I have spent the last eleven years trying to break the addiction of alcoholism. As a child, I had watched my Grandmother wither away from the disease of alcoholism, which eventually landed her in a nursing home, diagnosis: wet-brain. She wore pink pajamas and an adult diaper 24/7 and muttered to herself all day long about “swimming with snakes in the river.” She died at age sixty-eight. Still, the knowledge of how alcoholism can take our sanity, dignity, and life away from us, I continued to drink as an adult. At age forty-eight, after a good sixteen years of alcoholic daily drinking, I found myself suffering from routine auditory hallucinations, delusional thinking, black-outs, and also suffering from an inability to tell the truth about anything whether sober, hung-over, or drunk. I rarely worked even though I had obtained an Ivy League degree. A small stipend from my parents was often times my only income; I had no friends or significant other.
For the past eleven years, I tried to earnest to quit drinking wine, my drug of choice. I tried residential alcohol rehab for 28 days, AA for eight years, Women For Sobriety, anti-depressants, therapy, and read a host of self-help books, including AA literature. Still, I could go no more than three days without getting drunk. (Often times, I read AA books while drinking.)
In June 2011, while thinking I should make “a run” to the liquor store, I instead stood in my kitchen and asked God to “please help me.” I promised God “…if you help me not drink, I’ll do whatever you say.” Immediately, and I mean within seconds, the Lord told me to say aloud, “Devil be gone!” I stood in my kitchen and repeated this phrase several times. God then told me to , “Read the Bible daily, and surround yourself with my Word.” Immediately, I bought Joyce Meyer’s Battlefield of the Mind, & play the CD in my car.
Nine months since this incident, I have not had one ounce of wine or alcohol in my body, and it is very easy to not drink. Whereas I used to have a mental obsession and voice in my head hammering at me to “Drink, drink , drink, everyone drinks or wants to, “ I now have inner peace and a sound mind. I do have stress in my life, such as a huge plumber’s bill, or I feel overwhelmed with work—but I can deal with such stresses without drinking. This is only because God is helping me.
I had felt even a few years ago that I had a demon inside my body and mind that drove me to drink. I told my AA sponsor this, and she said that was “not possible,” and she also told me not to go to church, “…all you need is AA.”
After God removed the demon from my body, it has never been back. It whispers daily, “Maybe have a drink?” but it is a faint whisper and easily defeated with only saying, “Devil Be Gone!” followed by a simple, “Thank You God.” I used to suffer from dreams in which I was attacked by demonic looking half-human, very distorted female animals; they were beyond frightening. I also suffered from insomnia. I have never had a nightmare since I reached out to God, and I sleep very peacefully each night.
I had never been a Believer in the Lord; I only attended church as a child because my parents made me go. I never had any interest in church as an adult; truly, it is a miracle that someone of my agnostic nature asked God for help. While I struggled to become sober in AA, attending at least 4 AA meetings a week for eight years, I watched two other alcoholics die from alcoholism because like me, they simply could not stop drinking. I knew one of them very well. This one man, in his early forties told me at a meeting one year ago, while crying, “I am going to die; it (alcohol) is going to get me and there is nothing I can do.” He left the AA meeting and one week later I received an email that he had died. Certainly, that would have been my fate, too, without God’s help June 16, 2011.
Since God delivered me, I received instruction from Him over the past few months and I have followed every instruction as if my life depends upon it, because, literally, my life does depend on doing what God says. I’ve been told by God thus far to: Read the Bible daily, find a Bible-based church, detach from all associates, only be friends with believers within the church I attend, and to quit spending money mindlessly and to give extra money to a good charity, and to take care of my health “so you can do my work.”
I have no idea what kind of work God has for me. Whatever it is, if He ever reveals to me what “work” there is, I’ll do it because I know that without God’s intervention, my life was quickly going to slide into permanent insanity, alcohol-induced, poverty, then death by suicide or end up in an institution where I would die alone—and soon.
I do not presently attend AA meetings or take any anti-depressants. (A year ago, I was taking 4 anti-depressants: Cymbalta, Abilify, Lamictil, Lithium). I don’t see a therapist. I do, however, take Biblical action daily: I pray constantly, read my Bible, keep Billy Graham’s website on my computer screen at work in my office, go to church every time the door is open—and feel great relief and comfort when I attend.
If you saw me, I look like a normal middle-aged professional woman. My house is clean, I prepare meals, know how to cope with challenges, have a sense of humour, I now work full-time, I function. God restored my life very quickly. I believe He would help anyone who asks for His help.
I do not know why I received this blessing—to live a sober life with inner peace and to be a content, joyous person who overcame. Everyday I thank God for what he has given me, and I pray for the alcoholics who die from this terrible affliction. I fear they die eternally cut off from God’s spirit.
It is my hope that soon, the medical/addiction treatment community will accept that those of us who aren’t “treated” or “put into remission” by AA or other program will accept that some of us are tormented by Satan, and need to have a demon cast out of our minds and bodies. AA talks about God’s love, but not about exorcism. (Every treatment center should have an exorcist; I know I’m not the only alcoholic to have been in bondage with alcohol due to a demon’s will to destroy me.)
That summer night in my kitchen,God told me what to say to get the demon to leave my soul; since then, he has given me armor to protect me. I hope if someone reads this, wants to quit drinking and nothing works—ask God to help you. If he’ll help me, He will help you, too.
Amelia