The Recovery Show » Finding serenity through 12 step recovery in Al-Anon – a podcast

Do you fear being abandoned? How has it driven your life? How can recovery free you from this fear? Shannon says, I wanted to speak about the topic of Fear of Abandonment because (due to my childhood trauma) it’s a fear that I have struggled against my entire life and recently in 2020 was forced to face against my will. I wondered about others who have struggled in the same way and perhaps may find something in my story that might be helpful to their recovery. She grew up with an alcoholic father and a mother with mental health problems. When her father got angry, he would say he was leaving, get in his car, and drive away down their long driveway. “Several times I would be so terrified of the thought of him leaving and never coming back that I would run down the driveway after him. I remember seeing him notice me in his rearview mirror crying hysterically and yelling for him to come back. And he would always turn around and come back and tell my mother he only came back because of me.” Shannon was 7 when her grandfather died. Her mother reacted by retreating into depression and essentially emotionally abandoning her family. She says, “My father became my HP and protector and I lived to make him love me and be proud of me. He later (when I was around 18) got sober and never drank again and we had a very close and codependent relationship.” As an adult, she says, “I went from one bad relationship to the next, seeking out emotionally unavailable people who were incapable of loving and being responsible for themselves (some were alcoholics, some weren’t) who were most likely to abandon me as I, unknowingly at the time, tried to recreate the abandonment of my mother and threats of abandonment by my father.” In 2010, her father died shortly after being diagnosed with cancer. “I remember the morning he died like it was yesterday and watching the light go out in his eyes while I became that little girl in the driveway again, only this time he was never coming back. Without my ‘Higher Power’ and no recovery program my fear of abandonment was off the charts. My inner child went into hiding and I was running on the high of fear ever since, never even thinking to stop and look back.” She divorced in 2016, after realizing how toxic her relationship with her first husband was. Then she met the man who became her second husband, who was an alcoholic in recovery. He introduced her to Al-Anon and ACA, where she got sponsors and started working the steps in both programs. In doing her inventory she discovered how the fear of abandonment was at the root of many of her shortcomings. She says “the 3 I’s helped me: Inventory, Identity, Integrity”. “I found the more I worked at my inventories, the more I formed my own identity and began to see who I really was, instead of who my father or relationship partners wanted or needed me to be. This was actually a very long process …, but I can see my progress every day now and because I now have a better sense of who I am (identity), I have a much easier time setting and enforcing clear boundaries (integrity). Until I had my own identity, boundaries were impossible to set, much less enforce. This has been a huge change for me and my recovery.” We talked about recovery tools she uses, including * A God Box.* Learning that happiness can be a choice, and that she has choices.* “No” is a complete sentence She concludes, “Now that I have faced my past, learnt what I can from it, I feel it’s time to let it go and move forward. After a very long and painful journey, today I choose happy.”

How did I find compassion for the actively drinking alcoholic in my life? At first, I had no compassion. I had anger, frustration, and frustration, instead. Why would I want to find compassion? The two big reasons were, for me and for her. For me—I could start to release my anger, resentment, and frustration, or at least move it off of my loved one. For her—I could stop blaming her and start supporting her (as Tradition 5 says, “by encouraging and understanding our alcoholic relatives.”) How I got there I learned about the disease of alcoholism. A residential treatment facility offered weekly lectures about alcoholism as part of their “friends and family day”. There I became intellectually convinced that alcoholism was a disease of mind, body, and spirit. I learned that my loved one did not choose to be alcoholic, and that the disease affected not only her body, but also her thinking and behavior. I attended many “open talks,” at which an AA member would tell “what it was like, what happened, and what it is like now.” For me, these gave me two things: * An insight into the experience of the disease “from the inside,” and from people with whom I had no pre-existing anger, resentment, and frustration. I could hear their experience with an open mind, and then start to see the parallels with my loved one's experience.* Hope. Here were many people who had descended into the depths of despair and sickness. Some went deeper and some less deep, but they had all found their way to recovery. This gave me hope that my loved one would also find recovery some day. As I learned and listened, I found an image that was my first step towards compassion. I visualized her as the passenger in a car driven by her disease. It was driving recklessly and crazily. She was trapped in the car, sitting in the passenger seat, screaming in terror. OK, I have compassion. Now what? What other principles and tools did I learn that worked along with the compassion to enable me to continue to live in the chaos of active alcoholism? I'll mention just a few of the most important. First, the “3 C's”. That I didn't cause her alcoholism, that I couldn't cure it, and that I could not even control it. When I first heard these words, I felt a weight come off of me that I hadn't realized I was carrying. Those words encouraged me to come to my first Al-Anon meeting that same night. Much of my frustration and anger stemmed from the idea that it was my job to control or cure her drinking. I now had permission to stop that fight. Next, detachment. Specifically, detachment with love. That bizarre concept that I can let go of my attachment to her behavior but stay connected to her, and I can start to learn where the boundary is between me and the rest of the world. That I can detach her from her disease, love the one and hate the other. That I can realize that the behavior I hate is part of the disease and not part of her. This helps me to let the anger, resentment, and frustration flow out of me. And last, but certainly not least, is the Serenity Prayer. Where I ask for help to accept the things I cannot change (mostly other people and their behavior), change the things I can change (mostly just myself), and, perhaps most importantly, the wisdom to know the difference. Because I can not do this by myself. These tools, meetings, our literature, program friends, my sponsor, and the compassion they helped me to find meant that I was present when my loved one said “I don't want to drink today.

Do you find yourself avoiding scary feelings? Are you running away from things you don’t want to face? How are you facing your fears instead? Definitions We start our conversation with Kathy and Sabah with a couple of definitions, recognizing that pausing is healthy, while avoiding is usually not. Pause: interrupt action or speech briefly. – from GoogleA pause is a short period when you stop doing something before continuing. – from Collins English Dictionarysynonyms: Stop, Cease, Halt , Discontinue Avoidance: an act or practice of avoiding or withdrawing from something – from Merriam Webster Dictionarysynonyms: dodge, retreat, flight, escape, sidestep Quotes And also a couple of quotes. A ‘No' uttered from the deepest conviction is better than a ‘Yes' merely uttered to please, or worse, to avoid trouble. – Mahatma Gandhi When I was younger, I was terrified to express anger because it would often kick-start a horrible reaction in the men in my life. So I bit my tongue. I was left to painstakingly deal with the aftermath of my avoidance later in life, in therapy or through the lyrics of my songs. – Alanis Morissette Avoidance Coping We talked briefly about an article titled “Avoidance Coping and Why It Creates Additional Stress“, which included some tips on “How to avoid avoidance coping.” What is avoidance coping? Briefly, it is “trying to avoid stressors rather than dealing with them.” But often, this just causes more stress. How can you stop avoiding and instead actively cope with stressful situations? Some of the recommended steps may sound familiar. The article has a longer list with more details, of course. * Recognize when you are doing it (i.e. Step 4).* Take small steps (for me, this is often what happens in Steps 6 & 7)* Identify other options, find new ways to relieve stress, and practice them (ditto plus at least Step 11). How did we run away? Kathy described the “back story” of this topic, which included not avoiding discomfort while recording our earlier episode (356 – Domestic Violence and Other Unacceptable Behavior). When do we (or did we) avoid scary feelings, and how? Kathy says that she packs away her feelings, “… those things are not something that's healthy for me to dig in. Like it's better to just move on and focus on other things.” The idea of dealing with them later is something I can identify with, for sure. But, does “later” ever come? Spencer relates an occasion when “later” was forced by a deadline, and he discovered that what he had been fearing was not real. He could have avoided months of anxiety by just dealing with it earlier. What tools do we have? A tool that helps us to “unpack” these feelings that have been packed away is the 4th Step inventory. We can dig deep in our “searching and fearless” inventory with the help of our sponsor or step group. Asking for relief of shortcomings (such as procrastination) in Steps 6 and 7 helps us to be able to stay with our feelings in the moment, instead of running away. Sabah says “emotion doesn't control me anymore. I [can] say that I own my emotions.” Slogans such as “take it easy”, “first things first”, “just for today,

Tradition 5 tells us that part of our recovery is in finding compassion for our alcoholic friends and relatives. What is compassion, and how is it different from sympathy or empathy? * Definitions (from Chopra.com)* To feel sympathy, it means you are able to understand what the person is feeling. * Empathy is viscerally feeling what another feels. * When you are compassionate, you feel the pain of another (i.e., empathy) or you recognize that the person is in pain (i.e., sympathy), and then you do your best to alleviate the person’s suffering from that situation.* From dictionaries* Sympathy: feelings of pity and sorrow for someone else's misfortune.* Empathy: the ability to understand and share the feelings of another.* Compassion: sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it* But what does it mean in recovery?* Tradition 5: … by encouraging and understanding our alcoholic relatives,* How? How did I go from anger and resentment to understanding and compassion?* What does our literature say? From How Al-Anon Works* Slogans serve as gentle, calming reminders that our circumstances might not be as impossible or as desperate as they at first appear. These concise expressions of wisdom offer quick reassurance that we really are able to cope with whatever life brings, prompting us to take constructive action and to treat ourselves and others with compassion and respect.* Few of us realize that the alcoholics in our lives often suffer terribly, sometimes even more than we do. By listening, we can learn to distinguish the person from the disease, to have compassion for their efforts and their pain, and to recognize that they, too, are powerless over alcohol.. * Courage to Change Jan 5: I was terribly confused about the meaning of “compassion” when I came to Al-Anon. I thought it meant making excuses for the alcoholic or covering bad checks. Readings and Links We read from Courage to Change, Feb 11 and Jan 5. Also How Al-Anon Works, Chapter 9 (slogans), and Chapter 6 (The Family Disease of Alcoholism). We discussed definitions of sympathy, empathy, and compassion from chopra.com. An article from Psychology Today Compassion is Better than Empathy informed part of our conversation. Contributing Please call us at 734-707-8795 or email feedback@therecovery.show with your questions or experience, strength and hope. Or just leave a comment right here. Music from the Show The Band – The Weight The Weight | Featuring Ringo Starr and Robbie Robertson | Playing For Change | Song Around The World Alanis Morissette – Hand In My Pocket

How has music supported you in recovery? What inspiration do you find there? Are there certain songs that have become the soundtrack of your life? Sonia Lee is a singer and song writer in recovery. We talked about her recovery journey and her recovery songs. Sonia's recovery started when she realized she was alcoholic. But, after some years in recovery, some things just still weren't right. She tells of going to a combined AA and Al-Anon women's retreat. She talked to an Al-Anon speaker, saying that she thought maybe she should go to Al-Anon, but wasn't sure it was ok, being an alcoholic. And the Al-Anon member said “Honey, if you scratch an alcoholic, you'll probably find an Al-Anon.” Sonia has always felt a need to control others, from when she was young, which she illuminates with a humorous incident from her childhood. She says, with a smile, “I get along really well with people when things are on my terms.” In her family, there was some relapse happening. So, she started going to Al-Anon. But, this is what it sounded like then: “Hi, I'm Sonya, I'm an alcoholic, but I've been told that I should go to Alanon.” That didn't work so well, it turns out, “because right off the bat I came in and I was different in my own head. … not surprisingly the Alanon program didn't really work for me because I wasn't doing it, wasn't living it. I didn't even really understand what it was all about.” So, she stopped going to Al-Anon meetings. Years later, the relapses were getting worse. “I started dabbling again in Alanon because I didn't know what to do with my feelings. I was so angry and I couldn't understand why if I was able to get sober, why my husband was struggling.” At another conference, an Al-Anon speaker said to her, “I want to suggest that you come to Al-Anon as an Al-Anon and not say that you're an alcoholic and … get a pure Al-Anon sponsor.” That's what she did, “I looked for the person who was taking notes, I looked for the woman who was sharing, who was serious about her recovery. I asked her to be my sponsor.” She's been working her Al-Anon program ever since then. We talked about her song “Butterfly.” On the surface, it's a song about a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis. But it's also a song about recovery. The opening lines, “Come on out into the light. At first nothing will seem right.” certainly capture my early experience in the program. Sonia wrote this while she was singing as part of an event at a treatment facility. She says, “it just came out.” The song celebrates recovery, “In the bridge. It says ‘fly high. I will sing with abandon’ and for some reason, I love the word abandon. … I will sing with abandon, because for me personally, I was a singer, in my drinking days. And I didn't know when I got sober, if I could keep singing.” Sonia's song “God Shaped Hole (in My Heart)” was inspired by a woman who said “I had been putting all these things buying things, having relationships eating, food, alcohol, all these things. I was trying to make, to fill me up. And what I didn't realize and why that didn't work was because it was a God shaped hole in my heart.” The third song that we talked about is “Running from the Fire”, which was inspired by a speaker, who said “I don't know about you guys. I didn't come here walking towards the light. I came here running from the fire.” Sonia continues, “I didn't come to Al-Anon because things were going great. I came because my son looked at me and was wondering how he could make help make mommy happy.” Readings and Links

How have you experienced the effects of alcoholism or addiction transforming into the effects of recovery? Colleen suggested this topic, writing “we often hear about the effects of this disease, but I've never heard the phrase, the effects of recovery. It has really made me reflect, as I have found over the past couple of months, my recovery has really changed the way I feel internally. I've heard that this disease has physical, spiritual, emotional, and mental. I have been reflecting that the effects of recovery are also physical, spiritual, emotional, and mental.” She joined Spencer for a conversation about the effects of recovery. We looked at some of the effects that our loved ones' alcoholism had on us, and what effects of recovery we now have in their place. Colleen spoke of going from obsession to clearer thinking, from anxiety to feeling calm, from anger to acceptance, and from denial to awareness, acceptance and then action. Colleen had recently moved house, and we explored packing and moving as a metaphor for some of the Steps. During the process of moving, you take inventory of what you have, probably finding things you had forgotten you even owned. Then you decide, probably with the help of others, what to keep and what to get rid of. Which is exactly Steps 4 through 6, isn't it? As she dug into, literally, some stuff from her childhood, she realized that there was trauma there that she hadn't dealt with. Around that time, she found herself listening to episode 203, Adult Children of Alcoholics, and realized that she could find help there. After many years in Al-Anon, she now finds herself a newcomer in ACA, because of the clarity she gained as an effect of her Al-Anon recovery. Al-Anon gave her compassion and understanding for her mother, and she was able to mend that relationship and be with her mother at the end of her life. She has also grown close to her father, and she has clear boundaries on their interactions to protect her own serenity. She would like to go back and tell her scared and lonely younger self how much Al-Anon would help and how much she would gain. Readings and Links We read from Courage to Change, April 6; and How Al-Anon Works, pp 88-89, “Our mental and emotional health” (Chapter 12, Taking Care of Ourselves). Upcoming topics An upcoming topic is “it is ok to love an alcoholic”. Please call us at 734-707-8795 or email feedback@therecovery.show with your questions or experience, strength and hope. Or just leave a comment right here. Music from the Show James – Sit Down The Greatest Showman Cast – This Is Me Bonnie Tyler – Total Eclipse of the Heart

What is it like to keep working your recovery program after divorcing? Pat joined Spencer to talk about her experience. She fully recognizes that both she and her ex-husband contributed to the factors leading to their divorce. She says that she “did not want my relationship to be the example to my children of what a relationship should be.” When they separated, she was fully confident that they would eventually re-unite. That didn't happen. When they first split, she had been in Al-Anon about 6 months. This is what it looked like: * Initially, she tried to work through it* Their son refused to stay in the same room with his father, when they tried to have family meals* When her husband said that he should get the house, she shocked herself by saying “OK, I'll get an apartment for me and our son.” She says “This is Alanon all over the place. That never would have happened before.”* After about 6 months, she realized how much happier she was.* Some Al-Anon principles that helped during this time and afterwards include compassion, detachment with love, self care, choosing how much and when to trust, and dealing with drunk calls/dry drunk behavior.* It was a real struggle, while still young in Al-Anon and learning the tools and principles Even though the relationship “ended”, only of course it didn't, there are so many aspects to a relationship that need to be addressed and are ongoing despite a divorce. Pat used her program learning to accept her children's different choices that they made about how they would be in relationship with their father (both were adults at this point.) One chose to cut off contact, the other let his father move in for a time, saying “I don't think in this country, we support our elderly enough. I think it's important to take care of our elderly.” She did quickly “dive into” a new relationship with the person who is now her husband. She says that it is “Absolutely essential to use Al-Anon … to have a healthy relationship.” That includes “to continue very actively going to meetings, to work in my program, to have a sponsor, to work the steps, traditions and concepts,” Pat's ex-husband did die of his disease. With the support of Al-Anon, she was able to be with him, to love him, as he was dying. “Two years after his death, I had a sense of incompleteness. I had to do a step four around my relationship with him – eventually I had to remember that while I contributed to the problem of our marriage, I didn’t cause his drinking and I had good reasons to leave. It was okay that I did.” Readings and Links Pat read from the book Opening Our Hearts, Transforming our Losses: pages 81-83 on divorce; 83-34 on relationship with our adult children; and 97-101 on death of a loved one. Spencer mentioned two articles from the New York Times, one on languishing, and one on flourishing. Contribute your voice Please call us at 734-707-8795 or email feedback@therecovery.show with your questions or experience, strength and hope. Or just leave a comment right here. Music from the Show

Can CODA help when you grow up in dysfunction, and then love a controlling, gaslighting partner as an adult? As a child, Geraldine lived in fear of her mother's anger, which often resulted in beatings. She became her siblings' protector, and felt that it was her job to soothe her mother's moods, and to take care of her mother. At school she was shy and withdrawn. She just couldn't comprehend what the teachers were saying, so she did not do well. As her GSCE exams were approaching, “one day, it was like a thought came into my head and said, ‘If you don't do this, you're proving everybody correct.’” She says, “Even to this day, I don't know how this has happened. This is somebody who hadn't bothered doing any work. [I] deemed [it] as being completely useless. I just started to work. I thought, I'm going to do this.” And she did, gaining the highest mark in 5 out of 7 exams. With that, she could to go on to college (for those of us in the US, this would be similar to a 2-year technical college, as opposed to “university”). She says, “That was transformational for me, not academically but personally. I went from this really introverted, severely introverted and very depressed, teenager to this extroverted young woman who made friends.” With the help of her higher power, she made it into university, where she discovered her profession, which she loves. But then “I crashed around when I was 30. I hit a rock bottom. I think probably, I was on the verge of a breakdown. My life had changed. I think … the job that I did was almost forcing me to meet myself, the bit of me that I'd suppressed. “I ended up in therapy for 10 years seeing this therapist three times a week. I was in a bad way. It was all those things that I thought were normal, being beaten, being depressed, suicidal. I remember even saying to my then partner, ‘my mom used to beat me, but it never did me any harm.’ I really believed that until the bubble was burst. The pain that I felt, the suffering that I felt was so awful and realized that actually, that wasn't the way life was meant to be.” She left the man she had been with for a decade. “He wasn't a bad bloke, but I surrendered so much to him. And I realized that what I'd done was I'd literally gone from home to him. “So he was the other controlling person. I felt I had to find myself and I couldn't do it within the confines of that. Relationship and I had to leave him.” She began to forge an independent life. Then, “this guy walked into my life and and I thought, ‘I've met my other half, my soulmate.’ I never thought that I was going to meet somebody at this stage of my life. I fell completely hook, line and sinker in a way.” But it wasn't all wonderful. “I sensed that something was terribly wrong with the relationship that I was in.” Of course, she thought it must be her fault. “But as time went by, I thought there's something else that's going on here. … I felt like I was losing myself inside this relationship. And I was terrified. I guess I was so enmeshed with my mom, I started to become enmeshed with him, but he was a really sick man who was deliberately manipulating me to become enmeshed so that I would lose myself completely.” Luckily, she had come to Codependents Anonymous (CODA). Her brother was in Cocaine Anonymous (CA), and she loved going with him to his meetings. She loved the 12 steps. She once said, somewhat jokingly, “maybe I've got to become a coke addict and I can join.” Her brother responded, “that's not a good idea, Geraldine, but why don't you go to CODA?” In CODA she started to really find herself, and also found support in another member who had been i...

If Acceptance is the key to serenity, what do you do about unacceptable behavior and domestic violence? Kathy H joined the Recovery Show to talk about her experience with domestic violence, and the strength and hope she has found in recovery. We started with some definitions for unacceptable behavior and domestic violence. Definitions Definition of Unacceptable Behavior * any conduct that is unreasonable, regardless of the level of stress, frustration or anger experienced, because it compromises health, safety or security* From Law Insider* Unacceptable – too bad to be accepted, approved of, or allowed to continue* From Cambridge Dictionary  Definition of Domestic Violence Does that only start when a spouse physically hurts another spouse?  The answer is no – domestic violence starts much sooner than physical violence.   Domestic violence is defined as a pattern of behaviors used by one partner to maintain power and control over another partner in an intimate relationship. It includes behaviors that physically harm, intimidate, manipulate or control a partner, or otherwise force them to behave in ways they don’t want to, including through physical violence, threats, emotional abuse, or financial control. Multiple forms of abuse are usually present at the same time in abusive situations, and it’s essential to understand how these behaviors interact so you know what to look for (National Domestic Violence Hotline). Some examples of abuse that are part of domestic violence include: * Physically hurting you, children or pets* Reckless driving* Abandoning you in unfamiliar places* Trying to isolate you from family and friends* Financial control* Humiliating comments* Damaging belongings, throwing things, punching walls, kicking doors* Threats of violence* Gaslighting you by pretending not to understand or refusing to listen to you; questioning your recollection of facts, events, or sources; trivializing your needs or feelings; or denying previous statements or promises.* Verbal abuse  So many of these items sound and feel small taken just one at a time.  They are so easy to trivialize, minimize, and overlook.  Taken together they slowly, over time, cause a person to question their own feelings, instincts, and sanity, which gives the abusive partner a lot of power. Our conversation Kathy's experience is perhaps too neatly summarized here: “I experienced many types of gaslighting starting very early on in our marriage, attempted control of my friends, financial control, reckless driving, abandoning me and my child in unfamiliar places, and mean comments for 13 years before I finally saw through the denial and confusion. But I will say that in between those low points, there were very good times where my husband was great. Every time I would think “FINALLY! He has realized that what he was doing was wrong for so many reasons. And then at some point it would all pick back up again. It’s all a cycle which makes it all that much more confusing.” What did living with domestic violence feel like? “Living with domestic violence was like living in a circus fun house of weird mirrors.

How can recognizing powerlessness over a child’s addiction make it easier to detach and not enable them? Jacob joins us to tell his story and how he stopped trying fruitlessly to fix his son's addiction. He picked a couple of readings from ODAT — Jan 29 and Feb 11, saying that they have been and are important in his ongoing recovery. As I read Jan 29, it is about (not) enabling our addicted loved ones.  How has this reading spoken to you? How have you followed its suggestions? What benefits have you gained? I see Feb 11 as speaking about powerlessness over our loved one’s addiction. How has this reading spoken to you? How has your behavior changed as a result?How have you gained by recognizing your powerlessness and the unmanageability of trying to exert control? Readings and Links We read from One Day at a Time in Al-Anon, Jan 29 and Feb 11. Upcoming topics An upcoming topic is The Effects of Recovery. What effects have you experienced in recovery? How do these contrast with the effects that alcoholism or addiction had on you? Please call us at 734-707-8795 or email feedback@therecovery.show with your questions or experience, strength and hope. Or just leave a comment right here. Music from the Show Disturbed – Down with the Sickness Tool – Right In Two Tool – The Pot

Do you have trouble making decisions? What have you learned in recovery helps you make decisions? Eric, Spencer, and several of you share about indecision and making decisions. Our conversation was guided by these questions. * Definition: * a choice that you make about something after thinking about several possibilities* the ability to decide quickly and without pausing because you are not certain:* She acted with decision, closing the bank account and calling the police.* something you choose; a choice* If the enemy of serenity is indecision and hurry, why then is it suggested to “Don’t just do something. Sit there”?  huuhh??* There seems to be a contradiction for me between indecision, in its negative connotation, and a taking a healthy pause before making a decision.  How do you understand this?* Are you ok with asking for help?  Guidance?  “Suggestions”  Who do you turn to when in doubt about a making a decision?* How do I apply the acronyms; W.A.I.T., T.H.I.N.K., STOP, J.A.D.E. and exercise the Al-Anon pause without feeling anxious and indecisive?* Why Am I Talking?* is it Thoughtful, Honest, Intelligent, Necessary, and Kind?* Stop, Take, Observe, Proceed. (https://www.mindful.org/stressing-out-stop/)*  (don’t) Justify, Argue, Defend, or Explain* Can you embrace the notion “When in doubt, don’t”?* How do you feel about the phrase “I don’t have to win anything today”?* Are you ok with the answer “I don’t know”? when feeling confronted or forced to make a decision?  “NO,” as a complete sentence?* Is not making a decision, a sometimes healthy decision in and of itself?* Can I sit in the A of Acceptance (from the three A’s) as long and until I feel good about my decision? How do you “get there”?* Do you believe that “Urgent things are seldom important and important things are seldom urgent”?* Is the rocking chair ok to use sometimes to wait for guidance?  Going back and forth and getting nowhere?  Can I sit with this and actually allow myself to enjoy it sometimes Readings and Links We read from How Al-Anon Works, p. 69 (soft cover) (Just for Today slogan), p. 104 (Chapter 16, 12 Traditions), p. 50 (Chapter 8, Step 3). We discussed The Eisenhower Decision Matrix: How to Distinguish Between Urgent and Important Tasks and Make Real Progress in Your Life (Art of Manliness)  Jess wrote about a grief meeting on InTheRooms, Thursdays at 9am Pacific, 12pm Eastern. She sent a link about the therapist who leads that meeting, and an article Ambiguous Grief During the Covid Pandemic. A listener recommended the book You Can't Make Me Angry by Dr. Paul O. Marilyn told us about the Al-Anon group, Any Faith or None AFG, in Lawrence, KS. For information, email any.faith.or.none.lks@gmail.com. She says, We study the principles and tools of the program from a secular perspective.  Anyone is welcome. Upcoming topics An upcoming topic is the effects of recovery. How are the effects of alcoholism or addiction countered by the effects of recovery? What have you gotten from working a recovery program? Please call us at 734-707-8795 or email 

What is on your mind? This episode is built from your voices, sharing your experience, strength, and hope. Sharing your dilemmas and questions. Readings and Links Some of you sent suggestions of books or other resources. Many Voices, One Journey Al-Anon's story of growth and recovery as experienced by individual members and the fellowship as a whole over Al-Anon’s first 60 years. The Grief Club by Melody Beattie was recommended by Craig, who says it is “a powerful book on grief and grieving.” Gina wrote, I first learned about my inner child with a Reparenting workshop from an ACA zoom conference last year. There is a great recording of the workshop you can download online for a couple bucks. I highly recommend it! She also suggested a reparenting check-in worksheet and handout available on the ACAWSO.org website. Finally, she mentioned Bill Wilson's writing on emotional sobriety. Upcoming topics You can contribute to our conversation. Please call us at 734-707-8795 or email feedback@therecovery.show with your questions or experience, strength and hope. Or just leave a comment right here. Music from the Show New Christy Minstrels – Today

How is your Inner Child? What can you do to heal its hurts and help it grow? Becky joined Spencer to talk about how she has come to know and heal her inner child. Our conversation was guided by these questions. * I’m not really familiar with inner child work, can you tell me briefly what it means for you?* Please share some of your story, so we can understand where you started.* What happened to bring you into recovery?* Tell us about your recovery journey.* How has working with your inner child helped you?* What tools have you learned and developed?* How have you integrated this work into your life? Becky says that she is “perfectly imperfect”, and she tries to remind herself of that every day. Readings and Links The reading we opened with can be found in an essay by Brené Brown, titled “The Midlife Unraveling“. Eric sent us a notice about the Connecticut State Al-Anon Convention, March 19-20, 2021. Talk to us Please leave a voicemail at 734-707-8795 or email feedback@therecovery.show with your questions or experience, strength and hope. Or just leave a comment right here. Music from the Show Mary Lambert – Secrets https://youtu.be/EWgUmtksj20 Tom Odell – Heal

How are my recovery tools helping me to live with grief and loss? How am I feeling my feelings today? My father died a few days ago. I am grieving his loss. Because of my work in recovery, I can feel my feelings. I don't have to deny them, and stuff them. What a gift!

My life was out of control, but I still thought I could control my loved one’s drinking. * Cold Wednesday in April. The beginning of the story but also the middle of the story.* Where is the beginning?* When I learned, as a child, to take care of everyone else first? That I couldn’t be happy unless everyone around me was happy, too?* When almost all the romantic relationships in my early life were with someone who needed “help”?* When I married an alcoholic (not that I knew it at the time)?* When I realized her drinking was a problem and started trying to control it?* When I was living in despair and anger and rage as a result?* That cold Wednesday: * I heard the 3 Cs for the “first” time, and felt a weight lifted.* Found the pamphlet Has Your Life Been Affected by Someone Else’s Drinking? I answered “yes” to 16 of the 20 questions.* My first meeting — I am not alone.* Step one: accepting my powerlessness. * Step two: rejecting God, but finding a higher power speaking through the program.* Step three: “fake it until I make it” — “act as if” — Hindsight tells me that committing to work the program was and is a Step 3 decision.* Step four: SO SCARY. I worked the steps with a small group. We met weekly. Accountability kept me going, and hearing others’ sharing brought the understanding that I am not uniquely broken, but am just human. A powerful release of shame and blame.* Step five: “I’m only as sick as my secrets”. I have found that I cannot change my “defects of character” without admitting the “exact nature of my wrongs” out loud to another human.* Step six: What does this even mean? “Entirely ready”? ALL my defects? And HOW? Turns out that for me, this is about really accepting myself as I am, and that when I do that, then I am ready to change. This is where recovery starts.* Step seven: Ask for change. Trusting the process. Practicing new behaviors. My HP releases me from being stuck in old behavior but I have to practice the new way — that’s “my part”.* Step eight: Who did I hurt? What was “my part” and how did I injure them? Am I ready to make amends? Can I be willing to become ready?* Step nine: Amend means to “make better”, to “improve”. Step nine is not about apology. It is about admitting my role in events and about changing my behavior so it won’t happen in the future. * Step ten: I love this step because it keeps my life “clean”. I no longer have to carry guilt and shame over things I did, because I can make immediate amends and move forward.* Step eleven: * Step twelve: The only promise in the steps — we *will* have a spiritual awakening. My awakening was gradual and I only recognized it when the book asked me “Have you had a spiritual awakening?” Yes! I am living in a new way. I have serenity and a stable place to stand. I have tools to deal with the inevitable times when I am knocked off balance by events and people.* I came in broken and angry, full of shame. I thought it was my mission to get my wife to stop drinking and I was failing. Here I learned how to be a “me” that I actually like, to understand where the boundary between me and the rest of the world lies, to be able to ask for the wisdom to know the difference, and to experience serenity even when the world around me is full of chaos Feedback Please call us at 734-707-8795 or email feedback@therecovery.show with your questions or experience, strength and hope. Or just leave a comment right here. Music from the Show