Does a sponsor become unnecesary at some point?
It`s ok to stay sober
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Central NC
Posts: 20,902
I have a sponsor nearly 90 yrs old,soon to be sober 50 yrs,but he cannot read &
I decided to get a temp step sponsor some months ago and we are going back thru the book...yes,I believe we should always have a sponsor
I decided to get a temp step sponsor some months ago and we are going back thru the book...yes,I believe we should always have a sponsor
Guest
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Southern New Hampshire
Posts: 746
I have not had a formal sponsor in 4 years, and yet here I am today in a recovered state.I take my directions from God, that being said, I am a member of an accountabily group that is not exactly warm and fuzzy, we have a pretty structured format that leaves no stone unturned,this group keeps me sharp and spiritually connected. My ego will not allow me to go back to the group and have to report on a mediocre prayer or meditation life. Unfinished ammends, etc...
I have mentors today, and teachers, but my reliance is and always will be on God. I hope to always be a student, we are all teachers in some form or another.
I have mentors today, and teachers, but my reliance is and always will be on God. I hope to always be a student, we are all teachers in some form or another.
where the light is
Join Date: Dec 2007
Location: Ontario, Canada
Posts: 2,763
I've been in AA for 20 months and have had the same sponsor since day 1. Personally, I consider him more of a good friend than a sponsor but when we talk about my personal issues he always points me to God and/or the Big Book. He is a good man.
Member
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Upstate, N.Y.
Posts: 4,639
I've had the same sponser since day 1. I have learned so much from her. She also has a sponser and just celebrated 31 years last month. I believe you can always learn something new no mater how long you've been sober. Good topic.
Member
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: LA - Lower Alabama
Posts: 5,068
I think we should always have a sponsor.There is a guy in my home group whose sponsor just died and he mentioned he was happy he got another one. He (the one seeking a new sponsor) has 33 years of sobriety.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: Southern Colorado
Posts: 1,167
I'm with Rob. I've been sponsorless for about 4+ years and have been told to go and help others.
I'm accountable to my group and have guys I've done the work with who I bounce stuff off.
If I did have a sponsor it would be somebody who says, "Don't call me late at night and wake me up. Don't call me every day. You are responsible for and trusted in the Book and in the Steps. You need to develop a relationship with and seek God. I'll be around to ask you how your 4th Step is coming and how many amends you have left. I'll hear your 5th Step when you're ready. Let your yes's be yes and your no's be no." That kind of stuff.
I'm accountable to my group and have guys I've done the work with who I bounce stuff off.
If I did have a sponsor it would be somebody who says, "Don't call me late at night and wake me up. Don't call me every day. You are responsible for and trusted in the Book and in the Steps. You need to develop a relationship with and seek God. I'll be around to ask you how your 4th Step is coming and how many amends you have left. I'll hear your 5th Step when you're ready. Let your yes's be yes and your no's be no." That kind of stuff.
Forward we go...side by side-Rest In Peace
Join Date: Jun 2002
Location: Serene In Dixie
Posts: 36,740
The 3 women I asked to sponsor me in D.C. refused
1 offered to assist me with Steps 4 & 5 and did.
I also went to AA daily for well over a year staying
based with an active home group and new friends.
I relocated 3 years after my DOS.
In my new Fl. home group...I finished the Steps
useing several women.
Moved again 10 years ago to Ga. and another home group.
I had 10 years in recovery at that time.
In my 20 years of solid continious AA recovery
I've never had a specific person as a formal sponsor.
God and I are connected ...my AA friends enhance
my fantastic new life....
1 offered to assist me with Steps 4 & 5 and did.
I also went to AA daily for well over a year staying
based with an active home group and new friends.
I relocated 3 years after my DOS.
In my new Fl. home group...I finished the Steps
useing several women.
Moved again 10 years ago to Ga. and another home group.
I had 10 years in recovery at that time.
In my 20 years of solid continious AA recovery
I've never had a specific person as a formal sponsor.
God and I are connected ...my AA friends enhance
my fantastic new life....
Last edited by CarolD; 09-04-2009 at 04:31 AM. Reason: Typo
Om, Aum, Ohm...
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Punxsutawney/Pittsburgh
Posts: 4,797
I'm in the market for a sponsor. I've had the same one since I was a little over a month sober (fresh out of rehab), and there's no doubt in my mind I was led to her. I couldn't have asked for a better guide through the steps, even though many of the details of our individual lives were very different from each other.
For the past while, she's had her hands full raising babies and working very long hours, and I'm traveling a good bit of the week, so we don't connect the way we used to. I still need another human being, though--I've sought out others for mini-5th steps and to complete a tenth step. It would be nice to have one specific person who's agreed to help me with these things. But, I have sponsees with multiple years' sobriety who are beyond their formal step work, and we often use each other for this purpose. Still, it's not exactly the same. So, I'm again praying for the right woman to be put in my path.
Do I have a sponsor? Yes, in name, anyway. Does a sponsor become unnecessary at some point? Depends, I guess, on how many other resources we have available. If old stuff comes up, something left off my 4th step the first time around, I need another human being to hear it. I don't consider a 10th step complete unless someone else knows about it -- and I often share those everyday things with sponsees still doing formal step work. The teacher in me sees it as an opportunity to demonstrate "spiritual progress rather than spiritual perfection" (1st Ed. BB). I've gotten along in this way, though it sure would be nice to have just one person on speed dial.
I do think it's necessary that we have connections with other human beings. If human beings were unnecessary on this journey, then I wouldn't be directed to seek one out for the 5th step, or right my wrongs with them in the 9th, or carry the message to them in the 12th. Although my reliance must be on the God of my understanding, I can't transcend the human plane.
Peace & Love,
Sugah
For the past while, she's had her hands full raising babies and working very long hours, and I'm traveling a good bit of the week, so we don't connect the way we used to. I still need another human being, though--I've sought out others for mini-5th steps and to complete a tenth step. It would be nice to have one specific person who's agreed to help me with these things. But, I have sponsees with multiple years' sobriety who are beyond their formal step work, and we often use each other for this purpose. Still, it's not exactly the same. So, I'm again praying for the right woman to be put in my path.
Do I have a sponsor? Yes, in name, anyway. Does a sponsor become unnecessary at some point? Depends, I guess, on how many other resources we have available. If old stuff comes up, something left off my 4th step the first time around, I need another human being to hear it. I don't consider a 10th step complete unless someone else knows about it -- and I often share those everyday things with sponsees still doing formal step work. The teacher in me sees it as an opportunity to demonstrate "spiritual progress rather than spiritual perfection" (1st Ed. BB). I've gotten along in this way, though it sure would be nice to have just one person on speed dial.
I do think it's necessary that we have connections with other human beings. If human beings were unnecessary on this journey, then I wouldn't be directed to seek one out for the 5th step, or right my wrongs with them in the 9th, or carry the message to them in the 12th. Although my reliance must be on the God of my understanding, I can't transcend the human plane.
Peace & Love,
Sugah
Couper Institute Group
Join Date: Sep 2009
Location: Glasgow
Posts: 3
Sponcers for good ?
Originally Posted by tomvlll 
Just curious if some of you w/ long term sobriety still have sponsors.
A bit unsure of the question but i know my 1st sponcer still sends me text messages. And i call her once in a while. My sponcer i have just now i only ever chat with on the phone.
Member
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Upstate New York
Posts: 1,636
Early on I asked several people -- all with 15-25 years in program and all whose programs I truly admired -- if they would be my sponsor and all of them replied with some version of "You're doing so well already; why do you need a sponsor?" or, "I don't feel qualified to be your sponsor, but you can call me anytime and I'll try to help you as much as I can." And, although I know rationally that was, in some sense, very complimentary and should have made me feel good, it was actually pretty traumatic (and it feels somehow slightly embarrassing to me to talk about it even at this point, which is really weird) for me because it triggered my old, core wounding around the issue of my always having been perceived as being "so adult" and "so intelligent" and "so advanced" for my age that it was always hard for me to get people to see or acknowledge when I needed help or support. (I'm not saying here that anyone deliberately neglected or mistreated me as a child, but just that, because of my intellectual "maturity" I have pretty much been treated as a totally self-sufficient adult from a very young age and obviously, there are some things one misses out on because of that.)
So, anyways, because I was somewhat emotionally triggered by it, I was talking about it to my therapist at the time, and it came out that she, also, had recently began working another 12 Step program. It ended up that we decided to help each other do the 4th Step and that worked really, really well....although it did eventually lead to my "being graduated" from therapy because, toward the end of it, my therapist told me that she didn't feel it was right for me to be paying her for therapy when I was helping her more than she was helping me. So, that was a little weird, too -- but it all worked out for the best because now we are very good friends.
Also, as far as the sponsor thing goes, I do still call and rely on 3 of those people I had originally asked for sponsorship-like stuff, and they are there for me like they said they would be...but, also, these are definitely more like mutual-sponsorship/support relationships.
And what I finally came to realize through all of that trying-to-find-a-sponsor trauma was that, as others have indicated, the message for me there was a very strong message from my HP that I needed to rely on Him/Her/It. Probably because I never really was a child in the sense that most people are children and have childhoods (My family always jokes that I was born 30 years old with my dissertation in hand, which, for good and for bad, is pretty close to the truth!), I have always kinda had this very dangerous fantasy/wish/longing for a parent figure that I could think of as infallible, and obey 100% without risk, and rely on absolutely and totally. As an adult, obviously, that is, in most contexts, a very dangerous and inappropriate desire, but since I didn't have that experience in my childhood, it was something I always wanted. Looking back, I realize that it is something that I would have been very tempted to have projected onto a sponsor -- which would have been totally inappropriate and most likely a big mess for everyone involved. So, through my "failed" search for a sponsor, I was finally forced to turn to HP to try to get the wish fulfilled......and, that ended up being a miracle because, HP is, ultimately, the only One who can fulfill it.
I guess I should also note, however, that when I was trying to find a "real" sponsor, any of my AA friends whom I told about what was going on and what people were saying to me were totally appalled......They just seemed to have a much stronger sense that a sponsor was absolutely necessary and that, if someone was asked to be a sponsor, she was pretty much obligated to at least say "yes" provisionally/temporarily unless it was logistically impossible for her at that time to take on another sponsee.
And finally, I had lunch yesterday with an AA friend whose program I truly admire, and she is in the process of looking for a new sponsor. She has been sober for 13 years and, as far as I can tell, has always had fairly authoritarian, demanding sponsors. This woman really works a strong program and has an amazing connection with HP...but she, for some reason, gets a lot out of and feels a strong need to have this particular type of sponsor.Personally, I totally don't get it......but it is what works for her and, obviously, it works well.
So, it looks to me pretty much like the answer to the question depends a lot on the individual.
freya
So, anyways, because I was somewhat emotionally triggered by it, I was talking about it to my therapist at the time, and it came out that she, also, had recently began working another 12 Step program. It ended up that we decided to help each other do the 4th Step and that worked really, really well....although it did eventually lead to my "being graduated" from therapy because, toward the end of it, my therapist told me that she didn't feel it was right for me to be paying her for therapy when I was helping her more than she was helping me. So, that was a little weird, too -- but it all worked out for the best because now we are very good friends.
Also, as far as the sponsor thing goes, I do still call and rely on 3 of those people I had originally asked for sponsorship-like stuff, and they are there for me like they said they would be...but, also, these are definitely more like mutual-sponsorship/support relationships.
And what I finally came to realize through all of that trying-to-find-a-sponsor trauma was that, as others have indicated, the message for me there was a very strong message from my HP that I needed to rely on Him/Her/It. Probably because I never really was a child in the sense that most people are children and have childhoods (My family always jokes that I was born 30 years old with my dissertation in hand, which, for good and for bad, is pretty close to the truth!), I have always kinda had this very dangerous fantasy/wish/longing for a parent figure that I could think of as infallible, and obey 100% without risk, and rely on absolutely and totally. As an adult, obviously, that is, in most contexts, a very dangerous and inappropriate desire, but since I didn't have that experience in my childhood, it was something I always wanted. Looking back, I realize that it is something that I would have been very tempted to have projected onto a sponsor -- which would have been totally inappropriate and most likely a big mess for everyone involved. So, through my "failed" search for a sponsor, I was finally forced to turn to HP to try to get the wish fulfilled......and, that ended up being a miracle because, HP is, ultimately, the only One who can fulfill it.
I guess I should also note, however, that when I was trying to find a "real" sponsor, any of my AA friends whom I told about what was going on and what people were saying to me were totally appalled......They just seemed to have a much stronger sense that a sponsor was absolutely necessary and that, if someone was asked to be a sponsor, she was pretty much obligated to at least say "yes" provisionally/temporarily unless it was logistically impossible for her at that time to take on another sponsee.
And finally, I had lunch yesterday with an AA friend whose program I truly admire, and she is in the process of looking for a new sponsor. She has been sober for 13 years and, as far as I can tell, has always had fairly authoritarian, demanding sponsors. This woman really works a strong program and has an amazing connection with HP...but she, for some reason, gets a lot out of and feels a strong need to have this particular type of sponsor.Personally, I totally don't get it......but it is what works for her and, obviously, it works well.
So, it looks to me pretty much like the answer to the question depends a lot on the individual.
freya
Member
Join Date: Apr 2009
Posts: 3,095
I've always kept a sponsor because that was sort of how I learned. When I started, my sponsor through the steps had a sponsor. That was encouraged.
I like having someone that is familiar with my background and whom I trust absolutely. I still write inventory, and I still need someone to go to for discussion of that inventory, as well as bouncing some of my ideas off. It's more of a peer/friendship relation, but an important one I think.
That's not to say that I couldn't walk into my home group and pick any number of guys that could do the job just as well.
I like having someone that is familiar with my background and whom I trust absolutely. I still write inventory, and I still need someone to go to for discussion of that inventory, as well as bouncing some of my ideas off. It's more of a peer/friendship relation, but an important one I think.
That's not to say that I couldn't walk into my home group and pick any number of guys that could do the job just as well.
Member
Join Date: Nov 2007
Posts: 1,697
I don't know if I have a sponsor or not..lol.
There's the guy who took me through the steps ~ and we are good friends. BUT our stepwork is done, I do my tenth step with someone else. So I guess I would say "no", but he did say to a guy he introduced me to a couple weeks back as "This is Axxx, I sponsored him."
We have never really talked about it. After I was told to read "A vision for you", alone..I have only gone back to him twice about specific ammends and asked for direction. That direction involved praying and opening the book..
From the start it was clear, my reliance is never to be on him..and that I was helping him more than he was helping me, and if I was lucky ~ the same would be true for me.
Good question ~ there are certainly a lot of different takes on it.
There's the guy who took me through the steps ~ and we are good friends. BUT our stepwork is done, I do my tenth step with someone else. So I guess I would say "no", but he did say to a guy he introduced me to a couple weeks back as "This is Axxx, I sponsored him."
We have never really talked about it. After I was told to read "A vision for you", alone..I have only gone back to him twice about specific ammends and asked for direction. That direction involved praying and opening the book..
From the start it was clear, my reliance is never to be on him..and that I was helping him more than he was helping me, and if I was lucky ~ the same would be true for me.
Good question ~ there are certainly a lot of different takes on it.
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