Stick With the Stickers

Stick With the Stickers

As I had never known anyone in recovery when I hit bottom, the process that I surrendered to in search of sobriety was totally foreign to me. Part of the protocol for a self-referral in my military setting was to attend a two-week alcohol and drug addiction class while being introduced to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. In the first day in this class, the seasoned recovering soldier up front declared that we would be able to obtain sobriety if we would do just five things. As he reached for the chalk to write on the board, I reached for my pen and paper. I desperately wanted to stay sober and was eager to learn the secrets that I had not been able to find on my own (despite trying all the things our big book describes). He wrote:
1.Don’t drink (when everyone sighed, he added that the remaining four ensured #1)
2.Go to meetings
3.Get a sponsor
4.Read the book
5.Stick with the stickers
The rest of the class that day focused on the disease of alcoholism, and while I was interested and listening, I kept pondering the five secrets to achieve lasting sobriety.
As I said earlier, I had no previous exposure to recovery, and I had some incorrect assumptions about it. I thought that meetings were more classes to teach us where we had previously gone wrong with our sober attempts and then we would go on with our lives. I thought the slogans on the wall posters, coffee mugs, and bumper stickers where summary reminders of the secrets that would aid us to stay true to the lessons. Thus, I made every effort to read and memorize all the bumper stickers that I could. I wanted to be a good student and craved sobriety, so I studied these slogans in an effort to “Stick with the stickers.”
During this two-week class, my program consisted of not drinking, listening at meetings, planning to get a sponsor when I found the perfect one, reading the big book, and sticking with bumper stickers. When I heard people in meetings say that they had been sober for periods over a month or two, I felt sorry for them that they were such slow learners. I had been a secret drinker, and learning to share in recovery was a very slow process. I stayed to myself and rarely talked to anyone at meetings, and thus never asked why people were at meetings when they had been sober for a while.
On the last day of class, our instructor again wrote the five secrets on the board, and this time he commented on #5. He said, when you’re at meetings, look around and find those folks who keep coming back. Stick with those stickers. They are the winners, as recovery is not only about not drinking but also about learning to live happy, joyous, and free lives while sober. Huh?! I nearly fell out of my chair with this news. This was a life-long program? I needed to become part of this “fellowship” that I heard about at meetings? I should get close to these people? My head spun and my heart raced with panic. Only by the Grace of God, I was willing to listen and try to follow his suggestions.
Today, I am twenty years sober and living an incredible happy, joyous, and free life. I wouldn’t trade it for the anything, and I owe it all to AA. The program and the fellowship have enabled me to live without alcohol and have enriched my life beyond my wildest dreams. The fellowship holds the closest friends I have ever known, and I trust my life to them on a daily basis. Whenever I hear the slogan, “Stick with the stickers,” I smile and say a prayer of gratitude for both my original interpretation as well as the intended meaning of the words. I needed and will forever cherish both the AA bumper stickers and those recovering folks who have gone before me and so graciously pass the program on.