Welcome Caldo, I found out when I started working the 12 Steps in AA , when I did my 4th and 5th Steps, that many of the wounds of my past had a lot to do wit my alcoholism. I am free today because I dealt with them.

Do you go to AA meetings? Keep coming here, posting and reading.

(((Hugs)))

GammyRose

Hi Caldo,

I am very concerned about your comments about the pastor... I encourage you to do an internet search on "false memory generation". While the research does not discuss motives for why someone would employ these methods...it does help you understand how it is that they manage to do it, and how destructive this 'technique' has been in many peoples lives. What he is saying is a major violation of your psyche, your childhood and your emotional and mental stability.

I don't hesitate to suggest you find another confidante to share your fourth step with.

Look within AA for the support you need with this. Use this board to meet others online and get your head around the idea that we all arrived weak and ashamed. I shrivelled in the seat for weeks - but something sent me back...desperation, I think. Together we find strength in surrendering blame and getting responsible for our own choices and actions. I don't understand what it is that makes me different to non-alkies...in that I am unable to drink moderately and maintain a level of self-respect and social conscience...BUT, I do accept I can't. My drinking history drove the message home.

I was molested several times as a child - but that didn't make me drink. I spent a long time wandering about my country wondering "Why am I like this??"..."Why am I so different?"... "it's gotta be someone's fault"...AA helped me realise there are many like me...the scientists have tried for many years to locate the gene, personality, chemical imbalance, brain function, social issues and family structure that drives an alcoholic to drink...they are yet to define it. In AA, I found it no longer mattered what drove my alcoholism; I had the support to make a decision to stop drinking and stick with that decision. I realised there are many like me, who have done just that and were there blazing a trail for me to follow.

Then life changed.

If you want to stop drinking, stick with the ones who have lived life drinking to excess and learned to stop and turn their lives around...they will understand. AA's will help you. Many religious leaders have never, or vow never to touch liquour...how could they truly understand our problem? How can they understand and counsel from a position of experience? Would you go into the shop marked "Butchers" and ask them to fix your car?

Sometimes, when folks don't know how to deal with things, they will deflect to something they know more about to regain control of the situation and/or the person. This meets their needs, not ours. In AA, I found a heap of people who have collectively admitted they have no idea how on earth they ended up in the mess they got in...we will admit to not being saints...we will admit to not having all the answers...but we will offer you real experience (how it was)...we will offer you strength (how it is now) and we will offer you hope (how it can be).

As a sober alcoholic with a firm foundation based on the steps, there is heaps of time to consider religion and your understanding of God (and all that does or does not entail...people, places, things...)

I had to get sober, and stay sober to start exploring that with any sense of clarity though...I spent years visiting just about every religion that had a name, (and some that were still working their name out.. ) Getting sober wasn't the tricky bit...I did that hundreds of times...I learned to stay sober alongside other AA's. I couldn't and still can't, do that bit all on my own...

I have also found to stay sober, you need people that don't ask you to book a time with them. That is one of the keys to AA's success I think. We won't look at our diary's when you ask for help. (Unless we are trying to develop time management skills *joke*). We understand that little things are big things when it comes to alcoholism. If the kids are hollering at each other, or the dog dies, or Mum just hung up the phone on you...there is always someone to help you move through it. There are enough of us worldwide to be available 24/7...via phones, email, books, vids, meetings, face to face, or co-incidence...Just the way it works.

My sponsor told me to "get ya sorry arse down to that meeting and learn how to say sorry"...never made an iota of sense at the time...but it does now.

To get time, you got to give it time. It gets better with each new sober day and we come to trust that everytime we front up at meetings, there will be at least one person in there waiting for us to make their journey brighter. In the mean time...keep sharing it here. I like you already...relate to working in pubs... and the sheer struggle of hang-on-by-the-fingernails sobriety when we do it on our own... I also like your honesty and willingness not to just take everything on face value.

Check out that false memory stuff though, will ya? Tis...one of the misuses of psychology that really stirs me up.