Ali’s Recovery Story
Ali’s recovery runs through a horse named Rebel, a 6 a.m. men’s meeting in Spokane, and a recovery home for mothers in Maine. Nearly seven years in, she describes it as a tangled ball of yarn, loosene…
Topic
Twelve Step
AA, NA, Al-Anon, Gamblers Anonymous, and the wider 12-step world — sponsorship, service, meetings, and the steps as people actually live them.
29 stories
Pathways to Recovery
Someone recovers in a hospital bed. Someone else sits in a church basement. A third person decides at their kitchen table that life has to change. Each of these moments looks different, but they all p…
The Role of Social Networks
Marcus sits across from his sponsor, sharing something he couldn't tell anyone during his using years. This conversation wouldn't happen without the relationships he's rebuilt. The article explores ho…
Many Paths to Freedom, Five Free Programs for Your Recovery
Marcus sat in a church basement for the first time, uncertain. Around him, people he'd never met nodded in recognition. Five free programs exist for people in recovery, each built on different beliefs…
Alcoholics Anonymous Service Committees
A nurse student leans forward with a question: How do you encourage someone to try A.A.? Behind that curiosity sits a larger truth about recovery visibility. Across Maine, volunteers in Alcoholics Ano…
Gamblers Anonymous – “Do You Really Think There’s Any Hope For Me?”
A person sits across from a counselor, shoulders heavy with the weight of lost money, broken relationships, ruined careers. "Do you really think there's any hope for me?" they ask. In Maine, thousands…
Compassionate AA Sponsor
Michael watched someone walk into an AA meeting for the first time, desperate and lost. Years later, that same person had rebuilt their family and career. As a sponsor guiding others through the 12 St…
Are You Willing to Go to Any Lengths?
Etta Mae Lopez, five feet tall and determined, walked up to a police officer outside Sacramento Jail and slapped him. She had a plan: jail time meant she could finally quit smoking. Her unconventional…
Mutual Benefits of Sponsorship In Alcoholics Anonymous
A woman six months sober asks another woman to sponsor her, and the answer comes back: I would be honored. What follows is a conversation about honesty, willingness, and walking a path out of the wood…
Alcoholics Anonymous (Issue 16)
C. walked into her first AA meeting in 1989 with her sister, both seeking a way out. Thirty-five years later, she describes a life transformed by sobriety and connection. Alcoholics Anonymous has anch…
Al-Anon: Mutual Aid for Families of Alcoholics
Finn walked into his first Al-Anon meeting terrified he'd break invisible rules. Instead, he found a room where people handed him their phone numbers and let him listen quietly, no judgment. He came h…
Sobriety is a Gift That Keeps on Giving
The writer of this story has chosen sobriety since June 14, 2001. Today that life includes a healthy marriage, lasting 12-step friendships, and the freedom of making real choices.
Food Addicts Anonymous – Nourishing the Self
Elizabeth turned to food as a child to survive trauma, moving through restriction and purging before losing control entirely. Her story reveals how food addiction progresses differently for each perso…
Ben Sawyer
Ben Sawyer is a certified recovery advisor, a career he loves. The former Marine and nurse is remarried and still goes to 12-step meetings. He tells newcomers that hope is here.
Book Review: The 12 and 12
Someone walks into an AA meeting feeling lost, then finds themselves in a room where a stranger's story mirrors their own. The book "Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions" explains why these meetings wor…
Narcotics Anonymous: Q&A
Nicole walked into her first Narcotics Anonymous meeting and heard something that changed everything: "The lie that people can't recover is dead." Three members from Maine,Nicole, Brendan, and Jamie,a…
Narcotics Anonymous (NA)
Someone sits in a folding chair in a rented room, listening to people they've never met talk about their lives before recovery. No judgment. No fees. No one cares what they used or how long. Narcotics…
The Handshake That Changed the World
In a doctor's kitchen in 1939, two men shook hands. One said, "Hello, my name is Bill, and I am an alcoholic." That moment sparked something neither could have predicted: a force that would spread acr…
The Twelfth Step
Amanda K. spent years sponsoring others through 12-step programs while working full-time and raising a child alone. She burned out. Her new sponsor helped her see the 12th step differently: not as end…
Al-Anon: Personal Experiences
Yaeko walked into her first Al-Anon meeting thirty-five years ago while her husband attended AA. She carried the belief that if she was smart enough, good enough, she could stop his drinking. Al-Anon…
Al-Anon Family Groups
Someone you love drinks too much, and you've spent months trying to control it, fix it, convince them to stop. You're exhausted and ashamed. Al-Anon Family Groups offers a different path: meetings whe…
A Woman’s Way Through the Twelve Steps
A woman sits with Step Three, wrestling with what "turning it over" means when she's spent her life managing everyone else's feelings and needs. Dr. Covington's book reframes the twelve steps through…
Alcoholics Anonymous
Someone sits in a metal folding chair, listening to a stranger describe the exact moment they thought they'd never drink again, then did. They recognize themselves in that story. What follows is how A…
You Don’t Have to Be a Prisoner of Your Past
Colleen Garrick works the 12 steps and sponsors others in recovery. She speaks openly about her past in job interviews, and employers have thanked her for her honesty and vulnerability.
This is my Bill W. plant.
Tania took home a plant from the closing women's halfway house where she'd rebuilt her life. She didn't know it was a Bill W. plant, named for recovery's founder, until later. Seven years on, "Billy"…
Finding Recovery “In The Rooms”
Ken sits in his hospital bed scrolling through a recovery meeting happening live on his screen. Thousands of miles away, someone in a rural town joins from home. In The Rooms connects people in recove…
Recovery’s elder stateswoman celebrates four sober decades
At 90, Joan Giles has been part of Maine's recovery community for 41 years, sober since 1978. Over those years she ran a 12-step bookstore and helped run meetings in a prison.
Recovery off the mainland’s a little different
Keith Ivers watches the sun rise from his boat, headed toward mainland meetings, then watches city lights fade as he returns to Peaks Island. On Maine's smallest islands, people in recovery navigate i…
Veterans find military experience helps their recovery efforts
Dan Blake adjusts his uniform, remembers the acronyms. The military taught him to follow orders, to trust a mission larger than himself. Years later, sitting in his first recovery meeting, he realizes…