Coming Clean: Overcoming Addiction Without Treatment (Paperback)

~ (Author), William Cloud (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Despite the widely accepted view that formal treatment and twelve-step groups are essential for overcoming dependencies on alcohol and drugs, each year large numbers of former addicts quietly recover on their own, without any formal treatment or participation in self-help groups at all.

Coming Clean explores the untold stories of untreated addicts who have recovered from a lifestyle of excessive and compulsive substance use without professional assistance. Based on 46 in-depth interviews with formerly addicted individuals, this controversial volume examines their reasons for avoiding treatment, the strategies they employed to break away from their dependencies, the circumstances that facilitated untreated recovery, and the implications of recovery without treatment for treatment professionals as well as for prevention and drug policy.

Because of the pervasive belief that addiction is a disease requiring formal intervention, few training programs for physicians, social workers, psychologists, and other health professionals explore the phenomenon of natural recovery from addiction. Coming Clean offers insights for treatment professionals of how recovery without treatment can work and how candidates for this approach can be identified. A detailed appendix outlines specific strategies which will be of interest to addicted individuals themselves who wish to attempt the process of recovery without treatment.

About the Author

Robert Granfield is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Denver. He is the author of Making Elite Lawyers: Visions of Law at Harvard and Beyond. He has taught, conducted research, and worked in the field of addiction for twenty years. William Cloud is Associate Professor at the Graduate School of Social Work at the University of Denver, where he developed and has been chair of the Drug Dependency Concentration in the M.S.W. program.

Product Details

• Paperback: 296 pages
• Publisher: NYU Press; 1 edition (November 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0814715826
• ISBN-13: 978-0814715826
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #286,251 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Must reading for prevention and treatment professionals!, March 18, 2000

By	Karen Abrahamson (Denver, Colorado) - See all my reviews

As a prevention professional, I found Coming Clean a breathe of fresh air on a topic graced with strong beliefs and passions. The book is particularly germaine for the person contemplating a tobacco cessation program! A must read for the prevention professional and for the treatment professional alike.

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good Thinking Material, October 29, 2000

By A Customer

I like the authors' attention to defining words in the beginning of the book and think it picks up on a gut level, with more mass appeal, when individual cases are examined. Don't skip the appendix because there's some good practical stuff there. I know one of the authors and have met both here in Denver, so I might be biased on the positive side, but I think they offer some refreshing views of a subject that touches just about everyone's life. The ideas of social capital and of beating addiction without traditional forms of treatment are worthy of more attention, and I speak in the context of having seen treatment fail for others.

7 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Drug & alchology addiction and recovery., February 3, 2000

By	Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

Can addiction be overcome without treatment? This confronts the disease model of addiction, providing a set of alternatives to treatment programs for overcoming drug and alcohol addictions. The words and experiences of recovering addicts are used to enhance a title focussing on alternative recovery processes.