I first heard about AA while in a nuthouse in 2000. When I was discharged from the hospital, I was told by a counselor that I should go to 90 meetings in 90 days. I took his advice, and began my road to recovery then. I'm curious, how did you guys first hear about AA? Was it by word of mouth? Or in a hospital? Or through a counselor? Or through the legal system? I'd love to know
K, I first heard about AA when my father attended meetings back 35 years ago. Thought to myself, I never want to be like him... We'll you guessed it, 5 years ago my journey began much like yours. After an inpatient detox it was recommended I attend AA. It took another 3 years of R & D and getting beaten down by alcohol to get honest, open and willing to work the program, but I'm sure grateful god gave me this gift of recovery.
I was introduced to AA through a friend of a drinking friend. Her name was Cheri and she was friends with Lisa, who I drank with often. Well Cheri was put into a treatment center and when she got out she was told to go to meetings. I was with her and Lisa, and Lisa offered to go with her as support. I chimed in and said I'd go too. It was like I was pretending to be a friend, just so I could check out AA and not be committed in any way. I was never a real friend to anyone, but that fake act helped me get sober a year later.
I first heard about AA while in a nuthouse in 2000.
K
I was in a nuthouse also called my childhood home, living with my mother (sorry mom). But thank God that she found her way into the rooms, when I was 15 and i regularly had AA pamphlets appearing in my sock drawer.
Went for a medical to get state benefits having been signed off work by my Community Psychiatric Nurse (NOT for alcoholism but for having "mental problems") and the lovely doctor who assessed me ....very gently handed me a leaflet at the end of it - it was a meetings list with a helpline number on it. I don't know what came over me but I just grabbed him and gave him a big hug !
I remember saying to him during the medical, "No I didn't drink today cos I don't HAVE to drink and anyway I wanted to give a good impression cos I had to come here"....and so on..........he just smiled and was so lovely..........I will never forget him carrying the message to me....he just said "call this number .....when you're ready"
I met him 1 & 1/2 years later at a small AA convention and went over and thanked him.....God! It was SO beautiful seeing his face light up.........I'll NEVER forget it.
My spouses sponsor suggested open meetings along with Al-Anon...I hated (HATED) (HATED) those early "dog and pony" shows as I would think about them time to time. I heard nothing except blah blah blah with a drawl (western cattle atmosphere) and I told my spouse she wasn't a drunk and stopped going. She also stopped going and went back out for another 3 years. I wasn't known then for saying the right thing at the right time or using my brain for anything other than a leggo piece. I never thought I'd ever be an AA fellow. What a never say never event. Before that I always thought there were 3As in the term. Go figure!
I think AA has been pervasive enough in the culture that I just sort of grew up knowing what it was. It's like not knowing who the Christians are or something....I dunno. I knew more intimately what it was because my uncle started attending and getting sober when I was about 7 or 8. He started spouting all these sayings and we thought he was kind of nutty. Nonetheless, it was a large improvement off his drunken, rageful self prior to AA. He was a marital counselor and a substance abuse counselor before getting sober (yeah a drunk and 3 times divorced)....Sound familiar? Aside from not having the rage issue...I stated before that my apple must have fallen from that tree.
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i heard about AA when i was in my 20s (1980).... got my first DUI and had to go to DUI classes. the lady told us if we were in her class it shows we have some kind of problem with alcohol and we might be alcoholics and should try going to AA meetings. i attended one and it was all guys and i felt like a piece of fried chicken after a hunger strike.... didn't go back until my next dui in 2007. so i did know there was a place for alcoholics to meet and just did not want to give up drinking 'yet' .
I was told about it by a lovely guy who manned the phone at the Samaritans, who I had taken to calling most days I was crying about the ills I coudn't pay, and this guy sussed out I was drinking and asked me 'Did you stay up drinking all night, or did you start when you got up this morning?' When I said I couldn't remmber, he asked me if I knew what time it was, and when I said no, he told me it was 9 o'clock, which was a bit early to have drunk so much.
I told him I didn't think that was early, most folk go out at 7pm and are dunk by 9, but then he said, 'Avril, it is 9AM, and you sound pretty well oiled to me' and thats when he asked if I would permit him to ask a lady from AA to call me. I agreed and he did so, and sodding hell, within an hour this girl was on my doorstep telling me to get ready to go to a meeting that very evening.
I couldn't get out of it, since, strangely enough this girl was a nurse, and we had done nurse training together, and even socialised together on occasions, and she was telling me that she was an alkie, and would never be able to drik again safely, so I went along to the meeting with her for a bit of moral support, HELL she sure needed it, couldn't drink??? How bloody terrible an affliction was that for her to cope with??
I was so sorry for her, I went hoping that I might be ale to help her back into drinking at some point, like we usedto do together, we weren't alkies THEN were we??? I didn't stick around initially, but I heard in those early meetings that 'AA may not stop you drinking, but it will sure as hell spoil it for you' and THAT I can confirm is TRUE - certainly was in my case.
7 years after leaving AA forever, I was back in a state I could neer have imagined I could ever get into, and thankfully, my last drink was the best drink I ever took, I stayed dry for 6 months, drank again for 3 days, and that, up until today was the end of my drinking. July 11th 1990 was my first meeting back after 7 years of fighting the booze. I had finally realised and accepted that I cannot fight it, I had to surrender, and surrender I did, Giving up the fight was my turning point.
THEN the hard work began...............
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Serenity is Wanting what you have, not having what you want
Always remember non-alcoholic beers are for NON-ALCOHOLICS
A few months ago, Classic Rock magazine ran a short article on coming out of rehab and being left to it. The following month, they had a short peice on the Brands that Make Rock - this particular month (the previous month it was Jack Daniels) it was AA. And a bloody good peice it was too.
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It's not having what you want, it's wanting what you got. BB
I suppose most people have "heard" of AA through popular culture as has been stated. Jokes by comedians (a disproportionate amount are probably addicts themselves, weird how that befalls so many comics), word of mouth, etc. I think it would be far harder to have NOT heard of it.
But if you mean personally...last summer I was talking with a friend from the gym who'd been dry for about a decade. I told him I was looking for a lifestyle change - my drinking had gone from steady and functional to increasingly binge-like and potentially dangerous, and was intermittent with stretches of sobriety for the first time in many years as I fought the urge to drink.
He insisted I go to a meeting with him RIGHT THEN AND THERE and I said whoa pardner, I have a full day planned. Which I did, including a golf tournament with an open bar (which I took advantage of...open bars were my kryptonite when not driving). I did go a few days later with him though and again a few weeks after that. It was very eye opening but I didn't return until yesterday, and have knocked out three meetings already, hopefully another tonight, and two tomorrow. Gotta embrace it.
EDIT: reading these posts I must be astonishingly lucky that he turned me on to this - many have to have something really bad befall them until they are turned on to - or even forced into - attending them.
-- Edited by DBZ on Thursday 28th of January 2010 06:13:58 PM
) and the lovely doctor who assessed me ....very gently handed me a leaflet at the end of it - it was a meetings list with a helpline number on it. I don't know what came over me but I just grabbed him and gave him a big hug ! 
I didn't stick around initially, but I heard in those early meetings that 'AA may not stop you drinking, but it will sure as hell spoil it for you' and THAT I can confirm is TRUE - certainly was in my case.