9.2 – Introducing the 12 Steps of Recovery

Through the rest of this book, I cover the 12 steps of recovery and how they specially relate to us veterans. The 12 steps evolved in AA, but they are applied in some form to many other recovery programs.

They are the guides to a process of healing and recovery. It is most helpful to do them with a sponsor that has gone through them and has at least a few years of sobriety. I also used a self-study workbook and lots of writing in a dedicated notebook. They saved my life. That’s what inspired me to write self-study questions to go with this book.

The 12 Steps of AA

1. We admitted we were powerless over (alcohol, drugs, etc) – that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood him, praying only for the knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Don’t let one phrase or word in any of the steps keep you away or push you out of recovery. I have seen people relapse and disappear because they didn’t like the word “God”, “unmanageable”, “him”, “prayer”, “the”, “of”, you name it.

You are a member in recovery when you say you are. You don’t have to agree with every word in all the steps. That is not a requirement! Don’t let anybody tell you it is. There are also plenty of other non-12 step programs such as SMART or Lifering, so research those too.

If you are religious, that is great. Many return to their faith or watch it grow in sobriety. If you don’t have faith, that is fine too. I have known sober atheists, agnostics, and those with every type of spiritual higher power coming from a variety of philosophies. There are many alternative, secular 12 step programs popping up. Even my own notion of a higher power changes every few months, because I’m special of course.

The step process is a life saving, personal deep dive to go through with a sponsor. Find someone that you can relate to, trust, has similar experiences, and has what you want (maybe peace and long term sobriety?) There are plenty of veterans in sobriety, so ask around to see if any of them will sponsor you. Get one quickly since you need guidance early in sobriety. You can consider them a temporary one and always find another one if they aren’t working out. So, don’t stress too much.

The 12 steps guide us towards a new honesty and humility, things we have lost due to substance abuse. We are led to take responsibility for our addictions and actions. We start to understand we were only victims in our own minds.

As our time in recovery progresses, we begin to share our thoughts and feelings with others in the group. We find we never were alone in our fears, angers, and judgements. It is not easy at first to open up, especially if you have held secrets for a long time. But, after a few weeks and months of doing it, you will embrace the relief that comes from expelling it. You will quickly start to be the one that helps others too. This natural veteran instinct comes back quickly.

What I assumed were my unique thoughts are shared by many people in recovery. I started to listen to the similarities between our stories. I could relate my PTSD and depression to others with various traumas. We are all there for the same reason, to get clean and sober, improve our lives, and not die a miserable death. That is our uniting objective.

Much as the suffering through military experiences united us, I found even stronger bonds in recovery. We had all drank and drugged ourselves into hell. We help each other, using the 12 steps as a basis as we were helped when we first came in.