Peter M. – AA Speaker – “Freedom, Healing, and Happiness” NEW 2017
One of the best AA speakers of all time is back with an amazing share from earlier this year! Peter’s way of speaking and delivering the message is truly a gift from a Higher Power. He connects with his audience on a deep and personal level and it is a joy to witness. This is perhaps one of his most candid and open talks he has ever given. He goes in to some newly gained insight and recounts his journey to recovery. This is an INSPIRING talk and a MUST LISTEN!
Finding purpose in a relapse
When I was drinking, I had abscesses on my hands, holes in my arms, and I weighed about 130 pounds. That is about 60 pounds less than I weigh now. I was dying. I remember my dad found me in the grip of the grapes one particular day and he threw me in the backseat of his car. He was sitting there with his wife and he was just screaming at me. I didn’t hear any of it. His wife turned around, looked at me she said, “It hurts my heart to see you die in front of me.” Those words pierced through everything. I said, “I’m dying. I’m dying.” This was a self-imposed crisis and by the time I got some type of treatment, I had a powerful desire to stop drinking.
So I knew treatment, I knew how to do treatment. I knew I was an alcoholic and I knew I couldn’t stop drinking on my own. I don’t know how much I wanted to say stopped, but here I was in a terrible dilemma and I decided to go in to my fifth treatment center. I was there for nine weeks. Now back in the day, it was a 28 day stay and then you are out. To extend my stay there, the staff had a write up basically bogus psych issues so the insurance company would pay to keep me there. They said, “If you leave after 28 days, you’re going to die.” So they put me in this thing called the flight deck and I was up there for nine weeks. I started to feel better and look healthier. I wasn’t even thinking about drinking, and I was thinking, “I’m good to go!” That was one bad dream. I was discharged on a Saturday morning and as soon as I hit the fresh air, my alcoholism was there as if it had never left.
I was thinking about drinking again, I had anxiety again. My stomach was upside down again. I had chatter of a thousand voices. I couldn’t pay attention. I lost my appetite. I was vibrating on the inside and I experienced white knuckle sobriety for two days. I couldn’t take it. On Monday I was in front of a liquor store waiting for the liquor store owner to get there. He rolled up the fence. I put my money under the glass partition. “Give me a pint of Mr Boston.” I cracked the seal I ran outside. I got to lick it down as fast as possible to capture that elusive feeling so I could breathe. I can’t tell you how many times on my way to treatment on my way to detox I would be crying. I never going to do this again. I can’t do it again, and soon as I was discharged, I would drink again. This went on until I had a spiritual experience by working the 12 steps.
Another book says whether I make my bed in heaven, or in hell, God is there. Just because I’m in Alcoholics Anonymous now does not mean I have more God than a drunk under a bridge drinking themselves to death. The differences between then and now, is that when I came into AA, I got a program, and I got a sense of connectedness to my God, rather than the separateness from my God that I experienced in my alcoholism. God has removed many things from me which I interpreted as bad because they were painful. They were just standing in a way of me doing work for him. He prunes the tree so the tree bears fruit and people can eat. God got me sober to do one thing; be his servant and help other drunks achieve sobriety. When I lose that, I lose you.
