Former American basketball player Mike Gminski recently shared insights into his career, battles with alcoholism, and path to faith in Christ.
Gminski, now 64, played four years at Duke University from 1976 to 1980 and earned the title of ACC Rookie of the Year. Last month, he appeared on the UNPACKIN’ it podcast, discussing a range of subjects and offering his personal testimony.
During the interview, he shared that his relationship with drinking began when in college, but at the time, it wasn’t a full-blown addiction.
“When I had my first beer, and I was with a bunch of older guys on the team, I was starting with the varsity and hanging out with them, and you know, it wasn’t an everyday thing for sure, you know, weekends, maybe after a game after a win or something, but it did start then, “ Gminski said, adding that alcoholism runs in his family so it was something he was familiar with growing up.
At the same time, he said that drinking alcohol during college wasn’t something negative that impacted his life until later on during rough seasons of his life, such as the divorce of his first wife in 2011, whom he had been married to since 1981 and the loss of his second wife, Sarah, years ago due to a “massive internal hemorrhage.”
“What happened was her liver stopped being able to clot her blood, and she went into cardiac arrest twice more after the EMTs got there,” he explained. “They got her stabilized, and she went to the hospital. She had two more cardiac arrests, each for an extended three minutes.”
Gminski added that while she was placed on life support, she was ultimately taken off when doctors said she was brain dead. Regarding his alcoholism, he shared that his drinking became worse even when his friends tried to stage an intervention on his behalf. It was at this point that Gminski began to drink vodka regularly.
The turning point for Gminski came when he was living with his son Noah, who offered to help him overcome the addiction.
“I walk in the door, and at the kitchen table, there are all these filthy leaf-colored dirty vodka bottles with a note in front of it that said, ‘Dad, I love you. I want to help you’ and just brought me to my knees and shame and cried, and then he and I started having conversations,” he said, adding that his son would do an intervention for him.
Gminski added that his son’s intervention entailed a video call from two guys from the Florida-based program called Rebound as well as a woman, Leanne Miller, who ironically was the maid of honor at his first wedding, and that she had been in recovery for 13 years.
During the call, Gminski said he knew Jesus was in the room as he had this “amazing sense of calm” during the call. Afterward, Gminski traveled to Florida, where he would join the recovery program at Rehab for the next 60 days. Today, Gminski is 4 years sober and is entirely devoted to walking with Christ.
“I just passed three years 11 months in my recovery, “he said. “Four years ago right now, you wouldn’t have recognized, and that’s just four years ago. I tell people I said you know, you don’t think there are Miracles that happen now. I’m one, and I know it, and I know what He’s worked in my life.”
On Gminski’s LinkedIn, he honored God as he celebrated his three years of sobriety last year.
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