Wednesday, 27 January 2010

Addiction and recovery podcast 14 - Staying positive

In this episode I discuss the importance of staying positive. I also examine the risks associated with too much self-absorption.

Don't forget that you can subscribe to the podcast through iTunes.

Just click on play to listen

Monday, 18 January 2010

Relapse and relapse prevention

In this podcast I will discuss the important subject of relapse. This is a danger for everyone in recovery and all care must be taken to avoid it.

Don’t forget that you can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes.

Sunday, 17 January 2010

Understanding Dry Drunk Syndrome and How to Deal with Dry Drunk Symptoms

The term dry drunk syndrome can seem a bit confusing; after all if someone isn't drinking how can they possibly be a drunk? Well the dry drunk definition refers to a form of negative behavior that some people can exhibit even though they are not drinking alcohol.

Dry drunk definition

When we say that somebody is a dry drunk we usually mean that they are behaving in much the same way as they did as an addict. They may not be actually ingesting alcohol but in many other ways it is business as usual. This is a dangerous type of behavior for reformed addicts because a dry drunk syndrome can easily lead to a real return to addiction.

Read more

Wednesday, 13 January 2010

Mindfulness and Jon Kabat-Zinn

I have previously talked about how important Mindfulness meditation has been for my recovery from addiction. One very good teacher of this technique is Jon Kabat-Zinn. He has taken mindfulness from its Buddhist source and adapted it for a much wider audience.

Here is a video of him talking about this technique. It is over an hour long, but he offers some useful insights that can help everyone struggling with addiction or managing their recovery. I hope you enjoy it.

Tuesday, 12 January 2010

Addiction and Recovery Podcast 12 - Lessons from the temple

In this week’s episode I discuss how I eventually managed to get sober. I also talk about the tools that I managed to pick up during treatment at Wat Thamkrabok.
To find out more about this drug treatment facility in Thailand you can just click on the link.
http://www.thamkrabok-monastery.org/


Don’t forget that you can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes

Music for today’s podcast came from Doug and Judy Smith and the song is called “Crest of a Revolution”.

Tuesday, 5 January 2010

Addiction & Recovery Podcast 11 Dealing with bad days in sobriety

Life in recovery is not always a box of chocolates. Even those of us who have made it into to recovery will still have to deal with bad days. In this episode I will examine how to deal with the bad times within returning to addiction.


Friday, 1 January 2010

I love New Year; I always have. For many years it was a time of relief; I would have a whole new year ahead of me that I hadn't messed up yet. I would make all sorts of promises about how things would be different, but things usually ended up pretty much the same. These were during the long period when I was a drunk. By the end of most years I would be looking back at the previous one with shame, but full of hope for the next one. This doesn't happen anymore; well not in the same way. I still look forward with excitement to the New Year, but I have no shame about the previous one. I had a great 2009; in fact every year has been great since I gave up alcohol.


Read more