Twelve Step Recovery Programs

What are 12 step recovery programs?

In 1935, two men in Chicago, Il. Dr. Bob Smith and Bill Wilson, found a way to keep each other sober by sharing their experiences. Bill Wilson had gotten sober in New York and found himself working in Chicago for a time. After a series of events, Bill Wilson met Dr. Bob at a friend’s home where they spent several hours talking. Dr. Bob was struggling to stay sober as well. A month later, the two men worked out an approach to helping others stay away from alcohol (women would participate later).

What began so many years ago, has grown into a world wide organization known as Alcoholics Anonymous. In 1939, the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous was published. The book, written and rewritten many times reflects the founding principals in AA and a path to maintain sobriety.

For many years, this program brought sobriety, peace, and new life to many people. Other people suffering from addiction adopted the 12 Steps contained within the Big Book. Al-anon became the sister group of AA support system for members of the alcoholics family. The principles and the AA meetings helped so many people maintain abstinence that addiction treatment facilities began to incorporate the 12 step program and principles into the treatment modality.

These are the original Twelve Steps as published by Alcoholics Anonymous:

We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.
Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Many addicts and alcoholics find attendance at 12 Step meetings a great resource in recovery. At meetings, people can hear others struggling with similar life issues and learn that it is possible to experience life without the aid of mind or mood altering substances.

New friendships and support groups are formed that break the addict or alcoholic’s tendency to isolate or to try to endure alone. The notion that we are not alone is reinforced in meetings.