Sometimes it seems like forever ago that I had my last drink but I can wake up from a using dream and it still seems so real, like I'm still drinking. Drinking dreams remind me how alcohol always plays a role in my life even though I haven't drank in 23 years. It is a demon that I live with. I've managed to stay away from that first drink because truly, one is too many and a thousand are never enough.

On June 5, 1993 I ran out of wine at about 10 o'clock in the morning. I had no business driving but I struck out for one of the many different liquor stores I frequented. It was just a few blocks from my home but I was so drunk I got lost. I finally found my way home about 4 pm. That's when I decided I needed help. I was unemployable, I had lost my friends, my spouse was fed up and I hated that I was a slave to alcohol. I couldn't get my day going without some alcohol and once I started I couldn't stop until I passed out. I was tired of looking bad, feeling bad and all the falls and bruises. I really was sick and tired of being sick and tired.

To make a long story shorter, I reached out for help and really meant it this time. I wanted to live the life I was capable of instead of the miserable piss poor existence of being drunk all the time. I hated what I had become. I borrowed money from my mother for a 7 day in-patient detox and an eight week out-patient rehab. I went to AA meetings every day. I read the literature, I worked the steps, I found a psychiatrist, I got better, I got sober, I've stayed sober. I'm keenly aware that I'm lucky as hell.

I've never had an easy life, lots of bad things happened to me to help me crawl inside a bottle of alcohol and stay there for years. It wasn't a bed of roses to climb out of the bottle and sobriety doesn't just appear on a silver platter. It takes work, hard work to not drink. I've done everything that was suggested to me and then some to stay away from my demon. None of it came easy, I had to make it work for me. I reasoned what would work for me and skipped what didn't. I made up my mind and I just do it.

I'm not trying to toot my own horn here. I'm just sharing from my heart a little about me and how it was and some about how I've done it so far. Day by day, it works for me and if I can refrain from drinking, I know others can too.