LucyA

Bluejay mentioned this in another thread and it's got me thinking. If an alcoholic is in denial, wont accept they're sick and doesnt seem to want to help themselves, how can a bunch of strangers turning up to talk to them be of any help?
I really have no idea, and it's just plain old curiosity that lead me to post this.

Ago

It's generally speaking one "stranger" (a professional) and the family members in my limited experience

In my experience, from what I have heard in AA meetings, the success rate is low, but with teens the recidivism rate is pretty good.

As in, (with teens) the intervention takes place, "Buffy" gets her @ss shipped off to rehab, 6 months later she gets out, gets a new place in Beverly Hills, and 6 months later drinks again, and just goes down the tubes, fights with her boyfriend, trashes her apt. and hops in her new BMW and totals it, goes to jail DUI charges etc. she calls Daddy in Malibu, Daddy says, too bad Hon, the Rehab cost 65k, your allowance is cut off, and so are you.

She ends up in a SLE (Sober Living House) going to meetings with the "great unwashed" (working class) actually having to support herself by working at Starbucks.

A few years later she's in College doing undergrad work and has a new kitten and two years of sobriety.

How the story ends, I don't know but that's the speaker I saw a few months ago in Marin, and I had seen 50 versions of the same story while I was there (my home group got taken over by teens), it was great except for the part where they all nodded "identifying" with "and then in third grade, I ate paste n stuff", I had to go find an adult meeting after that, I don't even remember third grade (I was drunk at the time you see)

Anyhow, that's my "experience" with them, listening about them at meetings, it really did seem to have a higher success rate with teens.

flutter

I'm sorry I'm butting in to F&F threads, as I'm in recovery myself but I wanted to touch on this. I used to think the same thing. I think a lot of times an intervention forces what some people call a "bottom". I think one part of the intervention that creates that is when the loved ones explain that they will no longer enable the person, whether that's with money, shelter, communication etc.. Forces a bottom sometimes. I used to use that "I have to quit for myself" garbage.. well clearly in the midst of my drinking I didn't do much good for myself and couldn't see the reality of the situation. Ended up in a hospital almost dead, and still went back. Honestly, it was when I had a forced bottom, the be all end all.. My husband almost left, and I almost lost my job.. maybe that coincided with when I had enough, I don't know.. all I know is that I realized in a matter of moments that day that another drink was not worth losing everything I was about to.

I also remember watching that Intervention show, crying.. thinking inside "why wont they do that for me". I KNOW that sounds stupid, I know this was MY issue, and mine alone, but ... I dunno. Just my rambling thoughts I guess. I'm probably not being very helpful to you at all. I will however say that if I was presented with a 12 step program, AA based, etc.. and not given options for my recovery,.. I would have bolted.

just my humble 2 cents

Oh, and it's not a bunch of strangers, it's all the person's closest friends and family, plus an intervention specialist (usually a counselor). A lot of the time, each person goes around and tells the addict/alcoholic how much they love them but that they cannot continue their current relationship with them if they don't get help. that's what I meant by forcing a 'bottom'.

bluejay6

i think i probably shouldn't have used the term "intervention" in the other thread, since these days that is linked to professionals confronting the addict with the family.

what i was referring to was the old-fashioned AA way of intervention back when bill w. and dr. bob were building the program. the miracle they discovered in those early days was that an alcoholic would listen to another alcoholic even though he would not listen to anyone else about the reality of his sickness.

so they used to visit alcoholics in hospitals, often at the request of the alcoholic's spouse, and two AA's would go in and tell the suffering alcoholic their personal stories of addiction and recovery.

in the other thread which described an alcoholic with buckets of vomited blood beside the bed, i wondered if this person might be so near death that maybe taking action in the form of an AA visit (two AA's doing 12th step work) would be a chance...maybe....to get the person into detox then recovery.

so that's what i wonder from the recovering alcoholics....do AA's still do the old-fashioned visits at the request of family members when an addict is at the endpoint (dying) stage of the disease? thanks.

Ago

We do if we get a phone call

In my last fellowship (I'm still too new in this area to know how teleservice works here) what we had was volunteers manning the phones 24/7, the volunteers have a list of other volunteers called the Twelve Step Worker List, if the person on the other end of the phone is unable to make a meeting for some reason, two "twelve step workers" of the same sex are dispatched to that address/hospital etc.

San Francisco (Big Cities) have a thing called "Central Office" which has a paid staff that fulfills the same function (among others) after Office hours their phones get forwarded to Volunteers as well.

We also have something called "H and I" which stands for Hospitals and Institutions where meetings are taken into Hospitals, jails, homeless centers, Salvation Army etc.

So yeah, many many alcoholics find their way into AA by dialing 411 and asking for AA, We Deliver

Spiritual Seeker

I did an intervention on my son, he didn't go to treatment. But at the time he had a job, a band and a girlfriend to live with.
He did go a yr. later after he had slid further down to a bottom and lost it all.

Rainbowsend

So sorry SS that's so sad.