SLAA Fall Gathering

"If you persist, remarkable things will happen"

Saturday October 9th 11:30 AM - 6:00 PM CST

5555 N Lincoln Ave

An Open Event*

Pre-Registration has closed, but registration will be available day off at the Alano Club for $25

*Open meetings are open to not only those identifying as sex and love addicts, but also those interested in learning more about sex and love addiction or looking to attend with or out of concern for someone else.

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Tools I Use for Healthy Boundaries

Anonymous

 

I have a disease where I idealize others and lack boundaries. But through working the twelve steps of SLAA, I’m learning to set boundaries and to work on people-pleasing and other character defects that get in the way of my recovery.

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In the last several years of working this Program, I’ve noticed when boundaries are breached at meetings, like when someone’s anonymity is broken, but I’ve also noticed when I’m hard on myself for having lacked boundaries in the past. 

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One of the things that’s helping me is the story in the AA “Big Book,” “Acceptance Is the Answer,” in which the speaker writes that accepting life on life’s terms can help solve “all my problems today.” Part of what this idea means for me is that I can’t control the past and I can’t always control the future—though I can sometimes predict consequences for my actions—but I can control my actions in the present, including with boundaries.

 

An example of how I use the steps to accept myself and my issues in my life today is through step nine, making direct amends to people I have harmed. I barraged others with phone calls in high school because they acted nice to me, and regardless of any harm they caused in how they treated me, I made an amend to someone in 2020 who was in this position. We are on good terms now and I am much less hard on myself for having not understood social boundaries then: it’s where I was in my life.

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One of the key areas where I work to practice better boundaries today is in my professional life. When I’ve taught college, I’ve encountered plenty of students who make unreasonable demands for deadline extensions and the like, and though I can certainly bend when legitimate situations arise, I’ve learned to set boundaries by sticking to policies and having standards that reflect how teachers at the school would treat them. 

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In these situations, setting boundaries can be tougher than it sounds. I’m used to bending my will to please others—people-pleasing is certainly one of my stronger character defects—but having firm boundaries has helped me to develop confidence and self-esteem in my capabilities to grow and change my life with the help of my Higher Power.

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I also used to struggle a lot more with boundaries for sex and love. I know it speaks in one of the Twelve Characteristics of Sex and Love Addiction about not having healthy boundaries so that we become mired in addictive tendencies without actually knowing people. Oh boy, have I fallen for some people without knowing them! I can recall one time when I met a guy last year traveling—which means that he is in another state and thus unavailable for me—and came back home with a proposal and wedding song in mind—yikes!

 

In such situations, though, I’m learning to recognize my patterns and progressively create and enact healthier ones. After that happened, I talked to my sponsor and others in the Program to help right-size my fantasies to get back into reality. These days—most of the time—I don’t go out on dates with—or sleep with—people I’m not interested in, and when I notice red flags, I don’t minimize them to myself. That is progress.

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One of the most helpful things for my story that I’ve heard in the last year was a fellow who shared about sexualizing care, including from restaurant servers and doctors. I must admit, I fell for an “adorable” doctor I saw earlier this year. But thanks to the work I’ve done in this

 

Program, I recognized where I was going in my head with this fantasy and was able to move on. 

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Progress, not perfection, one day at a time.

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Healthy Boundaries

Anonymous

I got sober by going to meetings, by listening closely to the experience, strength and hope of others, and by working the steps with a sponsor. I stayed sober by bookending -- calling before and after -- any challenging situations and events and by making a check-in call to a different fellow program member each day of the week. I grew, I joyfully became of service and I learned how to be happy by establishing boundaries.

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First those boundaries became lifelines for staying sober. When I began to identify where my responsibility began and where other people’s ended, I was not as easily triggered to act out. Confrontations frightened me less and less because I knew it was OK for me to say what I was feeling and to hear another person’s response. I began to understand that conflict was not to be feared, but rather was an opportunity for growth.

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Eventually, I began to identify exactly which parts of those conflicts landed on my side of the street and I began to accept responsibility for my role. I was no longer triggered by another’s person’s attacks if I knew that my side of the street was clean and their attack was more about them than me. I was told that I sounded like a robot because I no longer participated in the drama. It drove some people away from me, but attracted those who led me to even greater growth by respecting my boundaries.

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Most of all, I know that I am the only one required to follow my boundaries. I do not set them for others to follow. I have learned that if people do not follow my boundaries, it is my responsibility to extract myself from such situations and, if necessary, restrict or end my relationship with those who repeatedly violate my boundaries. You violate my boundaries once or twice, shame on you. That’s not appropriate. You violate them repeatedly, shame on me. I should know better to move on.

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On Healthy Boundaries

Ian W.

I feel strange, writing on the topic of Healthy Boundaries, because the concept is so new to me. In my acting out days, I deliberately tried not to have any boundaries, and I pressured others to transgress their own boundaries. I took pride in my “free and easy going” nature, presenting myself as fluid and agreeable, ready to be whoever I needed to be in any given situation (really, to get what I wanted out of any given situation). In recovery I’m beginning to learn some healthy boundaries, but I’m no expert. Still, after praying about it, I felt Higher Power calling me to contribute to this month’s newsletter, so here we are.

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As I prayed on this topic, the God of my understanding pointed me toward our keystone prayer, the Serenity Prayer. We repeat it again and again, and today I find new layers of meaning unfolding from this time-honored tool of recovery. “God, grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the Courage to change the things I can, and the Wisdom to know the difference.”

 

What can’t I change? Almost everything under the sun, it turns out. I can’t change the past. I can’t predict the future. I can’t change the weather, or rush-hour traffic. All my anger at politics and religion over the years have scarcely moved the needle. I’ve tried like hell to change other people despite repeatedly striking out on that front. Before I was led to the rooms of SLAA, I had very little luck even trying to change myself, although I had at least occasional, small successes in that domain - the Self.

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Finally, over the past year and half in SLAA, with the aid of the Steps, our fellowship, and a growing connection with a Loving God, I am beginning to see some real change in that one thing: my Self. My partner and my fellows are by my side to affirm these changes, and to challenge me when I’m not entirely honest. Praying the Serenity prayer helps me to establish this essential demarcation - the boundary between what is my responsibility, and what is entirely God’s. When my relationship with God is strong, when I unconditionally Trust my Higher Power, then I am able to accept the things I cannot change, because I know those things are God’s. And then I can set about the work of changing what I can, by asking God for Courage.

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Courage to pick up the phone, when I don’t know what to say. Courage to get to a meeting, when I don’t want to be seen. Courage to accept service positions, when my disease would rather do literally anything else. Courage to sit down with pen and paper and work, through the pain of my low self-esteem. Courage to simply be present for others, to allow myself to love and be loved, imperfectly, honestly. I pray for this Courage because I don’t have it. It doesn’t come naturally to me; it comes supernaturally.

 

The Wisdom to know the difference, between what is changeable and not-changeable, what is me and not-me: this Wisdom is also not something I possess, but a Grace that God grants, moment-to-moment, in direct relation to my Willingness to surrender my shoddy thinking, and open to HP’s Will. In accepting the things I cannot change, I define what is not my road. I ask God for the Courage to walk the road. And I ask for the daily Wisdom to see the road, even just the next Right step, and not to stray. The “Five S’s” happen to be excellent boundaries that clearly define the guardrails on the beam: Sobriety, Sponsorship (and meetings), the Steps, Service, and Spirituality. This is a new way for me to think of them, and to see how they keep me in my lane, doing the work that works, and leaving the rest to God.

 

I still know so little. I am 18 months into my program of recovery, and that’s pretty much how I feel - like a toddler. Taking fumbling steps, sometimes falling on my face, relying heavily on others for support (but not as much as a year ago!), but also aware that I have so much growth ahead of me, and invigorated sometimes with a pure joy that was unobtainable when I was acting out. I really do feel like I have a new life. I experience bliss, and new wonder at the world, things that I wanted so desperately but could not find when I was out there, owned by my disease. Now in recovery that desperation has eased, and I find that the day-to-day walk along the path is what I was looking for - it’s right here. I needed boundaries to give my life some shape and direction, like water needs a channel through which to flow to make a river. I'm so thankful for what I've learned so far, what I am learning one day at a time, and I'll keep coming back for more.

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Healthy Boundaries

Jerry M.

I am a grateful member of SLAA in Chicago. Boundaries are something that I have had to learn as a member of SLAA. I was sexually, emotionally, and physically abused by family members as a child. These people had no boundaries. Nudity, inappropriate touch, forcible sex, getting into bed with me in the middle of the night. 

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I lacked boundaries in my acting out. I tried to seduce people as a teenager and later in life. I would force myself on others, get them drunk. Lie about my motives, and flirt. It did not matter if the persons I acted out with were married, in a relationship, or a man or a woman. I masturbated in peoples homes and used their items to stimulate me. I pushed masseurs to act out with me. Used prostitutes male and female to act out, I became a prostitute myself to men. I used them and manipulated them. 

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I am not proud of these behaviors, It makes me sad. It has been said that “we must hate the addict but not ourselves.” I have made amends to all that I can remember that I acted out with and used. I have forgiven the family members who abused me. It took a long time to forgive my dad, I resented him and talked badly about him.

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But he also gave me some great gifts. He made me a great fisherman. He was financially generous. And showed up for my significant events. He accepted me as a gay man later in his life. He made amends but I was in the throes of my alcoholism and could not really discuss with him. When he was dying I could not really be present for him, I was still drinking so consumed with self pity depression and self centered fear.

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My dad was a recovering member of AA and he tried to 12 step me but I was not open to that. But he let me know that AA was there. I have been sober from alcohol and substances for 41 years. I owe that to him. I was married to my husband in April of 2019. We have a monogamous committed relationship. We had a long courtship. I had never been in a committed long term relationship. I was never faithful to people I dated. I was always keeping someone in the wings in case my source dried up.

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Through SLAA, working the steps, having a sponsor, going to meetings, being of services, sponsoring others, attending retreats, and a loving and caring God my life has changed.

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My top line's have widened, I have written a book with my recovering twin brother about our abuse, addictions, and our continued growth in the arts. I have performed in plays and musicals, and officiated weddings. I have a garden that I share with my husband. I adopted a cat. I won a national award for my modeling for promotion of an opera.  My relationships with others have greatly improved, I have changed my diet and lost 30 pounds. I work out at the gym three days a week. 

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In my addiction I was so lonely, I didn’t keep commitments or show up and it was just me and my addiction. I would fall in love and fantasize about people I didn’t even know. It was years before I was totally committed to getting sober from my addiction.

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Today my life is filled with loving and supportive people. My social calendar is full with activities and doing things with friends. My financial situation is much improved. Today I am debt free. I don’t live a life of deprivation. Deprivation I created myself by spending money on sex workers, buying expensive gifts for people I was dating, alcohol wrecking cars, taking low paying jobs. Today I do nice things for myself and give to others and donate to causes.

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I am not perfect; I am not a saint. I can still flirt or lust. But in being honest with the group about my defects I do not have to act on them. I like to say that God is my source, God is doing things for me I could never do for myself. When I forget that I am reminded by my loving and supporting friends. I write gratitude lists, do daily meditations and quiet time.

 

It is never too late to recover, I am 76 years of age.  I am sober today because I kept coming back. There is a solution and there is hope.

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SLAA Summer Retreat Experiences

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A special thank you to the following groups who donated to the Summer Retreat: Ravenswood Fellowship Group, St. Hedwig, Rise & Shine, Tuesday NTAC, Thursday NTAC, Beverly Friday and Sunday Meetings, and Evanston Sunday Meeting. Also thank you to all those that provided service and all those who attended! Here are some quotes from the fellowship on what the experience was like. We hope you all can make it next year!

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"That this program of recovery really works. All of the leads and experiences shared reminded me of how much hope there is still to be had in my life if I put my recovery first before all else. That my recovery is a vehicle for a full and wholesome life. No matter what I’m going through or what challenges I face, everything will work out if I’m working this program to the best of my ability. It reminded me how precious my life is, and how miraculous this Fellowship is. I felt more connected to my brothers and sisters in recovery than ever before. And it gave me a lot of joy to be with everyone over the weekend." - Anonymous

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"I had a bunch of realizations about myself because of the leads and interacting with the other attendees. The building of friendships will obviously stay with me - love the idea of getting together again soon to keep it up. The presence of my higher power moment to moment. Gratitude that I get to go to this retreat."  - Anonymous

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"The 3-day format for this event allowed me to unwind and relax in a spiritually meaningful way. I was able to connect with my HP and fellows which refilled my spiritual reservoirs. The scenery, walks, trees, lake, and building grounds were beautiful. A big take away for me from this retreat is a renewed commitment to connect with my HP."  - Anonymous