About the fellowship
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Alcoholics Anonymous, or AA, is a free fellowship of people who help each other get sober and stay sober, one day at a time. It is the largest recovery fellowship in the UK, with meetings in nearly every town and city, every day of the week.
There are no fees, no referrals, and no waiting lists. The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking.
AA is for anyone who thinks they might have a problem with alcohol. You do not have to be sure, you do not have to have lost everything, and you do not have to have stopped drinking before you come. If part of you wonders whether your drinking is a problem, that is reason enough to walk in and listen.
This is the question that keeps a lot of people away, so it is worth answering plainly. AA is spiritual, not religious, and it is not tied to any church or faith. It talks about a higher power of your own understanding, which can be anything you choose, including the group itself, and atheists and agnostics are welcome and common in the rooms. There are also agnostic and secular AA meetings if the traditional language does not suit you.
A meeting usually lasts about an hour. Someone chairs it, reads a short opening, and members share from their own experience of drinking and recovery. You will never be called on or made to speak, and most people just listen for their first few meetings. What is said in the room stays in the room.
AA began in 1935 in Akron, Ohio, when two people who could not stop drinking, known in the fellowship as Bill W. and Dr Bob, found they could stay sober by helping each other. The book Alcoholics Anonymous, the Big Book, followed in 1939, and the fellowship reached the UK in the late 1940s. It is now in nearly every UK community and runs in person, online, and as hybrids.