Beat the Booze: A Comprehensive Guide to Combating Drink Problems in All Walks of Life [Paperback]

One of the most constructive, practical books on alcohol I've seen. --Marilyn Warnick, Books Editor at The Mail on Sunday

First class...provides real practical help to those who have succumbed in various ways to heavy drinking. How to beat it personally and the appropriate reactions of family and wider society are all very well set out. --Professor Roger Williams, CBE, Director of the Institute of Hepatology, International Centre For Research Into Liver Disorders

Reads extremely well and is highly informative...should help those who are not yet severely dependent but who are starting to get that way. --Dr Francis Keaney, Consultant Addiction Psychiatrist, National Addiction Centre

"How to beat it personally and the appropriate reactions of family and wider society are all very well set out."

"Reads extremely well and is highly informative...should help those who are not yet severely dependent but who are starting to get that way."

"A useful and informative read, ideal for anyone with an alcohol related problem, their family, friends or employer."

"One of the most constructive, practical books on alcohol I've seen."

One of the most constructive, practical books on alcohol I've seen.

First class...provides real practical help to those who have succumbed in various ways to heavy drinking.

Reads extremely well and is highly informative...should help those who are not yet severely dependent but who are starting to get that way.

A useful and informative read, ideal for anyone with an alcohol related problem, their family, friends or employer.

One of the most constructive, practical books on alcohol I've seen.

Reclaim your life. "Beat The Booze" is an inspirational, easy to read and highly practical book aimed at those who wish to cut down or cut out alcohol and at those who wish to help someone else who has a drink problem. It can help both problem drinkers and individuals who wish to reduce their alcohol intake simply for lifestyle reasons, and contains all the assistance the authors could find from interviewing leading experts in the field of alcohol addiction and case studies who have successfully cut down their drinking or given up alcohol altogether. It includes many new and previously little publicised sources of help, and the Appendix contains contact details for a vast range of organisations that can provide professional help and further information. The authors have also been able to draw on extensive personal experience in battling alcohol. One used to have a serious drink problem, the other gave up for lifestyle reasons.

"Beat The Booze" is an inspirational, easy to read and highly practical book aimed at those who wish to cut down or cut out alcohol and at those who wish to help someone else who has a drink problem. It can help both problem drinkers and individuals who wish to reduce their alcohol intake simply for lifestyle reasons, and contains all the assistance the authors could find from interviewing leading experts in the field of alcohol addiction and case studies who have successfully cut down their drinking or given up alcohol altogether. It includes many new and previously little publicised sources of help, and the Appendix contains contact details for a vast range of organisations that can provide professional help and further information. The authors have also been able to draw on extensive personal experience in battling alcohol. One used to have a serious drink problem, the other gave up for lifestyle reasons

Edmund says: "It is a book we wanted to find in the bookshops
ourselves, but most titles on the subject are written largely for medics
in a text book format or simply try to promote one way of quitting
alcohol based on a single personal experience. But we know that there
are many different reasons why people drink too much and many
different potential solutions."
Helen adds: "We discuss how to approach someone with a drink
problem, what reactions to expect from those around you should you
decide to cut down or give up alcohol yourself, how to avoid getting
a history of alcohol abuse on your medical records and what diet to
follow in the early stages of recovery."

"Beat The Booze" is an inspirational, easy to read and highly practical book aimed at those who wish to cut down or cut out alcohol and at those who wish to help someone else who has a drink problem. It can help both problem drinkers and individuals who wish to reduce their alcohol intake simply for lifestyle reasons, and contains all the assistance the authors could find from interviewing leading experts in the field of alcohol addiction and case studies who have successfully cut down their drinking or given up alcohol altogether. It includes many new and previously little publicised sources of help, and the Appendix contains contact details for a vast range of organisations that can provide professional help and further information. The authors have also been able to draw on extensive personal experience in battling alcohol. One used to have a serious drink problem, the other gave up for lifestyle reasons.

First class, in setting out why we have the problem and also the wider reactions of countries in Europe to our own country's self-induced ills. The book also provides real practical help to those who have succumbed in various ways to heavy drinking. How to beat it personally and the appropriate reactions of family and wider society are all very well set out.

Professor Roger Williams, CBE, Director of the Institute of Hepatology, International Centre For Research Into Liver Disorders

Edmund Tirbutt has been teetotal for over 21 years, after drinking heavily during his years at university and subsequently finding it difficult to drink in moderation in his 20s. He tried various methods of cutting down and introduced rules to reduce his alcohol intake, including only drinking at weekends or when on holiday. Neither of these approaches worked as he always ended up drinking to excess. His decision to quit was determined by the intervention of a friend - when he was 28 years old - who told him he would end up sad and alone and, most probably, soon dead if he did not quit the booze, which he then did almost immediately. Since then his life has changed beyond recognition. He fulfilled his ambition to become a journalist on the national papers, and during the final seven years of his journalistic career won a remarkable 18 awards for excellence.

Helen Tirbutt has been teetotal for over two years, after deciding that life without alcohol is infinitely better than a life with it. She made the decision to quit drinking for lifestyle reasons. During her 20s and 30s Helen worked in the City in the area of PR and Communications, and alcohol was very much a part of that lifestyle in the boom-bust years of the 1980s and throughout the 1990s. After setting up a copywriting company with her husband Edmund in 2004, she made many changes to her life, including moving out of London, taking up meditation and introducing more healthy ways of dealing with work tension and stress. She quickly found that it is a total myth that you can't have a good time without alcohol, and realised that there are plenty of other healthier and more effective ways of dealing with the modern day worries that cause many people to drink.

The only statistic that matters is you

Furthermore, we have also confined medical gobbledegook and
detailed statistics to our Appendices. We are acutely aware that
boredom can actually exacerbate drink problems, and the only
statistic we care about is you. Whatever percentage of others have
succeeded or failed to beat the booze is of no relevance; you have
it within you to triumph and overcome.

Whether we are throwing you a lifeline, offering you a lifestyle
change, or both, the aim is to take you on an exciting journey that
other individuals featured in this book have already been on.

Time for a change

Many people who feel stuck in a rut are willing to consider making
radical changes to their life to escape from the drudgery and
routine that has been getting them down. They might, for example,
risk changing careers in middle-age or relocating to a foreign
country. Why then should they not consider giving up drinking? It
involves far less personal upheaval than emigrating to Australia
and far less expense than retraining to become a lawyer! Indeed
giving up alcohol can enable you to realise significant financial
savings and create considerable wealth. Not only will you no
longer have to splash out on alcoholic drinks, you will also have a
huge amount of new time available which can, if you wish, be used
for earning money.

Help is at hand

Whatever form of drink problem you have, the good news is that
you have the power within to overcome it. Around one third of
problem drinkers manage to do so without any professional help
at all, and the help options available are far greater than generally
supposed. Some of these, such as treatment facilities funded by the
NHS, social services and charitable bodies, and self-help groups
like the AA, will cost you nothing, while many forms of private
treatment cost less than you probably think. Even staying in
private residential rehab doesn't have to involve the types of prices
you may have seen splashed around in newspaper articles about
celebrities visiting well known upmarket clinics. It can be possible
to obtain a six-week residential rehab course followed up by three
months of external counselling for around £6,000.

All you need is bottle!

Whatever help you receive, the war can only be won from within.
Ultimately, victory depends primarily on one thing: You must want
to overcome your drink problem more than you want to drink.
Many people who have given up mainly for lifestyle reasons report
that the process wasn't anything like as hard as they had first
feared.