PROGRAM ACRONYMS

Feeling quite ill, I answered the telephone and it was a fellow in the program. He asked me how I was doing. "I feel like shit," I answered.

Being teddibly adult and program correct, he said, "I don't know how shit feels."

"It's an acronym," I said. "It stands for Sore, Headachy, Infirm, and Tense."

Curiously enough, "SHIT" originally was an acronym standing for "Store High In Transit." In the days when fertilizer was shipped in leaky wooden boats, getting the stuff wet could have rather explosive effects. So, longshoremen were instructed to load the stuff in the ship's upper reaches. "Store High In Transit" became abbreviated to "S.H.I.T.," and the rest is history.

There are many program acronyms attempting to make it easier to remember a slogan, some fact or guiding principle, such as the familiar "KISS" = standing for, "Keep It Simple, Stupid."

Here are a few others that have been sent to me by Twelve Step program members over the years:

ASK = ass-saving kick.

BMW = Bitch, Moan, & Whine.

DAMIT = Dreams of Absent Minded Transgression.

DENIAL = Don’t Even kNow I’m Always Lying.

FEAR = False Events Appearing Real. Also, Fuck Everything And Run.

FINE = Fucked-up, Insecure, Neurotic, Evasive (also Emotional) and Feeling Insecure etc.

GOD = Good Orderly Direction, Group’s Outstanding Direction, Good Old Doubt, Group Of Drunks, Group Of Druggies, Gathering Of Desperates.

HALT = Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired.

SLIP = Sobriety Losing It’s Priority.

SOBER = Son Of a Bitch, Everything’s Real!

TENSION = Temporary Effect of Nervous Stress I Openly Neglect.

TIME = This I Must Earn (also) This I Must Excrete.

WBBB = With Bill Before the Book (old-timer).

YET = (As in "I haven't done that yet") Your Early Termination.