Myths and Beliefs About Substance Abuse

This post is intended for non-step recovery members. It is not intended as a gauntlet thrown down for adherents of AA. But discussion is welcome.

Some widely held beliefs about substance abuse are questionable, debatable, or even provably false. Why does this matter? Because our beliefs can affect, effect, or otherwise shape our behavior.

The notion that any amount of alcohol will trigger more drinking behavior.

This belief is so widespread in popular culture that I first read it in Dear Abby or Ann Landers, many years ago. In Chapter 2 of Alcoholics Anonymous, we find this quote:

“We are equally positive that once he takes any alcohol whatever into his system, something happens, both in the bodily and mental sense, which makes it virtually impossible for him to stop.”

But studies have shown that people who think they are drinking act drunk even if they aren’t drinking alcohol. And people who don’t know they are drinking alcohol don’t act drunk. The behavior results from their thinking.

Studies have also shown that chronic drinkers will stop drinking even after they’ve started if they have to give up the drinking place or situation they have come to prefer in order to continue. Even people who are drinking can make partially rational decisions about their behavior.

The notion that abstinence is the only successful approach to problem drinking behavior.

Obviously, most of us have come to that conclusion about our selves, based on our own past histories. I certainly believe it is my healthiest choice. And evidence suggests that most people gradually re-habituate to heavy drinking if they’ve done it before.

The problem comes when we project those experiences and statistics onto everyone. Some people do eventually drink moderately, or socially, or just reduce the harmful levels at which they were drinking. So the statement that “there is no such thing as making a normal drinker out of an alcoholic” is questionable at best (depending on how you define ‘alcoholic’).

Dire predictions are unproductive, possibly even counterproductive (think back to your junior high school drug “education” classes). This is a pretty easy notion to test for ourselves anyway, and if someone wants to try moderate drinking the resources at Moderation Management (moderation . org) are very useful.

The notion that substance abuse is incurable.

Recently a young man said to me, “Once a tweaker, always a tweaker.” Just a variant of “Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic.” Nope.

Cognitive approaches based on CBT embrace the concept that one can move beyond any behavior. Since they are based on the concept that your beliefs cause your behavior, the logical extension of the principle is that your behavior has largely changed once you have firmly adopted new beliefs.

Relapses occur for some people. But they aren’t necessarily a full-blown return to the previous behavior. This is one of the reasons secular approaches resist the use of labels. ˜Alcoholic? ˜Recovering’ or ‘recovered’? You decide for yourself. If the fear of relapse motivates you, then the label and the notion that it’s incurable may be useful. But it’s a belief, and it’s individual: it’s not a fact applicable to everyone.

 

The notion that change is not possible on our own.

This one is incredibly common: that only in recovery groups, or rehab, or counseling (take your pick, or all three) will we be able to get sober.

We will be “unable to stop drinking on the basis of self-knowledge.”

(Chapter 3, Big Book). “The first requirement is that we be convinced that any life run on self-will can hardly be a success.”(Chapter 5).

This gets at the basic concept of where change comes from. People vary in this regard! ‘Self’ is at the core of cognitive behavioral approaches. The recovery jargon is ‘internal’ or ‘external locus of control’, and you can take online quizzes to see what your own beliefs are.

Secularists are likely, IMO, to believe change is internal. So sobriety is mostly a matter of learning new tools for changing behavior, and new ways to cope with life’s stress factors. People predisposed to believe in a god are likely to accept that change will be external.

The notion that a higher power is necessary for change is a logical extension of the ‘external locus’ idea. No problem if you are predisposed to such a belief. But it’s a real stretch for agnostics, atheists, and secularists. Indeed, when taken as an absolute (“his defense must come from a Higher Power”, Chapter 3) it clearly states that failing to accept an ‘external locus’ of change is doomed to failure. Yet such people do achieve sobriety.

Note: secularists are often referred to the Big Book’s Chapter 4: We Agnostics. But the whole premise of that chapter is non-agnostic:

“Actually we were fooling ourselves, for deep down in every man, woman, and child, is the fundamental idea of God.

We finally saw that faith in some kind of God was a part of our make-up.”

Certainly no atheist would write that. Most agnostics wouldn’t. It seems to argue against our core theological beliefs by implying that they are character defects (there are numerous examples; just re-read the chapter if you don’t believe me).

The notion that we must grapple with the urge to drink every day. One Day At A Time, and all that.

This certainly seems true in early sobriety. It really has to do with the immediacy and intensity of urges. Dr.Thomas Horvath, President of SMART Recovery, describes common misconceptions about urges:

·          Urges are awful or unbearable.

·          Urges are constant, and get worse.

·          Urges force one to use or act, that we can’t control our behavior when we really want something.

·          We will suffer serious mental anguish if we don’t act on our urges.

 

If you believe these things, each day may be an argument about using or drinking. But in fact, we CAN stand them, they are time-limited, they don’t MAKE us use or drink, and nobody goes crazy or dies because they want to drink or use drugs.

Progress can be celebrated even if it isn’t perfect (seems to me there’s a slogan about that somewhere). You can do it on your own, but the good news is you don’t have to. Nothing is inevitable. You can find the power from within, or find comfort in seeking it elsewhere. What you believe is key. It’s your recovery.