Valuetainment - April 21, 2021


How to Overcome Alcohol Addiction - Claudia Christian


Episode Stats


Length

50 minutes

Words per minute

195.33855

Word count

9,803

Sentence count

670

Harmful content

Misogyny

10

sentences flagged

Hate speech

1

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Actress Claudia Christian joins Jemele to discuss her journey with alcoholism and how she overcame her addictions to become a star in Hollywood. Claudia talks about her journey to recovery, how she got her start in the entertainment industry, and what we can all learn from her story.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 And when I became a binge drinker, my life was literally broken down into how many binges did
00:00:04.660 I have that year. What does a loved one do to help that person transition out and be free?
00:00:10.700 So when a person says, my husband is choosing to drink over our relationship, you have to
00:00:15.880 eliminate that from your thought process because the people who've gone through addiction,
00:00:20.440 this is not a choice. Nobody is asked for this to happen. This is not his fault.
00:00:26.240 We're driving home and he says, hey, Pat, how come you're not saying anything to me? I said,
00:00:30.620 you know, just to be honest with me, I just see you being a pain and I hope you realize there's
00:00:34.260 value to life. I don't know how to help you. That is the best and most honest and supportive
00:00:39.640 thing you can do to a loved one who's suffering. Is alcohol adversely affecting any part of your
00:00:46.940 life? If the answer is yes, then you need to address it.
00:00:56.060 My guest today is Claudia Christian, which by the way, if you go in there and do research
00:01:01.020 on her story as an actress and what she's done in the life she's lived, you will be so curious
00:01:06.400 on what we can learn from her because she did a TEDx talk a few years ago. I don't know if it was
00:01:12.940 two years ago, three years ago on how she dealt openly. She came out and talked about how she dealt
00:01:18.020 with AUD and how she relapsed 20 times and how she even went and tried a lot of different programs
00:01:25.400 and even once she spent $30,000 on a program. And this is very close to me because I've dealt
00:01:30.200 with many close friends and family of mine who have struggled with this. But prior to getting into the
00:01:36.160 interview, let me just read to you what her book, Babylon Confidential, a memoir of love, sex,
00:01:41.180 and addiction, how it describes her life, then you're going to see where we're going to go with
00:01:46.160 this. So from the set of Dallas to her starring role on the sci-fi series Babylon 5, Claudia's
00:01:51.840 affairs with billionaires, supermodels, rock stars, and celebrities are mixed with shooting, stalking,
00:01:57.000 heartbreak, and betrayal, on set and off. Drama follows Claudia, an alcohol-fueled coke run and 1.00
00:02:02.940 make-out session with a bridesmaid on her wedding day. Her love-hate relationship with actor Agnes
00:02:10.240 McFadden, the conspiracy theory surrounding her ex-husband, and her relationship with billionaire
00:02:16.680 Dottie Fite, who's from Egypt, Middle Eastern, before he dated Princess Diana. Hollywood life
00:02:21.980 takes on a toll on Claudia as she descends into alcohol addiction and desperate battle to reclaim 0.52
00:02:26.620 her life. The reason why I'm reading this is because I asked permission before I read this.
00:02:31.080 I spent going article after article after article, and I think who we have today is somebody that can
00:02:37.580 save many people's lives. Every year, 100,000 people in America die due to alcoholism. Worldwide,
00:02:43.880 3 million. And that's a real number. That's 5.3% of all cause of death around the world every year is
00:02:50.840 due to alcoholism. And she's doing something about it. With that being said, Claudia, thank you so much
00:02:54.960 for being a guest on Valuetainment. It is my absolute pleasure. Thank you.
00:02:58.660 Yes. And I appreciate you going out there, you know, talking about it years ago when,
00:03:06.100 who was it? I think it was Gerald Ford's wife when she came out. And she used to be Betty Ford when it 0.71
00:03:12.840 was very much of a secret thing that nobody would talk about. And she has a facility in Palm Desert.
00:03:20.580 I think it's in Palm Desert or Indian Wells. And people swear by it. So for you to be able to do
00:03:26.820 that, I know it's been a positive impact on many other people's lives. But before we go into that,
00:03:31.480 why don't we kind of go into your story? Because your story is so, so many different angles, we can
00:03:36.300 go with your story. So before anything, I'll just let you tell us, Claudia, if I was in high school with
00:03:41.880 you, and we were 14 years old, if I'm sitting next to you in high school, and I'm classmates with you,
00:03:48.980 who was Claudia in high school? Claudia in high school was a 45 year old trapped in a 14 year 1.00
00:03:57.820 old's body desperate to get out of high school. She took extra courses, worked five jobs, sold sports 1.00
00:04:07.660 equipment, worked in a cafe, getting her butt pinched by the manager, just to make enough money to move 1.00
00:04:13.580 the hell out of the house and become an actress in LA. So my impetus as a 14 year old, my virginity
00:04:21.380 at 14 had just been taken by a molester who lived next door to us, we moved to a new high school. So
00:04:28.960 I was 15 in a new high school and away from that rapist. So I was in probably a very vulnerable
00:04:35.160 position, but I was extremely focused and a very tough kid. So I'm really never dealt with that trauma,
00:04:42.460 I went straight into the next school. And my plan was to get out as soon as possible. I had an
00:04:47.820 amazing guidance counselor, who got me a scholarship and got me enough credits to graduate with a GED
00:04:53.060 by the time I was 16 and a half years old when I moved to Los Angeles. So if you had met me in high
00:04:58.340 school, I wanted nothing to do with anybody, I wanted to get out. I didn't want anything to do with
00:05:03.060 the high school experience. I was an adult, I had a checking account, I had a plan, I wanted to be on TV,
00:05:08.100 and I was focused as hell. When did that happen? When did you know what you wanted to do?
00:05:13.500 Very, very young in life. I did some theater as a little child, and I was very shy, I had tinnitus,
00:05:19.960 I had difficulties with my hearing. And I remember being on stage and everything disappeared.
00:05:26.100 And I was focused and I was, I felt that I could move people. I was a really highly sensitive child.
00:05:31.360 So when I saw people listening or laughing or even shedding a tear when during the production,
00:05:37.740 I was, I was really, that was it for me. I thought, well, I can communicate this way with people.
00:05:43.840 So I fell in love with performing as a child. And then subsequently, really didn't know how that
00:05:50.440 would transform my life or how I would get into it. And then we were transferred to California. And I
00:05:55.320 thought, well, this is God's plan to put me near Los Angeles, because it wasn't going to happen in
00:06:00.700 Westport, Connecticut. But yeah, so that sounds very myopic and kind of conceited. But, but, you
00:06:07.620 know, children don't have that, in general, don't have that fear of failure. All I knew was, this is
00:06:13.840 what I wanted to do. So I'm going to make it happen. And I, you know, I think that that's probably why I
00:06:19.520 succeeded is because I didn't really know I could fail. You know, this was my dream. And I wanted to do
00:06:26.620 it. Amazing. And wasn't, wasn't Marilyn Monroe also known as being highly sensitive as well. Like
00:06:32.360 she could, you know, she would move and feel and, you know, respond to all the different reactions
00:06:37.600 people were having. Do you, do you see that as a common trait with those who become very good actors
00:06:43.180 and actresses? I think that a lot of artists are empaths and that we absorb pain from other people.
00:06:49.420 And we can sense when someone is uncomfortable. I mean, and we can read people. So I would agree
00:06:54.040 that I, a lot of my, my actor friends and writer friends are very sensitive people.
00:06:59.780 Does that necessarily equate to being a good actor? No, not necessarily, but it's, it definitely
00:07:06.220 tends to also make you take a lot on. And I, and I think artists are drawn to that. We have pain and,
00:07:13.780 you know, this is an expression of our, our need to communicate, our need to show our pain. So it's,
00:07:19.920 it's quite exquisite when you get a role, for instance, that you can dive into that,
00:07:24.040 that madness or that shame or something because it's cathartic. So, so this is almost therapy.
00:07:31.060 You know, it's when you get a really good role, it's, it's therapeutic on a daily basis.
00:07:36.620 Perform. So when you left at 16 and you're deciding to go pursue your dreams and be an actress
00:07:43.760 yourself, you know, when, what, when did you land something when you said, I think, I think I'm in
00:07:49.600 this thing now, which one was it when you're like, I think, I think this could lead into a real
00:07:53.560 career. I, I was so fortunate. I met a manager and I talked her into signing me for a three-year
00:08:00.800 deal. I did all these things, which used to be called in the industry, go sees back in the old
00:08:06.440 days, the eighties, they casting directors would see new actresses and have take meetings with them
00:08:12.640 to see if they could cast them in the future. So I was lucky. I made the rounds in, in Los Angeles
00:08:17.940 through the work of this manager. And eventually when I turned 18, because I looked much older,
00:08:24.260 I was very tall. I had a deep voice still, even then. So I had to wait till I was 18 to play,
00:08:29.560 you know, 18. Yeah. Second, I turned 18, I had a job lined up on Dallas. I mean, five and under.
00:08:36.540 And then the next thing I had Falcon Crest. And then I had a TV series called Behringers. By the time
00:08:40.600 I was 18, I was making six figures. Wow. It happened. Yeah. And I mean, Dallas for everybody
00:08:47.360 to, you know, I remember watching Dallas when we were in Germany and Dallas was like, if you're on
00:08:52.860 Dallas, everybody followed Dallas. How would you compare what Dallas is today? Because everybody
00:08:58.980 in the world was following Dallas. It's like, it's as iconic as Friends or Seinfeld. I mean,
00:09:04.520 everybody watched Dallas. Everybody was riveted to it. I had a very small scene, but it was the top
00:09:12.060 of its game. I mean, Larry Hagman directed it. It was the very first television show I ever did.
00:09:17.420 So, you know, the catering was, was, it was amazing. You know, it was like steak and lobster. I mean,
00:09:22.420 everything was, to start there, was kind of rough because subsequently over the years doing indie films
00:09:29.480 in, in, you know, in, in Eastern European countries and so forth, you know, you have to get,
00:09:35.440 you have to sort of take, take, take everything with a grain of salt and know that nothing would
00:09:39.840 be quite that glamorous as that first job. Out of all the work you did and all the different kinds
00:09:44.600 of movies you did, what, what format was your favorite? Was it more doing the two hour feature
00:09:50.400 where you're going out, you're going to be with your team for a while? Was it more the sitcoms where
00:09:53.780 you're kind of going in and how that format was, was it more the independent film side?
00:09:58.300 Which one was your favorite? When you got a job, you're like, I'm excited about this one here.
00:10:02.140 I was always excited to get a studio film or something, but to be honest with you,
00:10:07.760 I love being on a series because it's, it becomes your family and, and it's, it gives your life
00:10:14.600 structure. You don't, you're not looking for a job anymore. You're, you're, you're home,
00:10:19.820 you know, you know where you're going to work this day, this day of that week, you've got your
00:10:23.840 script, you have, you fall in love with your character, you work on your correct character,
00:10:27.600 you develop it through the seasons. So for me, series work has always been the most gratifying.
00:10:32.860 And, but I mean, I'm, I'm a person who, who likes that regular work. You know, and it's, it's, it's,
00:10:39.560 I'm, I've done a lot of television. So I think that's my, my wheelhouse, my, you know, I'm not,
00:10:45.740 not to say that I didn't love doing a movie of the week or a feature and going to, you know,
00:10:50.320 someplace and shooting a film. It was marvelous. Get to know people and you're out in a month
00:10:54.440 or a 45 day shoot or a 20 day shoot. Yeah. That's fun too. But I like, I like coming
00:10:59.720 home every day to the same crew, the same makeup artist, you know, shooting the breeze
00:11:05.020 with the same people because it really does. I'm still friends with people that I did series
00:11:09.540 with in the nineties because we became so close. Pre-cell phone days, of course.
00:11:14.640 Pre-cell phone days.
00:11:15.880 Pre-cell phone days.
00:11:17.080 People talked.
00:11:17.680 The days where we were free because now you have to stay on top of everything and everything's
00:11:25.020 being documented today. So whatever you're doing, there's 330 million cameras around you,
00:11:29.780 nonstop recording everything you're doing. It's a different time we're living in.
00:11:32.820 Let me tell you how grateful I am that I didn't have the worst of my alcohol problem
00:11:37.140 nowadays, where there's a camera on you everywhere because people would have
00:11:41.940 shame, shame inducing video on me. I'm sure because, you know, but luckily I didn't,
00:11:47.820 they didn't have smartphones when I was really suffering. So that's something I think about
00:11:51.980 a lot because it's such an invasion to people who are suffering right now. We don't need to
00:11:56.180 see a picture of them walking into the rehab facility. It's really not our business, you know,
00:12:00.440 and everything is so public now and seeing people, you know, coming out of surgery or out of hospital
00:12:05.860 or out of detox. It's really unfair. It's such an invasion and it's just normal now. We make fun of
00:12:12.700 people going into treatment, you know, late night comedians sit there and say, oh, it's the eighth
00:12:18.700 time they've gone in. That's not funny. It's not funny. They're dying. They're suffering. You know,
00:12:24.220 you wouldn't laugh at people who have eight rounds of chemo, you know, but we laugh at people who
00:12:30.460 consistently seek treatment and it's not, it's really not funny and it's because it's so public
00:12:36.760 and it's so, it's so, um, acceptable to shame people nowadays with photos, video, with, with
00:12:43.080 articles. I totally agree with you. I totally agree with you. And it's, um, I mean, I go back to the
00:12:48.980 army and I think about myself when guys say, so Pat, you know, you, you don't drink a lot. How come
00:12:53.300 you're not a guy that drinks, you know, I'll have an old fashioned every other week. If I'm sitting
00:12:57.040 with somebody and I'll have a cigar with a friend or something like that, but in the army,
00:13:01.640 let me tell you, I was competing. I was trying to see if I can finish all the Jack and Coke in the
00:13:06.780 world and see if I can do it all by myself. And I was hanging out with Jose, uh, on Friday night and
00:13:11.920 Saturday for two and a half years straight. And, uh, in my family in the middle East, growing up in
00:13:17.340 Iran, alcohol was like a cool thing. You drank because you were cool and everybody was doing it.
00:13:21.960 And then eventually you saw how it took some people's lives, personal lives, their sanity,
00:13:27.540 their freedoms, and some couldn't even drop it. You know, I can't tell you how many times I've gone
00:13:32.220 to friends, uh, where the first time, even when I was going through it with one of my friends,
00:13:38.300 he couldn't stop drinking alcohol. I said, why don't you just quit? What's the big deal? Right.
00:13:42.560 You kind of say comments like that. You don't know their pain. So eventually one of my friends who was
00:13:46.780 going through it bad, I was at the prison to pick him up. I'm sitting outside till three o'clock in the
00:13:51.280 morning. Finally, he gets out, gets in a car. This was like his fourth or fifth UI and we're driving
00:13:59.420 home and I don't say anything to him. And he says, uh, Hey Pat, how come you're not saying anything to
00:14:05.280 me? I said, I said, you know, just to be honest with me, I just see you being in pain. I just want
00:14:09.880 to see you get out of this thing. I don't know what you're going through, but you're in pain and I hope
00:14:13.420 you realize there's value to life. I don't know how to help you. I don't have a method. The only
00:14:18.400 thing I know is what I've seen others go through, whether it's AA and all these other programs,
00:14:23.240 but, uh, I hope you figure out a way to get through this. And eventually he figured out a way to get
00:14:27.820 through it and he's doing great. He's changed his life, you know, in a complete different way,
00:14:31.460 but many people don't get to that point. Yeah. But what you said to him, people should be aware of
00:14:36.620 that. That is love and support. And what most people do is say, why can't you just stop? Well,
00:14:42.260 ask somebody, why can't you stop breathing? When you have a compulsive disorder of the brain,
00:14:47.140 it's not logical. Why would I put a poison into my body that is ruining my life? That's
00:14:53.320 not logical. So to tell me to stop is not, doesn't make sense. Clearly there's something
00:14:58.740 wrong with my brain. I've learned this compulsive disorder. So for you to say to your friend,
00:15:04.080 you know, I see that you're in pain and I just want to support you. That is, that is the best
00:15:09.060 and most honest and supportive thing you can do to a loved one who's suffering. That is,
00:15:13.660 that is wonderful. And you did, and you were honest, you didn't know how to help him.
00:15:17.140 But you were there as a friend, you picked him up, you didn't shame him, you didn't judge him. That's
00:15:20.980 wonderful. What, Claudia, what was that movie where the husband, his wife was an alcoholic and she
00:15:29.520 couldn't help himself. And the husband was a sweet husband and she kept relapsing.
00:15:34.600 Meg Ryan. Andy Garcia.
00:15:37.320 Meg Ryan. And when a man loves a woman, she's the one. Yeah. Oh my boy. The clink,
00:15:44.500 throwing the bottles out and the recycling and the door locks behind her. Boy, whoo. That was
00:15:50.500 anybody who's, who's suffered through alcohol use disorder will know that we'll know those
00:15:55.380 little signs. No, it's very sad because most people are shared that this, this, all they know
00:16:01.860 is the 12 step world. And because that is what is predominantly used, despite the fact that alcohol
00:16:08.920 deaths are increasing, COVID has seen a massive uptick of alcohol use disorders, especially amongst
00:16:14.360 women. We still lose a hundred thousand people a day, three and a half million in the world every 1.00
00:16:19.140 year. It still costs the U S $225 billion a year, alcohol misuse. And we're still using this
00:16:25.020 antiquated peer support, which is not a medical treatment, even though we sex six medicines that
00:16:31.540 address alcohol use disorder. So when people say, you know, well, I don't just go to a meeting or do
00:16:37.360 this or just quit or just say, no, it's flying in the face of everything we know about addiction,
00:16:43.080 which it is, it is not something you can control or be mindful or willpower your way through it or
00:16:48.940 white knuckle your way through it. A very small percentage of individuals in the world can quit
00:16:53.400 anything on their own. That's about 8% of the population. And if you look at the success rates
00:16:58.580 of 12 step programs, it's about less than 5%. But the really sad statistic is that only 10% of people
00:17:06.140 suffering from an alcohol use disorder seek treatment. And out of that 10, out of those 10%
00:17:13.160 of the people, only one will have any form of long-term success.
00:17:17.900 Out of 10% only one will have success.
00:17:22.700 Yes. And that means 90% of people who are suffering right now, aren't going to seek treatment. And you
00:17:27.640 know why they're not going to seek treatment and told that all they can do is quit and go to meetings
00:17:33.120 for the rest of their life. And that doesn't appeal to a 30 year old or a 20 year old or anybody. I mean,
00:17:39.280 the majority of people, they want their life back. They don't want to be told that this is what they
00:17:44.160 have to do. And they don't want to live with cravings for the rest of their life.
00:17:47.300 Claudia, do you mind sharing with the audience how it happened? Because the way you described it in
00:17:52.480 my 20s, it was just what, in my 30s, later in my 40s, I'm like, I'm the last guy. Can you kind of go
00:17:57.260 through your experience, how that happened to you?
00:17:59.560 Sure. It is a learned behavior. So most people don't just go to a bar and have a drink and suddenly
00:18:05.760 they're addicted to alcohol. And it's clearly not a choice. You don't say, well, I want to wake up and
00:18:10.400 be an alcoholic. So what happens is if you have the genetic predisposition and you engage in the
00:18:15.340 behavior, you have a higher chance of developing an alcohol use disorder over time, especially if
00:18:21.220 you start drinking before your brain is fully developed around your early 20s. So here we have
00:18:26.360 me, I'm drinking in my 20s very lightly. I mean, for my, like for me to split a bottle of wine with
00:18:33.200 somebody was a big Saturday night of drinking. That's two glasses. I mean, then that was like, wow,
00:18:38.600 I've had enough. So I was normal. And then in my 30s, I was normal until my late 30s. It started
00:18:46.720 escalating. I was hanging around with a lot of wine collectors. You know, it was that time of
00:18:51.240 in society when people were smoking cigars and drinking wine. And, and, you know, it was,
00:18:56.480 it was very acceptable. I had a lot of friends who you would now call partiers. I had a wine
00:19:01.540 collection and it escalated from a couple of times a month to a couple of times a week to now four
00:19:07.760 four nights a week. I was drinking too much. And so it was brought to my attention by a boyfriend
00:19:13.960 and also by family members. You know, we think you're drinking too much. So I quit, which is
00:19:19.080 logically the thing you're supposed to do, right? You're supposed to quit drinking when you're
00:19:23.200 drinking too much. But what I didn't know is that causes what's known as the alcohol deprivation
00:19:28.520 effect. So your brain is now deprived of something. You've been feeding it on a regular basis.
00:19:33.400 Your neural pathways are engorged. It's used to getting ethanol on a certain regular pattern.
00:19:39.980 And now it's not getting it. So what does it do? First month or so you're fine. You know,
00:19:45.360 you're, you're saying, well, I feel great at being sober. This is something that can work.
00:19:49.600 Then the cravings start coming in the thoughts about alcohol. You know, you see your friend drinking,
00:19:54.820 you smell it, you, you see a movie where someone's drinking red wine or whatever.
00:19:58.480 Then you start physically craving. Like now you can't get it off your mind and you're,
00:20:03.160 you're uncomfortable in your skin. So you say to yourself, well, I've been sober for two months.
00:20:08.340 I don't have a problem. And you have a drink. That's what this little trickster in your brain
00:20:12.340 tells you. You're fine. You've been sober for two months. You don't have an alcohol problem.
00:20:16.560 Have one. And then that one turns into you coming home with a bottle two nights later. And that comes
00:20:24.260 into you opening up your wine cellar again. That's what happened to me and now drinking heavier than
00:20:30.620 you did before. So I went from being a light drinker to a social drinker, to a heavier drinker,
00:20:36.320 to a binge drinker. And when I became a binge drinker at that point in my late thirties,
00:20:42.940 my life was broken down until I found the Sinclair method in 2009. My life was literally broken down
00:20:48.880 into how many binges did I have that year? How long did I manage to have sobriety? And so that is
00:20:55.140 not a pleasant place to live because while you're sober, you're craving while you're binging, you're
00:20:59.960 miserable. So Claudia, let me ask you this. I see two things here. One, I see the, the, the, if we,
00:21:07.060 if we're running a company, you want to get to the deepest issue. The deepest issue is what started
00:21:11.000 it. And then once you're into deep, then how do you address it at that point? So let's go back to
00:21:15.660 the start, the, how it got started. And then we'll go into the deeper issue. So, so social light,
00:21:21.400 heavy binge, social light, heavy binge. When you started going through the phase of collecting the
00:21:26.840 wines and you got your own collection and partiers and all this stuff, how much of it was due to
00:21:31.760 association? How much of it was due to industry? And how much of it was it? Because you're a star,
00:21:36.660 you're on TV, you're everywhere, you're making money, your lifestyle is different. So there are certain
00:21:40.600 things that comes with, Hey, I'm making money and let me kind of a, this is what rich people do.
00:21:45.660 And the reason why I ask this is because, you know, most of our audience, they're entrepreneurs,
00:21:49.740 they're business people. So these are folks that are also experienced in the same thing. You start
00:21:53.020 off early, then you got a little bit of success. Then you got some neighbors, they got some newer
00:21:58.140 things. So how do you think most people who get into this and get addicted, how do you think that
00:22:03.880 habit begins? I, well, I believe that you just nailed it. It's a habit. So what happens is you,
00:22:10.060 you start partying with your friends, but you notice that your friends stop and switch to
00:22:15.620 coffee at 11 o'clock at night. Or maybe your friend goes, no, you know what? I've had enough.
00:22:19.740 I'm going to have a glass of water, but you, you don't stop. I was the last girl at the bar going, 0.96
00:22:24.700 come on, let's have Zambuca shots at this point. I didn't know what an end was. An end was 0.99
00:22:29.880 me just going to bed. And so that's not normal, but nobody in those days pointed out, you know,
00:22:36.740 Hey, Claudia, we've all stopped drinking. Now you don't need another drink because nobody really
00:22:43.080 noticed. It was just, she's the girl who keeps drinking. And there's always another guy who
00:22:48.160 keeps drinking. So then I'm drinking with that guy. It wasn't like I was the only one that didn't have
00:22:53.440 an off button. So, so that it normalizes it. And now of course, hindsight is always clearer. It's
00:23:00.520 completely not normal to drink four nights a week, two bottles of wine. That's not normal use of
00:23:07.600 alcohol. That's just not normal, especially alone drinking alone. Well, then you can justify it and
00:23:13.620 say, well, I I'm a wine connoisseur or, you know, this is what they do in Europe. Well, no, it's not
00:23:19.760 what they do in Europe and Europe. They have small glasses of wine with meal. You know, in America,
00:23:25.300 we have these large pours of, you know, of, of, of wine and for every occasion for a baby shower,
00:23:32.260 for this, for that. There's alcohol everywhere in the United States. Always. You know, we call
00:23:37.300 England and Australia drinking cultures. We are a drinking culture. So for me, it didn't seem like
00:23:44.080 it was terribly obvious until somebody said to me, you know, you drink really quickly. Now, mind you,
00:23:49.200 this is coming from a boyfriend I'm dating who drinks a ton himself. So once again, the defensiveness
00:23:55.940 of somebody saying, well, wait a minute, you're drinking as much as I am. And he's saying, well,
00:24:00.540 yeah, but I drink slower than you and I'm bigger than you. And you, you keep up with me. And it's,
00:24:05.100 it's kind of weird. I've never seen a woman drink as much as you. And I'm like, well,
00:24:08.060 I have a big tolerance. I'm Irish and German, you know, all of these things, when you're in it,
00:24:14.640 there's no way you can look outside yourself and say, oh, that's the hallmark of alcoholism.
00:24:19.980 Claudia, you need help. You know, you don't, you you're defensive, you're justifying it.
00:24:24.600 You know, I can look back now and say, wow. Okay. There were clear signs, but of course you don't see
00:24:29.340 them yourself. That's where people are right now. The thing I ask people is this is alcohol
00:24:35.760 adversely affecting any part of your life. That can mean anything from your relationships to
00:24:43.480 working out in the morning. Is it affecting adversely affecting any part of your life? If
00:24:48.940 the answer is yes, then you need to address it. If it's affecting your work, your health,
00:24:54.880 your family, anything, if you have lots of fights with your loved one, you've got to look at what
00:24:59.900 you're consuming and how much, and how is it serving you? How is alcohol serving you? If you
00:25:06.300 don't ask yourself questions, you're never going to be able to identify if you have a problem or not.
00:25:11.120 The challenge is, you know, if you're aware of it when you're in it. So let me, let me ask a
00:25:15.320 different question from you, since this is your world that you've spent a lot of time studying,
00:25:18.820 and you said 20 times relapsing, and you tried every single method that you went through, even
00:25:23.980 some of the methods you went through where one of them was shaming you and they finally gave you the
00:25:27.540 medicine. Like, I can't wait to get the hell out of here. You eventually leave. So you know the
00:25:31.020 different formats on what people are saying. The question becomes the following. How much,
00:25:36.280 like when I look at my personality, my wiring, I'm very obsessive. I know my wiring. Like I know
00:25:43.300 I have to sit in a certain place if I go to a restaurant, and if I don't sit there,
00:25:47.060 I'm not going to eat at the restaurant, I leave. That's my wiring. I can't help myself. I've been
00:25:50.420 like this since, since I was a kid. So how much of, how much of the individual getting addicted
00:25:59.520 has to do with them as their personality and wiring? How much of it is an upbringing? And how
00:26:07.840 much of it is escaping reality? So, so DNA, upbringing, escaping reality.
00:26:14.220 I think genetics play a big part of it. But to give you an example, out of three siblings in my
00:26:20.820 family, two became addicts and one did not. So how do you explain? We have the same genetics
00:26:27.280 and one escaped it. Was it because he's stronger or has more willpower? Or is it because he didn't
00:26:35.460 actually get that particular gene? Or is it because he was so busy with his particular line of work
00:26:43.480 that he could not engage in drinking as much as I did. So he didn't develop an alcohol use
00:26:48.980 disorder. This is the engineer? This is the engineer? Yeah. So, so, so you have two siblings
00:26:56.220 with the same child, sort of the same childhood. They're older than me. So they had different
00:27:00.220 experiences. And I left home earlier, but a similar upbringing and similar genetics.
00:27:05.500 My belief is definitely that socio influences are huge. Okay. Also trauma. My brothers weren't
00:27:13.500 raped, you know, but one of my brothers watched my other brother die. That's major trauma.
00:27:19.440 Wow. Major trauma. The third sibling perhaps didn't have as much trauma. Who knows? You know,
00:27:26.680 I mean, so, so you have, you have somebody who witnessed a death at a very young age. You have
00:27:31.100 somebody who was molested at a very young age. And then you have somebody who had, you know,
00:27:35.640 a rough time with his interpersonal relationships within his family, but didn't have that kind of
00:27:41.400 that raw trauma. So maybe that's why he dodged the bullet. I don't know. This is something that
00:27:48.800 I've certainly been observant. And I always ask people, by the way, speaking of your, your obsessive
00:27:54.280 need to sit places, it's interesting because people with OCD and eating disorders quite often do develop
00:28:00.280 a substance use disorder as well, because it is their way to control the circumstances. They
00:28:06.560 cannot control what's going on in their life. So they self-medicate or they purge or they starve
00:28:11.860 themselves in order to control their surroundings. It's a very easy thing to say, oh, that person drank
00:28:18.500 because they, they lived through a war. PTSD. Yes, absolutely. Trauma. Yes, absolutely. People do
00:28:26.160 self-medicate for those reasons, but it's not that cut and dry. There are people who are biological
00:28:31.920 addicts, meaning that they simply have the genetics, they engaged in the behavior and now they're
00:28:37.380 addicted. Now I always search for something more, but quite honestly, I've met people who once they
00:28:42.780 take this, they use this method and they get rid of the biological issue. They're, they're pretty good.
00:28:48.160 I mean, they move on in their life. They used to have a drinking issue. They're not
00:28:51.300 self-medicating for trauma or anything like that. But, but, you know, each individual is different.
00:28:57.120 Every single person drinks for a different reason and they're wired differently. So you can't,
00:29:00.840 there's no one fixed treatment for every single person. And I'm not here to espouse one treatment
00:29:05.840 or say that this doesn't work. Sure, of course. I'm a firm believer in whatever works for you,
00:29:11.440 it's the right method for you. The only thing for me, it's, it's just what triggers it. That,
00:29:16.080 that's what I'm curious about. Is there, is there a vision of things? I mean, it's also, it's also
00:29:21.400 the, every time you drink, you are learning the behavior, your neural pathways become more and more
00:29:26.900 engorged and wider and wider and bigger and bigger until they're super highways. And now you're
00:29:31.760 physically dependent on alcohol. That's the course. So you've got people walking around with little
00:29:38.300 country roads for neural pathways. And when they take a drink, they don't get that massive endorphin
00:29:45.260 reinforcement that alcoholics do. Yeah. So of course you don't want to stop drinking because
00:29:51.620 it feels so good. Some people take a drink of alcohol and they go, I don't know what the big
00:29:56.400 deal is. I don't, I mean, I like the taste of beer, but I don't, I don't, they don't get a
00:30:01.220 reinforcement. They don't get the reward that addicts do. Does that make sense? Of course it does.
00:30:07.900 Of course it does. So, but I know your father, I believe your father was a surgeon, but was,
00:30:13.220 was your father a surgeon? No, no, that's wrong on Wikipedia or wherever the hell that is on that
00:30:19.220 was some, somebody put misinformation out there. No, my grandfather was a surgeon and a cancer
00:30:24.160 researcher. Um, and I have a lot of doctors in my family, but my father was, uh, with shallow oil
00:30:30.040 company actually, uh, for the majority of his career, he was in oil business. How about your mom?
00:30:36.080 My mother was in retail and, uh, uh, fashion her whole life. Um, uh, and had her own store 0.87
00:30:44.780 and worked at Giorgio's and Beverly Hills and, um, very successful in that world, very into clothes
00:30:50.420 and so forth. Um, so home was pretty stable. Your, your home was pretty stable where you were
00:30:55.700 home wasn't stable at all. When I was eight years old, my brother was killed. I mean that, that doesn't,
00:31:00.540 and it resulted in my parents' divorce. I mean, uh, the, you know, so that fractured our family
00:31:06.200 intensely. Plus we moved around all the time. My dad transferred constantly. So I had no,
00:31:11.740 you know, friends I had, it was always the new girl, uh, you know, and there was, um, you know,
00:31:17.520 I, I lost my father last year and I loved him to pieces, but he was a, and he will admit it. He was
00:31:24.620 a tough, tough father. And there was no love lost between my parents. There were, you know,
00:31:30.340 affairs and so forth. So it's, it's, it was not an idyllic childhood at all, but did I have a roof
00:31:36.520 over my head and braces on my teeth? Absolutely. And do I, do I say that I'm better off than,
00:31:41.800 than most children out there? Absolutely. I had, I had a home and I got to go to school and,
00:31:47.380 and I was fed. That's huge. So I'm sorry. Sorry for your loss. I mean, you know,
00:31:52.620 when it's a year, it's a year and it's, it's, uh, uh, my condolences goes out to you and your
00:31:57.740 family. But, uh, you know, there's a movie that when you were painting a picture, just took me to
00:32:03.140 straight to a movie. I had my, I watched certain movies with my boys, my nine-year-old and my seven
00:32:09.120 year old son, my daughter's forced. I don't watch some of the movies with them. We watched two weeks
00:32:13.780 ago, walk the line. And I'm sure you've seen walk the line, you know, the walking Phoenix and the
00:32:18.540 story of Johnny Cash. And, and you see how Johnny in the story, how he had that one traumatic event
00:32:25.460 with his brother on what happened there and then how it haunted him for the rest of his life until
00:32:30.720 eventually he was free and he was able to move on from it. Most people don't know everybody's story.
00:32:35.680 So this is why sometimes I wonder if there is a connection to a place that if you don't address
00:32:41.080 that, you're going to constantly be escaping to something, whether your source is going to be
00:32:45.620 alcohol, sex, cocaine, pot, drugs, ecstasy, whatever it may be to have some kind of an
00:32:52.440 escape. Uh, uh, uh, you know, and that's one of the reasons why I was asking a question where
00:32:56.580 there's a person need to go to a place where you accept your life. Listen, I've had a screwed
00:33:01.740 up life. There's nothing to be embarrassed of. Having said that there's no need to escape this.
00:33:05.400 And if I do, there's a different way of escaping it so I can move on. So does that come first
00:33:09.760 or is a medicine I need to take to figure out a way to drop alcohol or whatever other addiction
00:33:13.980 that I have? That's a great question. I, my belief is let's get rid of the cravings so that
00:33:19.540 you can focus on therapy. You know, let's take the medicines to reduce the drinking. So you're
00:33:24.600 clear minded. You can listen to your therapist. You can let those feelings bubble over you. You
00:33:29.900 can let the emotions come up. If you're still drinking, actively drinking and self-medicating
00:33:34.220 with drugs or alcohol, how are you going to grow as a human being? So let's address the biological
00:33:39.600 issue of addiction first and concurrently at the same time, work on the emotional reasons
00:33:45.540 and the traumatic reasons why the person drank. But first we need to get them out of the state
00:33:50.820 of being actively in the disease. Got it. So let's get into the, you know, different methods
00:33:57.180 that you had. And then if you can tell us more about the Sinclair method, so maybe walk us through,
00:34:02.040 you know, when you said, I tried this, I tried that, I tried this, what, what were some of the
00:34:05.380 methods and then tell us about TSM, the Sinclair method. Well, the first thing I did was what
00:34:10.180 everybody pretty much said to do is to go to an AA meeting. And I, you know, I have, I have utter
00:34:17.580 respect for AA helping the people that helped, but for me, it didn't do anything. It made me want to
00:34:22.740 drink. I mean, I'm sitting in a meeting with a bunch of people talking about drinking and how it
00:34:26.260 ruined their lives. I still walked out of there with cravings, with, with anxiety. So it didn't,
00:34:32.540 I didn't feel gelled. And I also didn't like being called powerless as a woman. I really hated
00:34:37.840 that. I thought, I thought, you know what, I'm not powerless. I come from a family of physicians.
00:34:42.620 I know that there must be something to fix this. I'm not going to relegate myself to being an
00:34:47.720 alcoholic for the rest of my life. I want to be able to say I used to be an alcoholic. So this
00:34:52.040 isn't working for me. So that was AA. Then I went to a rehab facility where, you know, you're locked
00:34:57.760 in a place with people with everything going on, eating disorders, heroin addiction, cocaine,
00:35:03.920 sex addiction, porn, I mean, everything. And we're denied alcohol, obviously. And we talk about
00:35:11.560 our childhoods, but then we get out in the real world. There's no preparation for being in the real
00:35:15.580 world. There's nobody telling me how to identify a trigger or what is a memory, how to, a toolbox to
00:35:22.420 deal with, with triggers. So you don't drink. I mean, there was no preparation for the real world.
00:35:27.080 So yeah, we're sober when we're in there, but the second you get out, you relapse. So I relapsed
00:35:32.020 very quickly after that very expensive rehab that I thought was a bit ridiculous. Then I tried
00:35:39.460 psychotherapy. So I went to a therapist who was convinced that my drinking was all to do with
00:35:45.200 childhood trauma. Okay. Interesting concept, but no, absolutely no appreciation of the biological
00:35:51.680 aspect of addiction. So she's treating, she's trying to treat this trauma, trauma, trauma,
00:35:57.200 not knowing that all talking about it is just triggering me. Once again, I'm not given tools
00:36:03.280 to deal with those cravings or with anything else. I'm just sent out after the hour and a half of
00:36:09.140 talking about my childhood, wanting to drink because that's my go-to mechanism for self-medicating
00:36:14.800 to not let the feelings bubble up. So she didn't prepare me in any way, shape or form
00:36:19.740 for, for triggers or cravings or anything like that. And I'm not blaming her. She wasn't an
00:36:24.820 addiction therapist. I should have gone to a specialist in addiction. The next thing I tried
00:36:30.340 was hypnotherapy because I heard that it helped some people. That lasted about a week. I was like,
00:36:36.700 wow, I don't feel like drinking. And then a week later I felt like drinking. So that only lasted about
00:36:41.060 a week. And every time I would do an episode, like a expensive hypnotherapy session, it would last less
00:36:48.540 and less time. So it was a week and then six days and five days. So that I tried, oh, I tried vitamin
00:36:56.780 therapy because I was told that, I mean, I researched and realized that the brain is lacking things when you
00:37:02.340 abuse alcohol, that you need certain vitamin Bs and certain supplements that will, that will help maintain
00:37:10.980 equilibrium in your brain. So I went into that whole vitamin thing, diet thing, exercise plan. And I thought
00:37:17.820 I can do this holistically. The cravings were still there, you know, so I, you know, I couldn't change my brain.
00:37:24.800 That's eventually, um, I went to my first and only medical detox in 2009, uh, because I was really
00:37:32.700 afraid I was going to stroke out. I was doing what I thought was healthy. And that was just going cold
00:37:37.760 Turkey. I didn't know about tapering from alcohol. I didn't know that it was really dangerous to go
00:37:42.840 cold Turkey. Cause every time I would have a binge, I just stop. I would just stop and go cold Turkey
00:37:48.360 and recover from the binge. Well, this time as I was recovering from the binge, I really started
00:37:55.040 feeling like I couldn't control my body. So it was really scary. Cause I had heard about people
00:37:59.740 stroking out. So I called a friend, they took me to this medical detox and it was once again,
00:38:05.860 a horrific experience experience. And on the way out, I saw some flyers for various treatments for
00:38:12.820 alcoholism. And I gathered them all up and took them home and looked at them. And one of them said,
00:38:17.340 it stops cravings for alcohol. And I thought, well, that's my problem. It's the cravings, the
00:38:22.860 mental and physical cravings. So if I can just do that, that's great. So I researched it and it was
00:38:27.900 a shot called Vivitrol and I researched it and there was a lot of, a lot of bad reviews online and
00:38:35.560 talking about low grade depression and how it doesn't really target the alcohol, uh, in a, in a great
00:38:41.400 way. So I looked at what the ingredient was and it was naltrexone. So I Googled naltrexone
00:38:46.240 and up popped this book called the cure for alcoholism. And I was like, yeah, right cure
00:38:51.100 for alcoholism. But I read it, read the free chapter that they had online and I read it and
00:38:56.560 it seemed really intriguing. So I looked, I said, you know what, I'm going to try to get this
00:39:01.280 medication. I called my GP and he said, I'm not giving you an opiate. When I went in, I made the
00:39:07.300 appointment. I went in and I said, no, it's not an opiate. It's an opiate blocker. Uh, he still
00:39:11.280 refused me because he didn't, he had never used it on a patient, even though it's FDA approved,
00:39:16.140 it was totally safe. It's proven its efficacy. But at that point it was, it was always, um, given
00:39:23.260 to an individual with, with abstinence, but he wouldn't even give it to me for that. So I had to
00:39:29.560 order it online. So I ordered the packet of pills from India, from a pharmacy online, which was nerve
00:39:35.040 wracking and I thought illegal. And I received those pills after quite a long time. I think I
00:39:41.140 had three months of sobriety under my belt by the time they came. And I had ordered the book in the
00:39:47.300 meantime, the cure for alcoholism. I had read the whole book. I had done some research and I thought,
00:39:52.980 okay, either I'm, this is going to work or I'm going to die because the next binge is going to kill
00:39:56.620 me because the last one was so horrific that, you know, the binges get worse as they, as they come on.
00:40:01.680 That's how people die of alcohol poisoning. And it worked. I took that pill. I waited an hour
00:40:07.660 and I drank maybe a couple of sips of wine and I just wasn't interested. I tried it a few more times.
00:40:16.440 My body started getting used to the medication. I started drinking more like I did in my twenties.
00:40:22.660 And at about the four month mode, uh, month, I had my, what I call my aha moment. I talk about it in my
00:40:29.740 TEDx talk. I was driving down the road and I saw this billboard for wine. And normally that would
00:40:36.720 trigger me to want to drink. And I looked at it and my brain said, that's a billboard with a glass
00:40:42.200 of red wine on it. It didn't have any other effect on me other than registering what the billboard was.
00:40:49.500 And that to me, I was the moment where I went, Oh my God, I'm done. I'm done with, with that obsession
00:40:57.400 and that compulsive disorder of my brain. I felt normal. I would go whole days and realize I had
00:41:04.420 not thought of drinking. That was something that I hadn't experienced in almost a decade.
00:41:09.480 Wow.
00:41:09.920 So to, to, to, to, there's no other way to describe it, but to realize on a Thursday that
00:41:16.600 you have not thought about drinking since you drank on Sunday evening, it makes you want to cry
00:41:21.820 because prior to that every day I was either fighting for my sobriety, white knuckling through
00:41:27.420 every minute of the day, pushing down the thoughts of booze, or I was actively in a binge.
00:41:32.400 So that, that was profound. And when that happened to me, I wrote to the editor, I mean,
00:41:40.260 the publisher of the book. And I said, listen, I want to contact this man who wrote this because
00:41:45.780 he saved my life. And they allowed me to contact Dr. Roya Scapa. And I said, you know, I'm not a big
00:41:53.560 star. I I'm, I'm a working actress, but you know, I'm not really well-known. I have a little group of
00:41:59.360 fans that are sci-fi fans that are pretty much worldwide. You know, there are millions of people
00:42:04.100 that love Babylon five. Maybe I could help in some way, but you know, I'm not a Brad Pitt or
00:42:10.320 something. I'm just Claudia. And he said, why don't you write a book? And that's, that's why I wrote
00:42:15.820 Babylon confidential. And when that came out in 2012, I said, you know what? It didn't reach enough
00:42:20.680 people. This is a visual society. I'm going to make a movie. So I made one little pill, my documentary
00:42:25.460 and that came in 2014. It's available on Amazon for free. If anybody wants to watch it or
00:42:30.900 one little pill movie.com. And then at that point, concurrently, I said, you know what? We need a
00:42:36.920 nonprofit organization. I need to run it to give everybody the information that I needed when I
00:42:42.520 was suffering. So they don't have to order pills from India. And at that point in 2013, there was one
00:42:49.480 doctor in the United States that was willing to use TSM with his, with his patients, one doctor.
00:42:55.380 And now today in 2021, the entire United States has covered all of Canada, all of Australia,
00:43:02.340 New Zealand, most of Europe and the UK. Amazing to have gone through that process. And it's,
00:43:09.180 it's almost as if you did market research for others who are going through it because you tried
00:43:14.400 so many different ways. Claudia, a question for you about, you gave feedback to the person that's
00:43:18.940 going through it, how to handle it. What feedback could you give to somebody that has a loved one
00:43:23.840 who is currently at the binge phase and they don't know how to get out of it? What does a loved one do
00:43:29.880 to help that person, you know, transition out and be free?
00:43:35.000 First of all, you, you, you, and this is really hard to understand. It's funny. I just did a Twitch.
00:43:41.120 We have a Twitch channel that we, every Wednesday we do subjects and yesterday's was shame
00:43:45.340 and how important it is for a loved one to know this is not about you. And that's really hard to
00:43:52.640 do. So when a person says, my husband is choosing to drink over our relationship, you have to under,
00:43:58.920 you have to eliminate that from your thought process because the people who've gone through
00:44:03.240 addiction, this is not a choice. Nobody is asked for this to happen. This is not his fault. So let's
00:44:10.660 start there and start with love and support and say, look, I want to help you. And I've heard about
00:44:16.260 this method that involves drinking. It's not an excuse to drink, but it undoes addiction in the
00:44:21.600 brain. I think this would maybe work for you. And I would love if, if you would be willing to try it
00:44:27.440 and let's watch one little pill. So you get an idea of the science behind it. That's why I made that
00:44:32.640 movie. So loved ones can sit down with the person who's suffering and say, look, I'm not judging you.
00:44:37.680 I'm just excited about this thing I heard about. Are you willing to watch this documentary with me?
00:44:43.720 And if you are interested in doing TSM, I will help you. That's a loving way, a supportive way of
00:44:49.820 saying to a loved one, I recognize you're in pain. Just like you told your friend, I recognize you're
00:44:54.900 in pain and I don't know what to do for you, but I'd love to learn about this method. It might help you
00:45:01.720 and then do it together. If they, if they're coherent enough at that point to watch the documentary,
00:45:06.660 watch it with them. If they're not, you watch it on your own, go to c3foundation.org. Look at our
00:45:12.940 free resources. This person can get as much or as little help as they need. They can join free
00:45:19.020 online meetings. There's a whole community out there of people on the Sinclair method. There's
00:45:23.220 literally thousands of people all around the world that, that, that do meetings that have a forum,
00:45:28.940 Facebook pages. This is not something new or unproven. This is, you know, naltrexan has been around
00:45:33.820 since the early nineties used for alcohol use disorder, but it's only within the last maybe
00:45:39.360 decade that doctors are realizing it's better used in a targeted manner. That means taking it an hour
00:45:46.240 before you drink. So if you're in the UK, by the way, and you, or Europe and you get nalmaphine,
00:45:52.560 you have to wait two hours, but that's a whole other subject. There's two drugs that treat this,
00:45:56.600 nalmaphine and naltrexone. In the United States, you're bound to get, you are going to get naltrexone.
00:46:01.900 And it has many different generic brands of naltrexone. So you might get Revia, you might
00:46:07.500 get Nodict. It's all 50 milligram naltrexone for treating alcohol use disorder. So people can find
00:46:13.280 a provider on my page. They can, they can find whatever they need. So for loved ones, we also
00:46:18.080 even have a loved one for loved ones, Facebook page. So they get the support they need. Most
00:46:22.680 important thing to do is no threatening. That's a great page. Yes. We have a, we have a Facebook page
00:46:28.720 just for loved ones, because that is a whole, to watch your loved one killing yourself is
00:46:33.400 unbearable. Yep. And I have people say, I don't understand why my son just can't quit. It's a
00:46:39.040 reflection on the parent. If the child is not doing well. And so all sorts of things come in ego,
00:46:46.800 embarrassment, shame. My daughter's an addict. My son's a junkie. You know, all of these words that
00:46:52.540 we hear it's, it's mortifying for the parent. So they, they react quite often with anger.
00:46:57.320 Yep. And one thing that I can attest to that doesn't work when you're in the throes of addiction
00:47:01.680 is anger. If somebody is angry at you or they shame you, you're just more likely to drink more.
00:47:07.340 And we don't want to create that environment. We want to create a really safe communication line
00:47:13.240 with the loved one. So we want to tell the loved one, you know, just say, I know you're hurting and I
00:47:18.940 want to help you. And I, you know, I saw this actress talking about this here, let's watch her 1.00
00:47:23.740 Ted talk, you know, just slowly bring the idea up. And if that person is motivated to change,
00:47:29.540 then TSM is a great method for them. If they're not ready, you can't force them to take the pill and
00:47:34.800 wait the hour. So this is not a method for somebody to force on somebody. You cannot force a loved one to
00:47:41.120 do this. This method is for people who've tried other methods, who other treatment modalities have
00:47:46.780 failed, who are at their wits end, and who are really motivated to comply with the medication.
00:47:53.120 Because if you don't comply, it ain't going to work. Very, very important topic. I'm so thankful
00:48:00.800 that you came out to share your testimony with the rest of us. I highly recommend folks, you go visit
00:48:07.620 her website. We're going to put the link below as well as the book you wrote. I'll put the link below
00:48:11.820 second. We'll put the foundation at the top first. Claudia, I'll give you the final thoughts.
00:48:16.580 Is there anything else you want to share with the viewer based on the conversation we've had today
00:48:21.380 on Valuetainment? I just want to say, if you know someone who's suffering or if you're suffering
00:48:26.900 yourself, please, please don't give up. This method works for the majority of people who try it. It has
00:48:32.700 over like an 80% long-term success rate. When you have really good care and support, it goes upwards to 90%
00:48:40.880 long-term success rate. You have a really good opportunity to get your life back if you're
00:48:46.900 suffering right now. If it is a loved one, try and employ the methods that we discussed of being
00:48:53.460 kind and loving, and just giving them the support they need, and giving them this information,
00:48:59.120 this life-saving information. That's my last thought on the subject, and I appreciate you
00:49:04.340 having me on here. Every single time somebody hears this spoken about, a life is saved. Just know that
00:49:13.380 you are saving lives right now because I cannot tell you how many people reach out and say,
00:49:18.420 oh, I saw you on this, or I heard that podcast. You saved my life. No, you're saving lives because
00:49:23.780 you're having me on here, so I thank you for that opportunity. Oh, anytime. This is a very important
00:49:29.060 matter, and if we can collectively make an impact in somebody else's life, we did our part right. So
00:49:35.620 once again, thank you so much for being a guest on Valley Entertainment. Appreciate you. Thank you.
00:49:39.480 Take care. You probably know somebody that's dealing with the issue that she was dealing with.
00:49:42.860 Everybody almost knows somebody that's dealing with alcoholism or some other kind of addiction that
00:49:47.020 they have, and I've seen many people's lives being taken due to not knowing how to deal with it,
00:49:52.760 nor do the family members and loved ones knowing how to deal with them that is going through the
00:49:57.560 challenge right now. So I'm curious to know your thoughts. Comment below, and if you enjoyed this
00:50:01.140 interview, I think you would enjoy another interview I did with Daniel Lieberman. Similar topics,
00:50:05.240 different issues. Click over here to watch the interview, and with that being said, take care,
00:50:10.360 everybody. Bye-bye.