Hello Carolyn,
I have several clients who identify as being in recovery so wanted to reply to your post and hopefully offer some clarification. Neither I nor my clients experience recovery as incompatible with the IFS method.

Activities such as excessive drinking and drugging are generally engaged in by the protector parts of the system called “firefighters”. They have this designation because they get activated in response to the big feelings and beliefs (the fire) of the exiled parts and seek to protect (you/the system) by engaging in behaviour which immediately distracts.

Now because this behaviour is so immediate, and because the concern is only in connection to the exiled part or parts the other protector parts (managers) don’t generally approve of the firefighter methods. The manager parts also seek to protect and get concerned about what people will think, damage to the system in terms of physical health and other repercussions. Typically I find in the recovery community that people’s managers bring them into therapy to “deal with” the firefighters.

Managers can take control of the system (the “white knuckler”) and specific firefighter activity can be disallowed. This does not tend to result in greater peace and ease within the system, however and is instead experienced as a lot of inner tension.

What the IFS approach is able to do is to enable Self (which, if it helps, you may want to consider as your direct line to the Higher Power) to bring compassion to the distressed exiled part and eventuallly to facilitate its unburdening. Once exiles are unburdened their hardworking protectors (managers and exiles) can relax a bit.

Where there may be conflict between AA and IFS is the notion of “character defects”. IFS recognises that there are no bad parts – just parts doing their best under difficult circumstances. Once we can recognise that the part labelling other parts as having “character defects” is itself a manager we can bring our curiousity (Self energy) to it to find out why it experiences the need to protect the system in that paarticular way, how that came about, how it feels about its job etc. This process can be fruitful in yielding more information about how your system is organised… and in bringing more Self energy to the parts.

I hope the above has helped clarify some stuff for you Carolyn, I wish you well on your journey.
Regards,
Derek.

Hi Derek,

Thank you so much for your thoughtful response. I think I have a much better feeling now.

But here's another question. How does a person know if therapy is working? Let me provide a little background on why I'm asking. I've been seeing the same IFS therapist twice a week for almost 10 years. I feel so much growth and healing on the inside but my outside life hasn't changed much at all. Mind you, I drank heavily through the first 9 years of therapy so I know I wasn't allowing myself to reach some of the bigger issues. But brand my sponsor got together last night so I could share my story with her. She actually gave me a really hard time about the length of time I've been in therapy and how little I seem to show for it. My financial life is still in a shambles and I'm still finding myself alone. She was also dismayed when I told her my therapist never suggested or conveyed she ever thought I might have been an alcoholic. But then again, in fairness, my own psychiatrist has her doubts as to this self-diagnosis. Anyway, my sponsor asked me what I need from it and I finally confessed tearfully that I need someone to hear my pain. Wow, did that wake me up. It made me feel like I'm holding myself stuck.

Any thoughts?

Hi Carolyn,
It sounds like you've encountered and exiled part in pain who needs to be heard - and my guess is that this has occurred now because the system is ready to allow it.

Length of time spent in therapy is highly individual - and therapy does not guarantee financial stability nor partnership.

It also sounds like you have parts seeking change "on the outside". You might want to spend time with them and see if there are other parts polarised with them that might be contributing to the "stuck" place.
Derek.

I was in Workaholics Anonymous for a long time and I experienced this temptation to exile part or label them as bad also. I finally decided that much as WA had helped me in the beginning, the "illness" model it offered wasn't benefitting me anymore and I quit. It sounds like you're doing a healthy thing in looking for help in improving your life, from therapists or sponsors or whereever you find it. And asking questions about where you are and where you want to go is sometimes the beginning of another round of progress, in my experience.

I have started a Yahoo online group that kind of combines a 12 step model with parts work. It's called Parts are cool and the address is http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/partsarecool/
I am in the 2nd level of training in Seattle, and I've worked on a 14 principle program for trying to live with parts in a healthy way. To join you would join Yahoo groups and then ask to join parts are cool at the address above. We do weekly checkins and are open to other services people need.
Best wishes,
Karen