Big Book Sober

Big Book and AA Saved Me. Last drink 11/21/1997. Sober, Happy, Joyous, and Free. My life is full of luxury problems. Will faithfully send Big Book in Order

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Many of us felt that we had plenty of character. There was a tremendous urge to cease forever. p.34 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Whether such a person can quit upon a nonspiritual basis depends upon the extent to which he has already lost the power to choose whether he will drink or not. p.34 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Some will be drunk the day after making their resolutions; most of them within a few weeks. For those who are unable to drink moderately the question is how to stop altogether. We are assuming, of course, that the reader desires to stop. p.34 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Though you may be able to stop for a considerable period, you may yet be a potential alcoholic. We think few, to whom this book will appeal can stay dry anything like a year. p.34 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

If he is a real alcoholic and very far advanced, there is scant chance of success. In the early days of our drinking we occasionally remained sober for a year or more, becoming serious drinkers again later.p.34 #BigBook #AA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

As we look back, we feel we had gone on drinking many years beyond the point where we could quit on our will power. If anyone questions whether he has entered this dangerous area, let him try leaving liquor alone for one year. p.34 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

We, who are familiar with the symptoms, see large numbers of potential alcoholics among young people everywhere. But try and get them to see it! p.33-34 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Potential female alcoholics often turn into the real thing and are beyond recall in a few years. Certain drinkers, who would be greatly insulted if called alcoholics, are astonished at their inability to stop. p.33 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

To be gravely affected, one does not necessarily have to drink a long time nor take the quantities some of us have. This is particularly true of women. p.33 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Several of our crowd, men of thirty or less, had been drinking only a few years, but they found themselves as helpless as those who had been drinking twenty years. p.33 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

We doubt if many of them can do it, because none will really want to stop, and hardly one of them, because of the peculiar mental twist already acquired, will find he can win out. p.33 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Young people may be encourage by this man's experience to think that they can stop, as he did, on their own will power.p.33 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Commencing to drink after a period of sobriety, we are in a short time as bad as ever. If we are planning to stop drinking, there must be no reservation of any kind, nor any lurking notion that someday we will be immune to alcohol. p.33 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

But here is a man who at fifty-five years found he was just where he had left off at thirty. We have seen the truth demonstrated again and again: "Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic." p.33 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Though a robust man at retirement, he went to pieces quickly and was dead within four years. This case contains a powerful lesson. Most of us have believed that if we remained sober for a long stretch, we could thereafter drink normally. p.33 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Then, gathering all his forces, he attempted to stop altogether and found he could not. Every means of solving his problem which money could buy was at his disposal. Every attempt failed. p.32-33 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Out came his carpet slippers and a bottle. In two months he was in a hospital, puzzled and humiliated. He tried to regulate his drinking for a while, making several trips to the hospital meantime. p.32 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

Then he fell victim to a belief which practically every alcoholic has-that his long period of sobriety and self-discipline had qualified him to drink as other men. p.32 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

He made up his mind that until he had been successful in business and had retired, he would not touch another drop. An exceptional man, he remained bone dry for twenty-five years and retired at age of fifty-five, after a successful and happy business career. p.32 #BigBook #AA #XA

[Big Book Sober @First164SavedMe]

He was very nervous in the morning after these bouts and quieted himself with more liquor. He was ambitious to succeed in business, but saw that he would get nowhere if he drank at all. Once he started, he had no control whatever. p.32 #BigBook #AA #XA