By wvs

ACA which used to be ACOA is the 12 step program that helped me the most with emotional growth. I doubt that it would have been as effective had I not spent years working the 12 steps in AA prior to going to ACOA. I was living in Orlando (Winter Park) at the time (1985-1990). I was an addictions counselor who ate, breathed, and absorbed recovery as if I were an oxygen-deprived fish. I still am very involved in recovery but I have learned to add other parts of my life–especially the creative side.

I think of ACA as adult children of addicts as I believe few people didn’t experience  a confusing childhood. Addiction of any kind is in charge of the family dynamics if one or both of the parents is using the family energy to maintain and/or promote an addiction. Alcohol, prescription drugs, illegal drugs, money, power, religion, sex, food, gambling, shopping, and hoarding are a few of the main addictions. The most information is about alcohol because addiction recovery started with AA in 1935.

I also believe that most of our patterns of behavior were established in our family of origin. We use those patterns which generally helped us as children but now hinder us as adults. For this month of July, 2010, I am researching and writing about this legacy of ACA. Please email me at changemaker.kathy@gmail.com if you have any ACA blogs that you know of.

I recommend the following blogs:

Chaz’ journey back.

Chicago Therapy Connection

Child Abuse Survivor

Community.childabusesurvivor.net

divorce360.com Acoa

DrunkDaddy

Dynamics of Alcoholic Family

Feistysprite’s Blog

Guess what normal is

Just Be Real

The L.I.S.T. ACA Group

mamaTRUE parenting as practice

Realistic Recovery

Sophie in the moonlight

Survivors Network

Understanding my son

Writing

Strawberry Schoolhouse by kevindooley

(1)  The Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Sourcebook

“Trauma can take many forms, from witnessing a violent crime or surviving a natural disaster to living with the effects of abuse, rape, combat, or alcoholism. Deep emotional wounds may seem like they will never heal. However, with The Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Sourcebook, Dr. Glenn Schiraldi offers a remarkable range of treatment alternatives and self-management techniques, showing survivors that the other side of pain is recovery and growth.”

Live your life more fully-without fear, pain, depression, or self-doubt

• Identify emotional triggers-and protect yourself from further harm
• Understand the link between PTSD and addiction-and how to break it
• Find the best treatments and techniques that are right for you

“This updated edition covers new information for war veterans and survivors with substance addictions. It also explores mindfulness-based treatments, couples strategies, medical aids, and other important treatment innovations.”

(2)  Reparenting by Dr. Larry Gilliam, Deborah Freeman, and David Majors

Product description:

“Deep inside you, there is a part of you that still thinks, feels, and reacts like a child. This is true because time alone does not heal all the wounds of childhood. There are actually steps and a process you must go through to nurture and heal the child within you. This process is called reparenting, and this workbook is the first of two volumes designed to walk you through it.”

(3)  Stories That Heal: Reparenting Adult Children of Dysfunctional Families by Lee Wallas

This book has many stories about each phase of childhood growth.

(4) When Love is Not Perfect: Discovering Gods Reparenting Process

No information available.

(5)  Reparenting Yourself by Art Martin has a subtitle of “Growing Up Again–Recovering Your Lost Self.

No information available.

Mommy, I'm Walking by Dave Hogg

(1)  It’s Never Too Late to Be Happy: Reparenting Yourself for Happiness by Muriel James

Product notes–

“In It’s Never Too Late to Be Happy: Reparenting Yourself for Happiness, Muriel James, coauthor of the 4-million-copy best-seller Born to Win, presents a clear, layman-friendly self-reparenting program through which the reader can actually create a new internal parent–one which is fully functional, supporting, encouraging, and loving–to replace the old parent figure, whose negative psychological messages consistently thwart one’s hopes for happiness.”

“In the field of psychology, self-reparenting is recognized as a highly effective strategy for pursuing happiness. Thousands of people worldwide have used it successfully to discover what went wrong in childhood and throughout their lives that restricted their freedom to succeed and be happy to move from discontentment to happiness–reparenting themselves for a fuller, happier life.”

“It’s Never Too Late to Be Happy presents coherent, straightforward insights into how personality is developed during a person’s early years, how parents use and misuse the parenting skills that influence personality, how children react to negative or inconsistent messages, and many other issues that work together to prohibit both satisfaction and happiness in later life. Combined with chapter by chapter self-analysis exercises, these insights will lead any reader through the reparenting process which will invariably lead to greatly increased happiness–at any age.”

(2)  Self Parenting: The Complete Guide to Your Inner Conversations by John Pollard

Product notes:

“Self Parenting: The Complete Guide to Your Inner Conversations is the classic and original how-to book defining the concept of “self-parenting.” Many of us grew up within a parental environment that did not support our childhood needs for love, support, and nurturing.”

“As adults, we mentally continue the same patterns as an “Inner Parent” that left us feeling alone and abandoned as a child. By beginning the daily practice of positive Self-Parenting, the negative outer parenting patterns taught as a child (and subsequently internalized as an adult) can be recognized and reversed.”

“The foundation of the Self Parenting is the daily practice of the Self-Parenting Exercises, a thirty-minute session of cognitive interaction between the Inner Parent and Inner Child. During these daily half-hour sessions Illustrated In the book, the reader learns how to love, support, and nurture his or her Inner Child as well as increase their awareness of the profound implications of their Inner Conversations in the “real world.”

(3)  Growing Up Again-Parenting Ourselves by Connie Dawson and Jean Illsley Clarke

Product notes–

“Jean Illsley Clarke and Connie Dawson provide the information every adult caring for children should know–about ages and stages of development, ways to nurture our children and ourselves, and tools for personal and family growth.”

“This new edition also addresses the special demands of parenting adopted children and the problem of overindulgence; a recognition and exploration of prenatal life and our final days as unique life stages; new examples of nurturing, structuring, and discounting, as well as concise ways to identify them; help for handling parenting conflicts in blended families, and guidelines on supporting children’s spiritual growth.”

(4)  The 12 Steps to Self-Parenting for Adult Children by Patricia O’Gorman and Philip Oliver-Diaz

Product  notes–

“If you are the child of an alcoholic or an adult child who has experienced a traumatic childhood, you can give yourself a second chance for intimacy, fulfillment and joy by Self-Parenting. 12 Steps To Self-Parenting, based on the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, will guide you to nurture your Inner Child so that it may grow into healthy self-acceptance.”