Bill W Gets Sober

Daily Gratitude List 11.8.22

I’m grateful for a chilly morning. I’m grateful for a busy day and grateful for new opportunities. I’m grateful to see how writing the ending writes the story. I’m grateful for the ferry. I’m grateful for a clean desk and for coffee. I’m grateful to be sober today.

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Welcome to the Tuesday edition of the Daily Gratitude List, whatever that might mean. First, I would like to extend a personal welcome to the new subscribers—it’s really great to have everyone here. Second, I would like to extend a huge personal thank you to all of the people who have been subscribers—you are the collective straws that stir this non-alcoholic drink.¹ Speaking for myself, Jane and Your Sponsor Tommy, the reason we write this is because it helps keep us sober and being able to share it with all of you is a really tremendous honor—-and that is how I look at it.

Bill W’s sobriety date was December 11, 1934. One of the things I realized as I celebrated my three-year anniversary in October, was that the happy, joyous and free feelings were mixed in with some pretty shitty memories. While October 22, 2019 marks the beginning of my sobriety, the month before was a not a great one for TBD. The feelings of hopeless desperation as you approach the bottom are pretty hard to shake. I think Bill W had a pretty shitty November in 1934.

By November 1934, Bill W realized he was near the end, not of his drinking, of his life. By November 1934, Bill had pursued nearly every treatment available then to people of means. If you pause for a moment and think of the dedication and effort and just sheer drive it took to doggedly pursue that kind of mental health treatment in 1934—it’s pretty inspiring. It should also inform you as to Bill’s absolutely authentic desire for a new way of life. Bill was a serial relapser and I will share with you that coming back after a relapse does not get easier with practice.

Anyway, Bill’s Brother-in-Law agreed to fund another stay at the Charles Towns Hospital at 239 Central Park West. It was during this stay that Bill finally gained critical self-knowledge about the disease of alcoholism that was afflicting him:

It relieved me to learn that in alcoholics, the will is amazingly weakened when it comes to combating liquor…My incredible behavior in the face of a desperate desire to stop was now explained. Understanding myself now, I fared forth in high hope.

Big Book, p. 7

Of course, self-knowledge and knowledge of the disease is not enough and Bill began drinking again. Susan Cheever’s excellent biography, My Name is Bill, tells the story of Bill playing golf on Staten Island on Armistice Day (11-11). Bill had lunch with a new friend, initially declined a drink and then proceeded to lay out his entire theory of alcoholism to his brand new friend, the causes, the potential treatment, all of it. The completely non-ironic part of the story is that when the bartender then offered the men a free drink on account of it being Armistice Day, Bill W, being a veteran of the Great War, accepted and began drinking. Apparently, his companion was horrified. To me, that’s how you know Bill was a real alcoholic—who else would do that?²

Bill describes that lunch this way:

Then came the insidious insanity of that first drink and on Armistice Day 1934, I was off again. Everyone became resigned to the certainty that I would have to be shut-up somewhere, or would stumble along to a miserable end. How dark it is before dawn.

Big Book, p. 8

Ebby Thacher had journeyed to Brooklyn to have dinner with Bill and share the story of his new-found sobriety and it had managed to worm its way into Bill’s thinking. He was still drinking, but something had changed. Susan Cheever tells the story that Bill wandered down to the mission where Ebby was staying on 23rd Street, had a few drinks on his way there, talked with Ebby and friends and then drunkenly shared that he had seen the light and given his life to God.³

246 E. 23rd Street today.

Bill kept drinking a few more days and then checked himself into Towns hospital again. Of course, he showed up drunk with just a few cents in his pocket. After a few days of detox and another visit from Ebby, Bill realized he was at the bottom and prayed his last prayer as an agnostic, “If there be a God, let him show himself!” and had his moment of realization:

Suddenly, my room blazed with an indescribably white light. I was seized with an ecstasy beyond description. Every joy I had known was pale by description…I stood upon a summit where a great wind blew. A wind, not of air, but of spirit. In great, clean strength, it blew right through me. Then came that blazing thought, ‘you are a free man.’

Bill W, p. 94

The whole story is crazy, right? It gets crazier. Bill W, still wearing whatever convalescent gear they provided at Towns Hospital, went to see Dr. Silkworth and told him he had figured out alcoholism and wanted to start working with the other patients. The astonishing thing? Dr. Silkworth said “Yes.” Dr Silkworth described it this way:

Many years ago, one of the leading contributors to this book came under our care in this hospital and while here, he acquired some ideas which he put into practical application at once. Later he requested the privilege of being allowed to tell his story to the other patients here and with some misgivings, we consented.

Big Book, p. xxvii

Haha, “some misgivings,” I’ll bet! Bill W was a lost cause, a chronic relapser who kept telling everyone he really, really wanted to change, but just kept drinking. The kind of drinker who lays out his theory of alcoholism to a brand new friend, AT A BAR, and then punctuates his presentation with a drink. And then he wasn’t. The change wasn’t to his circumstances, his finances, his relationships with other people; the change was to his heart. The miracle was that he finally found courage; that is, the ability to put his heart at the center of his life.⁴

Bill started working with other alcoholics, and while the message didn’t always take root in the new subjects, Bill discovered he was staying sober. That’s the miracle of AA: Helping other alcoholics is the key to our own recovery. How Bill found that thread in the darkest days of his drinking is amazing, but the real miracle came when he began authentically sharing his story with other alcoholics. It was impossible to ignore the truth of Bill’s conversion, even a jaded doctor who knew that most of his patients were goners, saw that things had changed in Bill and let him try. That’s how it started, and that’s still how it works.

Thanks for Letting Me Share

1. That came out not sounding as cool as it was meant to be. Sorry.

2. This is also why A Million Little Pieces is one of my favorite books. Who but a real alcoholic would try to claim a clearly fictional account of time in rehab was true—and do it on national TV with Oprah?

3. My Name is Bill, p. 116-17.

4. For a refresher on the definition of “courage”:

Liner Notes for Episodes 22 and 23