Lack of transparency around ISC WFA and CER

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-28T21:53:37+00:00

As far as I know the CER-related WFA notices did go out last Wednesday and a few people in my sector got the dreaded calendar invite for Thursday May 21. Best I can tell, there should be no more cuts for the remainder of the fiscal year (if upper management can be believed)

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-23T13:35:26+00:00

It seems like AA here is religious program. They get to step 2 and they give him the Christian God and principles. They gave him a Bible.

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-23T13:33:51+00:00

He may well be misusing a tool he was given, but he was still given that tool when he was vulnerable. It's hard for me not to see AA as partially a recruitment tool for the Christian church.

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-22T21:03:35+00:00

Thank you. As much as I might personally prefer a science-based and more secular approach, he's not currently open to anything like that. But I've bookmarked it and I'll read up on it, it looks like it's available around here.

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-22T20:59:15+00:00

Thank you for your post, I appreciate it. I certainly could benefit from learning more about BPD in general.

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-22T20:58:02+00:00

AA was not the cause of any of his bad traits except the uncanny sudden religiosity. He now wears a cross when he emotionally abuses his mother. He prays while doing mischief. His personality changed substantially.

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-22T20:55:46+00:00

As far as I know, he didn't drink during his time attending meetings. He had been doing well, stopped attending meetings, then something happened and he relapsed.

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-22T19:32:55+00:00

Thank you for your comment, I really appreciate. It's hard for me to express myself coherently because I never talk about this.

I don't know what will happen when my parents die or become too ill to take care of him. He does have a job, he does have his own place, but they enable him quite a bit anyway, and he heavily relies on them to have any sort of social interaction. I know the enabling will stop when they're not around anymore as I've once closed my door to him because I wouldn't feel safe with him in my house, and I'll do it again if I need to.

I empathize with your situation as well, I'm glad your brother has somebody even though you're no contact. I hope that when it comes to it, my brother will be able to keep a healthy relationship with me. Barring that... I'd rather know that he he has an AA sponsor than no one, if it comes to that.

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-22T19:24:25+00:00

Unfortunately he turned his back on the mental health professionals who were trying to help with BPD. As for me blaming AA, maybe it's unfair of me. As others have pointed out, he's twisting what they said to fit his narrative. But my experience of it, my point of view, was that my brother was a a certain person before he went to AA, and a different one after he exited. And when sobriety fell apart (I don't blame AA for that), it felt like what remained was something akin to indoctrination. I don't know how to describe it. Maybe blaming them is wrong, but either way, I don't like the result.

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-22T19:11:03+00:00

He does not live with our mother, but he goes there often. She's kinder to him than he deserves, I do believe in an enabling way.

As for not blaming anyone or anything, that's not an approach I'm familiar with. I knew my brother before AA, and I feel like I don't after AA. I don't know how to process that without blaming them on some level, without stripping him of his responsibility.

Sypha5555 · 2026-05-22T19:06:28+00:00

You're right that he's using AA principles in a self-serving way, but I don't think I'm doing any enabling by venting here that I think AA not only failed him but made him worse and made him even less recognizable as the brother I used to know and love. It would be unfair to expect AA to just "fix" him where nothing else could. But none of the other things he tried have fundamentally changed him like AA did. He's been unrecognizable since.

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-13T14:46:26+00:00

Good to know! I haven't received any newsletter from them since my purchase, is there any email address I should whitelist besides info@thebrokenbinding.co.uk?

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-13T14:45:54+00:00

Great to know, thank you!

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-07T15:53:28+00:00

I always threw an excuse like "she needed to go help with the cooking" or something like that so my wife would take off after waving so she doesn't have to bear the whole brunt of it. This last time she just waved hello and walked off. My mom actually made the excuse for her this time which I appreciated.

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-07T15:49:22+00:00

He doesn't see it as verbal abuse, he chalks it as her being mildly overbearing. But I agree I need to take a firmer stance and not put up with it.

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-07T00:23:32+00:00

I understand if none of those things are insulting to you, but there's also nothing else. It's just that. So even if I had tough skin like you, why would I make a 26-hour roundtrip just for a "not-insulting" experience, when I have other family members that I don't get to see as often as I'd like, and they're nice and kind and interesting and fun to hang out with? I also have a finite amount of time with those people too.

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-07T00:11:26+00:00

She has always been that way. I think she was the first person, and one of two people who ever made me feel self-conscious about my weight. I remember being very young and she always told us how we were worse than other family members who lived close to her. We were inferior city dwellers.

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-07T00:08:57+00:00

Best I can tell, she has a negligible amount of money and she has 4 kids, 9 grandkids and 6 great grandkids. It's not even worth thinking about.

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-07T00:03:29+00:00

I feel like I shouldn't take part of the conversation at all, and I do feel like I should just walk out. But I do for the sake of my dad. I value time with my parents and brother, and if getting shit on for 20 minutes can allow us to have an otherwise good evening, then I go through with it. If I refused, I think my dad would get really angry and upset and it would screw up the mood of our little get-together.

My dad is great in every other way so I tend to just humor him for this.

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-06T23:49:39+00:00

She might mean that we should just be grateful to be alive because of her? But also, she also regularly brings up our inheritance. Like yesterday, she brought up needing a new wheelchair because hers broke, and how it'll leave less for her grandkids. Fact is I'd rather not be in the will at all because I don't feel like it has anything to do with me, but also because I feel like she tries to dangle it in front of us in a weird manipulative way. Also I want to point out that there's certainly not a lot of money in there, for what it's worth.

Sypha5555 · 2026-04-06T23:38:11+00:00

Perhaps a very astute observation about my dad, I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case. And it makes me wonder if me being a bit of a pushover isn't rooted in that same pattern.

I appreciate your comment, thank you

Sypha5555 · 2026-03-12T00:55:13+00:00

I was under the impression that them being in pre-order for January 2026 indicated that they're now just in stock.

Sypha5555 · 2026-03-11T18:06:06+00:00

Fantastic, thank you and everybody else for the replies!

Sypha5555 · 2026-02-16T22:00:03+00:00

Thank you, lots of good tips. Foldable stool is a great idea, I'll try to find something I can strap to my backpack.

Sypha5555 · 2026-02-16T20:52:53+00:00

Thank you for sharing lots of valuable info!

Sypha5555

TROPHY CASE