Ardis Caru Fy Un (Welsh for Ardis my Loved One)

Hello. This is a story I wrote down in the aftermath of losing my best friend and kindred spirit to end stage liver disease in 2006. In the spring of that year- three months before she died, I took her to a local famous gastroenterologist, who told us that she would die soon without a liver transplant. I came home that day pretty spooked, and told Sharon that I was thinking of quitting drinking, and actually stopped my daily trips to the keg fridge in the back room. When she died on the third day of August 2006, I came home at 3 am and made the decision to drink again for a while before addressing the issue of quitting for good. I would be ready to quit when I was finished with the story and had mourned for a time. I felt that quitting drinking right away would be a ridiculous endeavor so soon after the most traumatic loss I had ever experienced. I did not know how dangerous quitting "cold turkey", was, especially and would end up hospitalized after I did , needing inpatient detox, and AA- I did 200 meetings in those first 90 days.

Someone once wrote that you can only love something about someone else or hate something about them if it is something you love or hate about yourself. This was especially true of Ardis. She was so much like me, she drove me crazy, and I drove her equally crazy, but we also had more to say to each other than any one else in our lives. It drove everyone else around us crazy. We would never shut up. Even after working together for 8 hours, when you would think we had said everything there was to say for that day, we would yammer on the phone about Chinese food, gardening, music, cats, dogs, and our favorite past time, drinking BEER.
She died on a Thursday morning, one o'clock AM sharp. She was wearing a clean gown, and in a clean,warm bed, with me holding her hand, just the two of us, the end of a long struggle for her and the very beginning of another one for me.
After drinking 550 cans of beer in 44 days, I drove out to her grave, sat on a lawn chair, and lit a Marlboro light from a box, and cracked a 24 ounce can of Budweiser. To see if that taste and buzz would be worth giving up. To see if I could even contemplate giving it up, and trying to imagine life with out those two things, especially the beer. I have been sober since.I choose LIFE. I go to AA for me AND Ardis, now. Bobby

Thank you to my dear wife Sharon, for typing this story for me. Thank you for staying.