Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is America's oldest alcohol addiction treatment. Its elements have been integrated into almost every treatment center for alcoholism and drug addiction. For teenagers, this presents special challenges in certain steps of the program. Also, some factors may be ignored in the AA approach, especially prevention and core treatment concerns.
Problematic Parts of AA in Effective Teen Treatment
An uncredited author writes in Are Twelve Step Programs Useful for Teenagers on a rehab advocation website, that AA membership is composed of only 12% of people under 20 years of age. While this number is low, the top concern for many parents remains alcohol problems in their sons and daughters. Why the contradiction between youth needs for effective treatment and total AA make up?
AA is composed of 12 steps. Steps 5 through 9, are especially difficult for young addicts because they represent challenges only able to be met by persons developmentally capable of formal operations in cognitive thinking. The steps are:
- Five. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
- Six. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
- Seven. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
- Eight. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
- Nine. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
These are difficult for anyone to do effectively, much less an adolescent. If alcohol addiction is present, the teen may be stuck developmentally where the drinking began. This will make accomplishing the steps correctly impossible without the assistance of inpatient programming.
Alternatives and Supplemental Therapy for 12 Steps
AA is effective if it is applied daily to the life of the person suffering from addiction. However, the behavior of drinking is the only focus of the group. Many people feel this falls short of achieving effective treatment.
Chris Prentiss' book The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure [Power Press, 2007] points out the special need for parents to be involved in prevention. Prentiss also presses for the idea of discovering the true root of why the adolescent is acting out to the point of addiction.
Prevention is, of course, the best treatment because it is aimed at stopping the behavior before it begins. It is the duty of every parent to have an honest conversation with his or her son or daughter about the use and abuse of alcohol. Prevention points to make include:
- Alcohol is a drug. It has very definite effects. Although it may deliver a sense of relaxation or well being, it also aggressively attacks brain development and organ structure.
- Alcohol use for a teen is illegal. The consequences of its use will be out of your hands because law enforcement will be involved.
- Alcohol is often used experimentally. However, there are specific signs of addiction and binge drinking. These should be covered with your son or daughter.
The Root of the Problem
As mentioned previously, drinking may be just an experimental process taken during adolescence. How strongly you feel about the act will determine how your react to the condition. However, there is a difference between having one drink and full blown alcoholism in adolescents. If alcoholism is present in your adolescent, there may be an underlying cause they needs to be identified.
The Trauma Program at Timberlawn Hospital in Dallas, Texas, advocates the concept of addiction existing as a result of an attempt to resolve a painful situation. Drinking is a self-medicating action to avoid dealing with a past trauma. These traumas may include childhood abuse, both physical, sexual and mental, or current psychiatric problems such as anxiety or depression.
Until these issues are resolved, the behavior is likely to continue. This is especially true for adolescents who have developmentally limited coping skills. The Trauma Program suggests inpatient programming in which not only is the drinking stopped and the body detoxed, but past transgressions against the child are explored and resolved.
For parents dealing with an alcoholic son or daughter, 12 step programs, including AA, offer a solution for daily sober living. Parents should be prepared for some steps to prove very troublesome. In addition to twelve step programs, parents should begin with elements of prevention, reflect a model lifestyle and consider inpatient programs which explore the root causes of the addiction. After inpatient programming, AA offers ongoing support.
Reece Manley - Reece W. Manley, DD,M.Ed.MPM, works in a number of fields using his extensive experience and educational background in human development, ...
