Hi all, I hope this is the right place to ask this question - I trust the mods will move it to the appropriate thread if needed.
I was wondering if anyone here is familiar with or has experience using the recovery materials from Don Coyhis'
White Bison organization? I will have to bring up some personal stuff to explain the background on this, but I will go ahead because I would appreciate honest feedback on the value of his Red Road/Wellbriety philosophy.
I am a U.S.-born Latina (Bolivian-American) and my daughter's father is Mexican. When we got divorced a few years back, it was really hard on us both: he was drinking heavily (a lifelong issue for him) and I was struggling to keep my mental health together. A white friend encouraged me to go to Al-Anon meetings and read the AA/Al-Anon materials. I did, and it was somewhat helpful, but I found it really hard to relate to in some ways - it seemed like the program reflected the cultural and religious context it had been created in, and used language and concepts that were so hard to translate into something meaningful to me, at a time when I needed help to be as accessible as possible. I looked around for cultural adaptations of 12-step programs or other recovery models that might be more understandable and readily usable, and what I found at the time was the materials put out by White Bison. Seeing the
description and reviews of the books gave me hope that it was a more culturally adaptable program, or at least one that would be more relatable to me, so I purchased and used "The Red Road to Wellbriety" and "Meditations with Native American Elders" (although they are more intended for the AA than the Al-Anon audience). My daughter and I still go to Al-Anon/Alateen meetings, but the Wellbriety books have some parts that really speak to me. Sometimes I wish that there were people doing the work to adapt them for a Latino audience, many of whom share a cultural background and history with similarities to the native people of the US & CA. In my experience, communities of color in the US struggle with a lot of deep-seated problems around addiction and related issues, but in my area at least, I don't see our communities really embracing the traditional 12-step programs. (Although IDK– this could be because we are more likely to turn to our church or mosque w/these problems... a source of help that is too fraught for me...)
What I related to about Coyhis' books is how, first thing, in the introduction to the one linked above, he grounds how people live their lives today to historical trauma and oppression – but then he also traces the Native recovery movement back to cultural and religious leaders of the 1750's. This affirms to the reader that any people has its own history of resistance and healing that its descendants can identify with and be proud of; as opposed to the AA approach of universalizing the the experiences of AA movement founders Bill and Lois W. in the 1940s. Another aspect I liked was the concept behind the book “Meditations With Native American Elders,” which I guess is meant to be an equivalent of “One Day At A Time” in AA/Al-Anon. When I did the daily journaling I actually often focused on Coyhis' reflection on each quotation. But I really liked the idea, again, that people committed to recovery do not have to draw mainly on the Euro-American or Judeo-Christian paradigm, but rather could seek out their own communities' oral or written histories and teachings as a source of guidance. Thinking this topic over today, I was doing research and found
a paper which seems to have been published in Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly in 2008, that really expanded upon my thoughts about this. The authors reference Coyhis' Wellbriety movement as a positive example. And he and his organization were recently recognized with
an award.
However, having learned a lot over the past year from this site about the scale of cultural and spiritual appropriation and exploitation of Native communities in recent decades, I am troubled by some of the things I now perceive in Coyhis' recovery philosophy and tools. One issue is some of the materials (not the 2 I've used personally) appear to promote the medicine wheel concept outside of its traditional context. Another is that of the about 110 Elders quoted in the “Meditations” book, several are people here listed as frauds. I don't know if it would be appropriate or helpful to list all authors quoted, or for me to go through the list and search for results on the boards, so you have an idea of what I'm referring to? I could do that with a little time, if anyone requests.
I am putting this query out now because I was approached by a couple close friends this week for my recommendation on what tools might be helpful for them, since they know what I've been through with my ex-husband. One is a Mexican-American who has family members who are being released from detox this week, the other's Puerto Rican and divorcing an active user who is currently hospitalized. Although I feel I personally had a good experience with it, the Wellbriety stuff may be a real mixed bag... but then so is AA....
Thanks for any perspective you may be able to give on this. Given his scholarship on veterans, for whom recovery is often a concern, I would be particularly interested to hear Al's take. And of course anyone else who is kind enough to share.
