For many years I thought my drinking was symptomatic of underlying problems
and as ninety percent of our minds are unconscious I really thought I should drag deep and put light on the demons . I finally came to the conclusion that there must be some deep hidden reason like Einstein admitting defeat but saying we'll get the answers when we discover the hidden laws . I got alot better in myself but drinking remained a problem in my life abating for periods , I'd beat it down with moderation techniques . All that stuff like starting later , taking AF's , drinking something else ,I supose in away that is behaviourhal therapy it can work to a point . But alc probs ALWAYS creep back , well for me they do .
So the above approach went on for a good fifteen years .
The second approach for me was that offered by Rational Recovery about three years ago . This spoke alot of sense to me . RR would have to violently disagree with tsm but funnily enough up to a certain point they do share a common road before dividing . RR claims that addictive desire stems from the part of our brain we share with animals healthy apetites like sex and liqids and food are all down there . Maybe some of us have the genetic predelection to drink but by installing the behaviourhal software of drinking again and again that part of the brain cries out to be fed , the more you keep pouring the more the beast demands to be fed.
So RR developed a technique whereby essentially you realize that all though these are your desires they are actually very alien to your human, moral intelligence and as they really **** up your life you have to regain control . Now this is clearly the point where similarity ends with tsm because to deal with the problem you commit to Never drink again . If you do that you will of course be solicited by a strong desire to drink but by separating from that voice you reclaim power from the beast
exactly what those techiques are and how they work would need more going into which they offer . But I found the techhniques and the whole approach very effective. They helped me have my longest periods of abstinence . they would say to me that I chose to drink again . Tsm would say we can't resist that urge . Truth is to this day I don't know who is right . But I do know tsm deserves a full chance and I do believe it will make abstinence easier as a path .
My greatest fear with tsm is this : will it actually extinguish the memory of drinking ?
Is it not the memory of the buzz or something subcoscious that 'll keep pulling us back ?

Just one more thing here , concerning what was being said about cutting it demonstrated for me the ambiguity at the heart of addiction and I mean how one can be in two minds 1) the human that is disgusted by it and shocked and2) "the beast brain" (addictive desire ),our bodies saying " hmm I wonder what that's like ?" .

Hi elfern,

This is good stuff! Gets the grey matter going.

You've raised some interesting points but I'm going to have to think them through carefully before I come back to you.

Hopefully, I'll do that within the next 48 hours.

V.

You are so right! It's the cortex (frontal part of the brain that does reasoning) vs. the limbic system (the lizard in us) It's IMPOSSIBLE for the limbic to be rational, and while we may UNDERSTAND that, we still can't stop what it does in terms of desire.

2 good books: Addictive Thinking: Understanding Self-Deception by Abraham J. Twerski, M.D. and Healing the Addicted Brain by Harold Urschell, III, M.D.

Good Luck! Keep us all posted.

Chelate

At the very heart of TSM is the dismantling of the neural pathways that keep us tied to alcohol. When we are cured by TSM there'll be nothing pulling us back. You may want re-read Eskapa, pp. 105-107. This is sound science, as opposed to the ponderings of some guy with an IT certificate. It always helps to go back and read about Sinclair's scientific research in Eskapa's book when our fears start creeping in.

As potato says, don't overthink it. Just take your nal one hour before you drink.

All the best.

Chelate the books look great I'll have to check em .
Lena , thanks I'm on board and 'll keep taking the NAl - promise .
As WTE said RR was Rational Recovery no other !

too funny. Ah, thank god we still have the memory of RR to bring us all together for a combined laugh...

elf- regarding the memory of the buzz...I don't think I remember the buzz anymore (just realized it last night while posting at MWO). I still love my wine, but if there is something missing, I don't physically remember what it is...and in my mind, I can't call up some fond memory and think, ' oh, wow I wish I felt like that again'. Right now, I just love the taste of my wine. More so than before, really, which is odd - I am actually taking note of which brands I like over others. I'm enjoying the taste, not the buzz so much (I remember at one point drinking brown wine just for the buzz -- it all tasted the same to me, that's not what I was after). And lately I am able to stop after 1 or 2 glasses during my nightly drinks...still working on social occasions.

There is nothing missing with me - got the buzz, the taste, the ahhhhhhh going on.

But also got the faith, baybay. Just waiting for it to kick in for real on a bigtime regular basis. Only had one inkling last weekend, but that was enough to stoke my fire! :-)

Brown wine Yukk , yuk !
But I'm jolly sure I'd take it too for the buzz . You're right the whole don't care about the buzz thing is a very good sign .
An old girlfriend once made some bread with blue dye in it , it was very interesting
at first we didn't want to eat it , it was very off putting .

Oops-a-daisy! Of course it is Rational Recovery, not that whose-it whats-it that finally gave us some peace.

RR is great for those of us whose brains have not yet been hard-wired to drink alcohol. It’s not really me that wants a drink; It’s the Beast; I’ll call it It. It wants a drink. I’m not going to give It any more drinks. No meetings; no fuss; just say “No” to It. Done! Simple! Made perfect sense to me for about an hour, then all this talk about drinking sent me off to the wine cellar. Oh, and it must not be as simple as it seems, because to get to the really good stuff on the web site you have to sign up for a few months to the pricey subscriber section of the site.

SMART is a spinoff of RR; according to their site, they broke off due to “philosophical differences” with RR. They have meetings but hold themselves out as the anti-AA; no higher power, no powerlessness over alcohol. The concept of moderation doesn’t seem to sit well with them, according to a friend of mine who was banned from the board for trying to “promote” moderation.

And therein lies the problem with both modalities: The idea that we can stop drinking if we really want to. This is anathema to TSM, which identifies alcohol addiction as a physiological condition, treatable by naltrexone.

Again, I think of my mental health issues as separate and distinct from my alcohol addiction, which I am curing w/ TSM. I reject roundly any modality that tries to tell me I can stop drinking by changing my thinking.

I was going to say so much after this post, since my treatment methodology went from AA to SOS to RR to SMART to TSM. I stuck with SMART the longest since it made the most sense ("anti-AA; no higher power, no powerlessness over alcohol"), other than it denied a physiological component for addiction, which really should be obvious, once you try and fail again and again.

TSM likely will smother my physiological alcohol addiction soon, which leads me personally as to what to do afterward. Since I need to be abstinent due to psychiatric medications, I will probably go back to SMART to keep free of alcohol. And when I go back there, I will not be silent about TSM. My banning there will be likely, but they'll have to delete my TSM posts to keep this method from spreading.

Bob