No Concern Is Too Minor in 12-Step Program for Teen-Agers

Snuggling around a crackling fire in their sweats and socks, chain-smoking cigarettes with the lights turned low, the teen-agers look for all the world like carefree adolescents at a co-ed slumber party.

Perish the thought. This group of cutting-edge Valley Girls and Boys has assembled in a darkened Canoga Park living room for a loftier purpose: spiritual replenishment, soul searching and inner growth. At least, as much soul searching as a teen-ager still living at home can muster.

It has never been easy growing up. But if you choose to believe this particular group of high-schoolers aged 14 to 19, it has recently gotten a whole lot tougher. Gangs and drugs. AIDS. Racial tension. Divorced parents searching for their own inner children while neglecting their biological ones. And other weighty issues, such as that one’s older sister has recently developed . . . an attitude .

“A 12-step group for teens,” gushes Laurie, the hostess and mother of one of the kids. “It’s never been done like this before.”

Laurie, who looks like Malibu Barbie’s older sister, has become den mother to the kids, after her own teen-age son said he needed a group to pour out his feelings to, in which others would understand what he was going through. Not a group for teen-age sons and daughters of alcoholics, or for kids with drug problems themselves, mind you--just for teen-agers trying to cope with . . . being teen-agers.

Ah, the heartland of the San Fernando Valley--a trendsetter once again.

Twelve-step programs are rigidly defined, designed to wean addicts off destructive behavior. Although some in this group actually do happen to wrestle with drinking and drugs, it is not clear what specifically they are seeking to overcome.

“They’ve put a lot of work into this,” says Laurie, including obtaining the necessary formal approvals so the group could be an official 12-step program--FACTS, for Families Anonymous Concerned Teens--and follow the same spiritual growth tenets that groups like Alcoholics Anonymous have popularized. You know, the “I’m so and so, and I’m an alcoholic” routine.

Pretty heady stuff for teen-agers whose pals are probably hanging out at the mall about now.

“The only thing I asked is that they show up clean and sober for meetings,” Laurie says, her short list of rules prompting giggles from the assembled jumble of T-shirts, sneakers, ankle bracelets and bandannas. It appears all five girls and four boys have obeyed.

And serious? No concern is too trivial, including sticking to the rigid 12-step format.

“Hi, my name is Angela,” one begins. “Hi, Angela!” comes the cheerful chorus. Angela--these are the kids’ middle names here, to protect their identities--reads the group’s 12 steps, a gospel that begins with the admission that one’s life has become unmanageable, and continues on with the promise to make a “searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.”

Next up is Lee, who launches into the “Helping” prayer, which seems tailor-made for teen-agers. “I will change my negatives to positives . . . panic to serenity, the inertia of despair to the energy of my own personal growth,” Lee says, as the others repeat each phrase. “I can change myself. Others, I can only love.”

After a few more psalms--the best received is Jeannie’s “You Have the Right to Be Listened to and Understood”--it is time for self-reflection and self-realization.

After cake, of course.

Ronald has been sober for one year, and Laurie brings in her home-baked candle-topped cake to a rousing rendition of “Happy Birthday,” followed by an even rowdier chorus of the teen-age mantra, “Right on, duuuuude!”

And while conversation turns to drugs and alcohol at times--John says he only pretends to get high with friends now and that it’s just as much fun--it more often meanders through the mundane vicissitudes of growing up in the modern world.

Lee’s brother gets whatever he wants, including use of his grandmother’s car without a license. Lee doesn’t. “I’m stuck,” he says, “with a crappy old van.”

“I know life is not fair,” Lee says. Indeed, the group sighs collectively, it is not.

Samantha says her controlling boyfriend of four months makes her watch her weight. Groans of shared sympathy. The fire is now red embers, the room nearly dark save for the glow of cigarette ends, and quiet except for the baying of Laurie’s two hounds on the patio.

Samantha’s mom “is always on my butt,” especially when she skips school, and her sister with the bad attitude gets on her nerves. Soon, she is asked to stop--she’s spoken too long, and others have problems they need to share. Several say their friends are getting off marijuana and turning to the hard stuff, like crack cocaine.

Jeannie, who peppers her speech with like and you know , is bummed that she isn’t progressing through the 12 steps. “I’m bummed that I’m not working the program,” she sighs. “But I’m terrified of that fourth step.”

That’s the aforementioned one about taking the fearless moral inventory. But hey, isn’t everyone afraid of that one?

John says his mom still thinks he’s stoned on marijuana all the time, even though he isn’t. But his home life could be worse. “My friends wanna kill their parents,” he adds, shaking his head. “That’s stupid.” (Which should be a relief to the parents of one Valley teen-ager whose middle name is John. But which one?)

It would be an especially stupid move for the kids whose parents had given them rides to Laurie’s house. If it weren’t for them, waiting patiently in the other room, these kids would have to walk all the way home.

Bummer.