Why did I feel afraid to go to my first Al-Anon meeting?
Welcome to the fourth of six Al-Anon Family Group podcasts, especially recorded to introduce you to Al-Anon meetings.
Why did I feel afraid to go to my first Al-Anon meeting? Isn’t the drinking somebody else’s problem?
32 Comments on “Why did I feel afraid to go to my first Al-Anon meeting?”
I love love love that Al-Anon has taken this more public approach!!! We have got to start reaching out like this in more and more ways, lets put these podcasts on CD and hand them to people that need them with a meeting list!!! I am going to email this site to everyone I know, thanks so much for putting this together!
Hugs
Sheila
This subject brings back so many memories of my first meeting in Al-Anon. I had no idea what Al-Anon was all about but my mother-in-law had told me that there was such a program and it had helped my sister-in-law with her life.
I knew that life was terrible at home and I was probably the biggest part of the problem but didn’t know it.
I went to that meeting and did not miss a meeting for the next five years. It saved my life and still today I seldom miss my meeting as I know that the program has been a life line for me. Keep coming back- The program works.
Love in Al-Anon
Ruth
Hi,
Thanks for the newcomers series. They are great and informative. Am i missing something? Are there 6 podcasts or only 4? Perhaps numbers 5 & 6 havent been posted yet? I look forward to the balance of the series. Thank you, brenda
Hi,
My name is Beejinmaa (for short Bella). I really want to come Al-Anon meeting but I am afraid that I will feel not happy, I will cry and have a headache…….
Sorry if I made grammar mistakes. I am Mongolian woman and my English is not so perfect.
Thank you for understanding.
Sincerely,
Bella
Thank you for helping me to remember. I felt afraid to go to my first Al-Anon Meeting because the meeting was in a church and I was Jewish. My stickin thinkin had me believe that I was the only Jew who had an Alcoholic loved one . Boy was I wrong. I also had fear that I would be recognized as both my Alcoholic and I were involved in the Community. I did not understand then about the Anonymity that we all cherish and protect. That was many years ago. I am so glad that I was able to walk thru my fears for walking thru the doors of Al-Anon is how I helped myself and enjoy the freedom and serenity Al-Anon offers.
hi I stumbled upon this site. My husband is an alcoholic. He would never admit it, still doesn’t. But he took the first step today and went to his first AA Meeting..I feel that this is a huge step…how can I help him succeed?…I know that nagging isn’t the answer…we have not been married long…second for both of us..I’m trying to keep this together..what can I do? THis site is great I’ve never been good at attending meetings but this I could do.
Thanks
I am so happy to have found that Al-Anon has podcasts! This one in particular, indeed, brought back memories of my first meeting. Scared, confused, I walked in a mess. Not much change when I came out but I definitely felt loved and people listened to me. I am a young, daughter of two alcoholics. I have a very busy life and in rural America it is hard to get to enough meetings. Podcasting is one more way for me to stay in touch with my program! Thank you and I can’t wait to hear more. Love you all.
Amy
I didn’t want to go to Al-Anon because I thought it was religious. I never even heard of the word, spirituality. I knew I needed help but it took me five years to “lower myself” into going to Al-Anon. I also thought that Al-Anon would fleece me out of money like a lot of other religious organizations.
I was not a joiner which didn’t help either. It fed into the isolation part of my illness.
By not going to Al-Anon, I just got sicker and even became violent toward my husband. When I finally “broke down” and went to my first meeting, I knew right away that I was in the right place. I never left and still to this day attend at least two meetings a week.
It felt so good to be around people who understood exactly what I was going through.
I was afraid to go my first Al-Anon meeting because I thought that someone there would know my alcoholic and his family and turn around and tell them that I was their talking about his problem or mine as the case maybe. But I realized that I had nothing to worry about because what is said in the meeting stays there and who we see there stays also. I was also afraid of embarrassing myself by talking to total strangers but I shortly figured out that they are not strangers they are just people that I have not met and I am meeting them now and we have a common bond and we are all there for basically the same reason and that is to get ourselves help and courage to live with our alcoholics. The more that I go the more that I learn and in my group I am the youngest at 39 and with them being older and wiser I seem to be learning a lot from them and I am glad that I am going every week as long as my work schedule permits. I thank God for Al-Anon I think it has helped me some in short time that I have been going which is only 7 or 8 weeks. they say keep coming back it works if you work it and it don’t if you don’t and I am beginning to believe and I am taking it one day at a time and some days one hour at a time.
Dear Bella,
Try 6 meetings then decide if Al-Anon is for you. I cried at my first 3 meetings then it got better. It was okay that I cried. They had tissues there ready for me. Many others have cried at first, too. Alcoholism makes us sad. Recovery brings happiness.
Dear Charlene,
You don’t have to be “good at” attending meetings. You just have to want to find help for yourself and then go. The resources found at meetings is so rich; don’t cheat yourself. You don’t have to talk if you don’t want to. Just listen if that is more comfortable. Hope to see you at my meeting soon.
Hugs, Roberta
Thank you so much for having this resource. It has literally saved me tonight. I am in love with an alcoholic and have been blaming myself for so many things. I see now that I have been trying to manage him and that is impossible. The good news is that he isn’t drinking and hasn’t been for some time, but I think the dynamic is still there. I think if there is any chance for us I need to go to Al-Anon. I am someone who has a lot of false pride and has tried to handle this on her own, but I really feel like I need help.
I am so glad to be hearing this! I am returning to Al-Anon after many, many years. I was dating a man about 8 months ago, who turned from crack to alcohol for legal purposes; just transferred one addiction to another. There is plenty of drug addiction and alcoholism in my family.
I am here because I do not like groups; and I’ve been to plenty; AA, NA, CODA. AL-ANON. I am very depressed and tired of living a life of solitude and going without love for fear of attracting yet another person with a substance abuse or other mental problem.
Some groups were better than others to be honest. I think I can do better with this format as well as listening to audios right now. This feels safer.
Thanks for letting me share.
Yasmina
Thank you WSO for bringing our program to life with real people sharing with the newcomers.
I started out approximately 8 yrs ago in Al-Anon, then discovered 8 yrs later & after 17 months of soberity in AA I have an extreme amount of pain from other alcoholics in my family and after two of my ex partners that r my childrens fathers. I’ve felt I had to take responsibility for my own part in my addiction that has affected my children and myself , before I could ever attend anything like Al-Anon. I now feel lonely in AA sometimes and want to talk about the effects alcohol has had on me as well as from people I also loved and still love! I don’t want to feel lonely in my healing journey anymore!
I have two close friends, who are both alcoholics and part of AA, who know me better than I know myself and have invited me to many of their meetings as an insight into seeing that I had many problems and needed help. Well, I just went as support for them and didn’t think that it had anything to do with me. Not putting two and two together, that I grew up in an alcoholic home and dated a person who was an alcoholic, they actually had to come right out and tell me that I needed to get my butt into Al-Anon and start taking care of myself. Because you see, I am here to help everyone else, and me when and if I have time. You can imagine where I am at in my life and hating every bit of it.
I am trying to work up the courage to attend my first meeting this evening, but just thinking about it gives me the biggest lump in my throat and I really hate to cry in front of others (which I am sure I will figure out why eventually) lol…
Oh boy! My husband of 12 years, who lied to me and told me he had been clean for 20 years prior to our marriage, has been slipping for the last 3 years. I’m ready to go to an Al-Anon meeting. I feel so ashamed at 62 that I married a man with this problem. My children, we have 5 between us, all grown and married, found out last year he slipped and got all over my case. It was awful. I honestly have thought that he would slip and then return to sobriety. I know I need help. I get anxious coming home after work at night because I’m afraid that I’ll find him asleep and drunk. He lies to me about drinking. At first, I thought I was crazy until he finally admitted to me that he had been drinking. I’m so afraid to let my/his children know that he’s drinking again. He only drinks at home, not a social drinker at all. I guess you can tell I need help. I do feel ashamed, guilty, and live a lie every day alone, afraid to tell anyone.
My husband has worked with AA for over 40 years. I do realize that I have no power or control over him but continue to try and micro-manage his behavior. I think if I was honest with the family, I would feel better. I am so alone and supressed and angry.
I will atend my 1st Al-Anon meeting this Thursday. After reading some blogs, it’s exactly where I need to be!
Thanks for the support.
I really need to go to a meeting, but I guess I am just afarid. My husband of 36 years has a serious drinking problem, although he says he doesn’t. He hides whiskey and rum and drinks straight from the bottle. I have tried scaring him by telling him I am leaving and even told our 3 kids (they are all grown and living in other provinces - thank God).
I hate my husband when he is drinking. He is a good man but not when he is drinking. He is not abusive, but can be if provoked. I don’t know where to turn anymore. I am 59 years old. He is going to turn 60 in September and I feel so unhappy. We have a nice home. I work part time. We have 3 beautiful kids and 2 grandkids, but still he keeps drinking, hiding it always. What can I do? I sometimes feel like doing away with myself. But then, is he worth it????
I am so glad that I have found this on-line support. I have 2 small children and find it hard to start going to meetings, but I know after I have read these, I have to.
I am noticing that when my husband comes home drunk usually we are asleep, but more and more he is coming home and interacting with my children. It makes it very uncomfortable, because when he drinks he gets angry at me. And now when they are awake and he acts strange, I feel I can’t protect them from the craziness. I don’t know what to say to them, except it ends up being me saying, “I’m sorry,” and my 7-year-old responds, “That’s okay, Mom, I’m used to it,” and that breaks my heart.
I need to get help and will attend my first meeting when they get into school this week. I promise, within a week. I will be the one in the meeting, crying and shell-shocked, but I know I need to. Thank you for listening.
I am 51 years old soon and have been married to an alcoholic for 33 years. I have covered for him, been embarrassed by him, mentally abused by him. I am only truly happy and relaxed when he is out of town. I tighten up when he comes home, because I never know how he is going to be or how much he is going to drink. He is not a nice drunk. And I still stay here! I have two grown sons and six grandchildren. They don’t visit often. I hope and pray life can get better. He says he will stop drinking, but never does fully. I would really like to save my marriage. I work part time and would have to tun my life upside down to start over.
Gina, you wrote what I had in mind except that I’m 59 (and so is he) and we don’t have any kids. My husband is in chronic pain from old back injuries and it doesn’t seem that it can be fixed. So, he’s in “pain management” with a local pain clinic. He says the pain meds don’t do the trick so he drinks too.
I’m worried that the combination of meds and alcohol will kill him and sometimes I wish they would. He’s said many times that the only reason he is alive is because of me, and I think that’s true since he’s been suicidal since I met him. But he is such a good man otherwise! I love him and don’t want him to hurt, but he’s not doing anything about getting a life now that he is retired, so he does the drugs and drink thing to block mental and physical pain.
Usually I go to work, have my own separate life, etc., and am really relaxed in my own home only when he is gone. Do I go to his next doc appt with him and tell the pain doc that he’s drinking like mad? He’ll be furious, but he’s been lying to her for years. I keep suggesting things for him to do, but usually if it comes out of my mouth he won’t do it. We had someone I work with stop over last night and he embarrassed me to death with his rude, crude behavior and I watched myself drinking too much wine because of the awfulness of the situation.
Basically, I felt afraid to go to my first meeting because of two reasons. The first one was that I was about to meet people like me, affected by someone else’s alcoholism, and somehow that made me feel very vulnerable. The second reason was that attending that first meeting involved getting out of my safe self-created isolation, which was very uncomfortable to me, just being close to other human beings.
Thank you for reading my sharing.
Reading the above, the stories and feelings could be written by me. I am 55 years old and living their lives. Our children are grown and after 4 years being sober (after 25 years of drinking) we have been back in the game for 7 years. The 2nd go around has been so damaging to me. I guess now that the children are grown I can fight back. I often compare myself to a puppy who is abused that wags its tail until one day it bites back. It took me longer than most to start fighting back and in reality nothing changes. I know that but I can’t help it. So much anger. I have not gone to a face-to-face meeting yet, but getting closer.
My husband is a drug addict. I should be writing in a Nar-Anon site but can’t find a chat room for Nar-Anon. He nearly died 7 weeks ago from an accidental overdose. He is currently in rehab and I know that I need support, especially before he comes home. It’s been hard to make it to an Al-Anon or Nar-Anon meeting because I work full time, have 2 kids and no husband at home to help. Reading these comments is helpful but it makes me realize that I must make the time to attend a meeting.
It will be hard to go by myself, but I must have the courage. I am scared to walk in alone (a friend was supposed to attend with me but I can’t count on her). I’m scared to see people I may know. Not many people know about my husband’s drug problem and I don’t want the word to get out because we own our own business. I must learn how to stop being an enabler. Will Al-Anon help me with this? There are many more Al-Anon meetings than Nar-Anon and I was wondering if these would be just as useful.
I am looking into going to my first meeting this week. My boyfirend is a “functionaling” alcoholic. I can’t talk to my family because I know they will just tell me to leave him (being we are not married). I need someone to talk to. My boyfriend has admitted he has a problem, but does nothing. So now I feel lost.
These podcasts are helpful, especially as I am afraid to go to my first Al-Anon meeting. 46 yrs old and scared, but fear has ruled my life for most of those years. I have a daughter who is an alcoholic, married to an alcoholic, and was married to an alcoholic for 17 years. I have covered up for the alcoholics and I need to learn not to do that. Hoping today is my first meeting!
My son has been in and out of treatment centres for 5 years. He is addicted to crack cocaine. I have been going to Al-Anon meetings for 11 months and I meet a lot of people there that go because someone they love is addicted to narcotics.
You will meet the person or people that you can relate to, trust me. I meet them every time I go to a meeting. I used to feel so much shame for this addiction, but now I know that it was never mine to begin with.
I hope you go to the meetings if only to get some phone numbers of people you can call when you are in crisis.
This terrible addiction is eating away at my son, and I know so many people that have died from addiction-abuse. It is astounding what this drug does to people using and the ones affected by them. It is satan working to kill the ones we love. God bless every one out there and keep coming back. It works if you work it, and you are worth it.
I have been married for nearly 25 years to a man who has habitually found a way to blame me for the problems our marriage has encountered. From money problems to him not believing me, I am the reason for all our problems. I recognized that my husband drank every day, but it wasn’t until about 4 months ago that it hit me that the amount of alcohol consumption has increased drastically.
I know I have been raising 3 kids and living with a man who has progressively become more and more addicted to alcohol. He tries to justify his drinking by only drinking beer and not hard alcohol. He also tries justifying his habit by making statements that he is “in control” and “can handle himself.”
I have been through numerous counseling sessions both with and without him to help with marital problems. I am currently in counseling again by myself. Every time we would bring up the issue of drinking and the amount of consumption that takes place, my husband would make comments that the counselor didn’t know what they were talking about and they were getting off the marital issues. Our marital issues have escalated to the point of talking about divorce. Neither of us wears our wedding bands any longer. I figured if I entered more counseling, it would help me with helping our relationship.
I have found that the counseling has helped me find myself. I finally did a search on the WWW on living with an alcoholic and was directed to Al-Anon. I have read through some comments and have located a meeting site and time in my area. It is with a heavy heart that I am to the point that I must admit to myself that I cannot do any more to help my husband other than let him go and hope that his freedom from me will help him find happiness. I am hoping that Al-Anon will help me find a way to heal emotionally and get through losing my partner and friend to alcohol. Thanks for the opportunity of this website to get myself on the track to healing.
I was afraid to go to my first Al-Anon meeting because I was so sure I’d hear how I was to blame for the alcoholic problems in my home. I’d been blamed for everything that went on in our house for so long.
Instead, I was assured that I did not cause the alcoholism, but I could find a lot more enjoyment in my life than I currently had. Meetings helped me discover how real flesh-and-blood people had bettered their lives, even in those cases in which active drinking continued.
As time went on, I found that the Al-Anon Steps, slogans, and other tools, helped me weather the other storms in life as well.
I am scared and ashamed, mostly because I am still in love with my husband and I am worried that we will grow apart if I get help. I know how selfish I sound; it has all just started to get out of control. Can families survive this?
I read these comments and am heart-broken. I have been married for 19 years to a wonderful man who will not admit he has a problem. Although he was sober for ten years (after a near fatal car accident), he went back to drinking when we moved to a new town. He always wanted to drink socially. Well, this has spiraled into drinking during work, drinking after work, and when he works “late,” sometimes doesn’t come home or comes home when we are asleep.
The drinking and driving terrifies me. I am afraid I will receive a phone call one night saying he is either dead or has killed an innocent person or worse, a family. I also despise him when he is “buzzed” and starts talking to our kids. He acts differently, reeks of alcohol and recently can either pass out or get angry.
I am afraid of him, so do not want to get into “it” with him. I am scared that my only solution is to separate. I know this will devastate my children and it breaks my heart. I just do not want to live a lie and continue this downward spiral. I know I need to get to an Al-Anon meeting. I have sat in many parking lots terrified to go in, for many of the same reasons others have said; recognition, religion, fear. I am desperate for help. I feel like I don’t want to go on living like this and am exhausted mentally and physically.
Hi:
After reading all these comments; I think I am ready to take the first step to my recovery. I have been married with an alcoholic for about 8 years. I still love my husband but I am very angry, desperate for help. I will go to my first Al-Anon meeting tomorrow. I am scared.
Today is the first time I went to Al-Anon meeting, even though my husband has not been drinking for 7 years. He lives and works in another town but would come home for the weekend. 4 months ago I came as a surprise visit to his office, since I felt something was wrong and lying to me (my gut intuition). He was not happy with my visit, shouted in front of the office secretaries “you bitch, get out of here”.
Ever since then he has not come home, does not answer my phone calls and completely ignores me. He is in contact with our 4 grown children. My 19-year-old girl still lives home with me and she is his confidant and “pseudo wife”. We have been married for 40 years and I am devastated.
I found out that he plans to retire and sell his medical practice without involving me. He always blames me for the family disfunction. not taking accountability for his own problems. I am his problem and I feel that he hates me and conveys the message to our children. I do not know if he is filing for divorce, or has a paramour, though he is not the type. He kept telling me “I take care of myself, I do not care about the children or granchildren”.
I decided not to call him. I was o.k. until about two weeks ago where I broke down and am completely depressed. I know that I need to take care of myself and I try my best but I feel completely alone, no support from anybody. My children do not want to be involved and they tell me so. I talk to some friends but it is still not enough.