I Wasn’t Doing Fine On My Own.
It isn’t easy to explain – even to a sober alcoholic – why Alcoholics Anonymous works, or how it helps keep people sober for a week, let alone a lifetime. So I didn’t understand it.
I’d gone to meetings – off and on, usually with Paul – for three years. Thanks to meetings, I knew the basics of the program: read, call sponsor, work steps, more meetings. Blah, blah, blah.
Meetings didn’t really help me, though I had no idea why. I thought AA was ineffective, when the problem was definitely me. I wasn’t going to AA to get better – to feel better, to think better, to be healthy and happy and have a future.
I was going to AA because I thought that’s what I was supposed to do. So I did only the bare minimum in AA.
I knew I was supposed to read the AA Big Book which, to the best of my recollection, held about 200 pages of gibberish and a bunch of stories. I only read the stories.
I knew I was supposed to call my sponsor, but I’d stopped calling my sponsor after determining that I was smarter than she was. So really? I didn’t have a sponsor. I didn’t even know why I should have a sponsor, since she was just another AA person. And why did I have to call another AA person when I was doing fine on my own?
Except: I wasn’t doing fine on my own.
I knew I was supposed to work the steps, and I had done some of that. I had read about the steps in the “12 and 12” – AA’s book that detailed each of the steps and traditions, and why they mattered. I read them whenever I thought I needed to know something about them, and then I forgot whatever I read. So I guess I wasn’t really “working” the steps, whatever that meant. I just knew what they were. They had something to do with a Higher Power and I believed in God ever since the shooting star so I figured I knew what I was doing.
Except: I didn’t really know what I was doing. And after Paul and I broke up, I didn’t have a soul to talk to about that.
I thought having (almost) three years sober meant that I had my act together, I could teach other people with all the wisdom I’d acquired (from Paul) and I could stay sober all on my own (because I was still sober) and I could do whatever needed to be done for the rest of my life without any help (even though I desperately needed help) because I absolutely, positively had to stay sober no matter what happened, and that included breaking up with Paul.
Except: breaking up with Paul was the worst thing ever.
In AA, they talked about building a foundation. That foundation, they said, is important. It’s what sobriety is built upon.
I had no idea what that meant.
“Foundation” meant: I needed to meet people. Get to know them. Share with them. Tell them how I was feeling – really – and call them – often – so that when everything fell apart, I would know where to turn. I’d know what to do. I’d know who could, and would, help me get through things without picking up a drink.
I knew a few people from meetings, but I didn’t hang out with them. I didn’t talk to them outside of meetings. And I didn’t turn to them for help when I needed it.
My entire “foundation” of sobriety was Paul.
And Paul was gone.