Recovery & Growth

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Family Recovery: Widening the Lens and the Path

Family Recovery: Widening the Lens and the Path

by | Sep 29, 2026 |

Today’s post is part of an ongoing series calling for greater attention to family recovery from the negative effects of problems with alcohol, drugs, and other substances or processes. I believe the best way to slow down the obvious and hidden effects that can extend across generations is to better connect individual and family recovery. This requires widening the lens through which we view recovery and being open to new possibilities in what we say and do to advance recovery for all.

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Lessons from the Jellyfish

Lessons from the Jellyfish

by | Sep 15, 2026 |

If you’re lucky, you’ve never been stung by a jellyfish. If you spend time at the ocean or a bay on the East Coast and like to swim in very hot weather, you are likely to know what jellyfish are. Maybe you have even been stung once or twice.

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Appreciating Lois Wilson and Her Legacy

Appreciating Lois Wilson and Her Legacy

by | Jun 2, 2026 |

I am coming to the end of leading two weekly book discussion groups of A Marriage that Changed the World: Lois and Bill Wilson and the Addiction Recovery Movement. For over three months I’ve been meeting with one group on Sunday morning and another on Monday morning, one in person and one on zoom. As we read Chapters 18 and 19 about Bill and Lois’ final years this past week, I was moved to tears several times. 

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A Fresh Look at Lois Wilson and Al-Anon at 75 Years

A Fresh Look at Lois Wilson and Al-Anon at 75 Years

by | May 19, 2026 |

This week’s post is part of a series aimed at increasing awareness about how families are impacted by addictions and how they recover. Most days I experience painful evidence of alcoholism and other addictions being passed from generation to generation. Learning and writing about the birth of Alcoholics Anonymous (A.A.) and Al-Anon Family Groups (Al-Anon) and the addiction recovery movement they spawned is one way to hopefully slow this cycle and pass on awareness of recovery to current and future generations.

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Al-Anon at 75 – Vital Lessons for Addressing our World Addiction Crisis

Al-Anon at 75 – Vital Lessons for Addressing our World Addiction Crisis

by | Apr 21, 2026 |

Seventy-five years ago tomorrow, April 22, 1951, Lois Wilson hosted a lunch at her Stepping Stones home for the wives of A.A. members from the U.S. and Canada attending the A.A. General Service Conference in NY, her neighbor and friend Anne Bingham and other wives of local and regional members of “wives’ groups”. This little-known meeting was the first step towards a Clearing House, the precursor of the Al-Anon Family Groups, a world-wide Twelve Step fellowship for families and friends of people with drinking problems. 

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About Tom Adams

Tom AdamsTom Adams writes and speaks on topics vital to the intersection of our personal lives with our community and global lives. He has for decades been engaged in and written about nonprofit leadership and transitions, spirituality and spiritual growth, how we each contribute to a more just and equitable world and recovery from addictions and the Twelve Step recovery movement.