This week's tribe is Millati Islami: Millati Islami is a fellowship of men and women, joined together on the "Path of Peace". We share our experiences, strengths, and hopes while recovering from our active addiction to mind and mood altering substances. We have sought to integrate the treatment requirements of both Al-Islam and the Twelve Step … Continue reading Tribes of the Recovering Community
Tag: Alcoholic Anonymous
Tribes of the Recovering Community
This week's tribe is International Doctors In Alcoholics Anonymous: IDAA is a group of approximately 6000 recovering health care professionals of doctorate level who help one another achieve and maintain sobriety from addictions. IDAA strongly supports mainstream AA as the basis for everyone's recovery program and that needs to be first and foremost. We are not … Continue reading Tribes of the Recovering Community
Tribes of the recovering community
I remember getting sober and learning about the Sober Riders and Fifth Chapter. This recovery stuff was a whole new world, and I never imagined there'd be tribes like them. There are sober MCs (motorcycle clubs) all over the country. Our local Sober Riders describe the MC this way: The Sober Riders is a fellowship … Continue reading Tribes of the recovering community
The adoption of 12-step practices and beliefs.
We're seeing a growing body of research on the mechanisms of change in 12 step recovery. Tonigan and Greenfield recently published an article in Psychology of Addictive Behaviors. Working the 12 steps is widely prescribed for Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) members although the relative merits of different methods for measuring step work have received minimal attention and … Continue reading The adoption of 12-step practices and beliefs.
What good is religion?
Sigfried Gold on what religion and 12 step fellowships get right: The work of self-transformation can be done through psychotherapy, religious practice, reading self-help books, independent resolutions and intentions, consulting coaches, gurus, psychics, body healers, mind healers and faith healers of all stripes. People come to the work of self-transformation in moments of despair, moments … Continue reading What good is religion?
Marc Maron on AA and psychiatry
This is great. I love Maron's fearless questioning and the interviewer's (a psychiatrist) tolerance for vulnerability and honesty: Slate: How did A.A. figure into your getting sober? Maron:For practical tools to deal with the addicted brain, the stuff I learned in Alcoholics Anonymous and the community of A.A. just totally worked for me. If you would … Continue reading Marc Maron on AA and psychiatry
Thanks for the evidence
Anna David points us toward some positive press for AA. One of the articles focuses on a lecture by Marc Galanter Galanter said that AA uses many of the psychosocial features that operate in any charismatic membership group: social cohesion through attendance at regular meetings; a belief system embodied in the book Alcoholics Anonymous; a behavioral program … Continue reading Thanks for the evidence
Women, Alcoholism and AA
An interesting new blog has a great post on Women, Alcoholism and AA. Admitting that I was an alcoholic has had a profound effect on my life. Most of my friends from the old days are not around anymore; they didn’t want to hear about my alcohol problem and some understood it so little that it … Continue reading Women, Alcoholism and AA
Gender Differences in AA Benefits
A recent study reported that men and women benefit from AA in different ways: For both men and women, participation in AA increased confidence in the ability to cope with high-risk drinking situations and increased the number of social contacts who supported recovery efforts. But the effect of both of those changes on … Continue reading Gender Differences in AA Benefits
a protective wall of human community
Sentences to ponder: In a 1961 letter to AA’s co-founder, BillW., the renowned psychoanalyst, Carl Jung, described two main ways in which individuals with severe alcohol addiction might recover. One was through ‘real religious insight’; the other was through ‘the protective wall of human community’ characterized by a ‘personal and honest contact with friends’ (AA, 1963) [62]. Although AA … Continue reading a protective wall of human community
Recovery Review 