MAY 27, 20 .. A.A. GRAPEVINE STORY .. RELAPSE AT 30-YEARS SOBRIETY

In this Month's May 2020 A.A. Grapevine, is a story about a woman who, two months before having 30-years sobriety, drank.

What happened?

She stopped going to meetings. Does THAT sound familiar?

She makes the usual good points.

We all know that we set ourselves up to take that first drink long before we actually physically take it.

She had moved and didn't like how meetings were run in her new location.

She didn't get a new sponsor in her new location.

She was busy. 

Her husband (who she met and married in A.A. and who has 38-years) told her .. "Don't worry. If you go back out and drink again, you will magically find lots of time for meetings!"

She lost sight of God and had no support system in A.A. Then things got bad in her personal life. A long time sponsor (back home in her previous location) died. Her mother and three uncles died. Her dog died.

"I wanted to hurt myself and I knew the simplest way to do that was to drink. And that's what I did."

To quote her .. "Let me be very clear. I did not drink because I thought that maybe I wasn't an alcoholic any longer after all those years sober. No, I knew that once alcohol hit my lips it was going to go badly."

The below IS important.

"I truly believed, when I took that first drink after so long, that when I was done drinking this time, I'd be able to simply turn my 'AA head' back on. I would go to meetings again and get sober. In fact, I told myself, maybe I wouldn't even tell anyone I'd gone back out. I would drink secretly for awhile to numb the pain and then get sober again."

Alcoholism, as the Big Book says, gets worse over time, not better.

"The craving hit me like never before. I tried to turn my AA head back on and stop drinking but I couldn't."

"There is nothing more insane than driving around drinking and reciting Chapter Five from memory, while throwing empty bottles of Vodka out the window."

"I was cited for extreme DUI. That ended up costing me nearly $20,000 to pay for lawyers, experts, fines, classes, traffic school and an Interlock device on my car. To go from nearly 30-years sober to sitting in a courtroom eight hours a day for almost three days with six jurors deciding my fate was mind blowing."

THEN?

"I drank for another six months before I was finally able to get sober."

Her conclusion :

"It's so much easier to stay than it is to try and come back."

In my humble opinion, this is one great story. So many Grapevine stories (most in fact) are about wonderful solutions to impossible problems.