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.
[SNIP]
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 ...
Yes, to all that.
And...that it notes the existence of a higher power....
Gabrielle Glaser is a liberal that wrote a book about women and drinking, Her Best Kept Secret. She’s pushing her book.
Thank you.
Just the title suggested empty-headed thinking.
AA does not claim to be the only possible way to stop drinking. All AA promises is that if you do what is suggested, you don’t have to drink.
Part of the problem with this article is that it plays loose and fast with the definition of alcoholism (or alcohol dependency or alcohol abuse). The author argues that total abstinence may not be necessary or appropriate for people who drink in a heavy, but controlled, manner. But AA would not classify those people as alcoholics. AA is geared toward people at the severe end of the alcohol abuse spectrum.
People who want to bash AA should put the program into historical context. AA was developed as a response to hundreds of years of abject failure by the medical profession to offer any solution to alcoholism. Now, maybe the medical profession has some new pill that will cure alcoholism. If so, that’s great, but please understand that we have heard that before.
The author is a liberal who wrote a book and, don’t ya know, Europeans drink sparingly but Americans are drunks.
One of my relatives was an alcoholic, and successfully beat his problem by attending AA. As far as I know, he was sober for the rest of his life. He was even able to eat in restaurants with family members, and avoid alcohol while others drank wine, beer, etc. AA seemed to help him make a big change and stick with it.
In a different example, a close friend of mine was an alcoholic, and was given the choice of losing his job or successfully completing rehab at a good detox clinic. He did the clinical rehab, and as far as I know, was sober until he retired. But when he retired, he started drinking again. Within a week he had been arrested for an alcohol-related offense, and just over a year later he died of an internal hemorrhage.
I believe it’s not just important to get help to beat the addiction, but to also be successfully encouraged to stay sober. I imagine it’s not easy, and what works for one person might not work for another. But I know of at least this one case where AA made a difference.
What nobody is saying here is that alcoholics DO NOT WANT to drink normally. They all wish they could, but that’s only because they know that they’ve hurt people including themselves. “If only I could drink like everybody else, my life would not be so screwed up” .....
Eventually whatever treatment the alcoholic gets to help him drink normally, will stop working or stop being used. The only solution is to help alcoholics rid themselves of the desire to drink.
10 years sober, and friend of Bill
Not really relevant. I've written no book and I agree with the "irrational" statement without reservation.
I have enjoyed 34 clean and sober years because of AA, I tried treatment first. My son has enjoyed 12 years so it is a good example.
The problem is that it's ANONYMOUS! The government can't track its efficacy, because it's not reportable. As such, they can't use Obamacare with it.
Mark my words, they'll banish the "ANONYMOUS" programs (NA, AA, etc.) because the government knows better. These programs will be relegated to underground meetings with crappier coffee than what they serve now.
“...follow AA and completely abstain.”
You can achieve recovery from alcoholism without AA but if you are a true alcoholic you ABSOLUTELY CANNOT ever return to controlled drinking.....EVER.
Alcohol to an alcoholic is poison and it WILL eventually destroy or kill them period.
Agreed! Addiction is a mental disease. It's marked by the constant drone of that "devil on your shoulder." It's always, "You're a big boy, you can handle just one drink!" But it NEVER ends with just one. And even if you drink moderately on day 1, day 2 eventually comes, and the snowball ALWAYS starts.
I've found that the best addiction in my life is to myself and the strengthening of my body. Becoming a "gym rat" is easy to start but hard to maintain, and I think that lends well to addictive personalities.
:: the third, FIFTH, and sixth steps in any 12 step program all appeal to God ::
I’ll drink to that!
Well said.
I think we have a winner!
It does.
There are plenty of other treatments that have similar records of failure but, that failure is the responsibility of the addict or alcoholic, who is the only lightbulb that must want to change...
Good example of the irrationality. That statement is inherently non-disprovable, but orthodox AA member treat it as Holy Writ. The truth or falsity of the statement is irrelevant to its provability.
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