Where it All Started

New York 2016

My experience in the Atlantic Group wasn’t like my experience in the Pacific Group. It was much more mild, and not nearly as damaging. But the number of friends from AG who have reached out thanking me for sharing my experience here, and who have shared their experience in AG where they did have very culty experiences, have inspired me to share what my experience of joining AA through Atlantic Group was like, and how it primed me to join the very culty Pacific Group later on.

The date was Tuesday July 5, 2016. I woke up on the couch of an acquaintance in Bushwick Brooklyn, hungover from marathon partying the day before. It was mid-morning, and the sun was already hot and pouring through the windows, heating up my already sweating body. Outwardly, I was a mess. Internally, I was even messier.

I felt dread, and I felt shame. I felt as if the world had nothing more to offer me, and that I was definitely incapable of offering the world anything in this state. I remember thinking very clearly, “I can’t do this anymore. I need help.”

“This” was referring to the partying I had adopted as my entire lifestyle over the previous 3 years. The partying wasn’t much of a party anyway. It was a coping mechanism. It was my way to disengage all of the unbearable thoughts and feelings I didn’t feel equipped to handle, after the death of both of my parents, and a couple of unfortunate traumatic experiences. It was my way of numbing out just enough to stay here. But that morning, I woke up and had a new resolve within me. Something needed to change, and I needed help to make it happen.

The next thought I had was a memory that a friend a year prior had told me, “If you’re serious about getting sober, go to the Atlantic Group.” So I did a quick Google search and found that there was a meeting happening that night at 7 o’clock, held at a church on the Upper East Side on 60th & Park ave.

I spent the whole day listening to podcasts about sobriety, and staying laser focused on my goal to get sober. I knew that if I let myself get distracted, I could easily talk myself out of going, and I didn’t want to do that to myself. Sometime in the afternoon, I got dressed in the most low-key outfit I could find, which was a tattered, oversized beige t-shirt, and some black bicycle shorts. I hopped on the train toward the Lower East Side, and spent an hour or so in Tompkins Sq. Park people watching and listening to podcasts, killing time before I had to get to the meeting.

When I finally arrived at the massive church on the UES, I observed a large group of people standing on the sidewalk in suits and dresses, and at first, I thought there might have been a separate event happening at the same time as the AA meeting that was surely happening in the basement, where the people who looked more like me would be. At this point, I had a pink and purple colored bob hairstyle, and a septum ring hanging from my nose. I was very clearly a different breed of human from those I saw standing in front of me. I checked the address again on my phone, just to be extra sure I was in the right place, and then at second glance, noticed quite a few of the people smoking cigarettes. No church go-ers I’ve ever met have been smokers. I realized they all must be with the meeting, so I asked them to point me in that direction, and they did.

When I walked inside, there was a line of people to greet me at the door, all smiling and dressed to impress. I immediately asked where the bathroom was, and ran downstairs as quickly as I could to go and hide myself. I clearly didn’t belong here, and surely no one was going to even look at me, let alone talk to me. I started planning an escape route, when I heard a toilet flush, and I panic ran to the sink and started washing my hands. I looked over to my left, and saw a petite woman in a pant suit washing her hands. Then, as a complete shock to myself, I said,

“Hi, I’ve never been here before.”

She responded back kindly, asking if I had a seat, and I told her I did not. So she ushered me upstairs, into the massive sanctuary filled with people, and rows and rows of pews. We walked about 3 rows from the front, and she chatted with a couple of people, and then told me I could sit there, and introduced me to a woman named Susan. We chatted for a minute, and the woman from the bathroom brought over a woman named Nina and introduced us. Nina was fresh faced, and full of energy. She was wearing a black long skirt dress, and she sat down next to me. What I remember from the conversation, was that she asked me a few questions about why I was there, and what my story was, and then she asked if I needed a sponsor, to which I said,

“Yes.”

I couldn’t believe how sincere I was about my resolve to get help. My actions at this meeting were very contrary to my hostile, protective personality I had developed over the last few years of what felt like war to survive. I was just soft enough to be open to what was being offered to me. I felt safe enough to let down my armor for an hour, which was a welcomed, and deeply missed feeling.

Nina agreed to sponsor me, and gave me an assignment to go home and look up the definitions for the word, “self,” and for the word, “honesty,” and to write about what they mean to me, and then I was supposed to call her the next day with the results.

I don’t remember anything else from the meeting, but I know that on the train ride back to my generous acquaintance’s home, I kept thinking, over and over, “Nothing changes if nothing changes.” Something I must have heard at the meeting, or maybe it was just a concept I’ve heard over time, that I was finally really understanding. Kinda like when you listen to a song as a kid, and then again as an adult, and you realize what they’re really singing about. It felt like that.

As soon as I got back, I thought about what I could change immediately, and decided to take out my septum piercing. Repeating as I pulled it out, “Nothing changes, if nothing changes…” It was my new mantra.

The next day, I did as I was asked— I looked up the words and wrote my interpretation of the definitions. I thought it was interesting to consider what self-honesty might mean to me. It was a concept I had long ago abandoned in the name of survival, and this consideration felt like a new challenge for me to change… “nothing changes if…”

It took me a while to get up the courage to call Nina after completing the assignment. I knew she told me to call her, but I was unsure if she ACTUALLY meant she wanted me to call her. I finally decided to ignore my fear, and called. She answered, and we exchanged conversation. I don’t remember hearing anything profound about the definitions, but I do remember she told me about what meetings I should go to the rest of the week, and then that was it. I completed my first assignment. I felt relieved, and I felt good about myself, which wasn’t something familiar for me to feel at that time.

I was 25 years old when I joined AA. I was pretty lost, and desperate for anyone to give me a sense of direction. I intended to join AA to get help, to be sober and get my life back on track… I didn’t realize then that AA was a completely unregulated organization, and that each group is completely autonomous and can choose to run however they like, without any real consequence from the powers that be at the top. There are no powers that be at the top.

Not all AA groups are the same, and I happened to join one of the most structured and, dare I say cult-like groups of the bunch, beginning my 8 year stint of experiencing coercive control, gaslighting, and narcissistic abuse, all in the name of “recovery.”