A culture of recovery shame
Alcoholism and Addiction | Recovery’s Foundation Destroyed
The discovery of the twelfth step laid the foundation of AA and the twelve steps— sponsorship
It is not lost on me why recovery rates are so low and so many addicts and alcoholics are dying.
As I have written in A Culture of Recovery Shame, one of the leading causes of this failure is the perversion of a concept that we call sponsorship.
Sponsorship, which Bill found to be the last and most vital ingredient to long-term sobriety, has been perverted and its benefits are being withheld from the newcomer — until they meet a certain list of fabricated requirements placed upon them by many senior members, also known as old-timers.
If you are a recovering addict and have not read my disclaimer for all 12-steppers, consider doing so before reading further. You may not understand my words if you do not understand my motives, experience, intentions and love for the programs of AA and NA.
We will start with an excerpt from Bill’s Story.
My wife and I abandoned ourselves with enthusiasm to the idea of helping other alcoholics to a solution to their problems. It was fortunate, for my old business associates remained skeptical for a year and a half, during which time I found little work, I was not too well at the time, and was plagued by waves of self-pity and resentment. This sometimes nearly drove me back to drink, but I soon found that when all other measures failed, work with another alcoholic would save the day. Many times I have gone to my old hospital in despair. On talking to a man there, I would be amazingly lifted up and set on my feet. It is a design for living that works in rough going.
More details about how Bill came to this conclusion — how he found Doctor Bob, prevented his own relapse, and came up with the last step of the 12 — can be found in a less popular but more historical piece of AA-approved literature, called Pass It On.
Pass It On serves as the biography of AA’s co-founder, Bill W.
Bill had almost six months sober after being guided to the Oxford Group by his friend, Ebby Thatcher, and having a burning bush kind of spiritual experience. He had finally found a way to not drink, after many years of misery and failed attempts. But with just over five months sober, he found himself in a situation that almost destroyed it all — if not for the call that led him to Dr. Bob, and ultimately to the creation of the 12-step program.
He was having some business troubles, which was not new for Bill as his business failings and the bitterness around them went hand in hand with his alcoholism.
Finding himself stuck alone in Akron, Ohio — with ten dollars to his name, a head full of disappointment, and no company — left him pacing the hotel floors on a sure track to the bar. He panicked as he faced complete self-destruction for the first time in almost six months and began rationalizing just one ginger ale or two.
Bill knew that one would be too many and a thousand would never be enough. But he felt his resolve deteriorating and leaving him nothing to cling to.
This cataclysmic moment is explained in Bill’s biography, as follows:
Now began the personal crisis that would set in motion a series of life-changing events for Bill. There was a bar at one end of the lobby, and Bill felt himself drawn to it.
For the first time in months, Bill had that panicky feeling of danger.
In New York, he had kept himself sober for more than five months through working with other drunkards at Towns and Calvary Mission. The work had been his protection; it kept him safe. Now he had nobody. He recalled “I thought, ‘You need another alcoholic to talk to. You need another alcoholic as much as he needs you!’ ” It was this thought that led him to the church directory at the other end of the hotel lobby.
Herein lies the founding of Alcoholics Anonymous and every other 12-step program that would be created in its image.
You see, Bill had worked closely and consistently with other Oxford Group members and drunks, using the Oxford Program. It was not until that moment, with not even six months sober and flying towards a relapse at the speed of light, that he realized the program of AA in its entirety.
He realized, at this moment…
I thought, ‘You need another alcoholic to talk to. You need another alcoholic as much as he needs you!’ — Bill W
…that you have to give it away to keep it. This realization completed the concept of the twelve steps to a spiritual experience — the twelve steps that we use today.
Working with other alcoholics was the missing link. It wasn’t just about helping others get sober; it was about staying sober yourself. Through working with others, the alcoholic could maintain the growth and maintenance of a spiritual experience — which the successful consummation of the program requires.
There would be no fellowship of AA if not for the discovery of the twelfth step, nor would there be a 12-step program. Nowadays, we call twelfth step work sponsorship.
Now that we are clear about how step twelve and sponsorship are the foundation of the entire program, let’s dig into how this foundation was uprooted — leaving the structure of AA and other programs to sit upon a gaping black hole of death.
This giant black hole swallows the opportunity for newcomers to practice the program, as it was written — many times robbing them of the opportunity to save their life.
New members are forced to wait years to do what Bill did with three days sober and, as he put it so eloquently, “abandon themselves with enthusiasm to the idea of helping other alcoholics to a solution of their problems”.
If you are not a 12-stepper, you ask in amazement why and how that would be the case. Honestly, that’s not a nut we can crack here because it is an entire tree of nuts. No, it is a forest of trees of nuts.
To put it simply, the apparent cause for this destruction of AA’s foundation lies in the Second Tradition of Alcoholics Anonymous and an imbalance in what it calls bleeding deacons and elder statesman.
Bleeding deacons also made my list of causes for a culture of recovery shame.
Bleeding deacons have robbed the program of its most vital ingredient — sponsorship. Over the years, they have created checklists and requirements that newcomers must satisfy before they are allowed to sponsor.
In many corners of the recovery community, they even require members to have a certain amount of time clean and in the program. This is of course based upon their version of what the program means. Some even ask for a year or years in the program before allowing members to sponsor.
The founders of AA, as well as Joe and Charlie, predicted the demise of the fellowship — did we not pay special attention to the spiritual principles of Tradition Two and how they apply to Step Twelve. Unfortunately, their fears have been realized.
Sponsorship is the key ingredient to achieving long-term recovery, yet members who flock to the rooms, in desperation, are denied the right to sponsor.
I was lucky enough to have a sponsor encouraged me to pick up sponsees at six months. And even before then, I had service commitments and went on 12-step calls regularly. Most are not so lucky.
The deep love and gratitude that recovering members have for AA makes it very difficult for its members to admit that they may have gone astray. But for most of us, the lost foundation was gone long before we entered the rooms.
To admit that there are areas of the fellowship that need some serious housekeeping is to honor the very principles that made it all possible from the beginning.
The AA groups need traditions like the members need steps. That is the only reason Bill wrote the 12 Steps and Twelve Traditions. He knew that AA needed the traditions for its survival, but that people would care less about them. He only added the steps to the book to get people to read it, as he felt the steps were covered in the Big Book — the original basic text.
The social construct that has been created around sponsorship is not in alignment with the traditions of AA or the foundation on which it was built. Yet it has permeated the fellowship and ripped its foundation to shreds.
If you are a member of AA or NA, you are not condemning yourself or your beloved fellow members in admitting that something has gone very wrong. Even more, in standing up and addressing the things that need to change, you express an undying faith in the program and the members of its fellowship — faith in them to practice the principles they wish to live by; the principles their life depends on.
Written by Holly Kellums
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