Virtual Meetings Are A Lifeline For People Struggling With Addiction

Every Friday for the last two years, the artists with Rise Up Central Wisconsin have met with a recovery group in Wausau, leading creative exercises designed to help group members find outlets and tools they can use to stay sober.

That’s all on hold now.

“While mental health is going to be a concern in the long-term, at this point physical health is something we have to protect — of everyone, and that takes everyone,” said Christy Keele, president of Rise Up, a nonprofit that promotes community art projects and works with those in recovery. “It breaks my heart.”

In place of in-person meetings and community art events, the group has turned to a collective online art project called the Rise Up Circle Project, asking people to create their own art and post it on social media. It’s meant to maintain connections they’ve built, including with those who are in recovery from alcohol or drug addictions.

People in recovery are being tested by the social response to COVID-19. Because 12-step groups and many other recovery programs depend on creating social connections, stay-at-home orders and social distancing have created stress that those in recovery say can put people struggling with addiction at risk.

Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous groups have moved their meetings online, as have many substance abuse counselors. And people involved in these communities say they are finding ways to reach out to those who need support.

“Before this, my husband and I didn’t miss our Monday meetings,” said Dana Nurkka, who submitted a question about recovery communities and COVID-19 through WPR’s WHYsconsin. “If I don’t go to a meeting, I start to feel restless. … I already miss it.”

Nurkka said after missing two weeks, she’ll join her first online meeting this week.

Patrick S., a technology worker in Madison who asked to be identified by his first name, attended his first virtual 12-step meeting this month. Now he goes to one nearly every day.

“I’m sitting in my living room, I click a button and all of a sudden I’m transported right into a room with my friends, having a meeting,” Patrick said. “I see their faces. I watch their cats crawl across their laps. We give each other these virtual hugs.”

Those gatherings are the essence of AA, Patrick said, and they’ve been essential to him during an uncertain time.

The shift to virtual gatherings is not so different from the way businesses and other organizations have adapted to the crisis. But for some struggling with alcoholism and drug abuse, those online meetings may be the difference between relapse and recovery. That’s why organizations are setting up new hotlines and online services, and many are emphasizing the importance of maintaining connections in a time of social distance.

Art Can Help Those In Recovery Find Resilience

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Stefanie Sladky has been sober for a little less than two years. She got involved with Rise Up Central Wisconsin after her recovery coach introduced her to one of its leaders, and today she’s a lead artist with the project.

Lately, when she’s not caring for her 2-month-old son, she’s spending a lot of time in her basement, detailing panels for a massive community mural created with the Lakeside Recovery group at North Central Health Care.

The 40-by-80-foot painting is going to adorn the side of a building in downtown Wausau. In early March — a time in the distant past which was, improbably, less than four weeks ago — Rise Up hosted a community painting day at which members of the public painted dozens of 5-foot square panels. Now Sladky and three other Rise Up artists are doing detail and touch-up work on those panels, adding shading and depth.

The mural was to have been finished by July. That’s on hold, too, but members of the group don’t rule it out if government restrictions are eased in coming weeks.

For Sladky, painting became a coping skill necessary to her sobriety. And she empathizes with people struggling with alcoholism and or drug use who are feeling pressured right now.

“It’s the isolation, but it’s also the feeling of uncertainty — that worry, the anxiety of (not knowing) what this is going to do to our loved ones,” Sladky said. “We don’t know if it’s going to hurt us. We don’t know when things are going to go back to normal, and if they’re going to go back to normal.”

That uncertainty, she said, is shared by everyone — but for some in recovery, there’s a risk that it can trigger relapse. That’s why virtual check-ins and at-home creative projects are so important.

At the same time, though, the availability of virtual 12-step meetings and other programs means people should not despair, she said.

“There’s a lot of resilience in this community as well,” Sladky said. “It’s just a matter of being able to identify that and recognize that in ourselves.”

Find Resources Online

To find online meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous in Wisconsin, visit the group’s directory of online meetings. For contact information for Wisconsin groups, click here.

For free, confidential, 24/7 treatment referral and information, call the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Adminstration’s national helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

To join Rise Up Central Wisconsin’s Circle Project, click here.