple

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 you're sober. My mom goes, well, I called, they never call me. Never. They did not believe

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 they should ever have to call me. I call and my mom goes, well, we wanted to wish you a

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 happy birthday, but you didn't call. And so I learned on my birthday, I could do what

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 I normally did, which was paste by the phone and say, I know they're not going to call.

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 I know they're not going to call. And then at the end of the day, my favorite thing,

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 I knew it, or I had new tools. Now I could call them. It's my birthday call and first

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 thing good morning. Just wanted to say, I love you. Today's my birthday. And I was just

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 thinking about you guys and then enjoy the rest of my day. Like these were crazy ideas.

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 And I think, you know, we talk about, once you're physically sober, we talk about emotional

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 sobriety. And I think for me, the definition of emotional sobriety is that I used to, my

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 happiness was solely reliant on your actions for the first half of my life. And for the

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 last, you know, in sobriety, my happiness is reliant on my actions. And, and so I just,

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 I just continue to take these actions. And I think just as our disease ripples out into

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 the lives of the people we love, so does our recovery. And my grandma, this horrible, mean

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 drunk woman suddenly started saying things like, well, you know, your grandma loves you.

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 And I'd be like, well, no, I didn't. That was my inside voice. But she changed. She

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 never stopped drinking, never went to a meeting, never read a big book, never did steps, but

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 she was profoundly changed by this program. And because you guys gave it to me and I took

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 it to them, I learned to take my mommy stuff to my sponsor and to my girlfriends. And I

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 learned to be of service and just bring love and goodness as much as I could, you know,

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 I was like three years sober. And I sent my weekly card. And my mom said, well, we got

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 your card, but it was in pen. And that day, I wasn't feeling as spiritual. And, but I

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 knew well enough to go, oh, look at the time I've got to run. And I hung up the phone and

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 I called Marilyn. And I said, that's it. I call, I write, I visit, I'm done. And Marilyn

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 said, and so I did. I sent those cards and I made those calls. No matter what the flash

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 forward, Mike, my grandma passed away about a month before Mike. And by the time my grandma

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 died, we were good. There was no bad feelings. And then Mike passed away a month later. And

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 I was living in San Diego because I'd moved down there to help take care of Mike. And

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 I moved back to LA, I was still having physical problems. And we're not supposed to say our

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 case is different. But if you have chronic pain, our case is different. And for what

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 I learned for me is, is it means I have to do twice as much to feel half as good. So

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 for a long time, I tried to do half as much because I was in pain and poor me, but then

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 I went insane. And in sobriety, I hit a suicidal depression. And so I learned that I am not

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 like my fellows out in the world, but I'm not like my fellows in AA. And that's where

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 the power comes in knowing that that even though I have friends who can do a meeting

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 or two sponsor, maybe not service commitments, maybe not, and they're happy, joyous and damn

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 free. And I think, you know, I'll do that too. And I don't end up happy, joyous and

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 free. I need to do a lot. And that's just what I know about myself. But anyway, I moved

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 back to LA, I was really struggling to get back into some kind of structure in my home

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 group and all of that my mom asked to see me and I drove up to where she lived. And

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 she told me all those secrets I'd written in that book when I was new, and I had not

313
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 found it necessary to throw them in her face all those years. And she the secrets that

314
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 I that were in that book were that my mom and dad were never married, even though my

315
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 mom said they were married and more wedding ring that my mom had embezzled the money that

316
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 my dad left me when he died that my dad was a womanizer and alcoholic, it was stuff like

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 that those were the and I did not tell her those and she sat down with me and she said

318
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 now that your grandma's gone, there's some things I think you should know your grandma

319
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 was a really private person. And but I want to tell you and I'm sure she was terrified

320
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 because she hadn't spoken these secrets and over 30 years and she said at when your grandma

321
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 was eight years old, her family couldn't take care of her and her sister. So they sent your

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 grandma to live with another family and in that house. She never went to another day

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 of school. She was physically abused, sexually abused, she cooked and cleaned and the way

324
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 she got out of that was she got pregnant by a man she didn't love when she was 18. And

325
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 she had my mom by the time my mom was born, she left that man and then my grandma began

326
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 her crazy life of drinking and all the stuff she started doing and started leaving my mom

327
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 to live with other families and in boarding schools and then forgetting her over the summers

328
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 and my mom was left with the nuns when all the other kids got picked up and she'd be

329
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 in clothes and shoes that didn't fit her and all alone and when she was given an option

330
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 to go live with my grandma in her teens, she jumped at it and it turned out that my grandma

331
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 had turned her a life of racketeering and prostitution and had been running a place

332
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 out in the Mojave Desert. She was the madam there and she turned my mom out to work that

333
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 business. So my mom was 15, never went to another day of school, was physically abused

334
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 and sexually abused. She had two babies as a teenager. I had no idea and she had to put

335
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 them both up for adoption and she had a picture of one that she had touched like a million

336
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 times and I mean I'm like I can't even imagine this is my mom's life. All I saw of my mom

337
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 was that she was depressed and angry, never had any friends, never dated again. I just

338
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 imagined she had this tiny little life but she had had this horrific life and she told

339
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 me about these babies that she put up for adoption and how painful it was. She tried

340
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 to keep the first one and she almost smashed him when she got punched by one of the pimps

341
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 and then one of the men tried to touch him inappropriately and so she sent that baby

342
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 to live with another family which is what had been done in our family for decades or

343
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 generations and the second baby she put directly up for adoption and in her telling me this

344
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 I realized that I always thought that she insisted that I terminate that pregnancy when

345
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 I was 13 because she wanted to punish me and she wanted to hurt me and it wasn't that it

346
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 was the complete opposite. Right or wrong our perception is our reality and her perception

347
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 of the world was a hard scary place and her experience was really painful and I can look

348
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 back in hindsight and I can see how everything she did was to ensure that I had a better

349
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 life than she had and that my grandma did and I absolutely have. She also told me that

350
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 my mom and dad were not married that she was my dad's mistress and there was a great deal

351
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 of shame in that and that his survivor benefit went to his wife and and to me and so she

352
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 used that money to help pay bills and so and it made sense why we weren't at my dad's funeral

353
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 because I always thought that that was weird like we're with him he died and then there

354
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 was nothing there was no end so all of a sudden all these things started making sense but

355
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 the biggest thing that I realized is that I'd spent my whole life being mad at my mom

356
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 for not giving me love and direction and these things that I I thought would have made me

357
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 a better person but she never had them to give. I had been mad at her for giving me

358
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 something she never possessed. I thought that she had it and withheld it from me because

359
00:27:14,520 --> 00:27:19,040
 she deemed me unworthy but it wasn't that at all in fact one time she said to me I envy

360
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 you I said you do and she said never figure out was somebody liked me or didn't like me

361
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 and I try and do that thing that I think that they liked but maybe that wasn't the thing

362
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 that they liked and she said and it just got really it got so hard I just stopped trying

363
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 and that's what she did and she just sat in front of a tv and that was the rest of her

364
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 life and um but the revealing of these secrets set us both free and that the last um couple

365
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 of years I had with her were the best and because she told me all these secrets and

366
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 I didn't I didn't do what I would have done had I heard it at two weeks over which is

367
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 tell her what I think about her because that's what I thought integrity was back then but

368
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 I got to say things like to her that um I'm so sorry that that happened to you and and

369
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 you know comfort her and I began to have a mad crush on her and I was so grateful that

370
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 I've been given that direction to send the cards and make the calls and be a good daughter

371
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 because my mom turned out to be like a superhero what she was able to do with me you know I

372
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 had the life of a princess compared to the life that she and my grandma had and so then

373
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 I was like super crushy on her and thought she was the coolest thing ever especially

374
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 because I you know I'm hearing all the stories in the rooms and I'm like oh you can't beat

375
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 this you know my mom's story was whoo but anyway she ended up getting cancer and um

376
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 lung cancer and then it went to her bones and her brain and I was able to take care

377
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 of her the last few months of her life and you know it wouldn't have happened had that

378
00:28:37,460 --> 00:28:42,060
 consistency not been built with the calls and the cards and just tending to my side

379
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 of the street what you do on your side of the street none of my business my job is only

380
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 to tend to my side of the street so I have to wrap up two minutes so um a lot has happened

381
00:28:51,500 --> 00:28:55,700
 over the years I've been married divorced married divorced um makes it sound like a

382
00:28:55,700 --> 00:29:00,760
 lot um too tough I smoke not smoke smoke not smoke smoke not smoke that goes on for hours

383
00:29:00,760 --> 00:29:06,260
 but um I don't I don't smoke now uh I've had health problems and good health and wonderful

384
00:29:06,260 --> 00:29:10,120
 times and hard times but the thing that remains consistent is I haven't picked up a drink

385
00:29:10,120 --> 00:29:14,620
 and I've stayed connected and next to getting sober the best thing that's happened to me

386
00:29:14,620 --> 00:29:19,140
 is um my work at the Midnight Mission I started volunteering there in Skid Row when I first

387
00:29:19,140 --> 00:29:23,520
 got sober and now I've been an employee there for the last 13 years and I get to take all

388
00:29:23,520 --> 00:29:28,420
 the love and hope I get in these rooms to Skid Row every day and so this pile of crap

389
00:29:28,420 --> 00:29:34,820
 that I came here with is now gold I get to use everything I have every day you know I

390
00:29:34,820 --> 00:29:41,860
 use it up and I feel like finally um I have a life with meaning and purpose and that's

391
00:29:41,860 --> 00:29:49,680
 thanks to AA thank you.