one of me greatest influences in life is a man who got sober at 45. he was so bad physically he spent a month in the hospital. then quite a bit of time on the mental stuff.
anyways, he would say," you can do anything you want as long as you dont drink."
some of the things he did after getting sober at 45:
started a successful business
built and flew an airplane
flew in an f16
traveled to every continent.
built a wicked cool ford t bucket( crazy old codger put a 500hp engine in it, which he built himself)
built a sawmill,which turned into another successful business.
and one thing he says was more important than ANYTHING:
became a responsible, productive member of society and got his family back.