Last week I finished the Men’s Newcomer Packet (item # K-23) since all the other items in the packet are ones I’ve already commented on. Time to move onto the next packet…
WHAT I LEARNED: 1. This is the first pamphlet in the Professional Packet (K-30) & the Al-Anon program is not described as a therapy group, but rather as a Community Resource. In fact, so far the only literature I’ve seen that mentions Al-Anon as therapy is in “The Al-Anon Family Groups (Classic Edition)” (item # B-5) – see page 151. Nowadays, I see the term “mutual support” &, of course, Al-Anon cannot be considered a self-help program because it’s a we program!
2. There’s a figure quoted in this pamphlet from a 2006 Al-Anon survey that about a third of members are referred by professionals. That’s more than I thought. 🤔
━━━━━▼━━━━━
**BONUS: I’ve done a little bit more research on members referred by professionals & according to the latest survey from 2012, this number is now up to almost 50%! 😲 There are nine categories of different types of professionals that are doing the referring. Click here to see the most updated survey results for yourself: Al-Anon Membership Survey
━━━━━▼━━━━━
***UPDATE (6/9/19): This pamphlet has been revised & redesigned for 2019 & a bilingual version appears to no longer be available. The Al-Anon store shows a version for English/Spanish (item # S-37ES), but when I click on it, it doesn’t take me to it. However, it can now be downloaded directly in 3 separate languages from the World Service Office website by clicking these links:
"CAL Chat" Blog ~My journey in Al-Anon~ 