Context?

We spend a lot of time talking about “context” as in “alcohol abuse occurs within a context.”

What we mean by that is that it’s not an isolated condition, like an actual disease, and that eliminating alcohol abuse is accomplished by changing the context of your day-to-day life. Mostly you change what you do so that there isn’t any room left for alcohol.

Of course the context of your life includes other people and when you change your “context” it also changes theirs. That tends to surprise most spouses so it’s a good idea to understand that ahead of time – and to make changes that improve not only your life, but theirs as well.

Simply stopping drinking doesn’t do usually do that. Just stopping only creates a void, and the void becomes a vacuum, and the vacuum sucks you back into drinking.

Changing how you organize your life, however, is a good exercise in improving things for everyone.

It’s truly amazing how much more time and energy there is when we’re not depressing ourselves with alcohol; not losing hours in a stupor; not constrained by hangovers; not planning our every activity and action around alcohol.

With the context of our lives freed from an alcohol focus we can actually have a life.

That’s what our clients do.

We’re sure you’ll want to join them by giving us a call, and getting to the point where you too can say,

“Drinking? Oh, yes, Been there. Done that.”

Families

One of the things that always surprises us, even after all of these years, is the way 99% of all treatment programs exclude family members. Yes, most have some sort of “Family Day” or other form of pseudo-involvement, but the rule that clients “must leave your family and join the program” is still the rule.

Why?

Frankly, it’s the way any brainwashing entity works. Isolate; indoctrinate; exploit; and so on. It’s the only way to successfully control and manipulate people to do things that aren’t really in their own bet interests.

It’s also a way to avoid dealing with the reality that you can’t change someone’s behavior without impacting the people around them.

So, whenever possible, we involve spouses, or parents, anyone who is directly affected by the drinking and who will also benefit from ending the alcohol abuse.

One of the ways we do this is to ask everyone to do a Cost/Benefit Analysis that lists the costs and benefits of drinking and stopping. Yes, there are benefits to drinking – otherwise we wouldn’t do it – and there are costs to stopping.

Why not download the form and give it a try. Do it individually then do one together. Some of the answers may surprise you.

The Analysis is just one of the many factors we consider with clients in figuring out what really will work for them and their families.

Why not call and see if we can be of help to you and your family?

Tools From Our Shelf

Don’t forget, you’re welcome to download all of our freebies – the Cost Benefit Analysis tool; Long Term Goal Planner; and Weekly Planner at:

Resources For You!

As always, for information or just to talk, one of us answers the phone personally from 8:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m., Pacific Daylight Time, Monday – Thursday, unless we are with clients, or from 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

If we don’t answer, leave your name and number and one of us will usually be able to get back to you within an hour.

Toll Free From the Lower 48 or Canada: 888-541-6350

In Los Angeles, or from Alaska: 760-580-5758