Alcoholics Anonymous and Rehab doesn't work for most people

[jonesg]

Originally Posted by Abba05

Re: predators at meetings
Quote: "Don't be so naiive"

IMO, it is outrageous to be aware of this vulnerability of young or new members and enable them to troll for targets and have AA members look the other way. Not everyone is there to recover. This may be one of the reasons that experienced members will sometimes start their own essentially private meetings.
Those overly dependent on their group as their identity will enable this sexual, financial, and/or psychological abuse to continue ...not every time perhaps, but too da*n often, rather than risk being accused of criticizing 'The Program' because (and I quote) someone new might hear you and go back 'out there'.

If someone is driven away by AA self criticism the booze will drive them back.

I've seen many predators in AA and the ones who come looking for them.

In rooms full of sick insane alkies, does anyone expect to find everyone sane, just because they walked thru a door?

[jonesg]

Originally Posted by Abba05

Reconnecting with your Family, Community, and Church are there. Bill Wilson wrote "AA is like spiritual kindergarten AND it is to reconnect you to your family, community, and church.
It (the 12 steps) were written along the pattern of the steps of The Oxford Movement. Read about it(I'm getting sleepy!) Based on morality tenents of many recognized religions. Bill W. thought that alcoholics needed their OWN program (he was originally in the O.M. as was "Dr. Bob" his proctologist best friend. In their early publications I read that there was an 'inside joke' about the origination of the "Easy Does It" slogan. His exams were free and in his office, and it was heard through the walls during one of these exams. It was never meant to be a lifetime of meetings, either. That is the business side of things directing this mandate. The 12 steps were originally done in ONE sitting, upstairs in their 'founder's homestead' kneeling with other men praying over you.
AA is a good place to get sober, but not a good place to STAY sober. After approx. 1 yr. many stop working on themselves but focus on 'the others' that need to hear 'their' advice. Great if you are a narcissist.

Yeh, that was my experience with the steps.
A weekend is all it takes.
In many meeting I've heard "work one step a month", that's just more alcoholic insanity.

What the general public doesn't know is AA meetings are not the program. The steps are the program.
I used to tell people I was in the program, I was lying. I was attending meetings is all.
No one has ever recovered by attending meetings, making coffee, folding chairs etc.

90% of the fellowship never even attempts to work the steps. That inconvenient little fact is
Always ignored in highly touted "studies" purporting to show the ineffectiveness of the 12 steps.

Makes me wonder what the motivation for these "studies" with their scientific pretensions are really about.

I'm a recovered alcoholic.

[Dwatted Wabbit]

Originally Posted by Javacoffee

These programs work for those who work them. Drinking coffee and socializing at AA and NA meetings isn't an instant cure. It takes a lot of work to maintain sobriety, work that many aren't interested in doing. That doesn't mean the programs don't work.

Indeed. You have to be ready and willing to quit your drug, to quit your drug. Drug includes alcohol of course.

Sponsors are not critical to success. "You MUST get a sponsor!" No, you mustn't.
Does the AA Big Book mention sponsors? "I do anything my sponsor tells me to do!" Now, is THAT a healthy arrangement? You decide.

Someone coming out of an addiction is frail and vulnerable. They need to stick to the books, i.e. AA Big Book etc., and stay away from their addiction. And work their program. And REALLY want and need to stop.

Of course the success rate is low. How many people cycle through an average AA or NA group in six months? How many are still there, clean and sober, five years or even one year later? Or 10 years, or 20?

Ditto for treatment programs. One of the MDs I worked with in psych mentioned it takes five to eight runs through "treatment" for it to take.

Addiction is a terrible fate, in this case an ounce of prevention is worth a ton of cure.

[JONOV]

Originally Posted by jonesg

Yeh, that was my experience with the steps.
A weekend is all it takes.
In many meeting I've heard "work one step a month", that's just more alcoholic insanity.

What the general public doesn't know is AA meetings are not the program. The steps are the program.
I used to tell people I was in the program, I was lying. I was attending meetings is all.
No one has ever recovered by attending meetings, making coffee, folding chairs etc.

90% of the fellowship never even attempts to work the steps. That inconvenient little fact is
Always ignored in highly touted "studies" purporting to show the ineffectiveness of the 12 steps.

Makes me wonder what the motivation for these "studies" with their scientific pretensions are really about.

I'm a recovered alcoholic.

I think, and this is a guess, that there's something to going to the meeting, instead of sitting at home alone, or thinking about going to the bar..

Sitting around drinking coffee and shooting the bull with someone is better than swilling liquor and fighting with your wife...

And you meet other people, that you can golf or fish or whatever with, that similarly are trying not to drink...

Just my .02...I'm not in AA nor have I ever been to a meeting. But if you want to Bench 400 lbs, go to a gym where there are other guys that bench 400...and so on...