Ranger

I dig what you're saying, though I'm uncomfortable with the assumption that lurkers view any given thread within context. I have no way of knowing whether the average lurker reads 2 threads or 200 before slipping away or making him/herself known.

Similarly, I have no way of knowing whether there is a high percentage of lurkers who come to SR looking for material that feeds their denial or their distrust of any given program. I suspect this is true, however, which is why I am probably overly concerned with what they are fed here.

noonereal

This has absolutely been my experience.

AA and it's approach to alcoholism is consider extreme and unique in most the world.

Mark75

Scientific studies of alcoholism and addiction have so many built in obstacles to obtaining good information, that I have a basic skepticism for studies like this.

A much higher level of finesse is required, IMHO, to even ask the study subjects appropriate questions... Much less understand the answers.

Tigger41

Yeah - I so didn't need to read this today. I'm still early (27 days) and still fighting the voice in my head that says I might be able to go back - even if it is in 5 or 10 years.

I keep repeating to myself. "If you are not one of those small percentages and you go back you will have to go through this again - and this sucks."

The I think about smoking and there is nothing I miss about it and wouldn't smoke again if you paid me.

I want to get to the other side where I don't think about drinking and when I do I think - "who cares - it never did much for me - I'm so much happier now"

But I could have done without this post right now. Just being honest.

Terminally Unique

I don't assume that lurkers are pathetic dumb-bells who can't absorb information and draw their own conclusions, or that we are much more enlightened than they are.

Ranger

I must say your jump from my assertion to characterizing lurkers as "pathetic dumb-bells" is quite a logical feat...

...if not an ill-conceived straw man.

Dee74

I worry about lurkers too - it's my job...and I still remember how vulnerable impressionable and desperate I was when I came here - it's got absolutely nothing to do with intelligence or lack of it.

I think there's been a balanced view here.

Can we move on?

D

keithj

All I have to know is the truth for me. What happens when I drink. What happens when I don't drink. Anybody else can classify it however they want, what is important is my own truth.

If you think you aren't an alcoholic like I am, if you think that you can moderate your drinking, if you think that you can start again and drink normally, then feel free. Hat's off to you if you can succeed.

langkah

It hasn't turned out well at all for those sober people I've known who've returned to drinking, and that's a big understatement. Seems like it should have been ok for at least 1 or 2 through the years.

I think SMART, SOS, LSR, WFS, RR, CR, and AA all have lifelong complete abstinence from alcohol as their shared ideal target outcome for lots of good reasons. Someone said earlier in this thread that AA is unique in that and extreme as no one except AA ever thought it a good idea for alcoholics not to drink anymore...I'd like to hear that one explained further.

BHF

I obviously can't speak for anyone else, but...
1. I've been a blackout drinker from day one.
2. I've been arrested multiple times for alcohol related offenses.
3. I've attended multiple treatment centers.
4. I've relapsed multiple times to worse results.
5. I've actually considerd the possibility of suicide in the past.
6. With one year sober, I STILL often experience a mental obsession to drink.

I'm positive that I can drink at any time that I want to, but I'm also positive that I will never be able to control my drinking like "normal" people. I don't enjoy drinking normal. I enjoy drinking like an alcoholic, I just couldn't ever live with the damage that followed.

SixStringZen

I used to think that I liked to drink...but, I really liked to get drunk...since, there's no real way to get drunk moderately, I don't feel the need to drink moderately...I don't begrudge those who do...
I'd agree that if you're positively salivating over the thought of getting to "drink moderately", you probably shouldn't be drinking...

TwelveSteps

Before I got sober I went through many periods of drinking "normally"... for a time. Maybe those people are experiencing something akin to those temporary periods (which sometimes lasted years). But for me, as an alcoholic, I always went back to drinking alcoholically when the "normal" period was over.

GG

Terminally Unique

I won't ever suggest to any problem drinker that they go out and drink again or engage in any controlled drinking experiments, for the simple reason that once a pattern of not "drinking responsibly" has been established, it is likely to continue. Additionally, such experiments might induce a free-fall-to-bottom, with ever increasing penalties, so I always recommend that people quit, not just for today, but for good. Some have accused me of "killing real alcoholics" with this simple, direct advice, but if people find that they cannot quit, there are resources available that can help.

soberlicious

Me too. Complete lifelong abstinence is all I've ever heard of with any program, not just AA, (with the exception of MM, of course). People who are self recovered also decide on lifelong abstinence. I personally, don't know anyone who returned to drinking socially after a period of addiction, but I suppose it's possible it's happened. I agree with the others though, here nor there to me. I already know the answer to whether I can return to drinking LOL and like others, I wouldn't even if I could.

Terminally Unique

Moderation Management is based on the assumption that there is a difference between "hard drinkers" and "real alcoholics," that the former can return to drinking, and that only the latter have to abstain. Personally, I think it is absurd to think that anyone learns how to drink moderately from a recovery group, since people who can drink moderately just do it. The only people who yearn to drink moderately are the ones that have already proven that they cannot do so. Since addicted people are impassioned to do whatever it takes to avoid quitting, however, I'm not surprised that MM was started.

lostbutterfly

I find that study fascinating, but not an experiment I shall be trying on myself. Why on earth would anyone like me want to drink moderately? What is the point? No, it's easier to be someone who just doesn't drink.

Itchy

I think that all of us need to remember that even the so called experts don't ever 100% agree.

More importantly that we here are a self help group and not a bunch of experts that vie for dominance one over the other, except for any that do.


Perhaps we need to look out for folks that seem to put themselves up above the rest of us?

I don't see anybody who comes here as being anything other than broken by drugs or alcohol. And wanting to mend. They will encounter these same kinds of statements from many sources and I think amongst ourselves we can pretty much put a reality spin on them as we have done here. With what, one exception we all pretty much agree that it won't work for us, and then one that says it might work for some but they don't want to test it?

I say that for me and most others if you couldn't control it before, then odds are you won't later after healing up a bit and taking a break from drinking.

Everybody is walking around the elephant in the room here I believe.

Allow me to submit this premise.

If one could not control their drinking, and reads an article like the one in the OP, and says to themselves that they too can drink in moderation I say to them stop wasting your time then. Why waste time with all the quitting process, just go directly to that moderation you possess deep inside.

Oh, you're here because you could not moderate? Because you couldn't drink just one? Because you do things under the influence that get you in trouble with the law, family and friends? Hmm maybe you want to consider abstaining like me?

If you always do things, the way you always did, it is insane to expect different results.

Haven't we always consumed alcohol and believed we would control it? Then found out we could not and did it again? And then went out after a night/day week and started to do the same thing again?

But of course if we quit for some unspecified period we will magically get different results?

Carl, I for one am glad you brought this up. For the folks that think it is something they didn't need to read, I am glad you read it here and got all our different contexts and views. Now you can make your own informed decisions.

SamanthaIam

Even if it is theoretically possible to have 1 or 2 drinks after recovery, why would you *want* to?