“If I didn’t have so much stress in my life, I wouldn’t have to drink!”  That’s often the war-cry of the practising alcoholic.  My reply never changes:  “alcohol is only a symptom of an underlying problem!”

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Once a person stops drinking, they often find more problems than what they had when they put down the drink. Take the alcohol out of the fruitcake and you still have the fruitcake and so they end up back on the merry-go-round. When a doctor tells a patient to ‘just stop drinking’ or ‘control your drinking’ they expect their patient will recover, with the help of an antidepressant, and send them on their way.

I wish it was that easy, but it’s not.

Closely connected to a distorted self-image is a tendency toward stress hypersensitivity and emotional overreaction by the alcoholic. Chronic exposure to traumatic stress overloads the brain systems responsible for self-protection.

An emotional numbness emerges that blunts all feelings and the emotional “breaking point” explodes when even minor stress can trigger a major behavioural reaction. These reactions typically take the form of outbursts of anger and hostility that, depending upon circumstances, can propel the alcoholic back to their addiction.

Once stress releases a “mood of self-hatred,” its effects can expand at a frightfully powerful pace. It is at these moments that you are in the greatest danger of returning to your drug of choice, alcohol. For it is then that stinking thinking becomes disrupted: thoughts race, flash, explode or get blurred.

Emotions become intensely confused and impulsive gratification steps in to referee the fight going on inside the brain.  The alcoholic is behind enemy lines. The mental agony builds and builds to nearly intolerable levels. Rational problem-solving, let alone helpful discussion with others becomes very difficult. You hate anyone near you. You curse anyone who dares to offer advice. You don’t want to talk. You want immediate relief and you want it now! It is at these moments that you turn to something to distract you from the emotional pain, your friend, the bottle.

The drunk takes the drink then the drink takes the drunk. That one impulsive decision to uncork the bottle has led to your compulsion as the disease of alcoholism is cunning, baffling, powerful and very, very patient.

Alcohol dependent and non-alcohol dependent people process alcohol differently through the liver. When alcohol reaches the liver, it is changed into acetaldehyde, a harmful by-product of alcohol metabolism that can damage liver cells.

What most alcoholics don’t realise is the compulsion to drink is triggered by the first drink, not the fifth or the sixth drink. A different brain structure enables an alcoholic to manufacture a highly addictive chemical called THIQ out of alcohol in the brain. Once a sufficient concentration of THIQ is formed and attached to the neurones, alcoholics feel a compulsive and over-whelming urge to drink. Even when they see their lives disintegrating around them, they cannot stop drinking. Social drinkers don’t have this problem as their liver breaks the alcohol down into a very toxic substance where it is broken down again into water and carbon dioxide to be eliminated through the kidneys and the lungs.  The alcoholic is not so lucky.

You might like to help your liver with the following suggested products:

LivaTone Plus is a more powerful formula that can support liver function when there are more chronic liver problems. LivaTone Plus combines the proven doses of St Mary’s Thistle with the benefits of Turmeric and Selenium. It also contains all the B vitamins and the amino acid Taurine as well as the antioxidant vitamins C and E. LivaTone Plus is designed to support the step one and two detoxification pathways in the liver.

L-Glutamine can help support efficient brain function along with Tyrosine Mood Food as Tyrosine is necessary for the manufacture of dopamine and noradrenaline, which are required for concentration, alertness, memory and a happy stable mood.

Magnesium Ultra Potent is known as The Great Relaxer and may assist in the reduction of stress, nervous tension, anxiety and sleeplessness.

Glicemic Balance Capsules aid in the metabolism of carbohydrates and supports insulin function and is helpful in curbing sugar and carbohydrate cravings when you are detoxing from alcohol.