Howdy: Been on Naltrexone every day for about 3 weeks now (Dr. prescribed it for me every day for the first 30 days regardless of whether I drink or not), and then switching to just the days I drink afterwards.

Two questions I have:
a.) I have a markedly reduced appetite (for food) in general, but when I do eat, I eat the same amount as pre-meds. Is this normal?
b.) My drinking levels can be charted like a sine wave over a horizontal axis (Y), where the wave plot is the amount I've been drinking and the Y axis is my pre-med daily average. In other words, I go from daily-drinking less than average to more than average. Overall it's been about the same ... but again, only 3 weeks in.

Perhaps related to my appetite, my pre-drink cravings are much lower than before, even after the first day on Naltrexone. Once I do start drinking, I feel less of the 'goodness', which is the goal of course; however, the 'lizard brain' kicks in and I go into auto-pilot, wanting to drink more until I feel I'm in a good-place, which I never really get to.

Thanks to JoeSixPack for addressing these things in my intro. posting, and for his feedback and comments.
Regards,
One Drunk Irish American

The appetite issue isn't one that always comes up, but most reports from people that I've seen indicate that they do eat less if they come across that particular side effect.

Usually, what I see with TSM is people drink markedly less, then the honeymoon effect comes to an end and their numbers rebound on the order of 50% of the difference. It doesn't always happen that way, that's just the tendency that I've seen reported.

Are you taking the Nal in the morning, or are you waiting till you actually crave a drink? TSM would be doing the latter. Also, while with TSM you shouldn't white-knuckle or deny your craving, it's perfectly ok to question whether you crave the next drink or you're just in the habit of drinking it. If the latter, then let the next drink slide for awhile and see if you can get along ok with opening it later on, or if you're ok simply sticking with your NA drink. See what kind of elbow room you can create if the desire is less than a genuine craving that just won't leave you alone until you crack open another one.

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Are you taking the Nal in the morning, or are you waiting till you actually crave a drink?
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One hour before my nightly wine, without exception.

And to answer your question, I have almost no craving before I start and even during drinking. It mostly seems to be habit by now ... but my drinking levels seem to be maintained not by my cravings, but by my "lizard brain's" desire to go to a happy place.

This experiment has also afforded me a unique opportunity to take a step back and reflect on why the hell I started drinking in the first place. I didn't start drinking *at all* until the age of 29, 30 and I didn't have a problem until I was around 34. I guess this afforded my youthful brain the opportunity to develop in the absence of drugs, but my liver probably doesn't care. It's tired and needs a sabbatical.

Irish and Drunk,
John

This would be a good time to start pushing and prodding around to see where there's a soft spot in the habit. Maybe start out with putting off your start time, even 15 minutes at first. Work on moving the drink away from you too, perhaps even leave it in another room so you have to get up and fetch it for another sip. You may find yourself getting a little jolt from the Lizard to go get it a sip, then the other side of your mind says "In a minute, I don't really need it right now. Don't try to haul your numbers down too fast with it, just a nice easy decline.