[Weeza]

Hi Carol, Mark, Sunrise, Endzy, and Zoomer,
Thank you all for writing in as it's helpful in giving
me the sense of acceptance with the fellowship
within the fellowship.

Right now I have a migraine and must mother my
7 year old after school after he's had a bad day from
being bullied to the point he did a dumb thing like
took a dare from some other kids which got him called
into the Principal's office. So there is a weird parallel
going on in my life personally and noticing how I've got
to step up to the plate to keep my own kid in check
as he went and did something against school rules
because he wanted to feel accepted by the friends he
so respects. And upon reflecting his incident, which was
a 'slip' of personal judgment (doing something foolish
for the sake of pleasing friends), I'm at a moment now
with wondering whether I'm doing the same here,
sacrificing my health and well being so that I may feel
accepted by my sponsor and original home group.

I have a lot of solid history with this first home group,
but must admit it's pretty hard core, and yes, I've been
told before it's an AA Nazi cult, which was hard to take
in the beginning, but it was what I needed at the time,
and it was good for me to keep active, really study the
Big Book, do all the Steps thoroughly and keep me motivated
with making amends. And because I was lock solid true to
working the Steps, I've enjoyed many miracles in life
because AA helped create a bridge back to life for me...
Got to college, complete my education, find a good career,
work abroad in Europe for four years, travel all over the world,
develop deep friendships, start up a family, speak at meetings
in a dozen states and four other countries, and witness my
hand in helping other recovering members get their lives
back... So I know the Program works and Miracles happen
once the watershed of Amends is opened....

But like Carol, after I did my first round of Steps in my
first and second years, it was enough for me personally
to keep moving forward in life. Yet I remained close to
the Program by attending meetings and taking commitments,
doing service, including GSR and establishing the first
Switzerland AA recovery web site that's now part of the
International AA listing, so I personally know that I made
a difference and gave back to the Program. But my esteem
has tanked about what kind of recovery I have when my
sponsors from my home group have told me I wasn't doing
my part after I became a mother since the new job of being
a stay home mother consumed all my energy and time.
I'm told that AA is to come first before family, but for me,
the well being of my family is my priority and it serves
as a Higher Power that keeps me in check with staying
clean and sober as I also know what it's like to grow up
on the hard knocks of life, going through foster care when
my parents abandoned me and my siblings for alcoholic
behavior that sent my mother to prison. So for me,
my family is my priority and AA is an extended family.

I trust my sponsor and know she means well, as well
as my former two interim sponsors, but none of them
ever were mothers and they've not experienced the
physical trauma of a violent assault that caused physical
disability to the point of creating permanent pain.

I'm doing my best to keep functional but it's hard without
medication and I can truly say I'm not living an optimum
life while feeling pain-- hard to sit, hard to stand up or
walk around. At best all I can do is lay on the bed or
sofa by my son while talking to him and doing homework.

My sponsor's asked me to go to 90 meetings in 90 days,
take newcommer chips and introduce myself as having
five days sobriety, which I feel in a way is taking away
from me all that I've gained from this amazing experience
of working the Steps and supporting the Traditions, and
when I go to these NA meetings of late and am surrounded
by many newcommers who are needing direction from
an old timer, at best all I can be for them is a friend.

I'm troubled by the idea of breaking away from my relationship
with my sponsor because she's been a friend to me since my
first AA meeting in 1991. She asked me today why I'm not
going to AA meetings but these NA ones and I told her that
since I slipped on medication and we're not to talk about
prescription drugs in the AA rooms, NA is the only place where
I can talk about problems other than alcohol.

I gotta say something weird is happening with my body in
that I feel a bit loaded right now from adrenaline stress
and my pain threshold collapsing, so all I can do is stay
flat on my back...... what kind of life is that?

If God is giving me pain so I may experience humility and
surrender to the program in this way, I feel it's not the
Higher Power I came to know and love when physically
healthier..... I'm in pain and this pain is doing my head in
and causing me to wish God to take me from this Earth,
which also makes me feel like a bad mother because
internally then I'm giving up on being here for my son.

I also have issues with how it's perfectly fine for the founding
member, Bill Wilson, to write in books about how LSD, cannabis,
cocaine and such ("Pass It On") is therapeutic for the recovering
alcoholic..... He got to use all those non-prescribed drugs and
keep his full sobriety time. But did he do so to stop feeling pain
or get out of a depression? If it was a depression, was depression
caused by not keeping in with the Steps and Traditions, or was
it because of something organic within his brain chemistry?
Either way, I don't judge him for what he did, but I do have
issues about the validity of my sober time remaining unblemished
because I 'picked up' prescription medications that were distributed
to me and also participated in 5 years psychotherapy for Post
Traumatic Stress after a violent crime. But the same group
cast judgment on me for seeing a therapist, told me I was letting
a person lead my life to restoring me to sanity so was not abiding
by the Second Step (no human power can restore us to sanity)...
Yet, isn't it a risk when giving my well being over to another
drunk (albeit sober drunk I respect)? It's a mind bender.

I also have issues with how my home group will allow for
celebrities to take as many medications their doctors order
but in the same breath tell me I'm not to nor see a therapist,
then not give me the time of day to hear me talk about pain
or what it's like to survive a violent crime or go through many
scary surgeries.

I wish my dad were still alive to tell me what to do... He and I
were eventually reunited late in life through AA. As it so happened,
he too became sober, had four years more than me. And he was
most helpful in getting out of my home group because he said
it was behaving too dictatorially when an interim sponsor told
my story to her sponsor and he said to get me out of therapy
and double up on meetings because psychotherapy was baloney.

We are not doctors.

There's even a pamphlet in AA about medications and other problems.
I feel I've been in compliance with what's in the Big Book and what
I've read about Problems Other Than Alcohol.

Must stop typing and lay down as a fever's been worked up.

Back in later, xx