I'm an alcoholic in recovery, I recovered without AA, however I have friends that are in AA and they tell me that I'm bound to relapse if I don’t "keep coming back", I cant go back. I hate the program with such rage and downright despair that the mere mention of the program can send me into an inner rage that is indescribable.
Somehow I need to recover from the program of AA and am finding it difficult. When I talk about my feelings about AA with AA's they look at me like I'm an alien, and the old-timers shake their heads and mumble stupid little sayings like, go back out, your bottom wasn't low enough. My bottom wasn't low enough? I almost died a couple of times. I was suicidal and unable to stop drinking. I was like many other alkies, home alone drinking nightly by myself and often waking up on the bathroom floor wondering what and how many pills I had taken. I woke up once only to find that I had a sharp blade to my wrist and I knew that I needed to quit, but I couldn't. Oh I tried, and one time after an overdose I quite for 5 days!
I was forced to go to AA daily, I did the steps and I prayed that this would be the end of my drinking. You see I wanted sobriety, and I had hoped that I would be something someday. After 6 weeks of treatment I came home after promising my counselor that I would attend daily meetings, get a sponsor and really work the steps.
I was stupid. I really was just incredibly naive and vulnerable....so away I went to my first AA meeting and that was the beginning of the end for me. The people there were nice enough, but they were all the same. They all kept saying silly sayings and they began to look and talk like robots. When I questioned the steps or *gasp* the Big Book I started to hear things like;
“You're a dry drunk”
“If you actually had a higher power, you wouldn't have any anxiety"
“You are angry, you need to pray to have that anger removed, your anger will kill you”. (Damn rights I was angry, who wouldn’t be hearing all of this shit?)
My favorite:
"If I had your sobriety I'd kill myself"
This was spoken by my big book thumping sponsor, who is now a counselor at the last rehab I went to.
Agreed. Free clear and logical thinking against AA isn't tolerated. That is why it is too hard to sit and listen and not cross talk these jokers. F! Them and it! F! It!
ReplyDeleteI can relate as well. I'm trying to recover a.a.'s being crammed down my throat (under misleading, misrepresented claims on a website), when I was in treatment, I need a treatment program to recover from treatment!
DeleteI can relate to that! A..A.
Deletes came into treatement where I was at and kicked sand in my face!
you are not alone
ReplyDeleteCome join is on leavingaa.com
kris kristofferson was asked to speak at an AA meeting many years ago
ReplyDelete.
.he showed up, wasted, and spoke these words "when i look in the mirror i know everything is gonna be alright, when i look at you bunch of losers, i know this is the best its ever gonna get"..... know trues words spoken
The man is a genius.
Sober. Without. aa. PERIOD.
Sophie,
ReplyDeleteCongrats on a really “to the point” blog. I sometimes wish I had been as aware as you have been about the rooms of AA. I spent some time in the rooms before finally leaving and it is kind of funny how often the question comes up, “why do we lose people?”, but any dialogue addressing the question always lacks any introspection about the program. I can’t help thinking the same kind of conversation is taking place right now at a factory making rotary phones or betamax video machines. They really have their heads in the sand, and I have come to believe that leaving and doing what you did is the norm not the exception. AA is quite incestuous in its thinking.
I never wanted to join an institution, but that is what AA is about once not-drinking has been conquered. They espouse honesty except when it comes to their own dogma. I wanted my life back and to live as normally as possible, not to buttress and defend a whole array of practices that have more to do with giving members a sense of belonging than for being there for people trying to get sober. I honor an celebrate anyone who has gotten sober however they accomplished this, and believe me, you are not alone.
Dear Sophie,
ReplyDeleteAfter a year and a month of sobriety, I had a nightmare last night about being in a meeting and being shut down, excluded and bullied by other women alcoholics.
The reason is that some hours earlier my sponsor came up with a new agenda for me that had to do with how her sponsor was telling her how to treat me. The kindness and support that we'd started with was gone. All I heard was, "I am the boss of you."
She also pulled out the old chestnut that if I don't keep going to meetings I will fall off the wagon, promoting fear in me. I thought about it and agree that that might be true for some people -- certainly those who go back to meetings and start over with day one, admitting they dropped out spiritually before stopping the meetings. But what about people who leave program and stay sober? They don't go crawling back to AA to confess they left because they don't fail. I know at least one man who stopped going and stayed sober, and I'm looking for more of those stories. That's how I came across this blog. I'm looking for hope that i don't NEED to go back to meetings. That fear my (now EX) sponsor planted in me still has its hooks in me.
My distaste for program has to do with people who don't practice the principles. These types gossip, exclude, judge, control, and create or support a power core. In the area I live in, there's a HUGE clique run by a queen and king. I will try driving to other areas before I give up entirely.
I hope you're able to hang on to your sobriety. Being newly sober is tough -- the feelings can be painful. Life is good, and (I believe) we only live once, so I choose to do it sober.
Here's a suggestion (it works for me): I use Alanon. The people are just as nutty, but less aggressive. The principles are more up-front. I laughed from honest identification several times today. (I needed an Alanon meeting after feeling stung by too many alcoholics.)
Best of luck to you. And me, too. Love.
I really like your Alanon idea and I'm going to try it! Here is my sponsor nightmare:
DeleteI have been trying to work the AA program since 2012. At times I had no interest. After
multiple, near fatal relapses, I decided I would give it a serious effort. I went to 90
in 90. Got a sponsor. Worked the Steps. Believed in the mythical god.
A month ago I had a three day bender and it all came crashing down. My sponsor told me
he was going to get extra tough on me. He demanded I attend 2 meetings every day of the
week. I told him that was too much because I had a home life that was important to me.
My sponsor then shook his skinny finger right in my face and said "you don't have a home
life and an AA life. Only an AA life and that's all". I wholeheartedly laughed in his
face and I thought he was going to pop!
Over the next couple of weeks, we did the 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th step. He kept copies of
my 4th step for crying out loud! He said they would be kept under lock and key, but I
wondered what would happen to them if he died! I hadn't done anything that horrible so
it wasn't an issue for me, but what about the other people he sponsors who had?
He began telling me what to think, how to act, what to say. Both at meetings and on
social media. He scolded me for not "greeting the newcomer" when in fact I was spending
hours with new people in a rehab center I had previously graduated from. If my sponsor
didn't see it, as far as he was concerned, I wasn't doing it! He suggested living amends
by putting $5 in the basket at every meeting. Let me sum that up for you.
$5 donation at 2 meetings a day x 365 days a year = $3650.00 a year. BULLSHIT!!!!!
My Mom went to hospice and died eventually on 7-4-17. I was an emotional wreck during
that horrific period. I halted my meetings and stopped calling my sponsor. My family was
enough support for me. And I didn't want some outside person coming to gawk at someone
he didn't know. My sister and I had to dissolve all of my Mom's possessions and complete
a funeral. I drank 2 beers every night to unwind and deal with the anxiety. I didn't
black out. I didn't end up in the gutter. I didn't land in jail. I didn't end up dead.
At first I was self loathing over drinking the beer. But I stopped that habit after the
funeral. I dreaded returning to AA meetings and my sponsor's expected wrath. I ordered
two self help books and joined a 30 day on-line rehab program. I have not felt this free
for a long time! I go to 3 AA meetings a week just for the entertainment. A reminder of
what madness is involved. I have made many friends there and like to see them more than
anything.
There are many solutions to addiction. I prefer a positive (softer - kinder) way. I am
currently building on my strengths, changing my lifestyle, changing my habits, reading
positive material, and letting "resentments" go. The ultimate goal is living a sober
happy life. I can't expect a mythical entity to stop my substance abuse. The bottom line
is that I, and I only, have the final say on how I live my life and manage my habits.
Best of luck everyone!
Wow, they actually pass a donation basket during their sessions????? How very Christian, totally like the church service I was forced to attend as a kid.
Deletei love you
ReplyDeletePeople can get sober without AA. It is not necessarily for everyone, by any means. Even so, I have a deep respect for it.
ReplyDeleteFor a few years after getting my B.A. and before going to graduate school, I was a substance abuse counselor at the Substance Abuse Center of Johnson County, close to Kansas City, Kansas. What I learned there was worth five Ph.D.s. Not being an alcoholic, I thought it was important for me to know as much as I could about my clients’ experience. That’s why I attended as many open AA meetings as I could. It was an eye opener. The members made me feel welcome everywhere I went. One of my proudest possessions is my 30 day coin.
What did I learn? I learned that you can’t just go to one AA meeting and think you know AA. Every meeting, every location had its own kind of culture. There were the hard-core biker meetings, the white-collar professional meetings, the womens’ meetings, huge open meetings, more intimate closed meetings…. you get the picture.
There were also the religious meetings, yes, and the agnostic ones. I learned my higher power did not have to be God in the Judeo-Christian tradition, although a lot of people were comfortable with that. If I wanted my dog Snoopy to be my Higher Power I was encouraged to go for it, as long as I gave up my need to Control and was willing to give it to something meaningful outside myself.
I learned that AA was a great leveler. Everyone was the essentially same: the lawyer and the short-order cook, the doctor and the housewife. Each were equally brave. Each deeply respected for the courage it took to just show up.
Well you weren't in the vulnerable position of actually having the problem. Aa is fine for the people it works for. But if you question what goes on n there you'll find that its OK to do it once. But those who keep doing it tend to find themselves out in the cold, in my opinion.
DeleteI went to a meeting once and it the negative vibe that hit me was enough to keep me away from it.
DeleteI am just curious Sophie have you stayed sober sense you posted this blog?
ReplyDeleteI am so sik of them saying sit down and shut up. Why an I at a discussion meeting for newcomers if all I hear is the old timers saying the same old stuff and telling us to sit down and shut up. We are not even stading up in the first place
ReplyDeleteBecause one does not choose aa out of clarity. One is confused, so you seek help from another. Please see the sanity of this. So it's inevitable that aa members will tell you that you can't think for yourself."Take the cotton wool out of your ears and put it on your mouth", as they say in AA. In other words shut up, you can't think for yourself.
DeleteI agree with you 1000% Sofie. I was manipulated
ReplyDeleteand coerced into AA by family members and ex-employer (I said those threatening words...sexual harrassment). They took away my life, my career, my money, my friends, family, my car, harrassed and threatened me for 12 years. After 4 years of AA, my life was totally ruined, nothing left. After another 5 years without AA, I have never drank, had a desire to drink and have tried my best to be a productive, happy, helpful human being. They have sabotaged all of my efforts because I have not co-operated with their plan for me to spend 24/7, for the rest of my life, doing service work for AA, and being "whipped" and
"beaten" into their little service worker.
By the way, I never considered suicide prior to AA, had spirituality and smiled and laughed alot.
The sponser I did have at AA spent all of her time talking about herself, how special she was, and her on line exploits looking for a man.
I will never go back.
I was coerced/mandated into it, in treatment, which gave me a bad taste in my mouth. No one, drunk, alcoholic, whatever, feels good about being disempowered. And being whipped, I can relate as well. Just slip and run into a Marine Corp-like old timer. You'll get the crap whipped out of you. Is that the way that you want to spend the rest of your life? Life is short.
DeleteTo Cathryn McClellan:
ReplyDeleteI have a curious question for you. How could you have a deep respect for an organization that commits so many abuses against the vulnerable and at risk people it claims to be helping? I think the anger and the depression Sophie wrote about from her experiences in AA are not a rare case. People in AA do a lot of damage to people who don't see things the AA way. There is the flat out bad advice given by these AA people because they cant see past their nose on their "only AA way" ideas. Then there are a good number of hardened criminals in the AA crowd who take delight in deliberately hurting someone. I am consistently shocked at how much abuse goes on in AA.
So, how is it you could have a deep respect for this program? I would think it is because you don't know what goes on in many AA meetings and the abuse that is committed by many of the proponents of AA. Also, as an substance abuse counselor you probably respect the money you make by supporting AA.
By the way, I found your question to Sophie "I'm just curious have you stayed sober since this blog?" to be condescending and lacking concern for someone who has so deeply suffered.
I agree. But first of all, best wishes to everyone in Sophie's position who is trying to get sober and finding that AA often places its own group-think mentality well above concern for new-comers.
DeleteIt's discouraging to see a counselor, someone who i would hope would be able to think with a little more of a critical mindset toward different treatments, spouting out the same slogans as usual. We've all heard the arguments you made for how great AA is - the great leveler, etc - and you probably are just repeating what you heard in a meeting. In fact, from meetings that I've been to, if you really listen to people's comments, they are almost all just singing AA's praises. Seriously, listen to people's comments. About 85% of them will follow the template of how they had some problem, then they did X suggestion from the program, and now they feel better, and isn't AA just grand?
AA is a little like an abusive relationship or a dysfunctional family. On the surface, it may present itself well. But you have to really dig in a little deeper to see what's going on. She implied that Sophie just hasn't gone to enough meetings, but I believe Sophie has seen much more about AA from the real perspective of a newcomer than she has.
I also found the "curious" question to be loaded and disingenuous, not honest or helpful at all.
Bottom line: AA is not willing to attempt any forms of self-correction. In fact, it would never even consider that if might need to change. Never changing even when new facts are found is the opposite of being scientific. And if alcoholism is a medical problem, then there is certainly no question that it requires a scientifically grounded solution. And no, anecdotal claims about a few people you know who got better going to AA are not valid science.
Finally SOMEONE has the same reaction to that horrible place and psychotic people as I do. If they want to know about denial they have no further to look than the mirror and I don't mean the denial they sell as a mask for guilt and shame. I'm having a hard time shaking it all off as well. Thanks for the writing.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty new to AA and while I don't share the same vitriol about the program I do certainly have some reservations. I'm 11 days sober and I thank the rehab I went to for 5 days for putting me on track medically. Since I got out I'm doing both outpatients rehab and daily AA meetings.
ReplyDeleteI find that the universal AA solution is to attend more meetings. My temp sponsor suggested I not only hit the evening meetings but lunch meetings as well. I skipped a day and there was grave concern... well I had spent 17 hours in various treatment, group, and AA meetings since getting out of rehab. I wanted a break.
Also I've been reading the big book as this is what the program is founded upon and I feel that the religious aspect of the program has been hidden from the public. They talk about a higher power but the book states god almost every paragraph. I'm an atheist, praying for me would be a useless exercise. I got to "how it works ", a section that they read every meeting, and noticed that the oral version read curiously omits the sentences referring to god and praying.
I feel a peer group is a good thing so I will keep going for now. But in my area I can't help but notice that the same people keep getting called up and sharing the same stories at all the meetings. They are not particularly good at the oratory, and the stories are not even particularly uplifting. Mostly lamenting that they would be dead if they didn't find AA almost bragging about how low they got and how thankful they are for AA and how they couldn't do it without.
When I finally got called up, I told my somewhat grim tale but I at least had them in stitches laughing (I do public speaking at work so I'm good at oratory) .
I will be evaluating the advice I receive at AA carefully.
AA does NOT have the corner market on sobriety...Their own literature states that, however 95% in AA have never even opened the Big Book which outlines their program of recovery....Oddly enough stats these days people say they have a 95% failure rate. Hmmm Coincidence?
ReplyDeleteProbably.
DeleteAa is the only recovery program where it's founder used to regularly speak to people who have been dead for several hundred years.The only recovery program where it's founder was clinically depressed for the first20 years of his abstinence,whilst preaching he was happy joyous and free.Aa is the only recovery program where it's founder used to screw vulnerable young pretty women behind his faithful wife's back.Aa is the only recovery program where it's founder died from an addiction that he could not overcome though he had hundreds of attempts to stop smoking.Aa is the only recovery program that the mainstream media promotes.Thousands of professionals preach this man's advice.This is part of the reason why people don't trust the media's advice,or the advice from professionals.
ReplyDeleteAA stole my mom and brainwashed her and al-anon is stealing my wife from me and my kids.
ReplyDeleteIm making a big decision tomorrow. Im not going to attend my next meeting. I have so resentful thoughts about the program and the people there (i care those people) that i just cant go there anymore. I think I can do this without my program. If I keep going Im gonna get more depressed and more deep in the steps that its gonna be hard to recover when the program is done. I have had excessive fears that Im a dry drunk etc but now I see more clearly that I just dont belong there. Im experiencing PAWS and at first i thought that these feelings are just drug-related but now I know its the fucking program!
ReplyDeleteI hate that program too. "Your best thinking got you here." They beat up on you, everything that happens in life is your fault It is a highly abusive program.
ReplyDeleteAmen, brother. When I first started AA, I found it a sanctuary. I liked the structure and the Thursday night meetings. That is, until I met my sponsor and started working the steps. That's when the sermons and the judgment started pouring down. AA is a sham: it's a religious order that claims not to be. It's full of people who clamor about "powerlessness" and in the next breath sputter about "choices." I quit after six months and haven't gone back since and I've controlled my drinking just fine. And Bill W's "white light?" Hallucinogenic drugs! To hell with AA.
ReplyDeleteIn 34 years in recovery the only people who don't recover are those who will not turn their will over to a higher power and adopt a moral compass to guide their lives. These people run on ego and self will. That is the sum total of why some do not recover. They lack the honesty, commitment and discipline and would rather spend their hours in self pity.
ReplyDeleteOh my goodness. You realize that the very essence of your comment is pretty much "our way or else" and more or less proves their point?
DeleteThese AA fruitcakes are now invading groups outside of their Legion of Gloom such as Relief Recovery, which is where I started to go to get away from these creeps. Well, guess what? A 'sponsor' who wouldn't give me the time of day at AA meetings suddenly took a shine to me. He probably overheard me and another guy who didn't cotton to the AA brain-wash talking and tried blathering that same crap about steps (preferably on the idiot's throat to get him to shut up), getting 12 or so sponsors and a higher power. I shot him down at every heavy-handed, stale lure he tried to toss at me and suddenly he had to go when there was no prize to be had. Chicken! Can't handle an opposite reaction from someone who isn't limp-minded and gullible? Toodle-loo, mother-fucker! Give out phone numbers? How about 911 if you don't leave me the hell alone. White light? I saw too but it was the paramedic's flash-light not a vision from God-oops-'higher power'. Seeing that set me straight for sure. So all you AA zombies, hear this and consider it gospel: STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM ME!! I don't want an assault charge on my record, so please go anywhere I'm not, you poor-man's Scientologists! AHHH!!
ReplyDeleteFor all the losers who walk from AA and decry how evil it is, perhaps it's not even a consideration in your selfish self centered lives that it is largely about helpingothers.
ReplyDeleteIt’s what you make it. For me AA is merely an operating system for my spiritual life. I have experienced astounding results for the past few years. I credit the program for that - but my experience transcends any program.
ReplyDeleteI just got a text from a buddy who was st a meeting: “OMG there are some dumb as dumbass motherfuckers in AA - like knuckle dragging retards.”
I texted back “there sure are - U at a retard meeting?”
He said “yes,” I said “Good Times - the funniest are the dumb as dirt old timers.”
THESE are the experiences you won’t want to miss.
Thank you for posting this. I have been struggling from the beginning with AA and the "higher power" nonsense and telling me as an atheist to turn my power over to the air, ocean, trees. It all sounds ridiculous. I am suffering a depression episode and had a thumper tell me I want to stay in victim mode. Lady, my psychotropic mediation has been off for over six months. I am over it. At this point the only reason I go is to get out the house. I play on my phone and had some old timer confront me about it. I looked at them and walked away. I don't have to explain anything to you.
ReplyDeleteThe brainwashing in those rooms goes very deep. Hearing the same slogans over and over impacts on a persons mind-set. Just look at the oldtimers to see if Wilsons version of Heaven on Earth Enlightenment crap works. The real world is a hell of a lot healthier than that made up on the fly quack-religion. Just observe the anger in the oldtimers not to mention the craziness. It is a back-door into Wilsons Christian God Religion that he was brain-washed in when he was in the Oxford Movement.It is a sneaky way to get you to Jesus. People get clean & sober in other cults and movements which proves it is down to the individuals choice & desire at the end of the day.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for this post. I have been committed after physical abuse from my parents, and sent to jail at the center for domestic abuse, after stealing my father's car to go to the police after he locked me in the garage. The police took me to the shelter for domestic abuse. I dropped the car off at the police station. Told them whose it was. my father told my probation officer that I wasn't at my home address (years before I was arrested and imprisoned for 367 days in jail, after being arrested during my enrollment at Penn State for architecture. I just got my architecture degree in may btw). After jail, I was sent to live with my mom, who was a belligerent and passed out neglectful mother, who has full custody of me during my entire life under 18. She had gotten sober while I was in jail and evicted from our home that smelled like shit and where i had on two occasions eaten maggots in my cereal as a child. she was living on a boat with her elderly boyfriend, who is also in the program. Anyway, it's been so many years later. My mom invited me on a christmas vacation this weekend. She has been abusive and disgusting, and keeps spouting bullshit about AA and phrases and how I need to leave the house because she takes her sobriety first and foremost. This will be the last time i ever spend time with my mother. I was repeatedly punched by my father for "being like my mother"..before i ever even drank more than a glass of alcohol. so anyway, my dad doesn't go to aa. he also doesn't drink (never really has), but I am in a much better place with the father who held a gun to my head five years ago than the mother who uses aa (i even go to meetings to support her, went daily for two years) to relieve herself of her crimes of neglect against children. I wish i had been put in foster care as a kid. or lived with my abusive father and his pill addicted wife
ReplyDeletei went to jail and was given felonies for acquisition of a controlled substance after I got addicted to adderall prescribed to me while i was 83 pounds and anorexic (living with my mother) at the age of 17. I presented two forged prescriptions at two different pharmacies, and was incarcerated for the year. the day i got out of jail, I begged penn state to let me back into school. they did agree to let me back into the architecture program, after a proving my sobriety with signed meetings for a year. like i said, i just graduated, but my felonies are also not eligible for expungment. I owed (and paid) 13,000 dollars of fines to Centre County probation department. At the same time that I was incarcerated, the district attorney (Stacy Parks Miller) was charged with felonies for forging Judge L's signature on court documents. She was acquitted in Pennsylvania by the attorney general, a friend of hers who she was seen in pictures drinking with on facebook. I don't see any chance of justice, and I feel sorry for the many people in aa who blame themselves for the abuse theyve undergone as children, or undergone from the justice system, or the shame theyve felt by society. anyway, i'm seeking licensure and got my official NCARB number last month. luckily, there is suprisingly justice in the national accreditation board, because they know about my felony and I am allowed to work to take the licensing exams someday. thanks aa for being so awful. i couldn't have done architecture or run every day with aa in my life.
ReplyDelete^^ both of the above comments are me, the same person
ReplyDelete