Carolyn Reuben, L.Ac., a founding member and the current president of the board of the Alliance for Addiction Solutions, shares her knowledge on acupuncture for drug and alcohol detox. This 5-point NADA training is a must-know, as is the vital information shared in this episode on the Alliance for Addiction Solutions.
Acudetox helped Matt Finch to significantly ameliorate the symptoms of alcohol withdrawal when he was 24 years old.
Almost a decade later, Matt saw the impressive benefits of Acudetox for patients tapering off methadone when he was a counselor at an Opiate Treatment Program (OTP).
In this episode, Carolyn Reuben, a long-time Acudetox practitioner and trainer, explains in detail how this natural therapy works.
About Carolyn Reuben, L.Ac.
Carolyn Reuben is a Licensed Acupuncturist, NADA Registered Trainer, book author, journalist, health educator, and consultant.
In 1999, Carolyn was given the Harold Cole Annual Memorial Award for Outstanding Contributions in the Field of Alcoholism and Drug Abuse Outreach Prevention and Treatment by the Sacramento County Alcohol and Drug Advisory Board.
Education
Carolyn graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in 1968 in sociology, worked as a social worker for Alameda County and then as a production assistant for an educational television series in Israel before studying motion pictures and television at UCLA and working in media in Los Angeles.
In 1979, she entered SAMRA University of Health Sciences in Los Angeles to pursue a new career in Chinese medicine.
After receiving her state license as an acupuncturist in 1983 Carolyn studied for three months at the Nanjing College of Traditional Chinese Medicine and for another six weeks at Dongzhiman Hospital, Beijing, before opening her own private practice in acupuncture in Los Angeles and then Sacramento.
Publications
From 1981-1991, Carolyn was the voice of alternative medicine in Los Angeles as a health columnist for the L.A. Weekly newspaper.
She is also the co-author of Essential Supplements for Women (with Joan Priestley, MD)(Perigee, 1988 and Thorsons, 1991) and author of The Healthy Baby Book: A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Birth Defects and Other Long-Term Medical Problems Before, During, and After Pregnancy (Jeremy Tarcher/Perigee, 1992); Antioxidants: Your Complete Guide (Prima, 1995); and Cleansing the Body, Mind and Spirit (Berkley, 1998).
Addiction Treatment
Carolyn began using acupuncture for addiction treatment in substance abuse treatment programs in 1992 and in 1994 helped establish the Community Addiction Recovery Association (CARA), a Sacramento nonprofit organization that used a wide variety of pharmaceutical-free treatments for addictive and mood disorders.
Community Addiction Recovery Association
CARA had contracts providing acupuncture other services to the Sacramento County Probation Department Drug Court, Kaiser Permanente’s Chemical Dependency Recovery Program, and numerous private treatment facilities.
Alliance for Addiction Solutions
Carolyn was a co-founder and is currently President of the Board of the Alliance for Addiction Solutions, a nonprofit organization dedicated to using acupuncture, nutrition, exercise, and other mind-body integration techniques to repair the brains of people with addictive and mental health disorders.
Training & Consulting
In addition to lecturing at state and national conferences, Carolyn is the author of magazine articles on the use of pharmaceutical-free treatments for addiction recovery, provides acupuncturists, physicians, and addiction and mental health professionals nationwide the National Acupuncture Detoxification Association (NADA) 5-Point Ear Protocol Training, and serves as a consultant to help develop nutrition and acupuncture programs in private and public treatment facilities.
Here are the main topics discussed in this episode:
- Carolyn’s career change from media to Chinese medicine
- The holistic approach to medicine and how Eastern medicine approaches treatment this way while Western medicine does not
- Acupuncture becomes legal in California
- Carolyn’s training while living in China
- How acupuncture would be very helpful to know if there was a third world war
- Dr. Wen’s use of acupuncture to stop pain during surgery while patients remained awake
- Micheal Smith’s use of acupuncture for drug and alcohol detox as the beginning of the Acudetox program in America
- How Acudetox works
- The different points in the ear which Acudetox works on and how it helps
- Sympathetic point to activate the parasympathetic nervous system activation
- Carolyn takes a training course to learn how to work with people that have substance addictions
- Matt Finch’s experience using Acudetox for alcohol withdrawal
- Matt’s experience working at an Opiate Treatment Program reduce methadone tapering symptoms using Acudetox
- Stimulating the vagus nerve
- Vagus nerve overview
- Shen men ear point
- Shen men ear point YouTube tutorial
- States and provinces that regulate the NADA protocol
- The Alliance for Addiction Solutions
- Drugs mimic our natural pharmacy neuro-chemicals
- The biochemical aspect of addiction
- The Three-Legged Stool Model of Addiction Treatment
- Neurotransmitter Questionnaires to find areas deficiencies
- Amino acid therapy for addiction recovery
- Teleclasses available from the Alliance for Addiction Solutions
- Julia Ross (The Craving Cure, The Mood Cure, The Diet Cure)
- Joan Matthews Larson (7 Weeks to Sobriety)
- Getting started with the Alliance for Addiction Solutions
How to learn more about Carolyn Reuben and the Alliance for Addiction Solutions:
Resources mentioned in the outro after this episode:
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Matt, this podcast, with your guest Carolyn Reuben, is phenomenal information. Within your podcast platform I felt she was given space to flow, with her experience, strength and hope. It was a cohesive and exciting podcast for me. I would like to learn the NADA technique with the intent to support my recovery. Elevation Recovery has become part of my support system….Thanks for all you gentlemen share. Y’al are making a difference, Matt & Chris. With gratitude, FlowerChild
We’re glad that you found this info valuable, and thanks so much for the feedback on this particular episode. We hope as many people as possible who need this information find this episode. What a great guest Carolyn Reuben was, and we sure are grateful for her taking the time to serve our audience. Take care. 🙂
I’m so grateful that you were able to expose Carolyn ‘s work and the Alliance. I serve as the Co-Educational Chair for the Alliance and work as a R.N in a outpatient Substance Abuse Center in Maui, HI. I have been able to utilize Carolyn’s, Julia’s and Christine’s work in service to our recovering addicts here utilizing all their life’s work. Thanks for bring it more mainstream
We are so glad to hear this from you. That was our intention. More people need to be aware of these extraordinary people and resources. Thanks so much for commenting.