Teen Alcohol Treatment
Confused and damaged teenagers are struggling to both fit in and stand out. Most of these mixed-up kids are drinking alcohol. It’s cheap, easily available and very effective in drowning their sorrows. The lost teenagers who find A.A. early on are the lucky ones. Most people who come to A.A. are in mid-life still deal with not having worked out similar childhood traumas. There is hope for all who come to share in the diversity of our meetings, and yet, we barely scratch the surface.

The modern day subject matter at an A.A. meeting is all by itself provocative, but mostly it is about finally having a voice. A shaky, at-the-edge-of-life-and-death voice, sensitive and emotional maybe, but not buffoons, and once sober we do not look the other way at the social problems that beset our lives. A.A. has inadvertently provided a live-and-let-live movement around the world, but it only deals with the alcohol problem. Yet I think if we take care of that problem by working the 12-Steps into our lives, the other social problems will take care of themselves.

If we all pitch in, we can end the insanity of a disease killing our young people. Together with education or early intervention we can stop the madness before it gets started. So that no child is left behind, rehabilitation is possible. I myself was caught in just such an unsuspecting trap and have returned from the brink of death. My sobriety is of little use in the closet. I break silence as a member of A.A., but I would die before I broke the anonymity of others in the program.

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