Originally Posted by
DoubtfulDebs 
this is 'doctor beast' in his white coat coming up with psuedo scientific REASONS to drink - i say that not to shut your topic down, because it's a legitimate thing to consider, but because thinking along those lines can trip you up.
Wait a second here. I was going to let this thread die since it didn't seem like anyone was interested in the subject, however, I did not try to raise this topic as permission to drink and I was not wearing my 'doctor beast" white lab coat. I happen to be the type of person who will do a lot of reading on a subject that interests me, and when I was reading up on alcoholism, I came across the relationship between dopamine and pleasure. Alcohol does not inrease dopamine throughtout the brain, it only causes an increase in dopamine in the area of reward.
http://hamsnetwork.org/dopamine.pdf It was kind of like a little "ah ha" moment for me. Upon further reading on this subject, I found there is much more involved than simply dopamine. I thought it was worth exploring and was wondering if anyone else on this forum had an insight.
As far as me asking how we can find pleasure without drugs/alcohol - I was asking how others have found pleasure. What did they do?
I have read RR and find Trimpey's approach refreshing in that sobriety can come in many forms and one doesn't have to do the AA route.
I obviously didn't express myself well with my OP.