Very excited: started in the new book ‘Seven weeks to sobriety’ by Joan Mattews Larson she advocates to cure alcohol addiction by getting the right nutrients in your body so that your brain can function normal again. She says addiction to alcohol is very much a physical disease. Only in 19 pages in the book yet but loving it! Wish I had this before, I had to look up all the nutrient info myself on the internet. She claims an 80% recovery at the Health Recovery Center and promises ‘no cravings’. 80% Is very high compared to the maximum of, I believe, 22% that other methods claim. I am reading it because I want to learn more about addiction and because I have no cravings as opposed to ‘all’ the others in this sober blog world. I am assuming that there is a relation to the nutrients I have taken while prepping for detoxing and during detoxing. Very curious as to how it works exactly.
Also she says hypoglycemia and alcohol addiction are related. I have hypoglycemia myself, the effects are not as bad anymore as I used have because I eat more regularly and used to not eat added sugar (except for the drinkable ones, yes hypocrite) and not even fruit because that set me off. Everybody I know that has hypoglycemia has a drinking problem. And, when reading all these sober blogs, everybody has an issue with sugar intake after they have stopped. And I am developing a sweet tooth myself, which is ridiculous. I, 100% convinced that sugar is poison, becoming a sugar addict now? Well actually in my life, I quit cold turkey from not eating a lot of sugar (10 biscuits in a week max), 25-40 cigarets a day, 3 liters of cola light and 12 units of alcohol a day. Quitting the sugar was the worst, tremendous headaches . I got back ‘on it’ 5 years later when I stopped smoking.
Also recognising what she says is ‘being over sensitive to chemicals’. I have that. Not sure anymore if I left it in the blog but a ‘fluoride poisoning’ and my approach to that was what lead me to believe I could quit.
Really looking forward to reading everything. Can’t wait. Have to get ready to leave now though.
‘Extreme mood swings’ is also one of the signs of a lack of nutrients. 😉
feelingmywaybackintolife 
Good multi-vitamins, minerals and oils will help, particulary B vitamins (from my nursing experience, we used to put every patient on our alcoholic liver disease ward on multivitamins, thiamine and folic acid as part of their medical detox)
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Yes, that is what I have been doing including sesame seeds for Calcium, nuts for Omega 3, vitamin B of all kinds and I believe Magnesium. Also important vitamin D. I you lack vitamin D your body will not take up any other vitamins and it seems that vitamin D shortage is rappidly becoming on of the biggest shortages in adults. And if you need D you also need A because they work together. Change table salt to Celtic or Himalyan salt and keep on eating your bread or add Kelp supplements for Iodine.The book is saying: ditch the sugar and the cafeine because they add to the cravings. But they don’t do all of this in one day, so (do) don’t worry. Really excited about it. Lots of things fall into place.
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I also extra take Vitamin D too 🙂
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🙂 And in general, do you think you have more, less or equal cravings compared to other people that quit drinking? Also the book goes on about not having depressions and sleeping well. I have both. I have these dark patches of hurt now and then but that is in no comparison to the depression and anxiety I had when I drank.
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This is the second time I have quit alcohol. The first time, I lasted 11 weeks. I never had it in my head to give up for good. I was just doing it for three months. BUT that time I are sugar like there was no tomorrow. I was addicted to chocolate and felt not better for having given up alcohol. This time, my mind set is way different as I started out by changing my diet, joined a ladies gym and then decided to give up alcohol. I’m now 15 weeks sober, don’t crave alcohol or sugar and have lost 8 kg. Totally agree with you about nutrients! I’ve just started on magnesium, I take fish oil, vitamin B and vitamin D. I’m also on thyroxine for hypothyroidism, which sucks. Hoping to fix it with nutrients. Enjoyed your post and will definitely check out that book 🙂
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Hi HTVP! (found that I can’t really change that to Hi Vomit!). Thank you for your reply. It is good to hear that you are in a good place now and actually loosing weight. From what I have read, but I might have missed stuff, you are one of the only bloggers that is seriously loosing weight.
I am interested to hear how you worked out the thyroide issue. I have been looking at that and studing dokter Eric Berg’s video’s on youtube. I have started eating kelp pills because I hardly eat any bread, not enough sea fish and Celtic salt so all in all little iodine. But I have not worked out why o why I eat about 1/5 of the calories I would normally have when drinking and still ‘only’ lost a few kilo’s. That is strange. Think my bowels are using it better. I’m excited to start working with my GP on the book though and see where it takes us.
Hope you enjoy the book and I would love to hear what you think of it. 🙂
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So many things to address 🙂 I joined a ladies gym called Curves. I seriously could sit on the couch all day if I let myself. Or lie in bed. I went to my psychologist one day – fat and sad and probably hung over. She recommended the gym because you only have to go three times per week to see results and it’s a half hour circuit. I should say I’m not sponsored by them in any way but I have had great results. I honestly think a switch just turned on in me four months ago. I was ready to change. The girls at the gym signed me up to the complete nutrition plan, which I follow. I had already started to cut refined sugar out about a month before joining the gym but I was still drinking red wine (guiltily) in copious amounts. After I joined the gym, I saw how many empty calories there are in booze. Then I had a huge bender and woke up in my own vomit. I quit drinking the next day. I also weaned off my anti depressants. I suffer from anxiety rather than depression anyway so I don’t think they were doing much for me. Only in the past few weeks I’ve started taking all the vitamins. Not sure about the effectiveness of those yet.
I found about about my thyroid issue through blood tests a few years ago and have been on thyroxine ever since. I’ve heard people have sorted theirs out and don’t need meds but I haven’t really looked into it yet. I feel like since I’ve quit booze I am going off on all these tangents of research and bettering myself but I can’t focus on anything! I have heard about a book called “Just one thing”. I think I need it!
So, I think my biggest keys to weight loss have been kicking the drink, cutting refined sugar and exercising three times per week. I’m finally into my healthy weight range and almost have a healthy BMI. Although, those heart foundation people have bloody high expectations!
I’ll download the book tonight to my reader. I love these sober Saturday nights in 🙂
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🙂 You have a very active approach! I am still in the ‘couch/computer desk phase’. I am trusting my organic process to get me off the couch but I also notice some apprehension, it’s actually called lazyness. Good to hear that you are feeling good.
And on BMI; there is a Dutch research that says that persons with a BMI of 25 – 27 are those that have least health problems, live longer and feel better. So eh…. that definition of 22 being healthy BMI? I expect to hear more of that in the years to come.
I have focus issues but I am noticing that with the blogging I do gets stuff out of the way and it is improving. The book promisses help on anxiety and focus. I am hoping it works. 🙂 Quitting is difficult enough without the hormones racing and live is difficult enough without a booze issue.
Enjoy your sober Saturday night :-).
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Last time I gave up booze I focused only on giving up the booze. This time I seem to be having some kind of awakening – like now I’m 35 I need to maintain my physical and spiritual being. To be honest I still feel generally crap. I have constant black floaters in front of my eyes, which my doc is convinced is from my anxiety. Getting the negative self talk/thoughts under control is going to take a lot of work. A good friend of mine calls me a “dooms day prepper”. It’s funny but it’s actually not fun to live like that. Meditation is apparently the key but I’m no good at it! I’m thinking I need to cut out caffeine but then what guilty pleasures will I have left?!
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Dooms day prepper? Check. Negative self talk Check ‘if I put myself down at least I have done something good today…’. I have therapy, use Bach Remedies and homeopathic stuff to help me with that. But it is tricky because Bach remedies are conserved in alcohol. Bach remedies are a bit like homeopathy but work on a mental state and therefore sometimes also have physical results. So exactly the other way around from the nutrients approach. I only take like 5 drops of them on 3 liters of water but there are people that say it it dangerous. I don’t have cravings from it because for me they are in the ‘medicine’ box in my head, like cleaning alcohol is in the ‘cleaning stuff’ box, I don’t mix those up with ‘having a good time’. But reading this nutrients book it says that some people have brainstructures / are in situations that can cause cravings if they even smell gasoline so I’m guessing there is a difference.
I’m becoming all Little House on the Prairy again. I quit drinking 3 liters (yes, sorry) of cola light a day by drinking warm or hot water with a half or a whole lemon pressed in it. That will wake anybody up ;-). One week of headaches. Brainwashed my brain to thinking that ‘nice herbal tea’ is now my not so guilty pleasure. Part of what we like is stuff we ‘made up’ by seeing commercials. If you would have not been aware of coffee and it would not be promoted in your world you would have never drank it because the first taste is awful, it is an ‘aquired taste’, which to me sounds like a chique version of: ‘you were peer pressured into liking it till you got addicted’. But… I did all of that when still drinking, so that also might be different.
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