[vander512]

My therapist wants me to go to AA and get a sponsor. Shouldn’t that be her job? If I work with a sponsor what do I need her for? Does anyone want to share their experience working with a sponsor. How is it different from a regular therapy session?

Originally Posted by vander512

My therapist wants me to go to AA and get a sponsor. Shouldn’t that be her job? If I work with a sponsor what do I need her for? Does anyone want to share their experience working with a sponsor. How is it different from a regular therapy session?

It's not AA, but my therapist recently suggested I check out CODA (codependents anonymous) meetings. I went to one, and then went back the next week, now it's been a month of going weekly and it's been really helpful to me already. In my case the sharing with other codependent peeps who are in the same soup as me so to speak is helpful in a different way from how my t is. Not sure if that helps at all?

[nikon]

does she want you to stop seeing her and just go to AA? a sponsor can't replace a therapist, because they aren't a professional, but it's a totally different experience having a sponsor vs a therapist. a sponsor can guide you through the aa program, if you decide to do it, and relate their experiences to you, and listen to all of your experiences. a therapist isn't going to relate to you personally; a sponsor is a closer relationship, because you share personal stuff, and have someone letting you know that they understand what you've been through, because they have too.

for me, having a sponsor has been like building one of the first real relationships i've ever had. they're not a therapist, not a friend, but like a combination of both and more - trusted friend, mentor etc. a sponsor will mostly focus on the aa program though, and will probably not have the psychology-related insights that a therapist might have. eg: they might not be of great help if you need to explore trauma, depression etc. my sponsor has been supportive but he doesn't know what to do if i get severely depressed - then i have to go to my therapist.

[Taylor27]

My therapist suggested the same thing to me a year ago, infact he post poned our sessions til I went to a AA meeting. I still have not gotten a sponser my AA is pretty small group of women also i go online. I am afraid if i do get a sponser therapy wont be avalible to me. I do not believe AA or a sponser should replace therapy. There are allot of things i would never tell in AA with my past childhood or my sponser. So sorry for going on about me. I hope someone can explain it to you better the difference between sponser and therapist.

[WarmFuzzySocks]

The roles of therapist and sponsor are so different that one cannot replace the other.

A sponsor relationship is more like a been-there-done-that mentorship with someone who is stable in their own recovery. The sponsor is someone who can offer a different kind of support and a different kind of outside accountability than a therapist can offer, and the boundaries are different. For example, a sponsor is unpaid, could meet you for coffee, can freely share their personal story and experiences, and so on.

[nottrustin]

Part of my program deals with substance abuse. We requireour clients to attend AA. The reason is that it is another form of support. They hold meetings 7 days a week at all hours of the day. With sponsors you can call whenever the urge to drink arises.arises

[stopdog]

Some of my clients have been required to attend AA by judges and it is a total joke. Requiring attendance for some other reason than a person wanting to try AA never helped any one I represented.
But, if you have not tried it, would it hurt to at least give a go for a month to see if you found it useful or not. AA is not for everyone but why not at least see if it would help.

[Carmina]

I'd suggest looking carefully and with critical faculties engaged at the 12 steps and its history - the programme has a strongly religious element not everyone would be comfortable with, and I would have concerns about the judgemental and disempowering aspects too - just don't feel pressured into this just because your therapist 'recommends' it (why do they do this?). If there is a dependency problem there are alternative programmes that are more evidence based and less judgemental and a therapist should be aware of those and give you options and informed choices, not recommendations.

[WishfulThinker66]

After my raising my concerns about my daughter's relationship with alcohol and lifestyle my pdoc suggested ALANON. I went to a meeting at three different groups and came away feeling more than a little angry with him. For apparently, he did not know me at all. He had failed to register things we had outright spoken about or nods to certain subject matters. For instance, some of my issues pertain to my resentment with organised religion owing to my past. Why the H would he have then suggested I attend something so obviously churchy that it made me ill. He obviously paid no attention to me at all.

[stopdog]

Maybe he did not know that much about alanon either.

[Anne2.0]

I think AA can be a supplement to, but not a replacement for therapy. I don't have any personal experience to share but I have known lots of people for whom the AA model works for, no matter what the "A" is-- drugs, sex, bad relationships, food, etc. I would see meetings and a sponsor as forms of additional support besides your therapist and it might just be something that helps you, and it's free. Give it a try and it may end up working for you, otherwise you've lost a few hours of your time.

[luvyrself]

Originally Posted by vander512

My therapist wants me to go to AA and get a sponsor. Shouldn’t that be her job? If I work with a sponsor what do I need her for? Does anyone want to share their experience working with a sponsor. How is it different from a regular therapy session?

—-the posts here are very good. I lived for 4 yrs w a man who was 13 yrs into recovery. AA provides a lot of structure thru a lot of rules, something I feel is sorely missing in most therapy. The relationship w yr sponsor is closer and they put up w less nonsense than a therapist. My dad was an alcoholic. He might have treated himself and othersmuch better if he had commited to AA. I wouldn’t say AA is religious. They want you to tap into your higher power which is different for different people.

[Deejay14]

I think it all depends on the type of meeting one goes to. AA meetings can vastly differ. I have to say I have been to both Alanon and AA and did not find them to be churchy. So I would suggest you try different meetings.

[mostlylurking]

Originally Posted by vander512

My therapist wants me to go to AA and get a sponsor. Shouldn’t that be her job? If I work with a sponsor what do I need her for? Does anyone want to share their experience working with a sponsor. How is it different from a regular therapy session?

If this was a suggestion about a way that you could possibly increase your social support, I could understand that, and perhaps it's worth trying, for you. AA does work for some people.

If it is part of your treatment plan -- more of an instruction or requirement -- I would consider that highly problematic, personally, because it's not scientifically justified. There are treatments that are considerably more effective.

So I guess it depends what your T is thinking you would get out of the sponsor relationship?

Originally Posted by vander512

My therapist wants me to go to AA and get a sponsor. Shouldn’t that be her job? If I work with a sponsor what do I need her for? Does anyone want to share their experience working with a sponsor. How is it different from a regular therapy session?

My primary mental health issue was a serious addiction to alcohol, which very much dominated a decade of my life and was, hands down, the most difficult challenge of my life. By the time I first went to therapy, I had more than a year of sobriety but then had a few relatively short but intense relapses, while in therapy! For me, therapy did not help at all with the alcohol problem/relapses - if anything, I educated the Ts about it and about different recovery methods. They pretty much only knew about rehabs, AA and harm reduction, even in a major city where information and recovery communities/meetings are very abundant.

I've tried AA myself. I did not do it regularly for a long time because it ended up not being the program that was most helpful for me. But going to meetings and having people to discuss both the ordeals and recovery with was helpful, especially when I struggled with frequent and intense cravings. Most people who have used AA successfully as their main method say that what works is not primarily the meetings, but the 12-step program it is based on. The whole thing was originally described in the book Alcoholics Anonymous at AA's inception, but the idea of the sponsor developed further later. Basically, a sponsor is meant to be another person in AA, ideally with a good chunk of sobriety, who used the program successfully themselves and would guide you through the 12 steps in a structured manner. Different sponsors have different styles though, there is no training for it other than what they hear from peers and everyone's own experience. There are no formal ethical guidelines either. Sponsors are also supposed to be available for phone calls or quick meetings when their sponsee is particularly struggling. I always think that this style would work better than therapy for those many people who want lots of "out of session" contact - in these programs, there is nothing that prohibits it, just depends on the individual sponsor. Basically, a sponsor in AA is a sort of sober mentor. They are not meant to be used for general coaching, mental health and emotional advice, although (unfortunately) some of them want to be way too all-encompassing and controlling, without having the necessary knowledge and experience, which can also become a problem. Also, a therapist indeed is not meant to be a sponsor, I don't think many of them have the first hand experience (although I know a few Ts who are recovered addicts). I've heard some people using a T for some very specific parts of the 12-step program that only require someone's confidential listening. They would not be the go-to person momentarily when we are struggling with impulses and urges at all sorts of random times.

For me personally, AA was my least favorite organized recovery program. It is not necessarily religious but some parts of steps are certainly more esoteric and require some sort of faith. AA meetings are also quite ritualistic and some people detest that. Others find exactly the simple rituals and dogmas helpful. I did find value in some of the steps and in some meetings, but many aspects are not very compatible with me and my personality. It was still a better choice than drinking when I was stuck in it. Still provided more help than therapy ever had.

There are other programs that involve peer meetings but unfortunately these are much less abundant than AA and not always easy to find unless one lives in a larger city. My absolute favorite was SMART:
SMART Recovery | Self-Help Addiction Recovery
This is what would be considered more "evidence-based", although there really aren't many scientific studies specifically on it, especially comparing with other programs. It's tools use various behavioral therapy-based approaches and exercises that focus primarily on developing a personal toolkit for relapse prevention without any esoteric concept and without having to dig deep into our emotions - the goal, before all else, is to achieve steady abstinence. Meeting discussions are centered around people's experiences with these tools and encouraged to remain relatively unstructured but practical. I personally came across a lot more like-minded people in SMART than in AA.

Then there is Refuge Recovery: Refuge Recovery – A Buddhist Path to Recovering from Addiction
This one is based off Buddhist principles. It has a textbook also called Refuge Recovery. This was my second favorite as I do identify with some of the Buddhist values naturally and had a pretty long-term interest even before my recovery. Less practical than SMART though.

Rational Recovery is basically a concept and the method (Addictive Voice Recognition Technique) is a cognitive exercise:
Rational Recovery | Welcome to Rational Recovery
This one does not have meetings and it's a bit antagonistic toward AA mostly. If one can use the technique effectively (usually people who still have a good dose of mental focus and willpower), it pretty much solves the addictive behavior itself. It does not provide any larger context or discipline though. A form of this is basically what I mostly used in the moments when I experienced cravings. It requires pretty effective cognitive power over emotions and impulses.

Finally, I used an online forum on the website called Sober Recovery quite heavily. It's similar to this forum but focused on abstinence-based recovery from various addictions. It has a vast amount of information and discussions on pretty much all the available recovery approaches.

For me, when I was in therapy, my goal was to use a combination of the above tools, general self care methods, and therapy specifically to discuss deeper issues that would require someone more knowledgeable in psychology than what I can find it peer groups. Ironically, I've found people way more informed and experienced in these things here on PC than in any therapist, and therapy quickly became counterproductive for me - it became a form of addiction by itself. I am now over 2 years sober again and no longer feel tempted to return to drinking. I still do go to some meetings here and there as a sort of maintenance. And the discussions on PC (plus my work, as I work in mental health) pretty much satisfy my interests and needs for psychological conversations.

Now going back to Ts saying that they won't see a client until they are in some sort of specialized recovery program - this is coming from the idea that people deeply stuck in active addiction cycle often have little use for honest and accurate investigations into their psyche. Especially addicts still in denial and hiding it. I don't fully agree with this but I definitely also lied to my Ts and basically could not use therapy even as a decent supplement when I was in relapse, because I often hid the relapse and just constantly used interactions with a T as a distraction - not even a high quality distraction. I also believe that once a week therapy is very inappropriate as a main tool for someone stuck in active addiction, for many reasons, one being because drinking/using/whatever rarely occurs around the session. The therapist is rarely available for complex help when it is most needed. Then, I think some kind of Intensive Outpatient Program can be more helpful to break a cycle. But it won't last forever and we still need to develop our own long-term strategies. The first step though is breaking the cycle. I think it's a pretty futile exercise to analyze why we use addictive behaviors while still engaging in it - it is a behavior and we cannot really think/talk ourselves out if it, it requires hardcore action and maintenance.

My first T did not think this way though - he actually discouraged me from even getting a sponsor or any other help but himself. He wanted to monopolize it. I found that utterly irresponsible and destructive. It would have been much more honest and responsible on his end to admit that he was not very helpful and either tell me to seek out other sources or keep our discussions seriously focused on my sobriety for a while, calling me out on my BS, instead of totally (then) useless stuff about my childhood, our relationship and such. I can imagine an intelligent, responsible therapist who knows their limits being helpful to provide support though, but not a main resource for addiction.