The Loving Chair

Dear ESSAY, we’d love to share the story of our Loving Chair with you all.

Jaime Daniel is one of the founders of our group. 12 years ago, he celebrated his 24th anniversary of sobriety in another fellowship where he received a small plastic chair as a gift. He donated that chair to our “La Liberación” group.

Since then, the chair serves as a reminder to us that our primary purpose is to keep our doors open to newcomers. For this reason, the voice of recovery takes precedence in our group. It is our wish that this voice gives hope to the person who hears the SA message for the first time.

At each meeting, the Chair of our group lights a candle to invoke the presence of the Higher Power, and places the small chair beside it. This is the loving chair, empty, perpetually waiting for the sexaholic yet to come.

In the closing prayer, we join hands and pray for the sexaholic who still suffers, for those who have left SA, and for those who do not yet know SA. WE WAIT FOR THEM AND LOVE THEM ALREADY.

The love of our Higher Power is reflected in the hearts of those who participate in this beautiful fellowship; we seek through our prayers to fill the well from which those thirsty for recovery can drink. We receive our sisters in recovery with special care, knowing they are a minority in this predominantly male community. To them, all our love and respect.

Our group was founded in 1997 and has remained open continuously, moving around the city through institutions, a park, a public library, the cafeteria of a department store, and a small shopping center. Over these 27 years, and thanks to the love and tireless work of our servants, we have been visited by foreign veterans such as John H., Dave T. (rest in peace), Priscila C., Marco V. (three times), Brendan T. (at least 5 times), Arsenio from Mexico, and Gilmar from Costa Rica.

This year, for our XII National Convention, we will have William R. and Mitch with 31 and 38 years of sobriety, respectively.

With advances and setbacks, we continue to grow in Bogotá. There are two other in-person groups in this city of 8,000,000 inhabitants, and between all our groups there are two meetings a day, Monday to Saturday. At our group, La Liberación, we continue to pray and make our meetings a pleasant, loving, and hopeful place for everyone: laughter and hugs are becoming more spontaneous every day!