Person Irresponsible, or PI as most people call her, describes herself as having been “fat, funny, forty-something, and in her fourth year of recovery when she felt an unfathomable urge to walk across America”. Previously she had hiked from the sofa to the fridge and back and considered camping to be a loathsome pursuit. She was also a confirmed nicotine addict and had never even considered climbing the UK’s highest mountain: a 4,000 footer called Ben Nevis.

And yet something drew her to the Pacific Crest Trail. She didn’t fully realize just how big a mistake she’d made until she hiked her way up the first mountain in Southern California. And if all that wasn’t bad enough, a global pandemic broke out in the middle of the excursion - leaving her to be one of the very few people to remain in the wilderness.

PI relied on everything she’d been taught in the AA fellowship to haul herself from Mexico to Canada. She then set about writing a book on how twelve-step thinking kept her from succumbing to the mental demons that lurked within. 

She called the book “Everything You Ever Taught Me” to honor her fellow alcoholics who have recorded their stories and wisdom in podcast format. She had listened to at least one podcast each day and it was their voices that kept her company day after laborious day: always reminding her that the twelve steps are a program for living that truly work - in all circumstances.

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• Everything You Ever Taught Me | Everything You Ever Taught Me

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