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From the Book

If You Want What We Have:
Sponsorship Meditations
By Joan Larkin

©1998 Joan Larkin

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A man takes a drink, the drink takes another, and the drink takes the man.
Sinclair Lewis

Newcomer

I’ve heard Alcoholics Anonymous members say, “It’s the first drink that gets you drunk,” and Overeaters Anonymous members say, “Don’t take that first compulsive bite.” It seems a little extreme. Don’t Twelve Step programs allow for the possibility of doing things in moderation?


Sponsor

There are numerous stories of addicted people who started with the idea that they’d have “just one” of whatever it was. Hours, days, or weeks later, they were still in the middle of a binge. Most of us, when we were active in our addictions, promised ourselves repeatedly that we’d be moderate, though we’d already accumulated plenty of evidence that we lacked the desire and the capacity for moderation. One we started using, no matter how seemingly insignificant the beginning, we were under the control of our addiction. We experienced a craving that no quantity of a drug or repetition of and additive behavior could satisfy.

There are people on this planet who leave wine unfinished in their glasses and food uneaten on their plates. There are people who can do in moderation what people filling the seats at meetings couldn’t stop doing, once they started. But we are not those people. If we’ve suffered from an addiction enough to come here for treatment, why would we want to keep playing with denial?


Today, I’m strengthened by accepting my need to take special measures to protect my health and recovery.