Addiction Alternatives

Information may not be reliable

*Make an appointment using my online scheduler
This is an opportunity to discreetly talk one-on-one to determine if I can be of help to you and if so to schedule a “Decision-Point” consultation.
*“Decision-Point” Recovery Consultation
Includes a 20-minute follow-up consultation, TCN ebook with audio, a comprehensive Core Assessment (scored and reviewed) prior to “Decision-Point” session, optional recording of session. A comprehensive analysis of your addiction problem that saves time and costs—with a plan for getting started quickly on the road to recovery.

A confirmation email will be sent to your mailbox: please read the instruction inside it to complete the subscription.

Have you felt that you’re between a rock and hard place, AA or losing your relationship?
You can stop feeling so ashamed that you can’t manage your alcohol (or other addiction) problem better?

Is there effective anonymous addiction treatment without the 12 Steps?
By the time I was 13, I was seriously overweight. By the time I finished college, I was addicted to alcohol, nose spray, smoking, and a variety of drugs. When it comes to learning how to overcome addiction problems, I speak from personal experience. I tried AA and various 12-step methods but found them illogical and totally inconsistent with my worldview–that of a nonbeliever.
I left my new career as an architect,after having a grand mal seizure in front of 60 colleagues while trying to stop my addictive behavior. I was sent to therapists A and B and C, all of whom promoted themselves as addiction treatment specialists. I found them lacking any real understanding of what the inside process of being addicted felt like.
After spending four years studying to get a PhD in psychology–my emphasis was on trying to grapple with my own addictions–to my surprise, I discovered a wealth of knowledge that suggested there were alternatives to the 12-step approach that had been previously documented. Yet atmy very first job interview after graduating, I was told that my notion of how to cure addictions was dangerously wrong.
What do habits have to do with addictions? We are all creatures of habit. Forming habits is normal and necessary. Some habits help us to be more productive. Being on time, brushing our teeth, exercising regularly are all habits that improve our lives. But some habits have the opposite effect. We call these out-of-control, unhealthy habits by another name. We call them addictions.
Despite the conventional wisdom, addiction is never simply a matter of having a disease. Nor is it simply a choice. In most cases, addictive behavior is really a complicated interaction of psychology, social environment, and individual biology. Smoking, excessive drinking, gambling compulsively, and even overeating are habitual patterns of behavior that can be modifiedwith the right approach.
How can modifying your habits
Habits and addictions are part of a continuum. Even addictions themselves range from mild to extreme. But traditional addiction treatments take a black and white, either/or position. The thinking is that if addiction is a disease (and if there is no real medical treatment), the best we can do is learn to live with the biological malady. You are powerless over it and the best you can do is hold onto the hope that it doesn’t unexpectedly reappear and ruin your life. If it is a habit, then we think that we should be able to stop it through force of will. And if choosing to stop doesn’t work, then the false conclusion is that either we are morally defective, weak-willed, or we must be biologically doomed for our lifetime.
Are addictions a disease and not habits? Habits and addictions don’t work all that simply. Habits may have biological underpinnings and addictions cause us to modify our behavior. Addictions can be reduced to habits or eliminated completely using modern psychological skill-building techniques. Progress can be made toward modifying an addiction even while you are involved with substance abuse or behavioral repetition. Startling as it may seem, some people don’t and shouldn’t need to stop their habitual behavior 100%! Can you imagine thinking that a 12-step approach to sex addiction would only work if Tiger Woods were never to have sex again?
What if I told you that there are “evidence-based” principles of how to modify your habitual behavior so you are no longer “addicted”? What if changing your habitual behavior needn’t take years of therapy or a lifetime of group meetings to succeed? These principles are intuitively logical, rational, practical, and are available to you to master at your own pace, privately, from any place in the world you happen to live or work. Maybe you have sought help in the past but havent found a behavior change methodology that really makes sense to you. Now you can get all of the key methods and insights you need in my book “Take Control, Now.” It’s now available for you to download, along with the audio version, read by my co-author, Lance Lennon.
Do you really need addiction treatment, inpatient rehab or just a kick-start? Since some habitual addictive behaviors are especially difficult to modify, I offer a recovery “Kick-Start” Session to help you map out how to gradually take more and more control of your behavior and ultimately your life. My “Addiction Free” methods focus on very specific, concrete strategies, behavioral principles and proven techniques that you can use to modify unhealthy habits and addictive behaviors.
During the Recovery “Kick-Start” program, I give you one-on-one, individualized habit/addiction counselingnot treatment–discreetly in person or anonymously by telephone–anywhere in the world. I provide the tools, tactics, and strategies you need to incrementally manage your behavior for yourself independent of me or anyone elsewithout taking up large chunks of your time, demanding you give up your privacy, your friendships, your dignity, or your ability to specify the social circumstances of your own life or your personal philosophy.
There is a logical and rational approach to addiction recovery. You can gain more control of your own life. Dont expect sitting in the back of a room with other lost souls, or seeing a therapist, or going to rehab to do it for youthese approaches really, really cant. And if you do find help in these places, realize that you are stuck now with a new addiction–an addiction to them, which they actively foster.
Ready to talk? You can see me in person in Los Angeles or talk with me by phone from the comfort of your home or officewith the assurance of complete confidentiality. You can press the large orange button on the upper right to schedule a consult right now, today. Or you can call and leave me a message at my Beverly Hills office at 310-275-5433, ext. 1. Or dial ext. 0 if you want to get started really fast.
Unsure if this is the right method for you? Start the process of deciding right now by taking the next step. Set up a 100% money back guaranteed, 15-minute Initial Consultation, or download a FREE download of Chapter 1, of my paradigm-busting self-help book, “Take Control, Now!”
Anonymous Addiction Treatment Without the 12 Steps

You dont have to wait to take back your life. You can start today.
About Dr. Kern As one of the nations most trusted experts on addictive behavior, Dr. Marc Kern has appeared frequently on nationally broadcast television and radio programs like Larry King Live and ABCs 20-20. Dr. Kerns method is not just more of the same kind of treatment that most people are familiar withand that have had very mixed results at best. Its not just another 12-step program, nor are his methods for everyone.

A sampling of some questions and answers that are currently on-line at "VideoJug - Life Explained on Film" with over 250 additional videos. I am interviewed as the expert in Addiction Behavior in the Mental Health Section.