Cut Back Coach
 

There at the top of my ***** email list this morning was that persistent revolving add that tries to get me to buy this or that thing that I'm not interested in several times a day. This one was new. It was an app for Cut Back Coach, a "sure fire way" to cut back on your alcohol consumption. I'm not posting a link for more than just the obvious reasons. But it was like reading a message from my mostly long dead alcoholic AV. All the usual lies were there in large print, and the ad was quite long. It wasn't until the very end of the scroll, down at the end of the page where it gave the following somewhat glossed over caution in fine print.

The results listed on this page are real and are based on average results of Cutback Coach subscribers who sign up and track their drinks for 30 days. They aren’t guaranteed and they are not intended to act as medical advice. Cutback Coach is a system for creating a more mindful approach to drinking to help you reach your goals. It is not designed to treat alcohol use disorder (AUD).

The link to the app went nowhere, at least on my computer. Maybe it works on a phone, because it's a phone app, so I don't know how much they were asking for it.

Mods, if you decide to remove this thread, I get it, and it won't bother me. The thing just insulted my intelligence. I wanted to rant, and I'm over it now anyway.

I tried everything else to moderate my drinking. I probably would have tried a phone app if I knew about one back in the day.
It wouldn't have worked, though. I have alcohol use disorder.
I suspect most people trying to moderate their drinking with a phone app are similarly afflicted.

Yeah, it's fine for normies, and I'm all for it in that case. I even realized that while reading the contents of the ad, but the lead in (the few words that make a subject heading for the email) were purposely worded to attract the attention of alcoholics in need. And I'm sure they will make a few sales that will end up dragging out a few alcoholic's recoveries for another couple of years longer than necessary.

Anything for a buck.
Folks have been taking advantage of the vulnerable forever. Nothing new.
Still disgusting though

It leads me to wonder: if someone feels a conscious need to "cut back," doesn't that indicate an alcohol use disorder? Aside from that, how many of us who really do have such a disorder were ever in denial of that fact? That's why I relapsed countless times.

I'll always remember that old adage, "If you have to control your drinking, you are not in control of your drinking."

Cutting back ......Geez....Oh, let me count the ways that I failed epically at cutting back. lol.
That app would only say that I drank WAY more than I wanted too and that I was not successful. I then would feel more shame, more guilt, more of all those bad feelings. So glad Im off that crazy train!

Cutting back is such a universal attempt by alcoholics that we could revise Step 1 and 2 of the 12 Steps.

Step 1: Realizing that our drinking has become problematic, we resolved to cut back on our drinking.
Step 2: Having failed at cutting back, we resolved to reinstate the old first two steps in their original form.

But seriously, trying to cut back was such a big part of my alcoholism that I actually do consider it to be one of the steps I took toward finally quitting. Until we prove to ourselves once and for all that we can't drink, we will always try to prove that we can drink like normal people. Throughout early recovery we are constantly finding out what works, and what doesn't. I think we can make a case, albeit a rather feeble case, that trying to moderate is almost part of the process of recovery, well... leading to it, anyway.

I do agree with this. I was speaking with someone yesterday and they are in the phase of knowing they need to quit but have not gotten to the point. The phase of slipping up. The phase of having one last hurrah! When they were speaking they did say they know how stupid it all sounds. To me it sounds like the journey and one that I was on for a decade. The journey of bargaining or testing or moderating or...... I mean, the journey is not linear for a lot of people. We dont just quit and never look back. Its a series of moments and lessons. More moments and more lessons and then hopefully you find yourself at the end of that journey ready to start a new chapter.

That's how it was for me. I have a good friend who describes his recovery as "just decided to quit," but I can't believe he hadn't been processing the situation for a long time. Like when he got shot on the street in a drunk altercation. Surely, that must have factored in to his "quitting." I think I should press him on this some more. I think he would be happy to talk about it. People just "deciding to quit" are how it often looks to an outsider who has no actual knowledge of what had been taking place in the person's mind before the actual event. Granted there is an actual brief moment where quitting actually occurs, but each of us varies in the amount of struggle it takes to get there.

If you have to be taught how to responsibly drink poison, as though drinking poison is necessary for survival, perhaps the simplest solution is to not drink poison.

It may have its uses although not for anyone who’s reached a level where they have to visit the SR site.

I can remember, less than twenty years ago, I drank alcohol but not every day, and I often went away or did an activity that meant a week or two without alcohol. I was clearly not alcohol dependent at that time. I had a lonely spell abroad in 2002/3 and drank every single day. That was so obviously where I crossed the line into alcohol dependency. If at that point, someone had stepped in and told me what lay ahead and that if I cut back, I’d be OK, that would’ve helped my life tremendously. I’d have been a genuine moderate drinker. But from 2003 onwards, I was dependent and no amount of coaching or schemes would’ve helped me.

Lol unless they literally tie me up after 1 drink.....this won't work. Humorous. Wonder if they have ever worked with real alcoholics.

Up until the night of my last arrest i probably would have thought I had the answers to write instructions for this app! This sounds like something I would have thought of creating.

Its so much better to not have to worry about this crap anymore!

Whenever this subject comes up, I suggest people put "Audrey Kishline+Moderation Management" into a search engine.

I'm sure there are alcoholics who have the app, so there will be alcoholics involved. I doubt if the app has a way of knowing who is on the other end, and I'm assuming it doesn't care.