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Hey I was just thinking about Pinkchips birthday, and how I am the only offspring in my family that remembers my Dads day of sobriety 4th April 1978. No one commemorates the day my Mum took the step through the Al Anon doors and admitted her part in it. Her addiction to the addiction etc.
The people in AA have a recognition system. 30 days, one year etc.
There is an external form of validation that they have been on the program and not participated in thier drug of choice. They even get a 'chip' I am led to believe.
I was just wondering... what do we get in Al Anon or ACoA. If we are addicted to our addicts, we chose to stay with that 'drug' of choice and work with it. We learn to let go of the control over person in our life's addiction.
What we achieve and how we work is just as hard. It is just as rewarding and it seems that it is not recognised officially in the way the chip system works.
Maybe someone could shed some light on this as I may have missed something or not really got the 'concept' of our life changing work here.
Is it because the AA people have a specific one activity that the success or otherwise is measured against and we not in AA have lots of aspects of our 'sobriety'?
I don't know what the "official" view of this is, but it seems to me that Al-Anon is more like Overeaters Anonymous, in that we can't give up all aspects of our addiction. In other words, alcoholics can abstain from all alcohol, but compulsive overeaters can't abstain from all food, and we can't abstain from all relationships with others. It's our relation to our "substance" that has to change. That's not as visible a change from the outside (sometimes even from the inside). So it's harder to know when we would get our chip.
I do remember the day I left my ex-AH -- it was September 27, 2003, and I actually did think "It's been 8 years! Yahoo!" on the anniversary the other day. However, I had a big relapse with my next relationship. So for me I have to renew my recovery every day.
-- Edited by Mattie on Tuesday 4th of October 2011 11:10:28 PM
In my home group and in the greater city we live in we celebrate our Alanon birthdays. My group has two birthday meetings per month, one in the morn and one at night. We are given a chip to celebrate our Alanon anniversary. Then we get up in front of the group and share how our life has changed as a result of coming to alanon.
I am celebrating my alanon birthday this month, I cant wait to pick up another chip. It is truly a One Day At A Time Deal.
I have heard of some groups doing as tommyecat said and celebrating birthday's. My group does not and I don't mind at all since I tend to relapse and obsess about my exAH and let him get under my skin from time to time. I do acknowledge when I started Al-anon and I do feel and see the changes within me, but my sponsor is the only person that really knows and sees how far I have come. My pay off is the changes in my attitude for gratitude and less obsessing over things I can not control. I have learned to hand so much over to HP before I get into a spiral over it. Maybe take a day to celebrate the new you on one of your milestone days and see if some people from your group want to go for lunch or something else, if you can't find a meeting that celebrates birthday's.
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