AN INTERVIEW WITH THE AUTHOR
of
"DOCTOR, ALCOHOLIC,
ADDICT"
July 1975 Dr. Paul's
story "Doctor, Alcoholic,
Addict" was published in the
Third Edition of the Big Book; his
remarks on acceptance, which appear
on pages 449 and 450 (page 417 Fourth
Edition), have been helpful to many
AA members over the years. This
interview was conducted by telephone
to Dr. Paul's home in California.
Grapevine:
How did you come to write the story
that's in the Big Book?
Dr. Paul:
The editor of the Grapevine - a
woman named Paula C. - was also the
chair-person of the committee to
review the stories. She wrote to
tell me that the magazine was going
to use an article I'd written on why
doctors shouldn't prescribe pills
for alcoholics. So she knew my
writing a little bit and she asked
me if I had a dual problem and would
I be willing to write an article
about it for consideration in the
Big Book. My reaction to that was
the same as my reaction when it was
suggested I come to AA - I thought
it was one of the dumbest ideas I'd
ever heard and I ignored her letter.
Later on she called and asked for
the article, and I lied and said I
hadn't had time to write it. She
extended the deadline and called me
a second time. I had a gal working
in the office with me who was in the
program, and she thought it would be
nice to have typed a story that
might end up in the Big Book, so she
said to me, "You write it, I'll
type it, and we'll send it in."
So that's what we did. But by that
time they had done another printing
of the Second Edition, and I
thought, “Fine, that means they
won't use it.” But Paula said she
liked it and the Grapevine published
it with the title "Bronzed
Moccasins" and an illustration
of a pair of bronze moccasins.
Eventually it was put in the Big
Book, but the title was changed, and
my guess is that they wanted to show
that an alcoholic could be a
professional and be an addict, but
that wouldn't make him not an
alcoholic. It worked well but maybe
it overshot the mark, and now one of
the most uncomfortable things for me
is when people run up to me at a
meeting and tell me how glad they
are the story is in the book. They
say they've been fighting with their
home group because their home group
won't let them talk about drugs. So
they show their group the story and
they say, "By God, now you'll
have to let me talk about
drugs." And I really hate to
see the story as a divisive thing. I
don't think we came to AA to fight
each other.
Grapevine:
Is there anything you regret having
written in your story?
Dr. Paul: Well, I
must say I'm really surprised at the
number of people who come up to me
and ask me confidentially if what
they've heard on the very best
authority - usually from their
sponsor - is true: that there are
things in my story I want to change,
or that I regret having written it,
or that I want to take it out
because it says so much about drugs,
or that I've completely changed my
mind that AA is the answer, or even
that acceptance is the answer. I've
also heard - on the best authority!
- that I've died or gotten drunk or
taken pills. The latest one was that
my wife Max died and that I got so
depressed I got drunk. So, is there
anything I'd like to change? No. I
believe what I said more now than
when I wrote it.
Grapevine:
Do you think that your story might
help those who are dually addicted?
Dr. Paul: I think
the story makes clear the truth that
an alcoholic can also be an addict,
and indeed that an alcoholic has a
constitutional right to have as many
problems as he wants! But I also
think that if you're not an
alcoholic, being an addict doesn't
make you one. The way I see it, an
alcoholic is a person who can't
drink and who can't use drugs, and
an addict is a person who can't use
drugs and can't drink. But that
doesn't mean that every AA meeting
has to be open to a discussion of
drugs if it doesn't want to. Every
meeting has the right to say it
doesn't want drugs discussed. People
who want to discuss drugs have other
places where they can go to talk
about that. And AA is very open to
giving the Steps and Traditions to
other groups who want to use them. I
know this from my own experience,
because I wrote to the General
Service Office and got permission to
start Pills Anonymous and Chemical
Dependency Anonymous. I did that
when I was working in the field of
chemical dependency. We started
groups but I didn't go to them
because I get everything I need from
AA.
I don't have any
trouble staying away from talking
about drugs, and I never introduce
myself as an alcoholic/addict. I'm
annoyed - or maybe irritated is a
better word - by the people who keep
insisting that AA should broaden to
include drugs and addictions other
than alcohol. In fact I hear it said
that AA should change its name to
Addicts Anonymous. I find that a
very narrow-minded view based on
people's personal opinions and not
on good sense. History tells us that
the Washingtonians spread themselves
so thin they evaporated. Jim B. says
the greatest thing that ever
happened in AA was the publication
of the Big Book, because it put in
writing what the program was and
made it available all over the
world. So wherever you go it's the
same program. I don't see how you
could change the program unless you
change the book and I can't see that
happening.
Grapevine:
It's a question of singleness of
purpose?
Dr. Paul: That
singleness of purpose thing is so
significant. It seems to be working;
why would we change it? I can't
think of any change that would be an
improvement.
Grapevine:
Nowadays drunks often come to
meetings already dried out, but that
wasn't always the case.
Dr. Paul: No, it
wasn't. You don't get Twelfth Step
calls as dramatic as they used to
be. Now I find that if you're called
upon to make a Twelfth Step call,
it'll be on somebody who is in the
hospital. You find out when they're
available and not in some other kind
of meeting, and make an appointment.
But this might change as the number
of treatment programs begins to fade
out. I used to make "cold
turkey" calls, where the
alcoholic hadn't asked for help. One
time I went to see this guy who was
described to me as a big husky
fellow. He was holed up in a motel.
I found out from the manager of the
motel that he was on the second
floor, and as I was walking up the
outside stairs to get to his place,
I thought to myself, if this guy
comes charging out the door, he
could easily throw me over the stair
railing and I'd end up on the
concrete.
So I thought, well, the good news is
I'd probably be one of AA's first
martyrs. Then I thought, yeah, but
I'd be an anonymous martyr. I made
the call anyhow, and he got sober
for a while.
Grapevine:
In your Big Book story, you say that
acceptance is the key to everything.
I wonder if you've ever had a
problem accepting what life hands
you.
Dr. Paul: I think
today that my job really is to enjoy
life whether I like it or not. I
don't like everything I have to
accept. In fact, if everything was
to my specifications and desires
there would be no problem with
acceptance. It's accepting things I
don't like that is difficult. It's
accepting when I'm not getting my
own way. Yes, I find it very
difficult at times.
Grapevine:
Anything specific?
Dr. Paul: Nothing
major, though it sometimes seems
major that I have to accept living
with my wife Max and her ways of
doing things! She is an entirely
different person than I am. She
likes clutter, I like things
orderly. She thinks randomly and I
like structured thinking. We're
very, very different. We never
should have gotten married! Last
December we were married fifty-five
years.
Grapevine:
I guess she knows your thoughts on
this matter.
Dr. Paul: Ad nauseum.
Grapevine:
You're still going to meetings?
Dr. Paul:
I'd say five or six a week.
Grapevine:
Do you and Max go to meetings
together?
Dr. Paul: Max isn't
in AA, she's in Al-Anon and she's
still very active in it. But I go to
Al-Anon too, and that helps a great
deal, and Max comes to open AA
meetings with me and that helps too.
It's kind of like Elsa C. used to
say: when two people have their
individual programs, it's like
railroad tracks, two separate and
parallel rails, but with all those
meetings holding them together.
Grapevine:
Do you think you'd still be married
if you hadn't gone to meetings all
these years?
Dr. Paul: I'm sure
we wouldn't. I initially thought
that the Serenity Prayer said I'd
have to change the things I couldn't
accept. So I thought, well, we can't
get along so it's time to change the
marriage. I used to go around
looking for old-timers who would
agree with me and say that's what
the Serenity Prayer meant. But Max
and I finally made a commitment to
the marriage and stopped talking
about divorce and started working
our programs. In fact we tend to
sponsor each other, which is a
dangerous thing to do, but we help
each other see when we need more
meetings, or need to work a certain
Step or something like that.
Grapevine:
Do you have, or did you have, a
sponsor?
Dr. Paul: Early on I
was talking to a friend of mine,
Jack N., who was sober a couple of
months longer than I was. Jack and
his wife and Max and I used to go to
AA speaker meetings together. I was
telling him how my home group was
nagging at me because I didn't have
a sponsor, and on the spur of the
moment I said, "Why don't you
be my sponsor?" and on the spur
of the moment he said to me,
"I'll be your sponsor if you'll
be my sponsor." And I said,
"I don't know if they'll allow
that." But we decided to try it
and it worked out. He calls me
because I'm his sponsor and I call
him because he's my sponsor so I
guess we call each other twice as
often. We're still sponsoring each
other. That's been going on for
twenty-seven years. He moved to L.A.
but we stay in touch, mostly by
phone.
Grapevine:
Is there a tool or a slogan or a
Step that is particularly useful to
you right now?
Dr. Paul: Pretty
much every morning, before I get out
of bed, I say the Serenity Prayer,
the Third Step Prayer, and the
Seventh Step Prayer. Then Max and I
repeat those prayers along with oer
prayers and meditations at
breakfast. And I say those three
prayers repeatedly throughout the
day.
I grew up thinking that I had to
perfect my personality, then I got
into AA, and AA said, no, that isn't
the way we do it: only God can
remove our defects. I was amazed to
find that I couldn't be a better
person simply by trying harder!
What I've done with a number of
problems - like fear and depression
and insomnia - is to treat them as
defects of character, because they
certainly affect my personality
adversely. With depression, I've
never taken any antidepressants.
Instead, with any defect I want to
get rid of, I become willing to have
it removed, then I ask God to remove
it, then I act like he has. Now, I
know God has a loophole that says
he'll remove it unless it's useful
to you or to my fellows. So I tell
him I'd like my defect removed
completely, but he can sleep on it,
and in the morning he can give me
the amount he wants me to have, and
I'll accept it as a gift from him.
I'll take whatever he gives me. I've
never done that when he hasn't
removed a great deal of my defect,
but I've never done it when he has
permanently and totally removed any
defect. But the result is that I no
longer fight myself for having it.
Grapevine:
That's a helpful way of seeing
things. It makes defects into a
gift.
Dr. Paul: That's
right. And it's the Rule Sixty-two
business [see Twelve Steps and
Twelve Traditions, p. 149]. It's
like Father Terry always says,
"Be friendly with your
defects." In fact some poet
said, "Hug your demon,
otherwise it'll bite you in the
ass." Poets can talk like that.
Grapevine:
Has your sponsoring changed over the
years?
Dr. Paul: I do a lot
more stuff by telephone. When I'm
speaking at a meeting, if I think of
it, I give out my home phone number.
So I get a lot of phone calls from
all over the country. People ask me
if I'm willing to help them as a
sponsor and I tell them, well, you
call me every day for thirty days,
or maybe sixty or ninety or
whatever, and then they call me
every day, and we get to know each
other, and during that time we find
out what it's like to be relating to
each other. It's kind of a
probationary period. Then if they
still want me to be their sponsor,
we'll go ahead and if they don't, we
move on and there's no loss. And
this gets them accustomed to
calling, so when they have a
problem, they don't have to analyze
it at great depth and decide if it's
bad enough that they should bother
me with a phone call. I haven't
personally been doing each Step
individually with people as much,
but I've redone all the Steps myself
on an average of every five years.
And every time I've done that, my
sobriety has stepped up to a new
plateau, just like the first time I
did them.
Sometimes people call me because
they're feeling in a funk, their
sponsor has moved away or died, or
they've moved away from their
sponsor, or the meetings don't mean
much anymore. They aren't getting
anything out of AA. And because of
my relationship with pills, I've had
a lot of people come to me and say
they've got - what do you call it? -
a "chemical imbalance."
They're seeing a counselor who says,
"Yeah, you're depressed,"
and the counselor wants to start
them on an antidepressant. My
suggestion is, if you want to do
something like that and you haven't
done the Steps in a number of years,
do the Steps first. And repeatedly
people will do that and decide they
don't need the pills.
Grapevine:
When you speak at out-of-state AA
meetings, does Max go with you?
Dr. Paul: I don't go
unless she goes.
Grapevine:
Why not?
Dr. Paul: Because I
decided I didn't come to AA to
become a traveling salesman and be
away from home. So we go where it's
a big enough event that they can
take us both. And what's really more
fun is if it's a mixed event where
Max can speak, especially if she
gets to speak first. She likes that.
She likes to say that I say that she
tells a perverted version of my
drinking story. Then she points out
that I was the one who was drinking
and she was the one who was sober.
Grapevine:
There are many more young people in
the Fellowship now. Do you think
young people have special problems
because they're getting sober at
such an early age?
Dr. Paul: People
always say they're so glad to see
the young people come in, and I
agree, but I'm glad to see the old
people come in too. I like to see
anybody get sober. It's hard to say
whether your pain is greater than my
pain or mine's greater than yours.
I'm sure that young people have
problems, but we all have problems -
gays have problems, people who are
addicted to other drugs have
problems, single people have
problems. I can't think of anything
more of a problem than being a woman
alcoholic trying to get sober,
married to a practicing alcoholic
male, and with a handful of kids.
That must be about as big a problem
as you can get. Everybody has
special problems.
I've said it often and I haven't had
any reason to change my mind: the
way I see it, I've never had a
problem and nobody will ever come to
me with a problem such that there
won't be an answer in the Steps.
That gives me a great deal of
confidence.
I think the program - the Steps -
covers everything conceivable. I'm
getting way off from what you asked
me. I can't give short answers. I
often tell people that the more I
know about something, the shorter
the answer, but when I don't know, I
just make up stuff.
Grapevine:
Did you find it helpful at some
point to become familiar with the
Traditions?
Dr. Paul: I
find the Steps easier to understand
than the Traditions an the
Traditions easier to understand than
the Concepts. In fact, I find the
long form of the Traditions
considerably easier to under-stand
than the short form, and I find that
the long form is much more specific
on the idea that AA is for
alcoholics and not for just anybody
who wants to come in. A lot of
people like that phrase "The
only requirement for membership is a
desire to stop drinking," and
people interpret that to mean that
if you're willing to not drink, you
can call yourself an alcoholic and a
member of AA. That's not at all what
it says. I think it means that if
you're an alcoholic with a desire to
stop drinking, that's the only
requirement for membership.
Grapevine:
How many years have you been sober
now?
Dr. Paul:
Twenty-seven.
Grapevine:
Twenty-seven years of meetings. Have
you seen any changes in the way the
meetings are conducted?
Dr. Paul: All I see
is that there are more meetings and
bigger meetings and more variety of
meetings. I just love to see AA
grow. I enjoy meetings. I've been to
meetings in Singapore and Hong Kong
and Japan, but I think the most
interesting was when Chuck C. and Al
D. and I were vacationing in the
Cayman Islands and we couldn't find
any meetings. We were twelfth
stepping alcoholics there and we
decided we all needed a meeting, so
we went to the local newspaper and
got some publicity. We had a public
information meeting, and we got a
regular meeting started. As far as I
know, that meeting is still going.
Grapevine:
So you haven't gotten bored by
Alcoholics Anonymous.
Dr. Paul: Well, I
thought about that some years back.
Why is it that so many people aren't
around any more? Where do they go?
It seems to me that most of the
people who leave AA leave because of
boredom. I made up my mind I wasn't
going to get bored, and one of the
things I do when I get bored, if I
can't think of anything else to do,
is to start a new meeting. I've
probably started fifteen or twenty.
The most recent one was last
November. I got a couple of friends
together and we started a "joy
of sobriety" meeting - it's a
one-hour topic discussion meeting
and it has to be a topic out of the
Big Book and it has to be on the
program and how you enjoy living the
program. It's fast-moving and we
just have a lot of fun. It's a great
antidote for depression.
Grapevine:
What's the most important thing
you've gotten from AA?
Dr. Paul: This whole
thing is so much more than just
sobriety. To be sober and continue
the life I had before - that would
have driven me back to drink. One of
the things I really like about AA is
that we all have a sense of
direction, plus a roadmap telling us
precisely how to get there. I like
that. All I want out of AA is more
and more and more until I'm gone.
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