How to Treat Addiction

How to Treat Addiction Lyle Hurd: Dr. Cass, we’ve been working together on Total Health Magazine and number of other things for about 10 years now probably and you do have an actual practice even though you travel and you lecture and you write books. Can you give me an idea of how someone goes back treating addiction? Hyla Cass: Addiction has been treated kind of this step child of psychiatry and people look on addicts as being weak, poor moral character if I would just get it together your self control and I have to say in a way the trust that programs kind of feed in to that and at the same time I have to say do appreciate any other 12 step programs because it really do help people have a support structure and that’s extremely important but what they’ve missed is that there’s a biochemical component to addiction. Now, build up that you knew that he had contact with Abram Hoffer and Abram Hoffer told him about what’s called orthomolecular psychiatry that is using nutrients. So, he was onto it. Bill was onto it. AA never adapted that. So, you go to an A.A meeting and so I hear because I haven’t actually been to one but I know people who are smoking, drinking coffee, eating cake and cookies. All of the bad stuff, right? Why? Not because they’re bad people or stupid or weak but because their brain chemistry are at whack. So, the very same things that they’re turning to now the sugar, the caffeine, whatever it is that they’re using as cigarettes alternates, the dopamine level and that’s the reason why they have their addiction in the first place because their dopamine level and other brain chemicals were out of balanced. So, if you can help someone rearrange their neurotransmitters and replenish the deficiencies the cravings are going to go away and not just what I do. When I’m seeing patients and they’re addicted. I’ll give them tyrosine, phenylalanine, glutamine. Those are my favorite in terms of amino acids for treating the situations. There’s also an herb called kudzu that does have to metabolize alcohol and to stop the alcohol cravings. What happen was I have self defense. I actually developed a set of products. A brain recovery AM and brain recovery PM because people in recovery when they’re dealing with addiction it’s really hard for them to figure out how to count their pills and count everything, this is in the morning and then I take one of these and three of these and they get confused because they don’t have their full brain function. So, there is very simple I have a morning pocket. Take them a pocket with breakfast, a pocket with dinner and the multivitamins involve this fish oil and both involve because you need the essential fatty acids for your brain. These amino acids in both and this blood sugar balancing products of both. So, when you’re taking the pockets, what you’ve done is help to re-balance your brain chemistry so that the cravings are going to go away. I had one guy, this is actually a good story. He actually was in the patient. I said, “I just developed this products, I like you to try them” because I knew he was in recovery. He was about six month is over from a met habit and he was at the met I gave him, “I want you to try this and I’m sober, I’m fine, I don’t need the message.” Do me a favor, humor me, try them? He called me two days later that I can’t believe it. I’m dreaming, I’m remembering things and within a week or two he was writing letters to get a new job and here he was sober already. He wasn’t using but he haven’t quite gotten together to get the kind of job he wanted or to live a life he wanted and it really help pull him out go the next step to getting his life together. So, that’s what’s happens when your brain is really working. And when someone’s addicted they’re not a bad weak person. They are deficient and if we can give them what they need and very often their low blood as well. So, they have to make sure to eat the appropriate. You know, it’s probably three to five meals a day and make sure to have enough chromyl and enough glutamine to help balance their blood sugar and to eat good helpful foods. Stay away from the bad stuff because that’s only going to perpetuate the addiction cycle and if you eat well that goes a long way toward even mitigating the cravings and to be storing your brain chemistry to what it should be. Lyle Hurd: So, basically, what you’re saying is you need to go a lot further than just be hanging to an organization where you are there with a number of other people who are fighting the same problem. You need to help to be able to hopefully overcome the craving and these are things that are really very prevalent but are replaced by the coffee and things like that. Hyla Cass: The coffee and donuts and I would love to speak at AA programs. I think they’ve done a fabulous job and it taking people in giving them support, having sponsors and I’ve seen the really possible effect but this one piece would be so important and so vital to introduce the role of nutrition of eating properly and taking up the bad stuff and adding in the good stuff like my brain will cause or anything like it just look at the ingredients and get it and equivalent to somewhere and that’s all on my website. A natural high as I talked about brain chemistry and I have one chapter that I really like. I love writing. It called addicted, I can quit whenever I want to because people when are addicted really think, “I’m in control?” They’re not, but I explain what’s really going on. Where that craving is coming from and how you can really conquer it very easily and you don’t have to do it with will power. You do it with nutrition. Lyle Hurd: Naturalizes the terrific work I recommended as well. Well, we all know someone either, someone we love or someone who is close to us or close to someone we care about that has these problems and I recommend that you look and take look at this video or that you have from seek help. Thank you. Hyla Cass: Thanks.