Customer Reviews

Seven Weeks to Sobriety: The Proven Program to Fight Alcoholism Through Nutrition

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I have often wondered what we as AA have to offer a detoxing newcomer other than "let go and let God", only to watch them get drunk before the night is over. Then we sit back and say "he isn't ready" or "she can't get honest". Larsons book opens many possibilities for AA and others to explore, and takes James Millam's book "Under The Influence" to a new level. I believe the conventional treatment industry and AA is going to be slow to try a new approach, even with thier dismal success rates, but Larson may have opened the door a little wider. This book is definatly worth a read, if at the very least, only to educate yourself as to some of the physical aspects of alcoholism, and at the very most, a working sobriety and knowledge to share with others. The only criticism I have is some of her dubious statistics, and her failure to offer sources for many of her nutrients other than her facility. I imagine that a practicing alcoholic could get frustrated going store to store trying to collect the numerous supplements, and a simple guide would go a long way in helping someone find these things. I hope that future authors will take the idea further. Perhaps it is time we began to take the treatment of alcoholism out of the 1930's.

Alcohol was a major annoyance in my life, but I had never succeeded in quitting for more than a few weeks at a time. I just didn't consider that it was actually feasible. I just thought I couldn't give up my precious wine because I was some sort of morally defective type who didn't try hard enough.

Twelve Step approaches were, for me, religiously heavy-handed and downright offensive. I had encountered too many True Believers whose grasp on sobriety seemed desperately dependent on endless commiserating and the weird veneration of helplessness. (By the way, the statistics on AA's "success rate" is one of the great eye-openers of Larson's book and worth the reading alone.) If "90 meetings in 90 days" and bumper-sticker slogans haven't meant much success for you, maybe there are good, practical, physical reasons.

Dr. Larson has uncovered a vital link between addiction and chemical deficiencies. The clear discussions of various types of alcoholic intolerance was precise and reassuring. Best of all, my own "cure" went practically unnoticed until one day I just didn't want to put wine in my mouth anymore. This happened less than a month after I began taking a carefully researched regimen of vitamins, amino acids and other suppliements that are the keystone to nutritional recovery. At first, I thought it was a fluke, but 13 months later, I still have no desire for even the best wines or any other liquor.

This book was recommended to me by a knowledge-able, trusted naturopathic physician who keeps a supply of the book an hand. We are both delighted that Joan Larson has written a book that was nothing less than an act of Grace for me.

First, to be fair, this book together with Audrey Kischline's book on Moderation Management and others, has helped me stop after years of heavy, consistent drinking. I was able to take the complicated regimen of various dietary supplements proposed in the book and reduce it to a simple twice-daily dose, based on a multivitamin pack, amino acid tablets, Glutamine powder and Melatonin. This has led to a diminished desire for alcohol, BUT...Sorry folks, will-power and attitude are still the most important aspects in making any change to your life, including drinking.

The debate concerning the role of nutrition and alcohol rages on. Based on a considerable amount of reading, I believe that alcoholism is much more than a simple question of changing diet and taking supplements, although proper nutrition plays an important role in reducing cravings for alcohol. Clearly the nutrition-only approach works for some people, however. Larson's book provides a program of amino acid and vitamin supplements which she claims has a success rate of 74%. If you examine the claim more closely you find it is based on only 100 sample cases from her clinic, and worse yet, buried not-so-subtly in the text is a "buy my mega-package of pills" pitch that turned me off completely. The daily recipe includes Tryptophan, a questionable supplement at best. Extensive reading and my own experience has lead me to believe that the most essential "non-vitamin" elements in this program are Glutamine and Melatonin. Larson fails to prioritize the importance to each supplement to the overall program, thus giving the impression that each of the 11 elements are equally important. The ad-hoc nature of her recipe, and the fact that it is neither age nor body-weight specific, detracts from the book. If her program were "74% successful", AA would be finished, the various treatment centers would switch to this approach and most alcohol abuse would go away.

Given all that, the bottom line is: If you have problems with alcohol, buy this book. It won't hurt, and for you it may be the critical factor in reducing or eliminating alcohol from your life.

I learned about this book when I attended my first Alanon meeting. My husband had just come off another binge and I was at my end. He agreed to stop drinking to save our marriage and began attending AA meetings, but it wasn't enough. He'd stopped drinking before and always returned to it eventually. He needed a different solution. So, I purchased this book and we both sat down and read it. I didn't order the vitamins through their treatment center, but found everything we needed through Puritan's Pride There are A LOT of vitamins to swallow, but it's worth it. We learned that there are different types of alcoholism and that there is a chemical imbalance that causes the cravings and mood swings. By replacing what your body is missing, you can eliminate all of these things. If you are skeptical, try it and you'll be convinced. My husband was skeptical and now he's been sober, HAPPY, free from depression and mood swings, and has NO DESIRE TO DRINK for 6 months now. These changes began happening overnight. As soon as he introduced the right chemicals (through the vitamins) into his system, he began to feel "normal". I more than recommend this book, I insist on its importance to the health and well-being of anyone that wants/needs to quit drinking. So often it's the emotional side-effects of quitting drinking that drives the drinker back to their old ways - depression, anxiety, mood swings, anger, frustration, etc. Quitting drinking is not enough to save a marriage, as we found. You have to fix the emotional side as well. By fixing the WHOLE PROBLEM, we've saved our marriage and our family. Thank you to the developers of this system and the authors of this book. I will forever be grateful for what this book has done for our lives. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

I read this book ten and a half years ago and haven't had alcohol since. I drank heavily for twelve years and tried countless times over those years to cut back or quit altogether -- I tried counseling, AA, Antabuse, and every book on the shelves at the time; nothing worked. The approach in this book worked the first time. For most of the past decade, I rarely even think about alcohol. AA is NOT the only answer. Read this book. If it makes sense to you, try it. Some days still won't be easy but you may find you have a fighting chance for once.

After killing her alcohol-addicted son by inflicting him with traditional medical and psychological treatments, i.e., "tough love" in a psychiatric jail, Dr. Mathews learned the hard way that such methods are medical malpractice and a waste of time and money. By treating a patient as a sick human being instead of a prisoner to be tortured in a dungeon, a series of laboratory tests are needed to check for underlying diseases and malnutrition. Since these tests cut profitability of traditional alcoholism treatment corporations, such "hospitals" do not bother with these critical tests. Therefore, Dr. Mathews describes how to get these tests done outside the alcoholism treatment community. Anyone attempting to recover from alcohol addiction--or anyone attempting to help someone else beat this addiction--absolutely needs the life-saving information this book supplies. As Dr. Mathews reveals, "The best-kept secret of alcoholism treatment today is that it doesn't work.... A fascinating study at the Kansas City Veterans Administration Medical Center demonstrated what can be expected.... Inexplicably, the alcoholics who got no treatment at all did slightly better than those in either of the other two groups." According to a report by the 1980 Rand Report, only 7% of treated alcoholics remained sober after only four years. A 1985 report in The New England Journal of Medicine found 45% of alcoholism patients treated in one hospital were dead within the 7-year time span of the study. In other words, if you want yourself or a loved one to survive, avoid traditional alcoholic treatment hospitals like the plague. Either follow the medical and nutritional advice found in this book, or attend Dr. Mathews' and Dr. Sehnert's clinic (or find a clinic that uses the authors' Minnesota Model).

I have struggled with crack cocaine abuse for fifteen years and sought out many different forms of treatment with little or no success.After countless N.A.meetings,5 treatment centers and several private counsellors,I was unable to find a solution to my overpowering cravings.After reading 7 weeks to sobriety,I inquired about a cocaine formula which to my suprise they had.I immediatly ordered and began using the formula,which to my(and my families)amazement,began to work within 48 hours.Since that time I have not experienced a single craving for cocaine and have completly changed my outlook and behavior.I always knew there was something missing in traditional treatment and am grateful to Dr.Larson for finding that missing link.I encourage everyone who is struggling with an addiction to get a copy of 7 weeks to sobriety and follow her recommendations and I am sure you will find success as I have.

Larson's book should be read by every director of every treatment center around the country, should be required reading for all doctors, and should be given to anyone who is trying to quit drinking but has had it up to here with the 12-steps. Though I personally am unsure of the efficacy of the nutritional supplements for myself (and I can think of several reasons why they didn't work for me when I tried them), I know they have worked for other people.

The reason I think Larson's book is so important is that it brings together in one place a large body of research into the physical nature of alcoholism, dispelling the common myth (perpetuated by AA) that alcoholics just drink a lot because they are depressed and/or weak and just need to get their lives together. This book provides a summary of experiments, studies, and investigations that have been going on around the world for decades into the physiological nature of alcoholism and how alcoholics are different from non-alcoholics. (The reasons that this research is not more widely known could be the subject of another entire book!) Larson's compilation of all these facts and data should serve as a starting point for further research into alcoholism to treat it as a physical/physiological illness and bring relief to the thousands of people suffering from it.

This book should also anger anyone who has been in a rehab center where they were put on "the hot seat" and forced to listen to people insult them in an insanely misguided and cruel effort to purge their desire to drink, anyone who has cringed sitting in AA meetings listening to people say, "Well too bad for him, I guess he's still in denial and hasn't faced his problem yet. It's his choice to stop or not to stop," anyone who has wondered why the best thing that the most prestigious rehab centers around the world can offer alcoholics whose bodies have been ravaged by alcohol is AA, and anyone who has lost a loved one to this horrendous illness.

I am a family therapist specializing in women's addictions therapy. I am the clinical director of a treatment program that admits over 100 women per year. I have also been the coordinator of substance abuse training for the past four years. Three years ago I invited all the addictions counsellors in our system of care to read "seven weeks". For most of us, the information changed our approach to early sobriety counselling. Clients who were previously diagnosed as chronically relapse prone were experiencing great success following Dr. Mathews Larson's advice. Accessing the vitamin formulas is difficult in Canada, but higher quality pharmacies are helpful in producing what clients require on an individual basis. Clients are deeply appreciative that so much of their problem is in their diets. They can change their diets without years of painful emotional therapy. It is incredibly empowering. Seven Weeks is a gift to society. Of the women who follow the "Seven Weeks" plan, more than 90% report dramatically lower incidence of depression. The combination of psychotherapy and sound bio-chemical management is a guarantee for success.

I found that this book and the program that it proposes allowed me to successfully quit after 25 years of fairly heavy drinking, with minimum discomfort and an increase in overall energy and general health. The author begins by helping the reader understand the connections between nutrition, allergies and other physical conditions to addiction, particularly addiction to alchohol. The seven week program is simple to follow, and the documentation on symptoms and corresponding nutritional treatments is very helpful. I recommend it to anyone who wishes to quit drinking.