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Speaker 2This episode is brought to you by TXU Energy. For the first time ever, Texans have an energy plan that combines free nights all year with daytime summer savings. It's called Free Nights and Cool Summer. You get free nights every night, all year long, plus a 25% bonus toward your daytime use all summer. It's a first-of-its-kind plan, created for how Texans actually use energy. Discover how much more you could save with Free Nights and Cool Summer. TXU Energy. Energy for everything. Visit TXU.com for more information. Rep number 10004.
Speaker 3I am, I get really triggered and tired when I see people demonizing alcohol. Sure, alcohol is bad on a fundamental level. It is ethanol. It causes breast cancer in women. It causes other cancers. There is no safe amount of alcohol to be drank, drank and drunk per week. That has been proven now. So there's this big anti-alcohol movement. Where I get upset is when people go on this tirade of pointing, blaming alcohol is the problem. And if alcohol wasn't around, it wouldn't be an issue. I have an alcohol problem. It's not a thinking problem. It's a drinking problem. I disagree with that sentiment because if alcohol was my problem, if drugs were my problem, I would have stayed sober after rehab. I wouldn't have needed recovery spaces to go to. I wouldn't have needed therapy after rehab. I would have been sober from the first time I went to rehab until now, which was back in 2015. I would have been sober from the first time I went to rehab until now, which was back in 2015. I wouldn't have needed recovery spaces to go to. I wouldn't have needed therapy after rehab. I would have been sober from the first time I went to rehab until now, which was back in 2015. I wouldn't have relapsed because alcohol was my problem. Thinking, my thinking is my problem today. I firmly believe that I am the one with the problem. I don't know how to turn it off. I don't know how to shut it down. Everybody else is going home at the end of the night when the party's done and I'm still going. I don't know. I don't have an off button. It's like playing Russian roulette when I drink. I don't know what's going to happen next. I might stop after three drinks. I might party for three weeks and end up in a trap house or a motel somewhere. Doing copious amounts of drugs and drinking until all the hours of the night by myself. All right, we're back. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to Recovering Out Loud podcast. I'm your host, Anthony. I'm an alcoholic, an addict, been in recovery since 2015. I had seven and a half years, had a horrible relapse at around the seven year mark. Seven and a half year mark. And now I'm celebrating almost coming up to a year and a half now. I'm a counselor. I work at a treatment center halfway through my schooling doing that. And I do these episodes to bring information to you. This is my perspective. This is not me talking on a spiritual hilltop. I'm not better or worse than any of you. We are all equal. I got prompted by a message on my Instagram at Recovering Out Loud pod, where I love when you guys message me. I read every single one. This person messaged me the other day and said something along the or no. They commented on my video and said something along the lines of I'm sick of this shit. Alcohol is the problem. I am not the problem. You are not the problem. It is not the person that is the problem. And of course, this fired me up because I'm a firm believer that I don't know. Maybe I would. I think what I want to do with this episode is let you decide for yourself. Is it a personal problem of powerlessness in addiction and alcoholism, a disease, whatever you want to call it? I talk about that at length in my episode about is alcoholism, addiction, a disease, whatever you want to call it. I think fundamentally beating up on alcohol and trying to this big alcohol movement. It just wastes a lot of energy for me. It's a it's an expenditure of energy that I don't need. Alcohol is bad for you. That's been proven fine. There are millions of people around the world that are controlling their drinking and enjoying it, actually letting it them benefit them that are not in recovery, that don't need to be in recovery, that can enjoy it. I just I don't think that we need to be focusing all this energy on big alcohol and alcohol is the problem. I'm not the problem. I think we need to do the inner work. I need to do the inner work and find out what alcohol does for me. Why do I drink and how do I live life successfully without needing to pick up? Those are the two things that I learned in rehab from a fundamental high level view. Today, I have to remind myself of that. So is alcohol addictive? Is it the substance or the person? If alcohol is just a drink, how come some people can pick it up and put it down? How come some people can just enjoy a few after work once a week or once a month or don't go into spirals like we did? How come my friends can drink normally now after years of partying with me? A lot of people that I used to party with would go close to as hard as I would go at times, not towards the end, because a lot of people didn't do the things that I used to do towards the end. The the patterns of using and behavior that I would portray that I would exhibit to get my drugs and alcohol, the things I would do to lie, steal, manipulate from people to get my fix. A lot of people didn't do that. I think I know you know what I'm talking about comes to a point in your addiction, alcoholism, where anything sort of goes and there's really nothing you won't do to get that drug or drink because you're so stuck. I'm so caught in the cycle that I'll do whatever. I'll go to any lengths to escape myself because it's painful. And when you're in the middle of it and you're in that cycle, the craving is so strong that I'll move mountains to get my cocaine, to get my mess, to do get my drink when I'm in it. It's very hard to get out. And so if drugs and alcohol are my problem, then all you have to do is remove me physically from drugs and alcohol for long enough where the craving goes away. The physical craving goes away. The physical allergy is gone. But that's not how this thing works. And I think a lot of you know that is. My thinking is the problem, I think. I think that this time will be different. I think that I can just go and have one. I think that alcohol will magically solve my problems. Drugs will will I'll be able to control it. The great obsession of every abnormal drinker and drug addict is one day it'll be different. I will control it this time. I will drink or use like gentlemen, like other people. It is not the case. And you will try every form of experimentation and suffering and to to get to that place, but you just you never get there if you're like me, you never get to that place of happy, contented one or two drinks, three drinks. It just never comes and we'll chase it into oblivion. One is too many. A thousand is never enough. So in this episode, I'm going to go into one of the most argued questions in addiction is alcohol the villain or is the person holding the glass? Who is responsible for this? It's not a trick question. Both sides have real science behind them. And how you answer it affects everything about how you recover. Let's get into it. Alcohol is a central nervous system, depressant, depressant. It hits the GABA receptors, which causes a calming and suppressing glutamate glutamate. That's why it relaxes you. It's a depressant. That's also why withdrawal can kill you. Your brain compensates by running hotter and then alcohol leaves and it can't self-regulate. Alcohol and benzodiazepines are two of the only, in my knowledge, substances that you can die from for from withdrawal. Heroin, you won't die. It'll be painful and exhausting and you won't ever want to go through that again. But alcohol and benzodiazepines, they act on the GABA receptors. They calm you down. They reduce anxiety. This is anti-anxiety medication is benzodiazepines. I had a problem with with benzos for a long time because I would get too high on stimulants, then I would use benzos to come back down. Terrible place to be. There's blackouts happening all the time. The withdrawal and the anxiety, it's lethal. And it's also very tiresome and annoying and depressing and sad. And anxiety ridden. So every drink triggers a dopamine hit in the nucleus accumbens, the brain's reward center. This is the same pathway hijacked by heroin, cocaine, gambling. The brain doesn't know alcohol from any other reward. It just knows that felt good. Let's do that again. That relieved my anxiety. I need that again. Anytime I feel anxious, boop, let's do that again. Let's drink, let's use. That'll solve my problem, because when you're in that, your brain thinks you're dying, right? Like it's that's that's what's happening here is you are in a fight, flight or freeze motion, your nervous system is acting up. Your body thinks you're dying. So you'll do anything to get that to stop, to to calm down. And the problem is, I always say this alcohol and drugs, they work until they don't with repeated use, the brain down regulates its own dopamine receptors. Now you need more alcohol to feel normal, not even to feel good, just to feel OK, baseline. That's the trap at this point. It's not a choice anymore in any meaningful sense. I have lost the power to choose. I always say this, but I choose I chose to relapse. If I go and drink today and I go outside, walk outside my door, go to a real sports bar and grab a beer, that is my choice because I am far enough removed from the craving, from the addiction cycle. It has been my experience that it is my choice when I'm in it. When I am a week into addiction or after after I take that first one, I lose all power. and choice in the matter. It's like playing Russian roulette. That's why you always hear people say, just don't take that first one. It's so annoying and obvious and simple, but it's true. It worked like, just don't pick up that first one. Just don't pick up. The first drink gets you drunk. So this is from the World Health Organization. Alcohol is responsible for 5.3% of all deaths globally. It's the leading risk factor for disease burden among 15 to 49 year olds. So the DSM-5, the medical diagnosis, I don't know what it stands for right now off the top of my head, but it's the book that tells you what diseases are. Classifies alcohol use disorder, AUD, as a diagnosable condition with 11 criteria. Physical dependence, including withdrawal, is a core feature of this diagnosis, of this disease, of this disorder. Alcohol withdrawal is one of the few that can be fatal without medical supervision. Don't detox alone. Okay. Countless times being in the cycle of active addiction, when I thought that I was choosing to use, I thought that I was deciding to keep going and I had a choice in the matter. But when you're in it like that, your brain is so hijacked by the drug, your dopamine, a normal, I always say this, but a normal dinner didn't get it for me. A steak didn't do it for me. I had to eat chips and ice cream and candy for dinner to get any sort of dopamine rush because the things that I used to like, when I'm in the middle of active addiction, I don't give a shit about any of that. My brain doesn't respond to that at all. I want high palatable items. I want dopamine. I'll do anything to get that dopamine fix. Research shows heritability, so hereditary heritability of AUD, alcohol use disorders, around 50 to 60%. Children of parents with AUD are four times more likely to develop it themselves. Even when raised, in different environments, adoption studies. These are done from adoption studies. This isn't about weakness. The biological starting point is different for some people. Around 37% of alcohol abusers have at least one serious co-occurring mental health disorder. So anxiety, depression, PTSD, ADHD. Alcohol doesn't cause all of these, but it gets used to manage them. It manages these things. Then it starts causing them after a while. Most people who drink, never develop alcohol use disorder. In fact, about 30% of Americans don't drink at all. And you see the numbers, it's going down. Less people are drinking today. And among those who do, only 14% meet criteria for alcohol use disorder at some point in their lives. This is the statistical reality that fuels the just drink like a normal person argument, and why it's so damaging to those who can't. So 12-step recovery uses the word allergy, not in a literal medical sense, but as a metaphor. Most people can eat peanuts. Someone with a peanut allergy can't. The peanut isn't evil, but for the person, it's off the table. The model sidesteps, this model sidesteps the morality debate entirely. So is the peanut the problem, or is the person that's allergic to the peanut? On the other side of things, the critics of the allergy model, so the people that don't believe in the allergy model, say it removes a cancer. They don't believe in the allergy model. They don't believe in the allergy model. It removes the accountability entirely. Supporters say it removes shame that blocks people from getting help. Both have a good point. I'm of the belief. I'm of the camp. I subscribe to the fact that it removes shame. If I have a disease, if I have an allergy, it doesn't remove blame. It removes shame. I need to remove shame. Shame is such a deep, dark-rooted problem in addiction. It stops so many people from getting help and asking for help and doing the things that they need to do to find help. I must be a bad person. Shame, the difference between guilt and shame, so I can feel guilty about doing something. Guilty is the action. Shame is I'm a bad person. Guilt is I did something wrong. I did that thing. I shouldn't have done that. Shame is I'm a bad person because I'm doing these things. I'm less than. So in camp A, alcohol is the problem camp. Alcohol is a toxic, addictive, carcinogenic drug that is normalized and legally sold. If it had been discovered today, it would never pass regulatory approval. You hear that a lot on social media. A lot of people say that. If alcohol was invented today, it would never be legal. It would be illegal before lunchtime. The substance itself creates dependence regardless of who drinks it. Remove the substance, remove the problem. Camp B is the person is the problem. So I am the problem. My thinking is the problem. My reaction to life is the problem. My perspective is the problem. My perception is the problem. Alcoholism is a disease of perception. You hear that sometimes. Alcohol is a disease of perception. You hear that sometimes. Alcohol is a disease of perception. You hear that sometimes. I love that one. I'm looking at things wrong. It's perception is reality and I am the one that is framing this as my magical solution, my higher power, my end-all be-all solution to all my problems. Millions drink without issue. The issue isn't alcohol. It's the predisposed individual who lacks coping skills, has unresolved trauma, or has a brain wired differently. Focus on the person, not the substance. I am in this camp. I find it a lot easier and just more settling to fall into this camp because then it means that there's a solution. There's a program of recovery that I can develop in the form of habits that only take place on a day, one day at a time, a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of my spiritual condition. But if you're not spiritual, the maintenance of your physical condition, emotional condition, any of those things, it's a daily reprieve. That's what recovery does for me. The American Medical Association classified alcoholism as a disease in 1956. The AMA, ASAM, and WHO, the World Health Organization, all support the disease model. It says that alcohol use disorder, AUD, is a chronic relapsing brain disorder, not a moral failing. This has improved access to treatment, insurance coverage, and reduced stigma in clinical settings. Some people argue the disease model inadvertently removes agency. If it's a disease, the disease model inadvertently removes agency. If it's a disease, you have not, if it's a disease you have, not a behavior you do, where's the motivation to change? Well, if I have a disease, then what's the point of all this? Philosopher and addiction researcher, Dr. Nick Heather argues for a complex learning disorder model that preserves both biology and agency. So I want to ask you, what did you believe yourself when you were drinking? And how has that changed over time? Did you ever tell yourself, I'm the problem, there's something wrong with me, how did that feel versus how sobriety helped you see it differently? For me? Yeah, absolutely. For a long time, it was like, well, I'm no good. I'm never going to get back into recovery. I'm never going to get sober. What's wrong with me? Before I relapsed, when I first came in, and I was 20, in my 20s, and I was using cocaine every day, I just didn't know what was wrong with me. I could see the way my friends were leaving it alone, and I was partying until all hours of the night. I couldn't go home. I had to keep doing more. I was after party Anthony, always looking for more parties. My dad said to me, Anthony, all you care about is the next party. And that was true for a long time. I didn't know what was wrong with me until I came into recovery and started educating myself. Today, I see it as I was caught in a vicious cycle of addiction. I don't know whether my brain is different than the next guy's, the average person. I think it is because when I relapsed, I couldn't stop. If my brain wasn't wired differently, I would have been able to catch myself in that relapse and say, oh, that was close. I better get back into recovery. I was out there for about a year and then four months of heavy using and party. I had to go back to rehab again and get physically removed from alcohol and drugs. I was caught in the addiction cycle. Today, as long as I don't pick up that first one today, I'm going to be okay. No matter what happens in my life, no matter what problems occur, what circumstances, what depression, what anxiety, as long as I don't pick up that first one. If I have one problem today and I pick up a drink, I now have a problem. I'm going to be okay. I'm going to have two problems and then many more problems after that. I guarantee it. It's happened to me so many times before. If you believe you're broken, shame leads to relapse risk going up. If you believe alcohol is purely to blame and you have zero agency in the matter, it's alcohol's fault. If alcohol wasn't around, I'd be fine. You may not do the inner work. You may avoid the best part of recovery and doing the healing and the recovering. The healthiest recovery frameworks both hold both truths. The substance is genuinely addictive and you have the capacity to change your relationship to it. The most honest answer to is alcohol the problem or the person is yes. Alcohol is powerful, physically addictive substance that rewires brains. And some people are neurologically, genetically, and experientially more vulnerable to that rewiring. Like myself, competing truths. They are the whole picture. Two things can be true. So is alcohol addictive? Clinically, yes. Is it the substance or the person? It was never either or. The most compassionate and scientific, accurate answer is both. Again, I like to stay away from the camp of alcohol is the problem because then, I don't know, it just seems so petty to me. It seems like I waste so much energy trying to take down the alcohol problem. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't alcohol industry for what? There's always going to be another new drug dealer out there. Now you see gambling commercials. I talk about peptides in my last episode. Peptides is going to be, it's just, the drug dealer takes all forms. The devil takes on new forms as we grow, as we move through life. There will always be a new bad guy. I would rather change what I can control in my life, focus on what I can control in my life, in my behaviors, my actions, my daily reprieve, than focusing on taking down alcohol and casting all the blame onto the people that are making money off of it. Let them, as Mel Robbins says, or stole from somebody else famously, let them. Who cares? It's out of your control. So this week coming up, I'm going to have a lot more guests in the studio. I'm looking forward to that. I'm going to get back to the schedule of having more guests on. I'm going to figure out the money thing. I don't know. I just, I have this passion to get this podcast back up with guests. And I want to introduce all the. Heroic, amazing stories of addiction that I've met from people that I've met in the recovery rooms over the years and recovery. I want you to know that I've seen a lot of shit in recovery. I've seen a lot of people come back from a lot of terrible, terrible things and a lot of terrible consequences. If you think you're too far gone at this point, trust me, you're not. There's always a solution. There's always a way out. There's always somebody that has it worse than I do. There's always somebody that has experience with something that I have had experience with. At least that's what I've found in recovery. If you stick around long enough, you're going to find somebody that knows what you're going through and is going to be able to help you and possibly save your life. And then you can do that for the next guy. If you've had a terrible experience in your life that you would rather not share about. Just think about this. There's somebody out there right now going through exactly what you are going through. As we speak, you can be that person to lift them out of the Canyon. You can be the person to drop the ladder down so that they can. Get out of the hell hole that they're in right now, because you remember how hard it was to climb out on your own. And you remember the person that threw the ladder down for you. Recovery is like a pyramid scheme without the scheme. Just keep giving back, keep being of service. Your life will change if you focus on others more than you focus on yourself. If you liked what you heard today, please rate like subscribe, follow the podcast. I appreciate every single one of you send this to a friend. It's no one's told you this yet today. I. Love you. And remember, recovery is simple, not easy.
Speaker 2This episode is brought to you by TXU energy for the first time ever. Texans have an energy plan that combines free nights all year with daytime summer savings. It's called free nights and cool summer. You get free nights every night, all year long. Plus a 25% bonus toward your daytime use all summer. It's a first of its kind plan created for how Texans actually use energy. Discover how much more you could save with free nights and cool summer TXU energy energy. For everything. Visit TXU.com for more information. Rep number 1 0 0 0 4.
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