Senior Seeks Serenity
The plus-side of getting sober after sixty

   I came from a long line of alcoholics: my grandfather and grandmother, my father and mother, and many aunts and uncles. I had my first drink at age fourteen, but started weekly drinking at sixteen. I was a "dance band" musician, and I found out that bartenders did not card band members in a band uniform.

When I went away to college, I partied at least once a week. When I came home to New Mexico, I continued college locally. It was after Korea, but before Vietnam, and they were still drafting young men like me, so to avoid being drafted I joined an Army National Guard band unit. That group really taught me to drink. During our two week encampment, we tried to stay drunk as much as possible. Since we were stationed just across the border from Mexico, we had an unending and cheap source of booze. After eight years in that outfit, I was a pro at drinking.

   My mother died in a situation involving alcohol and, a few years later, my father died directly from alcoholism. But I did not see that my mother was an alcoholic and that my father died as a "brown-bagger" in a hotel for drunks, so I did not learn from their deaths. After all, I was not a "brown-bagger." I just drank a little too much.

   I graduated college and got a job as a teacher. I taught band and later history for thirty-six years. I got married and had two wonderful boys. And I began drinking every day. I don't know when I slipped over into alcoholism, but it was probably in my mid- to late-forties. By nature I am not a morning person, but I was a very hard-working and conscientious teacher, so I would force myself to get up really early so I could get to school early to do all the extra work that is necessary if you are a good teacher. Then I could leave as soon as the teacher-bell rang and go home and drink. What insanity this disease causes!

Another insane alcoholic trait of mine was to get drunk and then see how sober I could appear. I would really concentrate on appearing and sounding sober. Later, when I got sober and was making amends, I found out I did a pretty good job of it. Many of those I made amends to when I got into the program were astonished that I was an alcoholic, but I did not fool all of them.

   I drank through my entire thirty-six year teaching career and retired at fifty-nine. Then I really started to drink, because I could drink all day. My pretending to be sober started to wear thin with my wife and other close relatives, though. They began to see through my act. When you drink a 1.75 liter bottle of gin every couple of days, it starts to come out your pores. Thoughts of suicide started to come more frequently. Nightly, I'd wake up at three or four in the morning in a sweat with feelings of guilt. I would vow not to drink any more, but the next day I was off again.

   Then our oldest son and his wife and daughter decided to move back to New Mexico. They moved in with us until we could work out living arrangements for them. My son figured out how much I was drinking and where I was doing it. I had a detached workshop that was an ideal place to hide and drink my gin. But now when I snuck over there to have a drink, my son showed-up when I came out and said, "Having a little nip, huh?" Then one night he said "You are going to end up just like your father! You will never live to see your granddaughter grow up." That really got me. I really loved my granddaughter, so for the first time I saw what I had become. It was the week before Easter in 2000. I was sixty-three years old.

   I called the local AA central office to inquire about meetings. The lady on the phone said it might be good if I came down and picked up a schedule. In a couple of days, while still drinking but, which I realized later, with my Higher Power in control, I went to get that schedule. Behind the desk was a gentleman who looked as if he were in my age bracket. I told him I thought I might need AA. He gave me a schedule and a very brief version of his story. I opened up the schedule expecting to see a few meetings. What I saw was hundreds of meetings. I had no idea there were so many people like myself out there. I said, "I don't know where to start." He said, "Well, I go to a meeting called Seniors Seeking Serenity" and showed me on the schedule when and where it met. I took the schedule and went home. I had a good stiff drink and looked at a lot of meetings on the list, but kept coming back to that Seniors Seeking Serenity meeting. People my age might understand where I'm at, I thought. I also read the Twelve Steps for the first time, which were on the schedule. I knew nothing about AA. The information on the schedule was my first contact with it. That was Wednesday. I continued to drink until the day before Easter. I drank even more than usual, as I felt this might be my last. I had a rough Easter and still had so much gin in my system that I call the next day my sobriety date.

   The "senior" meeting was on Wednesday, so I had a couple of very hard sober days. I started getting the shakes on Wednesday morning. I remember saying to myself, If this meeting does not work, I am going to get a bottle on the way home. I got to the meeting early as I was not completely sure of the location. I scared the lady who was there making the coffee, but I bet I was a lot more scared. She immediately put me at ease. She was wonderful, so loving and gracious. More people started wandering in. They were joking around and seemed so happy. I was not happy at that point.

   The meeting started, and after the readings I introduced myself. I said I was an alcoholic because everyone else did, but I don't think I really thought so. I just thought I drank too much. Someone said, "Let's have a First Step meeting." Then everyone began to tell a short version of their story. I heard my story in parts of theirs over and over. I remember many stories were not about "brown-baggers" like my father, but about people like myself who drank and somehow continued to function somewhat in life. Then I heard how, through this program, they got sober and stayed that way and how their lives became better. I don't remember all the details of the meeting, but something profound happened to me there. My Higher Power came through. I did not realize it until many months later, but when I left that meeting my shakes had stopped and I felt a profound peace. I also lost the desire to take a drink. I had somehow done the first three Steps.

   One real character in the group, but a real rock of AA, said to me "Al, either get a bottle or a Big Book on the way home." Thanks to my Higher Power, I got the Big Book, and it was about five bucks cheaper than that bottle of gin I would have bought.

I will have five years of sobriety on April 24, 2005, and that Seniors Seeking Serenity group I first went to is my home group. I proudly serve as its GSR. The understanding man who was at the desk at the central office when I came to get a schedule is my sponsor. And that schedule that got me to my first meeting and where I first saw the Twelve Steps--I now edit for the central office. I also serve on the central office's steering committee.

   In addition, I serve a desk shift at the central office so I can be there when other alcoholics' Higher Power leads them there. Because I'm retired, service work is not a burden; it is a joyful part of my day.

Even though I had a sudden transformation at that first meeting, I believe I would have gone back to drinking if I had not done a lot of hard work on the Steps, attended a lot of meetings, and got a sponsor. At my age, I could not go in and out of sobriety the way so many others had. If I went out, it would probably mean death.

   In my Seniors Seeking Serenity group, a lot of people have twenty, thirty, and forty years of sobriety. That made me realize at my age I needed to be on the fast-track to gain what they had. I listened to them very closely and tried to adjust my thinking to theirs. This works to some extent, but some things just take time.

   Getting sober after sixty is not only doable, but has some pluses: You have the time to work at AA full time. You can get in lots of meetings in the first ninety days, and you have time to think about your past life, where you are going, and how to get there. It also gives you lots of time to work on "the spiritual end of things" that is so important to this program. I am not recommending that anyone wait until they are in their sixties to get sober, but if, like me, it takes you that long to realize you're a drunk, it's not too late, nor is it going to be that hard because of your age.

   My life today is at it's zenith. I have never been happier or felt better about myself.

Al J. Albuquerque, New Mexico

Copyright © The AA Grapevine, Inc. February 2005. Reprinted with permission.