The list of amends to make in Step Nine may be long, but it is guaranteed to be finite. Even in a difficult Ninth Step, the promises still come true! “And,” this writer reports, ”I am able to stay abstinent . . . one day at a time!”
Sherril didn’t see why all the fuss about self-amends. Then one day, while they were doing laundry, her daughter remarked that Sherril’s underwear belonged in the trash.
OA’s Ninth Tradition shone brightly during the pandemic when local service bodies suddenly found themselves serving OA members from around the world.
At Step Nine, Fiona has to come to terms with apologizing to her mom. “Whether she apologizes is irrelevant,” she says. “I need to clear my side of the street.”
Alan’s grandmother helped raise him, but later, Alan couldn’t bring himself to visit her in the nursing home. Working Step Nine, found a way to make a living amends and find a new passion for public health.
“I need to forgive myself for my addiction,” says Anonymous. Thankfully, we can all share in this very powerful part of Step Nine.
Literature is one of our nine Tools of Recovery, but what if an OA member struggles with literacy? Here are suggestions to support these members in their recovery.
Mercy F. once believed in a Higher Power but is now agnostic. She has found success in OA even when working with those who believe in God or Higher Power as an entity. “We don’t argue about it,” she says. “We bond over working the Steps, using the Tools, and following Good Orderly Direction.”
Teresa, an atheist OA member, describes how OA members with a theistic higher power can better help the atheist/agnostic/secular newcomer who is struggling with both compulsive eating and the God-based language of our program.
Before OA, Courtney neglected and abused her body. “I have taken better care of my car than of you,” she writes in a message to her own body. Now after a few years of abstinence, she is ready to make an Eighth Step, add her own body to the list of persons she has harmed and become willing to make amends.