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At age 45, I found myself living in the street with no money, a twenty-year history of mental illness, legs in constant pain and addicted to crack cocaine. Standing on 119th Street and Lenox Avenue during the winter of 1990, wondering what to do next, I remembered what my mother told me, “Go to the hospital if it gets too rough.”

I dialed 911 from a pay phone. When the EMS technician came, I told him I had to get off the street. He asked if I had a “psych history.” When I said yes, he said, “No problem.” I was admitted to a psychiatric ward in Harlem Hospital.

My twenty-year-old daughter came to see me and told me my mother was in the hospital too. When I called my mother she said, “Bob, I can’t help you, I have to look out for myself now.”

My ex-wife came to see me as well and said it was time to “grow up.” I didn’t know what to do. Subsequently, I was admitted to Manhattan State Psychiatric day hospital where the therapist told me, “Bob, you’re not crazy, you just spend all your money on drugs when you get your monthly check. What do you want to do about it?” I said I wanted to enter a program of recovery. Ten years before, I had known some relief by going to meetings. I knew this was the way out of my problems.

I also went to an orthopedist who told me I needed a double hip replacement, but I had to be drug-free for ninety days first. I entered an outpatient drug program in Brooklyn, where I lived.

I went back home with my mother’s permission, but I had no keys to the house. After several slips, my last drug use was September 30, 1991. My hip surgery was scheduled, but, coming out of the outpatient program, I was hit from behind by a commercial van. It turned out it was stolen and the driver lost control and came up on the sidewalk.

When I arrived at Kings County Hospital, the doctors told me my left leg was broken as were several ribs and my thumb. My orthopedist told me to leave Kings County when the doctors there didn’t know the right procedure for my leg to help with my hip replacement.

As I lay on my back at Joint Disease Hospital, I asked God, “What happened?” I thought I was finally living right and then I read in the twenty four book a comment which said, “the rain falls on the Just and the Unjust.” More was to be revealed.

A maintenance man on my unit saw some recovery literature on my table and confided that he was living in a crack house and coming to work each day. Every evening he would come and sit by me and sometimes we talked and he said the meetings had helped him, but he couldn’t get past payday.

The wife of my roommate saw the recovery books too and asked if there was a phone number she could call. She wanted to give the number to her son who she hadn’t seen in a year. On my back I was carrying the message of recovery!

Well, I graduated from my outpatient program in June, 1992, and reconnected with a psychiatrist whose specialty was substance abuse. I had a rod in my leg and was on crutches. I would be on crutches for the next twelve months as the doctor replaced my hips. The rod was removed too.

I had found a sponsor in the recovery program named Bill and he helped me dress and get to meetings. He also guided me through the first three steps in the program. Just as we were to start on step four, Bill suddenly had a massive heart attack and died. I thought, well, that’s it, I’m through with the program, but now I was a sponsor.

My charge called me to go to a meeting with him. When I got there I saw a slogan which said, “Call your sponsor.” I asked myself two weeks before Bill died, who would sponsor me if I didn’t have Bill? I called Ronald. He carried me through the fourth and fifth steps and then disconnected from the fellowship. In the meantime, I was feeling better and started looking for part-time work.

I received a letter from Chess-in-the-Schools, asking for teachers to instruct children in chess. Chess had been a lifetime hobby of mine and I worked for them for the next seven years.

My mental illness went into remission and I began to meditate and date socially. Today, I have friends and associates in and out of the fellowship, most of whom are drug-free. My chess club picked me to captain a team in the local chess league and I have become a grandfather.

Recently, my mother died and I needed hospitalization for about ten days. I’m learning to enjoy life just as it is with its ups and downs and all the feelings in between. Through all that has happened to me, it was a belief in a God of my understanding that carried me. I have a prayer area in my home. Living life is truly an “inside job.”