Lyndal introduced herself as a recovered alcoholic whose life was changed, even saved, by AA 12 years ago. She gave us a little bit of background about AA – it was first established in Australia in 1945 at the Sydney Psychiatric Hospital. There are AA groups in 300 countries in the world.
AA is not governed. Members fund the organisation with their weekly donations. Groups are autonomous and can operate any way they like. They can visit hospitals, schools and courts to assist people who would like to take AA’s 12 steps to recovery.
AA does not keep records or statistics. It exists solely to help people regain control over their lives.
You can contact AA in a number of ways – by telephone, through the website, or a chat line. Meetings are held in many suburbs throughout Perth every week and you can attend as many as you like. There are also study groups, books and plenty of brochures which can help a recovering alcoholic.
Lyndal is a sponsor to two other people, she goes to AA meetings three times a week and runs an AA meeting at Graylands.
One of Lyndal’s sponsored women has three major addictions. Lyndal can only counsel her about her drinking, but with two other issues, Lyndal has recommended she try rehabilitation.
The other, who is only 23 and at university, was drinking in part due to a toxic relationship. She attended AA for eight months and was doing really well. But when she relapsed, she came back to AA, ended her difficult partnership, and is now almost finished uni and eight months sober.
Our second guest speaker, Tani, told us that one of the reasons she started drinking from a young age was due to a tumultuous upbringing and alcohol helped to blot that out and numb the pain. Alcohol was a refuge, a way to lose time and overcome crises. But it led to an uncontrollable craving and physical and emotional changes.
She felt the shame, despair and darkness which alcoholism brings. But AA helped Tani to stop drinking and stay stopped.
Some of AA’s 12 scaffolding steps consist of the acceptance of your problem, taking an inventory of who you become when you drink and taking responsibility for your actions, perhaps reconciling with family and friends who you have hurt, and then maintaining sobriety, so you never go back to being that person. Go to
https://aa.org.au/ to read more about AA and 12 steps.
Lyndal and Tani were very courageous in sharing their stories with us and members are grateful for their personal insights into their AA journeys.
