We respond and reflect on some of the topics brought forward by Matt Willis in the BBC documentary Fighting Addiction. It's a moving film that asks a lot of questions that require complex answers and contemplation. Lester Morse breaks down some of the most pressing questions brought up in the film based on his own 30+ years in recovery.

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Mat:

So welcome everybody to the altered attitudes podcast. And today we're just responding to the BBC documentary, Matt Willis, Fighting Addiction, which was a pretty honest and sincere documentary. It covered a lot of points that I've not seen before in other documentaries. So, I was wondering what your thoughts were on that. I mean, he starts off by saying something like, there's no one size that fits all for everybody. Will I be like this forever? And then that's really the point of the documentary, is him trying to work out, like, is this something that he's always gonna have to deal with? Is there a fix?

Lester:

I'm just trying to think what it brings up for me obviously I can only give my opinions and share my experience but as you were saying that Matt what was interesting which I kind of sort of believe but I think near the end he talked to the Neural Scientist which again about the brain scans which we've been talking about for 15 odd years about exactly what she was talking about and i think she was alluding to the fact that that they are coming up with medication now i long suspected that may be the case at some point because i think the medications we have at the moment uh... not very helpful for addiction treatment uh... most of the time for most people in actual fact i think a lot of medications is doing a lot of harm but that's another story but that she was eluding that they're developing a medication that will work on that pleasure part of the brain because again i think what they're sort of saying i believe is that that there people with this problem have like a pleasure deafness that they're not producing enough serotonin you know when you describe this situation to a doctor and again we have this very good DVD that we like to show called uh... is Kevin McCauley Pleasure Unwoven which explains the process of the brain of an alcoholic and it does show that there is the way that the brain's malfunctioning it's not producing enough serotonin so when you play that video to a doctor which we have a couple of times their solution is always medications have serotonin in like Xerox, antidepressants that kind of thing which again shows that they're understanding the problem and and they're offering a chemical solution i guess i've come to believe that that's not always a bad thing and I think when the mental problem is understood that they possibly would... I think again one of the things the lady did say that you know individual people would get different sort of amounts or different strengths of the medication but medication definitely would resolve the problem but again... from my point of view and my belief I think that your brain is more than capable of producing serotonin if you have this problem but there's stuff you're going to have to learn you're going to have to change the way you think and you're going to have to start taking a little bit more responsibility for your mental health now i very much think the best way to release serotonin is through spirituality i think spirituality gives you the peanut that you're looking for now again that obviously brings up a lot of issues for a lot of people that don't want to believe in that but i guess from my point of view... so my point i'm saying is is like i think you know the answer to me will always be like this if that means will I be able to drink and use drugs again the answer to me would be no I think you're never going to be able to do that again which is quite crushing for a lot of people with addiction they really hate that idea more than anything it says it's a great obsession to every abnormal drinker that they'll be able to one day regain control of their drinking and drink like other people but it's like that's not gonna happen

Mat:

There's even a scene in the documentary there where he meets with his bandmate Charlie and they start reminiscing on the old times about him throwing up in a suitcase and you know they're laughing and joking about it and yeah there's you can see that in that, yeah and you can see there they're kind of like wow that was a good time, it sounds horrible in some ways but they're like yeah that was a good time and it's clear you can see there's like an emotional connection to that time there.

Lester:

yeah but i think that's kind of like the normal what would their society would consider that you know that would be sort of normal parameters i think it's when you lose control and i think that's the bit that people sort of struggle with and they fight for: can i control my drug or alcohol in it? am i in control of it? and I think when people realise I've lost control I can't adjust it, I can't stop it and I can't moderate it that's really when you've crossed the line into addiction again my belief is you probably already had that in you, you were just waiting to get to that point i think it's like i always use the analogy of a peanut allergy you know you kind of already have it in you but until you actually eat a peanut you're not going to know you've got a peanut allergy i think they realised that in America i think there's a great massive evidence of that a lot of people were potentially heroin addicts but a lot of people wouldn't have had access to heroin but then when they start dishing out opiate based painkillers left right and centre they trigger all these people to become addicts that never would have become addicts unless they were given the medication and so now they've got an opiate crisis that's actually been the fuel that's come from the pharmaceutical companies because they've been giving so many people so it's kinda like worth thinking about that these people probably were potentially addicts because again there's a lot of people going to be on the opiate based medications that aren't going to turn into addicts but a big portion of them are and again I know heroin is physically addictive but if you don't have the mental obsession you can probably just go through the cold turkey and never do it again because you'll be like man that was terrible I don't want to do that again and you'll have the mental capacity to not do it again a lot of people will be like that's terrible I don't want to do it again why are they sticking a needle in their arm and every time they stick a needle in their arm they're like this is the last time I'm not doing this again but they don't have the mental capacity to to stop that so again that was like you know most rock and rollers and most people like a drink like a drug and depending on the crowd that you're with are going to get introduced to all kinds of different things and if you're very addictive to cocaine the moment you snort cocaine you're probably going to become addicted to it because it's going to have an effect on you it doesn't have in other people and them other people are going to go oh I've had enough of it now it's costing too much money it's causing me too much trouble I'm quitting now and they quit.

Mat:

The same thing happens with Matt and his brother. He meets up with his brother in the documentary and they talk about how his brother drunk a lot as well due to problems they had with their family and then this new father figure coming in and his brother left. But he didn't succumb to addiction in the same way that Matt does, even though they were exposed to quite similar childhood traumas really.

Lester:

Yeah and again I think even if people are using alcohol just to deal with childhood traumas that once they've dealt with a childhood trauma then they're probably safe to drink again without the alcohol being a problem for them but one I've got to say after running a rehab for a couple of decades that you know unfortunately a lot of people have had trauma in this world but there's a lot of people like I haven't really had a childhood trauma I can't even think of a of a reason why you know I can blame my addiction on all I know is I really love the stuff and when i'm doing it i feel alive and better than i ever feel or you know i have anxiety or social phobias when i drunk i felt a million dollars or when i took drugs i felt a million dollars but i can't think of any trauma that i've had it just makes sense i think sometimes people just put two and two together and you know it comes up five for me it's like I don't know whether that connection always fits it doesn't fit everybody erm... you know I think even when like he said in that documentary you know is it because I'm a rockstar? No mate because a lot of people ain't rockstars and they're just as bad or worse than you you know when people go oh you know I was molested yeah but he wasn't and she wasn't or you know it's my sexuality... well they ain't got a problem with that or I was bullied at school... well they weren't bullied when you actually listen to everybody's reasons it's like it would sort of stand to reason that everybody would have the same problem but then when they use a word like trauma it's like well you can pretty much bunch everyone under the word trauma but you can't because there's a lot of people that say I've not got a trauma that I can tell you that that was the reason for drinking and like I think most of us him and his brother never started drinking because their dad left or whatever happened to them they started drinking because that's what we do in our culture. Teenagers go drinking and a lot of them get to do drugs which is becoming more and more so I'm presuming as time goes on the problem's going to get worse because like in America a lot more people are going to get introduced to it. I mean it's my reason for not legalising drugs. I mean I can understand why it would be good to decriminalise it but I can't get away in my head from this point that the truth is alcohol is legal and it probably causes more problems in our society than any other drug. Smoking is legal. It probably kills more people by far than any other drug. Medication is legal probably kills more people than illegal drugs and so I mean compared to alcohol and smoking relatively few people die of illegal drugs so if you legalise it it would probably stand to reason that more people are going to do it you're probably going to end up with higher death rates and higher issues coming from it so that's one of my arguments but in other areas it makes sense to legalise it because it er... you know again I don't know which way I will 100% go I guess I still think it should be made shouldn't be legalised but again it's a very difficult argument in my head I've listened to all the arguments and I'm more convinced to keep it illegal personally but just for that reason i think the more people get exposed to certain things the more they're going to get triggered we've seen it in America they did through the medication they've been given opiates and it's triggered a lot of people that would never become opiate addicts if they weren't given medication of that variety for genuine health conditions do you know what i mean it's almost like an allergy.

Mat:

Bringing it back around, sort of segwaying it to the documentary again, but keeping it on that point, Matt says in there that that he's relapsed a few times and there was that a point where he was eight years sober and that kind of shows that you never really cured from it. It is a continuous journey and like he said, He said that he thought his drink problem was his problem but cocaine triggered him to re-enter into this relapse spiral. So I was just wondering what your thoughts were on that, the idea that you can go eight years and it can be something unexpected that sends you back into it.

Lester:

Well, we see that all the time. I mean again I think they said it on the documentary that relapse is kind of part of the path for a lot of people. Which I think that's true but again coming from my I mean I do believe in other theories and other therapies but I'm more of come down on the 12 steps. If you can get somebody to do the 12-step programme personally I think that's the best way forward. Not everybody wants to do it and that's fair enough. I can't speak for every philosophy or every idea I can only speak for the ones that I guess I believe in and try and promote the most. And so again coming from a... I actually got my big book out last night after I watched that because as he was speaking it did remind me of a lot of people that I've kind of met on the journey and you know as it was unfolding it wasn't his first time, he said he'd been in rehab a few times so again in a ways he didn't just relapse after 8 years he's relapsed quite a lot before that so again to really get a good picture i'd want to know what's happened what happened to them other times because when you actually again work in a rehab you and people have been in other rehabs they usually follow a pattern the same pattern and so you'd want to break that pattern see in a way that – let me draw a little picture here. Sometimes to try and explain to people we use I use this shape can you see it that that say this figure of 8 to say that that is an addiction pattern of addiction there's lots of different shapes I can draw to give you different ideas but for this purpose it's like so imagine this part is relapse this part is using, this part is abstinence this part is... when you're on this part of the pattern you're using when you're on this part you're abstinent now different people if you're in addiction you're on that pattern now the pattern, your pattern can go like this now this can be the using this could be like just a matter of days, this could be 8 years this could be a matter of days, this could be 10 years this could be a matter of hours this could be a matter of 20 years you know this could be your clean time that could be your relapsing but if you're on this pattern no matter how big it's spread out you're gonna end up back at that point so again if I was talking and could grill him not for criticism but to try and understand what his pattern is because what you want people to do you don't want them to repeat the pattern especially if the pattern goes over years see some people can have a relapse pattern I mean I've worked with people they do crack cocaine one night one night in a year. So at least once in that year his wife could expect him to not come home. and she'd know that he's in a crack house somewhere doing as much crack as he can and by the morning or the next day he's gonna come home again full of remorse full of regret promising never to do it again after spending whatever he's gonna spend doing what he's gonna do thing is she lived in anxiety for the other 364 days of the year because she knew it was coming but she never knew when it was coming and again that that was kind of like what I felt about listening to them guys last night that there's definitely a relapse pattern set now is he still in that relapse pattern I'd say definitely yes, I mean again look I can only tell you my experience because again what I was hearing led me to believe that I hope he don't and again that somewhere down the line he may realise something and it may divert the direction so again from what I was listening to last night and the body language of him and Emma Willis I'd say that he's in a relapse pattern and she's in a lot of anxiety about it. So, they're still...

Mat:

That brings me to a point that somebody from our community at ECR mentioned on Facebook. Stuart said he found the documentary really sad. Matt talked about his sobriety but not about his recovery. I didn't feel he had any serenity and I'd be worried he was going on tour to die again, which would be a massive trigger for both him and his wife. So, I mean I feel like he was quite sincere but I'd like to see what your thoughts are on that.

Lester:

Definitely mate again you don't want to criticise someone but talking about addiction, addiction's culling baffling and it's a lot of lies and it's a lot of denial, a lot of deceit and again it's like what I didn't feel and again look I'm making no bones about it spiritual person I'm a 12 stepper I think the problem ultimately is a spiritual malady that's what I honestly believe the problem is a spiritual disconnect I think the solution is to reconnect spiritually with yourself or your higher power whatever that may be. But there's, so we believe or I believe that it's a spiritual problem it's a mental problem and it's a physical problem. Now I think a lot of what I was hearing was about psychological problem but see I think you can know all there is... see I don't think therapists have the solution because they're not spiritual they certainly can help you with psychological problems they could probably get some help with physical problems you can go down to the gym, eat healthy, go running, take medications to change the way you feel that's all dealing with the physical problem but I'm a believer that it's a spiritual problem and so it has to be a spiritual solution now people would say well what's the difference I'm in recovery and... I haven't got a spiritual solution and I'm like great I'm glad that's... but then maybe you didn't have a spiritual problem to begin with maybe you were connected just fine now I think what I see the difference is and again I think that in somebody like Matt last night I couldn't see or hear that in actual fact I could hear... I could hear that he didn't have something that I feel that I've got because of the spiritual solution and the people that I know work a spiritual programme they have something that other people don't have. Now in AA in the meetings a lot of people don't work a spiritual program they like the psychological, the fellowship and that's fine not knocking anyone I'm just saying I think there's a difference and I'm gonna just hold up what I believe because that's all I've got I can't tell you anything else I'm just telling you the truth as I see it and again when I look at the AA book I don't want to turn it into a big book study but it says let me start reading it says look, this is step 10 in page 840 AA book and I think it's quite important to try and express because again it's like carrying the message and I think this is something that you really want to have but you're going to have to do this if you want to get it you know that's what we say if you want what we have and are willing to do what we did to get it then you're ready to take certain steps so by doing the spiritual steps I feel that I've got something that he possibly hasn't got I couldn't see whether he had it if I could talk to him then he might say no I have got that you misunderstood that's fair enough, I just felt he wasn't that convinced that he wasn't going to relapse. Now people go well you know no one can guarantee they aren't going to relapse. Again I believe that's true if you don't have a spiritual programme. I believe if you do have a spiritual programme then you shouldn't relapse. That's been my experience. I feel like you know he said it, he said it! It’s like so this is what it says and this is what I believe because this is my experience over 33 years and again working with other people seeing them that relapse seeing them that don't relapse it says and and we have ceased and again I've got to tell you mate people phone me up that have been in recovery 20 years and relapsed 10 years and relapsed I get people phone me up that have been in long-term recovery that relapsed they've called me and without fail when I question them they don't have what I'm about to read and then we try and get them to get that because I think this is the only thing that gets you off that pattern this is the only thing that breaks the pattern, and so if you don't have this in your pattern and you have this problem then guaranteed you're going to relapse at some point maybe five years maybe ten years look the next biggest relapse period after the first year is seven to nine years exactly where he relapsed and it's always for the same reason so it says... because again addiction follows a pattern it's like if you'd they say like Einstein says if you keep repeating the same process and expecting a different outcome that's insanity so that's always my concern when I'm listening to people I'm listening to the pattern. So it's like well it's alright you relapse this time but you said you relapse the load before what was your pattern? because if you haven't changed the pattern you might stay clean for another 8 years and only have another couple of nights relapse or the other way around but i want to know are you off the pattern? So it says and we ceased fighting anything and anyone even alcohol for by this time sanity will have returned and when he's talking about sanity he's talking about being able to say I don't want to drink, because when an alcoholics not drunk and decides to drink that's the most insane moment in their life knowing the outcome you know i think even that Matt said it that in his head he thinks you know when he gets off with a drink he can summons did he say that? I'm pretty sure he did that he can summons what happens what comes after that drink but even that's a bad place to be, you can't rely on that, that's not good recovery that's not good recovery, you shouldn't have to do that you've still got an alcoholic mind if you're doing that.

It says for the time sanity will have returned we will seldom be interested in liquor if tempted we recall from it like a hot flame but that's something built in once you've done this process because something's changed in me this spiritual experience it talks about is a change in psyche, something switches in my head something turns on something turns on that's been switched off and you can see it that you can see the people that get turned on and them that are still switched off and it says we react sanely and normally which means no thanks I don't drink mate I don't do coke what you doing coke around me for can you get it out of my room or I don't care if you do coke it doesn't bother me it's not even an issue. It says and we will find this has happened automatically see so what i've believed and learned is through my programme is i don't have a choice naturally to say no i don't want to drink, no i don't want to snort coke when you offer it me, no i don't want to smoke a pipe crack, there's no natural rational mind in me does that. It's not a choice. People go, use your willpower. It's like I don't have any willpower where that's concerned. I've got it in lots of other areas of my life but we're drinking drugs I've never been able to say no thanks if I have a drink I'm gonna piss myself and upset everyone if I do drugs I'm gonna end up getting arrested and getting in trouble I've never had that natural ability to do that I wanted to do that until somebody put it in front of me and again it's the same story see the story that he told I've heard it a hundred times I've heard it a hundred times from all different people and most of them weren't having problems I mean he didn't even say I was having a really bad time or you know he ain't having a bad time he's got a beautiful wife, a family, he's minted he weren't even having a bad time so somebody offered him drugs and he took it he had no mental defence he wasn't sane he was insane but nothing bad was happening nothing that he said, I don't think he said that, did he say that? He never said I was having a terrible time,

Mat:

No, no, said he was on tour and that was a happy time for him.

Lester:

Living at the top of the world being a rock star. So he weren't even having trauma. He's having a good time. He's had a new kid, beautiful wife, got the world, everything a person could want. Somebody offers him a line of coke. He's got no mental defence. But he did admit that he'd already been in his head. He was already thinking about it. Again, it's so common mate. Honestly, it's like what he didn't have was a programme. What he didn't have was a fit spiritual condition. That's what he didn't have now he may have had it and he may have stopped doing it which again I'm pretty sure for me that would happen I probably got a ton of spirituality in me bank at the minute because I do a lot of work on myself but if I stopped doing all of that at some point down the road I run out of fit spiritual condition I'm pretty sure I could relapse like anyone else as long as i stay in fit spiritual condition there's no chance that can happen.

I don't know what's going to happen if there's a massive massive catastrophe in my life all i know is that when my sister died and i'm standing around her bed while she died that the moment that she died I could feel the grief in my family I never experienced anything so catastrophic in my life, it was catastrophic, not even just her death my grief I could feel my family's grief it was terrible terrible terrible terrible. The first thing that come in my mind was I'm so glad I'm not drunk because I could see myself coming through that hospital door drunk on drugs making it all about me and upsetting and making their lives worse so at the worst moment in my life I was glad I didn't drink not I wanted a drink because I was in fit spiritual condition which again is what this book is telling me so it says and we will find that this has happened automatically so again I can't choose not to drink because I don't have that ability but if I do my programme then I can choose not to drink it happens automatically it's not even something I have to try and do it just kind of like it happens automatically all I have to do is work my programme. That's what the spiritual program is telling you. Not everybody wants it, not everybody wants to do it, that's fair enough. I'm just telling you the experience of us that those that do do it and how it works for us. It says we will see that our new attitude towards liquor has been given us without any thought or effort on our part. I mean honestly for an alcoholic this is like an amazing miracle. And I literally remember Matt that when I started doing this that... I was in early recovery, I went in this pub because I lived on this island If I didn't go in the pub, I wouldn't see anybody It was an island, there was only a pub and a club Not a nightclub, I mean like a country club If I didn't go in there, I wouldn't see anybody apart from at the AA meeting and I remember going in the pub and someone went who knew me was like, you want a drink? And I heard myself saying NO! and I honestly thought who said that? It was like the first time it was almost like the first time in my life that that actually had happened and I felt I didn't even want it it was even more miraculous I didn't even want it I felt so happy that I didn't want it and again so we say the problem is powerless. So the solution again is power I found that higher power I found that power that was greater than myself in myself I always said yes but in the higher power I could be restored to sanity and say no I don't want to drink I don't want to do drugs I don't want to behave like that and it says we see that our new attitude toward liquor has been given us without any thought or effort on our part it just comes this is the miracle of it and it is like a miracle it says we're not fighting it neither are we avoiding temptation so again it's like mate i was hanging around pubs and people doing drugs and and it didn't bother me it's literally like I didn't care I did notice a couple of times in early recovery funny enough when I see alcohol on telly for some reason that just seemed to be a little bit sublimable in my mind and this one time I opened the fridge and there was a can of beer and it almost jumped out but again like it said back a sentence I record like a hot flame I didn't feel that I just thought man that was a very powerful urge It said we feel as though we had been placed in a position of neutrality safe which is exactly how I felt.

It's like I'm not bothered either way and protected It said we were not even sworn off instead the problem had been removed and that's exactly how it felt very quickly It's like I just didn't want to drink anymore I just didn't want to It wasn't even like oh I really love one but I can't it was like I don't want to because again it's like my rational mind was working and it's like I don't want to do this it's not like if I could I would it's like no I don't want to I'm so happy not drinking because I want to enjoy the freedoms of not drinking and it said it does not exist for us and I think that can be pretty difficult for people to realise that that problem doesn't exist for me. So again I don't go around trying not to drink or take drugs I work my spiritual programme on a daily basis which is good for my mental health and good for my physical health and good for my relationships and part of that is I don't want to do it there's no fight, there's no fight, there's no fear, there's no fear of relapse I've got no fear of relapse I've got no fight, it's like the problem doesn't exist for me I don't even think about it very often unless I'm talking to people or doing something like this It's not on my mind, don't get me wrong sometimes when I'm buying the Mrs. Wine or booze that she wants for having a party or something and I'm walking down the... the Sainsbury's Isle or you know whatever you think sometimes your thought comes in your head it would be nice to have a drink and it would be it would be nice as an adult being able to drink alcohol without it harming you is a blessing I just can't do it. I'm allergic to it. When I go and buy a round when I'm out with everybody and in this hot summer and you're... I'm a grown ass man I've got a tray full of lagers and that lovely white head and that beautiful bead of lager running down the side and you're that just... it would be nice to have a nice pint of lager... that's true it would like I say I'm a grown ass man but I can't I can't, I know that I can't but it's not something that bothers me and it's not something I fight about so really I wouldn't even call that a craving or anything like that I think that's just a normal human you know it would be nice to have a glass of wine it would but I can't I'm allergic to it, it doesn't work like that on me and I'm fully conceded to that, that's what makes me you know I'm an alcoholic in that sense, I'm allergic to the alcohol and the way that

Mat:

Yeah, well you could compare that I suppose to being, you could sort of compare that to having like an allergy to again, like something like peanuts. You know, you might see the lovely cake, you know, it's got a lot of peanuts in it. It's gonna give you an anaphylactic shock. You think, well, it looks like a good cake, but I'm not gonna eat it, cause it's gonna kill me.

Lester:

The difference is with something like an allergy you've only got the physical allergy with people with addiction they may have the physical allergy but what couples that is the mental obsession. See if you were obsessed with peanuts and you were like then every time, you'd go to the hospital they'd be like why you keep eating peanuts? You know what happens to you? And you're like I just can't stop. See that would be an addiction. See that would be... so it's the mental obsession. See this is why we believe in abstinence recovery to say look the physical allergy we can't do anything about that as long as you put drugs and alcohol in it and if you think you can ever safely drink again so if you think well... is trauma that's making me drink too much so if I get rid of the trauma I can drink again well if you can good luck to you but that means you're not one of the allergic types but I believe that if you're an allergic type you can never drink safely again and medical science as yet hasn't come up with anything to make you be able to drink like other people.

If it wasn't, I was drinking for the effect you know it's kind of like they give Subutex to heroin addicts because it's a blocker. So, if you're on Subutex what's the point of doing heroin it's not going to do anything there's a lot of them want the methadone they can take the methadone and do the heroin but if they go on to the Subutex so if they you know have an alcohol blocker that blocks any effect then most alcoholics wouldn't bother drinking anyway my concern is like what are they going to go and do instead? You know again that Matt kind of alluded to that what other behaviours am I doing? and so it says that this is our experience this is my experience since I've done the programme that's my experience I don't worry about relapsing I'm not bothered by relapsing I can go to parties, weddings, bar mitzvahs, I can hang out with my drug addict friends for a period of time without having a single compulsion to drink or take drugs it's just not it's not it's not an issue for me it doesn't exist for me the problem has been removed that's how it feels. Now when you go to AA meetings and you can see the problem hasn't been removed from them they might not drink but the problem hasn't been removed there's still very much alcoholics in their own head that's all they excessively talk about their behaviours are like that you know they still keep going on like well as long as I don't drink I can do anything else and it's like come on mate you've been coming for like five six seven eight years you need to let go of that past you know and again I can see how people sometimes say it sort of puts them off of AA because people are powerless and it's like well not me I'm not powerless I'm powerful but I work a programme and if you read step one of the programme it says we were powerless not we are and the reason I were a I WERE powerless is because I've worked the programme so I'm not powerless anymore, my problem was powerless my solution was power and because I've worked the programme I'm now powerful, I've stayed in fit spiritual condition for 33 years and the last thing on my mind is having a drink or a drug or the fear of relapse and I'm pretty sure the people around me have not have that anxiety which again I felt a bit sorry for Emma Willis because again you can see that she's certainly got some anxieties. Again, one thing I find in erm... So let me just finish this bit, it says it’s easy to let up on our spiritual programme of action and rest on our laurels, and we are headed for trouble if we do, for alcohol is a subtle foe. We are not cured of alcoholism, what we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual and our mental condition. And so, he says we're not cured this is a substitute so I don't consider myself cured in that sense but I have an incredible substitute that removes the problem for me like any good medication that as long as you're taking it you will not suffer the symptoms of that illness and I feel that's the same with addiction The trouble is most people don't want to take this medication. Now they don't want to do it, whatever the reasons, I think this is an incredible medication but again I think a lot of people even misunderstand it. But for me it's like I followed the prescription and it's delivered 100% over 33 years. And so, I just felt that that Matt didn't really have that neutrality. And so that would question whether he's understanding the fit spiritual condition bit he may be psychologically and again even listening to Emma saying you know we've got to keep him peaceful he's like hmmm I don't think that's really your responsibility and the fact that you're feeling that because what you find when you talk to lots of people, family members and I've talked to quite a few hundred maybe thousands over the years, is that this one thing that you really notice in them is this incredible hope coming out of their hopelessness and it's almost like this denial that the person promises never to do it again. And the family member have no option other than to believe them and so it's almost with their whole heart they once again believe what they're saying but deep down they're just living in this anxiety because they know it's not true and I felt that from her that she could really do with going to some Al-Anon and getting herself some because otherwise she's going to be living on a knives edge worrying about him especially if what I'm saying is true she will be feeling that as well she will be feeling that he's not in that neutral position the problem hasn't been removed from him now they all hope it has, to the point of almost denial.

It's so sad that they have to believe it because they have no choice. But deep down they're living in this anxiety and I think it was kind of expressed that people in addiction are very good at lying and making you feel bad. They gaslight you to the nth degree. They make you feel that you're wrong she said that she said he makes me feel wrong about uh... what he's doing and the red flags and again if you understand that Al anon methodology you would understand why she's in that position that she's suffering from addiction just as much as he is except she's addicted to him and his behaviours and her and her children are trying to do everything to stop him being triggered but they will feel it in themselves and they will live in that anxiety and even if he only relapses once every eight years she'll be living in that anxiety... She did say that she didn't see it coming but I would say that's more denial than anything and again I can only surmise based on my experience if I had an opportunity to grill her about that: Did you see any signs that you ignored because you didn't want to believe it because that's, that's kind of what it comes down to they want to believe what the addict is saying to them and addicts are great at that they're really great at making you believe the lies they're really great at making you feel bad about trying to do the right thing they are they're really good at making... they're gas lighters, they're experts at it you know what you see you didn't see or what you heard you didn't hear or don't be stupid you gotta trust me why don't you trust me oh why do you keep on at me blah blah blah they give you all of that BS to stop you seeing what they're hiding and he even said himself that he was hiding the idea of using long before he snorted that line of coke how long? and did she notice a change in him? but see the thing is if she's in denial she'll ignore them signals because she will wish that it wasn't happening and she will want to believe him because they want that reality to be true but it's and so I really did see a lot of that in that that programme now I'd love to be wrong about it all and I pray to God for them that he never relapses he fully understands and that her heart lightens and the load that she's carrying lightens that she gets the peace and the relief that she's looking for in her life and that their family have a wonderful life experience that's the goal of being in in good good recovery but unfortunately see a lot of people they dig holes and then when they stop they're still down the hole.

Now obviously when you're pretty rich it looks good on the surface but it's not it's not about that, it's about how you feel in your stomach, how you feel in your heart, how you feel in your head that's with the real wealth is in this world that you're not living in a hostile environment inside your body, that you're living with a certain amount of joy and a certain amount of peace and a certain amount of security but she seemed very insecure and he's brought a lot of insecurity to his family so again you can even imagine the people that haven't got the wealth that they've probably got how much more difficult to find that that comfort but you find the comfort in the erm... for me there's a way of having that problem removed but there's stuff you have to do and I believe again it's a spiritual solution it's a spiritual malady, it's a spiritual problem and if you resolve that you straighten out mentally and physically again like it says there, once you resolve that the problem gets removed from you and you don't even have to work that hard on it, doing spiritual programme and practice is not that hard at all it's actually quite enjoyable and brings a lot of peace to your life. So, I think that's all I've got to say about that, trying to keep it under the 50 minutes, which are pretty 53 minutes.