Jodie,
If the Al-Anon meeting you attend does not seem a fit for you, then try others until you find one that does. Sometimes we have to try a few different meetings to find the group we feel most comfortable in. You will not have to talk, you can just listen. There is a format that is followed world-wide, which keeps the meeting nicely structured. Pick up the brochures to take home and read.
Al-Anon is a spiritual program, not a religious one. It is founded on the same Twelve Steps of AA, which were crafted by Bill W. and Dr. Bob when they founded AA back in the late 1930's. Before that time, recovery from alcoholism was considered by all medical professionals to be impossible. But the insights of a famous psychiatrist, Dr. Carl Jung, into the nature of addiction and its connection to a spiritual hunger, influenced the world in such a profound way that eventually AA was the outcome.
I share this because the most difficult yet most vital reality we must accept in our own spiritual growth while we are a part of this planet is that we cannot place our ultimate well-being and personal serenity upon anything or anyone outside ourselves. To do so is to make ourselves vulnerable to emotional and spiritual disintegration should outer events change--as they do, in various ways--and we find that what we have attached ourselves to in order to ensure our ultimate happiness has gone away from us.
In families of addiction, life is so uncertain, so unstable, there is always a sense of dread of what may happen next, that the loved ones of alcoholics and addicts are very prone to cling to outer circumstances and to people, no matter how painful or degrading, because the loved one feels, deep inside, that yet another loss, another abandonment, would destroy her. We "depend" on others' actions and feelings and presence for our well-being, our sense of worth, our direction in life. We become co-"dependent" for as the addict depends on something outside himself for a feeling of confidence and well-being (heroin, cocaine, alcohol), we also depend on something outside ourselves in the same way. And when we depend on an addict or alcoholic for our well-being and happiness, we are in a very dangerous situation emotionally, spiritually, mentally.
What spiritual recovery focuses on is our reconnection with a Higher Power, the soul's higher calling, the true meaning and purpose of our lives as designed by a loving creative force which some may call God or by other terms. It is about our soul's relationship to something greater than ourselves. Something which is unchanging, and which will allow us to accept that which Life brings our way, for we have a deeper faith that there is a purpose to all things and a meaning which we may not understand but can accept as it is. We begin to trust the outcome of whatever situation we find ourselves in, whatever pain, whatever challenge, for we have found a serenity about life which is not altered by outer events. This does not mean we don't hurt, or grieve most deeply. It simply means that when pain or confusion comes, we have somewhere to go: to our relationship with a Higher Power who we have come to believe guides and directs all outcomes with a higher wisdom and purpose beyond our understanding.
We can do this soul work in meetings, in counseling. It is good to have a combination of both, as we find strength from others in groups, and we find focus directed solely upon ourselves in counseling.
The process takes time and it is actually life-long, for we are ever being challenged by Life to grow. But without a container of some kind as we meet the chaotic situations which may come to us--the container of a meeting to go to, a counselor to see, a recovery friend on the phone--we find ourselves buffeted by Life's strong winds and can be blown so far adrift from our purpose and our true self that we are lost. This is when we are most vulnerable to the escape into substance abuse or destructive relationship with unstable and untrustworthy persons.
It's good you are planning a meeting, Jodie. It takes great courage to begin recovery for oneself. Your pain today may be a new door opening to heal a wounding which has long been calling for your attention.