Chapter 1 - page 7
Bill's family
"My brother-in-law is a physician, and through his kindness and that of my mother I was placed in a nationally-known hospital for the mental
and physical rehabilitation of alcoholics."
1
Big Book - Bill's Story - page 7
Bill had only one sibling, a sister. His sister, Dorothy, known as 'Dot', studied nursing at the University of Chicago. After becoming a registered nurse she worked at Chicago General Hospital where she met Dr. Leonard Strong. They married became a nurse. While working in married Dr. Leonard Strong, a physician who practiced in Manhattan. Not only did Leonard Strong help pay for Bill's treatments at Towns Hospital, but he also introduced Bill to the staff at the Rockefeller Foundation. When AA established a Board of Trustees, Leonard served as a non-alcoholic trustee. 2
Brother-In-Law of Bill Wilson
Served as a Non-Alcoholic Trustee for AA
His mother, Dr. Emily Ella Griffith-Strobell, also contributed financially towards his treatments at Towns Hospital. After his parents divorced, Bill lived with his maternal grandparents while his mother attended Osteopathic school in Boston. In 1923 she married Dr. Charles Strobell. Bill remained close to his mother throughout her lifetime, she was his guest at the 1955 AA International Convention held in St. Louis. 2
Mother of Bill Wilson
photo from findagrave.com
click here to see enlarged image
tree from familysearch.org
belladonna treatment
Under the so-called belladonna treatment my brain cleared.
1
Big Book - Bill's Story - page 7
In this sentence the In the sentence "Under the so-called belladonna treatment my brain cleared," the phrase "belladonna treatment" functions as a compound noun. 3
The Belladonna Treatment was developed by Charles Towns and was the primary therapy used at his hospital in Manhattan. This treatment involved a regimen of herbs, mercury, and castor oil, administered hourly for several days to detoxify active alcoholics and drug addicts. One of the key components of the treatment was the plant Belladonna, commonly known as Deadly Nightshade. For more details about the Belladonna Treatment used at Towns Hospital, please refer to the history section of this website. - Towns Hospital
Definitions from Webster's 1930 edition. 4
photo public domain from wikimedia.org
hydrotherapy
"Hydrotherapy and mild exercise helped much."
1
Big Book - Bill's Story - page 7
In this sentence the word hydrotherapy functions as a noun. 3
Hydrotherapy treatments included soaking in various water temperatures, massage using water jets, and enemas used to eliminate toxins from the body. Hydrotherapy methods can be traced to Greek, Roman, and Japanese cultures. The use of water in therapy was popularized in the U.S. by John H. Kellogg, doctor and inventor of Corn Flakes, at his Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan. He authored and published Rational Hydrotherapy (1900), Outlines of Practical Hydrotherapy (1926), and The Uses of Water in Health and Disease, which provided detailed instructions for practitioners on the use of baths, douches, and compresses. They were popular treatments used for many ailments, including mental health and addiction treatments during the 1900s.6
Definitions from Webster's 1930 edition. 4
public domain Library of Congress
a kind doctor
Best of all, I met a kind doctor who explained that though certainly selfish and foolish, I had been seriously ill, bodily and mentally."
1
Big Book - Bill's Story - page 7
The kind doctor is Dr. Silkworth, the author of the Big Book chapter "The Doctor's Opinion".
the goose hung high
"For three or four months the goose hung high."
1
Big Book - Bill's Story - page 7
The term goose hung high is not included in the 1930 edition of Webster's Dictionary. This is now listed as an out of date idiom. "Things are or will be very pleasant, desirable, or merry; everything is looking up. An allusion to the notion that geese fly higher during pleasant weather." 5
Using the idiom 'the goose hung high,' Bill describes his thinking after detoxing: everything was going better, he had put this thing behind him.
To avoid bad flying conditions Geese will adjust their flying altitudes to fly above bad weather patterns.
Interesting side road: Canada geese fly at an altitude of 3,000 feet for migration flight. A species from Central Asia, the Bar-headed goose, migrates
from India through the Himalayan range to their nesting grounds at Tibet. They have been documented as flying as high as 29,000 feet. In comparison
most commercial airlines cruise around 35,000 feet, helicopters between 1,000 to 5,000 feet, and hot air balloons as high as 3,000 feet.
delirium tremens or wet brain
"My weary and despairing wife was informed that it would all end with heart failure during delirium tremens, or I would develop a wet brain,
perhaps within a year."
1
Big Book - Bill's Story - page 7
In the sentence, "delirium tremens" and "wet brain" both function as noun phrases. 3
Delirium Tremens (DT's) - a severe form of alcohol withdrawal. Definition from Webster's 1930 edition. 4
Delirium Tremens (DTs) is a severe form of acute alcohol withdrawal marked by shaking, hallucinations, and delirium. "Wet Brain," or Wernicke-Korsakoff Syndrome (WKS), involves thiamine deficiency, leading first to acute confusion, lack of voluntary muscle coordination, and or eye issues. Untreated, it evolves into chronic Korsakoff’s psychosis, which includes memory loss and the fabrication, distortion, or misinterpretation of memories without conscious intent to deceive. Often described as "honest lying," the individual sincerely believes these memories are accurate and may be extremely convincing to others. Both are severe alcohol-related conditions but differ: DTs are sudden and intense, while WKS develops gradually due to poor nutrition. The two can occur together, with DTs often preceding WKS.
|
on to page 8 |
|
back to page 6 |
|
jump to the top of this page |
Footnotes for page 7
1Quotes from the Big Book on listed on this page are from the public domain version, in the United States, of the 2nd edition of the book Alcoholics Anonymous. Accessible at 12step.org
2Historical events taken from the books "Bill W." by Robert Thomsen (1975), and "Bill W." by Francis Hartigan (2000).
3Sentence diagramming, to determine the word usage within the sentence, was performed by CoreNLP at corenlp.run.
4Definitions used are from the Webster's New International Dictionary of the English Language 1930 Edition. Access to this dictionary online is at Hathitrust.org
5Farlex Dictionary of Idioms for goose hangs high
6Wikipedia entry for John Harvey Kellogg.