As many here, I was also put off by the religious aspects of AA, as well as many of the groups associated with 12 step programs. I always felt responsible for my drinking and it's aftermath. I felt that by bringing God into it, I was looking for a way to deflect the real blame. If I didn't have God in my life, I was bound to do these terrible things to my family and others. If only I would find God, I'd be just fine, I felt these programs were saying to me.
Well, skip ahead to me in my first day-group meeting at my rehab after a suicide attempt. What do they tell me? First and foremost, get a higher power. Oh, Great! Here we go! They are going to shove God down my throat
and I'm going to leave here no better off than I was entering it!
We broke for lunch and I headed back to my room in another building. It was snowing out and it was cold but it was lovely and quiet.I thought about what the counsellor had said in the group."Your higher power can be anything, a chair, a tree, anything". I looked at the trees and thought, how do you know which one is "your" tree if you choose it? Can you find it again? Does it matter?
Suddenly, I heard something falling through the pine trees and landing on the ground in front of me. It was a frozen french baguette-yeah, a frozen dinner roll fell through the trees and landed at my feet. Bizarre, right? Well,
I have to tell you, that changed my way of thinking. No, I didn't think God had dropped it but I did know it was something only I was experiencing.
That's what I needed to look at things differently. It put a smile on my face
and I told the story when I got to the afternoon session. Some people could appreciate my struggle and my solution. Still others thought I was totally
ridiculing the Higher Power idea. They couldn't have been more wrong.
I found it almost comical but it really stuck with me that now I had something, not God, to think about when working my program. And yes, that experience seemed magical to me, not that sobriety is magical; it takes real work, but it was special. Picking a chair as my Higher Power didn't seem special.
Ironically, as the years have passed, I have discovered that I did have a relationship with God and I enjoy it fully today. It is perhaps not the same as everyone or anyone else's relationship, but that is fine with me.
I don't know if this helps at all, but 8 1/2 years of solid sobriety has let me know that I just needed to look at the picture "outside the box" to have it work for me. I wish you strength and insight in your journey ahead with your family. You've found a wonderful place to share and vent.
Sorry if I jumped in on an Al-Anon thread.....
Jaxy