Alcoholism is not caused by alcohol — excessive drinking is just a SYMPTOM of the illness. In that regard, it is a "spiritual" (not a religious) illness, and not simply a biological problem.
Alcoholics use booze to shut off the tension, resentment, hurt and frustration they feel - and drinking actually does a pretty good job. The problem is that they keep using more excessively and frequently.
As they continue to rely on alcohol, they lose the ability (psychologically and chemically) to deal with life appropriately and so drinking becomes more and more necessary. Essentially, alcoholics are "self medicating" to deal with emotional difficulties.
Alcoholism is a terminal illness — without help, the reliance on alcohol (and the effect it has on their health, lives, careers, homes, finances and relationships) will kill them.
Recovery is difficult to achieve, and many will never recover. Alcoholics Anonymous is one of the more effective programs. AA members meet together regularly and follow these steps to move toward recovery:
1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol — that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His Will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
Note that the "higher power" mentioned is not necessarily God in the traditional sense, but each person in AA must determine what that means to him/her. (It would even mean a person’s own human conscience.) So, AA is a spiritual but not necessarily a religious organization.
Laguna Hills in Orange County California is the home of Embrace Recovery, an alcohol and drug addiction treatment center offering both those needing treatment of addiction and their families an effective out patient facility. The difference at Embrace Recovery is that their small size allows them to treat each person as an individual, they have evening meetings available, and family members have one-on-one meetings with a professional family therapist. For more information visit the website at http://www.embracerecovery.com or call 949 525-3696. Email is embracerecovery@aol.com
Moderation Management is a 51C national self-help support group primarily dealing with alcohol problems. But the principles of moderation management can be applied to any behavioral problem and any behavioral addiction. There is an internet chat room and internet support and tools and strategies that are available for someone to look up online. It’s free of charge. It’s a new paradigm in the self-help movement and the only one I know of that approaches it from a harm reduction standpoint. For more information visit http://aaalternatives.com
Watch Russ get completley hammered juxtaposed with the beautiful salmon of Quesnel lake spawning. Can Russ live in the past and continue to … all » chug beer like a teenager? Will the Salmon return to their place of birth to procreate? Come see the film. Shot on location at Quesnel Lake , B.C., Canada.