Other than the 12 Steps

[toe]

These are all secular recovery groups which can be found all over the world.

http://www.unhooked.com/index.htm

http://www.womenforsobriety.org/

http://www.moderation.org/

http://www.rational.org/

http://www.secularsobriety.org/

http://www.smartrecovery.org/

Please add any info SWIYall might have about secular, non-"rehab" alternatives for support of those seeking to overcome addiction. Feel free to include innuendo and rumor, as well as even the vaguest of contact info. (John Smith in Arlington, Virginia- no problem, SWIM will just call the phone company to get his number)

Any (secular) movement, no matter how small, deserves a mention here. The near-underground nature of alternatives to the 12-steps speaks to the importance of giving bandwidth to any alternative movement.

Tinkerbell refuses to believe that the above 6 are the only alternatives to the 12 steps. You do believe in fairies, right?

[savingJenniB]

This is an old(er) Thread that never went anywhere for some reason. Just the same thought I'd check them out.
Here's my take after a swift visit to each site:

Unhooked ~ a group therapy program aimed at alcoholism; kind of a funky past tense feeling ~ like an Amway sales seminar merging with a new-age self help group in Kansas.

Woman-for-sobriety ~ site looks exactly like the name ~ powder blue background, tasteful feminine scroll, soothing colors, empowering women everywhere. Everything
about this site assures you the toilet seat is never left up! Name of female Ph.D appears on each page. New Life Program presents with 13 statements ~
13 not 12 ~ statements not steps. Ahhh . . . guess that's what makes this program so special. Could not get out of there fast enough. (But that's just me.)

Moderation.org ~ This one is entirely alcohol oriented. What's more you don't have to quit drinking for it to work. You just need to cut back ~ Moderation.
Nine Steps instead of 12 ~ why buy the full dozen, when all you need is 9 for moderation? AA for a perfect world. Great social club for people without alcohol problems!

Rational.org ~ In my mind, the most potential for curing addictions. Addresses multiple addictions from heroin to gambling, sex, prescription meds, food, etc.
No group therapy. No meetings ~ anywhere. Rational recovery appears to be the real deal ~ no higher powers, JFC, powders, pills, communal sweats,
family therapy, using "replacement" medications. My initial attraction stems from a core philosophy that does not subscribe to family interventions, which
are really nothing more than forced recruitment into a health care setting that is programed to self perpetuate itself. This is a system
that is more skilled at maintaining a lifelong dependence on rehab services than actually curing their patients. Addiction is not a disease, it is willful, voluntary
misconduct in the pursuit of physical pleasure. "Therapy" consists of brutal honesty and a consistent logical sober truth-telling brainwashing
that gradually nudges you into accepting responsibility for you own actions. Cybernetics for the addicted. Here's a couple of quotes:
"You drink or use because you love to get high. Admit it!"
"The worst possible way to quit something you love is one-day-at-a-time."
"There is nothing in your past, in your genes, in your brain, or in your personality that compels you to drink or use. Using is voluntary, purposeful behavior."
"Addiction recovery is not a group project; it is an individual responsibility. You are ultimately on your own."
With all the time, money, and energy my whole family has invested in my niece, the rational recovery programs presents a compelling argument.
It appeals to me and warrants further investigation.

Secular sobriety ~ Can only be described as a Gestalt program for atheists. So much emphasis on this not being a 12 step program . . . . made it feel like a 12 step program.
Initial ineffectiveness justified my hasty retreat.

Smart recovery ~ Has all the embellishments, buzz words and "feel good about yourself" spin normally encountered in the Human Resources Department of a large
corporation. Slick, confidential, imperious and pricey. I wandered the halls a bit ~ a one dimensional facade, sadly phony & smelling of Botox.
Hype for addicts used to throwing money at a problem to make it go away. Gave way the feeling that graduates got better . . at hiding their addictions.
Heavy emphasis on keeping up appearances.

All the opinions stated in this post ~ are simply my own silly opinions based on minimum exposure to sites shown in toe's initial post #1 (above).
These are my own jaded and biased opinions, prejudiced by disappointment.
A recurring disappointment turned to distrust ~ of the addict (my niece), the programs, and the professionals who have all failed thus far.

Hoping there are DF members who are have utilized any of these on-line recovery sites? If you know anything about them please share your experiences.

[superdupernaut]

I think its unfair to classify AA as being non-secular. From what I know, the 12 steps can practiced in a secular manner. By their traditions, no AA or NA groups ought to be affiliating with any religious bodies.

In 12 step literature terms like spirituality and god are used, but these are not defined as supernatural phenomena. Many 12step folk are atheists.

[savingJenniB]

There are numerous drugs-forum threads discussing pros & cons of AA, NA and assorted 12 step programs . . . If you wish to discuss 12-step programs ~ secular, non-secular, Christian, L. Ron Hubbard or alien. . . . kindly go to one of those threads.

This is a thread discussing alternative methods for addiction recovery. This is a thread for the discussion of programs, organizations, and techniques which do not incorporate 12-step philosophies.

For example: When my Aunt stopped drinking ~ she did not attend any meetings ~ she made a decision and stuck to it. She had some problems and thought they might be alcohol related. She made and kept a promise to herself to not have anything alcoholic to drink for a period of six months. At the end of that period she took up occasional drinking, but never returned to her old patterns of nightly cocktails followed by daily hangovers. This is an example of an "Other than the 12 Steps" method.

[Dickon]

JennyB,

I was orginally drawn to the rational recovery thing, I even went so far as to swear off forever! But I went back today, and I was simply appalled by some of the crassness going on. I took a kind of addiction-IQ test so called, that spent half it's time slamming AA and the disease concept for being unscientific and the other half making completely ungrounded claims of its own. It was the ultimate in hypocrisy, and I think liable to be very dangerous. I suppose it's philosophy of "quit now, there is no other time" is great if you have a gambling addiction or a none-too-serious alcohol one. But you start telling someone with a barbiturate addiction to quit-now, and he'll wind up dead. There might well be something buried on the site about this, but it's simply not bought up responsibly as it should be. It might be effective for people who have not gone too far down the slippery slope. Alcoholics can die quitting. It seems all safety concerns are ignored for a slick message.

The idea that the only reason people use is to high is also rubbish; you never heard of withdrawal symptoms or methadone mate!? I thought that was one of the core principles of addiction: no longer using to get high, but to stop yourself getting low. The idea of self-medication is dismissed peremptorily. OK so I suppose those who use anti-depressants use them simply to get high! Well maybe yes, but getting high takes on a whole new meaning that is removed from instant gratification in that case. They don't say that, I'm just trying to see how they would rationalize the difference.

It's annoying, because I think there's the germ of a really good idea in this! I'm not entirely convinced, but as usual, people claiming to be anti-dogmatic, are just replacing one dogma with another. Such a shame. And to dismiss the power of fellowship (I'm getting a lot on here at times myself) is wasting a valuable resource. In some ways getting clean as I am now without real-world support (except for my wife) is a really powerful experience for me, but it wouldn't be possible had I not spent years in NA meetings learning an awful lot of things about addiciton.

What kind of organization would I make? In a word an open minded one that offered meetings, and yet it would be only expected that the meetings were temporary or available as a fall-back. Well, rather than set such a thing up, I'm going to get my fellowship on here (DF), and use NA in the real world should I absolutely must. As they say "the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop using." Maybe if you're one of the many on here who is so scared at "all the religious mumbo-jumbo in NA" (there's very little really) you should question you own convictions in your lack or doubt of faith. I really enjoyed the other day when I got invited over with my wife and son to have dinner with a lot of Jehovah's Witnesses. I could go over every day for a year, and would never become one. I'm confident in how I see the world. I'm not fixed, I'm always trying to learn more, but I know by bullshit detector will kick in if someone tries to tell me something I don't agree with. I'm not threatened if everyone around me sees things differently, if anything I get a smug sense of superiority! But that's just me. I'm often perplexed at how others see things, but that's ok. I just think that this usual objection to NA is so specious, and dumb. There are some annoying people in NA meetings. There are equally some annoying people in the world. There are some annoying people on here. Depending on your views, I might be one of them.

I could get quite riled about this, not even because I'm an NA member (I was), but simply because, in the words of AVRT (addictive voice recognition therapy - the principle behind rational recovery) I almost always here the addictive voice in objections to NA. At least when I hear desperate people with no expereince of recovery talking about it, who've never gone to more than one or two NA meetings. Whatever is wrong with the 12-steps, it's irrelevant to be working out the finer points of one's philosophical/theological take on the world in early recovery (well it's superfluous to requirements let's say). It's just nice if you're an addict to be given a cup of tea and a hug, see others who have made the journey, and ideally be given some phone numbers of people to talk to or get together with when times are hard. That is NA at its best. It's got me through once before when I needed it and didn't want rehab.

What NA has that none of the other groups have is a vast support network. So I say, any port in a storm, if it's bad enough. Get the boat fixed and then go looking for your Utopia. When starving don't worry where the bread's coming from, or if it's fair-trade bread, just eat it! [Point laboured enough......ed]

Dickon

[savingJenniB]

Excellent points ~ thank you for your post.

Sorry, I did not mean to get so dismissive in prior post. Just did not want to get into a religious discourse here.
Having spent the past week with family has considerably lowered my tolerance for any religious discussion.

You make several good points here ~ especially about how different addictions require different strategies.
"Any port in a storm" is very true ~ having attended numerous NA meetings when the need arises, I wholeheartedly agree with you.

Apologies to superdonaut ~ been around too many grouchy old people lately ~ beginning to sound just like them!

[drug-bot]

Originally Posted by savingJenniB

"There is nothing in your past, in your genes, in your brain, or in your personality that compels you to drink or use. Using is voluntary, purposeful behavior."

swim thinks this is patently untrue, espeacially regarding your brain, many drugs effect it radically. swim will use opiates as an example, opiate addiction depletes the body and causes the body to stop making natural endorphines (the feel good chemicals) and even when one stops using opiates your endorphine system doesnt go back to normal for a number of months to more than a year, thats why opiate addictions are so hard to kick and have a 90% relapse rate, imagine feeling no pleasure from the natural things in life like a good meal, sex, exersise, anything; its hell. so drugs effect the brain.
and like Dickson said you cant tell a barbituate, benzo, ghb, or heavy alcoholic to just stop or theyll wind up dead some where because of the long term effects they had on the brain and body, they need to be properly medically detoxed; and the lasting impact of those drugs on the brain are intense anxiety/panic attacks and depression that could last for a month or multiple months esp for long lasting benzos and heavy long time users.


swim thinks individual therapy and behavioral therapy work well through his experience. also one shouldnt discount maintance programs like methadone or suboxone/subutex for opiate addiction (yes one can argue its just replacing one addiction for another, but swim and many in the maintance field think its not the addiction that destroys peoples lifes but its the lifestyle and means in which one supports their addiction that does), theirs also vivitrol for alcoholics that make alcohol taste disgusting and if enough alcohol is drunk they get violently ill,: theirs currently a cocaine-antibody thats waiting to come out, its one or a series of injections, it makes your body attack the cocaine molecules thinking their some type of poison/bacteria, the end result is all the cocaine being disposed of by some cells in your body so none of it reaches ones brain.

[superdupernaut]

Originally Posted by savingJenniB

Apologies to superdonaut ~ been around too many grouchy old people lately ~ beginning to sound just like them!

No worries, I dont want to get into a debate re. 12 step programs either, and I can see how my previous post might be baiting such a thing to happen.

I guess the title of this thread says it all. I recently read a book, "The Heart of Addiction", by Lance Dodes, M.D..

He presents a sensible view of addiction that I previously hadn't heard. While there is no specific 'program' I think that this book is a good read for those who are interested in addictions.

[~lostgurl~]

Originally Posted by superdupernaut

I guess the title of this thread says it all. I recently read a book, "The Heart of Addiction", by Lance Dodes, M.D..

He presents a sensible view of addiction that I previously hadn't heard. While there is no specific 'program' I think that this book is a good read for those who are interested in addictions.

If you can, a Book review for this would be fantastic. Much reputation is given for original book reviews.

[Richard_smoker]

Originally Posted by Dickon

The idea that the only reason people use is to high is also rubbish; you never heard of withdrawal symptoms or methadone mate!?

i see your point, but as someone who has relapsed, i'll tell you that using simply to get high is 100% true. I look at it like this: the withdrawal and physical hell reinforces the urge to get high, and if anything that fear of withdrawal provides a WONDERFUL excuse to keep using.

which is more acceptable in today's society? using to get high, or using to avoid a terrible illness?

relapsing (and developing a habit for that matter) is all centered around the desire to feel high. no if's, ands or but's.

but you are correct in the statements about death from cold turkey from alcohol, barbs, and benzos. likewise, most people are simply not strong enough to endure a cold-turkey kick from hardcore opiates--especially when there's product to be had.

-DICK