Tony Adams: Addiction, Euro ’96 and The Day That Alcohol Stopped Working - Believe in People LIVE

Live Recording And The Big Question

SPEAKER_01 0:00

This is a renewed original recording. For millions of football fans, 1996 was the summer that football almost came home. For Tony Adams, it was the year that changed his life forever. Welcome to Believe in People. My name is Matthew Butler, and I'm your host, Hosalitzer, your fertilizer. This episode was recorded live from the whole unit, hosted by the Foam Trust. We were honoured to be invited to record up a second of a life podcast with former England captain Adams Legend and Mr. Admiral himself, Tony Louis. Our conversation centered himself's latest book, 1996, and one passage in particular struck to me. He writes At 5 pm on Friday the 16th of August 1996, alcohol stopped working for me. It made me wonder whether alcohol had really stopped working or whether it had finally done exactly what addiction was always going to do. I put that question to Tony.

SPEAKER_00 0:55

Yeah, I I I used different things to change the way that I felt. So I gravitated towards things that that made me

Ego Up Self Esteem Down

SPEAKER_00 1:20

feel good. And people saying, Oh, you're a great footballer. Oh that sounds good. Not that you're an insecure, big-nosed, big ears, kind of clumbersome, kind of uneducated, someone that can't talk and have panic attacks. It didn't kind of sit well with me, so I'll I'll gravitate towards the ego. So what was happening? My ego was going up and up and up, and my self-esteem was going down and down and down. So I got to that place after 12 years. So you just don't jump into it. So it'd be my final book, and it's the year of 96 was was a massive year for me, but you just don't jump into 1996. So we've all got a a journey to get there. And my this book's a celebration because I've got you know I've got out from under, got out from that broken man and and asked a power greater than me. And I was one of the lucky ones I had a a spiritual experience on that August the 16th, 30 years ago now, where the compulsion to drink completely left me. I was 29, I'd been in prison, blackouts, intensive care, 29 stitches. I've used everything, and they did. They all stopped working. Sex, everything had stopped working. It stopped me feeling better, you know, alive, like John Travolta for the older people in the room, Ryan Reynolds for the younger ones, I suppose. I felt like I got that substance inside of me. I was like, whoa, here we go, king for a day, you know, and it all stopped working. And right at the end, when I was broken. So I I did that year. That year I put my first wife, because uh I met her in blackout. It's not a good start of a relationship to meet someone in blackout. I took her back to my house, and then the next week she was uh she was uh spending a lot of time in pubs and clubs, so she was a barmaid, and I went back there the week afterwards and I chatted her up and she went, You just talked to me last week. What are you talking about? We went back to your place last week. Oh, did we? Oh, so I married her. There you go. So it's not a good start of a relationship, and her drug of choice, it was cocaine at the start, very quickly progressed onto uh onto crack, and I was me boost. What she did for me, she propped me up. I found someone that was, in my eyes, not as good as good as me, you know. He's like, I'll never be a drug taker. You are shit, you horrible people. I'll just obliterate myself with alcohol and and and do all the things, you know. It was funny because I was the one in prison, I was the one, you know, uh being unfaithful, I was the one doing, you know, peeing myself and and you know, she's the one with the problem. So I put her into rehab because she had a problem and not me. It's all that I I felt uh my whole life I didn't I didn't know how to do it.

SPEAKER_01 4:33

You've asked me one question, this is makes my group so much easier the more the more you do it. So I'm happy with that.

SPEAKER_00 4:39

But I've always felt like inferior, inferior and superior. You know what I mean? Like I'm better the worst, then you know, you I I've got to be better than you. I've got I've got more money than you, which makes me better than you. I've got less money than you. Oh, gotta get I've got to do better than you. You know, you're a better player than me. So the you know, it's like absolutely drove me insane, you know. All that kind of judgment, all that, all that the head is on fire. What was

Rehab Rejection And Losing The Kids

SPEAKER_00 5:05

on fire, absolutely on fire. I had no peace of mind like I've got in my life life today. You know, I've cleared the wreckage of the part through the 12-step programme. But in the January of that year, I put her into rehab, and what do you know? She got clean and sober, and she's she said, Well, I'm not coming back to a fucking drunk like you. I went, Oh, sugar, oh, okay, okay, and I had rejection, which I you know, I've got no tools, so what do I do with rejection? You get shit faced, you know, and I I spiralled again, and then blackouts, you know, the I'm trying to bring up three children at this point on my own, which it was a disaster. And thank God my mother-in-law, she came round. She I passed out one Sunday afternoon. I'm lying in my, you know, lying on the floor, and she's like, You drunken bastard, she's whacking me round the face, you know. What are you like, Jesus? You're drunken. Uh and she takes the kids away. But what she did, she didn't realise, old Barbara. Bless her, she's passed away now. But what she saved my life that day. She gave me a number, she slipped it in my pocket, and she said, uh, she said, go. Sorry, gonna get a little bit emotional. How does that come across on on oh Jesus? She saved my life. There's a couple of periods of my story that that that um I get a bit emotional, and that's one of them. She said, in her language, she was a East Ender, and I suppose, and and and she went, This guy, right? This guy, you've got to go and see him. He's uh you know, he used to do drugs, he was a drug dealer back in the day. He's not had a drink, he's gone a bit weird, he's gone a bit weird, he's not doing any drugs now. He's he goes to meetings and N A and G uh A and uh and he's not had a drink for about five years, and he's a psychotherapist now. And you just go and see him, just go and see him, because he knows, you know, he's a bit weird, like you need help, you know, come and eat him. I didn't know, I didn't know, but I but I she did put the number in my pocket. And in the ape in the in the April that year, so the January the wife's you know gone into the rehabs, then she's rejected me, then the kids have gone. You know, it's a great remover, this illness, it's a great take everything from you, your sanity, your self-respect. It took it all away from me, my dignity, it took it fucking away from me, all of it. You know, I couldn't I've shifted, walking down the street. You know, you've seen them. That was me, you know. So I'm yeah, all fucking weird, he's fucking fucking fucking mental, absolute mental. So, great remover, and then in the April I went and saw him, and um I always remember uh I went I went into his one-to-one, it was a bit of a

The Number That Saved His Life

SPEAKER_00 8:05

one-to-one therapy. He passed away, that's why I get a bit teary. He passed away uh April, like November last year, and the guy saved my life. Excuse me. He gave me it for nothing, gave me the tools, and and he taught me how to stay clean and sober a day at a time, you know. Oh dear, late diet. I I blame England for this, Jesus Christ. So I went in there and I said, I know how to get shit faced, I know how to play football, but I don't know who I am. I don't know who I am. So we had the big Euros, that's in 1996, we had massive Euro competition, so I used football to change the way that I felt as well. It's my first drug of choice. This thing that I became, you know, I was like on the pitch, was comfortable. I was way way fantastic, head the ball, kick the ball, come on! Better than what I didn't care about anyone else, I just wanted it, I was driven, driven, driven, obsessed with it every day, every minute. Off the pitch. Didn't know who I was. So I met James, but I didn't have any defence from the first drink. I've said it twice now. And as soon as Garham of Southgate missed the penalty in 1996, I was handed a Carlin Black label, actually, what it was in my hand, and I went on a 44-day bender and basically went to a place where a lot of us in the room have been, and thank God have got out the other side. And at 29 I didn't want to be on the planet, it was too painful. I couldn't I did I didn't know how to kill myself, I didn't know how to die, uh, but I couldn't live. I and and I was like I say I was 29 and I at the end of my drinking I could if I took brandy I'd spew it straight up, so I used to put it in my Guinness to keep it down, so I was having getting brunning fucking insanity. You know, who does that shit? Other than addicts, you know, put the brandy in the Guinness, get oh. So that my drink's there, and like I say, it's five o'clock, 16th of August 1996, and Bill the Governor came over and said, said, You alright, Tone? And I'm crying. First time, 29 years of age, and the tears are coming down my face, and I had a uh just a an ultimate surrender. I had uh in my words, it's the best I can do, I'm sorry, articulate this. It was just in a moment of I'm fucked, I'm done, enough, I could go on. You get the point, just done. And I prayed, did I pray? I don't know what I did. If

Euro 96 And The 44 Day Bender

SPEAKER_00 11:05

something inside, I kind of went, because I I prayed when I was 14 to get into the England under 14s, and I got thrown out the next day for bad behaviour. So I kind of went, God, sling your hook. You know what I mean? I'm gonna do it my way. So 15 years I'd been doing it my way, and externally it looked like I was succeeding, internally, dying, absolutely dying. So I got to that 29 and I got to that that social club on that that August Friday night it was, and I started to cry and I surrendered. And the minute I did that, I started to win. It's so paradoxical. This programme. I came in with a guy called John C, Boxer John, he's middleweight champion of the world, he was. He won't mind me declaring his anonymity, he's out there, he's 44 years clean and sober now, Boxer John. And he always talked about throwing in my industry, in his industry, to throw the towel in is the ultimate you know, surrender. You just don't do it, you do everything but that. And little did we both know that by doing that, by surrendering to saying I can't, something else can, a little window was broken. It's like the going back to uh Carl that I had a guy earlier, and and and saying that my favorite words as a kid was I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know fuck all. You know, and my beautiful thing today, just at that moment, just at 29, I didn't know. I didn't know, and I surrendered. And my life's been so, so good since. Absolutely a day of time. Life happens. They say, you know, it gets better. And I always say this, I said, my life, it's it there's been ups and downs. I've lost my mum and dad. It's really painful watching my mum die, in particular of bone cancer for nine months, holding around, not picking up a drink. Everything inside you screaming, get out of you pain, pain. I used to run from it two seconds to go and have a drink. I can't do all that stuff now. I've got to cry, I've got to be there with her. But I was, I was there, I was crying with her, and it was painful for nine months, you know. But it's see things happen. So you don't get better, but what's happened? I've got better. I've got better, and that's the secret. I can handle absolutely everything. I've recovered from this illness, but I still it's contingent on me keep coming back, still doing things like this. So I I I finally kind of finished the the the last book off, and and I've I I I did 6,000 words in one sitting just to explain this kind of provisional story, and then I go into the year which I've already mentioned, and then I got recovery in in August, and I was outed by the media. This is why I'm so out there now. Early recovery. I heard at the very beginning 90 meetings in 90 days, which really stuck with me, and I'm pleased it did, and I just bam, got in the meetings, I was in the meetings. Then I I wanted to be the best person in uh in Alcoholics Anonymous, you know what I mean? He said, Yeah, great, great, great, go for it.

The Surrender Moment At 5pm

SPEAKER_00 14:35

You know, my James always used to say to me, he said, Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. You had some good qualities in there that kept you driving and kept him going and kept him going, so don't throw them out. So I wanted to complete the book. Uh uh six weeks out, I was open to the whole world new and and and and and and took away my my choice of of of coming out. But it was a for me, it was the best thing that happened because you say you're only sick of your secrets, and I had a lot of clearing up to do because I'd done all I was front page of the sun every other week, you know what I mean? I was plastered on it, been with this stripper, been with this sex worker, been with this this. You're like, oh Jesus, have I got another read, another thing? So actually, to get it all up and get it in the first book called Addicted was absolute a kind of dumping process. So that's kind of dealt with, that's dealt with, that's in the past, that's not who I am. That was the sick Tony, and now I started created, and the second book, Sober, was about all the tricks of the trades. 20 was celebrating 20 years of recovery. The sober was, and it's all the good stuff, it's all the good stuff that them outside don't really good, but I do recommend that all you go and buy that one because it it's the secret, it's the keep coming back, it's the 90 meetings in 90 days, it's help helping other people to help yourself, you know. It's all about recovery, you know, it really is, and it and it's a fantastic book. So I just wanted to finish this one off to go through the year of 96, and then at the end of it, just to kind of close it all off with uh with gratitude and with because sometimes we're perceived, and the stigma around addiction in the world out there, and I'll let you have another question. Um I will the world out there, I think they've still got a little bit, you know, don't kind of like us, they don't pay, you know. You go into government and people like that, and hopefully there's some commissioners in the in the room here, and they're like, You're giving it to the sicklos, the the addicts, you know, what are you doing that for? I tell you what, it's any I just I'm the most decorated Arsenal football player in the history of their club of the club, okay? 140 years are coming up, or whatever it is. Recovery is the best medal that I ever got. You know, this stuff is is gold, it's absolute gold, and I've got it. I've won the ja you know, why wouldn't you want this stuff? Why wouldn't you shoot from the rooftops? Fucking yes! What a goal! What a goal! Anyway, I I'm quite excited about being in recovery. I don't know if you can tell,

Grief Without Drinking And Daily Practice

SPEAKER_00 17:30

but it saved my life, and the ripple effect of that is what I'm probably you know sitting here today with. That it just ripples out. You know, it ripples out. People come up to me before the meeting and and before the today and go, oh, I was seven years, oh I was 14 years, oh I'm I'm 22, I heard you, oh I read the first book because the book got more addicted got more people clean and sober than I ever did. It got it sold 400,000 copy copies, addicted, the first book. I got quarter of a million pounds for it. I gave it to Sporting Chance to start the charity. It's 26 years, they put 50 addicts through their clinic a year, they're 1,300 into into into uh into one-to-one therapy. And going forward, the ripple effect of that is is just amazing. Go on, ask me a question. Go on, it's a podcast for God's sake. It's supposed to be back and forwards.

SPEAKER_01 18:29

It's interesting, but the thing that I I do find uh that I probably want to explore a little bit more is you you talked about you know Southgate missing the penalty and the incredible I mean you talked about that moment with an incredible perspective, but the the the bender, the 44-day bender that happened after that. Would do you think it'd have been it's weird to deal in hypotheticals, but do you think it'd have been different if in if if England had won Euro 96, Garriford scored, you lifted that trophy as captain, or do you think the loss kind of accelerated your recovery? Have you have you thought about that moment? How it could have been different if it was if there was a victory there instead?

SPEAKER_00 19:05

Yeah, I think um money also can accelerate the illness, you know. I had I I had money, so I just went back and and and and and used again, you know, and didn't have to steal, I suppose. I did the 20 questions of are you an are you an alcoholic back in the day? I I did one when I was in denial and I got three, I think, were out of 20 answers. And then I did one about a year into recovery, and I was up around the 17, 18 out of 20, whether I'm an alcoholic. And the one the big one that I couldn't ever see was about the the have you ever stole to uh to enable you to drink. And and we had it well, I drank in a bar, I drank a lot of bars, but I drank at one of the bars in Emerson Park was horseshoe, horseshoe shaped, like that. And when Bill, the governor, went round the other side of the bar, we used to lean over and fill it up. That's not feathing, because that's a laugh, that's a joke. See the justification of that. I fucking stole a beer, your knees around the other side, I'm I'm filling it up, you know. That's stealing for God's sake. So I'm 20 out of 20. But I I also put in here for you guys, for you civilians that are asking the questions now as well, and I thought it was important to try and educate you guys. What I try to do is tell my experiences, because you can't lie about that. None of you can come back to me and say, No, you didn't piss the bed.

Being Outed And Going All In

SPEAKER_00 20:50

Do you know what I mean? If I start to say, Well, I think Harry Kane's better than guadiola or whatever, you're like, Well, actually, I think he's better than him. You know what I mean? I start to get you can argue with opinions, so I stick to my experiences, and hopefully you've identified or empathized with them and kind of go, Yeah, ah, me too. So that's what the books are about. But where this one is a little bit different at the back, I do go for because I've experienced and I've got a guy now that's just gone into a coma, a friend of the family, drinking him, drunk himself into a coma now. And yeah, yellow, 53. He was a skier when when you know, bless him. And you know, I'm praying for him, and and when he's ready, hopefully he comes through and and I'll be there by his side. But I think, you know, I and judging my my f my wife's a civilian, you know, and she's a civilian uh a civilian and she doesn't she doesn't understand, you know, she she'll never get it. She is enough. She's got natural tools emotionally she She's one of these people that cries at funerals. I'm like, how do you why do you do that? I remember when my dad died.

SPEAKER_01 22:08

Isn't that a normal thing to do, cry at a funeral?

SPEAKER_00 22:11

I didn't. Okay. So my dad died, and about seven months later, I'm sitting in the island of Capri on holiday on the balcony having a coffee and flutter tears. Cry my eyes out. And and the wife's come, she said, Well, you're alright, you're alright. What's up, Tone? You're alright. I said, My dad's died. You mean he died seven months ago? Why don't you cry at funerals like we all do? It's there for that purpose, you know. But I've been I'm used to suppressing. I've had a lifetime, I know so well how to suppress shit. I'm a master at it. Absolute master. First with football, first, then drugs, drink, you know, suppress, suppress, suppress with female suppress, panic attacks, any situation. Keep it down, keep it in, keep it in. Thank God there's things like this today, so I can get it all out. Spray it around the world. Get it all out, and I stay clean and sober, and that the head gets cleared. James always used to say, we all need a place where we can speak the unspeakable.

Stigma Recovery And The Ripple Effect

SPEAKER_00 23:30

That's a safe space, not here, probably. I'm 30 years now. I know I'm a little bit freer with a few bits of my story that I but we all need somewhere that we can go. Some people, I didn't have a family that could do that. Some people got families they can talk to and mums and dads and and and people that they can they go. I couldn't go to that. I just kind of came then came inside, went inside, went inside very early age, you know, and it just went all there. It all went in there. So it is important for me to try and explain the the stages, the stages of the illness and the decline and the the wellness, you know, and to the civilian. And and and what I did uh the in the big book of alcoholics and oh I'm getting one of like them old timers now, you know. And it's a quote in the big book on page 84 of the big book, you've not got a copy, Jesus Christ. Go and get a copy for God's sake. But there's a bit in there around different types of of people, I suppose, and and my wife's one as well. She she had a I think she had a a glass of wine. Maybe about 2004. I think, and and and she and I don't think she's drunk it since. You know, she's one of those that that puts the cap on the bottle and puts it back in the fridge and stuff, and you're like, you know, I get really annoyed with that. Well, you're not gonna finish that. What the fuck? You know, and I mean I've getting the real one, you know, they throw this beer around and all that. I'd be laughing, yeah. Jesus Christ. I'm looking for sober events now how much I've changed. I'm like, well, throw it over me stuff. I wouldn't have done that when I was shit faced. Well, you're wasting it. Why are you wasting it? Stick it down your chops, you idiots. Anyway, so that's the that's the addict. So I wanted to explain that there's there's normal, normal, take it or leave it. They can take it or leave it. I don't know, but you're you're probably normal, you know. You you have a beer, my son does, you know. I've got six kids. Most of them are good. My my eldest is is in recovery three years, but the others are like, they have a beer with their mates and they don't drink again, you know, for months, for months and stuff, and they've got no you're none doing acid or you know, they're not doing drugs, and it's like, wow, and they're and they're good enough and they feel okay themselves and they're confident and you're like, What who are you? You know, who are you? So they're not they're not addicts, they're not, they don't need a maybe a 12 books uh program. Then you've got the the uh the the kind of guy that that heavy drinks and and and gets on it from time to time and and and occasionally you know goes too far and and and and he'll go out and he'll he'll get drunk and and then it'll get it'll get really bad and and and and and his wife might say to him, look, gee, you know, you know, you may do something about this drinking, you better knock it on the head. And he does. Or he or he reduces. And he might go, he had might have health problems, and he might go to his doctor, and his doctor might go, Oh, yeah, your doctor you mate, you know, if you

Civilians Heavy Drinkers And Addicts

SPEAKER_00 27:00

if you were if you if you don't stop drinking, mate, you're gonna have you know, you you're gonna have a real cost to your life here, you know. You you're gonna have real problems. And he knocks it on the head. And then you've got the addicts. You know, I I heard once, you know, if if you tell me you've got a year to live, if you keep drinking and you've got a year to live, my first thought is I've got a year. Hallelujah. Here we go, let's do it. Do you know what I mean? It's like when your wife comes up to you and says, Look, you've got to stop drinking, and you go, Bye-bye, wife, bye-bye, wife, they're gone. You know, we don't we we've crossed when I crossed the line, I couldn't stop. And I know that was one of your questions you asked me, uh asked me earlier. You know, what why don't you stop? What is wrong with you? I'm bloody ill. I'm ill, I can't stop. That's the definition of addiction. That's a definition. I want to stop, but I can't. I'm obsessed with it. I'm I'm emotionally closed down, mentally obsessed, and spiritually flawed, I suppose, because of the shame. The shame and the guilt, it's a load of shame and guilt in there, but it's got me to my bottom. The shame and the guilt got me to the bottom, got me to my rock bottom, because I'm not like that man. I'm not like that man that used and drunk, you know what I mean? I'm not that man. And uh waking up and having done the shit that I did, it's like I can't be in this world knowing that I did that, so I needed a clean house. I need a clean house because that wasn't me, that was the ill Tony, that was the very sick Tony, and I'm not sick today, and I don't do that shit. Funny that, huh? Funny that. Yeah, go on, ask another one.

SPEAKER_01 28:58

Tony, I do know what this is. And we got no time. That was the easiest podcast ever. I've got to know two questions. And no, my producer's better dump it's wrapper, but obviously, thank you for being so vulnerable. And and one of the things that we like to do is because these are emotionally charged conversations, is I like to finish the podcast with uh 10 random quickfire questions. Um just just for quickfire, you've got one word.

SPEAKER_00 29:26

29 years I couldn't talk, and now I can't shut up.

SPEAKER_01 29:33

Should we try it?

SPEAKER_00 29:34

Go for it.

SPEAKER_01 29:35

What's your favourite word? Marlocks. Least favourite word, Tottenham. You said that it was gonna be said it was gonna be Tottenham. Tell me something that excites you. My family. Something that drains your energy or bores you.

SPEAKER_00 29:52

My family.

SPEAKER_01 29:54

What sound or noise do you love? Yeah!

Quickfire Questions And Closing Messages

SPEAKER_01 30:01

What sound or noise do you hear? When do you feel most like yourself?

SPEAKER_00 30:08

When I'm meditating.

SPEAKER_01 30:11

What if you wasn't a footballer, what profession would you like to have to have attempted?

SPEAKER_00 30:15

A recovering alcoholic.

SPEAKER_01 30:19

What profession would you not like to do?

SPEAKER_00 30:22

Practice an alcoholic.

SPEAKER_01 30:25

And then lastly, if heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you were around at the Pelie gates?

SPEAKER_00 30:31

I was expecting you earlier. But well played.

SPEAKER_01 30:35

Brilliant. And if you've enjoyed this episode of the Believe in People Podcast, we'd love for you to share it with others who might find it meaningful. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode. Leaving a review will help us reach more people and continue challenging stigma around addiction and recovery. For additional resources, insights, and updates, explore the links in this episode description. And to learn more about our mission and hear more incredible stories, you can visit us directly at believingpeoplepodcast.com.