KittyP

There are lots and lots of other treatments and almost every single one of them has better successes than the 12 steps, which has a significantly lower success rate than what is known as spontaneous remission, ie, getting better alone. I have absolutely no problem with the AA (which. by the way, is run by an enormous and very wealthy company called the AAWS - so your assertion that it has no leader/guru/boss is way off base) and I'm very glad that it helps/has helped the people who it has helped. But it has a very low success rate and does not suit most people. In helping my husband through his problem I have borrowed a quote of Franklin D. Roosevelt's and made it my motto; "It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something." When the AA/Al-Anon approach did not work for us, I went out and found something else, and then something else.

Thankfully, there are so, many, many alternatives out there. There is SMART Recovery, Rational Recovery, LifeRing, the MyWayOut programme, Women for Sobriety inc, HAMS: Harm Reduction for Alcohol, non12step, SOS - Secular Organization for Sobriety, Dr Stanton Peele's The Life Process Program, The Clean Slate, etc. Countries with state health care (pretty much all of the western world) run free Community Alcohol Teams, or similar, which are medicine and psychology based and have a reasonably good track record as they are paid for by the taxpayer.

There are numerous medical treatments, Topiramate, Naltrexone, Acamprosate, Antabuse and Baclofen. There is also even compelling evidence that a good diet and vitamin routine will reduce cravings and associated mood swings. In fact nobody should attempt a withdrawal without taking a daily dose of vitamin B1 (thiamine) as the risk of Wernicke's Encephalopathy is too great.

In addition just getting a good addiction counsellor/psychiatrist/psychologist has a very good chance of success depending on the root cause of the drinking. Of course the emphasis is on "good" therapist as a poor therapist, or one who is a bad fit, can do more harm than good.

(And Cyranoak, swearing at people is rarely "respectful or kind" regardless of how you precede it. In fact it's downright nasty, rude and unbelievably arrogant. What I have posted is not only supported but it's supported by the HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL. What you say is supported by personal anecdote. As it happens my personal anecdote isn't that my husband got over his addiction without treatment, but that doesn't make my experience the most common. I'd never, ever be so blind as to insist that what has been shown to be incredibly common can't happen because it didn't happen to my husband.)