It's been 3,836 days since I've had a drink.
But who's counting?

Hitting rock bottom is only defined when it happens to you. The road to self destruction was becoming more familiar to me until that sunny day in 2002 when I answered my front door to find a dear friend standing there with her drunk, toasted, wasted employee who was wearing pajamas. I had only consumed a few beers so it was obvious to me that pajama momma had a major drinking problem. She walked right past me grabbing my right cheek (face not rear) and squeezing it while slurring words that no one understood.

Here's what I discovered about addiction in those next few hours:

Friend: Would you let her borrow your bathroom since she tried to use my passenger's seat as a toilet?
Me: Yeah, sure.
Pajama momma: Ha aha, I dids snot.
Friend: I'm sorry to stop by with her but I couldn't think of anyone else close by that owns a pet taxi.
Me: A pet taxi for what?
Friend: I picked her up from her house and if she doesn't go to an AA meeting the owners of our company are going to make me fire her. The only way I could get her to agree to go was to bring the cat with us.
Me: She's going to an AA meeting wearing pajamas and taking her cat?
Friend: Yes, she has no choice.

From the other room I could hear pajama momma bumping into things and yelling that if she needed to go a meeting I did too.

Friend: Do you want to go with us?
Me: LOL! I can't go to a meeting after I've been drinking.
Friend: Sure you can.
Me: No, I can't but I will follow you outside and help you get her cat in the pet taxi.

Fast forward 5 minutes later and I am sitting in the backseat of my friend's car next to a pet taxi.

I couldn't believe that pajama momma thought it was early in the morning at 6 o’clock in the evening.

The meeting was totally disrupted by her obnoxious behavior and I was trying to act like I'd never seen her before in my life. She fired up a cigarette lighter in an attempt to smoke and screamed as she threw the lighter because it singed her hair. At one point she was in fetal position on the floor. On the way out she was babbling about how she forgot to pick up her chip so she could keep her job. I thought she was joking since she had one in her hand.

After the meeting I agreed to go grab a bite to eat at a neighborhood deli. I guess I hadn't finished learning my drinking lesson from pajama momma at that point. In all my partying days I had never seen this side of alcohol. I kept thinking about how she'd ruined her life and I would never want to end up like her. By the time we left the deli I realized if I didn't stop drinking I might end up living in a pet taxi and wearing pajamas in public.

Owning a brick and mortar optical business should come with a warning label: May Drive One to Drink. Looking back on my business I remember at times feeling trapped inside those four walls, six days a week with no way out. With financial support from a higher power (an O.D.) I was able to transfer the patient charts and all of the stress over to him.

Today in my work as a self employed Mobile Optician I am given the chance to help other business owners with their brick and mortar business denial. It's normal to slip up or relapse from what your sponsors or consultants taught you. Admitting that you need help so you can get with the program is half the battle.

Take this quiz to see if you need to recover your role:

1. Do you find yourself fixating more and more on petty matters?

2. Do you fail to “work direct” your staff and then get angry when things aren't done the way you think they should be?

3. Have you trained your staff to automatically make up excuses for you when you don't feel like dealing with patients or messages?

4. Has your office become a pile of “who cares” or “where do I start”?

5. Do you walk around like a mall walker looking over everyone's shoulder when business is slow?

6. Do you have to wait for staff to let you in the building because you don't own a key?

7. Do you ignore sound advice from the people closest to you?

8. Are you afraid to have meetings because of what you might hear?

9. Do you have patients waiting while you are riding the clock?

10. Do you want to punch the clock when you look at your payroll?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, then let's work on recovering your role as a business owner by using my never heard of baby steps program. Here's how it works:

The Ten Baby Steps Program

1. The key to your success belongs on your key chain

2. Be humble

3. Take one day at a time and remember your decisions affect many lives

4. Let go and let staff help make decisions

5. Create fun goals with serious meaning

6. Take turns chairing staff meetings

7. Pay your staff before you pay yourself

8. Know your inventory and how to work the office equipment

9. Keep a For Sale sign handy

10. Don't drink the kool aid

That's my story, thanks for letting me share.