Addiction Alternatives or Alcoholics Anonymous

Having been in AA for over 40 years, know that what is being said in this article is true.I would like to be in touch with DR. Kern.My phone # is 317-289-3881 / address is 6115 N. Winthrop Ave, Indianapolis, Indiana 46220. (John Claypool)I started a Smart Recovery meeting in Indianapolis, and found that a combination could, or would be more effective?

because I know that I have the option to do as I please. If I want to stop I will. I..have the power...

I totally agree. awesome comment

The author misrepresents the AA program: While most AAs would accept the disease hypothecy, this is not a major aspect of the program, and certainly the position of alcoholism as a "genetic inheritance from birth" is nowhere to be found. Also, even though many AA members would recommend to keep attending meetings to sustain sobriety, again the AA program nowhere prescribes attending meetings for the rest of one's life. The author confuses the AA program with what individual AA members may sometimes recommend.

Must agree with 'an unknown user'. Dr. Kern's article makes some relevant points however appears to make the same one dimensional misperceptions of 12-step program language. People can, do and will continue to recover in their individual ways, inside and outside of 12 step programs and/or any other groups with which they may be involved.

we need more of this amd more of it on national media

"rarely have we seen a person fail who throughly follows our path..." From their book. Last year the Big AA in the sky said at best they have an 8% success rate (that was in USA today)...but they keep no records. It has been a general consensus it was not more than 10%. The court systems offer little to no choice. Most after care is centered around AA. The real question is who is "bs'ing" who! For the real doubters read Dr. Jeffrey Schaler's Book "Addiction is a Choice." Those promoting alternatives are in fact saying "if this or that works for you then I am happy for you." AA sees no other way. AA fits the medical profession perfectly in that they both promote "diagnosis and not cure."

Right on target. Addiction alternatives are real. Addiction is a mental illness. The battle for recovery takes place in the mind. Once a healthy state is achieved, any relapse is then a conscious choice with full awareness of the consequences and a willingness to pay the price.

Wrong, oh so wrong. AA makes no money. It is totally self supporting and does not advertise or accept grants, makes no profit. It is run and supported by its very members, with no oficers or owners.

Love it!

Possibly looking for a counselor for emotional instability and dealing with troublesome co-workers. Been clean and sober about 2 months. My problem was with marijuana, not alcohol. Would like to know if I have to stop drinking forever.

I would like to learn more about the alternatives to AA

Thanks for posting this. I agree wholeheartedly that the so-called "fellowship" groups are borderline cults and infantilize people under the guise of "recovery"

The info provided makes me want to read more. I'm not sure this is the entire article but will now go to the other articles published by Dr. Kern.

Good Information. Options in perspective are empowering.

Though I am a member of AA and ACA I have to agree with your alternatives, though just to avoid argument I keep this to myself. Most of the stuff I hear is usually dogmatic crap, but at my age 59 there aren't alot of social alternatives. I have spent most of my life sober and only a few years of that attending AA meetings. I had to return to AA after some severe emotional difficulties as the result of old childhood issues and found ACA to better meet my needs. I do see a time when I will need to replace this with better social alternatives as I did before.

This article sucks it wont help me ever.

Even Aa would say they don't have a monopoly on sobriety. I can only sahre that it works for me and has so for nearly 7 years. Not only have I stayed clean and sober but my life has gotten full. Thank you AA!

very good

Wrong , re read the Big book AA s clearly define what is and what is'nt alcoholism

ambivalent AA member nearly 5 years. check your big book, guys: there is straight line from 'resentment' as the 'number one' destroyer of alcoholics to the state of 'spiritual disease' (chap. 5, p. 64). so the author is incorrect in describing the 12 step understanding of 'disease' to be purely (or even mostly) in physical terms, and a lot of the AA commenters are being disingenuous by pointing to the big book as 'proof' that the author is wrong or 'has no idea what he is talking about'.

AA's preamble suggests an 'open-arms' support group, while 'the program' encountered in meetings can be oppressively dogmatic & fatalist. that doesn't mean it doesn't work; it just suggests that the low 'success' rates (documented by AA itself) might have a little more to do with a lion's share of the organizations' members cleaving too closely to the religiosity (if non-denominational) of the early 'program' then in potential members' willingness to 'go to any lengths'. belief or faith in the supernatural is a pre-requisite for 'working' the 12 steps ("no human power could have relieved our alcoholism" -- suggesting that even the 'Group-Of-Drunks' or 'Good-Orderly-Direction' paradigms for god/higher power are, in the end, faulty and doomed to fail). being scientifically-minded, agnostic, or simply just interested in engaging the program as a simple support group can often be a very trying experience.


i have felt this discomfort personally. it is neither pleasant nor is it conducive to helping me stay sober a day at a time.

truly helping another alcoholic is helping another flesh and blood human being. it is not a matter of saving another's soul or bringing another's spirit in line with a higher power.

the whole initial point of the silkworth 'allergy' model was as a corrective to the widely held public belief that alcoholism was an individual moral failing -- a failure to exercise god-given 'free will' properly. cleaving to tightly to the strident religiosity inherent in the 12 step model sends the pendulum swinging in the other direction for far too many alcoholics (and drug addicts) if they politely refuse the 12 step model while remaining within AA. having been freed of the stigma of moral failing, they find themselves now implicitly carrying the label of 'spiritually' failing.

how on earth is that helping a fellow sufferer?

those who have found success and satisfaction using the 12 step model within AA need to open themselves to the idea that there is a virtual infinite space worth of solution between sobriety through step-work and "jails, institutions, and death" or the "hat's off" experiment.

just one man's opinion, but helping another alcoholic means being first and foremost another's friend. and friends allow each other to believe or disbelieve according to their own sense of 'rigorous honesty'. AA would do itself a world of good by embracing new methods, encouraging true openness to all things that might be of help.

"liquor is but a symptom" It has been through AA, and only through AA, that I have been able to identify the problem and then, address the problem. Sure, alternatives exist, but at just $1.00 per meeting, this is by far the best deal in town. But, if something else works for you, then go for it!

This is B.S. In my opinion, after being in AA for several years, I know how they feel. But the reasons they don't like AA is because they don't want to be an alcoholic, they think they can handle it. Of the hundreds of people I've met at meetings, the ones who work the program find that AA does work when you work it. If they're afraid or skeptical or they think it's a cult or they'll be brainwashed, they don't realize that nobody is going to MAKE THEM DO ANYTHING. AA changed my life; all kinds of people with high bottoms to low bottoms start identifying w/each other because we find there are others just like us. And it's really a lot of fun. You just have to keep going, or go to another group if you need to.
Thanks for letting me share. Rosharon B.

Bravo !! AA s bookbook clearly catergorizes levels of problem drinkers that are NOT alcoholic .Obviously thse people respond well to controlled drinking , Pharmacotherapies , SMART recovery . AA is not religion . I have known atheists in AA who do not , obviously believe in God , but believe in "something " In 20 years of working in a non AA based treatment facility I have not seen ONE alcholic < by AA s defintion > regain control of there drinking . Not 1 !!

I'm a alcohol and drug counselor and feel that AA is not the only way to stay sober, but I subscribe to what the Big Book talks about in a "willingness to go to any length" to staying sober. I too spent five years in AA and then lost my way, but stayed sober. This higher power thing didn't make sense until I found God and developed a personal relationship. I spent many years without AA, but continued to grow spiritually. I then found myself in the counseling field and low and behold AA was again the focal point of how to stay sober for me. The point being is that however you slice it, if you want all that recovery has to offer, there needs to be a spiritual component to your program, or you again are relying on what the Big Book, and the Bible teach is that we are all like sheep that have gone astray into self-will run riot and need divine intervention and simple honest self-appraisal about what drugs and alcohol has done or is doing in our life. Without a standard to go by, we are left to our own devices; which has not worked for us. Having been sober now for over 30 years, and only antecdotal evidence to go by, I've noticed the vast majority of people who continued their sober trek with a spiritual emphasis in their life have much better chances of staying that way. What I do see is people who fail to become honest and unable to share about themselves that often leads them back to square one; sitting in the bar and talking about their woes. Lastly, I'd like to say, Without help, there is only one power who could have relieved our addiction. God! may you find him now.

This article, to me, makes excellent points. Having said that, I quit drinking through AA. I'll try not to ramble, yet I do need to say these things. I found In my life, I was emotionally damaged in just the right ways for Alchohol, to be the perfect treatment, to releive my symptoms. This I find was true in me by age 7.
As to my spiritual condition, I , as probably most people, have never been atuned to the incesant subterfuge, and changing lines of truith, with which, Governments, Corporations, etc., have molded the social environment, of our Globe, and that, I refuse to accept as good behavior. Yet it has been that way for at least 4 millenia, and sadly inevitable.
For the physical Part, I happen to a fair amount of both American Indian, and Irish, that Alchohal does make me drunk imediately, and drastically elevates my blood sugar, to a point, that creates its own paradox, medically.
So ofcourse as I read the BigBook, And saw the information about the three fold desease, being an unlearned person, it came as a revelation. It also gave me a handle on the problem.
So I got sober, and attended meetings at a compulsive level.
No more DWI's
No more legal problems added to an incredible amount henceforth accumulated.
Unfortunately, I cant get a job. And that has gotten me nearly ostricised from my home AA group, mainly I beleive, because of the focus, and importance, placed by members, on the promises in the Big Book.
So as I am Sober, it has been, financially, the worst Ten Years of my life. And I cant even get a sponsor, as to date, within a few days of seeing what my life is on the outside, they refuse to beleive I am tuely sober, for I am broke.
With a Criminal record, it is hard to get a decent job, without lying.
That is just a fact, and not an indication of my Spiritual condition, or my Sobriety.
I have had many physical problems from childhood injury's that preclude me from manual Labor. Which I did from over 30 years, yet am not quite bad off enough to quallify for, any assistance. Yet file every chance I get.
Before this sounds like a plea for pity, I simply point thses facts out, because I know them and have lived them. It is not anyones responsabillity to help me. Society, Governments, Buisness, etc, owe me nothing.
I point these out because I am not alone, and from what I have seen, these factors alone, contribute, to 30 percent, of the people who return to alchohal, and then add those complication to an allready untenuable situation.
It is my hope that in the world of my children and grandchildren, our world will have made adjustments to accurately address these problems.
AA does not. Nor , do I feel was it designed to.
So in conclussion, it (AA) is the first generation of treatment, But we, as a specis, and alchoholism as a desease, was many hundereds of generation advanced past AA, at it's inception.
I ask you forgive my spelling, and realize AA does address the issue IMO.
We need much more, unfortunately.
PST yes Ive applied for grants, loans, higher learning, SSI, Welfare,Foodstamps, unemployment, Indigant, Rehab, etc etc etc,. This is not about me, yet I am deeper in debt than I was before getting sober. But its not about me, this post, its about the issue, and what I have seen with my own eyes, in relation to that.

Addiction in any form presents problems to us. In today's world one of the most dreaded types of addiction is Alcohol. It posts serious threats & is a definite killer. How to come out of a tough addiction such as this...
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Edwin