Jim Griffis’ Story
I was born in 1944 in Daytona Beach, Florida. My father was in the Navy when I was born and then after the war he became a policeman in Daytona Beach. I had a brother who was six years older than me. And I also had a brother six years younger.
My older brother, Kenny, quit school in the 10th grade and as soon as he was 17 years old he joined the Army. He was always my hero, my role model, as my father was gone from the time I was 5 years old. He was always into mischief in his adolescence. In the Army he was AWOL for a period of time and had other problems around alcohol drinking. He was eventually discharged from the Army with a Bad Conduct Discharge. He returned to Jacksonville where we were living and kept getting into trouble. First the local county jail and then he continued until he was sent to State Prison. Every time he got into trouble he was drinking. On one occasion he broke into a neighborhood bar, stole money, and when he left, he left his ID in his shirt pocket as he has taken off his shirt while inside the bar. He was not a successful kind of criminal, as he was impaired every time he did some criminal activity. He served his time in the state prison and eventually was paroled to Miami. He was there for about a year, then got into trouble and jumped parole and left the state. He changed his name, and started working as a high rise painter, painting water tanks all over the country. He would drink on the way to the job every morning, and drink all through the day. I never understood how he did not fall, drunk, off of a water tank. When he was 31 he died, drunk, in a car accident in New Mexico.
My younger brother, Buddy, was different. He quit school in his senior year and married a lady 3 years his senior who he had gotten pregnant. They seemed pretty happy, although, he was having problems with alcohol by the time he was in his late teens. They moved to California when he was about 20. He began working as a waiter in different restaurants in the LA area and in Palm Springs in season. He developed a drug problem, and awakened to the fact that he was gay. Needless to say, he was divorced soon after that discovery. On another note, and a different story, I lived in San Diego, in the navy. I had a severe case of the DTs and ended up in a Psych ward at the Navy Hospital. I was there 30 days. I spoke with him on the phone while I was there and he said, “Jimmy, stay away from that alcohol, it will kill you, just do the right drugs and you will be fine.” He went through a long battle with drugs and ended in Ft Lauderdale. I got him out of jail, tried to help him, as I was sober quite a while by then. He said, “you just don’t understand. I just need to leave the drugs alone” I will be fine with just alcohol. He moved to New Orleans and was a bar tender in the French Quarter for a long time. I visited him once and we walked around the quarter and he knew just where to get the big cup of beer for $2, as well as the best restaurant to eat at. Although he did not eat. He drank while I ate. It just got worse. In 1990 I got a call from New Orleans, that he had committed suicide. I went there to identify the body and get all his positions. Everything he had in this world I put in a small suitcase. 40 years old and a hopeless alcoholic. Through the years I tried to get him to go to AA. His answer was, “I’m gay and I know they would make fun of me, and I wouldn’t fit in” After I packed up his apartment and had identified the body, I knew I needed a meeting. I called the AA info line and interestingly enough there was a clubhouse two blocks from the apartment where he had lived. I went to a meeting there and it was about ten minutes into the meeting when I realized that I was the only person in the meeting who was not gay. It was a gay AA clubhouse! 2 blocks from where he lived. A sad ending for my brother. As I always reflect on my relationship with him. I loved him. His words still are so prominent in my heart…….. “Jimmy, stay away from that alcohol, it will kill you”.
My story
My mother and father divorced when I was 5. My Mother remarried within a year. My father was quite the drunkard and my Mother actually married another alcoholic and it turned out he was one who would disappear on payday and come home drunk a few days later and was violent much of the time. We moved from Daytona Beach to Jacksonville when I was in the 4th grade. Due to the disfunction in the home I spent much of the time in central Florida with my Grandmother. My father was in my life sometimes but usually with broken promises and typical alcoholic behavior. At age 12 I had my first drink of alcohol and I loved it. It made me feel like I was as good as everyone else which was new for me. Ages 12 through 16 I drank everytime I had the chance. I worked at a grocery store after school and always tied a line on six packs of beer and eased them down to the ground out the bathroom window. I quit school in the 11 th grade, age 16. Worked various construction helper jobs until I turned 17 then joined the Navy. I fit right in with the drunken sailors. After two years in the Navy I married my childhood sweatheart. We were stationed in Key West and all was well with us. Years later I remember saying to her “you know when we were married I didn’t drink very often at all” She replied, “Yes, but everytime you did drink you got terribly drunk”.
We were divorced after 5 years of marriage. I went back in the Navy after becoming essentially homeless. This began 10 more years of drinking as much as possible and as often as possible. Drugs were something I used when presented with the opportunity. However alcohol was my primary desire. At age 28 I had severe DTs and spent 30 days in a locked mental institution and then continued to drink another 7 years, reeking havoc on my second wife. In 1979 I was in trouble with the navy, having gone on a bender and not going to work, drinking 24 hours per day. My colleagues could only cover for me for a limited period of time. I knew I was in trouble so I went to the Alcohol Rehab center and asked for help. I was admitted to treatment and the first day they told me we were going to AA that night. I told them I didn’t want AA I only wanted treatment….they laughed. So I spent 42 days in treatment which in 1979 was basically indoctrination to AA. During that time I transitioned from just wanting to get out of treatment to a feeling of this life of sobriety just may work. So on the day I got out of treatment I went to an AA meeting and began to feel I was a member of AA. I had a sponsor, didn’t see him much. Got another sponsor who I saw all the time at my meetings. I worked the steps with him. Having reached the 12th step I realized that I had experienced a spiritual awakening.
When I had about 18 months sobriety, I applied for the Navy Counseling School. Was accepted, and spent 4 ½ as a Navy alcohol treatment specialist until my retirement in 1986. In the early 80s the navy wanted to clean up the drunken sailor image. There was a lot of money available and as a GED high school graduate, I was afforded the opportunity and funding to go to College at night and achieve BA and MA degrees in Psychology. Every summer the navy would send me to summer schools for alcohol and drug studies, at Rutgers University, Univ. of Utah, and Univ of California. So as I retired from the Navy, I was very well qualified as an alcohol treatment professional. I have followed that profession all through the years.
Personally, my recovery program has presented many challenges, as with everyone. Sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly, I have reached out to God for solution to lifes challenges. It works, it really does. I believe I learned the AA program in about 18 months. And now I have spent the next 41 years relearning the program over and over. The only thing I really know for sure in this life is God is the answer.
My life consists of AA meetings 5 or 6 times per week, Sponsoring new comers and others with more time. I have dinner with my sponsor every other week. I know he is there for me and that is a comfort daily. My day begins and ends with God. That statement is incongruent with the person who walked into his first AA meeting October 25, 1979. I was an obnoxious agnostic. And underneath just a scared little boy afraid of God and afraid of life.
I remain eternally grateful.
Jim Griffis