Here's what's really. Difficult. When you first come into a recovery group, however you. Find recovery. And for me and Steve, it was a 12 step group is you finally get over that hump and decide, I've got a problem. I got to quit drinking. And then you walk in and see people and you're like. You're not. Like me. So
hmm.
how do you find recovery? And immediately it is comparison, not identifying. What's the risk. There? Steve
It's tough. It's tough. I think a lot of us come in and the only thing we can do, right? We talk about,
Right.
you know, how. How we. You know, I've talked about it. Many people in this program, if you have if you have an addiction problem in your family that siblings or parents, it's easy to compare yourself, which is what I did. Right. I had a brother who was who had struggled long before I started to struggle, and he struggled with a more variety of substances lived in the woods. Right. He was your typical
really bad, you know. So I compared myself to him and it was easy for me, even when I came into the program to say, Oh, I'm not I'm not like that. That's not me. Right? It took me a long time to figure out that he and I shared the same addiction. And I mean, that took me a long time. So it's really hard. You got to come in. And this is where, again, we talk about it all the time. This is where you get some support in these groups and people can help you sort of work through that a
little bit. But now we all compare and listen, we still compare today somewhat, but we have a little bit more. You know, I think we all have a little bit more if you're in the program for a while and if you have some support groups, you know, you don't do it as much.
It's a lot. Easier. Actually. What I was trying to say is I just realized in the past maybe month or two that it actually was probably. Harder for me than maybe others, that if you're able to. Hold your life together, it doesn't mean you have less of an illness. It just means you're harder headed. And it's. Actually
Yeah,
worse in. Many ways if you can hold it together because. You suffer for longer, that. You can tell yourself, because I just choose to continue running into the wall, I must be fine. As opposed to people who quit a lot. Earlier or. Don't hold it together, Then it. Becomes easier to see. And. Maybe easier to find. Your way into some room.
Yeah. In our book, right, in our literature, they talk about how, you know, if you're that it's it's many times easier to help the low bottom alcoholic because of that. Right. Like they they could just look and go oh shit, here I am 30 something years old, I have a wife and kids and I'm living out in the street, literally like sleeping on the bridges and stuff. Right. They may be able to see that where you and I, who, you know, lived in houses, you know, we
own homes with our spouses. We we went to work and we did all these things. It was a little bit harder to see. And even when I came into the program, it was really, really difficult for me. I mean, this is a great topic for me because it was really difficult. I mean, actually I came in in 95 and again, one of the things I said I can remember thinking when I came into the program and went to meetings, I can't go to meetings that my brother would go to. I needed a
higher class meeting, right? I mean, we laugh,
Yeah,
right? I mean it like that's what I that's what I thought. My head like, oh, I God, I'm not going to go to meetings with him. He goes to those low bottom drunk meetings. I need a higher class. Mean it. And I get you know, today it is it's it's funny to hear me say that today. It's funny to me, but it kept me out for a long time. He kept me struggling for a long time. I
didn't drink for a while. You know, if you listen to this podcast, you know, my story was I didn't drink for a while, but I still struggled with life and struggle with addiction behaviors. And that's because I was comparing.
right.
Yeah, right. And then what happened was I stopped drinking and I'd like listen, I stopped drinking my life, you know, is heading in the right direction
The
that I know that I was still suffering.
first couple of meetings I went to, the very first meeting that. I went to was a beginner's meeting because me. Being very logical. I went through I didn't even get a I didn't even get a meeting book. I just went online. I, I found meetings online immediately. And I went through the. Online book that tells you the type of meetings. So there are. Open meetings, closed meetings, big book meetings, discussion meetings, speaker meetings, and there's different combinations of them tradition
meeting. There's all these different types of subsets of Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, specialty meetings, men's meetings, women's meetings. There's gay AA, there's
Mm.
there's all different types of meetings out there. And one of them is a beginner's meeting. And so I. Figure I. Would go to a beginners meeting because. I'm a beginner. That's where you start your. Orientation into AA. And I figured, you know, there be like some sign up sheet or something and
Right,
you'd have a, you know, a packet, you fill.
right,
Out your insurance
right.
or whatever.
Yeah, yeah,
And that's not what it was at all. And I was. Sure that the person who's chairing. The meeting. Maybe they were from the church or they were. Somebody that. I don't know professionally who worked for. AA and they just it was not conceivable to me that people. Who are part of the group would. Share the meeting. You know,
yeah.
it's a professional position
Right.
and this was a shit show, at least to me initially that I went to this meeting. It was in a. Tougher part of East Hartford. It was. The church. Was not pretty to look at and I found. Out later the reason they have a beginners meeting there is because there's rows of sober houses. If you don't know what a sober house is, these are houses that people are coming from rehab and they're. Sort of re-entering it. There are.
People who live. With sober people for a short period of time, or maybe it's a medium term period. Of time, but they're newly. Sober. And so they they went to this. Beginner's meeting. And it was all new people. It was people who are low bottom. Constantly. Relapsing. There was one guy the second time I went who came in and said, you know, my name is so-and-so and I'm drunk, actually drunk in the meeting. And I'm like, This is not for me. This is not like me. I am better
than these people. And it, it it. Embarrasses me. To see that now because I was no better. And there's a lot of value from those
yeah. It's really, really difficult for most of us. Certainly not for everyone, but for most of us or for many of us, put it that way. For many of us who come in, it's difficult to come in and not think that somehow we're different. Right? We're unique, we're different. That and that maybe, this thing doesn't fit us. And, and it really. It's easy to walk into these things. We have a we have a sober club, right in my town. And, you know, we've been around
since I think it was 1944. It opened up and I just remember being brought there early in my sobriety. And again, just like just like the church thing for you was it was this was an older it was a house that was gifted to help recovery. I remember it being dark and dingy and probably dirty and a bunch of probably really low bottom like. And today I, I go to recovery, you know, clubs in different towns. I have some family who
lives in different towns. And the thing about them like there's always meeting at recovery camps like it's easy to find them. So there's one in New Jersey that I visited and one in Chicago that I visited. And if I go out there a lot of times I go to these because it's easy to go to a meeting and they're all the same right? They attract a lot of people who come in. It's a warm place. We've talked about it here, the cup of coffee,
maybe a donut or something. So, you know, it's a but I just remember being like, I did not like that place. That was place was not for me. Right. today I realize I look at it and now I can go into that same place. It's not far from where I live today, and I'm like, I can go in there today and look at the people. And first of all, I know a lot of people like I go into that club any time and I got to know at least a half a dozen people, probably. So I don't
have to do that comparison. I don't have to do that because I know these people are suffering the same addiction as I am. It just kept me. It kept me sick and it kept me from really working. A program for a long time. Went before I could really understand that these people were just like me when
right?
it came to when it came to alcohol, right. When it came to alcohol, we were all the same. The other staff maybe not, but when we came, when it came to alcohol, once we started, we had a problem with it. And with that, once I learned that and then I could talk to anybody in these rooms.
I listen to a podcaster who is. Very. Well known, has a. Very big. Podcast host and. Is worth a. Lot of money, has talked about how he sold his private jet and now he wants to buy another private jet. And this guy also talks about all the drinking he does, how he was cutting back and it was okay because now he's into edibles. And I'm concerned with how I hear him talk about his drinking.
Mm
And there's no. Difference in a lot. Of times because you have that many. Resources. It's tough to admit you have a problem because you can live with the consequences. You can you can. Blow through money or have. Disasters that are going to destroy normal people that don't because you have such a cushion,
right.
that can really be a detriment when you have a cushion. So here are the risk. I'm kind of we'll do this kind of like a. Story because. I'm getting somewhere. With this. Is very easy to compare compare. And the risk. With comparing is you can just keep comparing and talk yourself out of having a problem because you want to compare to, well, am I like this person? Well, they don't own a house, so I don't have a problem. Or this guy, you know, he's dressed up nicely, but he was a
low bottom drunk at one time. He was homeless. I was never homeless, so I must not have a problem. If you take to its logical end, comparing. With whoever. You meet, you will. Not hear your story. Because you could compare it to the point that if it's not exactly like you, then you have nobody. To compare to. What identifying means. Where are the bits and pieces that you can identify with the story? So the first. Person I felt. A comparison. To
was this. Firefighter who's got 40 something years of sobriety. Now, and he talked about, I didn't drink every night. I could stop. At two beers. At times, but when I stopped at two beers, I was miserable. And even though this guy was in his sixties at the time and was a former firefighter, I could identify with something. It was that one piece of I could have too, and stop, but I was miserable and that was a ding, ding, ding. I've got a problem
you can always find. And I don't know if there's low bottom meetings. There are meetings that are in tough places, but. There are. Always going to be. People there of. Different
Mm.
walks of life. Even if you hear somebody that you see who might be homeless or might not be on the socioeconomic status issue, if you just listen to their symptoms, you will. Hear the. Same symptoms you have. It might be in a different setting, but you will hear. I got into trouble. Drinking doesn't matter what the trouble was. I got into trouble drinking. Here's the jam I got into. Here's how I realized. I had to stop. That's it. You can color that any different way of socioeconomic
areas. But if you break it down. To that and you just listen for that, you're going to get something.
Yeah. When I started to be able to do that and I started to be able to hear my story was when or my not even my story, my struggles, I think is more of it. When I started to hear that people struggled like I did. Right? Because, again, I came in here thinking that I was unique. I did. And that's not me. And that's not no pun intended, that's not unique to me. I came
in here thinking that. So when I started to hear some of these people who I knew, they were different for me, I knew we didn't have a lot in common common. But when I started to hear and identify with some of their struggles or some of the behaviors and I was like, Oh crap, I do that too. Or that's a
problem for me too. And then I started realizing, well, maybe, you know, this person has, you know, especially early on, this person has 12 years of sobriety or 15 years of sobriety, maybe this person can offer me some help. Right? That's what that's that's the difference is I was able to start making that identification and then going for help. I don't remember when that exactly happened. I really don't like You have the memories
of when it happened for you. I don't have that memory, but I certainly do remember when we talk about my buddy Edson all the time. Now, I remember like I didn't know Edson from all know, but all of a sudden when I started to get to this point where I could identify, I realized that it's in his brain and my brain worked almost exactly the same. We were totally different people, right?
Totally different people. But his brain and my brain, when it comes to alcohol and it comes to character defects, worked exactly the same. And we became very close in this program because that's his has a lot of sobriety. And I knew he could help me and he was willing to help me. So it really you know, the other thing, when you were talking about comparing and identifying and this is what I said, is it still can happen today. You know, we we do service. We talk about service.
And I can remember a lot of times what, you know, that that guy is not married. You know, the guy doesn't have a family. You know that guy. He can do all the service he like. He can he can put in more time than I can put in because he doesn't know what it's like to have a job and have two kids and like like that kind of stuff. Right. But yet today I do service and I see people who are just as busy as I ever was,
Yeah,
and they're just making time to do their service right.
I'm.
And their service takes them out just like it would take me out, you know? So, you know, that's the other thing that can happen. That's why I said it could still happen today. And, you know, and I look around the rooms that I still can look at. So many go, yeah, no family, no kids. They have a lot easier than I have it, know? So even today I have no kids because, you know, my kids are grown, so, you know, so I don't have any of that kind of stuff. It's like I'm at a different point in my
life. So it's like I'm having no kids. I do. I am married, so I have to keep that in mind. But it's really, you know, they identify the ID and like you said, it's it can keep you stuck. It can keep you stuck
Yep.
if you if you compare and you need to get out of that. I mean, if you're doing that and again, that's where, you know, we talk about it, it's like beating a dead horse or, you know, just like that's we're working with another alcoholic who will help you, working with someone who who knows this program, who gone through these steps or some of these other communities that I don't know much about. Like that's where somebody else can point out some
of these things to you. Okay, here's what you're doing here. You know, here's what you're doing here. You're comparing you're really not you're really not seeing your issues. You're only trying to see their issues. You know?
Right. I look at this as in recovery. It's like. You're the company vice president. And the guy who is your mentor is the janitor, and the janitor. Is the. One who has all the wisdom. That's the way it is here. What you are. Socially doesn't matter, because you could come in and feel somebody is low bottom and you'll find more wisdom from that person. Edson is a Six Sigma black. Belt in recovery, as far as I'm concerned.
Yeah, absolutely.
Different lifestyle. But that's the guy a lot of times there's going to help you stay sober. They know a lot more and they can share that in. Terms of service. If you're somebody who is in corporate. Those are probably the people who are more. Likely to be involved and take the. Time for service because it's just part of what they. Do. You know, I work in a corporate world. I do volunteer work outside of work. It's just kind of expected that you do some of those things. So I look. At
recovery and service as sort. Of an extension of that. I would expect to see people. In a corporate career who. Would be in some of those service positions. And then there's also the people who don't have kids and stuff. But
Right.
it also cuts. Across there's there's all demographics. In this stuff. So when you're. Identifying. Here's sort of the secret here. You have to start being unique. This was the. Thing that was very hard. For me. It was. The first. Lesson that when you. Come into recovery. You have to stop being unique from anybody else. You have to learn to be average. And that. Is very. Difficult in the United States because. Our culture is. To be the best of the best and to stand out and be unique and
be a shining beacon. And good recovery doesn't look like that kind of recovery. Looks like I blend in. I'm not noticeable. And when you identify it keeps you humble because you can see yourself in everybody. No matter who they are, You are no better or worse. Than anybody else.
You know, AA has a lot of these the silly sayings maybe that's so silly, but some people think they are and I think a lot of us when we come in, I think we think they are. But one of the things and this is, and one of the big ones, but a lot of people say I'm just another drunk on the bus. Right. And that's what we talk about. Right. And so so you look at that thing like a bus full of people. If they're all drunks. I'm not driving the bus. I'm not I'm just another drunk. I'm just
another drunk. That's all I am. Right. So, you know, and like I said, I'm just one of a group. I'm not outside of the group within the group. to me, that just to me, that gives me comfort. You know, one of the things that happened when I discovered all this is that I was able to relax, to realize that, you know, one of the things that, you know, my character defects and my problem growing up was I felt like I had to take care of we've talked about this. I felt like I had to
do everything. I had to take care of everything. I had to, you know, run my own life from an early age. And when I realized that there were people that could help me when I really realized that it really took a burden off of me, like, Oh, wait a minute, I don't need to do this on my own. There are people who actually know the answers that I need, like, so I have to be willing to listen to them. And today it's it's unusual for me. And listen, I'm a human being, so I still judge at times.
But it's unusual for me to judge somebody based upon something other than their sobriety and their message. Like, I really don't care about what they do and anybody for that matter, because a lot of times I can walk into a meeting and not know anybody. I mean that no, everybody. So somebody could speak and share. And I'm not I don't know nothing about that person. So I'm only listening to their message. And then, you know, and when I do that, either that message resonates with me
or it doesn't. And it doesn't that bad if it doesn't. But there's so many people that I can I can resonate with today because I identify with their struggles, I identify with the problem or and then I, I try to listen for the solution. Right. If and this is the whole thing, we get back to it. If, if, if I identify a problem and this other person has a problem and they seem to overcome it, they have a solution for it.
Yep.
And hopefully that solution would work for me to write it would work for me, too. And so that's the key. When you put it like, Oh, wow, look at that. That person is struggling, you know, with that and the same thing. It goes on. I have a sponsor that one day we were in a meeting we were it was our Monday night meeting when the old church and we were cleaning up afterwards. And if I remember correctly, he was either helping clean up or he had made hit a
coffee come. And he wasn't my sponsor at the time and he was talking about how he had gone through a divorce and he was having a really tough time with his ex-wife and the kid. He had two children and he was about the same age as I was when I first came in. And I remember looking at Mike, I looked at him like I could help you with that
problem. All right. I, I went through that and I said, if you ever want to talk and this was I was this was a little bit different than the A, but he ended up becoming a sponsor of mine because he had a problem that I had to deal with. And I was able to tell him, Hey, listen, if you want to get together, then we could do a little work on that. And that's the way I survive these days to
I thought of Mike C on Monday. I think was was Mike C recently. But I also remember Frank C who's not with us anymore. So this guy Frank C had. 31. Years of sobriety. He was another one of these guys that sponsored, you know, half of the people on our side of the. Connecticut River. Well known guy. I went to the same meetings, every single meeting and talked about in a meeting one time about how he kind of felt like a. Failure because. One of his
sponsors went out. And I almost sort of think there of like, if Frank couldn't keep this guy sober, how am I going to keep this guy sober?
right?
But it's not really about that. I think it really was that meeting where Frank was doing that is Frank wasn't complaining about that. Frank was asking for help.
Mm hmm.
He was. Looking for moral support for. Him because he was broken up over this guy going out. And Frank. Was a retired. Old guy. I'm far from retirement, but in that position I look at somebody like that. If I can identify with, there's a feeling of loss. There for him. Whatever it is. He has a feeling of loss and a feeling of failure. I can identify with that. And then you know, this old black guy to me.
Is further up the. Echelon than me because he's got all this sobriety and all these responses and this. Reverence towards. Him. There's something I would want. And if I just looked. At the surface. Maybe I don't think that way.
You know that. And that's just the beauty of somebody like Frank, who I didn't know. Well, I certainly knew him as we were talking. We a little bit late doing this tonight because I was planning on going to one of those meetings that Frank used to always go to. And I just knew of him and I knew him for going
to certain meetings. you know, it's one of the things when you get somebody like that and it's one of the things I appreciate is that when somebody who has really good sobriety and Frank did have really good sobriety and he had a really good program and all of those things, that when he can share that he strong, he's struggling with somebody with something, when he can
share that. And it was one of the things it was really was one of the revelations for me when I heard somebody who I thought had a really good program, share some of the same struggles I had. part of it was like, Oh crap, I'm going to have to deal with this for the rest of my life right? Really? Like, Oh, wait a minute, this person runs it. Really? And then the other part was, Oh, I thought I was doing something wrong. Why wasn't I getting this? And then it was like
Right.
when I when I realized and I talk to people, not just the person, but when I talk to people who like, Oh, no, this is something I'll have to do for the rest of my life. Like, I will have to work on a lot of the things not all of them, but a lot of these things, because they'll keep coming back because, you know, we talk about it in our program that my drinking and this is what my failure was the first time I came into my drinking was but a symptom of my
real problems, right? It was me trying to cover up some of those issues that I've had in life. you know, when I first came into the program, I didn't think of it that way. I thought my drinking was the problem. But today I realized differently that my my problem is in my thinking. It's in a lot of things. And the drinking is just what happens when some of that other stuff goes bad?
You could go into the inner city and go to a meeting with all people who are low bottom, and if you just. Close your. Eyes and hear things, you will hear the same mindset that you have. What I often do as well as I listen to some of those people. And it reminds me that what they went through is something that could be in my future if I don't do the right thing.
Yeah.
I think about that a lot. This is it my story. But there's no reason it couldn't be my story someday. And even though I'm in to feel like I'm in a good place. Keep your ears open. Hear that stuff that's really bad so that you have something that you can think of that I need to keep doing this because I don't want to end up the places they have. They were lucky enough to survive or the people. Who relapse, relapse, relapse. Relapse and then get it.
I listen to that because. I'm afraid I don't have a relapse. In me to come back. The people who come back like, thank God, I'm going to try and do everything I can because I don't think I I'm not confident I could come back after relapse. There would be too much shame. Maybe I could, but I don't want to test it. So I listen. To those relapse stories.
You know, you know, Matt, some one of the things you say and I said I came in when I came into the program, I certainly had a lot of drugs in my past. Most of them it wasn't really bad drug use, smoking dope, smoking pot was, was, was bigger than any of the other stuff. But most of the problems with my drug use, I mean, it was financial. Like I just didn't have the money to do a lot of
drugs. And one of the things I realized is when I came into this program, it was that I had come in and I had given up all my drugs and I wasn't out there doing that kind of stuff during the crack cocaine epidemic, you know, And I think about like, I am so grateful because that was like the perfect drug. It was cheap, right? You smoke? I loved smoking pot. You know, I was
able to miss that. So I would come in, I would see people my age or maybe just a little bit younger talking about how they were like sucking on the crack pipe, you know? And I was like, That could be me. That could have been me, you know? I mean, like, I could have ended up there and lucky for me, I didn't. So it's the same thing when I hear some stories like that. I just think, listen, you know.
The former mayor of. Toronto
Yeah.
was a crack smoker.
Right. And and the biggest thing I remember, I was in church and there was this big there's this guy who a big executive at one of the insurance companies, beautiful family would show up every Sunday. Turned out he lost everything because he was a crack smoker. He lost it all, lost his family, lost his job, and it's like I remember looking at that like, how how could that happen? And but for the grace of God, I mean, it's like it could have been me. It could have been
me. I got out of a lot of that stuff before it became popular. And and I'm really happy I did, because it could have been it could have been scary and it could have been deadly. Could have been
if
deadly,
you've been. Sober for ten or more years. He missed out on the opioid epidemic, and
right?
I. Feel very fortunate. About that. I had some pain pills, and the only reason I stopped taking them is if I don't stop this now, I will become addicted.
Right?
So I'm not going to start there. Those are the things I loved more than anything else. And because I had that feeling, it's I have to not take this.
Yeah.
This is not good. And I can get by with alcohol. lots of benefits there. We would love. To hear. What you have to say about that. You can always reach out to me, Matt at Sober Friends podcast com or on Instagram. Give us a follow at Sober Friends pod dot com. If you feel. Generous, there are. Expenses that we have and I'm thinking about this because we got to re-up the website. Everything that you put in. I actually put into this interest bearing account. I don't spend it until
we have to. Re-up. Something. If you want to help us out, it goes a long way. Getting this into the new guy. Or girls ears. You can go to buy me a coffee dot com slash sober friends pod will give you a shout out. Steve, thanks for coming in tonight and identifying with us.
Hey, Matt. Thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.
All right. We'll see everybody next week. Bye bye, everybody.