My Podium Story

What it was like, what happened, and what it is like now

As of today, January 8, 2024, I am 13 years sober. I’m supposed to add all these addendums to that statement, such as, “by the grace of God,” “thanks to the Fellowship of AA,” “one day at a time…” But for one day, today, I let myself be proud of my accomplishment. Tomorrow, I will recognize that it’s not necessarily MY accomplishment. :-) 

I don’t get my official 13-year coin¹ until the end of this month. Do you know about the coins? In AA, to mark our sober milestones, we receive coins, first at 90 days and then every year after that. The coins are hefty, bronze with Roman numerals, and are presented at your home group’s celebration meeting, which is the last meeting of each month. And there’s cake! 

By the end of the month, I’m SOOO over my sober anniversary. Anniversaries are weird for us alcoholics. Sure, we are happy to have made it this far. However, we reflect on what we were like X many years ago when we hit our bottom. It’s uncomfortable to remember what a mess we were and how we hurt our loved ones. Plus, we want attention but don’t want attention. I especially have that contradictory defect of “pay attention to me / leave me alone” that my poor husband Chris has to deal with on a daily basis. As a result of all these conflicting emotions, we recovering drunks are kind of a twitchy mess during our anniversary months. (Really makes you want to hang out with me this month, doesn’t it? Phone dings as plans are canceled. ;-)

For my sober anniversary today, I thought I’d share my story. Every AAer who has been around for a while has told their story in front of a group, perhaps at a podium in a church basement, while sipping coffee from a styrofoam cup. The purpose of sharing our story is to help another struggling alcoholic.  

“Our stories disclose in a general way what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now.” (Alcoholics Anonymous, p 58)

After 13 years of telling my story, it falls into a predictable pattern. Sometimes, I switch it up with a new tidbit or a current event, but for the most part, it’s the story below. I try to hit all the highlights: the first time I got drunk, when I admitted I had a problem, and how the 12 Steps helped me.  

When telling my story, I try to focus on an experience I’m uniquely qualified to share. Something that has happened to me that another alcoholic might be struggling with as well. For example, I always knew I was an alcoholic. It wasn’t a revelation; it was something I had known and hid for years. Also, I used my grief to justify my drinking. So I share those points in case someone in the room hears my experience, thinks, “Oh, me too,” and realizes they are not alone.  

My sponsor requests that her sponsees dress up when speaking from the podium. If you know me, then you know dressing up is not my jam. Like my mother, I’m a jeans and sneakers gal. But I follow this suggestion because I get it; it’s a sign of respect, and it’s one of the things that she “suggests” that is easy enough to follow. Also, before we speak, we are told to pray to our Higher Power. Ask him/her/it to speak through us.

I transcribed the story below from a recording I made on August 31, 2022. My insecurity needs you to know that this isn’t me “writing.” It’s me speaking. 

Without further ado, I present to you my experience, strength, and hope. (Deep breath: Please speak through me.)

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Hi. I'm Liz. I'm an alcoholic. My sober date is January 8, 2011. My sponsor is XXX, she has a sponsor, etc. I’ve sponsored women in the past but currently do not have any sponsees, and I’m available for sponsorship. My home group is Fort Monmouth Wednesday night in West Long Branch at 8:00 p.m.

So, the first time I got drunk was in eighth grade. I'm the youngest of four, and all my older siblings drank. I'm from a large extended family, and there was always alcohol present at family events. In fact, I remember being surprised when I went to another family's house for dinner, and there wasn't a cocktail hour. 

At age 13, I wanted to see what this drinking thing was all about. So I stole alcohol from my parents and from the people I babysit for, a gross mix of Vermouth and Scotch, and I mixed it in a ball jar. I hid the ball jar in a trunk in my room until our 8th-grade overnight trip to Washington, DC. I wrapped the ball jar in socks and put it in my overnight bag. (Back then, they didn’t search the bags. They do now!) The stealing and the hiding foreshadowed how I would end up drinking. I shared a room with three other girls. I passed around that ball jar, and we all took sips and got silly. But I was the only one who drank so much that I actually vomited and was hung over the next day for the tours of D.C.

But being hungover didn't stop me. I enjoyed the feeling of the buzz. And I chased that buzz. Partying was the thing to do in my suburban New Jersey town. As I headed into high school, I was all about the party. I surrounded myself with other people who drank the way I drank. Every weekend, we’d figure out whose parents were away and how we were going to get alcohol. 

As I was starting my drinking career, my older brother, William—he was four years older than me—was getting in trouble for his drinking. He had an accident and got in trouble with police. My parents sent him to a boarding school to get him away from “the wrong crowd” (meanwhile, HE was the wrong crowd). And when he dropped out of boarding school, my parents sent him to rehab and then another rehab. 

When he was in rehab, we were forced to go to family therapy sessions, and my sister and I had to go to an Alanon meeting. Because of this, I knew what it meant to be an alcoholic. I knew it was a disease. Around the house, we had those pamphlets asking: Do you drink before you go out? Do you blackout often? Even at ages 16 and 17, I checked “yes” to most of those questions. So I knew that even though I surrounded myself with other partyers, I drank differently from them. I knew that I was an alcoholic like my brother. 

But… I didn’t want to stop drinking. If I could stay under the radar, no one would call me out on my drinking, and no one would tell me I had to stop. I did my best to try to control it and to hide it. Even still, there were many moments when I woke up filled with guilt, shame, and remorse for what I could remember from the night before. The way I handled those negative feelings was to drink over them. Stuff it down and move on to the next party.

So I got through high school, and the summer after I graduated, my brother William, who had been sober for three years, relapsed and moved back home. He went out to a party, drove home drunk, and died in a car accident. I was 18. This was obviously a very tragic moment for my family, but never once did I see how alcohol or alcoholism played a part in my brother’s death. I always chalked it up to my brother being wild. I didn't stop drinking, and I didn't think twice about my own drinking. In fact, I drank more to wash away my grief.

Next, I go off to college, which is more of the same—a lot of partying. People often talk about how they go to college and start drinking more. I drank less when I first went to college because I didn't immediately find my people. But I ended up getting a boyfriend who was in a fraternity, and I was able to once again surround myself with other people who drank like me, fraternity brothers. There’d be shots of Jager and Goldschläger at every party.

College is more of the same. Lots of partying, moments of guilt, shame, and remorse. I’d call the day after a particularly crazy night “a baseball hat day.” I’d pull the bill of my baseball hat down over my face because I was too ashamed to look anybody in the eyes.

I make it through college okay. I had one terrifying moment when I crashed my dad's car in a blackout. I walked away from that incident and was able to sober up before I had to deal with the authorities. I told everyone I had fallen asleep at the wheel and had no consequences. I think now of my poor mother and what I put her through.  

After college, I am back home in NJ, trying to start my career and my life, when tragedy number two happens to my family. My older sister Julia dies by suicide. I am already drinking so much that I don’t even know if I process any of that grief. I’ve been through this before, and I know how to handle it. I drink more.

I moved to New York City, and I’m living with a roommate. At this point, it's not so cool anymore to drink as much as I had been drinking. It's starting to get scary to be black-out drunk, walking around the streets of Hell’s Kitchen a drunken mess; it's not safe. What I end up doing more and more at that time is drinking by myself. I discovered a new way to drink: I don't have to go to the bars or parties. I can do this by myself. I love it when my roommate is gone for the night. I get a six-pack of beer or Mike's Hard Lemonade and a pack of cigarettes. I take my drink and my cigs and my yellow Sony Walkman, and I go into the bathroom, stare at myself in the mirror, and cry and drink and smoke and cry some more. That's how I spent a Friday night as a young 20-year-old in the Greatest City in the World.

And it's hard to explain, but that's how I had to spend a Friday night. I had to do that in order to make it through the week. I had to have those nights by myself to drink the way I wanted to drink, until I totally passed out, in order to function as a regular human during the week at my job and socially with friends.

I met my husband at work, and we started dating. My Higher Power was watching out for me then, and I fell in love with someone who doesn’t like to drink. When we were dating, we’d go out to bars, and after one or two drinks, he’d be like, “Okay, let's go.” And I'd be like, What? I’m just getting started. He’s sipping his first Maker’s Mark, and I’ve downed two vodka gimlets and want to hit a third. But to tell him I want to have another drink would be to admit I had a drinking problem, and I still know I need to hide the way I drink from everyone, especially because of what happened with my brother and sister. I’m not like them. I’m fine. Everything is fine. Don’t look over here at my drinking.  

We get married, and it’s on our honeymoon when I realize that our different ways of drinking are going to be a problem. We get a gift basket from our co-workers with a huge bottle of champagne. I want to hang out in our suite and drink the champagne, and Chris wants to go on a 30-mile bike ride. It’s at that moment that I realize the pickle I’m in. How am I going to drink the way I want to drink while living with this guy?

So, from the beginning of our marriage, I start to push him away. I encourage him to go out with his friends. Do you want to go sailing for the night? Go. Sure. Do you want to go jam at the studio? Go. And he does. And I have my nights to myself. While he's out doing his thing, I'm at home drinking the way I want to drink. I still have those nights where I stare in the mirror with my Sony Walkman and cry and drink, and he still doesn't know about it. I hide the empties underneath the sink until it’s garbage day, and I can throw them in the bin without him noticing.

We have three children. I do believe my progression would have been faster if I didn't have children because I was able to stop drinking (for the most part) when I was pregnant. I might have had a beer or two here and there, but I was not drinking alcoholically. Between each pregnancy, when I would stop nursing, my alcoholism would start to progress, and I'd drink more and more. Then I’d get pregnant again, and I'd stop drinking for the moment. I was able to control it during that time.

But then I had my third child, my daughter Julia, and I can remember when I decided not to hold back anymore. My husband Chris was away visiting his family with the younger two, and I was with my oldest son Michael, who was five at the time. We had a challenging day. The way I dealt with it was that I stopped at a liquor store and picked up a bottle of vodka.

I knew at that point by making that decision to buy vodka instead of Mike's Hard Lemonade or beer, I was making the decision that this wasn't about just relaxing with a drink. I chose vodka so you wouldn’t smell it on me, and so I can drink a lot without feeling full. Also, I love the way vodka makes me feel.

For the years prior, my alcoholism was like a tiger in a cage. It paced and roared, but it was contained. But on that day, I chose to let it out. I let my alcoholism be free.

I drank during the day while I was home watching the kids. There were times when I drank and drove with them in the car. I would always start the day by saying I wasn't going to drink too much. Or I’m going to wait until the kids go to bed. But then I’d find myself drinking after the second cup of coffee in the morning. I’d wake up feeling like shit, by 10:00 a.m. I would start thinking, “You know what would make me feel better?”

I would have this routine when Chris was away. I would get $20 cash back at the grocery store. Then I would do something with the kids that would make me feel like a good mother, like take them to the Great Adventure Safari or the beach, and then on the way home, I’d swing by McDonald's for their dinner and then the liquor store for myself. I would use cash to buy the vodka so that Chris wouldn’t see the liquor purchase on the bank statements. 

I’m able to hide this routine from Chris because he travels a lot. Also, I'm a good liar, which I didn't realize until I came to AA and looked at my behavior. So Chris has no idea. And I'm doing nutty things, like having the one bottle on display while there are other bottles behind it that I'm drinking out of. Or, I'd get disgusted with myself and throw out the half-empty bottle of vodka in the outside garbage bin, only to retrieve it later that night, digging through the trash while in my pajamas.   

So anyway, my drinking gets worse. My life at this point is miserable. I don't know how to fix it. I know that the drinking is causing a problem, but I also know I cannot live without alcohol. I couldn't survive without drinking. Things between my husband and me are really bad. No surprise after years of pushing him away and lying. And then it all comes to a head in one terrific, horrible fight. 

While we were fighting, screaming at each other on our back deck, something happened. It was like there was a crack in the universe, and I revealed how much I was drinking. That I was drinking during the day while watching the kids. I certainly did NOT want those words to come out of my mouth. I knew the minute I revealed I had a drinking problem, I could no longer drink. That those words came out of my mouth was the work of a power greater than myself.

Chris had known something was not right with his wife and our marriage, but he didn’t know what or how to fix it. So, me finally admitting that I was drinking was a relief to him. Me, on the other hand, wanted to shove the words back into my mouth.

I was seeing a therapist at the time. By the way, I saw therapists on and off my entire life and never once shared with them how much I drank. What a waste of time and money. Anyway, my therapist recommended I see an alcoholic therapist who of course told me I had to go to an AA meeting. I went to the Thursday night Women’s Step Meeting and immediately met wonderful women who surrounded me.

The women told me I never had to feel that way again.

I went to one meeting a week and felt better during the meeting, but then I’d have to go home to my house, where things between Chris and me were really, really bad. I didn’t understand why. I had stopped drinking, and I was going to a meeting; why weren’t things getting better? The women kept telling me I had to go to more meetings, get a home group, and find a sponsor. I hung on for a while, going to one meeting a week, and I made it through Christmas and New Year's Eve without drinking by white-knuckling it. And then something happened after the Christmas break. My husband returned to work, and the kids went back to school; I sat at home alone and drank. After that, I realized I needed to embrace the program.

I started doing what the women suggested, and I went to more meetings, where I met my sponsor. She got me working the steps immediately. As I said, at that time, my life was a shit show. My marriage was falling apart, and I couldn’t fix it. I was so grateful to try something like the 12 steps just to have something to do. I had the gift of desperation.

I remember reading the 9th Step Promises lying in bed one night with Chris. I don't think he was talking to me at the time, but I was trying to patch things up, and I was like, “Listen to all these promises. This book says all this will come true if we work the steps. Can you believe it?” He continued to ignore me. At that time, I thought there was no way this program would do all these things for me. I can now tell you that all those promises came true.

I went through the 12 steps with XXX. Some steps were easier than others. Like I said, I always knew I was an alcoholic, so I didn't have trouble admitting that. However, it was difficult for me to acknowledge my life was unmanageable, which is ridiculous in hindsight. But even as I was drinking vodka during the day, I maintained a job, I was raising the kids, I had a house and a car, and I hadn't gotten a DWI, although I should have. I didn’t realize how unmanageable my life was—lying to my husband, drinking while taking care of the kids—until I wrote it all out in black and white. 

Regarding the Third Step. I grew up Catholic. I majored in religious studies in college, so I've always been seeking some spirituality. However, I struggled with the “Everything is God’s will” concept. In the beginning, I refused to believe it was God’s will to have my sister Julia die by suicide. Fortunately, my sponsor didn’t force that issue. If she had, I may have left AA. But she let me ride through Step Three until I was able to come to terms with that on my own. Eventually, I was able to see Julia was suffering, and perhaps her death was God’s will to end her pain. And that's how I came to accept a God of my understanding. It's not the Catholic God I grew up with. It's more of a General Spirit. I use nature a lot as my Higher Power. I enjoy being out in the woods or at the ocean.

Steps Four and Five were amazing. At first, you think, how will writing down my resentments help? I’m just getting pissed off at the world all over again. But going through it with my sponsor and seeing my part in my resentments was so eye-opening. 

Steps Six and Seven—Some people struggle with these steps, but I embraced them. When I blamed other people for my problems, there was nothing I could do to change my situation. But seeing and acknowledging my defects and working to remove them, well, it’s empowering.  

Steps Eight and Nine were very healing. I was able to make amends to Chris. It was a very healing moment for both of us. Although it didn’t feel fast then, in hindsight, we quickly repaired our marriage. It was December 2010 when our marriage fell apart, and by October 2011, we renewed our vows on our 10th wedding anniversary. On a beautiful ceremony at sunset on the beach with our kids in attendance, we recommitted to our marriage. Now, we have been married for 20 years, and our marriage is so much stronger from the hell we went through. We know what we almost lost which is a gift.

So, one last thing I should end with. The way I used to grieve was to drink over it. That’s how I dealt with the loss of my brother and my sister. So, when my mother died five years ago, I was able to experience her death sober. It was sad but also so beautiful.

The reason grief hurts so badly is because we love them so much. The pain can be understood not as a thing to avoid but as a beautiful tribute. Grief is love, and even though loss is painful, I was so grateful to be able to feel that love, experience that love, and be present for it.

That's all I have for now. Thank you for listening. 

If you are struggling with alcohol or addiction, AA can help. Visit AA.org to find a meeting near you.

1. I used to care a lot about the coins. I collected them, coveted them, kept them in my dresser’s top drawer next to my wedding ring that doesn’t fit. But over the years, the coins have lost some of their gravitas. You hear Oldtimers in the rooms say something like, the more sobriety they have, the less they know. This is a little mind-bending, but I interpret it to mean as you continue to be sober, the less absolute things become. Your mind opens. I’m finding this to be true. This makes the coins lose some of their importance. They only mark the passing of time, which doesn’t necessarily need to be celebrated.