The material presented
here is not Al-Anon Conference Approved Literature. It is a method
to exchange
information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal
level.
before i say anything, i would like to say this.........,
recently i have recieved the gift of being able to LOL [laugh out loud], shortly after getting this gift, i recieved the blessing to COL [cry out loud], yesterday for the first time i can remember in years, i decided to GOL [grump out loud], with amazing results. as i was grumping, my husband was smiling. an unexpected result to revealing my feelings honestly, by giving them over to higher first.
JUST FOR TODAY.......,
i would like to SOL [speak out loud , or in this case speak on line].
what do the initials my A's ar my AH mean?
i am assuming as i read the posts on this board it means "my alcoholic".
years ago when i first started to participate in Alanon, i was told........,
"we don't call people who are suffering from cancer our cancer victim, or someone who has the disease of diabetis our diabetic, or a person with high blood pressure my high blood pressure parent, or some poor soul diagnosed with bi polar brother my bi polor brother, ect."
in the same way we don't call our loved one who is suffering from the disease of alcoholism our "Alcoholic."
they are our husbands, our wives, our parents, our sisters, brothers, neighbors, friends.
OUR LOVED ONES,
who suffer the effects of alcohol on their lives [and ours],
in the same way they [and we]would suffer the effects of other diseases on their lives[and ours].
just a thought that has been niggling at the corner of my brain for a day or two.
yes A stands for Alcoholic and AH for Alcoholic Husband.
I understand what you are saying about labeling. I have often heard them referred to as our qualifier as well. Referring to our "qualifiers" as A's, in my experience anyway, doesnt seem to happen much in my ftf (face to face) meetings but mostly online.
Just something funny about the term "my A"...once when my husband (my A, lol) was reading over my shoulder while I was in chat, he asked "what does the A stand for? A*#hole?" I laughed, and thought, yeah, sure does, lolol...
Also, when I was in a face to face meeting, I was speaking to the group about my experience with my alcoholic husband, and I almost said, "my A said..." but I caught myself and said, "my husband". I don't think they would have understood what I had meant if I had said "my A", since they don't use that term normally. I think they would have thought what my husband thought the "A" stood for!
so glad you get to experience all these new things!! i don't mind saying A because it does keep more confidentiality. i'm scared to death of online hackers and the likes. someone who knows me could identify easily if they put CJ and _____ together...
on the flip-side, labeling has been used for years. it does kind of de-humanize things, and that's not always a bad thing. after all, i'm gov't issue (GI), told to keep my paws to myself, don't walk on the clean floor with my dirty hooves, was I born in a barn?, never been a rat - but do you mind being called a fox?, and been in the dog house many many times.
with love cj
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time to stop going to the hardware store to buy bread.
my stomach knotted up so bad, i could hardly move. i left the computer and went to do a couple of chores before i sat down and had the courage to read them.
"i am so relieved [i actually feel a bit weak; honestly] that i didn't recieve some kind of hate reply or that i did not strike an emotional cord with someone and hurt their feelings".
i conquered a huge hurdle this evening in having the courage to express my thoughts to you and being able read your comments concerning post.
as always,
THANK YOU SO MUCH for being a part of my recovery.
gosh darn...isn't it amazing how we can expect a negative/hatefull response to simply expressing one of our own feelings? even here? thank you for being brave enough to do so jewely. amazing to me that i can be human and still be loved. and most of all, i can still love myself. ahhh. fi
I am glad you are finding your voice and taking care of you.... that is great!
About the initials. For me, since this is a place where I vent a little I acturally like speaking of my A because to me that is not my wife. What I am relating is the disease working through my wife.
So for me it is not so much labeling my father,wife or my son, but rather speaking of the disease and it's effects and leaving them out of it. Just my thought... and I am glad you asked the question because I have not thought of it the other way.
Take care of you!
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"Good judgement comes from experience... experience comes from bad judgement" - unknown
Went to an al anon meeting where that page was read. Old timer in the program offered this insight: In the way that a cancer patient needs to follow the perscribed regimen of chemo, doctors, exercise, et cetera if he hopes to recover from his illness, so too must the alcholic if he hopes to get sober, stay sober, live sober. The key difference between alcholism and cancer, he explained to me, is generally while there are LINKS and POSSIBLE CAUSES to cancer, alcholism is WITHIN A PERSON'S control--at any time the alcholic has the right, the abilitiy and the choice of stopping. Their regimen, like the cancer patient, is to go to meetings, get a sponsor, work the steps, read the big book, do service work, et cetera. Put another way: Being told one has cancer has, historically, been out of the person's control; all of the preventative measures cannot do a person any good if ultimately they find out they have cancer. However, daily measures can continue a person's sobriety.
