Stuck in the Swing Door: A memoir from 34 years in and out of 12 step fellowships - Paperback

by Marilyn Cooper (Author)

Marilyn Cooper takes us through the doors of AA and other 12 step fellowship programmes and describes her 34 years in (and out) of "the rooms". An outsider from the word go, she recounts her initial scepticism of the revered "programme", her own life struggles with life-threatening cancer, and how eventually she saw through the "smoke and mirrors" of fellowship life and left for good, during the Covid pandemic when meetings went onto Zoom.
Coming from a working-class UK background, Marilyn began drinking in her early teens, finding solace in alcohol for many years, throughout her career as a journalist in London and then a singer/performer. Her family was an "averagely depressed and emotionally chaotic repressed one" which she couldn't wait to escape from.

Marilyn was always looking for answers, she thought AA would be a helpful foundation for living. After many years, she came to realise that the brainwashing and trauma she encountered in "the rooms" had only held her back on her path through life. In this memoir, Marilyn hopes to encourage others, particularly women, to speak out about their negative experiences in AA and to present an alternative view of AA to the rosy picture that the media perpetuates.
Ultimately, she hopes that rigorous public accountability will result from the many thousands of people now leaving AA and telling their stories. AA is held up as the "gold standard" of help for alcohol/drug misuse, with Fellowship based treatment centres making massive profits throughout the world, something that Marilyn feels needs challenging and changing.
In this personal story Marilyn breaks down the fellowship principles and promises and questions the authority of an organisation that relies on an American 1930's post depression era book, with religious guidelines at its foundation.