Serving the Russian SA Community

As a member of the SA’s International Committee, I serve as the contact person for the SA community in Russia. I grew up in Moscow and moved to the USA over a decade ago. I found sobriety here after hitting bottom in 2004. Today, I am excited to be able to share my experience, strength, and hope with my fellow Russians. Serving them is a passion for me.

The Russians have very few regular local meetings, but here in the US we have been able to help them by hosting two weekly SA meetings using Internet phone. These meetings are attended by loners who live throughout Russia and other countries of the former Soviet Union. Six to fourteen people typically attend each meeting.

In addition to the weekly meetings, in the past year we facilitated two independent Step study workshops via Internet phone. One workshop consisted of four three-hour sessions, which were recorded digitally. The MP3 files have been widely distributed among Russian-speaking SAs. In the other workshop, the facilitator took more than a dozen people through the Steps in four separate two-hour sessions. A monthly Traditions seminar is scheduled to start next month.

We also have a monthly speakers meeting, during which sexaholics from the US and UK share their experience, strength, and hope with the Russian community. All of these workshops and seminars are translated live from English into Russian by a bilingual SA member.

We are looking for more volunteers who would be willing to share their ES&H with the Russian fellowship. Volunteers do not need to speak Russian (we have people available to translate); however, we ask that volunteers have a minimum of one year of continuous SA sobriety.

Following are some suggested ideas for future activities: