Quitting, the Old Fashioned Way

Jan. 4, 2006

New Year’s resolutions are frequently made about quitting a bad habit like smoking or drinking or even toking. Perhaps it once gave joy to your rebellious self, but now leaves only dismal droppings of guilt, with only a smidgeon of pleasure. You know in your little addicted heart that it’s time to quit.
I recently wrote in Northern Express about ibogaine, a mild hallucinogenic, that stops an addict’s craving for drinking and drugs for up to three months. For some it’s enough time to make a profound lifestyle change. Ibogaine is illegal in this country, but hundreds have successfully ended their addiction after one or two treatments in overseas clinics.
But Bruce, a veteran substance abuse counselor (who also happens to be a close relative), didn’t buy it at all. He contends that attempts to cure a “drug with a drug” are legendary, but oftentimes disappointing. If your New Year’s resolution is to stop a lifelong addiction, his advice is to consider what research has discovered true for hard-core addicts: Aerobic exercise will greatly increase your prospects of success.
“What we used to call our second wind in long-distance track is really endorphins kicking in,” he says. “Endorphins supply the brain with the natural opiate of the body to counteract any drug hunger that someone might have for opiates.”

LEARNING THE HARD WAY
The success of 12-step programs is well -known and considered de rigueur for anyone serious about quitting, but Bruce became an advocate of adding exercise to the crucial 12-step program thanks to a professional colleague. “Robert” was a former heroin addict and sentenced to prison at the age of 17 after he murdered a drug associate. During his 17 years in prison, he earned his associate’s degree and also a master’s of social work through a special program for prisoners through Wayne State University.
“What he said was while he was in the joint, he would run, working up to 20 miles a day, doing this marathon-style running,” Bruce said. “After he got out, he kept running. He’d run whether there was a foot of snow or slush. That basically was his life’s blood.”
Robert got a job with a downstate clinic, and like an evangelist with a message to tell, he often shared the good news of his recovery. He invited every incoming group of addicts to join him on an early morning run, five times a week. His personal testimony combined with his news anchor good looks and charismatic personality were enough to win over even those who had a lifelong dislike of sweat.
A group of about eight men -- women typically weren’t interested -- would join Robert in a slow jog around eight city blocks. There was no glitz or Spandex or personal trainers. Wearing jeans and tennis shoes, they jogged on the empty sidewalks within a stone’s throw of a residential ghetto. They were a lone cadre, making tracks in the shadows of the Buick and Chevy assembly plants, but they were in it together, trying to heal their fractured lives.

SUCCESS RATE
Over the span of years -- primarily the 1980s, their success rate was impressive. First, consider the failure rate of those who neither exercised nor went to Narcotics Anonymous meetings. Almost all returned to drugs. For those who went to 12-step support meetings only, a little more than half stayed sober. But for those who both exercised and attended support meetings, an average of 70 percent stayed clean.
This, of course, is anecdotal data. And is exercise really so key? Doesn’t the commitment to exercise five days a week really reflect a person’s overall determination to stay sober?
True enough. But there has been at least one controlled study on exercise and drinking.
In a 1986 study, a group of heavy-drinking college students were divided into three groups. One was assigned to meditate, the other to exercise and the control group wasn’t assigned to do anything. Those who either meditated or exercised significantly decreased the amount of alcohol they drank compared to the control group. Unfortunately, the sample size was too small and the drop-out rate high, but the study pointed to the promise of exercise, according to a 2003 report by Jennifer Read and Richard Brown, both of Brown University.
But several smaller studies, when taken together, support the theory that exercise is a fundamental tool for fighting addictions, even for smokers, Read and Brown wrote.
Those studies show overwhelmingly, that exercise helps with anxiety, depression and helps people feel better about themselves. It also fills the void left by drinking with something that’s fun and naturally provides a new network of friends.
Those who are in treatment at Dakoske Phoenix Addiction Treatment Services in Traverse City walk city streeets every day to meetings and work out once a week, said Nicole McConnelee, clinical director.
Addiction can be isolating, even when you’re in a group, so it feels good to be out in the fresh air and the community. Good nurtition is also vital to build back often fragile health, she said.

SUCCESS STORY
Margaret Shamel, 51, of Buckley could serve as a poster lady for recovery and exercise. She started working out four years ago, long after she stopped drinking 17 years ago, but the benefits were profound. She lost 50 pounds and her eyes tell you just how serene she feels.
“It’s almost like a different life. You hear, ‘Gee if I could start my life over, knowing what I know now.’ The progress I’ve made exercising, eating better. I never knew life could be so good. I mean, it’s amazing.’”
That coming from a woman who was on the same downward crash course her mother took. She had long followed her mom’s advice that when times got tough, take a pill, pour a drink and go to sleep. Shamel said she was indoctrinated at a young age. She remembers sipping her mom’s hot toddies at the age of 8 and puffing her first cigarette at the age of 10, choking on the smoke.
But Shamel, who leads a 12-step group in Buckley, is quick to add that she still takes it just one day at a time and that exercise is not the sole answer to recovery.
“Physical activities are wonderful, and with the alcoholic probably more so than the average person,” she said. “We can use this as a part of physical healing and a way to expend energy that may be taken up by thoughts of using. But I truly believe, it must be a part of a whole program, not an entire program in itself.”
Shamel eased into exercise really by accident. In fact, she resisted the idea. Alcoholics, she explained, are generally anti-authoritarian and don’t like to do what’s “good for them.”

TRAGEDY STRIKES
But fate handed her a gift in the midst of tragedy. In 1996, a car going 60 mph hit her teen-age son, Chris Burns, who was walking down the side of the road. On the brink of death, he sank into an unresponsive coma for 22 days. He spent another seven months in a wheelchair.
His long and painful rehabilitation involved exercising with a personal trainer, Doug Petersen, at the Fitness Center. Shamel used to wait out in the car, while Chris worked out. Afterward, Petersen would come out to the car everyday and encourage Shamel to just give it a try. One day she decided to take him up on it. She started simply with a treadmill and an easy-going walk. She felt an unfamiliar sense of accomplishment and decided to try it again. Over time, she progressed from the treadmill to exercise equipment and now works out five times a week. For her, it’s worth all the time and money.
“To all the people who say that a fitness club is too expensive, I ask them how much money did they spend on their drinking or drugging? And isn’t it better to spend money on a more noble cause such as recovery than it is to support the local bar or the producers of whatever booze it was that you consume? If my buzz was ‘worth’ all the compromises I’ve made, shouldn’t I, myself, be worth that much, if not more?”