Walking Toward The Light

Don’s Story

I was born in Evanston, IL in 1950. Evanston is the suburb on the Northern Chicago border, on Lake Michigan. I was an only child. My parents both worked and my grandmother took care of me during the day. My parents and I were very close. They didn’t have much money so we were home most of the time. We were very happy, but God was not part of our lives. Everything was fine until my Dad died of a heart attack when I was 15. My Mom started drinking heavily. The whole world turned upside down. I learned from watching her how to medicate myself, so I started stealing alcohol from her. It wasn’t hard as she started having parties and I would serve drinks to her guests. When I was seventeen she signed for an apartment for me and she moved to California. There I was a seventeen year old alcoholic with his own apartment in 1967 in a college town. It wasn’t long before I was using drugs with the alcohol which was still my drug of choice. By the time I was 20 I was a binge drinker, one week on, and a few days off with only beer. By the time I was 22 I had been through the DTs one and had attempted suicide twice.

On 4/15/73 at 10:32am (I can still picture the clock) I stopped the machine I was running at work, and called Alcoholics Anonymous. They said someone would come to the house that evening. I went back to work and got scared because I just realized what I had done. That night two men came to the house and took me out for coffee. We talked about sobriety, serenity, and anonymity. I am not even sure if I knew what those words meant. The next day they took me to my first AA meeting. I was very sick. It was an open meeting on Clark Street in Chicago, with about 100 people in the room. I just remember having the shakes and sweats and getting sick while the speaker talked about the words I didn’t understand. I couldn’t sleep a full night for about 2 weeks. The sweats and shakes tapered off but lasted for many weeks. I don’t ever want to go through that again.

Now was the beginning of my life. I was married within a year. I quit going to AA meetings right away. I was sober what more did I need. I fell into a heavy depression for about 5 years. Those were probably the worst years of my life. I hated who I was, and was treating everyone around me accordingly. I was in the midst of a 32 year career of bill collections, and became a workaholic, food-aholic, or just plain an obsessive person who still acted like a drunk only sober. In 1986 I had emergency open heart surgery. In 1987 my folks retired to Wisconsin, and both got Cancer. We moved there to take care of them. In 1989 My stepfather died. In1990 my father in law my Brother in law died, and my Mom died. At that time a friend at work came to me wanting me to sponsor him in Alcoholics Anonymous. I think that was God’s way of getting me serious again about reaching out to other alcoholics.

My wife and I were living in Wisconsin in all the beauty, and only saw ugliness. In 1994 we separated.

This is when I really began to realize there was a God. I had some idea when I had the surgery, but now I was living in a cabin on a lake, with the mice, red squirrels and whatever else was living there. The snow was coming in the corners of the building, and all in all was a rough place to live. I finally decided it was time to try to end my life, or start drinking, or start over. I cried out to God and let him make the decision. He decided I would start over. I fell into another marriage that probably shouldn’t of been, in 1997. Looking back, this is one of the things in my life that pointed me to God. I gave my life to Christ in April 1998. I got real serious about working the 12 steps in a way I never had. I did a self examination, which changed my life. I was cleansed by Jesus in a way I didn't know was possible. Our marriage was destructive, and we divorced 4 years later.

Sometime in my life I contracted Hepatitis C, possibly as early as 1965. Being a new disease the doctors didn't know it and kept telling me I just had stress. It got serious in 1999. This disease is horrible, with many side effects. But the biggest one is how it affects your thinking. The doctor told me if I took treatment it could kill me, and if I didn't I would surely die. This brought me closer to God than ever. I prayed about it for a month, and faced my faith. Once I was no longer afraid to die,  I was ready to take the treatment. God and I walked through the toughest time of my life.  Part way through treatment Linda left. I almost died that month. I was giving myself the treatment at home. That Christmas eve I sat there so alone and instead of taking the shot I was tempted to mainline it. I figured let’s get this over with. So I again prayed to God do I live or die. The decision was again to live. That next week God did what he always does. He gave me some work to do. I suddenly was in charge of the mailings for an on line ministry I was involved in called Christians in Recovery. This became a passion, and gave me the purpose to get through those times. Through all of this I got into the Bible in a very real way. As sick as I was I kept getting this urge to move to Colorado and do street ministry. I had been there when I was a child and loved it. So I went through six weeks of arguing with God saying, “You know I am sick, why do you want me to move”?  In that six weeks I was receiving Bible verses coming to me from all different sources that laid out God’s purpose for my life. I finished treatment for the Hepititus C, and it became dormant. Weak and sick, I jumped in the car and drove through a five state blizzard to Colorado, with the praise tapes blazing. As crazy as this sounds, I was on my way to see what God had for me. As soon as I arrived in Colorado Springs, I knew I was home. I went back home, sold my house, and moved to Colorado Springs.

I have gone through many medical issues in the last 26 years, and am now on disability. God keeps me alive, and I have dedicated my life to him. I have now been doing street ministry in one shape or another since 2002. I have tried to help fellow alcoholics since 1973. I am not saying these things to brag. I am a sober drunk, who God has chosen to work through. I look at my life and realize that being willing to do God’s work I have been slowly becoming the man he intended me to be, and hopefully some people’s lives are better for it. All the success or money in the world could never replace that.  

I guess the main thing I want to say is that through everything God has been there even though I not only didn’t know him, but denied that he existed. I had many close calls in my life in my addictive life style, attempted suicide, bill collecting, etc. but God kept me alive through it all. Now I know that he is always there and I now know what the words sobriety and serenity, and anonymity mean, only through the grace of God. I understand today that living my life for God, and not myself is how it is supposed to be. Once we surrender our lives to him, and make ourselves available to him, he takes care of the rest. 

Favorite Verses

1Peter 4:1

1Peter 5:10

I have grown very close to 3 verses that have become a pattern of life for me. They are:

PHP 3:13-14 Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.

1TH 5:16 Be joyful always; 17 pray continually; 18 give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.

2CO 7:1 Dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God.