Recover to Live

Kick Any Habit, Manage Any Addiction: Your Self-Treatment Guide to Alcohol, Drugs, Eating Disorders, Gambling, Hoarding, Smoking, Sex, and Porn

By: Christopher Kennedy Lawford

Narrated by: Seth Michael Donsky

Length: 13 hrs and 42 mins

Publisher's summary

From New York Times bestselling author of Symptoms of Withdrawal and Moments of Clarity Christopher Kennedy Lawford comes a book that will save lives.

For most of his early life, Christopher Kennedy Lawford battled life-threatening drug and alcohol addictions. Now in recovery for more than 25 years, he works to effect change and raise global awareness of addiction in nonprofit, private, and government circles, serving as the goodwill ambassador for drug dependence treatment and care for the United Nations.

For the first time, Recover to Live brings together all of the most effective self-care treatments for the seven most toxic compulsions affecting every culture on the planet today - alcohol dependence, drug dependence, eating disorders, gambling, hoarding, smoking, sex, and porn. In Recover to Live, more than 100 of the world’s top experts interviewed by Lawford share their research and wisdom on how to determine if your bad habit is becoming a dependency, what treatments will work best for you, how best to help yourself or a loved one recover from addiction, and how to lead a fulfilling and productive life in recovery.

©2013 Christopher Kennedy Lawford (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

life changing

if you are struggling with addiction or know someone who is and want to help them then you need to read this book.

Recover 2 Live

This book should be for everyone not just addicts. It would help you understand the many addictions and the root causes.
Great book

A Powerful Eye-opener

I thought I was pretty knowledgeable about addictions having experienced my own challenges in life. This book opened my eyes to many different challenges that I knew very little about. Humbling. Eye-opening.

With addiction becoming a far bigger challenge - alcohol, gaming, food, opioids, etc - there is a very big need for solutions beyond the ones available today.

Further, as Christopher began the process of changing social attitudes/mindsets during his life, we need to continue to shift our awareness and attitudes toward this issue in order to eliminate shame and judgment and generate support and solutions.

For parents, doctors, etc., the addict

Where does Recover to Live rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

It's a good solid nonfiction, research oriented read. The most comprehensive book on every addiction that is fresh, believable, well researched and put together.

What other book might you compare Recover to Live to and why?

Perhaps his recent book on Ten Things That Addicts Know. I haven't read it yet.

Which character – as performed by Seth Michael Donsky – was your favorite?

Not applicable.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

No. It is full of heavy information and there is a lot to digest and take notes on if you want to follow up on any of his resources, websites, or research.

Any additional comments?

The Best book available on these subject matters. I wish I had known this information ten years ago when my kids and their friends were teens; I would have done things different. Talk about insight. Lawford shows how wrong this country is about handling addiction effectively in our culture of shame and persecution, and how we need to rethink our approach from parenting, to schools, to the mental health profession. I admire this author for his chutzpah. He doesn't hold back--we can't afford to not listen with a society in crisis when it comes to addictions.

Fascinating and Informative

What made the experience of listening to Recover to Live the most enjoyable?

The topic, the fact that he used experts from different fields (and opinions).

Would you be willing to try another one of Seth Michael Donsky’s performances?

No--that was the worst part of the book for me. There was something about his voice and the way he spoke that distracted me.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

I recommended it to people because of the way he covered the various addictions.

Essential tools for helping addicts recover

Loved it! Great book. This book is very informative and offers essential tools and techniques to help addicts recover from their addictions and destructive behaviors. This book will show the importance of family in the recovery process of any addict behavior. It will provide important information to help anyone suffering from an addition, to the road of recovery. A must read for any student or professional studying or working in the feld of Psychology, Social Worke consulting, or anyone seeking to help their clients, family member or even themselves with all sorts of addictive behavior.

I didn't know I was a workaholic

Any additional comments?

This helped reinforce what I already knew about addiction and taught me a lot about why people get addicted to different substances. I have a problem with Alcohol. One of the reasons is that I'm a workaholic. I really didn't know that about myself, but there was a chapter toward the end that described me when I didn't expect to find that part of me in the book. I've been using alcohol to 'relax' and to forget about the ongoing self-imposed pressures of the job. Wow, no one talks about that in AA. Now I know that I have to work on my 'work' addiction, it's helped with the alcohol problem. It's helped me to figure out how to relax a little. This was helpful.

The author has had a very interesting life and he drops parts of his life's story into the book. That was very cool and very well done. Addiction can be something clinical, but it's also very personal to everyone who addiction touches. It helps when the help comes from someone who's actually been there.

Very informative

The content throws a lot of light on the reality of addictions, habits and therapy options. Presents the experiences as comments or results from other researchers and experts; so it might not appeal to some non scientific readers. Interesting book. One might discover they have a habit or addiction they need to recover from.

lots of good info. The last part is a sales pitch

very informative. I presented some of the information I obtain from this book to my counselor to help customize my treatment plan and it is working. I think 12 step support groups are a valuable resource however they don't work for everyone and I am one of those people. so it felt kind of like a sales pitch at the end for 12 step support groups and his website.