Self(s) Healing Stories

Alcohol

UPDATE: 3/22/03
Dear Rhonda and Barry, It's now been 3 years since I've seen you. Where has the time gone?? I'm doing incredibly well, I just can't believe it, nor can my wife. You just can't imagine how I feel when the month of March comes around and "I GET TO SEND RHONDA MY ANNUAL LETTER"!!! I feel like a 7 year old at Christmas time.

In the past I had wondered when/if I get to the point of taking a drink for some reason, holidays, weddings, functions. Presently I just can't ever see a day or reason. I had thought that when I become financially independent I would return to 'enjoying a cocktail'. I just don't see that happening for any reason, I enjoy the way I am too much and have no reason for it. There is too much to do! I still go out with friends, socialize with clients, I'll buy a round of drinks but mine is a Club soda with lime, thank you very much…… I'm content. I kiss my wife after she's had a drink and it's a familiar flavor but I prefer coffee flavor kisses, thank you very much… My next challenge? I have a serious problem with cookies and milk. I ~WILL seek your help! GOD bless you both. I was blessed when my buddy Jim told me about you. Thank you!

UPDATE: 3/22/06
Dear Rhonda, I can't believe it's been 6 years since you treated me for alcohol addiction. I don't know what more I can say that I haven't said in my previous 5 annual letters. Thing are going well, though that sounds strange to me. I don't think of not drinking as "going well", I don't think of not drinking at all. It's my life, it's normal for me not to drink. I don't think about it. I vividly remember sitting in the waiting room reading some of the testimonials and thinking "If this could only work for me...". I believe it did! You did! Thank you! Back then I couldn't imagine 6 weeks, never mind 6 years. I have no doubt you saved me.

I'm continually reminded of the impact you had on me and the potential paths my life may have taken without you. Recently I ran into an acquaintance that I worked with on another construction project a few years ago. He asked if I'd be able to give him a ride home at the end of the day. I agreed and we talked a bit on the ride home. As it turns out he recently got out of jail from his 4th DUI conviction and his license is gone for the next 10 years. Although I never got into serious trouble, have never gotten arrested, I know the potential I had. I never missed work because of drinking, though I would go in hung over. I drank every day to the point of double vision.

I started drinking when I was 13 years old and drank hard for almost 30 years. Mom & Dad were both severe alcoholics, so I know the possibilities. Alcohol was my priority. I hate to imagine where I'd be today had you not helped me 6 years ago. As I've said in years past, please give my phone number to anyone who would like to talk. My cell phone is: (508)259-5554. That is the best way to get in touch. Please feel free to leave my number in this letter for anyone who would like to call. This has been my number for the past 10 years and should be for the foreseeable future.
Love to you and Barry

"I've recently returned from taking treatment for alcohol abuse at the Lenair Technique Clinic in Newbury, Massachusetts. My co-workers, friends, and family have noticed such a change in me that I've been swamped by people wanting to know what on earth took place there. My problem is that I am not quite sure myself other that the fact that what ever it was worked!

This past November I awoke on the morning of my 53rd birthday with a tremendous hangover. I am not proud to say that this was no new condition for me but something was different this particular morning. I took the time to reflect upon my life and shamefully recounted that I had been drinking, getting drunk, and waking up with hangovers for 40 years.

Forty years of hard drinking certainly took its toll. A broken marriage, alienated from friends, and family, work place and relationship problems, almost killing myself in a car wreck, and all the other self destructive behaviors that go hand in hand with the nightmare of alcoholism.

Several years ago I developed "Inflamed Bowel Disease" which was later confirmed to be "Crohn's Disease", a most humiliating and weakening condition that I could only wish upon the likes of Osama Bin Laden and crew. Although stress has been proven to provoke Crohn's, I have no doubt what so ever that I had been drinking myself to death.

Over the years, I had tried A.A. I know many people who have stopped drinking by attending their meetings. I have signed myself into a "30 day programme" in Buffalo N.Y. These programmes have helped many people but did not work for me.

I think the reason I was unsuccessful in these other formats may be because for seven years prior to getting on the fire department, I was a hospital orderly and worked with addicts in the hospital setting. Crossing the line from "keeper' to being one of the "kept" was just too difficult for me.

Deciding to try once again to quit drinking, I was not very optimistic. After all I had tried everything hadn't I ? For some reason I found myself on the internet looking for help when the web site for the "Lenair Technique" came up and I started reading. The more testimonials I read, the more I began to hope that maybe, just maybe there was still a chance for me.

I asked my wife Loretta to read some of the articles and see what she thought (she had been considering leaving me if I didn't seek help). Knowing only too well the failed attempts of the past, Loretta, without hesitation, told me to look into the "Lenair Technique".

My appointment booked, Loretta and I headed out for Massachusetts all the while me assuring my wife that if nothing else, we would make a nice vacation out of the trip. Even up to twenty minutes into my first session, I had serious doubts.

After that first twenty minutes however, something told me that this was no farce because after that time and ever since then all physical craving and desire for alcohol has been gone from me. I haven't yet been able to explain it but thank God, it's just gone!

After my first session, when Loretta and I went out to eat, I found that I was bothered just ever so slightly by the beer signs in the restaurant and the labels on the bottles at other tables. It wasn't an urge to drink at all, just a nuisance-uncomfortable feeling if you will. I mentioned this to Ms. Lenair at my next session and by the time we finished that day's treatment, the problem was gone.

Today, Loretta and I are happier and healthier than we've been for years. I was also given diet change recommendations and am practicing Yoga and Tai Chi.

I am not simply suggesting that people with a drinking problem look into The Lenair Technique, I am begging them to!

As a firefighter, I've cut your dead kids out of their wrecked cars finding an open bottle of booze or bag of pot inside the vehicle. I've extinguished the burning corpses of people who drank and drove and I've given futile first aid to people whose intestines had burst because they had become so weakened by alcohol.

If anyone reading this story feels the need by all means feel free to contact me but please don't just take my word for any of this, read the web site and call the clinic. I'm thankful to God I did."

Hi, Rhonda and Barry,
I have never, in writing, expressed my gratitude for an experience that I will never forget and one that has changed my life. My experience with Rhonda has changed my view about drinking and how it can ruin my life (and has ruined my life in the past). More than that, I felt a spiritual connection that I have never before experienced being in Rhonda's presence. I truly felt connected with the universe on a deeper level. My visits with Rhonda have deepened my spiritual journey.

I definitely want to connect with Rhonda again. Right now, I am putting children through college and cannot continue an ongoing relationship because of finances. I often think of my visits. They come to mind a lot, especially if I am in some sort of conflict in my life. I am able to handle those better now, too.

Rhonda, you are truly a gifted soul. I am glad to have met you and hope to see you again in the near future! Love,

"Dear Rhonda and Barry,
Thank you for visiting us in Canada: I know your trip meant so much to so many of us here. What I'd like to express is my truth. I believe I am alcoholic. I had attempted to curb and stop my drinking habit, many times by myself, by alternative healings, hypnosis, energy work of various kinds. I am a reflexologist and energy healer and want to be able to walk my talk. I could not bring myself to go to AA, not only because I was too ashamed to admit that I had a problem, but also because I have a fear of speaking in front of people, and crowds, or participating in any regular form of club/society that requires consistency. So the last possible choice of healing myself would be to join an AA. I had as I stated earlier, been working towards stopping drinking for 2 years, with no success when Rhonda and her addiction 'therapy' arrived almost at my doorstep. Like so many others must have thought, yeah right! as if this could be different. I went on-line and discovered how much this was going to cost, and said no way. Then I started to think how much does my 'habit' cost me. If this does work, I will be reimbursed within the year by not buying that daily bottle of wine, not to mention the dinner wine costs. So without telling my husband and only sharing with a few close friends (the shame is very great with this disease), I decided that if the mountain is coming to me then I have to use this opportunity and see where it will take me. Literally, Rhonda was going to be working out of a neighbours home.

I went to the first session very dubious, wary, and guarded but open to allowing the possibility of change. The session lasted over an hour, and I have not had a drink of alcohol since. (This was September 2006) The cravings disappeared. Our behavior socially involved drinking with friends, whenever we go together, which is often. That same night (it was a Saturday) we went out and I had water. I admit it was hard at first to watch the bottle being opened, and the smell was actually offensive, but it was more the body memory, and habit than the desire for the drink that was difficult.

The biggest thing I noticed was how difficult it was to say to others I am not drinking - are you ill - what's wrong with you - and how often the conversation or comments go to alcohol consumption in jest, or relief from stress, was amazing as I had never noticed this before.

The second session went well and quickly.

It was after this I gained the courage to inform my husband what I had done, including the cost; tearfully I admitted my shame and my great desire for change. His support was, as it always has been, tremendous.

The third session was enlightening, and a little sad as the loving compassion Rhonda emits will be gone after this, yet it is very freeing. I was very tearful with gratitude to the woman who had invited Rhonda to work from her place and for both Rhonda and her husband Barry for their guidance and support.

Perhaps this is all too much information yet I know there will be many others like minded who will not choose AA or other such ways. Rhonda has been instrumental in transforming me into a better human being. Each morning I awaken and say thank God I don't drink: I have been alcohol-free for 6 months.

Thank you again, Rhonda, for your incredible healing work!"