illuminae,
so sorry to speak out of turn for you. did i mention that accuracy was not my strong point? i hope you don't mind if i was too optimistic about your progress i guess i just remembered being so happy to see your sudden progress and how you thought that making an effort was making a difference. ah well. here's wishing you all success in getting to the next level with topomax.
i will edit the post and correct it.
path

The cured list was a source of quite a bit of interest and excitement about a year ago, when most of the people who are on it were cured. It was maintained (I think) by Nick and Lena, neither of whom are active much on this forum anymore. I have no doubt that probably many more people have been cured since, but the list isn't updated anymore. This forum is largely unmoderated so not everything is up to date.

As to why cured people don't stick around here more, all I can say is once alcohol no longer rules your life, everything alcohol related, including this forum, just loses importance. We all vowed to "shout it from the rooftops", and in our way many of us are, but the fact that most cured people are out there living their lives is to me the most convincing proof that TSM really works.

I did an unscientific poll a while back, and of people who responded it was like 38% cured last I checked (many had not been doing TSM long enough to be cured) . Again: unscientific, but definitely better than 26 out of 700!

At one point we also discussed removing the "cured list" thread entirely. Some found that getting on the list was becoming a distraction from the work at hand. Some of us may have even called it a little early because we wanted our name on the list so bad Now as the list seems to be not updated I think maybe we should reconsider if it is really helping.

Fire

I'm cured and am now standing on my rooftop shouting this to all my neighbours. If I could get up there, I would!! I had to delete posts because of privacy issues here but I told my story almost every day - started out very drunk for years - 10 years sober, fell on New Years Eve 2000 and had problems from then on. Found TSM and it took 4 months to see vast improvement. Then gradually over the whole year it got better and better and now that I've got my life back I don't have to drink unless I want to. So, I'm cured.

But I do think many people have no time to be on here every day, or every week. Some others are not very articulate and feel they can't write interesting stuff after their first burst of info. Others may lurk, do the thing, then get as cured as they need to be, and never come back.

People move, people lose their jobs, people have babies, people get divorced, people get married, change jobs, whatever - I'll be that accounts for some.

Those of us who are cured simply get on with our lives. Those who have no success usually go on to other treatments like topamax or bac. They are probably posting on the other site. Anyway just my two cents.

i personally think it's important to have a cured list. i think i would have felt there was something wrong if the folks here weren't willing to post the numbers of "cured". as to the board not being moderated anymore, can we address that? get new moderators? or conversely, can the list just be updated without official moderators?
thoughts anyone?
path

All,

I am cured, but acheived that by combining TSM and baclofen. Since I did not proceed by TSM alone, I hesitate to add myself to the list.

Currently, I no longer take any baclofen, and (despite my sig) have only tried alcohol a few times since going AF in July (I took naltrexone of course). I found that I did not enjoy it much; on one occasion I drank a glass of wine and thought it had gone bad. Everyone else present assured me that it was very good wine.

At any rate, I'm not sure what worked, but something did for that I am very very grateful.

Best,
-wort

I volunteered to moderate a while back and N101CS said that'd be great etc. and would make me a mod. it's been 3 months or so and I haven't seen or heard from N101CS. Hopefully that will happen, somebody will be made moderator, because I can think of about 5 people who have been cured since I started who aren't on that list, just off the top of my head. The first thing I would do is update that list.

This is a great forum, i just wish we had somebody to moderate it

hey joe,
why not just start a new thread, call it the something like the updated (unofficial) cured list? couldn't you just take the old list, and add to it yourself with the recently cured in a new thread, or in a response to that thread?
path

Here's another part of the population that might be missing from this board: As I've been working TSM I've also been compiling a running list of people I know that many would consider moderate to severely hopeless boozers. Most have been in & out of some type of abstinence based treatment program--about an average of 8 times over 20 plus years with little to no success. Sooner or later I'm going to start contacting these people about giving TSM a shot. As I think of these folks I can't imagine at least half of them sitting down at a computer and tapping out their guts. Part of it is not knowing how to use a key board or not having a computer. One guy lives in a garage. For others, it's just not their style. Keep in mind most of these individuals are 50 years or older and have been drinking since their 20's. Perhaps their drinking has kept them stuck in the 70's or 80's. After all, let's remember the obsession is for alcohol not keeping up with technology, etc. That's my VERY limited view of this topic.

Well done path for spending the time with your research. I couldn't help but get a shudder when I read the outcome I.e.25 out of 75 as that is the usual placebo response in trials. However we simply don't know the full picture at this stage. We need more people to come forward.

I registered to come forward and post my experience. TSM did not work for me and does not work for everyone. I think it is fair to assume that while some went away because they were cured, others went away because they were not cured and moved on to look for other options.

Just sayin'.