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Old 09-02-2014, 01:58 PM
  # 7 (permalink)  
lillamy
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Join Date: Oct 2006
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People are always the problem, my pastor used to say.

My home group had a problem member when I first started going -- the problem was different, but still. The woman in my group was extremely lonely, and the Al-Anon meetings were the only time she really talked to another human being. So she would monopolize the sharing time, talking for loooong stretches of time about the weevils in her tomatoes (or whatever, I wasn't listening) while other members were really needing to share about recovery-related issues.

My group leader didn't want to embarrass her in front of the group, so she talked to some of the other "old-timers" and then took the Problem Lady aside after a meeting. The leader (just her, so as not to "gang up") asked if she would go out for coffee with her, and then talked to her about how she could hear Problem Lady had a lot of things to talk about, but that her hogging all the sharing time was counterproductive for everyone -- so how else could she help her?

People in the group ended up going out for coffee with her after the meetings, taking turns "taking on" the job of listening to this woman. And the last time I saw her in a meeting, she had relented significantly. (I still didn't understand what her gardening issues had to do with recovery, but at least she only shared her woes for a couple of minutes...)

I can imagine someone who is controlling and overbearing might not be amenable to an approach like that, but I would think it might be worth a try?
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