When AA Isn't Enough: Finding Your Own Path to Sobriety

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Everyone, and thank you for joining me today. You were listening to the call her cat podcast and I'm cat York.

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And as always, my mission is to try my best to hold a supportive, honest and open space.

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For everyone, every stage of their healing journey.

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I tried to really dive into really candid discussions about healing addiction, mental health.

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Recovery and the powerful work.

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Of breaking challenging family cycles, the conversations.

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I built for anyone exploring sobriety or simply striving for self empowerment and self love.

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And today is going to be a soul episode.

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And I'm going to be talking about something that I have encountered along my sobriety journey.

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So, I first tried to get sober when my son was about 4 years old.

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I entered detox.

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I was over 200 pounds. I was facing foreclosure.

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Possibly losing my son. I was extremely unhealthy mentally, physically, spiritually, emotionally, all of it.

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And so I went to a detox because it is never safe, nor is it ever recommended to try to detox from alcohol alone.

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You can, you can die from that. You can die from trying to detox from benzodiazepines like Xanax and Valium as well as alcohol.

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So please don't ever try to detox by yourself. You need to be in a medical facility for that.

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So you don't die.

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So I'm in a detox and really the only option that was presented to me to get and stay sober outside of detox was Alcoholics Anonymous.

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And I was desperate. My life was utter shit at that point.

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And so I said, yes, absolutely.

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You know, I did the 90 meetings in 90 days.

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I got a sponsor, I got all the literature, got a home group, you know, listened to the speaker tapes, went to sober events, got phone numbers.

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I did all the things.

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And for a while, you know, I really felt good.

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I really felt good. I started getting my chips, you know, my 24 hour chip, my 30 day chip, my 90 day chip, two months, three months, four months.

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And I would, the same thing would happen every single time.

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I would string together some time, I would relapse.

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And more often than not, I was, I was met with sober shaming, like I had done something wrong.

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I had failed because I wasn't able to stay sober.

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I wasn't working the steps right.

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I wasn't doing enough.

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And that did more harm to me than good.

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Because while I loved AA, I loved the people, I loved the community aspect of it.

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I did not like the fact that there was this view that AA was the only way.

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And let me be clear, AA has helped millions of people across the world.

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And it's been around for, you know, since like 1934, something like that.

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And it's done incredible work and continues to do incredible work and help so many people.

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And I still go to meetings, online meetings.

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I don't do the steps.

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I don't have a sponsor.

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It's just not something that resonates with me.

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And right now, as we speak, I have about five and a half years sober.

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And I've talked to a lot of people on my podcast and outside of my podcast.

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Who have expressed the same frustration with AA.

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You know, there was so much thrown at them.

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And every time they relapsed, they felt like a failure instead of being met with love and

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support.

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It was, you know, you need to do this or you're going to die.

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And I am not at all cancelling out how important it is and how life or death, addiction and

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alcoholism can be.

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I've seen it.

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I've lived it.

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But I think to just come at someone so hard can often have the opposite effect.

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They'll leave AA and I've seen it.

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Unfortunately, AA has a very high relapse rate.

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And I think one of the reasons is simply because so much is thrown at the newcomer when they

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first come in.

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You know, we're just trying to put one foot in front of the other, you know, I took all

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we had to get to that meeting that day to tie our shoes.

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You know, and so over time I backed away from me.

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It just became simply too much.

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And, you know, today, while I still go to meetings online and I read the literature,

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I love the literature, I get the grapevine.

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I get the love.

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I get the support.

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I get the love.

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I read the literature.

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I love the literature.

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I get the grapevine.

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I don't do the steps.

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I don't have a sponsor.

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And my reason for not having a sponsor is especially being a female.

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I was very hard to find a female sponsor.

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I had more than one sponsor who would relapse more than one sponsor who just decided like

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it happened and she can help me anymore.

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I had one that did that around step four, which is the worst time to do that.

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I encountered a dozen women who said they had too many sponsors already.

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And that can be really, really defeating.

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And the suggestion given to me was just go to more meetings, keep talking to women.

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And to me, while I understand where I was coming from, that could seem like a lot of

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wasted time.

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You know, I mean, you're sitting down sharing some really intimate things with people, with

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a woman or a man, and, you know, you want to make sure they're a good fit and to keep

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getting told no, no, no, or I have too many sponsors and just go to more meetings.

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Fine.

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I don't think that's the correct answer.

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I've even been on online meetings where they would have monthly sponsorship meetings.

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There'd be like one woman there.

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You know, that's just not there's a severe lack of female sponsorship in the rooms.

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And I can't speak from a male perspective, but from a female perspective, it was certainly

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a challenge.

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So today, you know, I go to church, I have a spiritual relationship.

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I talk to God every day.

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I meditate.

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I exercise.

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I do the meetings.

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I read the literature.

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And I found something that works for me.

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And just like so many other people have found things that work for them outside of Alcoholics

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Anonymous.

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And I don't think that should be shamed.

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You know, I think we need to open up the conversation a little bit wider to allow for

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these conversations.

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You know, I've talked to several people who just did not find what they needed in their

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rooms.

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And they were not met with kindness or compassion or even questions.

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It was just, well, you're not doing it the right way.

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I'm sorry, but everybody's journey is their own.

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And we shouldn't judge.

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And what works for you may not work for me.

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And what works for me may not work for you.

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You know, and I think it's especially difficult when you actually get to gain some sobriety.

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You have a family and you have a job and kids trying to juggle all that to get to meetings

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only to finally get to one to be told you're not getting to enough.

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You need to make more.

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You're not doing enough.

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That will literally send someone right outside the rooms to not come back.

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You know, and child care was a big issue for me, too.

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You know, you shouldn't really be bringing children to AA meetings.

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And some meetings have daycares or women who will watch children.

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That's very rare, where at least where I am in the East Coast.

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So, you know, there are reasons people choose to not stay in AA or NA.

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And that's OK.

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As long as you're finding a path that works for you.

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You're not hurting anybody.

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You you're a productive member of society and you're not struggling.

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I don't see what the problem is.

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Not everybody gravitates towards the spiritual side of AA.

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And that's OK.

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I don't think it's our job to force that on anybody.

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That has to be a very organic journey.

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And, you know, so often a lot of people come into the room and say,

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so often a lot of people come into the rooms with, you know, baggage from religious abuse.

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You know, they've come from very strict Catholic homes.

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And, you know, it takes a lot to undo that.

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And you just can't force it on somebody.

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That takes services outside of AA to get to that point.

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You know, it can take years.

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And so that person is sitting there struggling for all those years because they can't

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reach this level of thinking that there's something outside of themselves spiritually.

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I think that's a bit much to put on somebody.

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And so I think we really need to have these conversations with people

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who have had different journeys outside of AA.

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You know, I had a great, great guest.

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She's actually my first guest, Toni Will.

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And whenever she would relapse, she said she looked at it as a data point.

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That she was able to sit back and like, okay, what happened?

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How did I get here?

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And she would have these conversations with herself

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and try to figure out where to go forward without shame or embarrassment or guilt.

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And I think we need to do that.

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Are relapses anything to screw around with?

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No, of course not.

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Of course they're not.

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But I think we need to have broader conversations around sobriety,

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around recovery, and the different ways people get sober.

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Because that's how I believe one of the ways we're truly going to help other people,

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more people, is if we take our foot off the gas saying AA is the only way.

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There is no one way.

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It's a way that has helped millions of people.

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Yes, but it is not the only way.

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And I think we need to really listen and have these conversations

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and look into other programs of recovery.

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You know, talk to life coaches or sobriety coaches

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and other people who have good sobriety that aren't in the rooms.

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And that's my hope is to just open up conversations.

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And if you have a sobriety journey that you want to share either on the show

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or just me personally, you disagree with me, you agree with me,

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that's fine.

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Feel free to email me at callhercatpodcast.com.

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And I'm sorry, callhercatpodcast at gmail.com.

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Sorry there.

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And just let me know what you think.

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The link to reach out will be in the show notes.

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And I'm just curious to know about other people's sobriety journeys.

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How you got sober?

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What worked for you?

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If AA was part of your story?

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If it wasn't?

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Challenges you faced?

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And these are just discussions that I think we need to open up a little bit more

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for young people and old people.

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Because like I said, you know, the AA literature,

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a lot of it was written 1930s and 40s.

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We're almost 100 years removed from that, right?

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The world has changed drastically.

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And I think we need to change our conversation around sobriety.

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So let me know what you think.

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And as always, you know, you don't have to carry where you came from.

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Keep telling your story, however you tell it.

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And I look forward to hearing from all of you.

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And I'll see you next time.