Sober Motivation: Sharing Sobriety Stories - He Drank Until His Liver Failed | Aaron’s Sobriety Story

Episode Date: July 15, 2026

Aaron never believed alcohol would nearly cost him his life.Like many people, drinking started as a way to fit in, cope with anxiety, and numb painful experiences. After losing his father at a young age, finding his brother after a fatal overdose, and carrying years of grief and trauma, alcohol slowly became his answer to everything.By his early 40s, he was drinking from the moment he woke up just to stop the withdrawals. His skin turned yellow, his body began shutting down, and after collapsing at home he was rushed to the hospital, where doctors weren’t sure he would survive.Today, Aaron is living with liver cirrhosis and waiting for a liver transplant.In this episode, we discuss:• Growing up around alcoholism and loss • How denial keeps alcohol addiction alive • The progression from social drinking to physical dependence • Living through liver failure and a coma • What it’s like waiting for a liver transplant • The guilt, shame, and hope that come with recovery • Why it’s never too early to ask for helpIf you’ve ever wondered whether your drinking is becoming dangerous—or you know someone who is struggling—this conversation is one you won’t forget.If this episode resonates with you, please follow the podcast, leave a rating and review, and share it with someone who needs to hear it.Recovery is possible, and you don’t have to do it alone.Sober Motivation Mobile App: https://apps.apple.com/app/sober-motivation-app/id6759266291Sober Motivation Website: https://www.sobermotivation.comSupport the Podcast: https://buymeacoffee.com/sobermotivationContact me anytime: [e-mail] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The lady at the liquor store, she's like, my God, you're yellow. She's like, are you okay? I was like, I was like, I just got a dark complexion, straight up denial. And I knew I'm not doing so swell. And I was like, one of these days I'm going to quit, I'm going to quit. We often hear about hitting rock bottom. Aaron's story shows that sometimes rock bottom isn't a DUI or losing a job. Sometimes it's waking up in a hospital after doctors weren't sure you'd survive.

I hope this conversation helps somebody out there. If you enjoy the podcast and these stories, your support would mean the world. Head over to buy me a coffee.com slash sober motivation. And if you're looking for some support to get or stay sober, download the sober motivation app and we'll do it with you. Now let's get to the episode. Welcome back to another episode of the sober motivation podcast. Today we've got Aaron with us.

Aaron, how are you? Doing all right today. Yeah, man. Thank you so much for being willing to jump on here and share your story with all of us. Yeah, no problem So what was it like Kind of get my word out there Growing up, I actually

Did a lot of outdoors Type stuff My brothers and I We pretty much lived in the woods So And both, you know, Our parents were Working and stuff like that

So we had quite a bit of freedom To do what we wanted And we were pretty good kids And But over the You know School and stuff We started getting in with

bad crowd and you know drinking eventually got with me you know it kind of just consumed me after a while

but I wish that that I could have stayed away from it and my father had passed away I was 12 years old so that kind of sent our family into chaos as very tough for my brothers

and myself, I'm the middle child, so I had an older brother, younger brother. But it just kept getting worse with partying, but doing, you know, smoking, weed, drinking some booze. Yeah, did you grow up? I grew up in northern Ohio, but I lived in northern Indiana for, I'd say, most of my childhood. just kind of back and forth from Ohio and Indiana. Yeah. Yeah, small towns, not much to do, especially as teenagers. Bad things will find you if you're not careful.

Yeah. Did you see a lot of drinking growing up from relatives or family members or anything? Yeah, I did. My dad was an alcoholic. I think that contributed to him having a heart attack. they really only drank at family get-togethers, things like that. But every once in a while, my dad would get on a bender and just kind of drinking and drinking it. And everybody in my family drank.

So it was always a party for every holiday. Yeah. Yeah. Do you remember when you first started drinking? Some people share two different experiences. They were like, oh, I got so sick. and I let off the gas for a little bit. Other people were like, man, this was just love.

It was just incredible. Everything kind of slipped away that I was so worried about. Yeah, my thing was, I was very shy and timid. Like I said, I smoked weed and stuff like that. But I kind of got sick of it, and I just stopped when I was still a teenager. And I got with booze, the alcohol, it was a social lubricant. and I like the way it made me feel I didn't care about this or that so I was more I felt like I was able to speak with people and talk to girls and stuff like that so yeah it was that social lubricant

that I desperately needed to interact with people yeah and yeah looking back where do you think that the maybe shyness comes from I was bullied in school and my older brother We were in the same grade. They thought we were twins, but he got held back. And there was, like, a lot of bullying going on. But as we got older, we got violent about a... Our dad had just passed, and so we were full of rage. And so we kind of quit caring what people thought,

but I always was introvert and just kind of stuck to myself. I played guitar a lot. And video games, things like that. So I didn't want to be around people. I just wanted to be left alone. Yeah. But I wasn't making any kind of life, no friends. While my brother was out doing that, making friends having a life.

So that's why I started drinking a little bit more, and it became easier for me to cope with the outside world. Yeah. What video games were you playing back then? Yeah, I was playing Metal Gear Solid. I liked a lot of combat, military stuff, stealth, whatnot. Yeah, I remember in high school I played a lot of CounterStrike. Yeah, CounterStrike, so calm, things like that.

Yeah, cool, man. So where do you go from here? Are you doing what you need to do to get through high school? And you spoke to a few times here, your dad passing away. Did you get any help or support on that? What was that experience like? No, that's actually. where things became worse.

My mother, she actually had met somebody after my dad had passed. And we didn't like him. No one's going to replace our dad. And my dad was no saint by any means. But we didn't like this guy. And later, we grew to love him, but we just smoking and drinking. And we dropped out of school, all of us. there was it's me my older brother and my younger brother we all dropped out of school but after my son

was born i went back to school and then i ended up going to college and got an associate's degree in communications of all things so when was your son born uh he was born let's see is october 2008. So he'll be 18 in October. Wow. How old are you then? I was 25 and his mom just kind of dipped out on us. So I raised him from birth to now. Yeah. So I've been a single dad. Yeah. So that area between like after high school for somebody who would have finished it or whatever. 18 sort of to 25. What does your life look like in in that space? A lot of drinking. That was pretty much like my introduction to a lot of other substances, things like that. And I didn't have any kind of responsibilities. And as far as jobs went, I had no aspects on getting anything great. after I met my son's mother, I decided it's time to buckle down, get my stuff together, and go to

college. And I did fairly well. I passed with a really good grade and stuff. So I kind of chilled out on the party scene. And then after she left, I got back into it hard. Yeah. What was it that the alcohol substances were doing for you sort of in this stretch of your life too? You have a lot of There's a lot of stuff happening, a lot of moving parts. Yeah. Deconnected dots of, hey, this is relieving X, Y, and Z for me? Yeah, it helped me. I wouldn't say help, but it's all denial anyway, but I felt like it helped me cope.

Yeah. And kind of numb the pain and ease the suffering. That's what I thought I was doing. But it was just making things worse. And looking back, I could have been a way better father because, kind of being a shitty dad drinking all the time. And I regret my son ever seeing me hammered. And everyone else was too in our lives.

So it's kind of normal for him to see it. And that's not cool. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of people come on the podcast. I think we're close to 300 episodes. And I feel like I hear a lot of parents, you mention and kind of look back.

I think there's this, maybe this idea for some that they're really smashing it out of the park. They're doing pretty good. And maybe they believe that at the time. But I think when they get sober, they look back. Hindsight's 2020, right? They look back and kind of get a little bit more honest with themselves or ourselves and say, you know what? Yeah, I wasn't killing it maybe as much as I thought I was.

How do you work through that now? like in your life is so interesting to me because we can't go back, right? Yeah. My thing is with him right now. He knows what's going on. Like I said, he's almost 18. And, you know, my plan is to make him a better man than what I was. And I hope that he sees me as a good dad because he means everything to me.

He's the most important person ever. and he's my only child and I just want him to be a good man and someone that that knows right and wrong and things to stay away from and my shortcomings maybe he could learn from those yeah yeah do you feel like you had that guidance growing up like sort of with the drinking and with maybe other things that were going on like sort of mentors, whatever category we put it into of like, Aaron,

the long-term vision of carrying yourself this way could have serious consequences or no? I didn't really have any kind of mentors because me and my brothers, it was just us. And we fed into each other's energy. And if one of us was doing something, the other one was doing it too.

And like my brother eventually overdosed. And unfortunately, I had to find him and see that. And that was seven years ago in June. And it really wrecked me. That's when things got out of control. My son was going to a new school because he wanted to. And we all agreed that it'd be fine for him to stay with his mother for a bit while I find a new job.

I actually lost that supervisor position because I was a shitty drunk. I couldn't handle myself. And I just kept trying and trying to not let it interfere with my work, but it did. It did. Like I said, denial is the worst thing about alcohol is the denial.

But after finding my brother had been expired for a few days, I lost my mind. I really did because he was my best friend. Unbelievable. The things I saw. Yeah. With this situation or other things as well.

With him. Yeah. That was, and then my stepfather, he actually self-harm, we'll put it at that. And he lived through it. But he was paralyzed on left side of his body. couldn't speak non-verbal and he ended up passing away last year from it seizures he had a metal plate and everything but so my mother had to deal with a lot of stuff my first my dad dying and then her second husband doing that and became a burden to the family we all had to because she's disabled she's got bad hip surgery

And my mother is very close with me, my son, my brother, and her firstborn son passing away horribly. That's something else I had to deal with was comforting her. And now she has to deal with this with me. I almost died and still not looking too good. Yeah. So you are close with your mom then? Do you guys talk? Did you talk throughout this part in your life, too, about do you identify, too, in this stage of

your life that you're struggling with alcohol? Okay, I want to quit or this is causing more problems or this is just kind of what makes sense. I think it's so important to how you mentioned earlier when I asked you about what alcohol was helping you with and you said it's the denial. It convinces us that it's helping us. But I think when we look back, you say, oh, my goodness, no, making everything worse. but are you guys having conversations about struggles and how life is going? Yeah, we talk quite a bit about it.

She's scared for obvious reasons. We know that this isn't the full solution. There's a lot of dangers that could happen. So she's very scared about that, but she has her own issues too. She was an alcoholic as well. And she still gets little, I fall in. off the wagon and stuff. And it really affects me.

I don't want to see that. Yeah. It's like I got to take care of my mother still and take care of my son. And I also got to take care of me, which is extremely difficult right now. Yeah. Yeah. A lot going on. Do things ever pick up pace for you, too?

You mentioned after finding your brother too, it kind of sounds like the door blew off the hinges. Was that leaning into more drinking or? Yeah, that's when I started drinking extremely heavy, dangerous amounts of alcohol. First thing in the morning, take a shot. I wouldn't even brush my teeth yet. And I'd already have to have that shot because, or two, because I'd be shaking so bad.

There's nothing I could do but drink a little bit more and ease myself. Then I'd get a shower, brush my teeth, stuff like that. But then it started becoming an issue where I wasn't even doing that. I was just drinking and drinking. And I wasn't eating right. I drank myself stupid. And I don't know how I'm alive. Yeah.

What were you drinking? I drink Jack Daniels. straight from the bottle. Mostly rum. Spiced rum. I enjoyed the rum. But I drink half gallon of that a day. Half gallon of Jack Daniels.

How did you settle on Jack Daniels? How do you find yourself there? Was that just from when you were younger, you kept that going? Yeah. The rum and the Jack Daniels, my family all did rum. We loved our rum and coax and stuff. But then it just became drinking shit. shots. But I feel like with Jack Daniels, it got me to where I wanted to go quicker. So that's

why I would do that. And then, you know, if I was a little broke that week, I'd go with the cheap rum. So, uh, how long were you at this point? Uh, let's see. I would have been 40, because I'm 42 right now. So this would have been, this would have been 40. where you, when you woke up, you would experience the withdraws. Drinking would help you get through that or get you back to your baseline and not have to go through the withdraws. What was your knowledge before that happened, before you had your first sort of withdrawal symptoms? Did you have knowledge of what was to come with the way you were drinking? Or what could potentially become?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I was familiar with withdrawals and detoxing. I had tried to quit drinking before unsuccessfully, but my brother, when he had passed, he was an overdose, and he would go through withdraws from alcohol and opioids.

So I knew a lot about that. And my mother also experiencing all that pain. She got addicted to opiates. And then she'd take herself off that. through the withdraws. And so yeah, I was familiar. And believe me, it was something I did not want to experience, but I knew it had to be done.

But I just, I did it too little too late. As far as what? As far as trying to quit drinking alcohol. Because I had quit just before something really bad had happened to me in my body. Yeah. What was it like your previous? attempts to quit. You mentioned there that you had tried to quit before or so picking up that this is impacting your life and change your ways. And plus two, seeing, I can't imagine seeing so many

family members in their own ways in maybe different substance, but struggling with addiction, it sounds like from your dad in maybe previous generations too. I don't know that it really just starts all of a sudden. I think there is some, not that it's necessarily maybe passed down genetically, but I think what we see and what we witness kind of can be the norm. Like, what about that? Yeah. Yeah, I kind of think it's a little, I think it's a little bit of both where you're just kind of prone to addiction,

you're indulging to either have a good time or to numb some kind of cope, to numb some kind of feelings that you have. And then just seeing that over and over, you would think I wouldn't want to do that. But I didn't see it that way. I seen benefits in it. I don't know why. I think finding a partner in life and trying to have friends and things like that,

and everyone's drinking. And when you're not drinking, people are like, oh, you're lame, whatever. So it's a little bit of both. And knowing all that, it doesn't seem to affect some of us out there. where we've seen the most horrible things. And yet we still put that poison right into us. Yeah. It's kind of like that quote I heard one time as somebody asked somebody else,

why do you always take the hard road? And the other person responded, why do you assume I see two roads? It kind of you think of, yeah, it would be like, yeah, that's causing them so much damage. Why would I ever do that? But I think as humans, we also have sort of this built-in, I don't know if it's a filter or it's a compass or what it is, but we convince ourselves that,

hey, that's John's story down the street. It'll never be mine. I'll know when to, I'll obviously turn off the tap before it gets to that point. Come on, I know much better than that. But I think what I hear in a lot of people's stories is it's sort of that gradual increase of things over time. And then if you're already kind of leaning on alcohol and then your story you're sharing here where these huge traumatic things are happening in your life.

you're kind of leaning on alcohol. It's your buddy. It's your trusted friend in a strange sense. Just lean into it more and more. Yeah, it's like I said, you would think that you wouldn't want to do those things. And seeing the two rows, who says I see two, I think everything just kind of builds over time. Because like you were saying, that's not going to be my story. I know when to call it quits.

And I used to kind of pat myself on the back because I, I'd be like, I knew my limitations. What I, I shouldn't have that extra shot. I shouldn't drive. I shouldn't do this. And but after a while, yeah, it's like the big bad wolf just blows your doors right off. And then it's got you. Yeah.

And when it takes you, it keeps you. Yeah. And I don't think anybody else, I don't think anybody starts drinking, hoping to be in a place where it's got you. I don't think anybody starts out like, oh, man, I just can't wait for the day. But it does happen. It happens to so many people that you might not even realize. It can happen fast when we're not even really paying attention to it. How is everything else going in your life?

You ever get in any trouble because of the drinking? Or did you drink at home a lot? Did you go out? What was the routine like? Yeah, I went out quite a bit. Fortunately, I never got in trouble, like any kind of big trouble for. drinking and driving. I never did that. Thankfully, I stayed out of jail. There's a couple instances where noise, arguments, and stuff like that kind of bleed through the walls. And so I think I had a disorderly

loud music and stuff like that. Disturbing the piece is what I think is what's called. A little ticket. So nothing too serious. But there's a lot of fighting. I've seen a lot of fights. Other people get and knocked on drag out brawls. So wild stories all the time. But they're not as funny anymore. Yeah. And probably shouldn't have happened. And I am thankful that I never ended up in any kind of serious trouble.

Drinking and driving was not something I cared to do. Yeah. Which is interesting to me, though. Would trouble maybe have changed course for somebody? I don't know. That's guaranteed, but could that, I know for me it did. I got in a lot of trouble and it sucked at the time and I thought my life was completely over. Oh my good.

Am I going to do? I'm doomed. But I look back at it now and I say, man, that accountability that wasn't optional in my life, none of us are waking up and saying, oh, by getting a lot of trouble today to, you know, change my ways, but it was always interesting sometimes of maybe sort of a, what do you, like a branch in the tire. What's that? What's that movie?

Big Daddy where the kid throws the sticks and the rollerbladers. Yeah, yeah. But I don't, there's no guarantees either way. So you went out a lot and hung out with a lot of people. Nobody mentioned anything or is everybody kind of drinking similar? It was kind of drinking towards the end. I call it the end. It's like when I fell into a coma.

The lady at the liquor store, she's like, my God, you're yellow. She's like, are you okay? And I was like, I was like, I just got a dark complexion, straight up denial. And I knew I'm not doing so swell. And I was like, I got to quit. One of these days I'm going to quit. I'm going to quit. And it never got to that.

I say that I'm thankful for not going to jail. But I've seen my brother go through it a lot. and he'd come out worse than when he went in. Your younger brother. My older brother. Your older brother? Yeah, before he passed, he just, he kept getting worse and worse. And he was in Ohio?

Ohio and Indiana. Yeah. We bounced back and forth. Back and forth. Just from what I've heard, too, I'm not there in Ohio. I've never been to Ohio, but I have heard too, that was like epicenter. Is that the right word? fort of the opiates and how all of that,

but just really seem to hit communities there really hard. Is that accurate for you being? Yeah. Yeah, that's pretty accurate. Yeah, because most of my family's from Ohio. So that's why we were able to go back and forth because we have family in Indiana, family in Ohio. But yeah, it's right on the border anyway.

Fort Wayne where I'm at, the next county over is Ohio. So. Yeah. Same thing. Yeah. So it's basically the same area. area people come here to go to concerts, things like that, go to the clubs. But yeah, it hit hard over there, that's for sure.

And methamphetamines was really bad over there. I never got into that. No, so you did have sort of what you were willing to get involved with. Yeah. Maybe that's another thing, too. The alcohol is so normalized. Like you even mentioned her, I think if you're not drinking, it can be in some social circles like, wow, that's kind of, you're weird or something, something wrong.

What's going on here, right? But alcohol is just, it's the one, man, where you can hold a job, you can, you can share. It's the one drug that you can share. And you might even be celebrated too, or people might even be celebrated by drinking the most, being the wildest. But if you bring, say, meth into the equation, right? Oh, my goodness, we can't do that. You can't pass a drug test.

Hey, this is overboard. But with alcohol, it seems, yeah, I mean, we've all just been. I think normalized to it. Yeah. It's cool. It's forgiven a lot. Your stupid actions that you make and people ride off these drunk, give him break, but with other drugs, that's a whole other story, you know.

Yeah. Probably a conversation for another day, but peeling back to layers about how we got here, right? So where do you go from here? You're kind of leading us up to you go to the liquor store. You frequented the liquor store. and they're saying, hey, you're turning, like, you look yellow. Like, but you're in kind of denial of, I'm not feeling that great, but that's all good. Yeah, I blamed everything on just stress.

And I knew that it's not good for you. I'm not stupid or anything. But they're sitting there saying that I look yellow. I'm like, man, my eyes just as yellow, bloodshot. And I kind of got sick of looking like that. And it was probably hell, man. It was a couple of years where I was just binge it, just benching. A couple years that looked yellow.

Yeah, like two years, I bet. Yeah, where I was like yellow. But it had been like three or four years where I was never sober. Yeah, I was never so. Relationships, relationships at all in the mix? Yeah, some of them, quite a few of them failed. luckily the one that I'm in now, she saved my life. And she could have left.

She could have just had enough and told me to go to hell. But she's not. And she's sticking with me through all this. And I don't know why, but, you know, put her through all that. Maybe ask her after this. Say I just got to know why. She just tell you that she loves me. And she'd do anything for me.

So I'm extremely lucky to have her. Yeah. And then also my son. But yeah, so I was looking yellow. I tried to stop drinking. And apparently I was acting silly one night, being weird. And she was playing a video game. And I was like, I'm going to go to bed.

And she didn't know that I was having this thing going on in my body. But my stomach had gotten really big. I do remember that a couple weeks before all that. Like when I quit drinking, my stomach was so big. And I was- You quit when you quit. Yeah. Yeah, I quit just before the coma.

Just a couple weeks, like two, two and a half weeks. And, you know, I went down increments. And then I was like, no more. I think it was July 30th. It was my last drink. And then I think I went a little too hard on the fourth. I drank a lot on the fourth. And I felt terrible after that.

So I was like, I'm going to quit. And finally I did. And I was acting silly one night. She's playing a game. And I'm sleeping. And she got done with the game. Turns and looks. And I'm hanging off the bed.

And I've got blood all run down my face. vomit. She was yelling at me to get up and we got to go to the hospital. We got to go to the hospital. I wasn't responding. And she called my mother and my mom's, you got to call the EMS now. And so she did. It came up, got me, took me to the hospital. And then they did whatever they had to do. They bumping me full of medicine. I had a pick line in. So medicine go straight to my heart and they had the priest come in and she's oh no this isn't a good sign when the priest comes into your room and they said that they didn't know if i was going to wake up and then when i finally woke up they didn't know if i was going to leave alive so that's how bad it was i defecated on myself

urinate, throw up, and then just blood everywhere. I just started bleeding. And I had what you call a hepatic encephalopathy. It's an ammonia buildup in the brain. I'm not sure if you're familiar with that. No. Ammonia, it's literally ammonia. It goes through your body and you urinate it out.

But when you're an alcoholic and kill your liver, it doesn't filter that out. So it stores in your brain and it kills you. Makes you goofy. It makes you disoriented. It makes you combative, confused, tired. And then eventually coma. And then death.

Wow. So it's right there. So that's what was happening. That takes some time to build up to get to that spot where you sound like you're confused, acting a little bit silly or didn't. know it was going on and then you went to bed and how many days are you in this coma for at the hospital before you wake up i was in i was there a whole week kind of in and out like responding but coherently responding and they just figured i was just going to expire

and i finally started coming too and told me that my liver was fried i suffered referred a severe kidney injury. Thankfully, that healed up. I'm fine. My kidneys are good. But, yeah, my liver is toast. It's completely toast. What are your earliest memories or thoughts when you get this news, this feedback?

This must be scary. Yeah. First thing I thought was about my son and my mom and how they're going to deal with this. and I didn't get to say goodbye I didn't get a all they knew me is this horrible drunk shame

guilt and I don't really get to talk about it that much other than these interviews I do a couple and I prepare by I take my medicine and things like that but

honestly I'm just I'm just sick all the time agony really and I'm not sure how much longer I got if I can hold off until the transplant team has a donor and that my body is able to

receive it because I'm not getting any better that's the bad thing with liver cirrhosis you got to be sick to get that liver but the more sick you get the more dangerous it is because my body's literally eating itself. So like I've lost a lot of muscle mass.

Yeah, I look like a blow pop. Just big old head walking around. Yeah. Go ahead. Yeah, just curious on sort of what happened after that, after you left the hospital, like they kind of figured out, let you know, he had liver cirrhosis.

Is there a difference between liver cirrhosis and liver failure or? Yeah. liver failure, like that's what I had was the liver failure, but they were able to get it kind of back working a little bit so I live. And they had this medicine to clear out all the toxins out of my body because my liver wasn't, it failed. And so they got all that out. And they held my brain come back. So I was able to remember things and stuff like that. And I was there for a good month before I got let go. And then it's appointment after appointment. But they said, I could go at any time until we get that transplant listed. So I had to go through six months of sobriety. I had to get colonoscopy down the throat, different blood tests, all different kinds to make sure I'm not drinking or narcotics. And so just everything to make sure.

Oh, and I also had to do what's called IOP. It's therapy for alcoholics and drug abusers. Yeah. So I had to do all that to prove that I'm going to stick with the plan. And I've done great. And on my opinion, I've done excellent. No falling off the wagon and stuff like that. The only thing is just the suffering.

Really. Yeah. What are your thoughts about? that too is you reflect back on the life you've lived in how everything may be compounded in one way or another to end you up here in this situation. I don't know. The shame kind of takes over. It's like you deserve this.

You put your family through a nightmare with all this. And so the shame is it's always there. Regret. But maybe my story can help somebody out there that's going through the same stuff that has a similar life that I lived. And it's not too late until it's too late and there's no going back. They want to plug all these medicines and things like that, that, hey, this is a cure all. And it's, you get it this bad, you're going to suffer. And some people can't deal with that.

How challenging it is. Extremely challenging, sticking to it. You got to put yourself in pretty bad situations on your body, going here, going there, changing your diet, changing just the way you live. And I never got that. euphoric sobriety moment. I was forced into sobriety, really.

Because I don't know, with me quitting, I don't know if it would have stuck. I could have just started drinking again. Who knows? Yeah. So I never got that great feeling of doing something on my own, which I'm still proud of what I'm doing now and staying away from it.

And it does feel good. but there's always that guilt and shame. Yeah. You think that will always be there? Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Like at the same levels? Same level?

Maybe not at the same levels because getting to see my son become a man and being there for my mother and my girlfriend, my little brother. It's really opened his eyes because he had a brother pass away from an overdose than his middle brother almost dying from drinking too much.

And he was right there with me. So I keep telling him, he needs to get checked out, get your levels checked, see how your liver's functioning, change your diet, because your liver will repair itself as long as you haven't killed it. Yeah. So. Is there been anybody else in the family who has gotten sober as well? My little brother, he may have a beer now and that.

But my mom, she still kind of battles with it. Yeah. Sneaking. She doesn't want me to know. But. That's the shame, right? Yeah. She doesn't want me to know because of what I'm going.

going through. So now I got to get on her. I got to be the parents sometimes. Yeah. Man, thank you so much for sharing with us. Like, where do you go from here? It sounds like it really hasn't been a question for you to drink again after going through what you went through, right? Your goal, you have to be six months sober, right? You had shared with me to get a transplant. You're on the list. It's based on you had mentioned too. a meld score i'm not overly familiar with this but maybe share with that a little bit what yeah that's a rating yeah it's the people the transplant people they have this scoring system of how your liver is functioning and how you're getting by and stuff and so they based it on that

i think i'm at 20 maxed out is 40 so i'm right in the middle but i'm at bottom of the list because i am get by even though it's just I'm sick all the time I have to take medicine to stop me from being so sick and pain and agony

so just to even sit here this long and do this podcast it takes a lot out of me and I'm glad that I'm feeling good enough that I can see here and do that but yeah the Melds score it doesn't necessarily dictate how sick you are,

but it just shows, hey, you can get by for a little bit longer because there's somebody way sicker that needs it. Yeah, yeah. And you don't want to, you don't want someone to pass for you to live. So there's that guilt and shame.

Yeah. And the whole process, too, because I talk with Will, I had him on the show, connected with him over the years. Yeah, yeah, really good. I don't know if this is right, but I feel it was Christmas Eve that he got the call. I don't know if that's right, but something is telling me you might know.

And that's the thing, too, from my understanding is that it can happen kind of whatever, right? Just you're on standby, right? Yeah, you're basically on standby 24-7. They can call you in the middle of the night. And I got to beat the Indianapolis. Yes. And it's a two hour drive. And they said four hours.

You've got to be here four hours. Yeah. Yeah. Talking about sitting on pins and needles nervous all the time. Yeah, man. It's a thing that I feel like I'm hearing more and more. I don't know if that's accurate. I'm not in the hospitals.

It's not my expertise. And I don't have all the information. But I do feel like I'm hearing it more and more. And I feel like I'm hearing it more and more from, maybe younger people. I feel like when I was growing up, I just didn't hear a whole heck of a lot from younger people.

Maybe somebody that was older and that drank maybe for 40 or 50 years or whatever situation may be. And I could be completely wrong, but I feel like I'm hearing this is coming up more. Yeah, I think it's the times we live in is the technology and we're able to see more stuff

and to get more stats on how many people are going through this. But I also think I'm 42 now. Maybe it's kind of an era thing where they're just getting too drunk, too much binge drinking, hitting it hard as younger people, just really go into town on the alcohol. But. Yeah. Yeah.

I'm not sure. Yeah. Is that something that you had, because of binge drinking, too. I've heard in passing that's more harmful than maybe a sort of steady stream. And of course, there's going to be variables, but I've heard that the binge drinking because this is what I heard. I don't know if it's accurate or not. So don't take me as a scientist here. But drinking consistently sort of warms up the liver in one way or another of how to function and how to process. Binge drinking, it's not used to it. So when you go and you binge drink

and you just drink whatever way more than you normally do, it's, whoa, that's overloading can do some damage. Yeah, it's too much poison at once. Because that's, your liver's filtering out all that toxins. And when you put that much into your body, it's gonna,

but you're overwhelming the liver. And that's what happens. The scarring of the liver is, it's being overwhelmed. And you just, you've got to be careful with especially the binge drinking, because

I had a friend. He got alcohol poisoning. He was in a coma for a few days, but I didn't really put that in the same area as me because he just poisoned himself, basically. You drink too much water. That's bad for you. Yeah. Where do you go from here? I just, I'm trying to stay busy. It's really hard because I live in a hotel. A lot of the apartments, they want way too much money.

And without me working, I don't make enough. And I got bad credit anyway. So I stay in this hotel and it's just doctor appointments. You know, I play video games to pass time, watch podcasts. And I read about sobriety. and what to look for after surgery, which is my next big obstacle. Yeah.

And there's no idea, like, three months, two months, one month, there's nothing. Yeah, there's no, yeah, they can't even give me a time. Yeah. Estimated time or anything. So that's scary. I'm terrified. I was telling Will about that, terrified of the thought of surgery. And then I don't know when it's going to be.

Yeah. It's just, it's there somewhere. It's just going to creep up on me one day. And so it's got me extremely nervous and scared. Yeah. What would your message be for anybody out there who's doing the binge drinking and waking up and having a drink and experiencing withdrawals? maybe not to this point yet,

but that are sort of in the thinking that this could never happen to them. Because you didn't think this was going to happen, right? You never say, oh, this is, yeah, yeah. What would you say to them? Hey, we're not Superman and it can happen to anybody. And the biggest thing I always tell people is denial. Yeah. You know you have a problem and you need to stop the drinking get test.

It's just a little bit of blood. I know a lot of people are afraid of needles and bad news. But it's better safe than sorry. The sooner they can see it, the better. Yeah. Because they can correct it. The liver does heal. So, yeah, I'd say don't be in such denial and don't think that you're going to beat it.

because alcohol is extremely dangerous. Yeah. Extremely dangerous. It's literally poison. Yeah, ethanol, yeah. Even if you go to the gas pump, it says may contain 10% ethanol, which is... Yeah. And it's for what?

A little bit of fun. It's plight that I have. Forget the fun. I'm way too sick to even think about fun these days. Yeah. The denial. you mentioned that a couple of times in the episode, and I do think that is a really good message to put out there for people that this is real life. This is real life, and it may not end up here,

but there's many other consequences that can happen from drinking. You got to think about your family, what's going to do to them, especially your family. When you're gone, they're still here. And it's very upsetting to even think about Yeah. Thanks again, Aaron, so much for jumping on here and even with everything going on, just sharing your story with us. And I had a couple other people on the podcast, Will, my other friend, Jersey Mike. And I'll be honest with you, man. Anytime somebody's talking about this, it gets a lot of views, which tells me that it's relatable to a lot of people. And I think what you mentioned there too is so powerful with this experience. is the shame is thinking to oneself, I did this to myself. I got myself here. And I think when we think like that, we don't reach up for help. We don't connect with others. It can probably probably be a very lonely place at times. I'm only guessing. Extremely. Like I said, I don't get to talk to a lot of

people. I think a lot of people, my family, they don't want to be reminded of it. I feel like an outcast again. I'm actually going through quite a bit of mental, I guess, shock or regrets and stuff like that because I'm going to speak on it. Yeah. I'm trying to have a pity party, but, you know, just everyone be safe out there. Yeah. I think it's a good reminder.

I don't feel at all. It's a pity party. I think it's your reality, the reality of so many others. and hopefully it can land with somebody. Maybe there's one person out there who's headed in this direction and they can say, you know what? It's not like they show in the movies where you have liver failure and you just show up at the ER and they patch you up 20 minutes later

and you're just good to go for the rest of your life and everything is fixed up. This is a serious process and it's not going to work out for everybody that's been faced with it. And I've heard of people who are on the list and get six months and start drinking again they don't even make it at all so it can play out many different ways. Exactly. Thanks again, Aaron. Anything you want to mention for closing then? Yeah, I got one thing I'd say. Anyone out there that is struggling, there's a lot of us out there that's been through it or gone through it and we will talk to you. We will let you get stuff

off your chest and kind of connect with each other. You guys can find me on Instagram Just Aaron Starbuck. Same with YouTube. I plan on kind of updating people because I've been in and out of the hospital a lot lately, just letting people know my process. I kind of want to record my process. And so I plan on making some videos and stuff like that. So yeah, Aaron Starbuck, YouTube, and on Instagram.

Check out my story a little bit more about me. And I just give a big shout out to all the other people that have had me on their shows and talk with me and stuff like Will. So thank you very much for listening to me. Yeah, of course. Yeah, we'll check you out, man. Thanks again. All right, thank you.

Well, there it is. Another incredible episode on the podcast. Huge shout out to Aaron for jumping on here. And sharing his story with all of us, I'll drop his Instagram down on the show notes of this episode below. Be sure to send him over a message and say, thank you. I hope nothing but the best for Aaron and that things work out for him. It's a heavy episode though.

I mean, a lot of people get sober and, you know, things start to get better. For Aaron, he's still in a really difficult spot from years of drinking. And I don't think anybody starts out drinking, you know, thinking that this is how it's going to play out. But everybody starts somewhere and things seem to pick up speed over time. and I really hope that it works out for Aaron. So thank you for listening. Drop your thoughts in the comments below and I'll see you on the next one.