A man clutches his chest. He’s having a heart attack. He collapses and his heart stops. His wife calls 911. A highly trained team of paramedics arrive and start lifesaving procedures. They administer pharmaceuticals synthesized by chemists and tested with the scientific method. They use equipment developed by scientists and engineers. He is rushed to a hospital and met by a medical team who continue to work on the patient.
When I first came into recovery in 1990 I had a higher power. The higher power was making me pee in a cup randomly. I don’t know if I could have stayed sober without my higher power. I also had the dilemma of no faith. I had a de-conversion experience in my high school years, long before I got into trouble with alcohol and drugs. I was very unhappy at that time and I decided to listen to these people in the recovery community. What I was doing wasn’t working. I wasn’t sure if I was a powerless alcoholic but I did accept the second half of the first step.
In this essay I will be specifically referring to alcohol and drug addiction or severe alcohol/substance use disorder, which is the terminology used in the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5).
One of the things we AAs read from the Big Book as if it were an ever-lasting truth, though it was written in 1939: “Physicians who are familiar with alcoholism agree there is no such thing as making a normal drinker out of an alcoholic. Science may one day accomplish this, but it hasn’t done so yet.” And it has been a well kept secret that science began to do just that around 1978.
AA orthodoxy depicts an especially dire portrayal of the negative consequences of resentment and rage for those of us addicted to alcohol, and who seek recovery through AA. Bill Wilson, AA’s co-founder primarily responsible for the AA canon of beliefs about alcoholism and recovery, doesn’t mince words regarding the negative impact of resentment and raging anger for alcoholics.
My early days in recovery were spent trying to fit in as best I could. Because the first men I met at the meetings were totally into the Big Book of AA, I in turn was totally into it. That includes my wonderful, faulted, evangelical first sponsor, Rob. From the start, though, you could say I had some problems with the material. Being not only inquisitive but at times downright obnoxious in my questioning, I likely irritated many of the people who diligently tried to bring me into contact with god - that entity who would finally enable me to get and stay sober.