AUTUMN 1960
"Most of you know me by now, but for those who do not. My name is Beatrix, but people call me Trixie and I am an alcoholic.
I am afraid I need your help once again. I need to make a confession, clear the air so to speak, but it's just impossible.
I let someone down very badly and I can never make amends.
When I first came to London around 6 years ago, I felt incredibly lonely and was very unhappy.
I was befriended by the most kind and generous of souls. A wonderful, vibrant and brave woman.
Who I had the privilege to call the dearest of friends, for too short a time.
You see she became very ill and she died.
I failed her and her family. When I needed to find something deep within myself, I just couldn't reach that far.
I should have been able to do more, give more of myself to her husband and son, who have never been less than kind to me. I just didn't know how. The truth was, I just didn't know how to be.
As some of you know I am a qualified nurse and midwife. But, I couldn't find a way to ease suffering or relieve pain. I lied to myself, it was better that others more innately skilled, more competent than I, give of their time and their love.
I absorbed myself in my work, I distracted myself with new friends and I numbed my guilt with scotch and its kin.
Recently I have been pointing my finger at my childhood, particularly my relationship with my father for my relationship with the bottle. As you all well know, it is never easy to try and go against the grain.
Once the clear direction of my future with my fiancé vanished, I found myself so far down the wrong road, that I finally had to admit I was lost.
I really thought it was that simple. What I have only now come to realize is, that the seeds may have been sown in my childhood and reaped after the collapse of my impending marriage.
But all the really hard work was done by me, in between those two defining relationships.
I hid behind a glass for so long, because what I saw reflected in it, was a more confident, more capable Trixie.
Reflected in it was funny, vivacious, devil may-care Trixie.
What I didn't find in any bottle or in any glass for that matter, whether finest crystal or a cheap paper cup, it's all the same in the end.
I didn't find how to grieve, how to mourn, how to feel pain, how to not always have the answers, how to miss someone, how to be vulnerable, how to be, just Trixie.
Therefore, I didn't discover, how to heal and that's why I am here. That's why I catch the No.49 bus each week.
I now have to learn, how to say I am sorry and to make amends, but I fear it may be too late."