now I'll see if I can do justice to this question....
I can't speak for anyone else but yeah - that was the moment I fully accepted what I was doing was going to kill me - in fact I thought it had.
Until then I was playing
Isn't that kind of amazing? How we can "play" at something others take for granted? How immature! It's really difficult, though, to get your mind around being "different" and accept being childish. Like an illness....a child who wants to go out and play regardless. Something that has to be accepted and acknowledged. But it ends up not mattering, right? It is. You can "play" all you want, but *it* exists in your life.
That night I accepted that I was an alcoholic...and whatever else I did, alcohol was not an option for me - not if I wanted to live.
I was lucky that I got a second chance.
The fear was mindnumbingly real and it stayed for a long time, but it passes - you need something else to keep the commitment long term, I think.
You mentioned spiritual awakening.
Yes, that. It's what everyone is looking for in the long run.
I'm not an AAer and I came into this a humanist, but even before I knew what to call it I found the longer I stayed sober my perception of the world, and myself, was changing.
I think a lot of that was me helping other folks here in an attempt to get out of my own head a little.
I really appreciated, for the first time in years how connected I was to everyone and everything.
Without going into hyperbole I realised how fragile life was how short it can be, and how bloody marvellous it really is, even with all the bad stuff we all know about.
I realised how immature I'd been - I'd had the world's longest adolescence - I was still 18 in my head. I'd let a lot of years go by.
I grew up in a short space of time.
I worked hard at being a sober man, and a better one, but a heck of a lot of things came together for me too - I was lucky to find this place, and I was lucky to find a supportive partner who's still with me, for example.
With things like that, and the fact I survived - and with not too many ongoing health problems - I began in believe in something bigger than me. I had no choice really 
Growing up. Getting out of our heads. Reflection. Survival. Living. This does speak to all conditions. I have to hear it from someone who has made it through. That's the way it is.
I dunno if any of that made any sense LOL but I think experience is always the best share.
Thats the Dee version of what the heck happened anyway
Thank you, Dee. We all need little help from our friends.