Explore Ebooks
Categories
Explore Audiobooks
Categories
Explore Magazines
Categories
Explore Documents
Categories
BY TOM M.
A RECOVERING ALCOHOLIC
I
My Obsession With Alcohol and My Recovery Author Tom McGoldrick
Copyright page and list of other books by this author
Also check out Mobipocket.com for all my books as e-books. Go to mobipocket and
search on McGoldrick. And, go to http://lulu.com/tjmcgoldrick7 and to
http://mcgoldrickadventurenovels.blogspot.com/ for previews and for links to publishers and
book sellers.
II
My Obsession With Alcohol and My Recovery Author-Tom McGoldrick
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO FELLOW SUFFERING ALCOHOLICS
I hope and pray that some of those who read this book may recognize their
own drinking problem, go to AA meetings, talk to other recovering alcoholics, take
serious action to get sober and to start leading a better life, and in so doing, not
put a family through as much misery and lose as much as I.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To all the thousands of alcoholics who took the time to share their personal
experiences and feelings concerning their deliverance from drunkenness and
chaos to sobriety and order before, during and after the AA meetings I was
fortunate in attending. They gave me the example and courage to persevere in
my new life without my old friend alcohol.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
III
My Obsession With Alcohol and My Recovery Author Tom McGoldrick
Page
TITLE PAGE ............................................................................................ I
COPYRIGHT AND OTHER BOOKS BY THIS AUTHOR………………….II
DEDICATION AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS................................…....... III
FOREWORD .................................................................................…...... V
FORWORD
IV
My Obsession With Alcohol and My Recovery Author-Tom McGoldrick
experiences with alcoholism while drinking and later after becoming sober and stopping
drinking. Procrastination, however, was easier than facing the reality that it is my duty to help
other alcoholics to achieve sobriety as I was helped. There are many ways to help. I have
heard of and met others in the AA program who visited hospitals and drunk tanks and took
people to hospitals and to treatment centers to dry them out and then talked the AA program to
them. Perhaps those individuals were comfortable and successful doing that, but I was not. I
had seen many others just going to meetings, looking presentable and successful in life, and
talking in a nice quiet language. They were not the loud and flashy ones. They were the quiet
ones with more than fifteen years of sobriety. When they spoke, they seemed to say the right
gem of wisdom I needed to hear at that moment. I decided these were the AA people I wanted
to emulate. I did not want a short-term cure. I wanted a long-term cure and figured the best
way was to watch, listen to, and emulate the winners. I knew people did not get many years of
sobriety and maintain an outward appearance of calm without learning how to live successfully
without alcohol. To me, anyone with fifteen years or more of sobriety had achieved a long-term
cure and I needed to learn how they had achieved and maintained that condition because at
I was taught that part of the AA program is to take an inventory. The inventory is not
only of what has been lost, but also of that which still remains. I was taught to be grateful for
that which remains. I am grateful for surviving some ridiculously dangerous events and
surroundings in which I placed myself because of my perceived urgent need for alcohol during
my drinking days. Since I have been sober, I have been fortunate in learning how to live sober
and have met many other people in the world who also live happy, joyous, and free without
having to consume alcohol on a daily basis. Many of them never drank. I never saw or met
these people when I was drinking. I also attended many AA meetings in many cities and states
V
My Obsession With Alcohol and My Recovery Author Tom McGoldrick
in the US and in cities abroad. At these meetings, I continued to listen to many stories of
recovering alcoholics. I need to hear how they lived while drinking, how they came to AA, and
how they are living today. Each teaches me some valuable lesson. I often found the same
personalities at each place as thought those personalities were replicated time and again.
This further eroded my frequent thought that I was different from others. Sometimes the
people looked the same and even had the same first name. Over time, these people had the
audacity to tell everyone my story, even the parts I did not want to reveal to anyone although I
had never told my story all at one time to anyone. I did not want to give anyone else power
over me by really knowing me. I kept a wall up. They were able to tell my story without
knowing me, because I am not unique. Many other alcoholics have similar experiences. As I
listened to them tell their stories, I could identify very closely with some of each person's story.
This, more than anything else helped dispel my belief that I was unique. My excuses for
drinking, therefore, became common and lost their value. I drank because it made me feel
better or at least had for many years and that was something I had to learn to change on a
long-term basis.
The knowledge and experience of how to do that was passed to me intentionally and
unintentionally by the many people in the many meetings I attended. And, individually and
collectively, they have aided me significantly in my recovery. There are times when I can still
recall the scorn of just a few words from a fellow former alcoholic who knew when what I was
saying or thinking was not right. I accepted and complied because I knew I had to in order to
get well. I continually reason if all those other people in all of those places and in all of those
different climates and living conditions can live successfully without alcohol, then I have no
excuse for drinking to cope with life. It was embarrassing to have to tell others in a meeting of
my daily miseries and then to have my miseries made insignificant by the next person who
really has serious problems. That is very humbling for me. It always puts me in a position
VI
My Obsession With Alcohol and My Recovery Author-Tom McGoldrick
where I have to take inventory and have a silent gratitude meeting because I, in spite of daily
difficulties, still have a life much better than many others. It also tends to cause me to keep my
mouth shut, to listen, and to not complain about things. I can only change my reaction to
people, places, and things and their impact on me. I cannot change other people, places, or
things. There is only one person I can change and that is I. I often find it best to not react to
situations and to just walk away. Again, I can change me and I have found that usually I was
never knew what portions of their talks I remembered and paid heed to and they did not need
to know. But collectively, I learned from them when I could not learn from non-AA books or
non-AA people. After my inventory taking and much contemplation, I realized that I had gained
experiences in my life and that if I shared them with others, I could and would be doing what
This book then is the story of a fifty-three year old man's (me, Tom M.'s) thoughts and
feelings about the disease of alcoholism as viewed and understood by a recovering alcoholic
(me) growing up in the USA and working for a few years in the states of Washington,
California, Montana, Alaska, North Carolina, and Utah, and many years out of my home
country in other lands such as Germany, Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia, and the Marshall Islands.
While drinking, I visited many well-known watering holes and could relate well to many world
travelers. I went down some streets to get a bottle in places I would not go today in broad
daylight without a police escort. Since sober, I can relate better to the historical, geographic,
cultural and societal aspects of the places to which I have traveled. While drinking, my point of
reference was drinking places. Since then, I have changed. Now, I visit churches (AA meeting
VII
My Obsession With Alcohol and My Recovery Author Tom McGoldrick
places) and interesting places not associated with drinking. It is amazing how one's frame of
reference can change. The book naturally includes comments about other alcoholics who I
have had the privilege of meeting during my travels while drunk and while sober.
Alcoholism is still a baffling problem. However, more and more people are becoming
aware of the hope engendered by the success of AA and more people are coming in to try the
program. Although the success rate is low, the long-term recovery success rate without
Therefore, any tool, which can offer hope and a chance of success, needs to be made
continuously with any of his important life adjustments and interpersonal relationships. It is up
to each individual to say that they are or are not an alcoholic. Whatever the problem, effective
treatment depends on accurate recognition and diagnosis. Does the person's drinking
frequently or continuously interfere with his social relations, his role in the family, his job, his
finances, or his health? If the answer is yes, the chances are the person is an alcoholic or on
the verge of becoming one. Once he or she begins to drink, they usually will not be able to
stop until they are unconscious, broke, or dead. Some alcoholics are able to control their
themselves with people of a similar nature. This preserves the belief that "Everyone else is
drinking the same as I; therefore, I'm ok," thus perpetuating the belief and image that there is
no problem. The alcoholic is often the last person to recognize that his drinking is a problem
and there are just so many friends out there who help the drinking person keep right on
drinking. They are called enablers and you have to be wary of them. They can easily get you
VIII
My Obsession With Alcohol and My Recovery Author-Tom McGoldrick
The above list of questions is typical. Positive answers only help confirm one's own
worst fears. That the person is an alcoholic and needs help. An alcoholic in denial is of no use
to himself or to others. Positive steps to recovery with or without a treatment center but with
the help of other recovering alcoholics in AA give the hope of daily relief and recovery from
alcoholism. Alcoholism never goes away until a person is dead. But, there can be a daily
respite and a much-improved life. Those with many years of sobriety in AA, who we look up to
as having the things and the kind of life we would like to have, given all of us hope that
perhaps we too can attain some of the daily relief and good life. After some time in daily relief
without alcohol, we can reflect and gain some measure of satisfaction for past
accomplishments which should encourage us to continue in the same vein. Please read on.