Finding Support: Al-Anon and Alateen

Community resource Al-Anon Family Groups is working to provide support to anyone affected by a relative or friend’s drinking.

There are currently over 24,000 Al-Anon groups and roughly 1,500 Alateen groups meeting the 118 countries. The Fort Collins and Windsor area has numerous active Al-Anon groups that hold meetings every day each week.

Individuals who are seeking to become members are required to have been affected by someone else’s drinking, as members will meet to share their experiences and apply the Al-Anon program to their lives.

Spouses, partners, adult children of alcoholics, parents, and coworkers can all find help by utilizing Al-Anon’s services as Al-Anon is nonprofessional, self-supporting, spiritually based, non -religious-affiliated, and apolitical. Alateen is part of Al-Anon Family Groups and was created for teenagers affected by a relative or friend’s alcohol addiction.

Al-Anon and Alateen are anonymous fellowships that hold private conversations between members that are kept confidential, which allows a sense of trust and honesty to be developed. Al-Anon and Alateen are separate organizations from Alcoholics Anonymous (A.A.), but they are based on the Twelve Steps and Traditions adapted from A.A.

No referral or invitation is needed to join the Al-Anon/Alateen Group meetings to learn more about addiction to alcohol and how it has impacted their own lives physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Being in contact with others who share similar problems can offer great benefits by sharing experience, strength, and hope.

Members will learn the three C’s, which are as follows:

• They did not cause it.
• They cannot control it.
• They cannot cure the alcoholic.

The three C’s offer relief from the burden of blame and shame associated with the disease of alcoholism.

For more information regarding Al-Anon, visit: www.al-anon-noco.org or call 970-225-2666