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Recommended Readings
We are currently assembling suggested readings. Here are our current favorite books by researchers and clinicians who put the body back into the
alcoholism equation.
Seven Weeks to Sobriety by Joan Mathews Larson (1997) offers self-tests that help alcoholics determine which underlying biotype of alcoholism
they suffer from. Larson's Health Recovery Center documents 74% clean and sober rates three years after treatment. She combines individual
nutritional protocols with rational emotive behavior therapy. Her book provides sufficient information for some motivated and supported alcoholics
to restore themselves to well being without a residential program.
Staying Clean and Sober by Miller & Miller (2005) is directed primarily at alcoholics. It describes how amino acids -- safe, over-the-counter
preparations -- rebuild neurotransmission and with it calm, stability, and sense of well being. The Millers' book is an easy read and offers chapters
on a wide array of natural methods of supporting sobriety from foot reflexology and aromatherapy to brain wave training.
In The Mood Cure, Julia Ross (2002) offers a self-test to determine your "mood type", which indicates which of the main neurotransmitters you
are most likely to need to bolster for nutritional rehab. Your drugs of choice are clear indicators of your nutritional deficiencies. This book
includes contact information for labs that do the kind of testing that may be necessary to individualize nutritional protocols.
Michael Schachter, MD, is an orthomolecular psychiatrist and author of What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Depression (2006). This book
deals with depression at the level at which it exists in each individual, not with single pill solutions. Dr. Schachter addresses depression first
with a biochemical profile for each sufferer and creates a personalized approach using diet, supplements, detoxification, and hormone treatments as
well as energy medicine.
End Your Addiction Now by Charles Gant & Greg Lewis (2002) addresses addictions to many substances and helps sufferers design recovery plans
using over-the-counter nutritional supplements that provide the building blocks of good mood neurotransmission and digestive repair.
Food for Recovery: The Complete Nutritional Companion for Recovering from Alcoholism, Drug Addiction, and Eating Disorders by Joseph Beasley
(1994) describes how eating nourishing foods and dealing with underlying allergies can make recovery much easier. See also How to Defeat Alcoholism.
Under the Influence: A Guide to the Myths and Realities of Alcoholism by James Milam and Katherine Ketcham (1983).
Beyond the Influence: Understanding and Defeating Alcoholism by Katherine Ketcham and W. Asbury (2000).
Alcohol and the Addictive Brain by Kenneth Blum (1991).
Lights out: Sleep, Sugar, and Survival by T. S. Wiley (2000).
Alcoholism: The Nutritional Approach by Roger Williams (1978).
Excitotoxins: The Taste that Kills by Russell Blaylock, MD raises many questions about common flavor enhancers that are added to foods and
beverages. Excitotoxins literally stimulate neurons to death, causing brain damage of varying degrees. Monosodium glutamate (MSG), aspartame,
Nutrasweet, cysteine, hydrolyzed vegetable protein, and often vague terms like natural flavorings and spice (which may be up to 40% MSG) indicate
that a product contains these neurotoxins. Exposure early in life has been shown to affect children’s brain development in ways that express later
as learning or emotional difficulties or a variety of endocrine (hormone) system problems. The role of these flavor enhancers in the development of
neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s is also addressed. Dr. Blaylock’s book is not an easy read however it is ideal material for the Suppers
audience because it addresses two of our primary concerns, whole food and the addictive food supply. These flavor enhancers artificially stimulate the
taste buds and the brain, making regular food by comparison less interesting to the overexcited palate. They are only there to boost sales of already
highly processed foods that feed into our mechanisms of addiction. For the parent of an ADHD child, the recovering addict, the obese or diabetic person
who has a dependent relationship with these processed foods, Blaylock’s Excitotoxins may convince you to turn away from processed foods and transition
into single, whole, fresh foods.
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