Reeks55

I can't believe it I was at a meeting and a shaky old man confessed he relapsed after 39 years. He said "it's only a dat at a time" but I wanna know his thought process leading up to it

Dave42001

ask him! Maybe it was too many meetings!

WMJ1012

Sounds like he's really working his program today.
Couldn't have been easy coming back saying that.
I'll add him to my prayer list tonight.

Fly N Buy

My father drank for awhile after my mother passed. He had 16 years of sobriety as I recall at the time. His HP was my mom upon reflection. He was several years older than my mother and simply never thought she would pass before he did.

There is much to be gleaned from listening to those who relapse, certainly. I have heard others with 2-5-10-15 and recently 27 years of sobriety relapse.
None of them stated an abundance of meetings was the issue.........the common identifier was quit working the program and stopped completely going to meetings. Most agreed they simply had lost their way on the spiritual path.

SoberCAH

This is scary stuff.

My disease never sleeps.

CAPTAINZING2000

I know of a guy here in my area had the same thing happen. His wife died and he wasn't able to take the grief. He had 30 some years sober. Last I heard he's not been able to stay sober.

stevieg46

Length of'' sobriety'' means a lot but length of abstinence means nothing I was 20 yrs abstinent'' dry drunk '' untreated alcoholism and got drunk , if you do not change the man you came to AA as , that man will take you back out , I did not fall from the program of AA , I did what ever suited me me me. Today thankfully I have ''sobriety '' which roughly means ''wellness of mind and body'' thanks to the 12 Step program I have ''recovered from a hopeless state of mind and body ''.

It is sad to hear anyone lifting a drink after a long period but getting drunk does not happen in an instant , lots of things can trigger it , ill health , bereavement , loneliness , not keeping oneself in a fit spiritual condition , at the end of the day ''there but for the grace of god go I ''.

Stevie recovered 12 03 2006 .
if a man hears a different drummer ? let him march to the drum he hears !

CelticZebra

I have a relative who was 25+ years free of the poison. Suffered overwhelming stress, drank inconsistently over a period of a few weeks/months and has been clean from the toxic drink for the past 7 years and has suffered periods of stress/grief since which didn't lead to 'picking up' I've been clean of amphetamines for 18+ years I've been clean of toxic poison (alcohol) for 2+ years I do forever, not a day at a time. I never drink alcohol now, I never take amphetamines now. I will never drink alcohol again. My mind and body are under my control, not accountable to anyone, except myself. I choose freedom! Driving my wagon of hope through beautiful views on my road to myself

AA didn't suit me and I found the AVRT website the first day I stopped.
I've been sober of mind a little less time but everyday adds time to my health and wellbeing.
I am responsible for my actions.

tomsteve

It is easy to let up on the spiritual program of action and rest on our laurels. We are headed for trouble if we do, for alcohol is a subtle foe. We are not cured of alcoholism. What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition. Every day is a day when we must carry the vision of God's will into all of our activities. "How can I best serve Thee - Thy will (not mine) be done." These are thoughts which must go with us constantly. We can exercise our will power along this line all we wish. It is the proper use of the will.


i have yet to hear someone who continued practicing the principles daily and in all their affars
say they drank again.

but ive heard many who took back their will and their life get drunk- even after years without a drink.

Ken33xx

I listen closely when someone with long-term sobriety goes out. And the one constant I have heard over the years is they drifted away from AA. They stopped going to meetings.

Now, does that mean if you don`t go to meetings you`ll pickup? No. As long as you continue to take measure which remind yourself you`re an alcoholic you should be fine.

Over the years I can only recall one share where a woman with almost 20 years went out literally overnight. Her relationship abruptly ended and she got drunk that weekend but this was usual. It`s not like in the BB where someone suddenly decides it`s a good idea to pour whiskey into their milk. The change in thinking usually occurs over a period of time. They "forget" and it often starts as they begin drifting away from meetings. Again I`m not suggesting meetings are mandatory to maintain soberity esp. today with so many on-line recourses. However, you do need to take measures to ensure you never forget picking up a drink isn`t an option.

Eddiebuckle

Personally, I believe the reason we introduce ourselves at the beginning of each meeting is not for the other people, it's for ourselves. I need to remember... my name is Eddie and I am an Alcoholic. The months and years since my last drink do not change that fact. A drink today will do exactly what it would have if I picked it up the day I came out of rehab.

Tommyh

Ken
The change in thinking usually occurs over a period of time.


I believe you are right.Thats one reason I keep coming back to meetings and keep my big book on my desk,and continue to come to SR

Music

I heard a woman speak at a retreat, who was friends with Lois, Bill's wife. Lois told her that on Bill's death bed, when asked if he had any last wishes, Bill asked for a bottle.

This disease is evil and as evil does, it waits until I'm at my weakest point and then attacks my pride or my self-esteem. There's a good reason why the Big Book tells us that alcohol is "cunning, baffling and powerful."

LiveInPeace

I'm reminded by what a sponsor told me: We have to stay in fit spiritual condition by practicing steps 10, 11 and 12 on a daily basis. Those who choose instead to rest on their laurels will slowly become restless, irritable and discontented and will relapse.

Mountainmanbob

Usually these ones will say that it was because of a lack of meetings.

Mountainman

NYCDoglvr

I'm in my 25th year of a recovery. I know I have another drink in me but I doubt I have another recovery since denial and rationalization are still part of my make-up. At a meeting a woman with 30 years had a one-day slip. She was at a dinner and simply picked up a drink without thinking.

WMJ1012

I once heard a speaker say she drank after doing the steps and having an awakening...she said it started with one lie.

Gottalife

I have heard this story a few times but I really don't believe it. I have sat with a number of dying alcoholics, even two who had completely rejected AA, and not a single one ever mentioned anything about wanting a drink. In my belief, they had other things on their minds, mainly worried about their families, the people they were leaving behind, and making their peace with the God of their understanding.

If Bill actually made a request like this I would suggest he was not in full control of his mental faculties.

Ken33xx

Or maybe he was just a man who realized is life was ending and wanted a drink more than anything else?

The Susan Cheever book is a very good bio if anyone is interested in learning more about BW.

During her research for a biography of Alcoholics Anonymous co-founder Bill Wilson, author Susan Cheever dug through the just-opened archives at Stepping Stones, Wilson's longtime home outside New York City. Alongside an archivist, she sifted reams of material that had not been looked at in decades.

One day, the archivist handed her a sheaf of wide, green-lined pages -- hourly logs kept by the nurses who tended Wilson on his deathbed.

Cheever glanced at them. They seemed mundane.

"Keep reading," the archivist urged her.

Cheever came to the pages covering Christmas 1970. On the eve of the holiday, Bill Wilson passed a fitful night. A lifelong smoker, he had been fighting emphysema for years, and now he was losing the battle. Nurse James Dannenberg was on duty in the last hour before dawn. At 6:10 a.m. on Christmas morning, according to Dannenberg's notes, the man who sobered up millions "asked for three shots of whiskey."

He was quite upset when he didn't get them, Cheever writes.

Wilson asked for booze again about a week later, on Jan. 2, 1971.

And on Jan. 8.

And on Jan. 14.

"My blood ran cold," Cheever said recently of the discovery. "I was shocked and horrified." With time to ponder, though, she found herself thinking, "Of course he wanted a drink. He was the one who talked about sobriety being 'a daily remission.' I realized that this was a story about the power of alcohol: that even Bill Wilson, the man who invented sobriety, who had 30-plus years sober, still wanted a drink."

Cheever's discovery, reported in her book "My Name Is Bill," doesn't really change what little we know about alcoholism, a cruel, confounding and mysterious disease. It doesn't really change what we know about Wilson, a rough-hewn and unorthodox American saint sketched by Cheever in all his chain-smoking, womanizing, Ouija-board-reading, acid-tripping holiness...

It's not easy making a spiritual figure compelling and real without slipping into iconoclasm. Cheever's approach is to apply a writerly version of Wilson's humility. She gets the goods on his serial adultery, for instance, but declines to make too much of it. "He was engaged to Lois when he was 18 -- hello!" Cheever says. "They were married 53 years. All we really know is that they were friends through an amazing life. He was a good-enough husband."

Likewise, she can look into Wilson's LSD experiment with proto-hippie Aldous Huxley without getting mired in a puritanical inquisition into whether this constituted a "slip" in his sobriety or hypocrisy in his creed..

Of Alcoholics Anonymous founder Bill Wilson, Cheever says, "He changed the world without knowing it, just as a way to stop drinking himself." In her biography of Wilson, Cheever tries to humanize the man whose philosophy aided her alcoholic father, and countless others. Bill Wilson in 1970, shortly before his death of emphysema. For 36 years, he resisted the unending urge for a drink.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/archi...-a9d9fd1674f4/

Gottalife

Why three shots of whisky? Not only is it a strange request, but gin was his drink. Why not a bottle of gin? Seems more likely. Then the LSD. There were medical studies and experiments going on with large numbers of alcoholics at the time. LSD was thought to improve the chances of recovery from alcoholism. One study of 563 individuals was recently peer reviewed, and it was found that LSD did have a positive effect. It would have surprised me if Bill had stayed away from any research that showed promise in helping alcoholics.

And once again, dying alcoholics, in my experience, have not shown the slightest interest in drinking. Even my sponsor who was totally conscious to the end because he refuse morphine, was more concerned about thanking the staff that looked after him. The thought of a drink never entered his head.

We may have to disagree on this one, but the story you quote, the circumstances surrounding his last days, it just doesn't ring true unless Bill was out of it on medication, but even that just knocks you out.