Rageaholics Anonymous (RA) is a fellowship that grew slowly, quietly, and often accidentally, shaped by people seeking recovery from something they could not name until they found one another. Its origins stretch across Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, Ireland, and eventually across the global online community. Though its beginnings were scattered, they share a common thread: people who were sober in other Twelve-Step fellowships but still deeply unwell because of rage.

 

Chicago: A Crisis Within a Crisis

The story begins in Chicago on 12 September 2001 — one day after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. The founders, Mike C. and Tom O., had scheduled the meeting long before the tragedy, but the timing became symbolic. While the world wrestled with collective grief, two men sat in a church basement facing a quieter, personal catastrophe: the destruction rage was causing in their own lives.

Both were active in another Twelve-Step fellowship but found that the Steps weren’t touching their rage. Mike often recounts a moment from the early ’90s when his wife said, “Every time you rage, a piece of my love for you dies.” That single sentence pushed him to seek a solution — or lose his family. With Tom, he began a meeting specifically for people whose rage felt addictive and uncontrollable.

The term “rageaholic” had been in the culture for some time, dating back at least to the mid-1980s, when John Bradshaw used the term in his book, Healing the Shame That Binds You. Mike C. and Tom O. chose the name “Rageaholics Anonymous” deliberately. This wasn’t anger management. It was treatment for an addiction.

In 2002, Newton Hightower had published Anger Busting 101, which explored the biochemical reality of rage, noting that repeated angry outbursts create measurable changes in the body. Rage, he suggested, could function much like a drug. This addiction model of anger provided language for what many sober members of other fellowships were already experiencing: they had stopped drinking or using, but rage still controlled them. Treating rage as an addiction like drugs or alcohol meant that a Twelve Step solution was possible. Hightower’s book would become important both to the Chicago RA group, and to others around the world.

A few years later, around 2005, Tom sought and received permission from Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) to use the Twelve Steps as the spiritual foundation for this new fellowship, ensuring respect for AA’s Traditions and spiritual integrity. 

In the early years, their only text was Alcoholics Anonymous’ Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions. Later, they incorporated Anger Busting 101, alternating readings to blend traditional Step work with rage-specific insight. The group kept meeting — small, faithful, practical — long before RA had any national visibility. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Chicago meeting moved to Zoom, then returned to hybrid format. It remains the longest-running RA meeting in the world.

 

Los Angeles: A Therapeutic Spark

On the West Coast, the Los Angeles (LA) roots developed more organically. While in therapy for chronic rage, David C.’s counsellor connected him with another man, Tom V., whose therapist had raised the same concerns. The therapists joined forces, believing their clients needed a Twelve-Step approach. Along with David P., they began meeting in West LA around 2007, reading the Alcoholics Anonymous’ book Alcoholics Anonymous (often called the “Big Book”) substituting “rage” for “alcohol.”

David C. points to a Seinfeld episode titled “The Apology” in 1997 as the first place he had heard the name “Rageaholics Anonymous” (and says he saw the episode and felt exposed — someone had named his reality).

Attendance fluctuated — sometimes two people, sometimes twenty. Newcomers occasionally brought their rage into the room. But the fellowship held, and people recovered. Over time, LA members carried the message outward. David C. later moved to Washington, District of Columbia (D.C.), where he began an in-person meeting and eventually the first Wednesday night phone meeting. When the pandemic came, both LA and D.C. meetings closed, but their legacy helped RA reach new places.

 

Houston: A Unique Path and the Hightower Connection

In Houston, RA emerged through a different path. Around 2014, three AA members — Gary C., Dow H., and Bob B. — noticed that though they were sober, rage still plagued them. They approached St. Martin’s Episcopal Church about starting a new AA meeting, but the church said it would have to be open to anyone, not just alcoholics. And so, unintentionally, a new RA meeting was born.

Houston remained small for a time, but its history is significant because of its link to Newton Hightower, the author of Anger Busting 101. Two of the founding members had been clients of his, and Bob B. had even contributed to parts of Hightower’s book. Their meeting blended Big Book principles with Hightower’s tools, yet they quickly learned that RA’s lived experience sometimes diverged from the clinical model.

In 2018, the Houston meeting moved online and became RA’s first dedicated Step Study group — a role it continues to fill today with the same core members. Over time, the group has witnessed significant recovery in both men and women who fully commit to the process and dive deeply into the Steps. Those willing to go beyond surface-level engagement and rigorously apply the program have experienced marked transformation in their relationships, emotional sobriety, and daily lives.

Since moving online, the group has quietly developed an international reach, welcoming members from across the United States as well as Australia, Spain, England, and other parts of Europe, reflecting RA’s growing global footprint. In response to the growing need, one of the group’s members, Dan G., has also gone on to start a Men’s Zoom meeting on Thursday mornings, further extending the fellowship’s reach and offering additional space for focused recovery work.

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Ireland: Recovery Through Commitment

RA took root in Ireland around 2013 through connections with the Chicago fellowship. Tom S., based in Chicago, shared RA literature with Cathal M. in County Mayo, who was attending AA. Cathal passed the literature on to Niall C., who recognized his own struggle with rage in what he read, and used the material as the foundation for starting an Irish RA phone meeting.

Early Irish phone meetings were held by conference call and were small and fragile. Members joined from across Ireland, including Galway, Clare, Dublin, Louth, and other locations, most already active in other Twelve-Step fellowships. Rage “sobriety” was new territory. Some members struggled to make it even a month without an outburst, and some nights only two people showed up.

What sustained the group was persistence and a shared commitment to making the meeting work and helping others. Members kept returning, anchored by the AA Big Book, the Twelve and Twelve, and Anger Busting 101, learning together how to apply the Steps to compulsive rage.

Around this time, Cathal D. was active in two fellowships and about a year sober, yet still raging intensely. He described being angry at God, teachers, parents, family, and siblings. Though sober, he found himself repeatedly dumping rage in meetings. After one such outpouring, a man approached him who appeared calm, cool, and collected. It was Niall, who simply said, “You looked pretty angry,” and suggested RA.  Cathal said yes straight away. He knew immediately that the program was for him.  He joined the Monday phone meeting, where Niall initially served as secretary before later passing the role to Skip S. The group worked the Steps in a group format and studied Anger Busting 101. When Cathal said aloud, “I am a rageaholic,” he later described it as though a weight had fallen off his shoulders.

Skip later connected him with the Houston online meeting, strengthening the link between Ireland and the growing online fellowship and encouraging him deeper into the work. Cathal obtained a sponsor and completed the Steps.

The pandemic unexpectedly strengthened the Irish phone meeting. Women and men joined from England, Belgium, and Spain, broadening both its reach and perspective. Over time, the group leaned more intentionally into the Twelve Traditions and developed a clearer, solution-focused approach. One founding member, who had once been unemployable and suicidal because of his rage, now runs successful businesses and remains deeply committed to making RA more welcoming, inclusive, and accessible to others seeking recovery.

 

The Fellowship-Wide Service Committee: Structure From Scattered Roots

As RA grew across continents, the fellowship still had no unified place for discussion, shared experience, or coordination. In early 2019, Avi G. helped form the Fellowship-Wide Service Committee (FWSC) using FreeConferenceCall.com. He served as the first Chair for about two years, with Skip as Secretary. Later, Skip stepped into the Chair role, where he served with steadiness and care for roughly five years, helping to guide the FWSC through a period of growth, consolidation, and increasing international connection. He continues to serve the fellowship as Treasurer. More recently, Tahli R. has taken the helm as Chair, continuing the work as a trusted servant, guided by the Traditions and the collective conscience of the fellowship.

Much of their early work focused on clarifying a basic but confusing question: “Were the daily phone meetings one giant group, or many autonomous meetings?” Through group conscience and steady application of the Traditions, the FWSC affirmed that each meeting is independent. The FWSC does not govern the fellowship; it simply offers recommendations and a place for intergroup conversation.

Avi kept extensive notes from 2019 through mid-2021. These are being compiled with other FWSC materials to preserve RA’s early service history.

 

Websites, Communication, and the Early Tech Era

As RA began to spread beyond a handful of local meetings, communication and stability became growing challenges. When Skip and Avi joined RA in 2016, the fellowship’s online presence consisted of a single “.net” website run by Jac W. Around 2018, Kathleen (last initial unknown) created the “.com” site, and another member later added the “.org” version, helping newcomers more easily find meetings.

The telephone-meeting era also brought real difficulties. Some meetings experienced active raging and disruptive outbursts, and there was little shared guidance on how to respond. Members were learning in real time how to protect meetings while remaining grounded in compassion and the Traditions.

Barbara W., who began attending around 2012, played a pivotal role during this period. She helped stabilize meetings during disruptions and later started a text reminder list around 2018, improving attendance and consistency. Janet B. recalled that Barbara treated RA as if it were her loving child, carrying an extraordinary amount of responsibility with quiet devotion.

Around 2019–2020, Janet and Helen C. collaborated to write what became known as “The Tools,” practical guidance shaped by lived experience, offering daily practices to support freedom from compulsive raging. 

Other members quietly carried service through this demanding phase, including Michelle C., Lisa B., Jac W., Skip, Avi, Janet, Phil G., and Randy P. Service was often carried by a small few, most clearly embodied by Michelle C., who, before sadly passing away during the pandemic, ran nearly every meeting for a period of time to keep RA available.

 

The Move to Zoom and the Pandemic Boom

Until late 2020, all meetings except Chicago and Houston were phone-based. The shift to Zoom changed everything. Bombing decreased, screen-sharing tools improved safety, and the fellowship quickly became global. Attendance grew rapidly during the pandemic, turning scattered groups into a vibrant international community.

 

The Women’s Meeting: A New Chapter for Inclusion

As Zoom meetings grew, so did the presence of women in RA — and the need for a dedicated space. In November 2023, the first RA Women’s Meeting was launched by Christina Z. Many women in the fellowship had long been the only woman in any given meeting, and while they were always welcome, they sometimes needed a space where their experiences with rage could be fully understood.

From the beginning, the meeting flourished. Women stepped into rotating service roles, trained tech-hosts, held monthly business meetings, and built a space that no single member “owned” — a truly shared meeting shaped by love, care, and the Traditions.

The meeting uses literature drawn from other Twelve-Step fellowships, exploring one Step each month. It is also an open meeting, welcoming women who struggle with rage and those affected by rage in others. This has allowed partners, mothers, daughters, and friends to find support when navigating the effects of someone else’s behavior.

Like other RA meetings, the Women’s Meeting encountered Zoom “bombers,” and early on voted to require cameras on at entry. This helped keep the environment safe and supportive.

Many women describe the meeting as a lifeline. There is now growing interest in starting additional women’s meetings so that more members worldwide can access this kind of support.

 

A Fellowship Still Growing

RA’s story is still being written. From a basement in Chicago, to a therapist’s office in Los Angeles, to a church hall in Houston, to a conference call in Ireland, and now to Zoom rooms connecting people across continents, RA has grown because people kept showing up — often during the darkest moments of their lives — believing that recovery from rage was possible.

What binds the story together is not structure, but people. People who were sober but still suffering. People who were isolated but found one another. People who had tried everything else and finally discovered that rage, too, could be treated as an addiction — and healed through the Twelve Steps and Traditions, fellowship, and service.

Rageaholics Anonymous remains a patchwork of local histories, individual breakthroughs, and shared courage. And like the addictive rage that brought its members to their knees, the fellowship continues to evolve — one meeting, one story, and one act of service at a time.

 

Special thanks to Matt H., Tahli R., and Bill Y., for compiling this history, and to the RA members who generously contributed their time, memories and information so that the early story of Rageaholics Anonymous could be recorded.