Ray, do you have the same cravings now as at day 0? Does the beer taste as good now as it did before you took nal? Do you still reach a euphoric plateau after drinking 4-5 beers?

In many individuals' cases there is an immediate and significant change in how booze tastes. (It tastes bad, or it just doesn't taste like anything.) And habit, not cravings, characterizes the drinking impulse for some. The endorphin rush is blocked by the nal. If all or some of these things have terminated, I have to ask, why drink 10 beers every night? It just sounds like habit, to me.

So if you lack the craving for a beer-buzz, and/or you don't get the buzz, and/or you no longer enjoy the taste of the beer, why not simply drink less? This is the part of TSM that I don't understand, because I have only my own experience and the recorded experiences of a few others. Nal immediately reduces my enjoyment of booze and the pre-drinking cravings. I have to choose to drink (to serve the extinction process). I also have to remind myself that just because it's 5 p.m. I don't have to do what I have done by habit and swing by the tavern to see the guys. I like having the nal to permit me to stop by the bar to see the guys, but yesterday I went out to the airport and hung out in my hangar instead. Wound up staying until late. It was like being 19 again, when alcohol was not as present in my daily life as coffee. That induced a healthier euphoria: true joy. I am not truly joyful very often at all. Lately only a few times a year. It's a motivating, remembered sensation at least as powerful as the warm embrace of whiskey (Wm. James: "Alcohol is the poor man's symphony.") Nothing weird is going to happen if you don't drink for a night, except that your conscience will soar. For reference I had been drinking, pre-nal, upwards of a pint a day of 80-100 proof booze. I had lost weekends, then I had lost weeks. Probably a lost couple of years, though my subterfuges fooled some. I endangered people and I alienated people (I am not a happy drunk, after the third or fourth cocktail).

Anyway, I'm with Barry, per usual. Try drinking less. Bring home one six-pack instead of two. Read Rational Recovery. You have agency. Based on your current level of intake and your unequivocal articulation of why you are going to stop, I'll be really surprised if you're not dry or under control in a few months. You're fortunate in your wife and I'm envious of people who have social interactions without resorting to the tavern or pub. Keep the faith, brother. Remember, success with Sinclair's rats, for whom compliance was a given, was 100%. The sh*t works but we have to do our part, as higher-order beings.

***

Science suggests that it takes 84 days on average to acquire a new habit. (Perhaps check out The Power of Habit.) That's only 84 days to a healthier, conscience-elevating, lifestyle. The nal should help with the hind-brain impulse to drink; CBT, mindfulness training, and Rational Recovery will assist in recognizing the hind-brain animal directing you back to the beer, as if by rote. Be more than that animal and learn to hate him.

Best wishes and congrats on taking steps to take charge of the problem.

I don't entirely agree with Barry on this. While it might give you a sense of accomplishment to get AF days under your belt quickly, I think it comes at the cost of extending the period when you continue to feel cravings. If you're patient, days will eventually come when you don't feel much urge to drink. The pill can do the work for you; that's much of the point of addressing your addiction this way rather than through an abstinence-based approach. But there are many different ways to apply TSM, and as long as you continue to obey the golden rule, the results should ultimately be the same (assuming you have the usual response to naltrexone).

As for dosing, it's possible that you need to go up to 75 mg (don't go all the way to 100 mg), but probably premature to make that determination after just a month. I personally don't feel I have an adequate response on just 50 mg, but I definitely saw some results at that dosage.

Thanks Ruthy!

I'm not sure that I have. But it does seem like mixing a drink is much more of a chore and I look forward to drinking it less. On the other hand, I look forward to cracking open a beer as much or maybe even more than before.

But then again, it's always been the case that I craved certain types of alcoholic beverages more than others. So it's hard to say.

Barry,

"I never quite get when people say they can't afford Naltrexone online, as it's quite cheap compared to alcohol. At alldaychemist.com you can get about 100 pills for about $100."

I must have been ripped of; because I paid $189.00 for 90 tablets and that was with a $10.00 discount for paying by echeck. Depending on your financial situation, that can be very costly if you dont cut back considerably on the amount you drink after 4 months.

I did cut back to half a bottle of wine but no AF days at all and no desire. Cutting back is very positive but I decided in February to stop TSM/naltrexone and my situation is the same. However, I dont get intoxicated anymore and I dont loose days; yet Im not satisfied with my daily wine drinking. I fear that it will get out of control again. Id like to try TSM a second time but not at that price. Basically, I have to use some willpower. The cost is an issue for me. Maybe alot of years of misery has helped me, along with age and maturity. I hope Im making sense. I think i would start with only 25mg this time. I had a problem with low blood pressure to the point of almost fainting during the day. No other side effects, with the exception of the first few days; feeling a bit foggy.

I will admit that I lost hope. Ive saved twenty 50mg tablets; in case of emergency. Ive been reading for a long time but never posted. Took some courage to post tonight but the 100 tablets for $100.00 had me very curious.

Sally,

That's still just $2 a day, although it is all up front. 25mg, in my opinion, can be just as effective as 50mg for some people. Remember, 50mg is just the amount that covers the receptors of almost every size human. So, your 100 pills becomes 200.

I'm sympathetic to your "misery" and "maturity" argument, but alcohol addiction for many people overrules all that, despite how miserable and unwise it can be.

Aren't you making up for the nal cost by saving on wine cost? I'm not sure what an El Cheapo bottle of wine costs these days, but I'd be surprised if it's less than four bucks.

I get that it seems like more when you pay it all at once. I paid just under two bucks per pill for mine, and I ordered the biggest lot, so it was a fair bit up front. I guess I was just desperate enough to do it.



To make sure I understand you -- this means you weren't able to stop?

If just plain stopping works, awesome. If stopping doesn't work, you'll need some nal for those times you don't abstain.

I hope you aren't drinking without nal right now. That's worse than never having done TSM at all.

Is the cost a psychological issue or a hardcore "my checking account balance is lower than that" issue? Those are separate problems, so possible solutions would differ.