How I Got to AA
I’m a periodic binge drinker. I can go months without drinking, but when I do drink, I always get drunk.
In many ways, life had been pretty good in 2008–things were good with my day job, my music, my business, and my health. Life was too good I guess because I began to wreck just about everything in my life by January 1, 2009. It all started with a big party in Nashville and a six-hour alcoholic blackout. (I didn’t even know what an alcoholic blackout was until I got into AA.)
The drinking continued every night in my hotel room and at parties when I got back to Texas. One night out of the blue (or it seemed that way to me), I found myself at the liquor store after leaving a party early. I did not drink at the party because I was on my best behavior after recently being asked by a counselor if I had a drinking problem. On this special night, I told myself that I was stopping at the liquor store to prove her wrong and prove that I didn’t have a drinking problem. The plan was to get home, have one glass of wine, read a book, and go to bed. So, there I was alone drinking that one glass of wine to prove that I didn’t have a drinking problem. But that one glass turned into I don’t know how many glasses. I felt sick. I wanted to stop but I couldn’t. Something was different that night. Getting drunk wasn’t fun. The high didn’t take me anywhere.
It turns out that the counselor who asked me if I thought I had a drinking problem was a recovering alcoholic herself, and she had sniffed my bullshit out when I walked through the door. She had asked me to read Chapter 3 in The Big Book and attend one AA meeting. Then, let her know if I still thought that I didn’t have a drinking problem. I dragged my feet about a month, but I finally went to prove her wrong, just like I had done with the wine.
Life hasn’t been the same since my first AA meeting on June 3, 2009.
