Aim

Hey everybody...I need your help please! I have my brother here with me. Long story short we are looking for help for him. I have a LOT of experience with alcoholism, so I know he has to do this himself. My question is (if I'm making any sense here...I'm in a hurry) are there other organizations besides AA that can offer support and meetings? He tells me that AA simply doesn't work for him; I want to throw another option at him. I can't get into the details of the story now but... help! Please!

smoke gets in my eyes

HI Aim...
As far as an alternative program that offers meetings, there is Smart Recovery. http://www.smartrecovery.org/
I'm sure there are others, but that's one I know of that seems sane.

Prayers for you and your brother!
Smoke

SylvryMoon

I checked out the smart recovery page, Smoke, and it does indeed seem very sane. There are meetings in my town, so I tried to email the names there for info. 3 email addresses, and ACK!! all 3 are no longer good email accounts.
I'll keep trying - I'm desperate.
(see my post "Crawling Back Again. . .and again.")

jimmyk

There's no sane groups other than AA! AA works if you work it! i know from persanal experience that AA works even if you don't like it. i'm sober 6 days now because of this board and aa meetings. AA works for everyone that works it. If an alkie doesn't find AA he'll be doomed to jails,institutions, or death. The big book says so and i believe it!
grateful for one more day,
jimmyk

smoke gets in my eyes

Hey again, Aim.

You might also look at these sites. http://www.moderation.org/ (moderation management)
http://www.unhooked.com/ (Life ring recovery)

Hello Jimmy!
I'm so pleased that AA is working for you. But "jails, institutions and death" are the alternative to recovery, not AA alone. There are all kinds of avenues to abstinance. Thank your HP that you found yours!

Hugs,
Smoke

Locoverde

AA didn't work for me. In fact, I left AA filled with self-loathing and self-doubt. I'm glad you are looking for alternatives for your brother. Too often, people who say AA doesn't work for them are told they didn't work it, or something to that effect. You can read that message in some of the other posts here.

I found AA didn't work becasue it never helped me to deal with the reasons why I drank. I found that methods taught by SMART Recoveyr did just that. They allowed me to change my attitude about my self, addiction and life in general in order to enjoy living with alcohol.

Regardless of whether I "misinterpreted" AA wrong, as I have been told many times, I never learned how to deal with the self-talk that led me to drink. AA to me was always about relying on external forces, namely the Group and Higher Power. SMART had been about relying on my own insights along with feedback from others to keep myself sober.

Loco