What is your opinion of Al Anon?

I have seen it be very, very helpful. Not everyone subscribes to every precept, but there is a lot of combined knowledge and wisdom for you to tap. I know people who will not miss a meeting.

First of all – cudos to you for seeing a counselor – that took guts. As a social worker who’s seen people through many things, I truly believe that the best way to understand your patterns and change them is by talking to a caring professional. The going may get rough – but stick with it, you’re on the right track.

Second of all, I endorse what @pdworkin says: Al Anon, like AA, offers the invaluable assets of a support group: other people who are going through a situation similar to yours, and who can offer their own experience and wisdom as guidance. In addition, most likely Al Anon will give you the feeling that you’re not alone, and that you can indeed change your life.

Counseling and Al Anon are not mutually exclusive; on the contrary, they complement each other. Find yourself a local chapter, keep talking to your counselor, and give yourself the time and space to (re)assess your life choices up till now and learn to make new ones.

Blessings.

Alanon is an excellent group. It teaches you to work on you and not on the drunk. For me personally it was a little bit too soft and too many said things like I love my alcoholic and take a bubble bath. I always had a lot of anger and resentment so ACOA (Adult Children of Alcoholics) suited me better.

The thing to do is meeting shop, search on line for a list of all the alanon and acoa meetings in your area. Keep going until you find one that feels like home. When you find the right one it is so good. The power of the group is amazing. And together with counseling will get you started on the road to a good life.

Growing up with an alcoholic definitely did strange things to my head and the way I dealt with life and its problems. It took me a long time to realize that. You have already come to that realization so you are well on your way.

Thanks all so far. If anyone can explain the difference between an Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACOA) group and an Adult Children of Alcoholics group within Al Anon, that would be helpful. I looked on line and both of them are close enough to where I live. I can do as @rooeytoo mentioned and try one and if I don’t feel comfortable try another.

I don’t know. AA is pretty much the worst thing ever. I can only imagine that a corollary of it would have to be bad, too. I’d stick with private counseling instead.

My ex-husband was an alcoholic; and while my parents were not, I was abused in childhood by another relative. As a result, my earlier relationships were very co-dependant. At my counselor’s suggestion, I attended a couple Al-Anon meetings, and purchased some related books.

For me, the group aspect wasn’t as beneficial as reading the books, but that is just because of my introverted personality. I think the suggestion to try as many groups as you can near your home or work is excellent, because you really do want to feel comfortable there.

After my last bad relationship ended, I did take some time to work on myself and focus on my son. That was a crucial turning point for me (and my son, who was suffering from the bad choices I had been making that nearly sucked the life out of me). I needed to really believe that I am deserving of love and happiness, otherwise I will not accept them when they come into my life.

So stick with counseling to work on building your own self-worth and dignity, so that you will no longer tolerate those who try to control you. And try to find others who can relate to you, so you can also learn from what has helped them and so you have others cheering you on.

My most recent relationship was with a recovered alcoholic who didn’t go through AA, either. He was not controlling in the same ways my previous relationships had been, but I think part of that was in reaction to wanting to break the habit of his prior co-dependent relationships. However, his last relationship and his drinking had ended just a few months before we met. He hadn’t really worked on himself. And while I was proud of being able to allow him to own his problems and not become a martyr, he just was not ready. I offered patience, encouragement and forgiveness for just over a year. He knew what he wanted intellectually, but wasn’t able to really live it. He hadn’t yet dealt with the underlying causes that led him to become an addict. My heart still aches several months later, because we were a terrific match in so many ways… but the timing was wrong.

I wish you the best, and if you ever need to talk, you will find support on Fluther, and you can always send me a Private Message.

When my sisters and I were younger my mother made us go to al anon meetings with her because our father is an alcoholic. If you’ve been you know there’s a group for adults, and a group for the children/teens. The main point of the program is to help you understand and cope with a person in your life’s alcoholism. They discuss how its a disease and how it will never be your fault when that person drinks. Also it gives you an opportunity to talk about how you feel with peers without fear of possible rejection/unacceptance/indifference due to lack of understanding from other family members or friends. However I do agree with rooeyto about it because a little too touchy feely for my tastes. If you are seeking to come to terms with a loved one’s alcoholism this group is more of a spring board into helping you come to terms with everything that comes along with being under the same roof with a loved one who has an addiction, as opposed to full time psychiatric counseling. the majority of the leg work you’ll need to do to get your life back will have to be done personally. Individual counseling is definitely a good idea to help you break the cycle of codependence. My youngest sister is headed down a pretty shitty road because she hasn’t seen that she needs to break free of those cycles. You are to be commended for recognizing that you need to change something in your life and having the strength to go through with it.

Learning the 12 steps of Al Anon could be helpful for just about anyone. They changed my life and when I first learned about them the only alcoholic in my life was a brother in law. It’s a great program.
It gives you a new perspective on how to tackle life, not just an addicted loved one.

You asked about the difference between Al-Anon and ACOA and all I can give is based upon my personal experience for where I was living at the time. I really don’t know if this applies to all groups all over the country. As others have stated, you should go to as many groups that are within feasible distance for you and go to those where you feel comfortable. Whatever you do don’t give up seeing the therapist

At the time that I began going to groups there was only one ACOA group and many Al-Anon. Most of the people in the Al-Anon groups were still involved on a continuous basis with the addict in their lives so there was a whole lot of venting going on (also known as complaining, pissing+moaning, kvetching etc). That is certainly a valid part of the process especially if the addict involved is a parent and you had no choice in the matter. We are just so relieved at no longer having to keep the “big secret” which dominated life that it all comes spilling out all over the place. As I said, that is a valid first step in the healing process but if you have already gone through that stage, listening to everybody else going through it doesn’t really produce much insight.

The ACOA group of which I was a part provided much more insight for me as to how to work on the behavior patterns which had helped me cope then but were now dysfunctional. That was a common theme for all of us in that group and it suited where I was at that point in time. I also think that is most likely the case in ACOA groups. Most of the members are grownups with their own indepent lives who are in the process of trying to figure out how to put in boundaries from the chaos of their addict parents lives. Some ( such as myself) have parents no longer alive but are still dealing with all the results of having grown up in that chaos that only an addict can create.

I purposely use the word addict since the substance of addiction (alcohol or otherwise) doesn’t matter as much as the patterns. During the later years of my Mothers life she could not strictly be considered an alcoholic since she no longer drank. With the aid of the dear (stupid) family doctor she traded her booze for a boatload of pills (perceived as so much more acceptable)

Did that change anything? Not really. Just made it all worse and gave her the means to be a successful suicide.

I heard an interesting definition at a meeting one time.

Valium is nothing more than powdered alcohol. So true.

Anyhow, that was my personal experience of the two groups. Your mileage may vary. The way I see it overall, the title of the group is not as important as whether you find it helpful and feel comfortable going on a regular basis. Try them all and settle on the one or two which feel right.

Also keep an eye out for any lecture series about recovery which may be open to the public. One of the things I found the most helpful for me was a series of talks given at a local rehab center in Philadelphia. The speaker, Vince de Pasquale was a former Priest who grew up in an alcoholic home and became an alcoholic himself. This was his ACOA series and he said that dealing with the after effects of his own alcoholism was easy compared with dealing with being an ACOA.

You commented about relationships and I’ll share just one of his little gems which made an indelible impression. He was commenting upon this strange magnetic attraction which we ACOAS have for addicts. It seems we always have that tendency to slip back into co-dependency (maybe because its so familiar)

To illustrate the point, he said that you could take a roomful of 500 people, all strangers and only two of them with addict backgrounds. By the end of the evening, they would have found each other , gone out for coffee and only weeks later discover that one was a recovering addict and the other an ACOA.. So true.

My personal life lesson regarding being involved with addicts (regardless of whether in recovery or not) is very simple: DON’T

As others have mentioned, feel free to PM me.

@girlofscience: why do you say AA is the worst thing ever?

I am going to comment upon one more aspect of this and I do realize that it is controversial to some, namely the term recovering as opposed to recovered.

Similar to someone who has diabetes or high blood pressure or a host of other diseases that are managed, recoverING is what describes the process of treatment and management. Alcoholism and addiction are similar. Just because a person is not currently active in their addiction does not mean that they are recoverED regardless of what they say. This is a disease where relapse is not unusual and can come at any time. RecoverED is a false and potentially dangerous term.

If I met a guy who had been a few months sober telling me he was recoverED, I would know that he was still in denial for there is a whole lot more work to be done on underlying causes and it doesn’t happen in a few short months. He may very well (at that point in time) have every intention of never using again, but intention is not reality.

I have met plenty of people who have confidently asserted that they are recovered and they are all with little sobriety time under their belt. The folks who have 10 or 20+ years of unbroken sobriety in their history (that you would logically think have earned the right to the term recovered) always describe themselves as recoverING.. They have the memory of their relapses and the realization that getting too cocky is a set-up for potential failure.

They have a term for those who have stopped drinking but not gained the insight necessary for personal growth: Dry Drunk

I’m not saying that people are doomed to spend the entire rest of their lives going to meetings, but if they don’t gain any insight into why they were using substances and what they were using them to escape from, a relapse is likely at any time that the circumstances of life change to become more challenging and they need a crutch.

And even if they choose not to go the AA route, I don’t know of any reputable therapists who would encourage the idea that merely not using means recoverED. That is a dangerous and slippery slope.

Heck, I never drank but I wouldn’t even term myself as a recovered ACOA as I am still finding areas worthy of change and others which may never change. I’m still a control freak as are most people who had to grow up in the chaos of an alcoholic household. I have been able to modify it somewhat, but I’m still recoverING.

:)

@Buttonstc – There are no meetings where I live so I haven’t been to one in a long long time. I truly miss them. Reading your last post was like going to one again.

Thanks for sharing.

Well I’m wondering if there would be any way to form a virtual (or cyber) Fluther ACOA group. With all of the various IM services or something like Google Voice or whatever it might be possible. Whaddya all think? There certainly seem to be quite a number of us :)

Or maybe a reading and discussion group sort of like a book club except with ACOA books??

Or would we be accused of having a clique??

Not necessarily a desirable clique, mind you. I can’t imagine anyone envious of the “Surviving-Living-With-Drunks-Clique” though. But, ya never know??

@Buttonstc – I would participate if there was a discussion group or book club

After a lot of discussion across the country with my contact group, I have to conclude that each are is different. It totally depends on the specific people who attend the meetings in your area.

I found them to be a bunch of whiners who sat around at every meeting and complained about what victims they were. I have heard some people say the same thing about group therapy, and yet, I was with a group in my therapy program that was very helpful.

@Buttonstc There is a Yahoo Group for that.

Any support group that works is good. I don’t care if it is related to alcohol or drug consumption or to mental illness or to books or conversation or infertility.

We learn most by sharing our experience with each other. No one is an expert, and yet everyone is an expert. We are all the greatest experts on our own lives. As long as we share our experience honestly, we can learn from each other. Support groups establish rules that make people feel safe to talk about things that are otherwise shameful.

The issue is not so much which kind of group you choose—although it does make more sense to find a group of people who are dealing with problems you face—but which group works. Does it have a process that makes people feel safe enough to be honest? If it does, it will help. Sharing information is what it’s all about.

Find people like yourself. Talk to them. Share your stories. Develop strategies to avoid your traps and be more effective at living in a way that fulfills you more. In your case, I think you would do well to find a group of people with low self-worth, and talk about what you can do to deal with that. It hardly matters if you understand how you got that way. All that matters is that you learn better coping mechanisms.

There are people with low self-worth everywhere. A lot of them on fluther. You’re in the right place. Stick around. Welcome to the club. Such as it is.

My opinion of Al-anon is that it is a great program yet like A.A. the singleness of purpose and strict non – conference approved literature policy limits me too much.

I do want to discuss PTSD, Codependency and other things related to my recovery too without feeling like I am limited and doing something wrong.

The newer Al-anon book Transforming Our Losses touches alot on grief but just not enough for me. This current rebuilding of Adult Children of Alcoholics/Dysfunctional Families…sperate from Al-anon ACOA has been interesting.

I do wish the ACA WSO board of trustees was full, currently I think there are about 8 trustees and currently just a small service structure. I am also investigating about the history of both Al-anon and ACA, ACOA, Adult Children Anonymous it gets confusing at times.

One main Al-anon principal is about detachment and although ACA/Dysf. Families (ACA WSO) also talks about detachment and integration I think ACA has more to do with the Inner Child concepts and more understanding of the importance of getting to the anger before the forgiveness.

PTSD can cause real detachment within, so although I do go to both Al-anon and ACA I feel there are actually completely different.

ACA vs.AL-Anon

ACA/Dysfunctional Families and Al-Anon’s; Adult Child Anonymous., Miracles In progress, Step Chat, etc..

The information passed on by my ACA Fellow Travelers helped to give me clarity.

Besides the different First Step and the different Tradition Seven funds I have learned ACA has the copyrights to The Problem ,The Solution and The ACA Promises “is” ACA WSO conference approved literature.

The Problem,The Solution and The Promises “is not” Al-Anon Adult Child Anonymous conference approved literature.

I was listening to the Marty.S presentation again this morning and realized he mentions the reason ACA had to separate from Al-Anon in the very first few minutes of this presentation. http://www.acawso.org/Marty_S.htm

Marty S. said at the 2006 ACA convention:
[quote]
The major piece of literature we used was the Problem and it was not conference approved literature…..(quoting his friend)“It was put in a box and shoved under the table”[/quote] The “We” he is referring to is Al-Anon ACA.

Here are two quotes from an ACA Fellow Traveler:
#1.)[quote]
While Al Anon and ACA are Twelve Step programs, they are somewhat different in focus and approach. Al Anon primarily focuses on familial alcoholism and how to live detached and serenely with a drinking alcoholic or to live a better life with an alcoholic, who has found recovery. In Al Anon, the Al Anon focus on self and works their own program.

In ACA, we focus on ourselves as well and work our own program. With the Twelve Steps, we focus on recovering from the effects of growing up in an alcoholic or dysfunctional home. We believe the effects of a dysfunctional home guide or steer our behavior and thoughts as adults. Unlike, Al Anon, we look at the family system in addition to inventorying our own behaviors in recovery.

The ACA member looks at dysfunctional family roles, harmful messages and other abuse involved in growing up in a dysfunctional home. We believe it is essential and healing to work the Twelve Steps and to look at the family system as we also concentrate on our individual behaviors and thoughts.

If you look at Al Anon’s First Step and ACA’s First Step, you will see the difference.

Al Anon—Step One:
``We admitted we were powerless over alcohol, that our lives had become unmanageable.’’

ACA—Step One:
``We admitted we were powerless over the effects of alcoholism and other family dysfunction, that our lives had become unmanageable.
[/quote]

#2.)[quote]
Hello,
I agree with the idea of having ACA meetings that adhere to the principles and the Twelve Steps of ACA. I believe in clarity for ACA meetings so that newcomers are clear on which fellowship they are involved with. I can’t tell you how many times I read these two questions on this forum.

1) ``What is the difference between ACA and ACoA?’’ (None).

2) ``Is ACA and Al-Anon ACoA the same thing?’’ (No).

ACA WSO has done its best to present the answer to these questions in ACA literature and through this forum and we will continue to do so while remaining respectful to Al-Anon and other Twelve Step fellowships.

With the publication of our new fellowship text, more and more people are understanding that ACA is an autonomous 12-Step program that is separate from other fellowships.

They understand that this separation is reasonable and in line with the separation called for by AA and Al-Anon and which works for AA and Al-Anon. More adult children are finding ACA and embracing our solution to the effects of growing up in an alcoholic or otherwise dysfunctional family.

Additionally, I respectfully ask that ACA meetings should not be confused with outside entities or other Twelve Step approaches that use ACA material but who do not use our fellowship name.

Adult Children of Alcoholics was the first Twelve Step fellowship to write literature that is specific to the adult child experience.

ACA meetings use the Laundry List (Problem), the Solution and the ACA Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions.

ACA meetings include ACA’s foundational language of alcoholism and recovery from the effects of alcoholism.

ACA has widened its focus to gladly include adult children from other dysfunctional family types but we remain Adult Children of Alcoholics with a focus on the the effects of alcoholism.

We are not CoDA or Al-Anon ACoA or any other combination of other fellowships. These are fine programs but they are not who we are.

[/quote]
Thank You Very Much for that quote-clarity

In my understanding there has been an ongoing problems with ACA separating from Al-Anon for a long time.

1989 Caucus Session http://www.acawso.org/ipb/index.php?showtopic=538
[quote] Jim M. noted that in the process of a years development of the Intergroup ”(BREAKING AWAY FROM AL-ANON)” a very strong group conscience developed around the issue of inclusively. Here they discuss the name change Adult Children Anonymous and changing the name to Adult Children of Alcoholics.

Currently there is actually an intergroup on the ACA WSO website using Adult Children Anonymous name. I find that VERY confusing and even against Traditions.

It was decided the ACA would not discriminate against any individual, irregardless of background, as long as they identified with the characteristics of the Problem.[/quote]Again, The Problem is not Al-Anon conference approved. That appears to be a “real problem” to me.

In my understanding of the Identity Papers and the reason for this separation is explained very well in the first paragraph of:

The Identity Papers:
Finding Wholeness Through Separation http://www.acawso.org/ipb/index.php?showtopic=473

I did not come to ACA recovery for more confusion. I am glad I finally understand the difference between ACA/Dysfunctional families and Al-Anon.

I have also heard there is technically only one Adult Children of Alcoholics and it is ACA/Dysfunctional Families.I hope others can add to this topic and spare other newcomers of the confusion.

In my understanding with the 2006 final release of the ACA/Dysfunctional Families Text this separation of Al-anon ACOA and ACA will finally be 100% complete….eventually.

I also had quoted Dr.Jan alot but now I disagree with her. She said,” Go to AA to get sober, then go to Al-anon to learn to detach then go to ACOA for recovery of core issues. Today I think that is too black and white thinking and know of many personally that could not get sober without doing family of origin work first or at least combined etc..

Thanks for listening

Al Anon teaches that alcoholism is a disease, a doctrine that is not supported by scientific medical evidence. However, if you ignore that ideology, the group should provide good peer support.

http://www.baldwinresearch.com/

Twelve-step programs and psychotherapy are not mutually exclusive. Rather, they can reinforce each other and provide help for you as a whole person. While there is some overlap, and there are some differences between the two, the differences are not in conflict. In fact, they can provide synergy to promote your overall welfare spiritually, emotionally, socially, and physically. You may find the following article helpful:
http://www.psychotherapy-nyc.com/blog/2010/07/therapy-and-the-12-steps/

It sounds like a good idea, but I have no personal experience with it. As with any organization, it is only as good as the local group.

Alanon is great! Each group is ‘stand-alone’ so you might have to shop around to find one that suits. If you can’t find one- they are easy to start…

So true @DavidG, finding the right group is like finding the right counselor, you have to keep shopping until one fits!