Alcoholics Anonymous Meeting Analysis

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There are many ways to approach recovery from mind and mood altering substances. One of the most popular approaches and widely available is through support groups. Support groups include meetings such as twelve-step programs, SMART Recovery, and Rational Recovery. As a student studying to become an addictions counseling professional I attended an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting and gained information that I did not previously know about twelve-step meetings. Through attendance I was also able to decipher the difference between various programs and if I believed twelve-step programs would be most effective for clients with addictions based on my observations of the meeting and research of other alternatives.
The first twelve-step recovery meeting was alcoholics anonymous, also known as AA. This came about after two “hopeless” alcoholics,
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This meeting was located at 20803 North 151st Avenue, Sun City, Arizona 85375. The topic of the discussion was, “Just say no.” As a recovering individual from addiction I had personally attended various twelve-step meetings. I had however learned something new at this meeting that I had not consciously recognized before. An individual who was speaking shared that they were court mandated to attend AA forty-one years ago and has been sober ever since. I had heard individuals being court mandated before, but these were always newcomers. Never had I heard of an individual being forced into a twelve-step program and remaining sober following mandated attendance. This leads me to believe that AA does possess certain qualities that can help individuals progress through the stages of change to recovery. They do not need to enter a twelve-step program in the preparation stage with the intentions of changing (Center for Substance Abuse Treatment,