While On Life's Journey.....

Comment recently posted to my blog:

"My name is Sarah Ikenberry
I am part of the National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month
team. SAMHSA, part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services,sponsors Recovery Month, which celebrates recovery, highlights the benefits of treatment, and educates the public on recovery and treatment options.I have been reading your blog and wanted to introduce myself. I appreciate the insight and expertise you share with your readers about substance abuse and recovery. I specifically enjoyed your recent post in which you encourage treatment providers to encourage those with substance abuse disorders to address their whole health.

Kind Regards,
Sarah

Sarah Ikenberry | Public Health Advisor | CA/OD/CSAT/SAMHSA
1 Choke Cherry Rd., Room 2-1059 | Rockville, MD 20857"

I am honored for this SAMHSA recognition. AND, pleased that someone is reading my blog. I appreciate any and all feedback.

Be well on your journey.

MAx Fabry is a regular contributor to a weekly column "ASK MAx" published in the SPRINGFIELD TIMES, Springfield, Oregon. The SPRINGFIELD TIMES is published weekly on Friday by S.J. Olson Publishing, Inc. This column is published on this blog by permission of the SPRINGFIELD TIMES. Visit their website at http://www.springfieldtimes.net.
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Dear MAx,
I recently went to lunch with a group of friends at a popular local restaurant. While the food was very good, I learned after I ate my hamburger that most of the menu items were cooked with alcohol! This fact was nowhere to be seen on the menu. I have been in alcohol recovery for the past two years so this information would have been helpful to me to make a healthy food choice. Why don’t restaurants warn their customers that their food contains alcohol?

Still Sober

Dear Still,
Thank you for your question on several levels. While this isn’t considered a “relapse” for you, it could be a trigger toward relapse. I appreciate the concern you have about restaurants using alcohol as an ingredient to menu items, but not revealing it to their customers.

Cooking with alcohol doesn’t only affect recovering people; it also affects certain religious orders, children, and people prone to an array of other food allergies. For instance, if someone is allergic to fruits, grains, vegetable, yeast, or certain bacteria’s, then cooking with alcohol can greatly impact their health.

The area of regulation for the listing of ingredients on menus appears to be illusive at best. The FDA regulates many things related to ingredients listed on labeling food products, but my research it does not look like any specific agency regulates what is to be printed on menus. It is an option for requirements to be set within individual states.

However, with the newest emphasis on eating, and being healthy, it looks like the restaurant industry may be addressing disclosure of menu ingredients on their own. Fast food restaurants seem to have been the forerunners in listing not only ingredients, but also nutritional value. Many fast food chains are also utilizing the internet to publicize these lists.

Traditional restaurants, too, are starting to step up to the plate. This industry is recognizing that it is to their benefit to not only listing ingredients, but also to list “use only locally grown” as a selling point for attracting customers.

Still, it may take a while before full disclosure about alcohol-cooked foods will be the norm on most restaurant menus. This, in part, is because within the cooking industry, the question of whether or not alcohol dissipates during the cooking process is still up for debate. Restaurants often marinate meat in alcohol because cooking the meat will be softer and tastier. How long would the meat have to cook to have all the alcohol gone?

For definitive answers I usually consult with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The FDA published information showing that the old accepted thinking that all the alcohol added to a dish evaporates during cooking is wrong. According to this report something would have to be cooked for at least three hours to totally eradicate all traces of alcohol. In addition, it would also depend on how the food is prepared and the type of alcohol used in the preparation. The best cooking scenario still leaves 5% alcohol content.

The good news here is that you can still go to eat at a restaurant and leave still sober and healthy. Here are three simple tips to help you choose a menu item:

*Consider the name of the restaurant: i.e.: “The Brewery” might put you alert

*Ask the waiter about ingredients you need to know about

*If you have multiple food allergies, carry a card that can be taken to the chef for clarification of your order

We could spend hours debating the many pros and cons around listing ingredients on menus, who needs to regulate, and what exactly needs to be included. BUT, in the end, it is an individual responsibility to make decisions that will be healthy for you and your family.

Of course, mentioning this to your favorite restaurant owners may encourage setting a new “normal” for how menus are presented. Restaurant owners want their business to be successful. Your voice can make a difference.

I have listed a chart for cooking with alcohol and substitutes for using alcohol in recipes, on my blog to help you clarify the food you are cooking for yourself and your guests. Change starts with YOU.

Still, thank you again for opening the door for discussion among restaurateurs and their customers. Most of all, thank you for raising awareness to the many people that could be affected by ordering their favorite meal off a menu.

Be well on your journey.

Have a question about addiction, recovery, or life transitions such as retirement, career change, grief and loss issues, empty nesting, etc, ‘Ask MAx’. Send your questions to Lifestyle Changes, PO Box 1962, Eugene, OR 97440; or, e-mail your questions to: askmaxcolumn@yahoo.com. Learn more about MAx Fabry and read her blog at www.lifestylechangescounseling.com.

If you are a professional addiction counselor, the links below are a MUST to bookmark. These are links to SAMHSA, part of the US Department of health and Human Services. “SAMHASA” is an acronym for SUBSTANCE ABUSE & MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES ADMINISTRATION. This is where you would go to find the most up-to-date information on addiction and mental health, find out where the money is, and build community with other providers.

http://twitter.com/recoverymonth Although “recovery month” is in September, SAMHSA celebrates recovery all year round. Become a follower.

http://www.recoverymonth.gov/ This site provides resources and lists of recovery events all over. You can list your recovery-focused community events here for FREE.

http://www.recoverymonth.gov/Community-Events/Event.aspx Recovery events happen throughout the year; post to this website to share the details with others.

Learn more about me, MAx Fabry, BA, CADCII, at http://www.lifestylechangescounseling.com

MAx Fabry is a regular contributor to a weekly column "ASK MAx" published in the SPRINGFIELD TIMES, Springfield, Oregon. The SPRINGFIELD TIMES is published weekly on Friday by S.J. Olson Publishing, Inc. This column is published on this blog by permission of the SPRINGFIELD TIMES. Visit their website at http://www.springfieldtimes.net.
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Dear MAx,
My 24 year old daughter finally went to treatment for drug use. Her father and I were shocked to learn that she had been using since she was 14 years old. She admitted that it started with pot and went to methamphetamine. She looks so unhealthy. How long does it take for someone’s body to get healthy again?

Yana

Dear Yana,
This is such a great question about the process of recovery. Since treatment is not a cookie-cutter process, there is no definitive time table I can offer for your daughters healing time.

Because you gave me your daughters starting age, 14, and her present age, 24, of beginning recovery, I will try to briefly explain some of the factors needed for consideration with your daughters process.

The recovery process is so much more then stopping the use of the substances, and going into a “treatment program”. Recovery is about addressing all three human dimensions: mind, body, and spirit. Your question deals specifically with the “body” aspect of healing.

The recovery process goal is about restoring the mind and the body to a pre-addiction state of good health. Unfortunately, the adolescent years are critical developmental years. Adolescence involves changes in personality, intellect, social AND physical development.

Most importantly, recent studies have shown “remarkable changes that occur in the brain during the teen years.” These studies confirm what parents already knew: the teen brain is very complicated and not easily understood. Teens brains are a work in progress that need to be protected and nurtured. Yet, adolescence is a time of discovery, taking risks, and “experimenting”.

Understanding that nutrition is a crucial aspect of addiction and recovery is vital in supporting anyone’s recovery efforts, particularly your daughter. What was your daughter eating as she passed from childhood into adolescence? Teen nutrition is not always high on their priority list. For most teens nutrition is whatever they can eat between activities.

Which comes first: the chemical imbalances or the chemical addiction?

There are interesting stats about families that sit down and eat together that show low rates of teen addiction. Is it the interactions that contribute to healthy teens? Or, is it the balanced meals they are getting during this family time?

The US Food and Drug Administration has been doing studies on the correlation between poor nutrition and substance abuse. Lack of iron, calcium, and other nutrients contribute to poor physical and mental function, particularly in the teen years. While most of this information is being gathered to focus on obesity in America, it could also shine a new light on the origins and proper treatment of addiction.

Once in the addiction lifestyle meth addicts, “tweakers”, starve themselves to the point of looking like survivors of a third world country. Marijuana users,“Potheads”, stuff their bodies with random foods during the “munchie” hour. And, of course, there are the recovering alcoholics, “sugarbabies”, that treat their bodies to as much sugar as possible to replace the sugar that was being produced by drinking alcohol.

Change the way someone is thinking, change their behavior and their life. Nutritional deficiencies, such as thiamine deficiencies, can have severe and permanent effects on brain function, including impaired memory. If you can’t remember to eat right, you are sabotaging your overall health as your addiction continues.

What we know about methamphetamine users, Yana, is that, because they may stay up for days at a time, they may suffer from dehydration, electrolyte imbalances, and profound weight loss.

So, if the goal of recovery is returning the body and the mind to pre-addiction, but the body and mind did not have an opportunity to fully form healthy because addiction started in adolescence, where to begin the recovery process?

I would sincerely encourage anyone starting on a journey of recovery to seek the services of a competent nutritionist that understands addiction, or is working with an addiction counselor. While the addiction counselor is working on core issues and addictive behaviors, the nutritionist will review the client’s entire nutritional history, habits, and patterns. Once this is done, the nutritionist can recommend a diet that will focus on rebuilding the body’s nutrients and bringing balance to the system.

Again, it isn’t just about stopping the use, it is about proper diet, exercise, and therapy that all work together to start a healthy lifestyle. Oh, yes, I might add, Yana, it takes PATIENCE, too. It took your daughter 10 years to get in this condition—thank goodness she lived to make the change.

Be well on your journey as your daughter begins to heal.

Have a question about addiction, recovery, or life transitions such as retirement, career change, grief and loss issues, empty nesting, etc, ‘Ask MAx’. Send your questions to Lifestyle Changes, PO Box 1962, Eugene, OR 97440; or, e-mail your questions to: askmaxcolumn@yahoo.com. Learn more about MAx Fabry and read her blog at www.lifestylechangescounseling.com.

I discussed in yesterday’s blog that alcohol DOES NOT EVAPORATE completely during the cooking process; that is, unless you cook it at a high temperature. The best you can probably expect is that 5% of the alcohol will still be left at serving. But, then, there are those recipes that call for alcohols like wine, beer, rum, vodka, etc. The easiest thing would be to find another recipe that does not use alcohol. But, if this is a favorite recipe for you and you don’t want to risk changing the flavor, there are substitutes you can make to eliminate the alcohol. For instance, to eliminate beer or ale from a recipe you can easily substitute non-alcoholic beers, or consider substituting chicken broth, ginger ale, or white grape juice; heavier beers use a stronger beef, chicken or mushroom broth or stock. Instead of sweet or dry red wines, again, you can use non-alcoholic wine, or beef or chicken broth/stock, diluted red wine vinegar, red grape juice diluted with red wine vinegar or rice vinegar, tomato juice, liquid from canned mushrooms, or plain water. When choosing a substitute ingredient focus on what taste and texture you are trying to achieve.

For a complete printable list of over 30 alcohol substitutes, send a request to: maxfabry@lifestylechangescounseling.com

Learn more about me, MAx Fabry, and my practice at: http://www.lifestylechangescounseling.com

Alcohol DOES NOT totally evaporate during the cooking process. The figures produced from an Food and Drug Report indicate that, at best, the alcohol can be reduced to 5%:

PREPARATION METHOD AlcoholRetained
No heat application,
immediate consumption 100%

No heat application, overnight storage 70%

Alcohol ingredient added to boiling liquid,
and removed from heat 85%

Flamed 75%

Baked, approximately 25 minutes, alcohol
ingredient on surface of mixture
(not stirred in) 45%

Baked/simmered, alcohol ingredient stirred
into mixture 15 minutes 40%
30 minutes 35%
1 hour 25%
1.5 hours 20%
2 hours 10%
2.5 hours 5%

Tomorrow, SUBSTITUTES FOR COOKING WITH ALCOHOL

Learn more about MAx Fabry at www.lifestylechangescounseling.com

MAx Fabry is a regular contributor to a weekly column "ASK MAx" published in the SPRINGFIELD TIMES, Springfield, Oregon. The SPRINGFIELD TIMES is published weekly on Friday by S.J. Olson Publishing, Inc. This column is published on this blog by permission of the SPRINGFIELD TIMES. Visit their website at http://www.springfieldtimes.net.
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Dear MAx,
I have had it with my mother-in-law. My husband and I have been married for three years, we live in our own home, we are both professionals, and we are now expecting our first child. She criticizes me all the time. She is constantly cooking what she thinks are my husband’s favorite dishes. If he doesn’t go over to her house to eat, she brings the food to our house. Once she gets into the house she criticizes how it looks, how I take care of it, and on and on. It never stops! Other then move far, far away, what can I do to keep this woman away from us?

Screaming

Dear Screaming,
How sad that this is happening to your new family. And, now a baby is due. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if this relationship could be resolved before baby arrives so there is only love in your family?

Mother-in-law problems is one of the biggest challenges in new marriages. A study from Utah State University indicates that tensions, particularly between daughter-in-law and her husband’s mother, effects almost 60 percent of all marriages. Sometimes these relationships never heal, often resulting in divorce.

Sigmund Fraud, of course, had his theories on mother/son relationships that he termed a Oedipus complex: which is when a boy is fixated with his mother and competes for her love with his father. In this model separation from the mother becomes difficult when boy turns into man.

Most modern day theories for repairing these relationships appear to be centered around being patient, being nice, hold your tongue, and wear her down with kindness. This is one approach. Genuine? Maybe not so much.

I would like to offer another possibility: understand where your mother-in-law is coming from. In order to do this, your ego needs to be balanced to see “who” your mother-in-law really is.

By balanced ego what I mean is that your judgments, expectations, and fears have to be set aside in order to understand where mother-in-law is coming from. Another words, you need to achieve a sense of “awareness” about this woman.

My first suggestion is that, to achieve awareness versus ego, is think of her by using her name instead of “my mother-in-law” or “his mother” or even “mom”. So let’s call your mother-in-law “Jane” for this exercise.

A couple times of year I present a Grief and Loss workshop to teach people not only “how” to grieve, but also to recognize that they are in grief. In my workshop I always say that “the death of a child is the worse death loss anyone can experience.” Grief is not just about death, letting go of your children also demands a period to grieve. Letting-go of a child you birthed and raised can be extremely difficult. Many empty nesters attend my workshop and are able to change their attitudes about letting go of their adult children and getting on with their own lives.

So, Screaming, when you married your husband, Jane may have gone into the process of grief without knowing it. Since we are a nation that doesn’t really know how to grieve, individuals often have a difficult time knowing that they are grieving. That is why my workshop is focused on understanding that you are even in grief.

Isn’t it interesting that the first stage of grief is denial? Imagine if you could help Jane move through this process of loss:

DENIAL: Accepting that her son is now a grown man and starting a family of his own. Accepting that the person that he chose for his wife in many ways is just like her.

BARGAINING: Helping her to understand that she no longer needs to cook for him, because you can and do nurture him. Helping her believe that there doesn’t have to be a choice between you or her.

ANGER: Helping her to recognize who she is angry at, why, and validating that “anger” is alright—ask her: “how can I help you get through the anger?”

SADNESS: Recognizing all the memories that she is holding on to that causes a nostalgic sadness. Sit with her, and be a good listener, while she goes through all those albums of pictures sharing stories of her being a mother for “all those years”.

ACCEPTANCE: I believe once Jane is allowed to relive her journey with her son, is acknowledged for her loving work, and is totally validated for her feelings, I believe she will be ready to move on with her life.

And, when she is ready, both you and your husband will be there to encourage her to start her new journey to find out who Jane is. Imagine the courage that will take. She will be so pleased to have TWO caring people beside her.

Be well on your new journey.

Have a question about addiction, recovery, or life transitions such as retirement, career change, grief and loss issues, empty nesting, etc, ‘Ask MAx’. Send your questions to Lifestyle Changes, PO Box 1962, Eugene, OR 97440; or, e-mail your questions to: askmaxcolumn@yahoo.com. Learn more about MAx Fabry and read her blog at www.lifestylechangescounseling.com.

I was having a chat today with a friend of mine that has been in and out of recovery for the majority of his almost 60 years of adult life. Presently he has been sober for almost four years—two of those years while in prison. He has returned to school; this is something that he had tried before the relapse episode that ended with him going to prison. He is able to articulate very well with me his thinking and the behaviors attached to that thinking.

He just completed a term that he perceived to be difficult because of all the papers he had to write about topics he had no previous clue about. It took almost weekly coaching to get him through this term. But he persevered; using alcohol was NOT an option because he was accountable to his PO, the people in his recovery house, and to me, his life coach.

He related that there were times he “just wanted to quit. “But I kept pushing through.” The feelings he described he experienced through this process were: frustration, anger, low self-esteem. “I often thought about how great it was when I was using.” “What was ‘great’ about it?” I asked. He responded “I could just make it all go away by drinking lots and lots of alcohol, throw in some drugs, and, I was in heaven.” My question back was “THAT kind of thinking is addict thinking. Where did you REALLY get using that life strategy?” He chuckled as he responded “I lost my wife, my home, and ended up in prison, and now I live in a halfway house with nine other guys thinking they, too, had a great life when they were using.” He laughed and added “It is the illusion of delusion. I was creating the “illusion” that life was great; but, in fact, it sucked and I was trying to drown it out. That way of life was really a delusion.” He stopped for a second, then with eye contact sincerity added “Most addicts really know that it isn’t true, but you talk yourself into believing it.”

I asked him “Is this another illusion you have created?” “No,” he quickly responded, “but, I don’t know how to explain how it is different.” As we sat continuing to debrief the school term and comparing it to previous similar experiences while he was under the influence, he described his feelings as of today: knowing, relief, an “I did it!” attitude.

It was then that we both noticed a “light bulb” turn on. As we continued to talk I got that he finally understood the messages being presented to him through years of attempted recovery: Life is about experiencing ALL the feelings good or bad, easy or hard, joyous or sad. By allowing yourself the experience of the difficult feelings we can so much appreciate the triumphs in our lives. Life is about being in awareness to get the gift of each day. Life is about living clean and sober.

MAx Fabry is a regular contributor to a weekly column "ASK MAx" published in the SPRINGFIELD TIMES, Springfield, Oregon. Have a question about addiction, recovery, or life transitions such as retirement, career change, grief and loss issues, empty nesting, etc, ‘Ask MAx’. Send your questions to Lifestyle Changes, PO Box 1962, Eugene, OR 97440; or, e-mail your questions to: askmaxcolumn@yahoo.com. Learn more about MAx Fabry and read her blog at www.lifestylechangescounseling.com.

I was thinking the other day about how we beg our addicts to “get clean and sober”. Then, when they do enter into recovery, even with the best of recovery plans, it still does not seem to make US happy. “What’s that all about?” I wondered. Well, I think it is WHAT we are asking for “get clean and sober”. Why don’t we all start asking our addicts to “please get healthy!” WOW! I bet this would make a difference. After all, we need to be careful what we ask for---words are very powerful.

MAx Fabry, http://www.lifestylechangescounseling.com

For anyone living one day at a time: you might enjoy this site:

http://www.frontiernet.net/~jimdandy/specials/onedayatatime/onedayatatime.htm

Smile on your journey.

MAx Fabry
http://www.lifestylechangescounseling.com