Studies show that if a recovering addict does absolutely nothing after s/he has been to treatment, no meetings, no spsonsor, no step work, no spiritual practice, no involvement with others in a healthy way, etc., then the chances of them staying clean for a year after treatment are very poor. We are talking about 2-3% of the group will stay clean and sober. That is a very, very small percentage of people of get well after treatment. This is cause for concern.
The same studies show that if a recovering person does one simple thing after treatment, their chances of recovery at the one year mark go up dramatically: About half of the people finishing a treatment program will stay clean and sober for a year or more. That one thing is to make a bond with at least one other person whom you know well, and knows you, and wants to help you in your recovery. Simple and easy to understand. But, for some remarkable reason, few addicts and alcoholics take this step.
Now, among the many things that makes the 12 Step program a product of the genius of Bill W. and Dr. Bob, the one thing that fits well with these modern concepts is their insistence on a recovering person having a sponsor. Sponsors are people who know you, and you know them, and they want to help you with your recovery. Sponsorship is the very thing that can improve the chances of staying clean and sober from 3 people out of a hundred to 50 people out of a hundred. I don't know about anyone else, but I would rather be among the group of 50 than the group of 3.
Sponsorship is all about relationship. Addicts and alcoholics are notorious for having poor relationships. After all, a career of drinking and drugging needs lying, deceit, manipulation, self-centeredness, and grandiosity as tools to get what the addict or alcoholic wants...the ability to use and protect the supply. Add to these overt behaviors the fact that most addicts and alcoholics have very poor boundaries, co-occurring mental health issues, and personal histories that are usually full of abuse and neglect and it is easy to see why building relationships is so hard to do. In fact it is generally true that the only real relationships addicts and alcoholics have are built on resentments - anger about some event from the past - that keeps a person tethered to another person based on the sickness of dislike and sometimes hatred of the other.
This condition cannot hold if a person is to live life happy, joyous and free. We must reach out to others and make healthy bonds with them that are fostered either through the needs of recovery or the desire to help another person. We need to go up to someone at a meeting and tell them how much we admire what they have shared in the meeting, asking them to be our temporary sponsor so a connection can be forged. And, we need to let go of the past so we can rejoin with our families and friends who have long supported us, even when we did not know they truly cared about our lives.
To be part of the larger percentage of people who make it past a year clean and sober, we are going to need to constantly reach beyond our comfort zone and find someone to bond with. Doing that is like vaccinating someone against the horrors of relapse. Such relationships made a big difference in my early recovery and continue to fortify me today.
All the best, Roger W.
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