Page 295 - The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous

Alco_1893007162_6p_01_r5.qxd 4/4/03 11:17 AM Page 284

284 ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS
my drinking and a job since they were both full time,
but I concocted all kinds of lies to ensure that nothing
would interfere with my drinking. After being repeat-
edly reprimanded at work for being late in the morn-
ings, I made up a story to hide the fact that I was
always hung over. I told my manager that I had cancer
and needed to go to the doctor for treatment every
morning. I would say whatever I needed to say to pro-
tect my drinking.
More often, I was having these little moments of
clarity, times I knew for sure that I was an alcoholic.
Times when I was looking at the bottom of my glass
asking myself, Why am I doing this? Something had to
give, something had to change. I was suicidal, evaluat-
ing every part of my life for what could be wrong. It
culminated in one last night of drinking and staring at
the problem. It made me sick to think about it, and
even sicker to continue drinking it away. I was forced
to look at my drinking as the chief suspect.
The next day I went to work, late as usual, and all
day long I could not stop thinking about this very real
problem. I could go no further. What was happening
to me? Therapy hadn’t fixed my life—all those ses-
sions; I was still miserable. I might as well just kill my-
self, drink my way into oblivion. In one last desperate
fight for a solution, I reviewed my life, searching for
the missing link. Had I left out some crucial bit of in-
formation that would lead to a breakthrough, making
it possible for life to become just a little more bear-
able? No, there was nothing. Except of course my
drinking.
The next morning I went to see my therapist. I told
him I’d decided to quit therapy, because after eight