Jack Trimpey, a drunk who reformed into a nationally known addiction buster, can't think of much good to say about standard alcohol and drug recovery programs.
"Most recovery programs are based on the idea that addicts are powerless over the urge to get high," Trimpey said.
The California man is leading a conference this weekend in Park City and will host a community addiction forum Monday night at the Yarrow Hotel.
"Recovery is for people who do everything but quit. Addicts don't need a psychological inventory of what led to their abuse or a cookbook of recipes of how to be fixed or the ready-made religion of AA," Trimpey said from California. "Recovery is not a process, it's an event. Disease or no disease, we drink and use because we love it; when we get fed up, we quit."
"Some do," acknowledged Tim Halen, treatment manager for the Salt Lake County Division of Substance Abuse. "But I don't think you can will your way out of the effects of chronic drug use in a four-day crash course. Besides, there is all kinds of research showing that when the brain is exposed long enough to mind-altering substances, cognitive abilities are altered, too."
New research by the National Institute on Drug Abuse is showing that chronic users of the stimulant methamphetamine, for example, can completely deplete their supply of the pleasure neurotransmitter dopamine as well as destroy the brain's ability to ever produce it again, leaving them in a permanent state of dread.
Trimpey said his research shows that more than half the people who quit, no matter what the addiction, do it on their own. "Recovery will just keep you the addict living between drinks or fixes. They deny free will. We affirm that we are free moral agents and free to choose right and wrong. We were created or evolved with the ability to overcome our desires and defeat this inner beast."
Trimpey said most programs teach people to keep addictions at bay, not to beat them. They're told they'll be addicts their whole lives and will only stay drug free a day at a time by cult-like adherence to a group.
"The idea that you can never say never again and mean it is the addictive voice talking," Trimpey said, noting that his research shows that more than half the people who quit their addictions do it on their own.
The approach sounds like a throwback to addiction as character flaw and ignores a huge body of research, said Pat Fleming, director of the Salt Lake County Division of Substance Abuse.
"This is a very simplistic answer to long-term complicated problem, and people should be very wary of this kind of 'born again' plan. Treatment is a two steps forward, one step back process."
That attitude is exactly the problem with traditional addiction treatment, said Trimpey, author of "Rational Recovery: The New Cure for Substance Addiction."
People can always rally the moral courage to assess their drug use and its impact on the lives around them. Traditional attitudes and treatment methods give people the gut-grinding, false message that they won't be OK if they just stop, "when in fact their self-indulgent use is the mother of all the pain in their lives," the writer said.
Trimpey's approach isn't faith-based but he does try to lead people to an epiphany of sorts: to recognize then ignore the addictive voice pushing toward using and to realize in a flashing moment that you have beaten it.
"If you know it's over, it's effortless," Trimpey said. "If it's one day at a time, you're white-knuckling your way through it."
E-mail: jthalman@desnews.com