Restorative talk and ritualized form: The therapeutic structure for Big Book support groups and the paradox for Adult Children of Alcoholics
Bill Elwood, Ph.D. OppNet/Health-Scientist Administrator NIH Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research 301-402-0116
[email protected]
The Big (Blue) Book
Alcoholics Anonymous • Group founded 1935 • Book 1st published 1939 • 4th edition, 2001 • Lasker (APHA) Award for “a new therapy based on the kinship of common suffering; one having vast potential for the myriad other ills of mankind,” 1951
Related groups • Al-Anon, Alateen • ACOA (2006) • Cocaine Anonymous • Debtors Anonymous • Gamblers Anonymous • Homosexuals Anonymous • Narcotics Anonymous • Sex Addicts Anonymous • Smokers Anonymous • Underearners Anonymous • Workaholics Anonymous
12-step support-group talk • • • •
Topic-specific themes Member-specific stories Ritualized story formats Ritualized meeting structures
Mythic narrative form • Cosmos from chaos (Eliade) • Simple stories “widely taught, widely believed” (Lewis) • “Stating how things were … [& how] the faithful should be vowed in the future” (Burke)
ACOA mythic narrative form 1. List adult dysfunctional behaviors, personal tragedies 2. Link current dysfunctions to successful strategies from alcoholic childhood 3. Rejoice in (self-)diagnosis 4. Celebrate community membership 5. Recount these sources for recovery and change.
Dysfunctional adult behaviors • • • • •
“Guilt” “Low self-esteem, and fear” “Distorted sense of responsibility” “Relationships gone awry for poor communication” “Chose 2 husbands who couldn’t share feelings when all I wanted was a man who wanted to dialogue with me” • “Trouble forming long-lasting, trusting relationships”
Childhood ◦ self-diagnosis ◦ membership “Chaotic, unpredictable” “I blame living with an alcoholic parent for most of my unhappiness” “My parents communicated either by fighting or in silence” causing “extraordinary damage to me and my relationships” “Some of these phobias are related directly to my growing up as a child of an alcoholic”
“The minute I got into ACOA, I felt a validation of myself. I could be understood by others” “ACOA meetings have helped me learn how others have learned and grown” “For the 1st time in my life, I wasn’t alone, everyone else told some variation of my story” “In this process I have begun to gather scraps of self I never knew existed”
Recount sources for recovery, change • “My strength is a positive byproduct of all the pain endured in my journey to adulthood” • “Today I’m able to view the war that was my childhood as a legacy, a gift” • “My healing began when I finally acknowledged and forgave the impact of my early environment” • ACOA “is the road to recovery and freedom”
ACOA paradox Ritual place, form • ACOA group: “Sacred” place & time to (re-)tell stories of past, present, future (Eliade) • Mythic narrative: “Ultimate linear progression to end all linear progressions” • “Forever inciting anew the search for a curative victim” (Burke, 1970) • Circular situation to discover, define, analyze, resolve inadequacies
Mythic circularity provides structure for people with addictions • “I’m just another recovering woman” • “Keep coming back; it works if you work it!“ • “If you consider yourself recovering so you never drink, so be it”
Paradoxical example “I am 65 years-old. None of my marriages worked out. 2 of my children won’t speak to me. I’ve been in ACOA for 8 years and I learned I need to mourn the parents I never had. I’ve been mourning for 8 years and I need to mourn a few more.”
• Mythic circularity can provide structure for adults to retain their childhoods of alcoholics • Myth provides opportunity for recovery • Myth can become a non-alcoholic addiction for others
References • Adult Children of Alcoholics World Service Organization (ACA-WSO). (2012). Adult children of alcoholics/dysfunctional families. Torrance, CA: ACA-WSO. • Burke, K. (1966). Language as symbolic action: Essays on life, literature and method. Berkeley: University of California Press. • Burke, K. (1970). The rhetoric of religion: Studies in logology. Berkeley: University of California Press. • Eliade, M. (1959). The sacred and the profane. New York: Harper and Row. • Hayes, E.N. (Ed.). (1989). Adult children of alcoholics remember: True stories of abuse and recovery by ACOAs. New York: Harmony Books. • Kritsberg, W. (1988). The adult children of alcoholics syndrome: A step-by-step guide to discovery and recovery. New York: Bantam Books. • Lewis, W.F. (1987). Telling America’s story: Narrative form and the Reagan presidency. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 73, 280-302. • Middleton-Moz, J., & Dwinell, L.L. (2010). After the tears: Helping adult children of alcoholics heal their childhood trauma. Deerfield Beach, FL: Health Communications. • Woititz, J.G. (1990). Adult children of alcoholics. Deerfield Beach, FL: Health Communications.
