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Gail shares how alcoholism has affected her family.
Gail:
Well for me, when I think about breaking the chain in my family, that’s a really sore spot for me and I am going to try to get through this without crying, but I haven’t spoken to my mom in four or five years, or my sister.
When I was, like my biological father was an alcoholic and I believe I was 2-years-old when he left, but I don’t remember him.
I just remember hearing he was drunk. He was no good and that was it. Nobody ever, ever spoke of it.
Well when I turned 40 I was drinking but I wasn’t at the worst of my disease. I went on lying and I wanted to research my father, my biological father because I had never seen him before.
I thought, well I could bump into him on the street and I would never know who he was. So I wanted to meet him.
And I knew that my mother had said, “If you ever contact him I will disown you.” But I am 40-years-old and I just needed to know. I am the baby and I just needed to know. Nobody else would tell me what really happened.
And my intent was to find him and go, “You piece of crap, where were you my whole life?” But when I got to him he had suffered a severe stroke and couldn’t talk.
So my intentions were then shattered and then when I went home, my mother found out through my ex-husband that I had contacted my biological father and she disowned me.
Two years ago when my brother passed away the family was here, was in our town and we were kind of talking briefly just because of the medical decisions that were made and my mother was overheard saying, “Well as soon as Mike has passed Gail’s going to be out of our life again.”
So she lost a child and then through one away. She doesn’t speak to my daughter, which, you know, that hurts because she is a kid. She didn’t do anything.
You know, I sent cards, Christmas cards, Mother’s Day cards, all to be sent back. Those are the things of my past that I haven’t been able to clean up yet but it’s in God’s time not in my time.
I know that I have done my best and that I might, she might go to the grave before I have a chance to make my amends to her, that I know that I did everything in my power.
So I have an old brother and, so as far as how it has affected my immediate family, I don’t really know. I mean I know my nephews. They are two – 23, 24. They are in the Marines and they are really proud of me and my brother is real proud of me and they tell me that all the time.
So to be able to break the chain I am being able to save my daughter’s life, something that nobody can, nobody in my family has been able to do and I guess that’s what’s most important.
It saved my life because I recognized it, 29 years later, but you know, the bottom line is I am just going to keep staying sober and it doesn’t matter what happens with them if they are willing to ever talk to me again or not.
I am not going to pick up over it. I don’t have to drink today and I am not going to and I just have to give it to God and keep my expectations real.
She might not ever forgive me and that’s something that she lives with and that, you know, that’s kind of not my control. I don’t have any control over somebody else. So it’s like not my hula-hoop.
I have to live in my recovery life on a day-to-day basis and I know that no matter what I don’t have to pick up a drink whether I have a thank you from them or I don’t have a congratulations from them.
My sister, she is a year older than me, she believed her teenager daughter told her that I had pinned her in the lady’s room and this was while I was sober and she got an order protection against me.
And I said, “Well I am going to fight it.” So I went, I fought it and I went before the judge and I brought my family. She brought her family. My mother did not attend, coincidentally.
And I told the judge, I said, “This didn’t happen. There was 300 people there and if there was 300 people there, there was no way I could have cornered her in the lady’s room. I believe that my sister is trying to damage my recovery and she is trying to get me upset so that I’ll get drunk, and that’s what I believe her intent is. Her intent is to sabotage my recovery, your honor.”
And the judge agreed and he dismissed the case and that’s something my sister has to live with.
I got up there and told the truth and the family that I do have surrounding me, my nephews and my great nephews and my daughter and my ex-husband and I are great friends today.
You know I apologize to him for what I did. I traded, I chased that drink and I chased it away from him.
Who does that? It’s tough, it’s tough to realize what you did for that next drink. The people you hurt, you manipulate.
But, you know, with the love and support that I have from my friends and from my small immediate family, I am blessed. I am really blessed. I have a great life today.
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Interview Scheduled By In The Rooms®: A Global Recovery Community.
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Gail,
June 27, 2010 - 9:08amYour great and we think the world of you. Keep up all the good work and know that we are here for you. Joni
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