Laura Bush’s Drinking Ultimatum to George a Myth, Book Says

Former first lady Laura Bush never challenged husband George W. Bush to choose between “Jim Beam or me,” but her new book does offer new details on the ex-president’s drinking problems and his decision to stop using alcohol after a raucous 40th birthday celebration.

ABC News reported May 4 that Mrs. Bush, appearing on the Oprah Winfrey Show to discuss her memoir, “Spoken from the Heart,” said of Bush’s 1986 birthday bash in Colorado Springs: “We had the wild drunken weekend and it was no different from any other weekend.”

“George just woke up and he knew he wanted to quit,” Mrs. Bush said. “And he stopped and he was able to stop. A lot of people can’t. A lot of people need help to stop. He just stopped cold turkey.”

Mrs. Bush said in her book that she never contemplated leaving her husband because of his drinking. She told Winfrey that the couple discussed Bush’s drinking a lot, however. Bush himself has denied being an alcoholic but has admitted that he drank too much in the past.

A meeting with the Rev. Billy Graham, Bible study and other factors helped convince Bush that he should stop drinking, Mrs. Bush said. “I think it was a combination of things: of maturing, finding yourself at 40 years old and deciding what you really want,” she said. “He had a wife who loved him, had baby twin girls, and had a father thinking about running for president who was vice president.”