What can I expect at an A.A. meeting?

In My Humble Opinion
41

Get to a womens meeting. I don’t even bother with mixed meetings anymore (boys and girls) because I find the best recovery for me is in a room full of kick-ass sober women.

Get a copy of the AA “big book” and let your SO read it, especially the chapter called “The Family After.” It could go a long way towards helping her understand what you are going through, and what’s coming next.

None of the meetings I go to are very heavily Christian- in fact, our womens meeting last night was led by a friend of mine who is a Hari Krishna vegetarian lesbian. So you find meetings where you are comfortable.

I won’t cheerlead for AA, because that’s not what we’re about. If you see me in a meeting, hear me share my story, and decide you want what I have, then I’ll do whatever it takes to help you get there. Millions of people have found lasting sobriety (along with happiness, joy and freedom) in the rooms of AA. Millions more have said “fuck this noise” and found what they needed elsewhere.

Good luck either way.

PS- I should identify- I have been sober for 17 years so far…

42

I don’t know how popular this opinion is going to be but AA weirds me the fuck out. I went through a phase where I was drinking a ridiculous amount. Katrina had just uprooted me from Tulane, I felt like my education and life was in peril and I didnt really know what I was supposed to do with myself. I promised myself that if I could quit drinking without incident or much effort for 30 days I would let myself off the hook. If I had a hard time doing 30 days, I would re-evaluate whether i was a real alcoholic or just bored and depressed.

So I hit up the meetings the whole time. I thought it was what I was supposed to do. You get there, and you know you are there because there are about 40 people smoking outside the building.

Everyone talks for about an hour about God and relapsing. Little awards are given. Its like Christian summer camp.

When the meeting is over, ladies, get ready to bob and weave because every man in the room is going to be all over you like a cheap suit which is strange because you’re not supposed to date each other.

I just get really nervous when people organize themselves into ritualistic groups that tell you how to live, who to date, who to socialize with. I feel like its just a quick step from AA to handing out flowers at the airport.

The women are equally aggressive with phone numbers to get coffee or be a sponsor or whatever. I really wanted all of them to step off my grill.

But the not drinking was the easy part. Getting the freaks out of my system was the hard part. I realized that I am incredibly lucky to not have the physical addiction and struggle I saw in so may at the AA meetings. I am proud of them for doing something to change but there has to be a better way than AA

I’ve also lost friends to “the program” and I guess they’re happier now so good for them. I just am weary of any organization you can lose someone to in the first place.

43

Lobstermobster,

There certainly are other options available besided A.A. I, too, am concerned that my aversion to groups and their social psychology will render A.A. and I unfit for each other. But no one knows until they try. You tried it and it didn’t work. The same has occured for many others. For some it’s their salvation.
I think it’s great that you were able to stop on your own. Since I opened this thread I’ve received alot of advice and I’ve read and reread every post. Some of the things I’m learning from those who have been there are that it doesn’t matter how you stop drinking , it’s that you stop and remain sober. Some of us can’t do it on our own. I’ve tried and tried to no avail. I also know that whatever method(s) I choose are only going to be as good as my desire and committement to quitting. A.A. won’t do shit if I don’t put effort into it. The outpatient facility I’m visiting next week will be worthless if I don’t go to the classes and counseling sessions and do the work. We may all have different stories and we may all be different types of drunks, but we’re all drunks nonetheless.

44

As far as the “Christian summer camp”, yeah, some AA groups are like that, but many are pretty secular. However, the AA credo makes extremely clear, and I found this to be very carefully emphasized at the start of every meeting I attended when the 12 steps were read, that the God they speak of is not the Christian God, or any specific being or interpretation of God:

[ul][li]Step 3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.. [/li][li]Step 11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.[/ul](Emphasis in the original)[/li]
They really do believe in a Higher Power, and they emphatically are not trying to interpret or define what that means, for anyone. Its meant to be as inclusive as possible. If your higher power is Buddha or Science, or whatever, that’s fine.

Having a Higher Power means drawing strength from a place other than yourself, because you’ve tried being self reliant in the face of addiction, and its not working. “God” is just a word, and an inadequate one, but you have to call it something.

While Googling, I found this story of someone who struggled with, and finally found acceptance of, the concept of a Higher Power that was not necessarily God.

45

Oh yeah I should also add that I am in no way sober. That was just my experience for those 30 days.

46

Scroll up to post #10 by MsRobyn. There are links for alternatives to A.A. if you’re interested. Since you’re in SF you should have no problem finding all sorts of different recovery groups.

47

Daily I ask Science to save me but He never responds.

48

Depending on the number of meetings in your area, there may be some that are specifically LGBT-friendly as well (if I’m reading your posts right and you are a woman in a relationship with a woman). Heck, if Baton Rouge has a few, I figure most small to medium cities must.

49

There’s one 45 minutes away in a shitty neighborhood…I’m not sure yet about that one unless I can find a local to carpool with.

50

Tell that to the flouride in your water and the rubella vaccine in your bloodstream. :smiley:

51

What Lobstermobster said is very unfortunate. It’s unfortunate because there are many people who can never get control of drinking, who have their lives and their very being stripped away by booze. Usually, it does not happen to the younger folks in AA. When I was in my 20’s I drank like a champ - of course I did, I was in my 20’s. I loved drinking, I loved that scotch in a snifter with a cig or that draft beer, or the screwdriver before a movie or a martini [dirty] when out with friends.
What’s not to love right?

A short list of things not to love is when after 30 your hands start to shake in the morning if you don’t have a drink, or you lie to the ones you love for no reason whatsoever, or you nail a kid on bike because you wanted one more martini at 3pm, or you are selling your ass to get a pint of popov, or you spike your kids gatorade at a soccer game and forget to give him the one without the booze in it at half time, or you fall asleep on the couch at 7pm and your kids can’t wake you…the list - trust me - goes on.

All things I have heard in meeting from real flesh and blood people.

It’s unfortunate what happened to Lobstermobster because (s)he decribes a really shitty experience with AA, and there are shitty meetings out there. If Lobstermobster went to the same meeting for all 30 days, that’s unfortunate that (s)he didn’t go find one that wasn’t so bad. Where it didn’t feel like christian day camp, because very few of them are like that. Yes, there are some. But then there are so many that are great for people, where people can really find a fellowship without the in your throat bullshit that some people describe. After your first 90 days, and your first several months, going to meetings becomes just-something-you-do…You see people at them that enjoy seeing you, that care that you stay sober, and if you slip they accept you back with open arms.

AA wouldn’t be there if everyone in that room didn’t like booze now would it? Most folks with a little sobriety know exactly what you are feeling, and understand that yes, it fucking sucks quitting drinking…join the club, we ALL WENT THROUGH IT.

But once you do get through it and learn to live without booze, life is unbelievably more fullfilling.

BTW- I didn’t mean to single Lobstermobster out, it’s just when people have experiences like Lobstermobster did it gives AA a bad name, for for all those hundreds of people I have seen AA work for and have seen AA save the life of, I feel I have to stick up for at least the good meetings out there.

52

Damn, lobstermobster, remind me never to hit a meeting in the city! :wink:

If I had an experience like that one, I might have given up on AA too. Thank Og I didn’t, because if I was still drinking I would be in sad shape indeed. For many of us, we tried EVERYTHING else- I mean, duh! Who the hell wants to go to AA? :wink: But this was the only thing that helped me to stay sober. YMMV, as always.

There are a million different vibes in a million different meetings. Feel free to pick and choose, Chao, and only stay where you are comfortable. Sure, folks are likely to introduce themselves to you, offer phone numbers, etc. But it’s mostly because we see that you are new and you might need help. We also know how hard it is to ask at first, so just in case, we “make the first move” and if you want someone to call or chat with, then the hardest part is done!

As far as the spirituality thing goes, just to give you an example I sponsor several women (means I work through the steps with them and try to help them get through “life stuff” sober). I am a nominally Christian straight white woman with Buddhist leanings. I sponsor, among others, a practicing witch, a lesbian lapsed Catholic, a close-to-fundy Christian and a questioning agnostic. It isn’t about who you believe in, or what, but that you can believe in something. If you can even just believe that I believe, it’s a start!

:cool:

53

Their point is that you have to have this kind of help, you apparently are powerless over this activity/addiction. If you can fix it yourself, why are you here? Go fix it. And… if you can’t fix it yourself, are you open to the idea that it’s a spiritual problem? No? OK, go find something else, because that’s what we’re about here. We regard this as a spiritual problem, but we’re not going to get radical on you about exactly what that means. But if you’d like to hear about how millions of people have beaten this problem, then by all means pull up a chair.

54

I was really surprised after reading his/her post that he is in San Francisco. I have been to several AA meetings as a visitor in the Bay Area (usually Berkeley) and I have never been to one like that. And that doesn’t sound like any SF meeting I’ve heard about from friends…I would think that describes the exception and not the rule in that area. Something I heard that I really liked at one of those meetings was: “My broken brain can’t fix my broken brain.” Not a plug for a higher power, necessarily, but a plug for outside help – therapy, or AA, or whatever: a different way of thinking, an objective view of what’s happening and what has happened, to help a person get off a self-destructive path and onto a better one.

55

[QUOTE=The Chao Goes Mu]
To those of you who have gone through this, quitting drinking, how did your SO handle it? Was he/she supportive? Angry at you for fucking up for so long before getting help?QUOTE]

Hi…I’m missred…former SO of an alcoholic. First of all, I was ready for something to give by the time he hit AA. At that point, anything had to be better than the way we were living.

I tried a number of Al-Anon meetings too. In the bible belt. Right at the buckle. Some of them were glorified church lady circles. I finally found a couple of meetings close to a college campus that were much more tolerant. That made a world of difference.

I worked the program for a few years, learning to deal with the old man sober…yeah, sometimes I almost wished he would just go out and tie one on and get it out of his system, but only almost. One of the hardest things that I had to deal with was knowing that it wasn’t “just the booze talking” when he said things that plain out hurt. I had to learn that I couldn’t bullshit myself any more than he could. When that happened, we could actually deal with the issues at hand. That’s not to say that we lived happily ever after. We split up about four years into his sobriety. It would likely have happened sooner had he still been drinking. He’s celebrating his fifteenth anniversary in the program this year.

Fortunately, over the years since, we’ve gained an understanding and friendship that we didn’t have together. It wasn’t a total loss. YMMV.

56

Oh, yeah, my thoughts are with you both. {{Chao}}

57

To be fair, lobstermobster didn’t clarify if, during those 30 days, she was living in San Fransico or not. As she mentioned, she was supposed to be attending Tulane (which is in New Orleans) but got Katrina’d.

Oh, and she’s a she. :wink:

58

Oh Ok, well, did she seek out other meeting in San Fran? I don’t recall her saying that…It seems in 30 days in a big city you could find some meetings that fit. Especially in a big city. :slight_smile:

I went to one near Telegraph sill that was wonderful when I was visiting friends. Just a bunch of old hippies who didin’t drink anymore. Like me! :smiley:

59

I had a lot of trouble too with AA at first as an atheist (philosophically a Satanist). Went in and back out (drinking/using) a few times. I finally decided to interpret “god as I understood him” the same way someone upthread mentioned- my higher power was my (self-actualized) sober self, which meshed perfectly with my beliefs of self-reliance. There are no RR/SMART meetings within 90 minutes of me, so I learned to cope.

I don’t pray, I meditate. I am silent but join the circle when they recite the lord’s prayer at end. I do say the serenity prayer, but not the “god,” at beginnning. When they talk about god’s will versus my own, I hear it as “Is this what feels good now or is this what future (sober) panth would want me to do?”. When I question my motives, I think of it (when necessary) as “If Self-Actualized Panth could travel back in time to now and tell me what to do to more quickly become him, would this be it?”

Check out some takes on the 12-steps by atheists/agnostics:

http://www.agnosticaanyc.org/12steps.html
http://www.lakeweb1.com/mrp/literature/agnost12.htm
http://www.perlierbath.com/boards/message_list.asp?boardID=18412&discussionID=535729

And reading this article was the first time I grokked alcoholism/addiction as a literal disease, I wish I had read it and the above links years sooner: Addiction as Disease

There are so many types of meetings, so many different formats and personalities to the meetings, please let me underscore again and again the previous suggestions to keep going to different ones until you find some you like, then hit those regularly and mix it up between. Alcoholism is a progressive and fatal disease, but there is hope. It doesn’t have to be AA, but it’s not a bad start. I also attend NA (alcoholism is an addiction, alcohol is a drug), and have weekly private meetings with “the guys” (support group from both programs) that we rotate between our houses.

-pantheon, 2 yrs clean and sober last month

60

ROCK ON MAN! Good advice. 8 out of 10 friends of mine in the program are atheist/agnostic. And we’re all doing just fine. :slight_smile: