What was it like to get sober in the 1940's?
Sober 51 years since 1948 at the age of 26, Don went to his first meeting in Haileybury in northern Ontario (the town later became part of Temiskaming Shores).
Don joined the Royal Canadian Air Force in 1940. He learned to drink while serving in WWII in North Africa.
After the War, he and his wife lived above their grocery store about 5 miles from Haileybury.
His wife was about to divorce him and a drinking buddy and recent AA member was seeking a drunk to work on. That friend died sober with 26 years.
He learned in AA to deal with his psychosis, neurosis, paranoia, manic depressive syndrome, schizophrenia, agnosticism and fear of failure.
He interestingly relates alcoholism to body odor - recovery requires regular cleaning.
He tells a number of jokes to start and ends with the psychiatric hotline bit that I put on the end of lots of CDs.
(45 min) (10.5 MB) (id#1193)