LOL Sober

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIS comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

I went to a meeting a few months ago and ran into a sober guy that I love. But I hadn’t seen him in awhile, and he said that to me. “Where have you been? We miss you around here. Everything ok?” he said.

It was such an innocent remark on his part. There was nothing untrue about it. I hadn’t been there for awhile, and I hadn’t seen him in a few months.

But I work a really good, steady program, so I was getting to lots of others meetings and feeling pretty great about how hard I was chasing sobriety. So I immediately felt my back go up a little bit.

I’m not sure exactly what that’s about. My thought process in the moment is, “F— you, mind your own business. Stop micromanaging my program. Who are you to interrogate me about my recovery?”

That thought process is terrible for about 10 different reasons.

First, his comments came from a good place. He’s a friend who cares about me. Asking, “How have you been?” is an obvious question. It’s also a question I ask people on a regular basis.

Secondly, why do I get so defensive about that? What is my insecurity? I’ve grown so much in having a level of self-esteem where you can say you think I am a bad driver or my fly is down or I am an idiot sometimes, and I don’t blow my stack. So why is it specifically recovery where I have the worst reaction to that? I have some thoughts on that topic that I will come back to.

Thirdly, using the word “interrogation” is a great example of how my inner dialogue doesn’t serve me well. Was that guy interrogating me? No. That word alone is totally blowing his comments out of proportion. He asked me how I was doing once. The whole exchange was 5-10 seconds. When was the last time you heard of a 7-second interrogation? Come on, brain, stop gassing me up on this b******t!

Fourth, the “mind your own business” thing is a recurring theme for me. I consider myself a fiercely independent, strong person. That serves me well about 90 percent of the time. I go to meetings because I push myself to. I am good at my job because I have a drive inside me that propels me forward. I go to the gym every day because of that internal drive. That’s the 90 percent. The 10 percent is when people offer me feedback I didn’t ask for and I feel my fists ball up. It’s rarely rude or pushy feedback—it’s usually people who care about me and throw a suggestion my way. If I were in a really serene head space, I could take any suggestion, good or bad, and respond, “Thank you for that. I’ll give it some thought.” Instead, I immediately get my back up like my cats when they start fighting over food. I gotta get better at that—I can’t let my ego flare out of control about a basic comment.

To go back to trying to figure out what the underlying insecurity is, I think it’s actually not a terrible thing for me. I think my insecurity is that I care about sobriety so, so much. It’s the most important part of my life. Of course I care about my family more than anything in the world. But I believe the old adage that anything you put in front of sobriety, you will lose—so my No. 1 goal every day has to be that I stay sober and enlarge my spiritual condition.

So when I feel like somebody might be picking at my desire to stay sober, I take it hard. Too hard. Way too hard! I don’t even think that’s what the guy was doing. I just have very thin skin about it. I probably need to grow up and just smile… I mean, deep down, I know I am doing the right things. Nobody else needs to know that as long as I do. So I’m not sure why it cuts deep the way it does. But I also think a part of me always want to care so much about sobriety that I am easily agitated because I want a sober life so bad.

So whatever you do, don’t ask me how I am doing… how freaking NOT spiritual is that?

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

OLDIE BUT GOODIE: The AA group gave the old-timer a pin recognizing her outstanding humility. And the first time she wore it, they took it back.

(Credit: Grapevine, April 2008, by J.C. of California)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIS comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

I was at a meeting the other day where someone really captured something that was a big problem for me, and also a big problem for many other people trying to get sober that I have known over the years.

He was talking about how putting down the drink and drugs is part one of the process, but you need to do part two if you want to recover. He used the phrase, “Don’t mistake a better life for a recovered life.”

I was a little perplexed when he said that but I kept listening. He started talking about how that first month or two of sobriety can be exhilarating. People are cheering you on. Everybody tells you you’re the most important person at any 12-step meeting. You feel better. Food tastes better. People that you hurt start warming up to you. It feels like a whole new life has just begun. I’ve heard the phrase “pink cloud” used many times to describe this period.

I felt that. Within two weeks, I thought I was going to be president of the world. I felt awesome. That kept up for awhile, and then I started working the steps and taking service commitments. Looking back, that seems like a minor miracle because my life had gotten so much better.

That dude at the meeting was making the point that so many of us see dramatic improvement and we mistake that for recovery. I could have easily done that. I remember thinking sometimes that I was killing it, that everything was turning around, that I physically felt very good every day. I was on top of the world. And when you’re on top of the world, it’s hard to think, “I need to spend a lot of time and hard work to improve myself.” What’s to improve? I’m crushing this thing called life!

For whatever reason, I kept going and felt no internal pull to rest on my laurels. Honestly, I deserve zero credit. This was the universe or God or something way beyond me. I wish I could say I am a remarkable person who has an insatiable appetite for self improvement. But that’s b******t. It just kind of happened. Did I play a part in clearing out the booze and pills to let it happen? Yes. But then it was out of my hands.

But I think mistaking a better life for a recovered life isn’t just a newcomer issue. I still catch myself having a job, paying my bills on time, feeling relatively happy, in good physical shape and thinking that the recovery is done. It’s not. Everybody I know who has had a great sober life for a long period of time behaves like they haven’t been sober for a long period of time. I need that mentality every day. Because at the end of the day, thinking I need a recovered life will actually lead to an actual better life.

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

A young man celebrating 18 months of sobriety told the group that AA was teaching him to be "responsible and a cannibal." They hoped he meant "accountable," particularly when he announced openings for residents in his group home.

(Credit: Grapevine, April 2008, by Wendy W. of Portland, Oregon)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIScomedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

I listen to a lot of sports podcasts, and one of the main topics this month has been what has happened with star baseball player Shohei Ohtani.

For the non-sports fans out there, I will summarize briefly what happened, though the facts and debate about the facts isn’t really where I want to go with this post.

Let’s start with the basics: Shohei Ohtani is a phenomenal baseball player. He is a generational talent as a hitter and a pitcher, which just doesn’t happen any more. It’s a little like being the best doctor in the world and the best lawyer in the world at the same time… it’s something I have never seen and I don’t think I ever will see again.

He’s made tens of millions of dollars since coming to the U.S. a few years ago, and he just signed a deal that will pay him $700 million for 10 years as a member of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

But he also is dealing with the aftermath of a bizarre gambling scandal, where his interpreter is suspected of betting something like $180 million of his money on sports other than baseball. The interpreter won about $140 million on his bets, so the net loss on gambling was around $40 million. At first, the interpreter did an interview with ESPN in which he said Ohtani was aware of the bets. Then he reversed course shortly after and said it had been all him.

People obviously had lots of questions about the interpreter changing his tune. And his story, that he did all the gambling behind Ohtani’s back, that he lied to banks on money transfers, that he changed alerts so Ohtani wouldn’t know about withdrawals, raises lots of questions, too.

I actually don’t have much of an opinion on what the truth is. I don’t think we know everything yet to be able to make a final judgment. But the feds seem to believe the interpreter’s second version of what happened, that he stole the money and was addicted to gambling and did so without Ohtani knowing. Is that the whole truth? I don’t know, and I don’t feel particularly riveted by the whole dialogue of what the truth is.

What I do feel invested in is some of the dialogue around the story. I think we’ve gotten to a pretty good place in this country regarding addiction, where states have laws in place to protect people with addiction issues and there are lots of treatment facilities for addicts. And I also think the general public has a decent understanding of what it means when someone says they’re an alcoholic or an opioid addict. I found mostly compassion and understanding when I sought help.

Which makes some of the chatter about the Ohtani situation a little disheartening. I have heard too many people saying things like, “Well, if it’s as simple as the interpreter had a gambling addiction, how did he get away with it all this time? Why didn’t he bet less money so it was harder to catch him? Why did he do it with an illegal bookmaker rather than a legal gambling site? How could he violate the trust of his good friend and his golden ticket in life? Why didn’t he just stop?”

Uh, guys, doesn’t this sound like some of the b******t people used to say about alcoholism? Remember how your bozo uncle would say, “Why don’t you just drink two beers and then stop for the night?” Or “How could you have driven drunk?” Or, “Why didn’t you stop when you knew that driving drunk would cost you your driver’s license, or your job?”

News alert, none of it makes sense! We’re addicts. We do insane things to chase highs. There’s not logic to apply. You could not have talked any sense into me. You don’t think I considered the INCREDIBLE concept of not drinking quite as much? I know people that have gotten five or more DUIs. I know people that have burned their house down in a drunken stupor. None of it made them cut back or stop. I think society now realizes that about drugs and alcohol. Not sure why somebody who can’t stop betting on sports would be any different.

I also have been struck by the concept of how confused people are that a gambling addict might be good at hiding his gambling. I still always think about coming out of a New York City meeting on Saint Patrick’s Day once and the parade was going past the church. There were people half naked puking, screaming, fighting… it was total chaos. And I remember this old-timer lighting up a cigarette on the corner of 35th Street in Manhattan and looking at the parade and saying, “Eh, looks like the amateurs are out.”

I always think about that story because it’s so true—I was a professional addict. I worked on getting drugs, taking drugs and covering up my drug use 24 hours a day. I never got arrested. No DUIs. No job firings. I was good at being an alcoholic and a drug addict, and you’d be shocked how smart alcoholics and addicts are! If you know someone with an addiction issue and they’re not locked up in a jail cell or a casket, then they were probably very resourceful and good at it, too.

The Ohtani story will be a very interesting thing to follow over the coming months. It’s one of those stories that lots of people rub their hands together in glee because it’s wild and salacious and involves absurd amounts of money. But I mostly just feel a sting in my heart and hope that whoever needs help finds it.

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

An officer pulls a woman over for weaving across two lanes of traffic. He walks up to the driver's window and asks her, "Are you drinking?"

The woman says, "I don't know—are you buying?"

(Credit: Grapevine, April 2008, by Anonymous)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIScomedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

Sorry, I took a day off last week to go to Disney with my family. I’m back now!

I was at a meeting the other day where the topic was that everything happens for a reason. The person who shared it is a very religious person and believes in that phrase from the perspective of a higher power who oversees his life.

That’s always been the way I interpret that phrase—through a religious lens. I’m not religious but I do have a higher power that serves me well, and on some level, I believe in the idea that the universe oversees my life. That’s not quite the right way to phrase it. But I believe in what goes up must come down, that I need to accept life on life’s terms, that what goes around comes around… I don’t know if others can see a higher power in there, but I can.

But at this meeting, there were some very interesting comments about there being a reason for everything. Someone shared that they don’t view it as God putting someone in your life to teach you a specific lesson, or God causing a bad event so that you will learn something. She said she believes a slight tweak on that: that every person, good or bad, and every thing, good or bad, is an opportunity to learn something. Which means, yes, there is a reason for everything.

I recently had some bad news that really sucked. I’ll share more specifically about it later. But it was a perfect opportunity to be like, Why me? And I do catch myself doing that sometimes. But not very often.

Because I feel a weird sense of gratitude that I think I’m only feeling now because I have been sober for awhile. Almost every bad thing that has happened in my life since I got sober, I later looked back on and found some good that came out of it. Including the fact that I am now grateful to have been an alcoholic and an addict. I have learned so much about living a life I am proud of since I got sober, and I wouldn’t want to give that back.

Sometimes I watch my kids go through difficult things, and they feel like it’s the end of the world, and I realize that it sucks now but they’ll be stronger for it later. I certainly get feeling like it’s the end of the world after a tough conversation or passive-aggressive work email—to this day, as a 46-year-old dude, I have something happen and think it is an absolute catastrophe. Three days later, I forget that it happened, of course, and that usually happens with my kids, too. I remember when my oldest daughter got dumped by a boyfriend for the first time, and the whole house was crying. But I can see how she grew from it later, and she might even see it now, a few years later. She never would have chosen that for herself, but she might not give back the wisdom she gained.

I would offer up this thought as a mini challenge: The next time you feel your neck burning with anger, or feel really fearful about something, or really sad about something, see if it helps to think about what lessons you might be about to learn. When I do that, I often am able to lessen the bad feeling by enough to make it manageable.

But just don’t break up with my kids, ok?

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

HEARD AT MEETINGS

"If I had to do it all over again, I'd overdo it all again."

(Credit: Grapevine, May 2008, by Ed L. of Wrightwood, California)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIS comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

We’re flying to Disney today, which is the happiest place on earth. Allegedly. I’m already taking deep breaths.

It’s actually a wonderful gift that I can take my family there every couple of years. They love it. It is an awesome experience that my whole crew looks back on fondly. It’s one of those adventures that we will all always have. We’ll think about it and talk about it forever, and my kids will take their kids because they remember the trip with such warmth.

But… holy s**t, there’s a lot of actual warmth there. As in, 89 degrees and pure sun all day, while you’re hiking 1,000 miles on nothing but pavement. Then people start getting a little feisty because they’re sweaty and tired and hungry, and then somebody twists an ankle and somebody else gets one small area of horrible sunburn and… on and on. Getting five people to and from Disney is basically a military operation.

I’m bringing this up here because I have found Disney to be both incredible and also a big strain on my sobriety. I’ve always tried to make sure my spiritual condition is strong before we leave, and that has mattered. I’ve had to tap into my spiritual reservoir quite a bit to stay as sane as possible, and I often have tried to get to at least one meeting in Orlando to make sure I stay on track.

It’s not that I worry about picking up drugs or alcohol. It’s that I start to drift and start to turn into an irritable hot mess that nobody wants to be around. I’ve figured out a few tips and tricks that I again will be deploying this year. These tips and tricks work for Disney but they also could be used any time on any trip, really.

Here goes:

—Get in tip-top spiritual shape before you go. Get to a meeting or two every day for a week before you go.

—One call per day with a sober buddy. Maybe more, if you need it.

—Get to a meeting wherever you’re going. It’s always fun to see how recovery happens in other places. You’ll always be glad you went.

—Pray for the people you are with. This sounds like sarcasm but I mean it. When you wake up in the morning, take a moment to pray that the people you are with have a day they will always remember. Seriously, it redirects your thinking toward being present in a lifelong memory, which always reminds me to be patient and loving and understanding.

—Say to yourself that understanding is more important than being understood. Say it again. These trips are about multiple people all functioning as one organism, so nobody ever really gets their way in its entirety. Make sure you are hearing peoples’ needs before jamming your own down their throat. If you set expectations on how things are going to go, I promise you, it will not happen and you will be aggravated.

—HALT is real for everybody you are with. HALT stands for Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired. Everybody you are with will have moments of all four of those things, including you. To expect somebody to not be snippy when they are tired and need a sandwich is absurd. Feed people. Let people sleep. Have grace when somebody’s temper flares.

As I read those, I’m thinking how great the tips are… and how I am hoping I get a B- and C+ in the actual execution of them in real life. I’ll report back how I do!

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

HEARD AT MEETINGS

"I started out as a social drinker. Then I had my second drink."

(Credit: Grapevine,by James J. of Hamilton, Ohio, May 2008)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIS comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

I was at the gym this week and there was a big guy lifting weights with a trainer that I know. The big guy was ripped and had on a T-shirt that said “Dummy mindset” on it. When he left later, I asked the trainer what dummy mindset means.

He said that that guy has a belief that even though he’s in very good shape and used to be a personal trainer himself that he is better off being completely open-minded about training. So he got a gym membership, signed up to work with a trainer and has tried to embrace the idea that he knows lots of stuff but is going to put it off to the side and listen to a new voice.

Holy s**t. That is so hard to do, isn’t it? I’ve written on here often about how much I love the Set Aside Prayer, which basically asks for the ability to forget everything I think I know about sobriety, about my relationships, about God, about the world, about everything. The goal is to begin every day, every conversation, every email, everything, with an open mind.

The key part of that prayer—and that guy’s T-shirt and mindset—is that it just encourages you to put your knowledge off to the side and listen. I don’t have to forget about anything forever. I just need to open up my ears and listen for new opportunities to learn and grow.

For that dude at the gym, he went to a new gym and got a new trainer. That’s the epitome of open-mindedness. In recovery, I like to go to different meetings sometimes and get phone numbers of new voices. I often don’t learn anything radically new. But I also don’t fall into my same patterns, hearing the same thing, feeling stagnant, sometimes.

And honestly, the notion of setting aside knowledge is a pretty awesome thing to do in all walks of life, not just with fitness and sobriety. At work, do you ever catch yourself waiting to jump in with your opinion? Do you ever complain about the way something is done in the office without fully considering why it might be done that way? Do you ever catch yourself being wildly wrong about stuff in your personal life? Do you ever tell somebody to do something one way and they should have done it another way?

The answer to all of those questions is probably yes for most of us. We’ve all most likely had a moment where we were certain of something and it turned out we were wrong, or at least too hard-headed about being set in our ways.

So I guess I need to maybe add some “Dummy mindset” T-shirts to my wardrobe!

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

The emergency department physician asked the nurse on duty about the condition of a drunk who'd been brought in after swallowing a spoon.

"Doctor," she replied, "he hasn't stirred."

(Credit: Grapevine, May 2008, by W.C. of Mississippi)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIS comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

I was at the ultimate sweet and sour kind of meeting recently—a meeting when someone from the rooms of recovery dies of our disease. I didn’t know the guy who died very well. But I knew his name. I saw him at meetings. I’ve hugged him a few times. So even though I didn’t have his phone number or know his last name, I saw him pretty much every week for a few years. He was in my life.

It’s sour for obvious reasons. I find it haunting to look around the room and know where a guy was sitting one or two weeks ago, and now people are announcing his funeral. It’s terrifying. It’s sad. And it’s realistic. I know if I ever go back out, I might not come back. I didn’t consume alcohol or drugs at a reasonable rate for about 10 years before I got sober. I don’t think I ever will. Which means if I relapse, I can’t pretend that I know I will get myself back to rehab or meetings. Hell, I could go back out and not make it through one day of drinking and drugging the way I used to do it.

It’s sweet because of the way that sober people rally. I’ve found that in sobriety, there’s an incredible resilience to the people in the rooms because we all know we could have ended up in jails, institutions or caskets from our previous life. So that morbidness and brutal honesty leads to the ability to hug and laugh in a way that is hard to describe to normies. I often chuckle about how many times I have heard someone share a terrible moment from their life and they laugh, and the whole room laughs with them. We know the highs. We know the lows. We know it often takes a sense of humor to get through the darkness.

At this meeting, lots of people shared for 3-4 minutes where they verbalized their heartbreak, then how they’ll move forward. Inevitably, the best message for me is when I hear people say the No. 1 thing I can do is be more sober today than I was yesterday so that if someone reaches out for help, I am ready to grab it. To do that, I need to turn that sadness into a drive to do service and carry a great message. I have had phases in the past when I’ve lost a good recovery friend and I immediately felt the need to pull back and protect myself—who wants to get close to people if the end result is that kind of loss?

Well, I’ll tell you who wants that: me. I need it. I need the biggest possible sober network of people I am close with. I need people who will walk with me and laugh with me, through sunny days and dark days. I know I’ll have both of those at some point in my life, and I am so glad to have the sweetest people for the sweet and sour stuff.

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

Tacked up on a cork board in an AA meeting room: "For sale: Wedding dress, size 8. Worn once by mistake."

(Credit: Grapevine, May 2008, by Anonymous)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIS comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

I have a very addictive personality. So I have to watch out for pretty much any mood-altering item. That includes drugs, alcohol, sleep medication, gambling and even stuff like food and money. If one is good, then more is better… right?

I’ve specifically been thinking about how the legalization of gambling must be so hard on gambling addicts these days. It’s everywhere. You used to have to drive to a casino to bet your life savings away. Now it’s on your phone, your computer, your TV, all over the place. In my active addition days, I used to occasionally gamble, and it was never responsible in any way. Even though drugs and alcohol were my go-to addictive behaviors, I know for sure that in a parallel universe right now I am a raging gambling addict. It could have easily happened to me because I felt the same highs doing it as I did taking opioids and drinking beer.

It made me grateful for the way I have managed to stay away from drugs and alcohol. I don’t just mean that I haven’t drank or used drugs; I’m actually rarely around them any more. So even if I had a five-minute mental slip-up, I’m not within five minutes of alcohol or drugs at almost any point in my life.

Now think about what gamblers are battling. You can bet so much online these days, with a slew of different apps and web sites, that it would be my worst nightmare if I got involved in it. At least with drugs and alcohol, you have to go somewhere and purposely get it and then consume it. With gambling, you can’t even make it through a basketball game without being constantly reminded that you are a click away from becoming a millionaire. Then you throw in all the free giveaways to new customers, and it’s like the old drug dealer thing about letting people take the first taste for free. They want you hooked.

I have been thinking about it a lot recently because we’re only a few years into the legalization of gambling in most of the United States, and we’re already seeing sports betting scandals involving athletes. It really is moving at 100 MPH as a part of American culture, and it sure seems like the downstream impact of needing lots of social safety nets for those who overindulge haven’t kept up with the rush to get it legalized. My guess is, 10 years from now, we’ll be seeing rehabs and 12-step meetings that have far more people with gambling issues than right now.

That all makes me grateful for a “boring” life. I put “boring” in quotes because it’s not actually boring to go to bed at reasonable hours and pay your bills on time and show up at your kids’ parent-teacher conferences. It’s a beautiful way to live my life, actually. But I have that part of my brain that says maybe I need something more exciting—as in, maybe I should grab a few beers with some buddies and bet some money on the game tonight. Luckily, so far I have decided that boring is better, and I watch the game in my recliner, excited to go to bed… even as all the gambling ads blare during the commercial breaks.

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

The field sobriety test proved to be too much when the police officer asked, "Was Mickey Mouse a cat or a dog?"

(Credit: Grapevine, May 2008, by Richard M. of Golden, Colorado)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIS comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

When I first got sober, I cared about my sobriety and the meetings I went to. That’s it. I didn’t want to hear about area commitments or world services, or the history of 12-step recovery. My ass was on fire and I needed to figure out how to live without substances on a daily—sometimes hourly—basis.

Boy, has that changed. I can’t quite put my finger on how or when it changed. But I think it was when I had about a year sober. At that point, I could raise my hand to potentially sponsor other people, and I’d been around enough that people asked me to chair meetings, be the treasurer for a meeting, and other bigger responsibilities.

At that point, I began to understand and revere how an unorganized pack of millions of people managed to not implode. And a lot of it stemmed from the dreaded 12 Traditions.

I used to avoid traditions meetings for the reasons mentioned above. I wanted to hear from people who were battling to not abuse alcohol and drugs. I didn’t want to know why anonymity is important, or the reasons why 12-step programs can hire outside workers for some management jobs. No thanks.

But once I started to get into the sponsorship zone of recovery, something clicked for me about the importance of carrying the message—not just my message, but the message of recovery and the rooms of 12-step programs. Around that time, I found myself hanging out more and more with people who had 10, 20, 30, even 40 years sober, and it seemed like a key component of that longterm sobriety was thinking bigger about holding down the recovery fort. That meant commitments at the area, state and national levels. But it also meant learning the Traditions and trying to guide newer people toward understanding what has worked for 80 years.

I bring all of this up because I just finished a six-week commitment chairing a meeting on the traditions. We read two per week for a month-and-a-half, and I had no choice but to really dig into them, form some thoughts and be able to speak about them. I gotta say, it was an awesome experience. I think the mistake I made—which I think lots of people also make—is that the traditions are rules from almost a century ago, and nobody likes old rules, or any rules, really (especially alcoholics!).

But one of the beautiful parts to the traditions is that they are like the entire program of recovery—they’re suggestions, and one of them specifically says every group is autonomous. The not-so-fine-print says that every group is its own entity except when it harms the recovery community as a whole, so there are limitations. But if a group decided they wanted to start raising money for a political candidate, they could. My hope would be that some people show up at the next business meeting and make the case for why that probably isn’t a great idea and goes against multiple other traditions. But every group is autonomous.

By the end of the six weeks, I think my biggest takeaway was a new appreciation for the tradition lovers out there. I used to groan about those old-timers who talked about who did what when they were writing the Big Book and why anonymity is so important and why avoiding outside issues is crucial blah blah blah. But what would we be without every generation aging and gaining wisdom to help guide the next generation? I am now 46 years old, with 15 years of sobriety, and I am quickly becoming the older generation. Part of my responsibility now has to be to continue to gain wisdom and also try to be a steady guide for newer people.

I guess I am saying now I need to be a mature, well-behaved adult… and I got some work to do on both of those fronts!

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

My alcoholic husband and I divorced over religious differences. He thought he was God, and I didn't.

(Credit: Grapevine, May 2008, by Anonymous)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe

If you want to subscribe to LOL Sober, hit the purple button below. I’m mostly publishing free pieces right now, but paid subscribers do have access to monthly premium pieces—such as THIScomedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes!

I was at a meeting the other day in which we read the story in the back of the Big Book where the author describes her state of being as “restless, irritable and discontent.”

I always liked that phrase, because it is a good description of how I feel when I roll out of bed many days. I used to drink to try to calm that, and then I got sober and had to figure out ways to mellow out and not become that phrase.

At the meeting, I got a chance to share and I joked that if I ever start a band of sober people, I might pick the name “R.I.D.” for “Restless, Irritable and Discontent”. People laughed and nodded their heads, and it seemed like others might choose that, too. Imagine a PA intro guy screaming, “Ladies and gentlemen, coming to the stage next… big round of applause for ‘Restless, Irritable and Discontent’!”

Then I started wondering, What would I actually pick as the band name that best captures my sobriety? R.I.D. is a pretty good option. I think the music would have to be pretty angsty, though. I don’t think that name works for a gospel band, ya know?

I also loved the recovery phrase “pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization,” which you could use the acronym P.A.I.D, which is kind of cool. I think that group would be a heavy metal band.

What about “The Recovered?” That has a very refined tone to it. I think we’d have to sing heavy songs, though. Very deep and meaningful. Painful songs with soul.

I could also see a 70s cover band called “Easy Does It.” Maybe do Creedence Clearwater Revival, Tom Petty, The Beach Boys. Just vibe out with some yacht rock from some former drunks.

Or maybe you name your group “The Procrastinators” and produce very chill elevator music, and your first album is named “Lazy Does It.”

Or how about a grunge band of alcoholics out of Seattle known as “The Contempt Prior To Investigation?”

What about a hiphop band named “The Serenity Playaz”? Like the Serenity Prayer? Get it?

What about a 24-alcoholic orchestra that plays classical music that is called “The 12 and 12ers”?

Ooh, how about a band of Alabama alcoholics that performs the Joe and Charlie Tapes as slow-jam country songs, and we call that group “The Joe and Charlie Daniels Band”?

Last but not least, let’s not forget the children. Let’s get some alcoholics together to sing kid songs, and we’ll call that band, “The Bozos on the Bus Go Swish-Swish-Swish.”

OK, that last one is particularly dumb. But hopefully you smiled. If you have an alcoholic band name, put it in the comments!

This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:

Q: Why can’t alcoholics sing well?

A: They only know one note—mi, mi, mi, mi, mi.

(Credit Grapevine, May 2008, by Gary O. of Anaconda, Montana)

Please spread the word to a sober friend! Find me on Substack… or Twitter… or Facebook… or Instagram… or YouTube. And introducing my web site, LOLsober.com.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit nelsonh.substack.com/subscribe