Of grave importance to my blog, and I write of this with all seriousness, is anonymity. This is a touchy subject and one that arises in many a conversation in the recovery community.
Blogging about my own recovery experience is a per se violation of the principle of anonymity, yes. That said, I feel it necessary in order for me to share in an authentic and intentional manner. I am a recovering alcoholic; inextricably woven into the fabric of my recovery is my membership in a 12-step program. I do not, however, in any way, shape, or form, intend to promote any 12-step program, nor do I in fact promote any 12-step program. Simply put, being candid and open about my addiction and sobriety is necessary for my own recovery. In my dysfunctional world, secrets breed shame and shame kills. I would like to see 34.
While I am a huge proponent for openness in my own recovery and in addiction advocacy in general (as I believe it combats damaging stigmas and misperceptions about the disease), I do not suggest or encourage others to “out” themselves as addicts or alcoholics or members of a 12-step program. That is an insanely personal decision. For me, not sharing my story is tantamount to hiding, but I enthusiastically support those who choose to remain anonymous.
I aim to share my own experience without jeopardizing the confidentiality of alcoholics, addicts, and 12-step programs. I intend to adhere to certain blogging guidelines, found on the “Guidelines” page of this blog, in order to to do so.
While I invite you to share your take on this issue, I do plan to pen posts specifically on anonymity. I also hope to bring you interviews about anonymity from advocates and additional interested parties. Stay tuned. Thank you!
Hi Andrea,
Re anonymity:
The purpose of the tradition — in addition to keeping us humble — is to avoid the situations that arose in the early days of AA. Some prominent actors and sports figures got sober in AA and naturally wanted to spread the word, which they did quite effectively with the help of their celebrity. Unfortunately several of them also relapsed rather spectacularly, which wasn’t good publicity for the fellowship and may have dissuaded other people from giving it a try.
It is my understanding that we do not identify ourselves as members of a 12-step group. For example, I can (and do) have my photo on my blog, and it is not difficult for anyone who knows her way around a search engine to find out exactly who I am, but you will note that while I write about the fellowships I never identify myself as belonging to one. In fact, I haven’t done it here.
My feeling is that it can go one of two ways and still comply with the tradition: no identifying information, or no direct identification with the fellowship. People who feel that they have no reason to follow either course need to talk to their sponsor.
Good job here on the blog. I enjoyed my visit.
Bill
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Bill,
Thank you for your thoughtful response and feedback.
I agree with your take on the tradition and have a good understanding of the principle of anonymity as it applies to 12-step organizations. I find it interesting that we are okay with some celebrities or big names “outing” themselves (Eric Clapton would be one example, I believe he even quotes the Big Book in his biography (which I have not read)), yet we are bothered by regular persons such as myself talking about recovery on Facebook.
It is also unfortunate that the media has chosen to portray celebrity addicts and alcoholics in such a negative and scandalous manner (most recently, Charlie Sheen and Lindsay Lohan). The reality is that alcoholism is a chronic and progressive illness often (although not necessarily) marked by relapse. It is often ugly and seemingly desperate. Multiple trips to detox or treatment are not all that uncommon, yet we are quick to judge these public personas for their failure to stay sober. So, while I understand the request for anonymity at all levels of press, I think it flies in the face of what we are really dealing with to say it’s necessary so that people don’t get a negative impression of 12-step programs. People recover in all kinds of ways. I have people in my life who belong to a 12-step program and I know people who have gotten sober on their own. I have friends who have relapsed numerous times but have kept coming back, only to attain lengthy sobriety; I know others who have never set foot in the door and cannot stay sober. This is a nasty, horrific, scary, unpredictably predictable disease.
I can only tell my own story, however, and have chosen–with intention and knowledge that not everyone agrees with me–to share that I work a program. It’s my belief that it’s failure to act with intention that lands me (as I can only speak for me) in trouble! Now if I can just keep my ego in check…
Again, thank you. I greatly enjoy the opportunity to discuss this issue and recovery in general. I hope you will keep reading!
Andrea
Hey Andrea – See DFW on AA in Infinite Jest, you got that from me right?
Not much of the press about “Infinite Jest” addresses the role that Alcoholics Anonymous plays in the story. How does that connect with your overall theme?
The sadness that the book is about, and that I was going through, was a real American type of sadness. I was white, upper-middle-class, obscenely well-educated, had had way more career success than I could have legitimately hoped for and was sort of adrift. A lot of my friends were the same way. Some of them were deeply into drugs, others were unbelievable workaholics. Some were going to singles bars every night. You could see it played out in 20 different ways, but it’s the same thing.
Some of my friends got into AA. I didn’t start out wanting to write a lot of AA stuff, but I knew I wanted to do drug addicts and I knew I wanted to have a halfway house. I went to a couple of meetings with these guys and thought that it was tremendously powerful. That part of the book is supposed to be living enough to be realistic, but it’s also supposed to stand for a response to lostness and what you do when the things you thought were going to make you OK, don’t. The bottoming out with drugs and the AA response to that was the starkest thing that I could find to talk about that.
I get the feeling that a lot of us, privileged Americans, as we enter our early 30s, have to find a way to put away childish things and confront stuff about spirituality and values. Probably the AA model isn’t the only way to do it, but it seems to me to be one of the more vigorous.
The characters have to struggle with the fact that the AA system is teaching them fairly deep things through these seemingly simplistic clichés.
It’s hard for the ones with some education, which, to be mercenary, is who this book is targeted at. I mean this is caviar for the general literary fiction reader. For me there was a real repulsion at the beginning. “One Day at a Time,” right? I’m thinking 1977, Norman Lear, starring Bonnie Franklin. Show me the needlepointed sampler this is written on. But apparently part of addiction is that you need the substance so bad that when they take it away from you, you want to die. And it’s so awful that the only way to deal with it is to build a wall at midnight and not look over it. Something as banal and reductive as “One Day at a Time” enabled these people to walk through hell, which from what I could see the first six months of detox is. That struck me.
It seems to me that the intellectualization and aestheticizing of principles and values in this country is one of the things that’s gutted our generation. All the things that my parents said to me, like “It’s really important not to lie.” OK, check, got it. I nod at that but I really don’t feel it. Until I get to be about 30 and I realize that if I lie to you, I also can’t trust you. I feel that I’m in pain, I’m nervous, I’m lonely and I can’t figure out why. Then I realize, “Oh, perhaps the way to deal with this is really not to lie.” The idea that something so simple and, really, so aesthetically uninteresting — which for me meant you pass over it for the interesting, complex stuff — can actually be nourishing in a way that arch, meta, ironic, pomo stuff can’t, that seems to me to be important. That seems to me like something our generation needs to feel.
Bill,
Thank you so much for your post and for sharing your thoughts. It is absolutely the right forum! I actually haven’t read Infinite Jest (I have a feeling I lost that one in the break up… I will replace your copy!) but I intend to now! Once I do, I will have a proper response to your question.
Isn’t it funny that we place such a high value on intelligence, and education is golden, yet as an alcoholic, the smarter we are, the more screwed we are? It’s taken me months and months to just accept the seemingly (yet not at all) trite sayings and let go. What a relief to know that a) I have NO control; b) I don’t get to know the answers to everything, and c) it’s all good. I can breathe for the first time in my life it seems. And the moment I start to choke, I know it’s because I am back to micromanaging.
Telling the truth is also a huge load off! No more wondering which story I told you guys and if it’s the same one I told someone else… I no longer have to make excuses for not showing up. Life sober is infinitely easier than drunk and it’s so, so much better. Do you remember me lamenting, at that first meeting you took me to, that I was never going to have fun again? You responded by asking me when I had last really had fun. What a moment. I won’t ever forget when that clicked for me–months into sobriety.
I hope you will keep reading and posting. It’s fantastic!
Peace.
Andrea