Questions via Email: 90 meetings in 90 days?

 

 

 

Dear Mr. SponsorPants,

hello im a sober member of aa. i have a conflicting issue though. The whole 90 meetings in 90 days thing...ive read the big book which contains the steps and haven't seen it anywhere...ive also noticed that people hear that and walk right out of meetings ..its re occurring where i live...the reason i ask you this is because i had someone call me and say that if i don't do 90 in 90 will i relapse...thanks ur website is really great.

 

 

 

Well thanks for the kind words, Sober Member.

First off, you're right, the suggestion for someone to do '90 meetings in 90 days' is not in the Big Book -- nor is it in the 12 and 12 nor any other AA lit that I'm aware of (nice loophole, Mr. SP!).

As my first sponsor told me -- and I've told other people I sponsor -- that the program of Alcoholics Anonymous is defined in the book from which our Fellowship takes its name.  What people in AA suggest you do, or try, should always be held up against what's mapped out in the book.  So your habit of checking input with the text is a good one.  If I were to make any suggestion at all to you it is to carry on with that good practice.

This whole 90-in-90 is, however, a common suggestion, made often to new people, or done by AA members with some time (one of my sponsees with double digit sobriety decided on their own to do it again) to either help establish a foundation, or to turn up the volume on the meeting experience; get a "booster shot" if you will, of AA medicine.  And there is much wisdom in the fellowship, based on our collective experience, outside of what the Big Book says.  So yes, check and see if something's in the book, but just because it's not doesn't immediately mean it's not helpful or worthwhile.  Common sense and feedback from others is a good filter for all AA direction.  (In my case of course, when I was new, I had zero common sense -- and I'm not sure I have much more today -- so I generally stick close to AA principle and direction from trusted spiritual advisers -- both in the form of sponsors and sober friends.)

(I have to confess to having a bit of an argument over this suggestion.  Some feel it means strictly that one goes to a meeting every day for 90 days.  That is the spirit of the suggestion, yes -- but if you've got a conflict on one day and making a meeting is especially difficult, going to two on another day can sort of "make up" the missed meeting.  I think it is unhealthy to be didactic about AA -- one should embrace the spirit of AA's suggestions, not just the letter of them.)

If you "don't do 90 in 90 you will relapse."  I can't say one way or the other.  There is more to sobriety than meeting attendance (though my sobriety isn't much without it, either.) 

People who hear that suggestion and "walk right out of meetings" would find a different reason to walk right out if they didn't hear that, I suspect -- some people are just looking for a reason to leave.  And that's out of my/your/our hands.  Do I think coming on too strongly can turn people off? Yes -- and in a number of places the Big Book addresses how that is not a helpful way to be in the context of 12th Step work (and what is a meeting if not always that, eh?).   

In your specific case, I would consider the source of the suggestion.  Is this a person who generally offers you good, calm, sober input?  Or are they perhaps a bit rigid or militant in their AA?  I often think of what the Big Book says when talking about how we should frame our sober sex lives -- that we should "avoid hysterical advice" and to (paraphrasing here) watch out for extremes of thinking.  That's a good way to process a lot of things, actually.

But alcoholism is serious business.  People may call AA a kind of self-help group, but that's not what it is to me.  It is a life-saving dose of medicine against my alcoholism -- it is a 24 hour reprieve each day which keeps sick thinking and profoundly self-destructive impulses at bay.

No matter who made the suggestion, or what you feel about them, maybe the universe is giving you a nudge?  What harm can it do to hit 90 meetings in 90 days?  Certainly it will be the aforementioned booster shot, and more importantly, rather than doing something for your sobriety, maybe it will give you the opportunity to do something for someone else's... and THAT is the best protection against relapse I know.

Good luck!

Mr. SponsorPants

 

Comments

[dAAve u]

I'm addicted to AA meetings. I go every day. It's also my social life. LOL

[Luna]

I went to 2 a day when I joined because I was close to death. It kept me busy and out of my head. If a person can spend 3 hours drinking a day, for example, then suggesting a 1 hour meeting/day is not unreasonable. There is also plenty of wiggle room in that 90-90 business.

It all comes down to willingness... Are they really ready? I love my meetings! Friends, fun, sobriety...awesome!

[Rhivenn]

I did not make 90-in-90 when I first got sober, but I did make about 5 meetings a week for the first 2 or 3 months. I think one of the main reasons 90-in-90 has become such a popular suggestion, is to help the newcomer form a new habit. In that light, I think it's a very good suggestion (though, not following it to perfection, does not necessarily mean a person will relapse.)

It takes time for meetings to have an effect on most of us, and many of us felt like we were drowning when we first got sober, and that meetings were the only life-raft we had. I think you're right, Mr. SP, when you say those people will likely find any excuse to walk out of a meeting, because they're just not truly ready.

P.S. I'm happy to see you blogging with regularity again!

[Molls]

I did more than 90 in 90 when I first came in-- and still couldn't stay sober.(Like you said, Mr. SP, there's more to it...) BUT I did hear the things that later "came together" and brought me to the point that I was able to make 24 hours, and then another, and another...Without those meetings, I probably would have drank much, much longer, had a worse life (and the life of my children certainly would have been worse) and very possibly been dead before I sobered up. I don't know if it was the meetings, or which of the suggestions helped me make it, but I am grateful for all of them. I love meetings, now; they help me remember to work my program, and what that program is, and how to do that. I think the advice to look to the person who is advising is good; there are many bad examples (and I've gotten some great wisdom of what I don't want to do from them!). Yet, sometimes those very folks come up with something that resonates....

[Daisyanon]

I didn't do 90 in 90 although I did as many as I could.

I've heard it explained that for someone whose life revolved around drinking then the discipline of getting to meetings, being in meetings, getting home from meetings helps use up and structure some of the time that would previously have been spent preparing to drink, drinking and recovering enough to prepare for the next drink....

I've heard a lot of people say it was a big help to them.

[charlie]

People will come in and out until they "let go of their old ideas". I go to about 10 meetings a week and have been doing so for 16 years. I let go of my old ideas.

[JBP]

I haven't visited this site in some time now. Since I'm almost two years sober I find that I don't do anything with quite the same regularity that I did when first returning.
I came back to AA after a 10 year relapse - my defiant period - and arrived in a condition that for a period of time precluded drinking and using because I was just so sick. I was broke too which didn't hurt. But more than anything I was broken. I didn't go to meetings looking for anything besides a place to go. Since I'd been before I knew there'd be a level of acceptance that was unlikely anywhere else and I puzzled to determine where anywhere else was.
I didn't speak to many people and I didn't get much out of the meetings. Each one was more a change of scenery than anything else. How many did I go to in how many days? Might as well ask me how many times I visited the bathroom last Thursday. I didn't count meetings. I didn't count days, I didn't count. I just went.
Eventually I began to heal and realized that meetings were somehow intrinsic to that healing. How, I didn't know, but I wasn't about to change anything that appeared to be working. I've never fought with the desire to drink or use since returning. I haven't fought with AA since returning either though I allowed myself to openly question things that didn't make sense to me or didn't seem particularly helpful as long as I wasn't being provocative. So far so good.
I'm not a thumper. I don't give much advice because I honestly don't know what exactly is working. However i am a member of a group. I'm the librarian now. I will chair meetings when asked. I've spoken a few times. And I do look to make newcomers feel welcome. But beyond that I believe the magic for me is in the community. For the first time in my life I'm not looking to graduate. I find AA is a community to which I belong in every sense of that word. Still I don't take every piece of advice i hear - some of it still smacks of hair shirt penance - and I don't really care what others do. Not my business. I generally don't like AA aphorisms though in some instances some can effectively capture a difficult idea. But difficult ideas still deserve some thought and effort if I'm really to make sense of them.
So 90 in 90 is two things I don't like. It's a prescription which I'm loath to write. And it is smugly trite. One of those things meant to seem self evident and beyond question when, for the person who is usually on the receiving end of that one, nothing is self evident nor beyond question.
I don't believe there is a map that will lead anybody out of the woods of active addiction and alcoholism. We trip fall and fumble and, if we're lucky we find ourselves one day in a clearing. If we're lucky again there's a guide there who can then provide us a map designed to keep us from getting lost again. Doesn't seem like much at the time but if hung onto and referred to with some regularity it seems to do what it was designed for.

[Brad]

Without abstinence from sex, recovery is impossible???? Where is that written, stated, or expressed? That is not an idea that I have ever read anywhere. I just want to understand why such a large generalization is being made. I haven't had a drink for over five years and I did not obstain from sex.

[soberinWI]

I did not do a 90 and 90 when I first came in 14 months ago. I have been sober consecutively this whole time, but just now am I starting a 90 and 90. I just got a car and feel that it is such a blessing that I wouldn't have without this program; with winter depression starting to set in and a rough patch in life, I decided to embark on the 90 and 90 journey. (90 meetings and 90 days seems like a lot. But am I willing?) No one told me to do it, but I know it's already helping so much and I have the chance to meet new people and attend meetings I wouldn't normally go to! It's been a huge blessing to me.

[curtis]

i would like to do 90 meetings in 90 day how do i do it

[Bridgette]

Many meetings, many chances...
Few meetings, few chances...
No meetings, no chances...