All the Way to the River: Love, Loss, and Liberation

Alcoholics Anonymous is a recovery program which provides free meetings for people in recovery from alcohol and drug addictions. Most AA members attend regular meetings in which they share their experiences and provide mutual support. AA was founded by Americans Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith in 1939 and is now active in 180 countries, with about two million members across the US and Canada.

Gilbert refers to the first of AA’s steps in a poem in the beginning of her memoir. She writes, “I came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to sanity” (ix). This line is step 2 in AA’s twelve-step program. She goes on to portray this program in a positive light, emphasizing its successful approach to addiction recovery. She believes that Alcoholics Anonymous’ belief in humility and trusting a higher power, as well as its focus on community support, makes it a good choice for all kinds of people in recovery. She writes, “This is why Alcoholics Anonymous—for all its faults and its creaky old 1930s language—is still the best game in town by far when it comes to sobriety (141). Gilbert has benefitted from the Alcoholics Anonymous approach to recovery and applies its language and framing when discussing her addiction.