[MajestyJo]

Didn't know this was a senior malady, seems like I had it all of my life. I was put on Valium at 16. I was teaching Sunday School back in those days, dedicated my life to God at 18 and walking very close to God, and life hadn't really begun for me. I didn't leave home until I was 17, didn't get married until I was 21, didn't have my child until I was 24. They said I had a nervous disorder, because I was having severe pains in my stomach and head aches. They couldn't find a cause. They didn't know about the disease of alcoholism. I firmly believe it was the fact that at the age of 14 I was baptized and took part in communion on Sunday mornings, and my body was allergic to the alcohol and wanting more. They used real wine at my church. I can remember trying to take a gulp and trying to make it look like a sip. There was no alcohol in our home. We lived on a farm, three miles away from the highway. I travelled by bus to school, no time or way to get alcohol and the only contact I had was once going out with the girls at work when I was 18 and having a Planter's Punch at a luncheon (forgot about that until recently) and not having any more until I was newly wed and our landlady toasted our marriage with a glass of apricot brandy (horrible stuff). Yet it all stands to reason, that time at 10 years old, when I stole that few inches of communion wine, 1-2" at the bottom of a goblet, that wonderful feeling that stayed with me for the rest of my life, when that wine hit the bottom of my stomach that spoke to me and said "Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh", was my disease awakened, never to be put back to sleep again until I was 49 years old. Only through going to my God daily, does that relief come.