When most people think about alcoholism or drug addiction they think only of the alcohol/drug-based symptoms and forget about the sobriety-based symptoms. Yet it is the sobriety-based symptoms, especially post acute withdrawal, that make sobriety so difficult.

It is right to be concerned about the possibility of "relapse," but the more that you know and understand about it the less threatening it will be to you. There are many mistaken beliefs about what a "relapse" is.

In many cases the addict is the first family member to seek treatment. Other family members become involved in order to help the alcoholic get sober. Many family members refuse to consider the fact that they also have a problem that requires specialized treatment.

Until this book, the technology to treat repeated relapse into alcoholism and drug addiction did not exist at worst, and was haphazard at best. What the authors did was study relapsers and notice patterns of relapse. These patterns could then be codified and used in a program to identify 'triggers' or situation that lent themselves to relapse, and could thus be avoided in the future.