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This is excerpted from Finding Our Way Home copyright 2026 Bernie Schultz
Back Into Society
A week later, on April 2, 1998, I left the Transition House and moved in with Nancy. My original plan had been to rent a room in a rooming house. We were talking about it one evening, and she started asking practical questions.
“Do you have a television?” “No, but I can get a cheap one at the pawn shop.”
“Do you have pots and pans?” “No, but I can find some cheap ones somewhere.” Already, the calculator in my head was adding and subtracting from my little paycheck.
“How about silverware?” “Again, I’d have to buy that too.”
She looked at me with that calm, matter of fact Nancy logic and said, “I have four or five TVs. I have a set of pots still in the box. I have about five thousand pieces of silverware. And I have a spare room. Why don’t you rent that from me? Then we won’t have to worry about travelling back and forth to see each other.”
It wasn’t a grand romantic gesture. It wasn’t fireworks or violins. It was practical. It was simple. It was loving. It was the beginning of a life built on recovery, honesty, and the kind of companionship that grows from two people who have already walked through fire.
And that’s how we started — not with promises of forever, but with one day. Today.
When I left the Transition House, I walked out with a small paycheck, a handful of clothes, and a heart that was finally learning how to stay open. Nancy welcomed me into her home the same way she welcomed me into her life — with clarity, kindness, and a sense of humour that kept us both steady.
We didn’t pretend we were starting a fairy tale. We were starting a life. And life, especially in recovery, is built on routines, honesty, and the willingness to show up every single day.
We went to meetings together — sometimes AA, sometimes Al-Anon, sometimes both. We drank coffee with newcomers. We prayed. We laughed. We cried. We learned how to talk to each other without running, hiding, or shutting down. We learned how to disagree without destroying anything. We learned how to love without losing ourselves.
Our programs weren’t just part of our relationship — they were the foundation of it. We didn’t put each other first. We put God first. We put recovery first. And because of that, we were able to give each other something neither of us had ever had: a healthy, honest, spiritual partnership.
Nancy used to joke about her “black belt in Al-Anon,” but there was truth in it. She had boundaries. She had wisdom. She had a way of seeing through my nonsense without shaming me for it. And I had a way of grounding her in the spiritual principles that had saved my life. We balanced each other — not perfectly, but faithfully.
We didn’t make promises about forever. We made promises about today. And every morning, we renewed them without saying a word.
The house became a home in small, ordinary ways. Shared meals. Shared chores. Shared laughter. Shared silence. The kind of life that grows not from grand gestures, but from consistency — from two people choosing each other one day at a time.
Looking back, I can see how fragile it all was, and how strong. Two people with broken pasts, building something whole. Two programs intertwining. Two spiritual paths converging. Two hearts learning how to stay.
It wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t easy. But it was real. And real was more than enough.
