Ask a Sober Lady AASL is 100% subscriber-funded. If you believe it is a valuable resource, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.
I’ve only got a handful of questions left and desperately need more of your thought-provoking queries! Send them to askasoberlady@gmail.com
If you’ve ever been around a person in addiction recovery, listened to a song about getting sober, or seen a movie where someone has a substance use disorder, you’re probably familiar with the concept of hitting bottom (also sometimes called ‘hitting rock bottom’). It’s an idea that was popularized by AA but has come to transcend 12-step groups and even substance use.
This particular phrase wouldn’t be terribly noteworthy if it weren’t associated with a particularly harmful mythology: that a person fundamentally can’t recover from a substance use disorder if they haven’t ‘hit bottom.’ To separate myth from reality, it’s worth outlining why it was (and is) such a foundational concept in AA.
Why hitting bottom is so important in AA
Technically speaking, the phrase ‘hitting bottom’ doesn’t appear in the twelve steps;* it’s traditionally thought of as the thing that 1) happens before you go to AA and 2) makes you realize you need to go to AA. This was true for me. My ‘bottom’ was less a single moment and more of a 24-48 hour realization that I’d blown up my life, landed myself in a locked Psych Ward, and had a doctor tell me that I was lucky to be alive and that my liver enzymes were off the charts.
Why was that my bottom? Because until that confluence of events, I still believed that my problem wasn’t alcohol (it was everyone else) and that some universe existed in which I could drink like a “normal” person. But in those fluorescent, antiseptic halls, I saw people in the clutches of terrifying delusions and mental health crises, and I saw myself in them. I belonged there. And I belonged there because I couldn’t control my drinking.
It’s a quintessential AA story—go to any AA meeting, and you’ll hear slight variations of the same tale. It’s a logical progression—hitting bottom ushers a person nicely into the first step of AA: We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.
Some people, like me, need to have big, dramatic, near-death emergencies to break through their denial about their substance use. I am the kind of stubborn alcoholic AA’s founders were, and many people in AA are. Scores of AA members’ stories follow the same trajectory: They’re in denial about their substance use, a bunch of terrible things happen, and the denial bubble bursts. Voila. You’ve hit bottom and realized that if you don’t quit drinking, you’re in serious trouble.
A realization by any other name
The ubiquity of dramatic ‘hitting bottom’ stories in AA—and the phrase itself—can be misleading. Hitting bottom is not actually about how many bad things happen to you as a result of your substance use. I know people who have had unthinkably serious and tragic consequences as a result of their drinking and never truly realize how much their substance use played a role in those events.
Conversely, there are plenty of people whose “bottom” occurred on some otherwise average morning—they woke up, looked into the mirror, hungover and head pounding, and realized they felt like shit because they were drinking too much. It’s the moment the this is fine bubble bursts and becomes this is not fine, and I know why. It’s a moment of clarity—the realization that the crappy feeling or outcomes you’ve been experiencing are tied to your substance use, and to change those crappy feelings, you’re going to have to change the way you use substances.
Where ‘hitting bottom’—as a phrase and a trope—becomes problematic is when people think of it as anything other than an internal process. For example, if a loved one (or worse, some Dr. Phil-esque interventionist) believes deliberately humiliating, demoralizing, or hurting a person with addiction will speed up their journey to “the bottom,” it’s not only cruel but can end in tragedy. (This is not to say that people shouldn’t set boundaries with a loved one experiencing addiction. But those boundaries should be about what’s right for you, not what you think will trigger a “hitting bottom” scenario for your loved one).
The reason moments of clarity are so effective in catalyzing behavior change is precisely because they’re internal realizations arrived at organically. It’s why they take on a kind of spiritual significance in AA—whether dramatic or ordinary—these revelations are intensely personal. I can’t count the number of times I’ve spoken to people in recovery who have said something along the lines of “That wasn’t even me at my worst; it was just the day I woke up and realized I couldn’t do it anymore,” or “I realized I’d be living some version of this day over and over again unless I got help.”
So, is it possible to get sober without hitting bottom? Absolutely. Does someone with a substance use disorder need to have an inkling that their substance use is negatively affecting their life before they address it? Probably! I don’t know about you, but I typically don’t seek help for problems I don’t think I have.
*It appears in the long-form description of Step One
Send questions and feedback to askasoberlady@gmail.com. By sending a question, you agree to let me reprint it in the newsletter with your name redacted or changed. Emails may be edited for length or clarity.
I’m not a doctor or mental health professional, so my advice shouldn’t be construed as medical or therapeutic. You are free to take or leave it.
And sometimes it's a bunch of bottoms, like falling down a rocky hill. I knew for decades that I had an issue with it and got to a point where I was mostly done, but the complete ending took a while. Any one of those little episodes could or should have put an end to it, but I couldn't quite see that life without it could be full and complete.
thank you for this