NA Recovery Chat: Online Chat & Recovery Community

We have many online NA meetings every week. Click here to see our schedule for NA Chat Room Meetings. Also, be sure to check our Message Boards if you are unable to attend a meeting in our chatroom, or feel like sharing with other recovering addicts in a setting other than an NA chat room. We're pretty laid back though- just addicts trying to help each other recover. The only thing we ask is that you respect one another. We do make a conscientous effort to abide by the Twelve Traditions of Narcotics Anonymous.

News:

Some group members were suggesting that we have a contest to design some NA Recovery Chat t-shirts for the chat room, and then print some up.  A member used to have a t-shirt business and still has the equipment, so it would be relatively easy and cheap to do. So, if you want to submit a design, please email your artwork (make it in a gif or jpg format) with the subject line "T-shirt Design Submission."  Be sure to include your nickname that you use in chat or on the message boards! Discuss this idea.

We'll run the contest through the end of May and print them in June; people will be able to buy them at cost through PayPal or a major credit card (No Amex), but price will be determined at a later date. We're guessing less than $10 though. 

NA Recovery Chat: Purpose

Our Message is that "an addict, any addict, can stop using drugs, lose the desire to use, and find a new way to live."  To that end, NA Recovery Chat sponsors many meetings every week.

NA is a nonprofit fellowship or society of men and women for whom drugs had become a major problem. We meet regularly to help each other stay clean. We are not interested in what or how much you used, but only in what you want to do about your problem and how we can help.

This group has come together from a variety of previous online groups (NA Chatrooms), so some of us have known each other for years.  Whether new to Narcotics Anonymous (NA) or not, we'd love to have you join us in what we hope to to a long-lasting and unique online NA community of recovery. This group is run as an NA group, so that we may avoid the fate of of many online groups in which individuals have dominated the decision-making process. Everyone is valued here, no matter how long you have been in recovery from addiction (or if you are simply trying to get clean from drugs.) The desire to get clean is the most important factor-not whether or not you are currently clean! NA can help you if you let us!

Enjoy Your Chat and Keep Coming Back! It Works!
Note: If you are looking for the chat room, it is here

Day	Type of Meeting	USA Eastern Time	Your Time Converted
Mondays	Open Discussion	10:00 PM EST
Tuesdays	Open Discussion	10:00 PM EST
Wednesday Evenings	Just For Today Discussion	10:00 PM EST
Thursdays	Open Discussion	10:00 PM EST
Fridays	Open Discussion	10:00 PM EST
Saturday Mornings	Open Discussion	10:00 AM EST
Saturday Evenings	Open Discussion	10:00 PM EST
Sundays	Step Study	10:00 PM EST

About Our Chat Room

Our NA Recovery Chatroom is open 24/7/365. There are usually a few people chatting at just about any hour of the day or night, so feel free to come on in! We also have message boards where addicts can share on a variety of recovery and addiction topics. The basis of our NA recovery program is the 12 Steps of Narcotics Anonymous.

Click HERE to Chat Now. We are located on the IRC Chat Network IRCStorm.Net  There are several ways to join. See the information below for details and help on how to reach the NA Chat Room.

Enter your desired nickname in the box above and press "Connect."  Please allow a minute for NA chat to load.

• Free Java Chat Applet provided by FreeJavaChat.com

Other Methods of Connecting:

• IRC Client: Click HERE if you have an IRC Client, like mIRC or XCHAT. This will connect you automatically to our chatroom on IRCStorm.net.  Special thanks to Free Java Chat.com for providing us with the Free Java Chat Applet so that addicts from around the world can connect with one another at any time. Our Chatroom is open 24/7/365!

To Connect to our ChatRoom using a preconfigured version of mIRC:

• Download #NARecoveryChat mIRC 

Download #NARecoveryChat mIRC for the Visually Impaired 

From there, join #Help if you have trouble. (Simply type: /join #Help) Or visit our Chat Room Help Page 

• To Connect to our ChatRoom using a preconfigured version of mIRC, Download it HERE 

About Our Online Meetings

We go to great lengths to make our online meetings resemble "real" NA meetings as closely as possible. For example, we:

• Start with the Serenity Prayer (if you're not religious, don't worry- this is a spiritual program that does not require any belief in God per se.)
• Read the Group Readings from the Basic Text
• Discuss NA Literature and Recovery Topics
• Moderate the room so that only one person shares at a time

WORLD SERVICE BOARD OF TRUSTEES BULLETIN #17

What is addiction?

The World Service Board of Trustees developed the "What is Addiction" essay during the 1988-1989 conference year.  It was revised during the 1995-96 conference year.

The task of defining addiction has challenged physicians, judges, clergy, addicts, their families, and the general public throughout history.  There are as many potential definitions as there are groups with an interest in defining addiction.  These definitions emphasize such things as physiological dependence, psychological dependence, family dynamics, behavioral problems, and morality.  This list could be expanded at length, and NA could come up with its own definition and add it to the list.  Fortunately, Tradition Ten steers us away from such public debates.  Clearly, debating such issues is not NA's task.  Our task is to carry the message of recovery to the addict who still suffers.

Still, defining addiction for ourselves is certainly important to the process of recovery.  After all, in our First Step we admit powerlessness over it.  That admission is the foundation upon which our recovery is built.  So the question, "What is addiction?" is relevant indeed; the fellowship has a responsibility to consider it carefully.

This discussion will not include a restatement of our fellowship's broadest understanding of what addiction is.  That may be found in the Basic Text, especially in the chapter "Who is an Addict?"  Instead, we will focus on a few difficult issues that the World Service Board of Trustees has been asked to consider.

Is Addiction a Disease?

This is one of those questions about addiction that is difficult to answer.  There is much public debate over the question of whether addiction is a disease, and we do not choose to become involved in this debate.  However, it is our fellowship's collective experience and understanding that addiction is, in fact, a disease.  We have no reason to challenge that perception now.  It has served us well.

Our experience with addiction is that when we accept that it is a disease over which we are powerless, such surrender provides a basis for recovery through the Twelve Steps. The number of NA members living in freedom from active addiction show that this philosophy has worked for us.  So even though we as a fellowship are not in a position to argue what is or is not a disease in the strictest medical sense, we are fully confident that our use of the word "disease" in describing our condition is appropriate.

This is the key point:  professional people in fields like medicine, religion, psychiatry, law, and law enforcement define addiction in terms that are appropriate to their areas of concern.  So do we.  Narcotics Anonymous defines addiction for the purpose of providing recovery from it. We treat addiction as a disease because that makes sense to us and it works.  We have no need to press the issue any farther than that.

Does "Addiction" Mean Only Drug Addiction?

What about other kinds of addiction?  By the word "addiction" we do, in  fact, mean "drug addiction."  Our Third Tradition says, "The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop using."  Clearly, we mean "... a desire to stop using drugs."

As a fellowship, we place much importance on the fact that we have shifted the focus of our steps off any specific drug and onto the addiction itself. We have done that by wording Step One "powerless over our addiction" rather than "powerless over drugs" or "powerless over narcotics."  Any wording of Step One which named specific drugs, or drugs at all, would have stated the principle with much less power than our current wording does.

If we were to broaden our focus beyond drug addiction to include other types of addiction, we believe we would seriously damage the atmosphere of identification in our meetings. The balance we strive for is a delicate one.  On the one hand, we must understand our First Step well enough to keep our sharing at meetings focused on the disease of addiction, not on specific drugs.  That way our focus is broad enough to include all drug addicts.  On the other hand, we must keep our focus specific enough to provide clear identification for our new members.

Why is Our Fellowship Named After a Specific Category of Drugs, Then?

Since it is true that we attempt not to focus on any particular drugs in our meetings, many members have questioned why we are called Narcotics Anonymous. Wouldn't Addicts Anonymous or Drug Addicts Anonymous have been a more appropriate title?

The name of our program does seem incongruous with our philosophy and with the varied nature of our membership. In fact, when our fellowship first formed, we called ourselves "Addicts Anonymous."  Two separate fellowships, both calling themselves "AA" was not such a clean break, though.  So our founders chose the name Narcotics Anonymous.  At the time, "narcotics" referred to all drug categories, and so "Narcotics Anonymous" was a reasonable choice as the name of our fellowship.  The original title, then, did reflect our philosophy of not being focused on a specific drug or drugs.  Unfortunately, the word narcotics later became associated with a particular drug category.

As our message is translated into other languages, a dilemma occurs.  Sometimes "Narcotics Anonymous" is being translated into "Addicts Anonymous" or "Drug Addicts Anonymous" because the local translating committees understand the philosophy of our program.  Other times, a new word is created in a language to preserve a stricter translation of our name.  And sometimes "Narcotics Anonymous" is translated literally.  What has seemed important to us is that the spirit of the NA message be maintained in these translations and that the program, by message and by name, be recognizable regardless of the language used.

Afterward

The essay is intended to stimulate members' thinking discussion about the nature of addiction. As members awaken spiritually and share with one another, the answers get woven into the fabric of the fellowship's conventional wisdom.  Then, just when our thinking begins to harden into dogma, another generation comes along to challenge us and keep our perspective fresh.

We urge NA members to remain open-minded and flexible. It is important to look to our literature and our experienced members for guidance, but ultimately each member has the right to understand and apply this program in the way that works best for her or him.