What is the Success Rate of Recovery in AA?

In December 2005 I finally realized I had a BIG drinking problem and actually needed help to stop. I enlisted the help of an Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP). That step alone did not get me sober. Although I fought tooth and nail, after my first relapse (January 2006) I finally agreed to listen to them when they suggested I go to 90 meetings in 90 days. When I relapsed the second time (February 2006), I revisited what I was doing. I then got a sponsor as it was suggested I do. Well, I worked the program and remained sober and in the AA program for almost 2 years. Then, my sponsor moved away, and I got complacent. I started going to meetings sporatically; however I have remained sober for over 5 years (2/26/06). I have remained sober to this day!! Now, I am trying to get my RN license and because I admitted to being an alcholic (honesty may not always be the best policy) they are now REQUIRING me to attend AA meetings and get a sponsor. Why?? I will admit that AA got me sober. I am 100% convinced of that. But keep me sober? I don’t believe I HAVE to stay in the AA program to remain sober. I realize this program got me sober, and that many people believe if they don’t go to meetings on a regular basis that they will pick up a drink. But I have no desire to drink. It’s like telling me if I don’t go to church, I will be damned to hell. If I don’t go to AA meetings, I will be damned to drinking. What are your thoughts?

To Lynn – AA is an anonymous program. There is no way to monitor whether you go or not. So I don’t understand how anyone can force you to go. I, like you, got sober in the 12 step program. I am currently a chemical dependency counselor who RARELY goes to meetings. Through the years I developed some real concerns with the program and decided it wasn’t for me.
It is a good program and a great resource in a country whose health care system fails it’s citizens.
The reason many counselors recommend the 12 step program is because it’s free. Recovery cannot be achieved in the 7 to 28 days most insurance companies allow.

I have been in AA for 15 months and so far so great. I start to wonder why AA doesn’t work for some people as they have testified here. I refer backt o the Big Book for AA pages 20-22 and it says

Moderate drinkers have little trouble in giving entirely if they have good reason for it. They can take it or leave it alone.
Then we have a certain type of hard drinker. He may have the habit badly enough to gradually impair him physically and mentally. It may cause him to die a few years before his time. If a sufficiently strong reason-ill health, falling in love, change on environment, or warning of a doctor-become operative, this man can also stop or moderate, although he may find it difficult and troublesome and may even need medical attention.
But what about the real alcoholic? He may start off as a moderate drinker; he may or may not become a continuous hard drinker; but at some stage of his drinking career he begins to lose all control of his liquor consumption, once he starts to drink.
Here is the fellow who has been puzzling you, especially in his lack of control. He does absurd, incredible, tragic things while drinking. He is a real Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. He is seldom mildly intoxicated. He is more or less insanely drunk. His disposition while drinking resembles his normal nature but little. He maybe one of the finest fellow in the world. Yet let him drink for a day, and he frequently become disgustingly, and even dangerously anti-social. ..

And it goes on and on talking about the “real alcoholic”. But I remember reading these pages and asking myself which catagory I fall into. I fell into the ladder and as I read testimonies of people who say they stayed stopped on thier own and I wonder if they were moderate or heavy drinkers and maybe they didn’t need a program like AA.

I’m concened that a real alcoholic is thinking of getting help will read these other testimonies and compare themself with them and decide AA is not for them. And so to that person wI offer, why not read those pages for yourself and ask yourself honeslty which catergory you fall into. Check out a meeting instead of searching for answers online, online you are searching for what you want to hear. In a meeting you may hear some truth you need to hear.

I’m sure AA is not the only way but it’s at least its a way, so if your curious try it out. My Mom is an alcoholic, she attempted AA and stopped. She is yes still abstienet but she goes through real bad periods of dry drunkeness but she also is a spiritual person and does lots of service work in her community so in a way even though she doesn’t go to meetings she does, unintentional do some of the step work. And other times her quality of life and her behavior is that of an alcoholic. So take what you can, leave the rest, God Bless.

The program outlined in the book Alcoholics Anonymous, not too closely followed by some who claim it, and often quite different from popular media, places importance upon an open mind. So, if you are still reading, I hope you will consider the following offered only to be helpful. AA is not successful, nor does it fail, any more than Harvard, golf or a violin. Many who earnestly try usually succeed. Millions have. If one succeeds, it works. If dozens succeed, it is evidence. If hundreds succeed, it is replicable. If thousands succeed, it is phenomenal. But, if millions succeed, it cannot be denied. People only succeed if they try. In the first few years of what later became Alcoholics Anonymous, the trial and error or flying blind period, many experiments and approaches were attempted, some were helpful and some were less so. They decided to write down what was working. In the next sixteen years, just over 300,000 copies of the first edition of Alcoholics Anonymous were placed in circulation. College, golf and music are not successful. Like a college class, chances of success increase if you get the book, read the book, study the book, and follow the lead of those who teach the book. Like golf and music, success usually only follows practice.
In 1955, AA had approximately 150,000 members; divided by 300,000 books is 50%. Of course, many got the program by word of mouth. Others borrowed the book. But, many got the book and never read or took any of the recommended actions. Some bought more than one copy. In order to thoroughly follow the AA program, the book is required for some Steps, especially Step Twelve, when the person may need to lend a copy of the book to a new prospect. People got the book and successfully stayed sober all over the world, many with no other book, little or no guidance, or even meetings. In fact, had not Alcoholics Anonymous first edition helped so many to succeed in staying sober, AA might not have such large presence or even be around at all. It was the only book on the Twelve Steps, until 1953, when Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions was published. Another meditation book was published in 1954. However, these were not widely circulated until well after 1955, and were first purchased mostly by people already sober using Alcoholics Anonymous. So, any successes during the first twenty years, perhaps 50% more or less, were likely due mostly to the book Alcoholics Anonymous. At that time in history, anything close to 50% success in helping persons with chronic alcoholism, many very seriously afflicted indeed, was worth note. It still is. Alcoholics Anonymous book sells for around $12, about a buck at garage sales, far less expensive than treatment co-pay. The audio book is about twenty hours of listening. If you drink too much, have trouble stopping, or staying stopped, it might be worth the time and money. Try it, you might like it.

I have had some success with AA, but I have also been viciously verbally attacked in public meetings. I don’t speak up as often as I used to at meetings. Heaven help you if you dare to question anything in the Big Book.

a bunch of crazys

AA is certainly not the way to go for me. It’s really an outdated program that many people take too literally. When I got out of treatment, I went to two AA meetings during that first week out and I never went back. This is because I found myself looking around the room and thinking “I’d rather be dead than live like any of these old timers at this meeting”. Naturally, there is another way… It’s called take control of your life and put down the bottle.

We receive lots of visitors from your site and thank you. At age 86 with 25 years of continuous sobriety, I’m still a happy camper with A.A. And that’s because I left no stone unturned in giving the program my best shot. That meant lots of meetings, going early and staying late, getting a commitment, getting a sponsor, involving myself in every kind of fellowship fun and learning, studying the Big Book, going through the Steps, sponsoring lots of men, and always looking primarily for a newcomer to help. Add to that my greater and greater trust in and reliance upon God, and I’m glad this great resource was made available to me. Today, I lke to say that I am A.A. friendly, history friendly, Bible friendly, and recovery friendly. And I think Dr. Bob set that as an example for all.
God Bless, Dick B.

My father was an episodic abuser of alcohol (the pseudo-scientific term “alcoholic” is meaningless), brought on mainly by an anxiety problem (the root cause of most alcohol abuse).

He was bombarded by the unasked for attentions of AA fanatics, which made the problem worse if anything — he did not need the sense of personal helplessness and guilt they tried to instil in him. +He could have been saved by a simple benzodiazepam program — Librium became available in the last year of his life and at least eased the suffering caused by the anxiety problem. But it was too late and he died.

I was a heavy alcoholic for three years (one litre of cheap “whiskey” per day minimum) — same underlying cause: anxiety disorder. I went cold turkey one morning, staggered to my general practitioner (a very wise young woman) just round the corner with the worst panic attack I have ever experienced. She gave me an injection and put me on a six month valium program, starting high and phasing out slowly. The perfect cure and it has lasted for ten years. I can have a glass of beer or sherry when I feel like it (not very often) without the dire consequences of “one drink and that’s it!” that AA fanatics predict.

I believe that anxiety disorders are the main underlying cause of alcohol abuse. Society makes it much easier to walk into a liquor store (without a prescription) and buy a deceptive “cure” for anxiety, than it is for most people to seek medical help — for alcohol abuse as a symptom, and the underlying anxiety or stress which is the real “disease”.

The evil of the AA programme is encapsulated in the compulsory “I am Sam. I’m an alcoholic” — it is reductionist, it reduces the complex human being “Sam” (father, husband, friend, professional worker, artist or craftsman etc) to a pathetic one-dimensional creature: an “alcoholic”.

Anyone who has read that old classic “Battle for the mind” by Sargent (?) will recognise the methodology of the AA as brainwashing. If they read the book they will also know that the effects of even the most severe brainwashing quickly wears off once the individual returns to normal society.

The AA is a cult, and a dangerous cult, which undermines a true understanding of the underlying causes of self-medication with alcohol — such as anxiety disorders — which require medical help, not mumbo-jumbo. AA only works for highly suggestible people with underdeveloped intellects.

aa is a program of honesty. “many people are constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselves. their chances are less than average.” aa works just fine. i am living proof of that. it is nothing more than a fellowship of men and women whose primary purpose is to help the alcoholic who still suffers. you can condemn the program without giving it an honest chance to work in your life-while maintaining your anger and untreated disease of alcoholism, or you can see what it’s all about….they’ll be waiting for you in a meeting near you. i promise.