How serious should we take the First Tradition?

A few years ago a sponsee of mine got involved with a man new to the program. Being this wasn't her first time playing 13th stepper, she and I had a long conversation about it and the potential damage she was doing. Didn't matter, her needs came first. I fired her. After a while this man started spending a lot of her money in the name of "starting a business". Well things went from bad to worse. She ended up in an inpatient psych unit due to depression. Her family order everything bought with her money to be returned to them immediately (which he did). In the mean time he borrowed $3,000 here and there. He was also collecting rent money from all his roommates in their house so he could pay the landlord in one check. Well he wasn't paying the landlord and everyone in the house was evicted. Eventually owing a lot of people a lot of money he left meetings in our area.

Well, he has come back-apologized to the people he stiffed (no money paid back) and he has started his tricks with another woman in the program. She is a single mother and he was able to get a lot of money from her. And now he is not showing up at meetings again.

OK as far as I am concerned, though I feel badly for the women and I pray they have had a good learning experience from it.

BUT I know where I got sober (in Albany, NY), this guy would not be doing this again after the first time. We had a culture where the men called out badly behaving men and the women did the same with women. Of course we had preditors and 13th stepping, but it usually wasn't anything that was allowed to be repeated by the same person.

If we are truly going to be united, what do we do with preditors? Do we call them out? Or do we continue to let them victimize in the name of "well some are sicker than others"? Personally I am sick of seeing newer folks relapse after a 13th stepper or another type of preditor has gone after them. This goes double when they preditor has a history.

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Comment by Kimberly M on May 17, 2011 at 9:37am: Yup, you're right on that one. The old, "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make 'em drink" comes to mind. Except in this case, we want to STOP drinking, or whatever other immediate gratification they are into. The best we can do is to share our experience and have faith that some part of what we said lodged in there somewhere.

Then for the ones who go ahead and go for it, we are there to listen to how they were some kind of fool for the umpteenth time as we try to gently remind them about what the definition of insanity is, with some hope and faith that one day it will all sink in. For some it won't but there are that percentage that eventually do listen.

Comment by Sara VP on May 17, 2011 at 5:13am: I'm not sure what 13th stepping has to do with Unity as it applies in the First Tradition, but I do know that I really try to protect the newcomer ladies in our meetings to the best of my ability. However, a recent situation occured where the newcomer was bound and determined to disregard the advice of the gals who were helping her and so she is having to learn the hard way about why we suggest that newcomers concentrate on their own recovery.

Unity and the First Tradition are more about protecting the group from anger, competition among other groups, and working things out so that the group stays unified. I'm not sure what tradition is used for 13th stepping...I think it's more about good sense. Just my opinion.

Comment by Kimberly M on May 12, 2011 at 7:54am: I ran into much the same situation when I first got sober. The first program I was in (I went through 2, back to back) there were quite a few people there from the Horse Racing Association, trainers and handlers, mostly. There was a grey haired gentleman who had 25 years, and claimed to be a representative of the association who made the rounds of all the programs in the area, bringing cigarettes and such. Of course, he paid much more attention to the women than the men. Forward 18 months, I am sober, living with my children and have a wonderful sponsor who actually got sober the year I was born! And I am no spring chicken, ya know what I mean? I digress. There was a candle light meeting on Friday nights that I liked, my sponsor attended and then this guy from the racing assoc., started showing up. He would not leave me alone no matter what I said and I was rather blunt, but I was raised to respect my elders so I just stopped attending the meeting. Eventually my sponsor asked me why I had stopped going. I am not a very good sponsee sometimes, I tend to be a little too independent, so I told her why and she didn't say anything else to me about it. Two weeks later in the course of one of our regular conversations, she asks me to meet her at that meeting. I was also raised to do what my sponsor "asks" of me so I went. Lo' and behold that man wasn't there. After the meeting she explained to me that she had contacted the racing board and they did not have a liason who went to rehabs and meetings. As it turns out, this guy was not even an ALKIE! Swear to God he had a problem if he thought being an alcoholic to get his way was the best plan!

My point being, if I had told anyone else, they would have done the same thing but I was still wet behind the ears. Now I too, look out for this type of behaviour and try to protect the newbies. My husband and his friends will set a man straight very quickly if he thinks AA is there for him to find partners. That is the least we can do for each other after what we have done to ourselves out there. Just this alkie's opinion. Your right, I have a bunch of them! -kimberly

Comment by zoolie on May 11, 2011 at 8:29pm: thinking there's a special place in hell for people like this. Taking them out back and shooting them would be my suggestion.