NEWS AND VIEWS: 12-step "miracles" help Ukraine combat problem of alcoholis (07/04/99)

NEWS AND VIEWS

12-step "miracles" help Ukraine combat problem of alcoholis

by Nancy Stek

I have heard countless people share the miracles of 12-step programs. I have spoken of them myself. But never before have I truly experienced those miracles as profoundly as I did in Ukraine, where Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is barely 10 years old. Alanon a self-help organization to support family members of alcoholics, has been struggling along for eight years. Naranon, a self-help organization that assists families of drug addicts, is just being born.

A change in beliefs about alcoholism and the emergence and success of AA's self-help model are beginning to be woven into the damaged fabric of Ukrainian families and society. Solutions to the problem of alcoholism - successful treatment and recovery - are being experienced and shared.

I went to Ukraine last June through September as one of four dozen volunteers - all American alcohol and drug treatment professionals - who have gone to Ukraine in the past 18 months to help teach Ukrainian alcoholism professionals how to help alcoholics get sober using a self-help model. For the treatment community in Ukraine, self-help is a radical adjustment to the accepted treatment methodology of institutionalization, archaic thinking and approaches upon which they depended in the past.

While browsing the Internet one day last year I read about a group called First Light Partners (FLP) whose mission is to bring recovery and updated treatment methods to Ukraine. The information about the group just jumped out at me and struck me as something I'd like to do. I don't know why I connected, maybe because I'm interested in Eastern European culture. I sat on it for a couple of months, interviewed with FLP's director, and in June found myself in Ukraine working with physicians, psychologists, nurses and social workers.

It was an astounding experience. I watched these professionals move from a highly suspicious, yet curious, challenging and defensive posture to one of openness, acceptance, self-examination and self-discovery. They came to see their patients as themselves in that very same light. I was in the midst of their personal, intellectual and philosophical struggles daily for three months. I watched these professionals change and grow, and pass their knowledge and experiences to the patients as they brought their patients through a treatment cycle. Patients and professionals alike learned to apply the concepts of self-help and the steps of AA to their own life.

I witnessed countless miracles. One of them was meeting a woman, Ukraine's Lois Wilson (wife of AA founder Bill Wilson). The woman started Alanon in Ukraine and was the sole member at meetings in her town for at least three months. Immediately I loved her. I loved her hope, faith and belief in the possibility of something being done differently. That Alanon exists in Ukraine today truly is her doing.

The ability to capture the essence of a nation, describe the nuances of its people, and tell the story of alcoholism and treatment within the Ukrainian cultural framework is a skill that I am not certain I have. However, Ukraine's story deserves to be told, no matter how briefly.

Ukraine is a country in crisis - political, economic and social. Since gaining its freedom from the former Soviet Union, it is experiencing serious growth pains and faces countless challenges. Ukraine is a beautiful country full of pastoral scenes. There are many quaint cities and towns with ancient roots and a rich history. Mountains and the sea line its borders.

The people there have survived the devastation of wars, politically engineered famines, cultural cleansings, the nuclear disaster at Chornobyl and daily conditions so severe that many of us would be unable to tolerate them. Yet Ukrainians have persevered, survived the decimation, and gained their independence as a nation whose people exude a deep and abiding pride in their country and culture.

There is another side of Ukraine: the side that is rapidly losing two of its most valuable resources - people and hope - to the disease of alcoholism. It is estimated that one out of five [adults] in Ukraine - 5 million all told - has a problem with alcohol. Alcoholism in Ukraine resembles alcoholism in America in that it plays a major role in family violence, crime and suicide. There also has been a decline in the life expectancy of Ukrainian men, down to age 57 from 63, and alcohol has been identified as a major contributing factor.

Alcoholism hits Ukrainian children hard as well. About 30 percent of its newly orphaned children are "social orphans," meaning their parents are alive but have abandoned them because of alcoholism. Ukraine's rate of fetal alcohol syndrome is the highest in the world.

There is no lack of medical professionals or treatment facilities in Ukraine; however, alcoholism in Ukraine has been treated solely as a biological problem - with detoxification until the immediate physical need for alcohol is eliminated. The country lacks accurate information about the concept of alcoholism as a disease and a treatment method that also address the psychological, emotional and spiritual impact of the disease.

The medical community has been reluctant to incorporate the principles of self-help to break the alcohol addiction and thus has not been successful in treating alcoholism. And alcoholics themselves have hesitated to assume any responsibility for their own recovery, believing instead that "it's the doctor's job to cure me." Therefore, alcoholics and treatment professionals alike felt hopeless.

Being alcoholic in Ukraine has been a death sentence - until recently. As alcoholism treatment methods in Ukraine have been changed by knowledge brought by Americans, so have I because of my experiences in Ukraine. I have a greater appreciation for how deeply 12-step programs can bring about change in the midst of economic and political despair. The structure of the 12 steps is an intense light of hope that reinforces the Ukrainian people's internal determination and strength to survive. Now their struggle is to survive more than physically. It's to survive spiritually as well.

Nancy Stek is director of training and education at the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence (NCADD) of Middlesex County in New Jersey. This article is reprinted with permission from Perspectives, a bimonthly journal on addiction prevention and public policy published by NCADD - New Jersey.

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