Addiction Treatment

Treatment for addictions to alcohol or other substances often requires
admission to a treatment center, where intensive, specialized therapy is
prescribed and applied. There are other treatment methods that do not require admission to a treatment center. Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous follow similar 12-step plans that combine personal recognition of the problem,
personal accountability, with "sponsor" and group meetings and interaction.
These are especially useful for highly motivated addicts. The 12 steps of
Alcoholics Anonymous are:

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol - that our lives had become
   unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to
   sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we
   understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so
   would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly
    admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with
    God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and
    the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to
    carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our
    affairs.

Newcomers are not asked to accept or follow these Twelve Steps in their
entirety if they feel unwilling or unable to do so. They will usually be
asked to keep an open mind, to attend meetings at which recovered alcoholics
describe their personal experiences in achieving sobriety, and to read A.
A.. literature describing and interpreting the A.A. program.

A.A. members will usually emphasize to newcomers that only problem drinkers
themselves, individually, can determine whether or not they are in fact
alcoholics. At the same time, it will be pointed out that all available
medical testimony indicates that alcoholism is a progressive illness, that
it cannot be cured in the ordinary sense of the term, but that it can be
arrested through total abstinence from alcohol in any form.

Physicians and counselors often recommend the treatment methods above, or
use medication or psychotherapy to change or influence behaviors.