For my first few weeks in AA I stood in a corner clutching a plastic cup containing tea (or what passed for tea!) and watched amazed and terrified at all these alcoholics talking to each other, I was truly baffled by it and wondered how on earth they did it. I watched them very carefully but couldn't seem to work it out.

About 3 weeks in and a scrawny little Scotsman said to me: 'Away over here and help me make this tea.' I was too scared to tell him to f**k off so I did it. It really helped a lot because when people came to the serving hatch they would usually say hi and ask me how I was before they asked for tea or coffee, so I started to get to know people just a little and (more importantly to me at the time) they got to know me too.

I think I was about 7 years sober before I felt entirely comfortable approaching someone I had never seen before - I did it, but it took me that long to feel comfortable doing it.

AA has it's own 'language' and we just forget how weird and mysterious it might sound to a newcomer. I can't tell you how many times I have been working on the helpline and overheard someone ask a prospect 'Would you like a 12 step call?' How the hell would they know what a 12 step call is! LOL

So, we got to meetings and hear talk of Big Books and God and Steps and Sponsors and 12&12s and Meditation and Principles before personalities and serenity prayer ..... and we wonder what the hell we have let ourselves in for. If we are always speaking in those terms, expecting a newcomer to just join in a conversation would be like asking them to speak in Swahili - they don't know the lingo!!

So, let's remember that - to keep AA as 'user-friendly' as we can and to make the first move to welcome someone even if we find it difficult Bill Wilson once wrote that 'pain is the touchstone of all spiritual growth' and even though I threw the book across the room in frustration when I read that - I think he might've been right.

To newcomers all I can say is: we really are a friendly lot, we just don't always think - it's an occupational hazard - but i know this to be absolutely true - you ARE welcome and valued - you are the lifeblood of AA and it's members! Now will you please get your ass to a meeting????

When I started going to AA meetings, I was petrified. During the meeting, I would sit in a corner hoping I wouldn't get called on. If I bumped into a chair, I would say "sorry"

Everyone was friendly and seemed genuinely happy to have me there (my family wasn't giving me pats on the back for doing what I should have been doing all along!)

One night my sponsor said out loud to me before a standing room only meeting "you look so pretty tonight" I thought someone overheard her feeling sorry for me and ran out the back door and drove home!

After the meeting, a group would always go to Denny's for more fellowshipping.

After a couple months, after watching the folks there, I went and started gathering ashtrays, mind you, waiting for someone to scream "put those down!". No one did. So, I graduated to washing the ashtrays, then running the vacuum. Finally, I knew I had arrived! I got to clean the bathrooms!

It was a matter of days after that people were calling me by name and after the meeting one night, one of the oldtimers said "hey Dianna, we're going to Denny's, are ya comin'?"

That night, that group became my home group. I never felt out of place again.

Today, I stand at the door and welcome people as they come in the door.
You see, us folks in AA really do value the newcomer and all who come in from the cold looking for a solution as we all did!

I think most people walk into the rooms for the first time absolutely petrified and with shattered self esteem. I think that that is actually a good sign, cos they are hyper sensitive to the message.

I remember my first ever meeting. It was in Barcelona and I was so overwhelmed by the whole thing it was crazy. My dear friend accompanied me to the first few meetings, I really don;t think I'd have had the courage to go alone. I was met by a couple of guys who asked if I was new. My friend had to speak for me cos I was just too scared. They took me in a side room, friend holding my hand (metaphorically) and proceeded to talk about their drinking exploits - something about drinking in protitiute bars is all I remember (I identified with that I'm ashamed to admit).

I was then taken back into the main meeting. I think the whole language thing was just one bridge too far. They moved between Catalan and Spanish throughout the meetings and people reminded them they had a foreigner in their midst so they tried to keep it to Spanish as best they could. It was a round robin meeting and I managed to mumble a few words in Spanish that I thought that this would help. made it to about 2 more meetings, but I just think that detoxing, having all the cultural and linguistic differences and being absolutely paralysed by fear and a life that was falling apart was just too much for me to handle. The illness had me by the balls and I went back out on the rampage.

Fast forward a couple of years. 5 months or so into a 24/7 relapse and feeling lonely and desperate I was in a chatroom seeking company. trouble was, not many of the peoplein there were drinking with me, but hey at least i was amongst my own - and the cultural differences weren;t too overpowering as Americans are quite like the Brits in a lot fo ways and the language is practically the same. I also connected with a few Brits - which was pretty powerful. Anyway they had nagged me for a couple of months and finally one day I announced I was going to a meeting. I was absolutely pye-eyed and half way through a second bottle of single malt. I was advised that maybe I should go when sober. Fuck that, I said, I'm going and that's it.

I had no idea what time it was and amazingly I ended up arriving very early for the meeting. I sat on the pavement and sent a couple of customary abusive text messages to someone who I thought had been treating me unfairly and promptly lost my phone, probably 2 yards from where I lay and fell asleep. It was a Sunday and the church's prayer group turned up, woke me up and took me inside for a cup of tea, bless them (oh and a biscuit!). I hadn;t lost my half full bottle of whisky, naturally. They gently prised it out of my hands when i announced I was an alcoholic (I think i thought that that was the AA meeting for a while) and made a joke that even though i was an alkie, I certainly had good taste in my sauce. i liked them for that. they seemed kind. Anyway, soon they announced that the AA meeting was about to start next door. I asked for my beloved whisky back and marched into the meeting taking a slug. I asked if it was ok to bring the bottle in and was politely told to leave it outside. I obliged, by a few inches and well within my sight - no-one was gonna nick it off me!

I caused a bit of a fuss, accusing the secretary of being gay, which he was. I felt quite embarassed at my outbursts (I later learned that he wasn;t at all upset and was only concerned that i was about to proposition him, boy I had judged that one wrong all that time - the beauty of amends :)). Anyway, i felt moved to share my profound experience with the room and they looked on in sympathy. I quite liked that. I did keep it short though, thankfully. At the end of the meeting I retreived my beloved bottle and ceremoniously poired out the contents outside as a show of defiance and how i had this thing beat. I marched off defiantly to the pub, afterall i had no idea where i was in the city and had to try and find out. So, I suppose you could say it didn't go all that well and the guilt of the episode kept me away for another several months.

Ok first meeting sober. Saturday night at a drugs and alcohol centre. The first person I see is the gay guy I thought I had insulted at the first meeting. He remembered me and was most welcoming and listened to my mumbled words of apology. The truth be told, I had no steam left in me and all i wanted to do was listen to these guys and really find out what this AA thing was all about.

I think the thing that really sucked me in was the warmth of the people, the lack of social pretence, the honesty shared and, if I'm perfectly honest, i quite enjoyed all the stories of misery and drinking, lost families, spent money, heartache, fear, isolation, desperation. They were me afterall. It just kinda made sense that a bunch of drunks got together to stay sober and I just thought "this is the stuff, I don;t really know what this stuff is, but its for me alright".

My confidence grew with a few meetings and it wasn;t long before I had a sponsor and was really getting into the book. I've been trying to deepen my experience of all aspects of AA ever since. The fear-based resistence I felt in those meetings in Barcelona is not there anymore.

I think the beauty of AA, and few may realise this, is that it is available in your own town with people just like you linguistically and culturally. It makes identification so much easier and it is much easier to fit in that way.

I'm glad I went back, it really is good stuff and I look forward to going back to that group in Barcelona to say hi to the people there - perhaps I'll get more from it next time and god forbid, i may even contribute a bit to it ;)

A couple of suggestions for newcomers. There really isn't much ice to be broken in AA, it doesn't seem to be bound by the same social rules as society at large. The only issues are the ones you take in there with you.

Why not just go up to someone and say "Hi, I liked your share" or "Hi, I'm feeling a bit scared"

Hi nicky, nice topic. Oh wow, my first AA meeting I was scared. Scared I wouldn't say the right thing, even though I didn't know what that was lol. I sat on my hands and hoped no-one would look at me, but I felt like everyone was. I was shaking a bit, but that might have been the DT's.

There were quite a few of us 'newcomers', so they went around the room and introduced each other. "Hi I'm Jack and I'm an alcoholic". Huh? I couldn't say THAT. So I just said "Hi I'm Leanne and I drink too much" I pretty much expected someone to have a go at me, but they didn't. They just moved on to the next person. I felt like yelling at them "well, arn't you going to tell me I did wrong?", but no-one did. Hmm

For the rest of that first meeting I just counted the words in the 12 step banner at the front of the room, all 200 of them, over and over again. After the meeting a few came and talked to me, asked me where I was from and how I was travelling that day. They were really nice. I was quiet and didn't say much, but I wasn't as scared at the end of the meeting compared to the start.

The second meeting was when I got a reality check. It was a bigger meeting and people were speaking of their experiences. One man spoke about how his drinking had affected his family, oh boy, that hit a nerve. I'd left my husband and 3yo daughter to enter rehab a week before, and hearing him talk about how his drinking had affected his loved ones just hit so hard I didn't see it coming and I just burst out crying.

I ran out of the room and sat on the step and sobbed. A woman came out and put her arm around me and said "It gets better". She stood me up blubbering and all, and took me back inside. I stayed and talked to that man after the meeting, he made me a cup of tea, smiled and stayed by my side for the next 30min whilst people came and introduced themselves. This is when I knew I wasn't alone. I felt safe there. To tell you the truth, probably the first place I've ever felt safe.

After a while, I stopped counting the words on the banner and started to read them. One thing I did notice early on is that all those AAers were happy, they laughed a lot, even after what they'd been through. I still attend AA, and am active with Defence Force addiction programs, and yep, laugh a LOT lol. I'm 10 years sober in May and making a trip back to that first home group. I'm so excited, I can't wait. Coogee xxx

I've been sober for 48 hours. I've been to 4 meetings in that time. I have never met more generous, accepting people in my life. A lovely woman bought me the Big Book my first meeting, 10 other women gave me their phone numbers and told me to call them anytime. Several of them called to see how I was doing the next day and offered to meet me at the next meeting and introduce me to people. I got hugs and felt like I belonged. I can't wait to go to my next meeting because I know it is the only way I can achieve sobriety and that everyone there is rooting for me. Yes, I want what those of you with years of sobriety have, because you are nothing short of saints. I don't know that I will ever be able to give back what has been given to me in such a short amount of time. AA is a miracle because of people like you. Thank you.

Wow, that group sounds really nice, I have to say. Even I want what they have! :-)

Try to get involved with helping people too, it's really nice to be like they are, it really helps. Soon there will be someone coming through the doors behind you.

I got a great welcome when I went to my first meeting. I didn't find it hard to be a part of it.Since I was an alcoholic. I didn't want what you people had, but I had enough of what I had , for sure.