Al-Anon/Alateen
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For friends and family members of alcoholics.
Al-Anon and Alateen are international organizations jointly known as Al-Anon Family Groups with a membership of over half a million men, women and teens, providing a twelve-step program of recovery for friends and family members of alcoholics. Al-Anon is for adults within the program whereas Alateen is for young people (ages 12 to 20). Al-Anon was formed in 1951 by Lois Wilson, wife of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) co-founder Bill Wilson. She recognized the need for such an organization as family members living with AA members began to identify their own pathologies associated with their family members' alcoholism. In the USA, Al-Anon is organized as a 501 non-profit organization in many states.
In Lois's Story, she explained why, as the spouse of an alcoholic, she also required treatment.
After a while I began to wonder why I was not as happy as I ought to be, since the one thing I had been yearning for all my married life [Bill's sobriety] had come to pass. Then one Sunday, Bill asked me if I was ready to go to the meeting with him. To my own astonishment as well as his, I burst forth with "Damn your old meetings!" and threw a shoe as hard as I could.
This surprising display of temper over nothing pulled me up short and made me start to analyze my own attitudes. ... My life's purpose of sobering up Bill, which had made me feel desperately needed, had vanished. ... I decided to strive for my own spiritual growth. I used the same principles as he did to learn how to change my attitudes. ... We began to learn that ... the partner of the alcoholic also needed to live by a spiritual program.
— Lois Wilson , Lois's Story in "How Al-Anon Works..."."
Processes and benefits
Research suggests that as family members of alcoholics learn to recognize the pathologies in their families, assign the responsibility of those pathologies to a disease, forgive themselves, accept that they were adversely affected by the pathologies, and ultimately learn to accept their family member's shortcomings, they begin to improve.
When an alcoholic's spouse is active in Al-Anon and the alcoholic is active in AA, not only is the alcoholic more likely to be abstinent but marital happiness improves and both the alcoholic and their spouse become better parents. Participation in Al-anon has also been associated with less personal blame among females, though not among males.
Encouraging alcoholics to participate in treatment
Although Al-Anon emphasizes alcoholism cannot be arrested by its members' intervention, analysis of methods used by Concerned Significant Others (CSOs) to encourage alcoholics to seek treatment has shown participation in Al-Anon to be effective towards this goal. The Community Reinforcement and Family Training approach (CRAFT), however, has been shown to be significantly more effective than Al-Anon participation for this purpose. Spouses of alcoholics wait, on average, seven years before making an intervention.
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From Wikipedia
Get Interactive Support from The 12 Steps Interactive Support Groups.
Step One - Step Two - Step Three - Step Four - Step Five - Step Six - Step Seven - Step Eight - Step Nine - Step Ten - Step Eleven - Step Twelve
Yours in fellowship, Soldier Billy...
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