Hi, my name is Jo-Anne and I'm an alcoholic.

The topic of Change hit me right between the eyes. Change -- that was the single "must" my sponsor gave me. In my early days of sobriety, I stood in front of her one night, crying my eyes out, full of anger, pain, fear and self-pity. She kept saying, "You must change, YOU must change." I finally got it -- the world wasn't going to change, my boyfriend wasn't going to change -- I had to change. That night I got down on my knees and prayed for the ability to change the things I could, knowing that the only things I could change were my attitudes and my actions. It turns out, that was all that needed changing. As I changed my actions, my attitudes changed, the results changed, people didn't necessarily change but my feelings about it all did. Now, my entire life has changed in ways more wonderful than I could have imagined. I know that in my drinking days, it seemed that nothing ever changed, day in or day out, year after miserable year.

Thank you for being here, thank you for my sobriety.