8 Books About Sobriety to Help You Drink Less, or Quit Altogether The New York Times

Posted on Nov 10, 2020

As we wrap up our exploration of the best books on alcoholism, let’s remember that recovery is a journey, not a destination. From the 12-step program to cognitive-behavioral techniques, these books provide a range of practical strategies for recovery. Now that we’ve explored some of the best books on alcoholism, let’s delve into the impact these books have had on individuals and the recovery community in the next section.

This book can supply you with the internal resolve and concrete strategies you’ll need to make progress in all aspects of your life. The only part I took issue with was the diet chapter, which promotes some dated myths about meat. This book can provide great value for the person who has quit drinking and still does not feel good on a daily basis. Anxiety, depression, and cravings are not a sustainable way of life, nor are they inevitable symptoms of a permanent disease. Know My Name by Chanel MillerThis should be compulsory reading in every high school.

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The co-founder and CEO of Whole 30 and bestselling author, Melissa Urban, helped millions of people transform their relationship with food. Now, in The Book of Boundaries, out November 2023, Urban, who has been in recovery for more than 20 years, shows how setting clear limits can help protect your time, energy, health, security, confidence, and freedom. Former “20/20” anchor Elizabeth Vargas shares her story of anxiety and alcohol use disorder in this compelling memoir. Between Breaths reveals how she lived in denial and secrecy for years before finally entering rehab and a life of sobriety. So here are 10 best-selling and/or award-winning books on addiction and recovery. Along with educational insights on substance use disorders, the books provide multiple perspectives from those who have successfully traversed the road to recovery.

  • If you are concerned about any of the issues raised on this page then please seek medical advice from a doctor or treatment specialist.
  • It was not due to some kind of lineage of influence reaching back to De Quincey, but the inevitable result of applying the simplifying dictates of storytelling and lowest-common-denominator audience needs to roughly similar experiences.
  • Early sobriety forces, like giving birth, a quick and complete break with a former life in order to make way for a new, sometimes ambiguously desired one.
  • This book was written to help mankind avert totalitarianism, and you will probably not enjoy it if you care little for philosophy or history.
  • 2000’s Cherry picked up the story by showing Karr as an adolescent, already dabbling with drugs and profoundly lacking any sense of belonging.
  • When Laurel’s new boyfriend introduces her to meth, she immediately falls under its spell, loving the way it erases, even if only briefly, her past.

The book discusses drug policies, substance use treatment, and the root causes of substance use. More than anything, In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts provides a voice of kind generosity and understanding to anyone who is https://ecosoberhouse.com/ looking to learn more for themselves or a loved one. One of the first of its kind, Drink opens our eyes to the connection between drinking, trauma and the impossible quest to ‘have it all’ that many women experience.

The Best Books by War Correspondents

Probably the least-known work of the Brontë sisters, by the least-known sister, Anne’s second and last novel was published to great success in 1848. Helen ultimately escapes her marriage and pretends to be a widow, earning a living as an artist to care for herself and her young son. The book was so upsetting to her sister Charlotte that, after Anne’s death she passed on the chance to have it reprinted, and the book was neglected for a really long time. Today it is widely considered to be a landmark in early feminist literature, but its frank depictions of addiction within marriage are just as deserving of acclaim.

But the challenge is particularly acute when the story is about a life that, as the reader well knows, has simply gone on and on beyond the final page. How do you craft an ending that makes narrative sense but which feels complex and inconclusive in the way life so often is? Many addiction memoirs evince a desire to repay the reader for all the dark places the story has taken them with a thumpingly joyous ending. For these reasons, in many addiction memoirs the end is the weakest part. Dr. Gabor Maté has spent decades treating drug addicts in Vancouver and his patients haunt this sprawling, outraged book—the human faces of a failure of medicine, policy, and law.

Why did Coll love this book?

She discovers in Catholicism a spirituality that makes sense to her and seems to keep her sober, but she doesn’t proselytise or become too holy for irony. Instead she presents herself as a kind of Godly schmuck, chronically slow on the spiritual uptake. For readers who’ve followed her over three searingly honest books, where survival let alone redemption often seemed unlikely, her final discovery of a bruised and hard-won peace feels like an instance of what can only be called grace.

  • Van der Kolk describes our inner resilience to manage the worst of life’s circumstances with our innate survival instinct.
  • Maté challenges the idea that addiction is a medical disease and that drugs are inherently addictive.
  • He shares his experiences with alcohol addiction and his journey to sobriety, offering a candid, insightful look at the realities of alcoholism.

This book functions as daily devotional with reflective meditations and modern day translations on how to improve your mental health. This book is for everyone, but learning to ‘tame the inner dragon’ is especially helpful to people in recovery. Straightforward and to the point, Carr helps you examine the reasons you drink best alcoholic memoirs in the first place in The Easy Way to Control Alcohol. For example, he explains why stating alcohol is poison and repeating the tagline “Never Question the Decision” can help you change your unconscious thoughts about alcohol, and shift your mindset. This book is a great place to start if you’ve been feeling sober curious.