There’s No Room for Shame in Recovery

I live and breathe 12 Step spirituality and I am never ashamed of it. I willingly tell people that I was raised in an alcoholic home, that I wrestle with codependency and other addictive issues and I am NOT ashamed. I acknowledge my personal baggage, I own it and I work at taking my power back from it. That is something to be proud of.

I remember the first day I learned from a therapist that I suffered from an addictive personality, specifically codependency. I asked myself “Should I tell others? What if people put me down or abandon me because of it?” Then I realized that these were shame-filled, fearful thoughts. So I thought “Seems to me that shame has always been the real problem. If I am ashamed of being codependent, I will hamper my recovery, so I chose right now to be proud and grateful that I am helping myself.” And I decided to tell others. That was 1995, and I have never looked back with regret.

Most every recovery group title ends with “Anonymous,” and that’s OK. But I hope that no one hides behind “anonymous” with shame. And I urge everyone to be proud of the fact that they are working to make their lives into success stories through the tools of recovery.

Shame is the great destroyer. For years and years many of us have suffered from the ravages of shameful feelings about who we are and how defective we believed we were. Shame kept us stuck in old, bad patterns of behavior, and recovery is here to set us free from that shame.


If we choose to be anonymous about our recovery, that’s fine. But let’s never be ashamed of being in recovery or allow fear or shame to taint our efforts to be the best we can be through living the 12 Steps.

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