Can someone who’s “in recovery” help you recover?

Among the common myths around alcohol treatment is the one that someone who identifies themselves as being “in recovery” has some special ability to help you fix your alcohol problems.

The reality? Nothing could be further from the truth.

To understand this misconception, and frequent misrepresentation, it’s helpful to understand what code phrases commonly heard in the “industry” actually mean. “In recovery,” for example, actually means “I’m not about to give up my alcohol focused life and all the ‘benefits’ I get from that.”

Obviously someone who isn’t interested in truly recovering isn’t going to help you to. Quite the opposite. The person “in recovery” has a personal, vested interest in maintaining their status as an “alcoholic” and will do whatever they can to prevent you from ever truly recovering.

That’s the The Bucket of Crabs  problem.

Is it occasionally helpful, and reassuring, to know that someone has been through what you’re going through and succeeded? Of course it is. But that means you want to know that that person recovered, not that they’re keeping the door open to return to alcohol abuse or dependence.

One of the things we offer to you, to couples, and to families, is that one of us fully recovered and the other was the family member designated to find real help for a relative – and discovered there wasn’t any. That’s when we put our backgrounds, training, experience, and research together to offer you an option that works.

Wouldn’t you rather be an ex-drinker with no need of labels, meetings, inane slogans, and trinkets than an “alcoholic in recovery”?

We thought so.

To add alcohol abuse to your list of “been there, done that, no longer a problem” just give us a call and let’s get started.


While we’re on the topic of alcoholic code phrases, let’s take a look at “working my program”.

All of us have heard the excuse, “I’m working my program,” or the threat, “don’t you be messing with me working my program,” or other variations on the same theme. But what does it mean?

Really, working my program means I’ve got a new excuse for doing all the same things I used to do under the “but I was drunk” excuse. It’s just that now I’m avoiding home, responsibilities, relationships, and life, by hiding out at meetings instead of bars.

We get a lot of calls from wives and husbands who report that their 12 Stepping spouses are worse now than when they were drinking, except, possibly for the driving worries.

They’re usually right – they’ve lost their spouse to a cult and now they don’t even get to complain about it because their husband or wife is now “working their program”.

Yes, there is also an implied threat in there, too. The code is, if you complain then you are interfering with me “working my program” and so it’ll be your fault when I go back to drinking.

Talk about passive-aggressive.

Still, it comes down to what do you want for yourself, your spouse, your family, your life?

If you want to hide, punish, avoid, evade and escape, then stick with the bottle, AA, and the traditional excuses.

If you want a life, love, intimacy, self-respect, and the well earned self-esteem that comes from putting a difficult problem behind you, then give us a call and lets get started on creating a real solution.


Links to Success:

Our Expanded Program Description

“How Can You Possibly Cure My Years of Alcohol Abuse in Just 5 Days?”

The Real “Steps” to Overcoming Alcohol Abuse

Smart Women and Alcohol Abuse

Ten Things I Wish I’d Known Before I Sent My Brother Off To Rehab;