I use Campral and think it is a great tool. One of my personal rules for posting online is to try not to be negative but I'm going to break that rule here: I HATE the idea that medications are in some way cheating, somehow lessen one's own fight at sobriety and somehow make those using them less truly sober. Modern medicine has evolved for our benefit and why shouldn't we take advantage of that? You wouldn't tell someone with a broken leg to "practise" walking without a crutch when newly injured and in dire need of some help, no?
No, craving reduction medications and antabuse are not permanent fixes and do not address the underlying issues, but they sure as hell do help those of us who need an extra push or support.
Campral and antabuse have bought me sober time. Campral specifically has lessened the intensity and frequency of cravings allowing me to stay sober long enough to clear out my body and mind of residual alcohol and get to work on the underlying issues. If I was never able to get sober in the first place I couldn't do this serious work. "This serious work" includes meetings with a psychologist, working the steps of AA with an online sponsor I met here on SR, using SR as a tool and working on my "better me" project/plan which includes exercise, karate, language lessons, reading and getting my house and garden in tiptop shape.
In the beginning I was taking the maximum dose of campral, which is based on weight, and was two 333mg pills, three times a day. In collaboration with my doctor that has been reduced to two pills in the morning and one at night, so half the original dosage. I don't know now if it is the light dose of medication that is keeping cravings at bay or if it is the other work I have been doing, but even at this lower dose I do not have frequent or strong cravings. I am sticking with Campral for the time being as I feel safe and protected by taking it and I also like the other benefit (which i am not sure naltrexone addresses, but that is a question for a doctor) that it repairs injured pathways in the brain that resulted from excessive alcohol use.
I am also still on antabuse. I went back on it after my last relapse in March. It was a one day drinking episode but upset me and scared me enough that I wanted to attack it with any means possible so I asked to go back on antabuse and have been taking it ever since. Again, I feel safe taking it, knowing that it will back me up (to an extent, I could drink on it, to disastrous consequences) when I feel shaky.
Hats off to those that have gotten and remained sober without the use of medication. But hats off too to those who have been brave enough to approach their doctor about medical option available to them and have used medications in conjunction with a solid recovery plan addressing this beast 360 degrees.