By Dennis P. Carman, President & CEO, United Way of Greater Plymouth County
I am the son of an alcoholic. On one hand, this means that I was both witness to and victim of some traumatic times, including verbal and physical abuse from my father, Donald Parker Carman. On the other hand, at 12 years old I was given the life-changing and life-saving gift of a recovery program, Alateen, for the children of alcoholics/drug addicts to help us cope with our parents’ addictions not cure them, but to manage our lives in ways that help us survive and grow beyond the challenges.
Alateen and Al-anon, recovery programs for the spouses/significant others of alcoholics and drug addicts, are both based on the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous or, as it is more commonly known, “AA” for adults in recovery from alcoholism. My mom has been a member of Al-anon for over 50 years, and she encouraged me to attend Alateen, as she knew first-hand the insanity of my home life. Sadly, my dad never quite connected to AA to reap the benefits of long-term recovery from his alcoholism, and he died at the fairly young age of 67. My recovery program helped me to love my dad in spite of the drinking that led him down many dark roads.
Though I have held a number of positions in the substance abuse treatment field over the years, including being the Director of Anchor House in Plymouth, MA, a halfway house for males in recovery from substances, I do not consider myself to be an expert of any kind. Rather, I am a passionate advocate for what 12-step recovery programs can do to miraculously turn the lives around for men and women struggling with addictions. The Twelve Steps of AA are:
We admitted we were powerless over alcohol — that our lives had become unmanageable.
Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when doing so would injure them or others.
Continued to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
While at Anchor House, I worked with a small staff of caring, talented men who were themselves in long-term recovery from their drinking. One of them, Fred, used to brag that he could summarize the 12 Steps in six words, namely, “Trust God,” “Clean House,” and “Help Others.” As much as I appreciated his simplifying the AA program in this way, I know from my own experience that learning and applying the Twelve Steps is so much harder than that. Oh, but the rewards for joining together at AA, Al-anon, or Alateen meetings with people who know what you are going through and who can support you in your tough times are so wonderful.
Addictions turn our worlds upside down. Recovery reverses our topsy-turvy lives, so we can find “serenity.” My sincere hope is that if your life is being affected by your own addiction or by someone else’s addiction, you find a Twelve-Step Recovery program that will restore your life to what it was meant to be.
Resources:
Find an Al-Anon group near you
AA Central Service Committee of Eastern Mass
12 Channel Street, Suite 604
Boston, MA 02210
Tel: 617-426-9444
Alanon (and Alateen) of Massachusetts
Call 508-366-0556 or email office@alanonma.org.
Community Voices for Health 