THE HIDDEN DANGERS OF ALCOHOL: UNDERSTANDING YOUR ADDICTION – ALCOHOL ADDICTION, HIDDEN DANGERS OF ALCOHOL, RECOVERY PROCESS

The Hidden Dangers of Alcohol: Understanding Your Addiction

Alcohol consumption is a common part of social gatherings and celebrations worldwide. However, beneath its seemingly harmless facade lies a labyrinth of potential pitfalls that can ensnare even the most cautious of drinkers. Understanding the hidden dangers of alcohol and recognizing the signs of addiction are crucial first steps toward reclaiming control over your life.

Perception and Preconception

Many individuals have preconceived notions about what it means to be an "alcoholic." Often, people picture an individual who is visibly intoxicated, struggling to maintain a semblance of normalcy. However, the reality is that alcohol addiction can affect anyone, regardless of their appearance or lifestyle. It's essential to challenge these perceptions and understand that addiction is not defined by outward appearances alone.

First Steps to Freedom

Recognizing that you may have a problematic relationship with alcohol is the first step toward freedom. This acknowledgment can be daunting, but it is crucial for initiating change. Understanding that you are not powerless and that you possess the strength to overcome addiction is empowering. The journey to sobriety begins with the realization that help is available and change is possible.

Understanding Why You Drink

To effectively address alcohol addiction, it's important to examine the underlying reasons for drinking. Many people turn to alcohol as a coping mechanism for stress, anxiety, or emotional pain. Identifying these triggers and understanding the role alcohol plays in your life can help you develop healthier strategies for managing these emotions.

The Trap of Alcohol

Alcohol can create a deceptive trap, luring individuals with the promise of relaxation and social ease. Over time, this trap can tighten its grip, leading to increased consumption and dependency. Recognizing this pattern and understanding that alcohol is not the solution to life's challenges is vital in breaking free from its hold.

The Illusions of Alcohol

Alcohol can create illusions of happiness and confidence, masking the underlying issues that may be present. These illusions can be powerful, making it difficult to see the true impact of alcohol on your life. By shining a light on these illusions, you can begin to dismantle the false beliefs that fuel addiction.

I Want A Drink

The desire to drink can be overwhelming, often driven by the belief that alcohol provides comfort or relief. It's important to challenge this belief and explore alternative ways to satisfy these needs. Developing new habits and finding joy in activities that do not involve alcohol can help reduce the desire to drink.

Facing Fear

Fear can be a significant barrier in overcoming alcohol addiction. Fear of withdrawal, fear of social judgment, and fear of the unknown can all contribute to maintaining the status quo. Confronting these fears and understanding that they can be managed is essential in moving toward a healthier, alcohol-free life.

The Role of Willpower

Contrary to popular belief, overcoming alcohol addiction does not solely rely on willpower. While determination is important, understanding the psychological and emotional aspects of addiction is equally crucial. By addressing the root causes of addiction, you can create a sustainable path to recovery that does not rely solely on willpower.

The Addictive Personality

Some individuals may possess traits that predispose them to addiction. Recognizing these traits and understanding how they influence behavior can provide valuable insights into your relationship with alcohol. By addressing these underlying personality factors, you can develop strategies to prevent relapse and maintain sobriety.

Normal Drinkers

It's important to understand that not everyone who drinks alcohol develops an addiction. Normal drinkers can enjoy alcohol in moderation without it negatively impacting their lives. However, for those who struggle with addiction, striving to become a "normal drinker" can be a dangerous pursuit. Recognizing your limitations and focusing on sobriety is key to recovery.

Consuming Questions

As you navigate the journey of understanding your addiction, you may encounter numerous questions about your relationship with alcohol. Seeking answers and gaining knowledge will empower you to make informed decisions about your health and well-being. Remember, there is nothing to fear in asking these questions; they are a vital part of the recovery process.

The hidden dangers of alcohol can be insidious, but by gaining a deeper understanding of your addiction, you can take control of your life. Embrace the journey of self-discovery and know that you are not alone. With the right support and resources, you can overcome addiction and build a healthier, more fulfilling future.

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Labels: Wines, Spirits, Alcohol, Alcoholism

To Cris Hay—Allen Carr’s Easyway to Stop Drinking Alcohol Therapist Extraordinaire

To Cris Hay—Allen Carr’s Easyway to Stop Drinking Alcohol Therapist Extraordinaire

About the Book

This book is based on the principles discovered by Allen Carr through his Easyway method, developed in close collaboration with Robin Hayley, chairman of Allen Carr’s Easyway organization and the most senior Allen Carr’s Easyway therapist in the world. Having worked closely together for over three decades, Allen entrusted Robin with the future development of the Easyway method to ensure that his legacy would achieve its full potential.

About Allen Carr

Allen Carr was a chain-smoker for over 30 years. In 1983, after countless failed attempts to quit, he went from smoking 100 cigarettes a day to zero without suffering withdrawal pangs, without using willpower, and without putting on weight. He realized that he had discovered what the world had been waiting for—the easy way to stop smoking—and embarked on a mission to help cure the world’s smokers.

As a result of the phenomenal success of his method, Allen Carr gained an international reputation as the world’s leading expert on stopping smoking. His network of centers now spans the globe. His first book, Allen Carr’s Easy Way to Stop Smoking, has sold over 12 million copies, remains a global bestseller, and has been published in over forty different languages.

Hundreds of thousands of smokers have successfully quit at Allen Carr’s Easyway Centers where, with a success rate of over 90 percent, they guarantee you’ll find it easy to stop or your money back. The Easyway method has also been successfully applied to a host of issues including weight control, alcohol, and other addictions and fears.

A list of Allen Carr centers appears at the back of this book. If you require any assistance or have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact your nearest center. For more information about Allen Carr’s Easyway, please visit www.allencarr.com.

Allen Carr’s Easyway: The Key That Will Set You Free

Contents

• Introduction
• Chapter 1 • The Key
• Chapter 2 • Perception and Preconception
• Chapter 3 • First Steps to Freedom
• Chapter 4 • Understanding Why You Drink
• Chapter 5 • The Trap
• Chapter 6 • Illusions
• Chapter 7 • I Want A Drink
• Chapter 8 • Fear
• Chapter 9 • Willpower
• Chapter 10 • The Addictive Personality
• Chapter 11 • Normal Drinkers
• Chapter 12 • Consuming Questions
• Chapter 13 • Nothing To Fear
• Chapter 14 • Taking Control
• Chapter 15 • Withdrawal
• Chapter 16 • Preparing to Quit
• Chapter 17 • Your Final Drink
• Chapter 18 • Enjoying Life Free From Alcohol
• Chapter 19 • Useful Reminders
• Chapter 20 • The Hypnotherapy
• Allen Carr’s Easyway Centers

Introduction

The five hours I spent in a session with Allen Carr at his center in London over 25 years ago changed my life. I entered that session as an addict who had to know when I could have my next fix or I would panic; who was convinced that I would have to give up one of life’s pleasures and would feel miserable and deprived; who was frightened that I wouldn’t be able to deal with stress; and who found it almost impossible to imagine a life without my drug.

I left with no need or desire to continue taking the drug. I suffered no withdrawal pangs. Like others I knew who had seen Allen, I found it easy to stop. It took no willpower. There was no feeling of deprivation; instead I felt huge relief and utter elation that I was free. It was truly extraordinary.

The drug I was addicted to was nicotine, but I realized at once that Allen Carr had devised a method that could help any addict.

Labels: Wines, Spirits, Alcohol, Alcoholism

ALCOHOLISM - THE MEANING, THE EFFECT AND STIGMA

What really is alcoholism?

ALCOHOLISM A SICKNESS?

Alcoholism

The term alcoholism was first used by the Swedish physician and temperance advocate Magnus Huss in 1849 to refer “only to those disease manifestations which, without any direct connection with organic changes of the nervous system, take on a chronic form in persons who, over long periods, have partaken of large quantities of brandy” (Jellinek, 1943:86). It enjoys widespread use, though there been no consensus as to its meaning (Babor and Kadden, 1985; IOM, 1987).

A recent definition, derived through a Delphi process that surveyed persons felt to possess appropriate expertise nominated by 23 professional organizations, is “a chronic, progressive, and potentially fatal biogenetic and psychosocial disease characterized by tolerance and physical dependence manifested by a loss of control, as well as diverse personality changes and social consequences” (Rinaldi et al., 1988:556).

Most persons with clinical experience will immediately recognize this description as applicable to individuals they have seen in practice. This applicability is attested to by the high levels of interrater agreement achieved for the similarly defined diagnosis “alcohol use disorder” in the field trials (Spitzer et al., 1979) of the third edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association (DSM-III) (American Psychiatric Association, 1980).

Indeed, persons without clinical experience will nevertheless recognize that the definition applies to some people they have encountered during the course of their everyday lives, as well as to current popular notions of the nature and course of heavy drinking (Mulford and Miller, 1964; Rodin, 1981; Caetano, 1987).

The question, however, is not whether the formulation or formulations embodied in the term alcoholism represents with a high degree of validity some persons with problems around the consumption of beverage alcohol. It does. The question, rather, is whether the formulation or formulations validly represent all those whom the committee would wish to include within the scope of planning, policy development, and treatment.

The committee's view is that the answer is negative—some persons, but not all persons, whom it would wish to include are encompassed by the term alcoholism. The term may with substantial accuracy describe a subset of the target population but does not describe the target population as a whole.

If one consults the vignettes presented at the outset of this chapter, the problem posed for the committee in the use of the term alcoholism can be illustrated. Jimmy is the only one of the eight individuals who would unequivocally meet the definition. Others, such as David and William, might or might not qualify.

Elizabeth represents a particular problem; while she has been brought to clinical attention by an acute medical emergency most commonly seen only in individuals who would meet the definition of alcoholism, and while she is certainly tolerant and almost certainly physically dependent (although given the consistency of her consumption, this has not been tested), “loss of control,” whether subjective or objective, is not clear.

Moreover, in many respects the course of her life does not feature the diverse personality changes and social consequences of the definition. Gregory, although in some respects the person with the most serious problem of all, would clearly not meet the definition. Nor, for other reasons, would George, Sally, or Patrick.

A possible qualification might be introduced: some at least of the individuals in the vignettes and elsewhere who do not qualify as “alcoholics” in terms of the full definition might instead be considered to exhibit the early stages of alcoholism. For example, a 72 year-old widow who was a total abstainer from alcohol for the 52 years of her marriage was prescribed sherry as a sedative hypnotic by an attending physician.

Although she “never drank more than three cordial glasses of sherry in any twenty-four hour period” she is described as “fully alcoholic” because “she would make anyone around her miserable until she got her sherry” (Talbott and Cooney, 1982:15). This behavior is viewed as consistent with the fundamental symptom of alcoholism, defined as “inappropriate, irresponsible, illogical, compulsive lack of control of the drinking” (Talbott and Cooney, 1982:27).

Although it does not preclude the possibility that some form of assistance might be useful in this case, the committee feels that the extension of the definition of alcoholism in such instances is not realistic.

Widespread acceptance of the term alcoholism may be due in part to the remarkable saga of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), a fellowship devoted to helping those who wish to stop drinking. From its original two members in 1935—Bill W., a stockbroker, and Dr. Bob, a surgeon—it has become an international organization consisting of more than 73,000 groups worldwide, with a current active membership in the United States and Canada of approximately 800,000 (Jackson, 1988). E. M. Jellinek (1890-1963), considered the founding father of scientific studies in this area, did most of his early research on AA members, and his book, The Disease Concept of Alcoholism (Jellinek, 1960), is considered a classic. The National Council on

Alcoholism (NCA), the principal citizen's group involved in the field, was an outgrowth of both AA and the Yale (later Rutgers) Center of Alcohol Studies. Yet the key individuals involved in these significant developments did not see alcoholism as a useful synonym for the totality of problems. Bill W., for example, spoke in “The Big Book” of “moderate drinkers” and of “a certain type of hard drinker” who could experience serious consequences but who were not “real alcoholics” (Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., 1955:20-21).

In like manner Marty Mann, the first woman to come through Alcoholics Anonymous and the founder of the National Council on Alcoholism, identified “two groups . . . whose drinking is not so easy to distinguish from alcoholic drinking,” which she labeled “heavy drinkers” and “occasional drunks.”

She placed many of her New York friends, with whom she lost contact during her sojourn abroad and her own successful struggle with alcohol problems, in the former category. When she eventually returned to New York,

I met once again many of my own acquaintances of the Twenties. Some of them were still drinking exactly as they had when I had first known them, with no visible harmful effects. The majority, however, today drink comparatively little—at most, social drinking in the strictest sense of the term. None that I have met again has stopped drinking entirely—and none has become an alcoholic. (Mann, 1981:82)

In The Disease Concept of Alcoholism, E. M. Jellinek (1960) identified what he called different “species” of alcoholism. He was particularly concerned with five such species, to which he assigned as identifiers the first five letters of the Greek alphabet—alpha, beta, gamma, delta, and epsilon. Jellinek felt that only the gamma and delta species could be viewed as diseases.

He noted that “obviously there are species of alcoholism . . . which cannot be regarded as illnesses” (p. 35), and added that “all the remaining 19 letters of the Greek and if necessary other alphabets are available for labelling them” (p. 39). Jellinek also mentioned “other species of alcoholism” such as “explosive drinking” and “fiesta drinking,” with the admonition that “the student of the problems of alcohol cannot afford to overlook these behaviors, whether or not he is inclined to designate them as species of alcoholism” (p. 39).

Finally, he observed that “By adhering strictly to our American ideas about ‘alcoholism' (created by Alcoholics Anonymous in their own image) and restricting the term to these ideas, we have been continuing to overlook many other problems of alcohol which need urgent attention” (Jellinek, 1960:35). Jellinek's view of alcoholism as a diverse phenomenon, and of the need to look beyond it in a broad perspective, is consistent with the view of the committee.