Many recovering addicts say they felt a "spiritual emptiness" or a "God- sized hole" in their souls and tried to fill it with alcohol or other drugs.
"The drug distorts clear thought and often makes the person feel ecstatic, invulnerable, godlike," Ringwald writes. "Then, in the final throes of an addiction, counselors and addicts report, life condenses to a self-centered round of getting, using, and recuperating before starting over."
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What makes "The Soul of Recovery" (Oxford University Press, 2002) stand out from the pack is the way Ringwald approaches the recovery movement as a journalist, not as an evangelist or protagonist. He understands the power of spirituality in treating substance abuse, yet still asks some hard questions about the wisdom handed down from "Bill W." and "Dr. Bob."
Ringwald, who covers legal issues for Newsday, devotes a chapter to another treatment philosophy called "harm reduction," which, unlike AA, does not see total abstinence as the only way.
Counselors in this faction say that "abstinence for many merely increases the luster of the forbidden fruit."
"When certain alcoholics relapse even slightly, their remorse can be so severe -- thanks to the lessons about 'one drink will get you drunk' -- that they go on a tear to blot out the shame."
Ringwald cites studies showing that many nonabstinent alcoholics can reduce their consumption substantially by being taught how to moderate their behavior,
or by alternating between periods of abstention and drinking.
This kind of thinking challenges the medical model of the for-profit recovery industry, where total abstinence is seen as a kind of First Commandment.
"Harm reduction challenges the most basic of substance abuse treatment assumptions: the disease concept," Ringwald writes. "Whether advocates say so or not, their emphasis on resolving conditions -- poverty, housing or other illness -- first, rather than halting the drug abuse, argues for alcoholism or addiction having some origins outside the person."
In the end, Ringwald notes that the two camps really want the same thing -- to create a social environment where addicts have more to live for than the next fix. Both treatment styles seek to change addicts' spirit by connecting them with something larger than themselves.
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