Milkman's Sober Living Site

MacPlains (Cleve)

Personal Story

Page one

My StoryThe Early Years

12-15 years Occasional drinking. Sometimes I would order a 6 pack and drink it at work at the local grocery store where I was a Grocery clerk stock boyI thought it was normal but in looking back I can see that it is not normal for a 12 year old to be drinking during the middle of the day while working a job. At 15 my parents submitted to step one and admitted that they were powerless over alcohol and that their lives had become unmanageable.

They started attending AA and I would attend the meetings with them. That was my first introduction to AA. It is a shame that I didnt absorb theprogram then but had to go out and continue to research for another 35 years with occasional attendance at AA meetings.

The Teen Years.

I joined the US Navy at the age of 17. Partly to get away from home and the other reason was because I was accepted in the U.S. Navy School of Music after an audition on the trumpet. This was a dream come true and would have provided a wonderful career if booze and drugs had not interfered. My first friend at the school was a big drinker and we spent a lot of time at the Enlisted club enjoying the happy hours. Never had been able to drink such cheap drinks and we did our share. I was beginning to notice the volumes of drinks that I was consuming and it was even astounding me. How can a person drink so much alcohol and stay with the party I used to ask myself. This continued until we had enough gathered to start a class. At that time the School moved me to another part of the barracks where everytime you opend the doors all you could hear was Rock n Roll music. I loved it. One of my bunk mates was getting out on a drug discharge. Naturally he introduced me to drugs and I believe the first one was Opiuminated Hashish. Others gladly introduced me to prescription drugs that they had acquired from the base Psychiatrist. They told me that all you had to do was go see the shrink and tell him some weird story about your sex life and he would give you a prescription. It worked. The next 6 months was quite a blur since I was boozing, and doing drugs. The Captain called me to his office one day and said I had an important meeting down at headquarters. and to get over there ASAP. When I arrived I noticed these guys looked a lot like FBI agents. I was close because they were NBI which was the Naval Burea of Investigation. They had my number. Every where I had been, every person I had bought drugs from, or sold to, and I was scared to death. I was 18 thinking that I am going to jail. After reading the riot act to me they wanted me to sign some papers. For some reason I had sense enough to ask if there was any other statement I could sign other than that one and they said I could sign a statement stating basically that I was not going to admit to anything. I agreed to sign that set of papers. The Captain was disappointed that I did not admit to anything and booted me out of the School of Music that day. He told me to go pack my sea bag and to report to the ship at the end of the dock that night. Heart broken and confused I went and did as he said. The corpman on the ship asked me about that blurp about drug useage on my records. I said dont worry those days are over. The next day I was approached by some druggies wanting me to go get them some drugs at the school. I said no way because I was afraid the NBI would nail me and ship me right on out of the Navy to the Brig. Anyhow, they asked me to move into an apartment with them and that was another mistake because there was nothing but drinking parties and drug parties every night that we had any money. The ship I was assigned to was an Ocean going Tug and our task was to haula ammunition from New York to the Panama Canal for shipment to Vietnam. Also, we were used to intercept torpedos and other things like that when were were not going up and down the east coast. Needless to say we spent a lot of time drinking on our off duties. Close to my 19th birthday I got pissed off with the Navy about something and someone told me about a program where I could turn myself in for drug useage and get out with an honorable discharge. I immediately went after this program and as soon as I admitted to what I had done they had me off the ship and out of the navy in 2 weeks. My 13 months in the navy was spent drinking and doing drugs and now I was home about to go to work with my brother and father in their new construction company.

Short Lived Sobriety, Heavy Drinking, Wife, AA by age 21

Naturally I felt a little remorse for not having finished my course of study in the school of music. Also I was ashamed that I had got booted out of the navy for drinking but figured Dad would understand since he was an alcoholicWrong. Alcoholic or not he was tough on me and pushed pretty hard. Heacted as if he was ashamed of me and my brother was treated as if hewas the saint in the family because he was learning the building tradeand studying real estate which my father was involved in with his own up for a short while, got involved with a church for a short while, and then became discouraged and decided to have a few drinks with some friends. A few drinks turned into many drinkas many episodes, many situations, and before I knew it I was marriedDuring this time I had started my own Paint contracting business and only hired folks my age that smoked pot so we could take a pot break instead of a coffee break. I had my own business, my own home, a couple of vehicles and was basically sitting on top of the world until I was introduced to cocaine. You know the story. My father found me one day passed out on the floor with my cousin because I did not show up to paint a house on a certain day. He informed me that I was going to close up that whore house I was running and I was going to college. I said sure You are the boss. And that is the way I felt. It was a big resentment that I had. He also had a big resentment because I was drinking and he wasnt He was the most arrogant sober person I had ever seen and that really bothered me. He was very controling and I felt that I could not escape his control unless I was drinking or doing drugs. That was my escape. He had may brother take me to the college to arrange for me to get . He closed up my house, sold it to my brother for an investment and made me move back home. What a plan. I guess he felt that he could control me that way but it didnt work. I just stayed out after work drinking and doing my drugs until I was sure he went to bed I am sure this was one of the resentments he carried around with him for a long time until he had his slip a year or so later.. College seemed to work for me. I found out that I did enjoy studying.

High School was always just a place to hang out. The only thing I was interested in at High School was band. The rest of the time I was working making money. College folks seemed different. But, I noticed that lots of them drank and they had some pretty wild parties. Yet, even though they had wild parties they always magaged to make it through classes. My VA benefits were paying the bill so I was enjoying my new way of life so much that I decided that I needed to move to the college and devot my full time to my studies is what I told my Dad. He agreed after seeing how my grades had improved from High School. I guess we were both trying to fool each other. I got involved with all of the extra curricula activities in the music department since I was a music major. I attended all classes, activities, and of course all parties. I discovered that I could buy a case of the cheap boone farms wine and drink that after my morning classes and maintain until my serious drinking started at night. I had that one figured out. 2 bottles to drink on the way to the liquor store to buy the case and 2 bottles to drink on the way home. That was clear to me at least In the Spring of that year I was heavily involved in a Broadway musical at the college called "Hello Dolly". My parents were looking forward to attending. When I went home to give them their tickets I discovered that they had had a slip and were drunker than two skunks. They managed to make it to the play everynight but life changed again for them and for me. It took that summer to help them recover and when I returned to college I just wasnt enthused about it. I managed to finish the fall quarter but decided after that to work for a while and raise some money to return to school later. It was through a worker at that job that I met my wife. After working through the winter, I took a vacation to Florida to visit my cousins. Me and my younger cousin went on down to Disney world and really did our share of drinking and drugs. When I left from Florida his mother gave me a lecture about how I should be preaching and that I needed to stop that drinking. Everytime I turned on the radio I seemed to hear the same message. So I prayed and asked God for a wife because I thought if I had a wife I could stop drinking. I met my wife the next month when I got home and we eloped and married in Alabama the next month. We have just celebrated 30 years together. My poor sweet wife just didnt know what she was getting into when she married this old drunk. Even though we have had our ups and downs overall to me it has been good.

The marriage didnt stop my drinking. In fact it gave me more reasons to drinkThere were lots of reasons I discovered that I could get drunk over and I did. I blamed her for everything just so I could go get drunk. I still dont know how she put up with me. I have told her that I would have thrown my ass out a thousand times. But she stuck by me. For that I am proud. On my 21st birthday she invited one of my friends out to our house for a little party. About all I can remember is waking up with matches burning my feet. Those rascals had stuck matches between my toes when I was passed out and lit them to wake me up. We moved 2 times in that first year and then my wife became pregnant. It might do me good to sober up I thought so I started attending AA. Things were good. I got sober, went back to college, finished my degree, our son was born, and I bought a new house. We were too successful

Then I had the bright idea that I would go back in the Navy. After getting over 23 letters of reference recommending me to re-enlist I was confronted by the Captain of the Navy in Atlanta, Georgia. He told me that in the best interest of the Navy and me he thought it best not to recommend me for re-enlistment. My bubble was shattered and what do alcoholics do when the rug is pulled out from under them?

We take a drink. I drank hard until I ended up in some detox unit several times I was even put in psychiatric care for a couple of months. When "they" thought Iwas ready they released me and I went back to work with an Ecclesiastical Artist painting a Catholic church. She wanted me to go to New Orleans with her but I decided to go to Savannah Georgia instead and live with my sober alcoholic uncle and work in the Union. Things went well for a while until I moved into a rooming house. Then an apartment. My wife was pregnant and could not travel born in November. All of that time by myself led to loneliness which led to another drink After the baby was born which was a daughter I went to get my wife and children and moved them to Savannah. Work closed up and I went to work playing in a night club where the drinks were free for the band. We didnt play until 9pm but I had to be there by 5 to "set up the equpiment". Yeah I know, it was to drink for 4 hours before getting on stage. Another detox unit. Then I had a spiritual awakening and felt the call to preach. The Bull St. Baptist Church thought I was full of B.S. so didnt get much help there. We ended up going back to our hometown and attending a Pentecostal church in the country where they took me serious with my call to preach. I began to study for the ministry and amazingly got sober in the process. When the pastor ran off with one of the ladies in the church after about a year I was disillusioned. Took a job in Atlanta and started to drink again. This went on for another 6 months until we decided to give the church another try.

Continued

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