Benowhere

The big book itself is an opinion!!! Please, someone show me any evidence that the 12 steps work for addiction? Yeahgr8, you are showing yourself as totally indoctrinated into AA. I have been there, and it ain't pretty. Your worst thinking got you there, hopefully your best thinking will take you out of there.

yeahgr8

I am living in the middle east...there are some meetings but i haven't been to one in 10 weeks...i have spoken to my sponsor a couple of times in that period but 99% is non AA or recovery talk...

How on earth does that sound like someone who is indoctrinated into AA...you ever heard of anyone in AA saying yeah no probs dont go to meetings for a couple of months?

I have a couple of thought for the day books that i try and read each morning, i pray morning and night, i come on SR most days and i am very grateful even in "tough times"...i have a very close conscious contact with God (my HP) who removed the mental obsession to drink from me...

At 6 months sober, due to my job, i was staying in a Hotel over here for 4 months and stacking my diet cokes and water on the beers and spirits in my mini bar in the Hotel room...like i said recovered...

I was, in the end, a daily drinker and couldn't even get a day together dry...

I am one of millions of people that have recovered from alcoholism thanks to AA!

Anyone who wants the same read my previous post and get to a meeting to find your sponsor:-)

(ps yeah i know ill go to a meeting...you know who you are who would point this out lol)

glitter

Benowhere - based only on your last post, can I just ask if AA hasn't worked for you why (this is MY perception) do you knock the use of the program by others? "Best thinking get you out of there." (?)

Indoctrination? I believe this is a word that could be construed as inflammatory when applied to AA. AA is NOT a cult. The ultimate outcome of a cult is malfeasence. AA is the complete opposite with the practice of beneficence.

Evidence? I am staunchly scientific minded. However, is it not evidence enough that AA does work for so many? I can accept this.

To me, "God" is an opinion. But I can accept that billions of people worldwide rely upon their God in ways I can't even begin to understand. There is no evidence that a God - any God exists, but who am I to say there is no God or that believing in one is wrong due to the lack of scientific evidence?

I'm sorry you have had a bad experience with AA and I wish you the very best in your recovery.

Mark75

Nope...

The big book is an account of what Bill W. and others did to get sober. There may be some editorializing in there, but it's not opinion.

Opinion is when I tell you what I think you should do. It's better if I tell you what I did.

RobbyRobot

Yup, it is indeed, an opinion, but not just that, it's really an informed opinion, and as such has intrinsic real value for any alcohnolic peer who picks the big book up and reads it for what it is: a sharing of recovery from sober-minded alcoholics who declare themselves to have been in the past alcoholic-minded alcoholics who share the journey forward of how to achieve that same sober living experience.

Benowhere, you said you were a golden boy in AA. What really happened with that? I've seen golden boys before, and I'll see them again, there is no end to the differing kinds of experiences within AA. How did yours really go so south? And why do you have such a hard-on against AA simply because you were a golden boy?

You don't have to answer of course, I'm just asking is all, you know.

Regards,

Robby

Mark75

That's interesting Robby Opinion or not... We probably agree more than not on this point.

RobbyRobot

Absolutely, Mark.

Rob

Benowhere

A lot of people, especially ex-members think of AA as a cult. I could send you links, but it doesn't seem to be allowed here.

As far as evidence, well... Dr George Vaillant, a non-alcoholic Trustee of AA, conducted a decades long study into AA members habits, and he himself declared the outcomes as 'appalling'. 3 percent was his rate of recovery, 2 percent less than no treatment at all.

Also, The Cochrane database of evidence, which is hugely respected worldwide, has a list of 48 treatments for alcoholism, and AA comes 38th.

Other studies, such as AA's own Triennial surveys, show a recovery rate of 5 percent, again, the same as no treatment.

AA makes it very difficult to study itself, but where it has been done, with proper scientific research, it has always been shown to be inneffective. The reason it seems it works is because people who quit using AA dedicate their whole life to talking about it. The quiet majority simply move on and live their lives.

RobbyRobot

Guess I was looking for more a personal share, Benowhere. I'm not gonna challenge your findings, nothing good will come of that debate, has been my experience when working with alcoholics, lol.

Anyways, have a great day. I hope all is well with you. Godspeed.

Rob

LaFemme

Merc...I don't know if this helps you or not but I am a deeply spiritual person who did not go the AA route. Someone once said to me "I thought everyone who was Christian went to AA". I think for me, one of the reasons AA did not appeal, was because I have always been a "Spiritually Awake" person:-) Even when I was drinking heavily I was still in a relationship with God. I went to Church and I drank, I went to Bible Study and I drank, I read the Bible with a bottle of wine. I prayed on my hands and knees to God to make it stop, to make my desire for alcohol to go away. And it did...it took awhile, and only God can say why, and I continued to make myself drink for awhile after He made it awful for me to drink, but I finally stopped and I don't miss it, and i didn't mourn the death of a friend, and I don't wish I was "normal". I talk to God all the time, but not about drinking, that's on me for the time being. I have my relationship with God, and it works for me.

If I were in AA, I would probably be one of the crazies anyway...LOL:-)

Best of luck to you Merc...I have read many of your posts and I know you are really struggling...I will keep you in my prayers...hugs!

yeahgr8

Valiants Clinical Trial - source wikipedia

In the Clinic sample, 48% of the 29 alcoholics who achieved sobriety eventually attended 300 or more AA meetings,[66] and AA attendance was associated with good outcomes in patients who otherwise would have been predicted not to remit.[67] In the Core City sample the more severe alcoholics attended AA, possibly because all other avenues had failed—after all, AA meetings are rarely attended for hedonistic reasons.[68] The implication from all three samples was simply that many alcoholics find help through AA.

Non-conclusive (source Cochrane Databse)

Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is self-help group, organised through an international organization of recovering alcoholics, that offers emotional support and a model of abstinence for people recovering from alcohol dependence using a 12-step approach. As well as AA, there are also alternative interventions based on 12-step type programmes, some self-help and some professionally-led. AA and other 12-step approaches are typically based on the assumption that substance dependence is a spiritual and a medical disease. The available experimental studies did not demonstrate the effectiveness of AA or other 12-step approaches in reducing alcohol use and achieving abstinence compared with other treatments, but there were some limitations with these studies. Furthermore, many different interventions were often compared in the same study and too many hypotheses were tested at the same time to identify factors which determine treatment success.

"The reason it seems it works is because people who quit using AA dedicate their whole life to talking about it. The quiet majority simply move on and live their lives"

So which are you again?

Like i said love this thread...bottom line is we all hope any alcoholic can recover and live happy lives...but this it too much fun to stop posting...hmm ok maybe this is the last post on this thread for me too:-)

Benowhere

Yes Merc,
Of course you can be spiritual and not go to AA. I have plenty of interest in spiritual matters, they aren't the same as AA, but that doesn't matter. I am going to sign off this thread now, as there's nothing else to say, and you cannot win when arguing with AA people, even cold hard facts are meaningless. But all the best to you.

Benowhere

Just to finish, don't trust wikipedia for 'facts', read Vaillaints book, actually sit down and read it.

glitter

Hope you don't disappear forever Benowhere. There is a lot we can learn from each other....even if it's a bit uncomfortable.

All the best.....

yeahgr8

agreed...i imagine school kids sourcing their homework from wikipedia and shiver, talk about opinions...

anyways just wanted to share the sentiment passed on already...stick around and its been a good discussion...there are no winners apart from the alcoholics of us who find their way into sobriety through whichever route...

At the end of the day we could lock an alcoholic away for a year and tell them over and over again about our respective ways of getting sober and if they aren't ready they aren't ready...we can just hope that by sharing our experiences and offering some kind of road map to sobriety that God will put the people we need to meet in our paths who we can help...

Dee74

I've removed some posts under rule 4.

If this thread or topic bothers you, take a break...or look around - there's many other threads that could use experience and support.

D

mercurial me

Thanks so much! I'm still going to give AA another shot & I feel a bit more reassured tonight having read your message. Thanks again for sharing..xx....mm

LaFemme

Hey Merc! I'm glad it helped andcwasnt too out there. Just keep hope alive...although I would have been angry at anyone who said that to me when I was in darkness...but God does answer our prayers, just not always the way we expect Him to so be careful how you phrase things:-)

There is a guy the author of Eat Pray Love meets in an Ashram in India. He's in recovery and on a spiritual path...he tells how he used to pray to God to open his heart...then he had a heart attack had had open heart surgery! So phrasing is important!!!

DayTrader

Seriously, why can't everyone just focus on what DOES work for them rather than spend so much time trying to discredit something that "you" din't like / believe works but does work for millions of others?

I can find 100's.....maybe 1000's of posts on sites that explain how alcohol isn't addictive, that alcoholism is a flasehood, "proof" that discredits therapy, psychiatry, treatment facilities and/or detox facilities as well as every AA-alternative out there.....but I don't because it's just a waste of time and would only serve one purpose - to stroke my ego and be an attempt to "prove" how much I know about how this, that, or the other is "bad" and how what I do is "good" or better.

"Emotionally immature" - so true of the alcoholic....... drinking or not.

Dee74

ok...lets hit restart

Thanks all
D