My Vicious Cycle of Alcoholism: From a Life on the Streets to Sobriety and Freedom

by Cherokee
(California)

My drinking lead me down a path of self destruction and torment, jails, prison and eventually homeless and living on the streets.
After losing everything.....wife, jobs, homes, family and friends I was a drunk pan handling and living from day to day in shelters, churches, and drunk tanks.

Waking up at 4 or 5 am with my body shaking for lack of alcohol and going through withdrawals I'd have to have a drink to calm my nerves and get past the shakes so I'd start pan handling to get enough change for a bottle of white port or Thunderbird - since beer was a waste of hard earned pan handling change and didn't do a thing for me anymore..... maybe a cheap bottle of Vodka to get past the shakes faster.

Sometimes I'd get arrested at 11:00am for drunk in public and get released by 5:00pm and be back in jail by midnight for being drunk....The vicious cycle had me in its grips and for some alcoholics we don't just die, we live and suffer the torment of Alcoholism and some even past through the demonic realm of evil.

12 DUI's, 200 arrests, state time, lost relationships, lost jobs and homes did not scare me straight. Alcohol is Cunning, Baffling, Powerful - and without help it is to much for us.
But there is ONE POWER may you find him now as AA tells it.

I remember one night in the drunk tank a lady officer looked into my cell and said to another officer....."Man this guy has seen some miles".
I've never forgot that comment and days later on a lonely dark cold night in a parking lot in an ally I looked up into the heavens and said "God I can't take this any more please help me".

The light shines even in deep dark holes as I found out and his love stretches to eternity and is never ending and he had mercy on a puny little man like me.

As I look up and see Jesus hanging on the cross, beaten, and bleeding he looks at me and says " I DIED FOR YOU ". It's a love that surpasses all understanding that he would give his life for a gutter drunk like me and forgive me for everything I ever did and set me on the rock and show me the way to a better life filled with love, peace and joy.

I picked up my mat and walked away a free man to which I have never drank again. He gave me the gift of salvation and sobriety and today I live a good life, no more vicious cycle, no more jails, no more loneliness, no more fear, no more guilt or shame.

Today I have a loving wife who loves me for who I am whom I met at church, we have a loving home ... He restored not only my sanity but a new way of life.

I work and contribute to the community, I'm a part of ... instead of being an outcast. Been sober many years now and plan to grow old with my wife and enjoy this extended life God has given me.