The vibe of positive personal change, spiritual growth, and accountability-taking that permeates 12-Step meetings is itself an intoxicant, particularly if your life has been stagnant or in decline. In my experience, there is a shroud of mystery surrounding the Program that can keep people from attending their first meeting. On that note, here are a few things that I wish I had known before heading into the Rooms.
There is a 2000 movie called 28 Days featuring Sandra Bullock as a dipsomaniacal NYC reporter given a choice between 28 days in jail or 28 days in rehab. It's a lighthearted presentation of inpatient rehab and 12-Stepping that I'd recommend for anyone in recovery.
My favorite addiction movie of all time, however, is Country Strong (2010), in which Gwyneth Paltrow plays a country music icon on a comeback tour after a public disgrace involving losing a pregnancy from drinking. Paltrow's character is torn between residual feelings for her first husband, played by Tim McGraw, and her 12-Step sobriety coach, played by Garrett Hedlund. Although I'm not a fan of Gwyneth Paltrow in general ("conscious uncoupling" instead of "divorce" is as pretentious as it gets), I watched this movie with a bunch of guys who were recently released from state and federal prison, and by its heartbreaking conclusion, there wasn't a dry eye in the room.
*Quick note: I’m switching between using Alcoholics Anonymous (alcohol) and Narcotics Anonymous (drugs) for examples in this piece because it’s exhausting and grammatically challenging to include both fellowships in every example.
1. Pay attention to the meeting descriptions when selecting which group you will attend. Closed meetings are for people with a drinking problem who want to do something about it (see 2); open meetings are open to nonalcoholics, as well. If you are interested in support meetings for family members of alcoholics and addicts, Al-Anon and Nar-Anon are wonderful organizations.
2. You don’t actually have to be sure that you’re an alcoholic to start attending AA. The Third Tradition specifies that the only criterion for membership in the Program is a desire to stop drinking, but even that doesn’t have to be fully present when you begin attending (in fact, plenty of people will show up just get to their court-ordered 30 or 90 meetings in after their first or second Driving While Intoxicated (DWI) offense, for example).
3. Most people will introduce themselves as follows: “Hello, I’m X, and I’m an alcoholic,” but you can just substitute “Hi, I’m X, and I’m thinking about taking a break from drinking” or any other language that you feel comfortable with; no one will bat an eye.
One of my favorite things about the Program is how old-timers personalize these little bits of formality once they become comfortable with their home groups. At a meeting that I used to go to frequently, there was a woman who introduced herself as “V, career drunk and Christmas ruiner,” after a legendary incident in which she drove her car into her parents' living room while drunk on Christmas Eve.
4. You don’t have to say a thing during the meeting if you’re not comfortable doing so yet. “I’m just listening today” is universally respected; often, old-timers who don’t feel like sharing during a particular meeting will say the same thing, so you’re not giving yourself away as a newcomer by using this language, either.
As a newcomer, you will likely be asked to do one of the opening readings. The meeting leader will approach you before the meeting, ask you if you’re interested, and then hand you a big card with the reading on it if you accept. He or she will also indicate when in the opening or closing structure you should begin reading. Remember to introduce yourself first!
5. Addicts can absolutely go to AA, and alcoholics are welcome at NA. In fact, one of the founders of AA was a doctor who had a raging prescription drug problem, so there is a long history of each organization welcoming addicts of all types.
However, if you attend AA as an addict who doesn’t drink, you might want to say “other forms of alcohol” instead of “drugs” and “sober” instead of “clean” when sharing. In most groups, people ignore the semantics because they understand that addiction is the same disease across all substances of choice, but there are some crusty AA old-timers who have a purist mentality. Using this language makes it impossible for them to take issue with what you’re saying.
Don’t worry about feeling like a “dirty druggie” at a bougie AA meeting, either. Remember that many of our friends the alcs habitually drove drunk, drank mouthwash, gave back-alley BJs, hallucinated during DTs, and so on. There is more than enough humiliation to share; addiction is fun all around. We are all screwed in the head.
6. The basic format of all meetings is the same*. There are opening readings, including the 12 Steps and the 12 Traditions. Newcomers, out-of-towners, and people coming back from a drink will be asked if they want to introduce themselves (keep it very short at the start of the meeting because you’ll have a chance to share in depth later on). There is a moment to acknowledge sobriety birthdays, during which people receive chips for one day clean, one month clean, six months clean, one year clean, and so on (see photo below).
Then, two people each propose a topic for the meeting either based on that day’s readings or something going on in their lives. For the next 40-50 minutes of the hour-long meeting, anyone who wants to share can do so. The meeting leader will choose who speaks in what order, as there is no fixed sequence. I recommend letting the more experienced members of the group share before you if you’re new, as it will give you a sense of how long to speak for.
As the closing time approaches, the meeting leader will ask if anyone has a “burning desire” to get something off of their chest. Finally, the meeting will close with the Serenity Prayer: God, grant me the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change; the courage to change the things that I can; and the wisdom to know the difference.
*There are speaker meetings, Big Book / Basic Text study meetings, and other specialty meetings often held once or twice a month. These will be indicated in the meeting listings, and you should probably avoid them until you are further into Stepwork or at least are sure what those distinctions mean.
Example of a one-year AA chip. Getting a one-month chip after thinking that I would die in active addiction meant as much to me as my college graduation. On another note, I knew someone who ordered one of these off of Amazon to try to convince his Probation Officer that he was doing well, which ultimately backfired in a stupendous way when he failed a drug test.
7. The coffee isn’t always free, but you’re probably not going to get punched if you take it without paying. Charging 50 cents or a dollar for the coffee is a way for each home group to take in the modest amount of money that it uses to be financially self-sufficient, as a big part of the organizational credo is not depending on outside entities for funding.
8. If you introduce yourself as a newcomer at the start of the meeting, whoever is leading it will circulate a sheet for people to write their names and numbers on, then hand this to you at the end of the meeting.
You can call any of these people at any time for anything related to getting clean and sober. You’d be shocked how many will pick up the phone even when you'd think that they would be at work, sleeping, or otherwise occupied. People know that these meetings save lives, and most 12-Steppers take that very, very seriously.
9. There is no requirement to believe in God to attend meetings, and they are not overtly religious.
As you learn early on in your Stepwork, “God” is simply a Higher Power of your understanding. God can be the Program, your home group, nature, a feeling of belonging to something larger, or anything else that exalts your spirit. No one is going to proselytize to you about Christ, Allah, or any other God.
10. Please don’t go to a meeting drunk or high. This is in incredibly poor form, as some of the people there will be new to sobriety and understandably triggered by you smelling like a bar, drooling on yourself, or whatever.
This happened at an AA meeting that I went to once. One of the old-timers noticed what was going on very quickly, announced “we’ve got a live one” under his breath to the meeting leader, and quietly led the guy - who used to be a member of that particular home group - into another room to rough him up (just kidding; to give him some individual support and make sure that he had a safe ride home).
11. You won’t get direct advice from anyone in a meeting. Meetings aren’t therapy (I have an upcoming post on this topic). In the 12-Step context, we share our own experience, strength, and hope; “keeping it on the ‘I’” is the favored expression. So, if someone starts a meeting by proposing a topic of “difficult relationships with addict family members who are still using,” you won’t hear anyone respond with a second-person “You should do this or that.” Instead, people will reflect upon related situations that they’ve been through in their own recovery and what worked or didn’t work for them in those.
Each person only shares once during the meeting with the possible exception of the people who proposed the topics, who might wrap up their thoughts briefly at the end. There is no cross-talk, which means that no one interrupts, responds directly to what someone else has said in a confrontational way, or otherwise disrupts the orderly sharing directed by the meeting’s leader. If someone says something that you feel is directed at you that rubs you the wrong way, it probably isn't; even if it is, remember why you are there. "Take what you need and leave the rest" is a wonderful slogan for such occasions.
12. If you are female, be a little careful of newcomers of the opposite sex. Twelve-Step meetings are very safe places, but I have heard a couple of stories from female friends in the Program about older guys who sort of offered to take younger women who were new to sobriety “under their wings” with uncomfortable results.
Getting into a relationship with another person in early recovery is called 13th Stepping, and it is frowned upon because codependency or even simple distraction often derail recovery. For this reason, staying single is typically recommended during your first year.
13. Plan to hang around for a few minutes after the meeting if you can. Old-timers will refer to this as the “meeting after the meeting,” and this is when you can get to know group members, follow up on things said during the main part of the meeting, and network to find recovery supports. If you need help getting to and from meetings, mention this to the meeting leader after your first group; there are people who pick up other attendees as a service commitment.
If you’re active in a 12-Step fellowship, you will never lack for companionship for coffee dates, hikes, sports events, concerts, or anything else that you’re into. When I lived on Maui with my aunt and uncle, there was a group of people from my home group - led by a woman named Robin, who was well into her 60s - who went to the beach to go bodysurfing directly after our Saturday morning meeting. In AA and NA, addiction is sometimes talked about as a disease of leisure, and 12-Steppers understand that this is a hole that needs to be filled throughout recovery.
14. You won’t get a sponsor or a home group right away unless you are very proactive, and this is for a reason. In my opinion, it’s typically best to attend three or four different groups, pick your favorite one, and then connect with a few people in that group before you end up choosing a sponsor. It’s one of the most intimate relationships that you can have in life - this is someone with whom who you will share your most private thoughts and most shameful secrets - so it shouldn’t be entered into randomly or lightly.
If you are in need of someone to lean on heavily and right away, which many newcomers are, use your phone list and / or request that someone established in the group act as a temporary sponsor for you.
Some closing thoughts: If you’re feeling too anxious or embarrassed to share about something, just remember that every single person in a 12-Step meeting has been a dumpsterfire at some point - most of us spectacularly so, and for extended periods, often with relapse involved. There is truly no judgment, and I promise that whatever weird or bad thought or experience you think is unique to you will have been shared by at least two or three other people in any given meeting. Part of recovery is letting go of the feeling of "terminal uniqueness" that helps us to rationalize why they can get better but we never could.
Intherooms.com has digital meetings at many different times and with many different foci throughout the week. The official meeting listings for your area are best found by Googling the nearest town or city or the name of the region that you live in plus "AA meetings" or "NA meetings" (so I use the Syracuse AA Intergroup website and the Heart of New York page on the Northern NY NA site).
I have two upcoming posts that are short stories based on my experiences in China, for those of you who are into that side of things! As always, thank you for reading. B.
p.s. If you're interested in reading about my Stepwork experience, I wrote a two-part reflection on what the First Step means to me and have more content on the other Steps forthcoming).
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