Bad AA experience
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: UK
Posts: 10
Hi people. Thanks for all your words of advice - it has really helped!
I think I am going to try another meeting in the city centre (Edinburgh) next weekend. I will let you know how I get on. I hope you're all well! Thanks again.
I think I am going to try another meeting in the city centre (Edinburgh) next weekend. I will let you know how I get on. I hope you're all well! Thanks again.
Member
Join Date: Dec 2011
Location: Canada. About as far south as you can get
Posts: 4,768
Member
Join Date: Feb 2012
Posts: 234
Plenty of AA meetings are like this. Some are better than others and some are worse than others. You might have to jump around until you find the one that fits you best. I'm sure a lot of us on this site can relate to bad meetings. Sometimes the cops get involved, someone in the meeting is throwing and breaking coffee cups, swearing/cursing out everyone. It gets WEIRD. I understand. I've been there.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2012
Posts: 139
Plenty of AA meetings are like this. Some are better than others and some are worse than others. You might have to jump around until you find the one that fits you best. I'm sure a lot of us on this site can relate to bad meetings. Sometimes the cops get involved, someone in the meeting is throwing and breaking coffee cups, swearing/cursing out everyone. It gets WEIRD. I understand. I've been there.
Member
Join Date: Dec 2011
Location: Between Meetings
Posts: 8,997
You go to enough meetings skip....You'll see some crazy stuff now and then....You get a cast of charactors in AA....Most of our members have been thrown out of a bar or two...Sometimes people show up a little drunk...Sometimes you'll have somebody show up that's just full goose bozo....I learn something at all of them.
Can you elaborate? What do you mean by "sponsor" in this context? AA is not affiliated with any religion. Lots of groups meet in churches but they pay rent to do so in order to avoid violation of our 6th tradition.
The way I like to think of it, imagine you have been poisoned, and the guy at the door has the antidote that will save your life, because he just might.
Oh, and those unkempt guys smoking at the door, I'm one of them, and like to think of myself as a pretty darn nice guy, the kind who calls his mother almost daily and eats at his elderly grandmas every other week. I also hold doors open for anybody, not just the ladies, and I like to make babies smile. I just happen to be a smoker with sub par hygeine habits developed through thirty years of drinking and drugging. The sense of love and openness permeates itself through the fellowship, give it another shot.
Oh, and those unkempt guys smoking at the door, I'm one of them, and like to think of myself as a pretty darn nice guy, the kind who calls his mother almost daily and eats at his elderly grandmas every other week. I also hold doors open for anybody, not just the ladies, and I like to make babies smile. I just happen to be a smoker with sub par hygeine habits developed through thirty years of drinking and drugging. The sense of love and openness permeates itself through the fellowship, give it another shot.
Member
Join Date: Dec 2011
Location: Between Meetings
Posts: 8,997
I think what it really boils down to....People come up with a 1000 different reasons to not attend an AA meeting....My opinion...They don't want to stop and are afraid it might work.....They don't want to admit they are a member of a group with the word Alcoholc in the title....Or they're just flat out scared to do it. When it get's bad enough and you don't think you can do it anymore....You'll find a way through those doors. And if you put in the effort...It will work.
Don't worry about those people UK, just walk by them casually, (say hello if you wish) and go on inside if you don't wish to be around the smokers. If you get there too early you can help set up the chairs or pass out books if you'd like but you dont' have to.
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