Quiet, insular, and lacking confidence are not traits people usually associate with alcoholics. After all aren't the alcoholics those people that are social, loud, exhuming confidence and all the while consuming more and more alcohol? Although conceptually being counterintuitive, these sets of character traits and alcoholism fit together perfectly and an addict's switch from having no confidence to showing great displays of "self orientation"through outward expression is usual alcoholic behavior.

Many alcoholics will tell people that they need alcohol to exist. Their social skills are better and they gain the confidence they had always lacked. This is of course only one of the reasons alcoholics drink and continue to drink even after they discover their alcoholism. It is true that most scientists and medical professionals now admit that alcoholism stems from a complex mixture of genetics, sociological, and psychological circumstances, yet for most alcoholics it is the confidence and personality and friends they never had when they were sober that spurs continued drinking. When an alcoholic says, "I need alcohol to exist," they aren't lying. Their continued personality, confidence, and friends depend on their continued drinking. This is the alcoholic beast. It is this beast which convinces the alcoholic of his or her need to drink.

Killing the Beast

The debate on treating alcoholism, runs deeper than rudimentary differences in various treatment approaches. Multiple treatment approaches are natural outcomes of different beliefs in the "root-cause" of alcohol addiction. For example someone who believes that alcoholism is an expression of deeper psychological damage usually abuse or abandonment, will seek psychotherapy and support groups to break the addiction or at least help "control the disease."

Presently, with new research available many addiction treatment professionals concur that many people have been born with a genetic predisposition to alcoholism. This genetic predisposition leaves the person with all the factors that lead to alcohol addiction. These factors include an intense craving for alcohol, heightened tolerance, and extreme dependence. This is not to say that every alcoholic was born with these, but those that aren't end up creating the same situation by long term heavy drinking.

Given the fact that research shows a complex set of causes for alcoholism, treatment responses will inevitably become more complex as well. Since the uncovering of the "alcoholism gene" more and more addiction professionals have been supporting the active change in the the addict's nutrition. A change in food intake can go a long way in transforming one's genetic predisposition to alcoholism. One such method called orthomolecular medicine focuses on brain deficiencies connected to nutritional problems in biochemistry and genetic predispositions. This method has shown much success in using food and nutrition in augmenting an addict's biochemical deficiencies.

Combining Methods

Despite the success of orthomolecualar medicine and other nutrition and medical treatments in fighting alcoholism, most addicts have still not abandoned traditional support groups, such as 12 Step/AA,which advocate an almost spiritual awakening. Although most advocates of any addiction treatment of course signal out their methodology as "the proper"treatment, what is clear is that the best route to successfully "kill the beast"of alcoholism is a combination of nutritional changes, coupled with proper therapy and support based healing. Only this combination can successfully give the addict the true inner confidence and proper physical balance he or she has sought.