I got sober in AA and even though I’m an aethist I still love it. There is a list of many meetings for agnostics and people who aren’t comfortable with all of the judeo-christian thinking in AA. The URL is the one near my name.

“My name is Barbara and i am an alcoholic-addict” Wish i had a quarter for every time i have said those words in the last seven months of my latest struggle for sobriety . . . AA has saved my life, and although i have had a couple of relapses in the last 13 years since i first quit drinking, i have had several years of sobriety inbetween them, and there are more days than not that i would be willing to become a spokesperson for AA . . . i have more true friends in AA now than i have had in my entire life put together, and i am grateful every day for the program that keeps me sober and straight. i go to two meetings every week, and they are godsends . .. my spirituality and my self-esteem are growing daily, and i thank God and AA for that, always . . . And i thank God for you as well, Therese, your posts are always so inspiring, comforting and reassuring to me, they are like a root beer float on a hot summer afternoon . .. Hope you never stop writing, God has truly given you a gift.

Lately I’ve been hard to reach
I’ve been too long on my own
Everybody has a private world
Where they can be alone
Are you calling me?
Are you trying to get through?
Are you reaching out for me?
Like I’m reaching out for you.
(Verse 1)
I’m just so fucking depressed
I just can’t seem to get out of this slump
If I could just get over this hump
But I need something to pull me out this dump
I took my bruises, took my lumps
Fell down and I got right back up
But I need that spark to get psyched back up
In order for me to pick the mic back up
I don’t know how or why or when
I ended up being in the position I’m in
I’m starting to feel distant again
So I decided just to pick this pen
Up and try to make an attempt to vent
But I just can’t admit or come to grips
With the fact that I may be
Done with rap, I need a new outlet
And I know some shit so hard to swallow
But I just can’t sit back and wallow
In my own sorrow, but I know one fact
I’ll be one tough act to follow
One tough act to follow
I’ll be one tough act to follow
Here today, gone tomorrow
But you’d have to walk a thousand miles
(Chorus)
In my shoes just to see
What it’s like to be me
I’ll be you, lets trade shoes
Just to see what it be like to
Feel your pain, you’ll feel mine
We’ll go inside each other’s minds
Just to see what we find
Look at shit through each others eyes
Don’t let them say you ain’t beautiful
They can all get fucked, just stay true to you
Don’t let them say you ain’t beautiful
They can all get fucked, just stay true to you
(Verse 2)
I think I’m starting to lose my sense of humor, everything ‘s so tense and gloomy, I
almost feel like I gotta check the temperature in the room just as soon as
I walk in, Its like all eyes on me, so I try to avoid any eye contact
Cuz if I do that, then it opens a door for conversation, like I want that!
I’m not looking for extra attention, I just want to just like you
Blend in with the rest of the room, maybe just point me to the closest restroom
I don’t need no fucking man servant, Trying to follow me around and wipe my ass
Laugh at every single joke I crack, and half of them ain’t even funny like
“Haa! Marshall you’re so funny man
you should be a comedian god damn”
Unfortunately I am, I just hide behind the tears of a clown
So why don’t you all sit down, listen to the tale I’m about to tell
Hell, we don’t gotta trade our shoes, and you ain’t gotta to walk no thousand miles
(Chorus)
In my shoes just to see
What it’s like to be me
I’ll be you, lets trade shoes
Just to see what it be like to
Feel your pain, you’ll feel mine
We’ll go inside each other’s minds
Just to see what we find
Look at shit through each others eyes
Don’t let them say you ain’t beautiful
They can all get fucked, just stay true to you
Don’t let them say you aint’ beautiful
They can all get fucked, just stay true to you
(Verse 3)
Nobody asked for life to deal us
With these bullshit hands we’re dealt
We gotta take these cards ourselves
and flip them don’t expect no help
Now I could’ve either just sat on my ass and pissed and moaned
Or take this situation in which I’m placed, get up and get my own
I was never the type of kid to wait by the door and pack his bags
Or sat on the porch and hoped and pray for his dad to show up, who never did!
I just wanted to fit in
In every single place
and every school I went
I dreamed of being that cool kid
Even if it meant acting stupid
And aunt Edna always told me
Keep making that face it’ll get stuck like that
Meanwhile I’m just standing there
Holding my tongue trying talk like “this”
Til I stuck my tongue on a frozen stop sign pole at 8 years old
I learned my lesson then, cuz I wasn’t trying to impress my friends no more
But I already told you my whole life story, not just based on my description
Cuz where you see it, from where you’re sitting, its prolly 110 percent different
I guess we would have to walk a mile in each other’s shoes at least
What size you wear? I wear 10’s, lets see if you could fit your feet
(Chorus)
In my shoes just to see
What it’s like to be me
I’ll be you, lets trade shoes
Just to see what it be like to
Feel your pain, you’ll feel mine
We’ll go inside each other’s minds
Just to see what we find
Looking through each others eyes
Don’t let them say you ain’t beautiful
They can all get fucked, just stay true to you
Don’t let them say you ain’t beautiful
They can all get fucked, just stay true to you
(Queen Sample)
Lately I’ve been hard to reach
I’ve been too long on my own
Everybody has a private world
Where they can be alone
Are you calling me?
Are you trying to get through?
Are you reaching out for me?
Like I’m reaching out for you.
(Eminem)
Yeah, to my babies, stay strong, dad will be home soon, and to the rest of the world. God gave you them shoes, to fit you… so put them on and wear them and be yourself man, be proud of who you are. Even if it sounds corny, don’t ever let no one tell you, you aint beautiful…

My name is Dee and I am a competent woman. I became sober using the Women for Sobriety 13 Statements of Acceptance for a New Life and this is how we open our meetings. It has been over 22 years and I credit WFS with changing my life and giving me the opportunity to develop deep friendships with women who worked hard at becoming 4C women (capable, competent, caring, compassionate). The positive approach to recovery is what attracted me to WFS. There are f2f meetings as well as message boards and online chats (meetings). Thousands of women have been supported and encouraged through this medium. The focus of emotional and spiritual growth has given me the coping tools and renewed spirituality to help me face life’s challenges and changes – for which there are many. I am truly grateful to be a teacher and student of life through WFS. This is one of the major reasons I subscribed to Beliefnet. It’s supportive and informative. I just wanted to share my experience in recovery and to let women know that there is additional support out there.

I belong to a DBSA bipolar/depression group in Chattanooga,TN,and with the help of a dear friend run a DBSA group in Calhoun, GA. Many people with bipolar have serious problems with alcohol and/or drugs, and many of us have things something like an addiction to, say, gambling or sex, but these problems start and stop as the mania starts and stops. So, most of us are familiar with addictions in one fashion or another.
The main thing people in our group tell us, and we experience in the one we attend, is that for the first time in their lives they are among peers who have the same kind of problems they do, the same experiences, who understands them, and who want to help them with their troubles.

I truely want to tell all of the recovering addicts out there that i look up to each and everyone of you. a person never really knows what an addict goes through unless you have been there. I have been taking presciption drugs for nine years, what first started as a recreational “activity” eventually turned into a full blown habit. I was in denial for a long time and i have just started admiting that i have a problem, i have heard that is the first step to recovering, but i dont feel that is the case for me. I want to go back to normal i want to have my life back because right now i dont have a life. there is no life in being high. i do not want to wake up in the morning and feel like i have to get high and if i dont i will be sick. that is not how a person is supposed to go through life. I pray that one fine day God will say “you have had enough child of mine, i will deliver you from your burdens if you put your faith and trust in me and take my hand and walk with me. the question is when that day comes, and it will because if you want it it will come, will i have the strength to accept his love? Each and everyone that is in recovery i will pray for you, and i want to be like you, i want to have the courage and just everything you have that keeps you sober.?

I am a recovering alcoholic/addict woman and this website has been such an inspiration to me.
Wanted to say to “slr” who posted a comment…The road to recovery begins with a first step… then another step… then another. One foot in front of the other. Attending and participating in AA has allowed me to live sober. That is a miracle for which I am grateful.
God’s will for us is to be clean and sober. It is almost impossible to hear God’s voice within us and through others when we are high or drunk. The connection to healing cannot exist. As we are told in God’s word.. we cannot serve two masters..
Regarding your desire to have God “deliver” you from your burdens, I wanted to share this writing called “The Unseen Essential”:
(not sure who originally wrote this)
How many times are we challenged, only to cry out “Lord, deliver me!”. He says, “No, I’m going to DEVELOP you my child!”.
When we whimper “God, please take me out of this”, He replies with gentle compassions saying, “No, I’ll take you THROUGH”.
How often do we try to twist God’s almighty arm into blessing us by arrogantly waving our preferred choice of His promises. He will often point to His other promises and say, “At the moment I’m more interested in your CHARACTER than your COMFORT, I want you to learn faith my child”.

Nothing can replace our wonderful meetings. I have been sober 19 years and have found the solution and support in the fellowship of AA — and in the Big Book. It is always important for me to remember my first drink — how it made me feel and my last drink — where it eventually took me. I might have thought that my early drinking was “fun” but in reality alcoholism is a disease of perception — what I thought was fun might not be perceived that way by a normal drinker.
Thank you to my sober sisters and brothers who have shown me that there is a better way of living through the fellowship.

My observation from being continuously clean & sober 29 years and dealing with my bipolar for the last decade is from my own and speaking with hundreds of people over the years.
In the beginning of going to meetings it has to do with how beat down and teachable a person is to seek the recovery we have.
For the smaller numbers of us that take the steps with a sponsor, involve ourselves in being of service to others in recovery, and being sincere openminded, willing and honest, the HOW of the program – we can relate to what is said and felt in a meeting of recovery more intensely and on a personal level.
In this way we all have an investment in our own and others recovery as we have been dealing with our “issues” between God as we understand Him/Her and our sponsor for a while as well as we’ve learned that it’s best for us to continue to take personal inventory on a regular basis so we may feel more balanced and in touch with “reality.”