Posted on 03/17/2015 9:25:29 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
[SNIP]
The 12 steps are so deeply ingrained in the United States that many people, including doctors and therapists, believe attending meetings, earning one’s sobriety chips, and never taking another sip of alcohol is the only way to get better. Hospitals, outpatient clinics, and rehab centers use the 12 steps as the basis for treatment. But although few people seem to realize it, there are alternatives, including prescription drugs and therapies that aim to help patients learn to drink in moderation. Unlike Alcoholics Anonymous, these methods are based on modern science and have been proved, in randomized, controlled studies, to work.
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The debate over the efficacy of 12-step programs has been quietly bubbling for decades among addiction specialists. But it has taken on new urgency with the passage of the Affordable Care Act, which requires all insurers and state Medicaid programs to pay for alcohol- and substance-abuse treatment, extending coverage to 32 million Americans who did not previously have it and providing a higher level of coverage for an additional 30 million.
Nowhere in the field of medicine is treatment less grounded in modern science. A 2012 report by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University compared the current state of addiction medicine to general medicine in the early 1900s, when quacks worked alongside graduates of leading medical schools. The American Medical Association estimates that out of nearly 1 million doctors in the United States, only 582 identify themselves as addiction specialists. (The Columbia report notes that there may be additional doctors who have a subspecialty in addiction.) Most treatment providers carry the credential of addiction counselor or substance-abuse counselor, for which many states require little more than a high-school diploma or a GED. Many counselors are in recovery themselves.
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
Bump for later reading.
I gave up drinking.
I gave up smoking.
Now I suck on tootsie pops and lemon drops and chew gum.
Perhaps an “oral fixation” (and/or an addiction).
AA has at best an 8% success rate. Many other treatments are more effective.
“Speaking from experience, it is a pretty good way to get better.”
At first I read “bitter”!
As a successful member of NA, I agree with this.
The DISEASE is self-seeking and self-centeredness.
Define 'success'. If success is staying off drugs or alcohol, perhaps.
I define success as becoming a better person with a richer and fuller life. For those 8%, they get something the other programs don't always offer.
That is lovely-a nice story, and the first time I’ve ever heard such.
To your point of the members not being therapists-people who are emotionally unhealthy, or have strong personal agendas are going to take advantage of the more submissive, timid individuals in a group like that where there is no therapist to keep such a thing from happening.
Even with rules in place, as a therapist for a co-dependent group that meets once a week, you end up spending a lot of time keeping those individuals from preying on the more timid ones-it is just what people like that try to do-it is why they are going to therapy in the first place.
It was a free for all in the meetings my supervisor and I were at-those “sponsors:” were most definitely not there to “guide” or “help” those women-they acted like lounge lizards at a bar-one guy had his hands all over a young woman’s butt while she was talking, crying-obviously vulnerable-she left with after the meeting-I can guess where that ended up.
I’m sure your own experience with AA was just as you say-but I saw no such altruistic motives or actions when I went there with my boss to observe.
Just wanted to clarify my earlier Post.
I used the word “blame” when speaking of AA Meeting attendees who identify their Families as Contributors of their Drinking Problems.
Allow me to change that terminology. Instead of “blame”, I should say that they “invoke” their Family History into their Sharing with the Group.
As a witness to this, and as a NON Alcoholic I only attend one AA Meeting a Year to support my Father, my take it that they are shirking their Personal Responsibility and looking for a scape goat.
Again, that is how I analyzed it and it may not be the case.
Didn’t mean to let my viewpoint blur the personal experience of the AA Meeting Attendees I was referring to.
I can see that. I don’t see anything wrong with disagreeing with the approach of AA. I think it can help, and anything that has a chance to help any alcoholic is good in my book...:)
Further, probably 98% of anyone who has gone to a meeting has not gone through the 12 steps, certainly not honestly and rigorously, and given that the final 3 steps involve ongoing maintenance of the first nine, it's probably fair to say that only about 1 - 2 % of people who touch AA actually follow through.
Not that I am at all familiar with the program. :-)
Not one of the following 3 items listed as summarizing AA in the first paragraph is any part of the 12 steps, including the third.
... believes
I'm not going to preach for AA, but I will preach that this article is not connected to any truth about AA. Feel free to mail me if you're going through a problem around booze. It's a nightmare, and no, your not going crazy if that's how you feel. .
I’d love to see your documentation of that.
Yep, unfortunately the mere thought that there is a power higher than the government is very offensive to some.
Zactly.
You elevator yourself above others and seek anything that is a means to an end, as well ends to fulfill a mean.
Relationships become objectified and the whole thing results in a life lived on an island, marooned from loved ones and friends.
I believe it’s a programming thing, with stories one tells themselves.
“Had a great day. I’m celebrating”.
“Had a bad. Need to ease the pain”
It becomes a vicious cycle of stories we tell ourselves.
AA doesn’t cure the drinking problem. It only makes members not drink by continuing to go to the nightly support group. You’re still an alcoholic if you cannot have a drink without losing control.
But for that 8% it works and that is a good thing.
I went through some really bad times.
I drink a lot, but usually keep things under control.
My grandfather was an AA member who credited with saving his life.
I went through a phase where I lost control and went to AA to save myself.
What I found was that alcohol wasn’t my direct problem, anger and resentment was. I still drink, but I’ve learned to wash away the anger and resentment.
If you don’t hate yourself for drinking, you can recover as long as you can control some aspects of yourself. Don’t hurt yourself or others and you can live a reasonable life.
I won’t speak for others, but when I have spoken about my family background at meetings, it’s used as a way of giving some context to my particular story.
Alcoholism has a wide impact on those who suffer its grip, and recovery from it takes time and can be an arduous journey.
I’ve been to more than a thousand meetings and have heard and seen all sorts of things that I didn’t agree with. But I always try to keep in mind that their recovery is truly their own, and I can’t judge the quality of it. I just hope that the life they have is better than the one they’ve left behind. However that happens is up to the individual.
Agreed.
No matter my Opinion of what Alcoholics label the cause of their Affliction, watching People who had no hope and Family Relationships in ruin work to turn their Lives around in inspiring.
When I attend these Meetings with my Father, I always make a point to encourage those in attendance with positive comments at the end of the Meeting.
My Father is the oldest one in the Group, and the fact that he could give up 60 Years Drinking at such a late stage in life works to inspire those who lose faith in themselves to win the battle.
Nobody who hasn’t faced the challenge of Alcoholism can begin to understand the Personal dynamics at play. Many of those attending AA were forced into attending as part of their sentencing for DUI Convictions. You can spot the “newbies” as soon as you walk in the room.
Many of those same people actually get their act together, but just as many don’t. I’ve met both. It’s either uplifting watching them overcome or very sad knowing that a “substance” can control someone’s Life.
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