And most will also agree that all alcoholics are typically diagnosed and seek help for their problem much later in their drinking "careers" than they should, and often later than people who are addicted to other substances and behaviors.There are at least four reasons for this:
First, drinking is an accepted behavior in most societies, so we're obviously not as alarmed seeing someone drinking as we are if we saw someone jam a needle full of heroin or meth into their arm.Secondly, on at least a visual and appearance basis, there's a fuzzy line between someone who REALLY likes to drink, someone who doesn't handle liquor very well and an actual alcoholic.
Thirdly, like with all addictions, there's a stigma associated with alcoholism that isn't pretty.A lot of people still view alcoholism as simply weak will, bad personal choices, or moral failure.Well obviously, not many of us are too thrilled with the idea of walking into a clinic and saying, "Hi, I'm weak-willed, I make poor choices, and I'm a moral failure.Is there someone I can see about that?"
And the last reason is that with rare exception, most physicians have little if any training in addictions.How little?Some call it the "4 - 2 - 1 syndrome."What that means is that over 4 years of medical school, the average doctor will receive 2 hours of training concerning the number 1 treatable health problem in society, which is addiction.
Do you believe that mentioned opinion of alcoholics, that it is still that weak willed no good son of a gun is still here. I feel that times have changed on that over all in todays society....
I could be very wrong, but think it is for the most part especially in very populated areas considered as an illness.
Think this has tended to happen with our poor dear souls we send overseas, and so many come home with major PTSD, are refused the correct diagnosis, and soon become the homeless man out on the streets with their little brown bags, and their big Posters standing on corners begging for handouts.
I could be very wrong in my imput here, but just thought I would share it with you....
And that 4-2-1......mind boggling......
Thanks for the Post, you add so much good food for thought everyday.
Hey Larry!Yeah Dr. William D, Silkworth writes in the Doctor's opinion,The subject presented in this book seems to me to be of paramount importance to those afflicted with alcoholic addiction.He says I say this after many years of treating alcoholic and drug addiction.Was Bill W. who says in 1960 ,that we don;t refer to alcoholism as a disease but an illness as not to go against medical thought at the time and then in '80 AMA says its a disease anyway(we don't endorse AMA)...We don't endorse outside entities but we do read from Hazelden and Betty Ford clinic who talk of alcohol addiction treatment(on their web sites).I actually think it was also said that the "allergy' theory was eradictaed in like '73.(wikopedia on the disease model) The Doctor says(william silkworth) the theory that we have an allergy interests us!but our opinion may mean little.(I still believe for me my allergy is to the "first one"Can't have it or I can't stop.(manifestation of an allergy and craving phenomenon)... Thats why they tells us to let doctor know what you suffer from so you can get the best help for your situation...Its our responsibility.Alcohol and Benzo;s certainly a tricky mixture...???)Believe it was in early 70's Used to see in the "clinic' up here signs saying'Alcohol is an illness,not a moral weakness(could have some brain sludging on those dates!!)!That was a little enlightening for me when I read it,but I still got drunk....You would think there would be more Doctors versed in addiction meds and knowledge today.Interesting article,I would say I was late about 25 years worth..But God had another plan.Thanks for the read......
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Selfishness-self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles.
It is amazing how many doctors have so many different opinions about our disease. Some docs believe that they know how to treat our illness, and with all their hearts and minds, they try, but a lot of them don't have much success, or else they can't grasp a "non-scientific" treatment. Many of them I htink revert back to trying to treat how we alcoholics "feel", instead of how we "think". Bug difference. This is only my opinion, but I feel that many doctors believe that our feelings drive our thinking, adn that if we feel better, we will think better. After all, that is the basis of neuroscientific pharmacology, right? (i.e. treating depression hoping that feeling better will cause the patient to THINK like a happier person who will then not revert to self-medication, right?) Wrong, in our case. Because we don't drink because we feel bad. We drink because we feel bad. And good. And excited. And angry. And scared. And bold. And so on. Sure, we have feelings. But they don't dictate our drinking. The thinking does. And doctors are better at treating feelings than they are at treating thinking. AstraZeneca, Lilly, Pfeizer et. al. have supplied enough medication to treat feelings to take care of producing or eliminating just about every feeling ever discovered. (By the way, depression isn't a feeling, it is a disease with feelings as symptoms... in my opinion of course.) Sure, changing brain chemistry can facilitate better thinking, but doctors cannot simply write a prescription and change the next thought that enters the alcoholic mind.
Doctors study testable hypotheses based on chemistry and biology, for the most part. There are so many facets of alcoholism that simply cannot be dropped onto a slide and placed under a microscope. Sure, there are focus groups and surveys and statistica about alcoholics, but this is all vague in comparison to being able to look at tissue under a microscope and seeing cancer cells. Or looking at a strand of DNA and saying, "there it is!!!! Let's irradicate/inject/extract/alter/poison/remove.... it."
I think more doctors know more about treating symptoms than actual diseases. And alcoholism's symptoms can be really elusive considering that most bonafide alcoholics do not first present themselves with full blown liver failure or alcohol-derived chronic pancreatitis. That is why alcoholism, when treated by a medical professional, requires that it be treated by a SPECIALIST. There are, thank GOD, addiciton specialists now. Just like oncologists study cancer and endocrinologists study glandular and hormone problems, addiction specialists research and treat and TRY to irradicate addiciton. There are precious few of these specialists floating around. And the ones worth their salt know that THEY are not ultimately the ones who will arrest the illness, but the sufferer has to (through AA, NA, etc.)
But how many people do you know who in casual conversation say, "Sorry Tuesday is bad for me, have to see my Addiciton Specialist... maybe we'll do lunch on Firday?" Eegads.
There are plenty of good ones out there. It's just that no one is seeing them.
2 weeks ago before Group, I asked the head of the whole department for addiciton treatment at St. Thomas Hospital, which was Dr. Bob's hospital, which prides itself on it's historical contribution to Alcoholics Anonymous, and has endless cases of memorabilia lining the walls, and which takes its treatment of addiction and it's suggested therapy of AA very seriously, I asked this Dr., the head Addiciton Specialist (Dr. Andriosi), "Is it true that cocaine stays in the body, stored int eh fat cells, for months after the addict goes through initial detox?" This was told to me with certainty by another doctor who is not an addiciton specialist, who warned that cocaine could "leak" out of fatty tissue and back into the blood stream and reactivate a craving at any time.... to this question, the Specialist said, "No. That is not true. That is not going to happen. It is gone from the body in 72 hours, give or take."
So, don't know where I was going with this, but i guess I ended up somewhere, right? (A mile and a half of post later... sorry)
I believe many doctors knwo what they are doing, they are the ones specializing in addiction. And many of these suggest 12 step programs. And none of them, so far as I know, prescribe garbage like valium.
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~Your Higher Power has not given you a longing to do that which you have no ability to do.
Do you believe that mentioned opinion of alcoholics, that it is still that weak willed no good son of a gun is still here. I feel that times have changed on that over all in todays society....
I could be very wrong, but think it is for the most part especially in very populated areas considered as an illness.
Think this has tended to happen with our poor dear souls we send overseas, and so many come home with major PTSD, are refused the correct diagnosis, and soon become the homeless man out on the streets with their little brown bags, and their big Posters standing on corners begging for handouts.
I could be very wrong in my imput here, but just thought I would share it with you....
And that 4-2-1......mind boggling......
Thanks for the Post, you add so much good food for thought everyday.
Hugs, Toni
Toni,
I believe we have made great progress instilling the disease concept of Alcoholism with the public. However far too many still see Alcoholism as a choice. We who have it know better.
A recent example happened in Buffalo, NY where I moved from. The most popular radio talk show and the most popular radio talk show host in that city devoted an entire show to ridiculing the disease concept of alcoholism.
He used many derogatory adjectives describing us with absoulutly no compassion at all. When ever a person calling in would support the disease concept, he would talk over them, interrupt them and ridicule them.
How many in the listening audience were influenced by that show we will never know. I am fairly sure it did not help our cause.
The worst point was what about the Alcoholic that was just about ready to get help and heard that show. Some of those will die from alcoholism and the talk show host will never be held criminally responsible.
Larry, -------------------- The most dangerous untruths are truths moderately distorted. ~Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Wow I didn't know that about doctor training on addiction.
I always lied to my doctor about my drinking anyway...
My doctor went to the same high school as me and knew my dad, who died of alcoholism a long long time ago. I didn't start seeing him as my family doctor until after I was sober (didn't even know he was a doctor actually). He's very happy that I'm sober. From a purely scientific point of view as he put it - on top of being diabetic, overweight, and high BP I don't need any other aggravations. He said a lot of people with type II diabetes don't stop drinking. Being type II is also a convenient thing to tell people why I don't drink.
Really, really interesting stuff. I know lots of people who have come into the rooms having been recommended by their doctors. For my part, I never thought to share my inability to stop drinking with my doctor. In retrospect, I guess it's because I never saw it as an illness, but indeed as bad decision-making on my part, a moral failure etc. And being an active alkie, had a doctor asked about how much I drank and how often and told me that it was unhealthy, I never would have listened.
All that said, I've come across at least two doctors who have a combined 18 years sobriety in the Fellowship. Both I have heard talk about the illness. That even helped me to keep coming back: if they thought it was an illness, and that this was treatment for it, then who the heck am I to think that I know better.
