I was recently listening to the podcast Happier with Gretchen Rubin and she brought up the topic of people being moderators or abstainers.
In a nutshell, a moderator is someone who does well when they allow themselves small quantities of something they love.
For example, if they love chocolate they like to have a chocolate bar in the fridge, even if they are on a diet. Every day or so, they’ll get a craving, have a bite and feel satisfied. Then they are over their craving and don’t think about the chocolate at all for the next few days, even weeks, until the craving comes up again.
The moderator’s problem is if you tell them they can’t have something, then they obsess about it.
On the other hand, an abstainer does much better if they quit something cold turkey.
They may hate quitting the thing they love, but they know they struggle to stop once they start. And even if they do manage to limit their favorite thing to just a few times a week, they think obsessively about it while they are waiting to have it again.
So, with the example of the chocolate, they may still only have a piece every night, but a disproportionate part of their day is spent thinking about the piece of chocolate. And once they have it, instead of being satisfied, they just want more.
I think the answer of abstainer vs. moderator is pretty easy for anyone in recovery.
As much as we’d love to be a moderator, the fact that our drug of choice got out of hand means we do better when we cut something off completely.
I have a friend I went to rehab with who I talk to on a regular basis. When we were told to accept the fact that we could never drink like a normal person, she couldn’t see straight. She hated that alcohol was off limits.
I was also completely devastated, but at the same time a little relieved that there was no gray area. I could either keep drinking and stay sick, or stop and get better.
My friend stayed sober for about three years and then decided to try a Moderate Drinking Plan. Basically, about once a week she could have a beer. She was very happy with the idea. To me, it sounded like torture.
For her, it hasn’t worked great. There have been a few times over the past two years that she started to drink and couldn’t stop. She ended up binge drinking and regretted it. But for her, it hasn’t led to binge after binge. She is able to go long stretches without drinking and says she rarely thinks about alcohol any more.
This isn’t a cautionary tale about trying to drink moderately. My friend didn’t lose it all. She’s still a successful lawyer, still married and a happy mom to an adorable little one. She says she doesn’t get the urge to drink very much anymore, but likes that the option of a beer feels more available to her than it did during the years when she abstained from alcohol.
For me, I know that one drink will lead to 20. I feel relief in the fact that if I have a drink I consider it a relapse, not an experiment in moderate drinking.
Now I still battle my sweet tooth on a daily basis. I love a good dessert and many times struggle to stick to the small portion that I should have. The few times I have cut back on my sweet treats, my obsession levels have gone down, as have the cravings. This alone lets me know that if I could only align with my abstainer personality and cut sugar, I could easily lose those last 10 pounds!
