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What is the "Thirteenth Step"?

In short:

  • There is no Thirteenth Step in the Big Book. The phrase isn't anywhere in the fourth edition: not in the program text, the appendices, or the personal stories.
  • In the rest of our sources it turns up three times, with three different meanings. In 1946 Bill W. joked about the book becoming the "Thirteenth Way Out." In 1947 he cautioned against treating clubs as a "Thirteenth Step." In 1980, Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers used "thirteenth step," with a wink, about an early man and woman in Akron in 1935.
  • The 1980 use is the only one about two people pairing off. No book in our sources defines the phrase. A later A.A. pamphlet (P-16) lists a member's "attempts to attract the romantic interest of newcomers" as a group problem, without using the phrase.

What the search found

All our sources were searched for "thirteenth step," "13th step," "step thirteen" and "thirteenth" alone. The fourth-edition Big Book has none of them. Here is each use found, oldest first.

1. The "Thirteenth Way Out" (1946). In his Grapevine article "Anonymity" (1946), Bill tells how the book got its title. A narrow vote had favored "The Way Out," but the Library of Congress already had twelve books by that name: "we shivered at the possibility of being the 'Thirteenth Way Out'" (P-17, "Anonymity," 1946). So the book, and the fellowship, became "Alcoholics Anonymous." Bill tells the same story in A.A. Comes of Age (1957). This isn't a step at all. It's a joke about a book title.

2. Clubs as a "Thirteenth Step" (1947). In "Clubs in A.A." (1947), Bill writes that so many members value clubs that "we might conceive them as a central A.A. institution — a sort of 'Thirteenth Step' of our recovery program without which the other Twelve Steps wouldn't work" (P-17, "Clubs in A.A.," 1947). He raises it as the far end of the pro-club view: some enthusiasts act as if club life alone could handle the drinking problem, and they "are apt to depend upon clubs rather than upon the A.A. program" (P-17, "Clubs in A.A.," 1947). He then gives the opposite view and settles on a middle ground. Members who want clubs should have them, but clubs should be separately incorporated and kept apart from the groups' A.A. affairs, "to separate the material from the spiritual" (P-17, "Clubs in A.A.," 1947). (See What did Bill W. say about clubs and A.A.?)

3. "Victor" and "Lil" (written 1980, about 1935). Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers tells of a former Akron mayor and "the first woman to seek help," two of the alcoholics around Akron in the summer and fall of 1935 "who didn't jell" (Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, 1980). "Together, Victor and the lady known as Lil started out to write the 'thirteenth step,' long before the first twelve were ever thought of" (Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, 1980). The book adds that "they say it began in Dr. Bob's office—on his examination table" (Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, 1980). The night ended with Lil, drunk, grabbing pills and lunging for a window. Bill later recalled that they were all "scandalized by the episode" (Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, 1980), and "they say" Dr. Bob was wary of alcoholic women for a long time afterward, though he still tried to help any who came along. The book passes the story on as A.A. "folklore" and as hearsay ("they say"). It doesn't define the phrase. It uses it knowingly, for a man and a woman pairing off, and expects the reader to get the joke.

What the books say about it, without the phrase

The 1939 program text doesn't take this up as a group matter. On a member's own sex conduct, Chapter 5 asks of every relationship "was it selfish or not?" (p. 69), and asks where we had "unjustifiably" aroused jealousy, suspicion or bitterness (p. 69). Chapter 7's instructions for a helper put the newcomer's welfare first throughout, and say to keep your work with him free of any claim on him: he "is under no obligation to you" (p. 94).

The modern pamphlet The A.A. Group (P-16, 2018) lists, among common group problems for an informed group conscience to work out, "another's attempts to attract the romantic interest of newcomers" (P-16, 2018). It doesn't call this the Thirteenth Step, and it gives no rule beyond the group conscience.

What the text doesn't settle

None of the books in our sources defines "Thirteenth Step." Many people use it today for a member pursuing a newcomer romantically, but no book here says so, and our sources can't confirm how the phrase is used now. The nearest is the 1980 story, which uses it for two drinkers pairing off in 1935. This page reports what the books say and leaves current usage to the reader.

Read it yourself

Sources

Source Pages Date
Alcoholics Anonymous, whole fourth-edition text (searched) — 1939 text; fourth edition 2001
Chapters 5 and 7 69, 94 1939
Bill W., "Anonymity" (P-17) 42 AA Grapevine, 1946
Bill W., "Clubs in A.A." (P-17) 17 AA Grapevine, 1947
A.A. Comes of Age (the "Way Out" title story) — 1957; after 1950
Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers (Victor and Lil) — 1980, about 1935; after 1950
P-16, The A.A. Group — © 2018; after 1950

P-17 page numbers are the pamphlet's printed numbers (© 2019), which match aa.org's free PDF.

Recovery Starts is independent and not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous. Quotations are brief and cited; the Big Book, P-16, A.A. Comes of Age and Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers are © A.A. World Services, Inc.; P-17's articles are © AA Grapevine, Inc.

These pages answer questions about A.A. from A.A.'s own published literature, read in full, with every quote checked word for word against the page it cites. Recovery Starts is independent and not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous. What we read, and when each source was written.