If Life Was Fair

True Stories of Alcoholics and Addicts.  Struggles, insights, physical, emotional and spiritual recovery.

Transcript

Daryl 0:01

Hey, out there. Welcome to this week's episode of Miles of Recovery. My name is Darrell. And I'm Kim. We're really glad you've joined us. Our goal with this podcast is to help the listener gain some insights into the mind of the alcoholic addict, as well as the processes involved in the individual's recovery. The stories will provide some entertainment directly from the recovering alcoholics and addicts. Sometimes these stories will be quite difficult to hear. Other times we'll be able to share some laughs. Either way, we hope you'll consider how they relate to your life and your recovery. It's important to note this podcast is not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous or any other 12 step recovery program. We are not experts on the subject of recovery. And though I've been in recovery from alcoholism for more than 18 years, I'm in no way an authority. And although I'm not an alcoholic, I've been in Al-Anon to aid in my own recovery from experiences living with both an active alcoholic and an alcoholic in recovery. And we both continue to learn as we navigate our lives today. Mm-hmm. The readings provided are stories of personal experiences. The insights drawn from these experiences may be the result of the source or storyteller, the interviewer, or review of the material by artificial intelligence. Yeah. So can we just pause for a second and address this AI beast? Of course. You know, I've been particularly interested and we've had serious discussions about AI over the past couple of months. Um, and I've been interested from the very first moment I heard about it. Yeah. And you know that I've been feeling the opposite. I have deep reservations about AI and I know I'm not alone. In fact, sometimes it scares me and I'm guessing some of you out there feel the same. But with that being said, I got a new perspective when you fed one of your recovery stories that you'd written through an AI program, and I realized I may want to check some of my bias at the door. Yeah, I completely understand and I understand the fear. Uh, I'm just curious about what it can do for us. And I've got to say the AI analysis of that first story really put us on this path to developing the Recovery podcast. I experienced some profound insights into my own story, insights I didn't have, despite my time in aa, having worked the steps, attended thousands of meetings, worked with a sponsor and sponsored other people with the amount of work I've put into my recovery and having reviewed these experiences through that lens. I figured I'd gathered most of the insights already, but there's always more to learn, right? Yeah. You know, you asked me to listen and reluctantly I did. I learned that maybe we'd only scratch the surface and I gained some real insights of my own. Yeah, there's no putting a genie back in the bottle. We can fear and reject AI or we can, as the saying goes, take what works and leave the rest. So I hope you listening out there will listen with an open mind and on the subject of listening with an open mind. Remember the particularly poignant words of Herbert Spencer from page 5 68. In the big book, there is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a person. And everlasting ignorance, that principle is contempt prior to investigation. Let's not let that happen to us. Alright, so here's how this is gonna work. And if you're new to this podcast, welcome. And we need your help to make it work. Each week we'll share a recovery story, ours and yours, but preferably yours. We will be sharing honest lived experiences as people in recovery. We will then run the story through AI for its deep dive into the inner workings of the story. Yeah, and remember, the overriding goal here is to maintain this podcast to bring new information and recovery insights, specifically to help alcoholics and addicts. We hope to reach a broader recovery community than localized AA and NA meetings. Okay, Darrell, here we go. We're looking forward to hearing this week's story. Okay. My life as an active alcoholic, as most of us in recovery have experienced was peppered with opportunities for or realized tragedies. I cannot fathom the number of times I drove intoxicated, the number of times I risked the lives of my children myself, and uncounted numbers of people unknown to me in cars and boats. I frequently engage in various forms of what I considered entertainment while severely impaired. Most of the potential tragedies having never even been recognized as opportunities for life altering traumatic events. July 30th, 1987, feeling pretty great. I was 28 years old. My Navy career had reached a new peak as I had been selected for Chief Petty Officer. Recently selected as Naval Air Station, Meridian, Mississippi Sailor of the Year. I had the first brand new car and SUV that I had ever purchased, and I was still celebrating the recent birth of my third child. I had just finished my 18 hour weather forecaster shift around 11:00 PM that night, and I was heading the six miles or so home. It was warm and muggy. That night. My windows were down and I was thinking about how nice the next few days off from work were going to be. I had just lit a cigarette, a habit now long since extinguished. I was coordinating in my mind how I could arrange drinking opportunities for my days off. I was headed home from the operations building on a dark narrow two lane road. The airfield had closed in streams of cars with pilots, air traffic controllers, and weather folks all headed home. As I lit that cigarette, I noted a quick flash of light, and then nothing. I came to a few seconds later with pain seemingly everywhere in my body. I was slumped forward and felt searing pain in my left shoulder and my right knee. I saw blood running down the sleeve of my shirt onto my hand. I could not move my left arm to open the car door. It took a few seconds, but I recognized that I had been hit by another vehicle. This was quite a shock 'cause I'd never even been an a fender bender before. I don't remember much of the first few minutes after the accident, but pretty quickly I saw flashing red lights, heard sirens, and knew that help was on the way. It turns out I had been involved in a very serious car crash with a small Dotson sedan, which had been moving at a rate later. Estimated was traveling at 90 to a hundred miles per hour. Their car was split in two. And the two young people in the backseat of the Dotson were both killed that night. The driver and his buddy in the front seat were spared. I found out the following day that the driver and his friend had been drinking heavily at the Navy Base Club and were well over the Mississippi blood alcohol content limit at the time of 0.0. There were two profound lessons that I could have learned from this incident. The first was based on the fact that Mississippi did not yet have a seatbelt law. But the Navy did so because I was driving on the base at the time of the accident, I was wearing a seatbelt. I was not in the habit of wearing a seatbelt. So this New Navy rule is the only reason I was wearing it that night, and very likely the reason I'm alive today. The second lesson was learned that maybe just, maybe I would consider this a warning for me to curtail my drinking and perhaps completely halt my driving under the influence. I can honestly say that I did indeed take one of those lessons to heart. I have not in the nearly 39 years since that night, been in a car without having my seatbelt buckled. My drinking on the other hand, continued unabated. In fact, my time in the hospital included calling my drinking buddies, having them sneak beer in during my 10 days. There this with a broken collarbone thanks to the shoulder strap on the seatbelt, a shattered knee cap, a broken ankle, broken nose, and multiple lacerations and bruises. Plus I was getting Demerol shots every three to four hours because as needed for pain meant if wanted to me, but not a glimmer of what I would consider an insight regarding my drinking habits and the recognized danger of driving while impaired alcohol truly had my number. I cannot recall considering just how fortunate I was after that accident to be alive and eventually physically back to near normal. I drank progressively for another 20 years. I drove intoxicated frequently, not remembering the drive for another 20 years. I was stopped multiple times while under the influence, but some piece of good fortune always provided me with a mulligan. Why? I just figured I was a talented drunk driver, and if you're an egocentric alcoholic like I am, you will understand this type of thinking. Fast forward to 2007, I got sober. And began attending Alcoholics Anonymous. After 30 years of progressive alcoholic drinking, I no longer believe it was because I was a good drunk driver, that I was not cited for driving under the influence, which I certainly did during my drinking years. I now understand that my good fortune wearing the seatbelt at the time of the accident, never receiving a DUI. Avoiding many alcoholic related tragedies and getting sober was unadulterated grace today. I thank God as I understand him for all these things. Why am I still functioning in society with a good job with at least most of my neuronal functioning still intact? I've seen and interacted with a number of alcoholics with alcoholic dementia or wet brain as a result of their drinking. I no longer consider my ability to think clearly today as a result of my special physical constitution. Today, I can only see this outcome as unadulterated grace for which I thank God as I understand him. I've seen numerous sober alcoholics and heard numerous stories in the rooms of aa of those with continued life altering or life-threatening physical maladies as a direct result of drinking well after they've sobered up. I may not have the smooth skin or calm GI tract that I would have if I hadn't consumed the amount of alcohol that I did, but those are very minor inconveniences in my life. I no longer chalk my health up to being the sturdy athletic guy that I did for so long. Nope. I know my good health is a direct result of pure unadulterated grace, and I can humbly thank God for that today. So when today the thoughts begin that I have been slighted by some circumstance in my life and the feelings of self pity burrow into my mind, I remind myself that life is not fair, and now I can thank God for that. I've spent hours, days, months, and years nurturing resentments because I was not treated fairly. That I did not get what I deserved at work or at home, or generally in life. I mean, look at me. I don't look like Brad Pitt. I don't have the wealth of a Bill Gates or Oprah. I can't read a defense like Tom Brady or overwhelming opponent like LeBron James and certainly can't sing and entertain like Justin Timberlake or will I am pour me, pour me, pour me another drink. I just need to keep in mind squarely focused, front and center on thank God life is not fair that I didn't and still won't always get what I deserve because if I did, I would be behind bars, wet brained, begging for a liver transplant or dead. And today, without this insight, I could still nurse a resentment to my death. God's grace has allowed me a second opportunity in life. A life where I know things will not always be fair, and today I can be grateful for that today. I thank God as I understand him for all these things I. Thanks for that original story. We appreciate you listening out there. Next up is the analysis. Enjoy I. I wanna start today with a concept that is, uh, pretty much hardwired into us from birth. Yeah. You see it in toddlers fighting over a toy. You see it in sports. It's the demand for fairness. Mm-hmm. We screen that's not fair. Anytime the scale seemed to tip against us. But I was reading through the material for today and it poses this question that, I mean, it just completely scrambled my brain. It is a disorienting question for sure. We usually assume fairness is the ultimate good, right? But the question is, what if the absolute best thing that could ever happen to you? The very thing that keeps you alive is for life, not to be fair. What if getting what you deserve is actually the worst possible outcome? Exactly. And that's really the core tension of the memoir we're diving into today. It's titled, if Life was Fair. And you're right, it just flips the script entirely. It does. Instead of looking for justice, the author is looking back at a life that should have ended multiple times and realizing, you know, fairness would've buried him. And this isn't some abstract philosophy lecture. This is a gritty boots on the ground story. Mm-hmm. Or maybe, uh. Wheels on the road is a better way to put it. Yeah, that's a good way to frame it. We're looking at a memoir from a man retired Navy veteran who is looking back at one specific night in 1987 that defined everything. Even if he didn't realize it for another 20 years, that delay is so crucial. This isn't a story about an instant epiphany. It's a story about a crash, a miraculous survival, and then a two decade gap where the lesson was just completely ignored. A case study in denial, a total case study in denial addiction, and eventually what he calls unadulterated grace. So let's get into it. Set the stage for us. Who is this guy? Before everything goes sideways. Okay, so it's July 30th, 1987. We're in Meridian, Mississippi at the Naval Air Station. The author is 28 years old, and if you looked at his personnel file, you would think this guy is absolutely crushing it. Crushing it. How? Like just doing a good job. Well, better than that, he had just been selected for Chief Petty Officer. Now, for those who aren't familiar with Navy Rank Structure making chief is a, oh, it's a massive deal. It's a massive deal. Yeah. It's the transition from being just one of the guys to being the chief, the backbone of the leadership. It takes years of perfect performance to get there. So he's got the respect of the fleet. He's a leader. He does. And on top of that, he was recently named Sailor of the Year for the entire air station. Wow. So professionally, he is at his absolute peak, and personally it looks just as good. He's married. He's celebrating the recent birth of his third child, and this detail becomes important later. He's driving the first brand new car he has ever bought. A shiny new SUV. Okay, so he is the poster boy for success, sailor of the Year, new dad, new car. He's on top of the world. That was the external mask, but the source material, it just rips that mask off immediately. The internal reality was rotting. The author describes himself during this exact period as an active alcoholic and not just a casual drinker, someone whose entire life revolved around the next drink. Give us a sense of that mindset, because I think it's hard for people who haven't experienced addiction to understand how you can be. Sailor of the Year and falling apart at the same time. It's all com compartmentalization. On this specific night, he had just finished an 18 hour shift as a weather forecaster. He's exhausted. 18 hours. Yeah, he's driving home in that new SUV. Now, a normal person might be thinking about the promotion or getting home to see the baby, but he's not. No, he explicitly writes that his mental energy was focused on logistics. He was calculating in his head how to arrange drinking opportunities for his upcoming days off without his wife catching on or it interfering with his work. So even in a moment of triumph, the addiction is in charge. The addiction is the project manager in his brain. It's a chilling insight, and he talks about his driving habits during this time too, which are. Frankly, terrifying. They are. He admits to frequently engaging in what he calls entertainment while driving impaired. He talks about risking the lives of his own children and strangers on a regular basis. Not out of malice, but just out of a complete lack of awareness. It was just normal for him. So that brings us to the drive. It's 11 PM Dark Mississippi Road. What happens? He's leaving the operations building. It's a narrow two-lane road. The airfield is closed, so there's a stream of traffic, pilots, controllers, everyone heading out. It's a warm, muddy night, so his window is down. He mentions a specific habit here. Yeah. Something he doesn't do anymore, right? Lighting a cigarette, it was part of the ritual back then. He lights up, takes a drag, and then he sees a quick flash of light just flashing flash, and then blackness. Nothing that is just nightmare fuel. One second. You're smoking a cigarette. The next, nothing. When does he wake up? We don't know exactly how much time passed, but when he comes to the silence is gone. He slumped forward in the seat. He describes the searing white hot pain in his left shoulder and his right knee. He looks down and there is blood running down his sleeve onto his hand. Panic Must be sitting in at this point, confusion, and panic. He tries to open the door with his left arm to get out and his arm just. It doesn't work. It's mechanically broken. So what actually hit him? This is where the physics of the crash get just horrific. He was hit by a small datson sedan, but the datson wasn't just drifting into his lane. Later estimates, put that little car traveling at 90 to 100 miles per hour. A hundred miles an hour. On a narrow two lane road, that's a missile, not a car. It is violent. The impact was so severe that the datson was actually split in two pieces, split in two, and we have to pause here because the source material is very clear about the tragedy involved. The author survived. Obviously the driver and front passenger of the datson survived, but there were two young people in the backseat of that Datson. They were killed instantly. And it's just, that's heavy and it complicates the fairness conversation immediately. It does, and to add another layer to the tragedy. The driver of the Datson, the one doing a hundred miles an hour, had been drinking heavily at the Navy Base Club. His blood alcohol content was well over the Mississippi limit. So you have two drivers, both part of this culture of drinking, colliding in the dark. I mean, it feels like a moment that should shake you to your core. Like if you walk away from that, you have to change your life, right? That's the logical assumption. And the author breaks this down into what he calls the two lessons. He says There were two things he should have learned that night. Lesson one is about the seatbelt, and there's a bit of legal irony here, isn't there? Massive irony. In 1987, Mississippi did not have a seatbelt law. You could drive legally without one, but the Navy is the navy. They have their own rules. So because he was on base, because he was on base, he was buckled in, but not because he cared about safety. Not at all. He admits he wasn't a safe to conscious guy. He wore it strictly to avoid getting yelled at by a superior. That compliance, that fear of a reprimand saved his life. The shoulder strap broke his collarbone, but it kept him inside the SUV. If he hadn't been wearing it, he would've gone through the windshield, no question. So lesson one, buckle up. He says he kept that one. He did in the 39 years since he has never ridden in a car without a seatbelt. But then we get to the missed lesson. And this is where the story gets really dark, you would think waking up in wreckage, knowing people died, knowing alcohol was involved. Yeah. You'd think that would be the rock bottom. The author is incredibly honest Here. He says there wasn't even a glimmer of insight regarding his own drinking. He spent 10 days in the hospital. He's got a broken collarbone, a shattered kneecap, broken ankle, broken nose, lacerations everywhere. And do you know what his priority was? Getting better smuggling. Beer. You're kidding. Into the hospital. He called his drinking buddies and had them sneak beer into his hospital room. He's lying there in traction broken and he is drinking. Wow. And it wasn't just the beer, he mentions the pain medication. He was prescribed Demal shots as needed, which usually means when the pain is unbearable to him as needed meant if wanted. He was demanding shots every three to four hours. He says. Looking back, it's clear that alcohol and addiction had his number. He completely missed the warning sign. That is just baffling, but it explains why the story doesn't end there. I wanna talk about the timeline because this is the part that really surprised me. The, the crash was in 1987, but he doesn't get sober until 2007, right? This isn't a crash in convert story. There is a 20 year gap. He calls these the mulligan years, like in golf, a do-over exactly a free shot where the score doesn't count. But usually in golf, you take a mulligan to fix your shot. He took the mulligan and kept swinging the exact same way for two decades. The drinking didn't just continue, it progressed. Oh, he's driving drunk for another 20 years. Yes, and this is where we have to look at the psychology of the high functioning alcoholic. He talks about driving with blackouts, literally not remembering the drive home, but waking up safe in his driveway. Okay. Now you or I might wake up in a cold sweat thinking I could have killed someone, or I'm so lucky to be alive. He didn't think it was luck. This is the delusion. He honestly believed he was just a talented drunk driver. Wait, he thought it was a skill. He rationalized it. Yeah. He thought, I'm good at this. I can handle my liquor and I can handle a car. He was stopped multiple times by police over those years, but never got a DUI. So every time he got away with it. It didn't feel like grace or luck. It felt like confirmation of his own ability. That is terrifying. It's confirmation bias on steroids. I made it home, therefore I am in control precisely. And that egocentric thinking is the armor of addiction. As long as you think you're talented at managing your vice, you never have to stop. You don't need help. You certainly don't need grace. You just need to keep your hands on the wheel. So what finally cracks that armor, how do you go from I'm a talented drunk to sober. Fast forward to 2007, the wheels finally come off. He joins Alcoholics Anonymous. He gets sober after 30 years of drinking, and suddenly the fog lifts and he has to look back. He has to look back at that history, the seatbelt in 87, the mist, DUIs, the blackouts, and rewrite the entire narrative in his head. He has to admit it wasn't skill. He realizes it was what he now calls unadulterated grace. He stopped seeing himself as the hero of his own story and starts seeing himself as the recipient of a gift he absolute did not earn. He mentions his physical health in the memoir too, which I found really interesting. Because 30 years of hard drinking usually leaves a mark. It leaves a massive mark. He talks about looking around the recovery rooms and seeing the physical price tag of addiction. He mentions peers suffering from wet brain. I've heard that term thrown around, but what is it actually? So the medical term is Vernick Korsakoff syndrome. It's a form of dementia caused by a severe Vitamin B one deficiency, which is really common in chronic alcoholics because they drink their calories instead of eating. It causes permanent brain damage, memory loss, confusion. It's irreversible, and he drank for 30 years. Escaped that he did. He realizes he has retained his neuronal functioning. He can think clearly, aside from maybe some minor skin or GI issues, he's healthy. And I'm guessing the old version of him, the Sailor of the year would've said, well, I just have a strong constitution. I'm built. Tough. Exactly. I'm an athlete, I can take it. But the sober version looks at the medical reality and says no. This is another example of grace. If life was strictly biological math input, alcohol output damage, he should have wet brain, he should have liver failure. Which brings us right back to the fairness concept again, because even in sobriety he talks about struggling with resentment. It's the resentment trap, and this is so relatable even if you aren't an addict. He talks about spending years feeling slighted. He calls it the Why Not Me Syndrome. He looks at Brad Pitt and asks, why don't I look like that? He looks at Bill Gates and asks, why don't I have that money? I love the line he uses here. He says, his catchphrase was poor me, poor me, poor me. Another drink. It's a clever play on words, but it's deadly. Self-pity is a massive trigger for relapse. If you believe the world is treating you unfairly, you feel justified in numbing the pain. You feel like the universe owes you a drink. So how does he break that loop? How do you stop feeling like the world owes you something? You flip the ledger, you stop asking for fairness and start realizing what fairness would actually look like for you. And this is the heavy hitting reality check in the book. Mm. He lists out what fairness would be for him based on his actions over those 30 years if life were truly fair based on the drunk driving the risks he took, the chemicals he ingested. He says he would be behind bars, he would be suffering from wet brain. He would be begging for a liver transplant. Or most likely he would be dead. That just stops you in your tracks. Yeah, if he caught what he deserved, he wouldn't be here to write the book. And that's the pivot. When he feels that self pity creeping in when he didn't get the promotion or things aren't going his way, he reminds himself, thank God life is not fair because the unfairness of life is the only reason he has a second chance. It really redefines the concept of a bad day, doesn't it? If your baseline is, I should probably be dead or in prison, then you know, a bad day at the office doesn't sting quite as much. It completely shifts the baseline of gratitude. He views his life now, not as a continuation of his own efforts, but as a second opportunity that was allowed by grace. I do wanna circle back to one thing, though. We talked about the two people in the Datson who died in a fair world, maybe the author doesn't survive, but in a fair world, maybe those innocent people don't die either. It feels like a complicated thing to wrestle with being grateful for your own unfair survival when others paid the price. It is deathly complicated and the source material doesn't shy away from that tragedy at all. But I think the author realizes he can't change the math of the past. He can't bring them back. The only thing he can control is what he does with the survival he was given, right? If he wastes it, if he goes back to drinking, that's the ultimate insult to the grace he received. It forces a certain humility. You can't strut around thinking you're the master of your fate when you realize you're only standing there because the universe spared you when the odds said otherwise. It's that transition from arrogance. I'm a talented drunk. To humility. I am a recipient of grace, and that humility is what keeps him sober. The arrogance kept him drinking. The humility allows him to live. So let's zoom out. What does this mean for the listener who. Isn't an alcoholic. Maybe they'd never been in a crash, never had a mulligan, quite that dramatic. Why does this story matter to them? Well, I think it matters because we all keep a, a fairness ledger in our heads. We walk around counting up the good things we do. I worked late. I was nice to my neighbor, and we expect the universe to pay us back. Right. I ate salad all week. I deserve to fit into these jeans. Exactly. And when the universe doesn't pay up, we scream unfair. But this story asks us to look at the other side of the ledger, the side we conveniently ignore. What about the mistakes we made that we didn't pay for? The times we texted while driving and didn't crash the times we were negligent or cruel or lazy, and no one caught us. The times we hurt someone and they forgave us instead of retaliating. If we demanded absolute fairness, we'd have to answer for all of that too. It's uncomfortable to think about, we want justice for the good stuff, but like amnesty for the bad stuff, this source suggests that maybe we should stop demanding justice for the things we don't get and start being grateful for the punishments we didn't receive. It's a shift from I deserve more to, I've already received more than I deserve. That is a much more peaceful place to live. It just dissolves the resentment. If you wake up every day surprised and happy that you aren't suffering the consequences of your worst moments, it's hard to be angry at the world, and it transforms the memory of that night in Mississippi. For the author, the Broken collarbone isn't a grievance anymore, it's a receipt. It's proof of purchase for a life saved. A life saved by a rule he didn't even believe in at the time, which is the ultimate irony. We've covered a lot here from the heat of a Mississippi night in 1987 through the delusion of the Mulligan years. All the way to this place of gratitude. It's a heck of a journey. It really is. And it's a testament to the fact that insight can be delayed. He didn't learn the lesson in the hospital bed in 1987. It took 20 years, but he got there eventually. And that in itself is a form of grace. So as we wrap this up, I wanna leave the listener with a challenge. We talked about the author's realization. What about you? Think about the areas in your life where you feel shortchanged, where you feel like life hasn't played fair with you. Now, try to flip the lens. Where has life been unfair in your favor? Where did you get a lucky break you didn't earn? And here is the provocative thought to take with you today if you were put on trial right now. And the judge had a complete video record of your worst moments, your worst decisions, your most reckless behavior, and they handed down a sentence that was perfectly mathematically fair. Where would you be right now? And if you weren't there, maybe it's time to stop complaining about fairness and start saying thank you. A huge thank you to the author for sharing such a raw and honest account, and if life was fair, it certainly gave us a lot to think about. That's it for this deep dive. We'll see you next time. Hey, we hope you enjoyed today's episode. If something you heard today resonated, we'd love to hear your take on it. Feedback and story submissions are always welcome at Daryl r@milesofrecovery.com. That's DARY l_r@milesofrecovery.com or Kim r@milesofrecovery.com. That's KIM r@milesofrecovery.com. This podcast exists to share experience, strength, and hope, not advice or instructions. And it is not a replacement for meetings or professional help. Support is always available through the National Helpline at 1-800-662-FOUR 3 5 7. That's 1-800-662-FOUR 3 5 7. This podcast is a not-for-profit endeavor. We are considering it an act of service to the broader recovery community. Nonetheless, we are asking for donations only to defray the costs involved in producing the podcast. There is no obligation, but if you feel inclined to donate to miles of recovery, it's super easy at buy me a coffee.com/miles of recovery. Thank you. Join us next week for a story about when we step on the toes of our fellows, they retaliate. We look forward to sharing with you then. And remember from the wise mind of Fred Rogers, there is no normal life that is free of pain. It's the very wrestling with our problems that can be the impetus for our growth.