Recovery Summit

My name is Ashley and I am a grateful alcoholic, and my sobriety date is September 27, 2020. Drinking started as something fun in my early 20s, but I soon discovered that alcohol gave me a way to hide from or escape the feelings of unworthiness and shame I had carried for most of my life. For far too many years, I drank excessively into blackouts while hospitals, jails, and institutions slowly became the direction my life was heading if something didn’t change. I felt empty, hopeless, and exhausted from living the same painful cycle, but I could not imagine another way out. My body needed alcohol and the obsession and dependence on alcohol had me in its grips. Everything I did was centered around it. When I wasn’t drinking, I was certainly obsessed on when I could get my next drink. I had accepted that alcohol would eventually take my life because I had lost hope that anything could truly change. I couldn’t imagine a life that alcohol was not a part of.

My recovery journey began in 2018 through an outpatient treatment program at Kaiser, where I was introduced to a 12-step fellowship. After waking up in the back of an ambulance, feeling completely broken and believing there was no way forward, I began to find hope through God’s grace and the rooms of recovery. Although I stumbled several times along the way, I kept coming back. Between my fourth and fifth years of sobriety, my recovery deepened profoundly when I began attending 21 Pathways in addition to Alcoholics Anonymous. Through that community, I developed a stronger relationship with God, formed meaningful connections with other believers, and learned a deeper level of surrender. I began to understand that recovery was not only about abstaining from alcohol, but also about allowing God to transform every area of my life. I was baptized at 21 Pathways and later committed to reading the entire Bible in one year. By God’s grace, I followed through. During that year, I experienced a freedom, peace, and closeness with God that I had heard others describe but never believed would be possible for me. I came to understand that God had not simply rescued me from alcohol; He had given my life a new purpose.

Today, I am pursuing my Master of Social Work degree with the goal of helping others heal from addiction, trauma, shame, and the experiences that often leave people feeling alone and without hope. I have the privilege of sponsoring women, speaking at recovery centers, and sharing my testimony with others who may still believe that change is impossible. Recovery is the greatest gift I have ever been given. I am passionate about sharing the hope, freedom, peace, love, and grace that have changed my life so that others know they are not alone, their story is not over, and there is a way through.

Hi, my name is Red and my sobriety date is February 3, 2004. I am a grateful recovering alcoholic. My bottom started in 1973 when I was 10 years old, and my mother was killed in a commercial airline accident. After that, I had to go live with a father that I barely knew. Although he was not an alcoholic, he was violent and we moved around a lot. The next five years found me in and out of at least six different schools, and when I was 12 years old, I had already started drinking. I was on my own by the time I was 15. From that time until I got sober at 40 years old, I was in and out of multiple institutions within the state. Not only did my addiction and bad choices destroy my life, but it also destroyed the lives of every relationship that I was ever in. That includes three sons who still today I don’t have a solid relationship with, but I believe that all things are possible with God on my side, so I just keep putting one foot in front of the other and trusting the process, and I don’t pick up no matter what! My main focus today is to help as many guys along the way as I can to find recovery and hope! I think that’s why God pulled me out of the scrapheap of life is, to help others.

My sobriety journey began with the help of the Salvation Army in Southern California. I only have one sobriety date. That date is the most important date in my life; I guard it continuously. I’ve always had a sponsor, I believe in sponsorship 100%. I continue to work the steps as I work with others. Recovery is a huge part of my life. It is one of the most important things for me. Through recovery I found a relationship with God. I have been personally blessed to experience the AA Promises.

I continue to do the things that I was taught to do early on in my recovery because I’m not exactly sure which one of those things keeps me sober on a daily basis, so I just do them all. I’m very active in H & I work in California prisons and Fresno County Jail. For the last year I have been blessed with daily work in a recovery-based reentry program here in Fresno. I absolutely love my work in recovery and sobriety. I believe at the end of the day, my recovery is about relationships with others in all my daily acts. It’s always an honor to be asked to speak at any meeting. My hope is that someone will relate to my story and give recovery a chance.

My name is Miranda, and I am a grateful recovering alcoholic with a sobriety date is November 20, 2021. Although that is not my first period of sobriety, and it took me 13 years to get this sobriety date, I cherish it because, God willing, it is my sobriety date that, as Bill once said, is “for good and all.” As long as I maintain my spiritual condition and stay connected to my Higher Power. Before recovery, my life was ruled by alcohol, drugs, fear, and the belief that I had to face everything on my own. I carried deep pain after my father was murdered when I was twelve years old, and I watched the addiction impact on my family in ways that left me searching for something to fill the emptiness inside of me. I believed that if I joined the Army, found the right relationship, or became successful enough, I would finally feel like I was enough. But no matter what I accomplished, I remained empty and disconnected from God, myself, and the people I loved. I kept trying to numb the deepest, darkest parts of myself that I wanted to run from with alcohol and drugs, hoping no one would ever see how broken I truly felt. Looking back now, I can say it was in my brokenness that God began to build something beautiful. Every jail stay, every rehab, every relapse, every psychiatric stay, every hospital visit, and every moment I reached the end of myself became part of the path that led me to Alcoholics Anonymous, a place where God began restoring what I believed was beyond repair.

Today, my life is completely different because of the grace of God and the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. Today, I can honestly say the A.A. Promises have come true in my life. I no longer wake up carrying the shame, guilt, fear, and hopelessness that once defined me, that scared little girl wearing every mask so no one would see what was really underneath. Instead, I wake up with purpose knowing that God has transformed my life in ways I never thought possible. I no longer look at my past as a barrier but as an asset because it has become the very thing God uses to connect me with the women I sponsor today. I have found serenity in the middle of life’s storms and discovered that true freedom comes from the little surrenders in life. I get to see doors open that I could never have imagined. Not by my own works alone, but by doing the work and trusting the process. Today, I am pursuing my master’s degree in Social Work so I can continue helping people find hope and healing. I get to work with the population I was once a part of through the Federal Public Defender’s Office, and I also serve as a domestic violence and anger management counselor, facilitating the very same classes I once had to attend. My life isn’t free from challenges, but today I never have to face them alone. I know without a doubt that God has done for me what I could never have done for myself. If my story proves anything, it’s that no one is too broken, too lost, or too far gone. With God’s grace, the willingness to do the work, and the love found in these rooms, a life beyond our wildest dreams is possible. My greatest joy today is passing that hope on to the next person who is still suffering.