How We Are Different From Treatment

and the keys to our success

How is St. Jude's different and more effective than all other programs in the nation?

The answer is simple: St. Jude's is the ONLY program in the world that actually delivers what we promise. From the first call, whether you choose our program or not, our mission is to help you or your loved one find and build success. We are great at what we do, and we have been the leaders in the industry for more than 20 years. Please read on to understand specifically the ten characteristics that no other program has been able to match:

The Original Non-12 Step Model

St. Jude's created and launched the first and authentic non-12 step program model in 1988 during a massive research effort that exposed the ineffectiveness of the 12 step support meeting model. How many of you have gone to an AA meeting and thought, 'This is not for me.'? You are not alone; 95% of those who enter AA meetings for support leave within the first year of attendance. Any model that has a 95% leave rate must be considered a failure. St. Jude's exposed this reality and left that model behind after a full ten year research project. In this project the co-founding researchers attended over 4,000 12 step meetings to make sure they had a full understanding of that model and its history and actual effectiveness. This research resulted in St. Jude's creating non-12 step program model that remains the most successful program series nationwide. No other research team has researched the 12 step model with such thoroughness. Our guests get the benefits of that knowledge.

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The Original Non-Disease Based Program

"Can someone catch alcoholism or addiction?" This simple question exposes the disease of addiction model for what it really is, a sham. You must first choose to drink alcohol or use drugs before the consequences of these choices can occur. Drinking and using drugs are choice based not disease based. If you get cancer, this event is totally beyond your control. Making a CHOICE to drink/drug is a far cry from suffering through a legitimate disease. St. Jude's along with hundreds of independent studies have proven the falsity of the disease concept. Further St. Jude's and others have shown that this concept actually contributes and causes continued failure. Just the term "disease concept" tells the true story. For instance, no one says, "I believe in the cancer concept." St. Jude's provides real answers to real life problems, and then empowers people to overcome those problems once and for all. As the original creators of the non-disease model, St. Jude's has helped thousands to grow past their self imposed powerlessness, and finally be free of those limiting beliefs. You can be a success too!

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Compassion

Watch an episode of Intervention or Celebrity Rehab - and ask yourself, is this compassionate? The "clinical" idea of breaking down a person to build them back up again promises to end in continuing relapse. There is no compassion in an approach that promises failure and mistreatment. In contrast, St. Jude's believes in you and your natural abilities, and those positive aspects of your life that are waiting to be enhanced. You have positive characteristics, hopes and dreams, and we will help you find them! That is compassion.

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Empowerment

You or your loved one is not diseased, so therefore your problems are fixable and changeable. This fundamental truth begins the process of empowerment. Our program will guide you through a process of self awareness and solution based methods. Are you struggling with a bad marriage, a career change, drugs, alcohol, becoming an adult, going through a middle age crisis, etc.? St. Jude's are experts in building an empowering plan to overcome these life struggles. You are not alone! You can succeed through these problems, and you will leave a strengthened, positive person!

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An Alternative to Treatment

Treatment is defined as any program with these key phrases: 12-step, disease-based, holistic, medical or brain disease, psycho-social disease, brain disorder, etc. Wouldn't you like to be free of those harmful labels? Wouldn't you like to leave your past problems behind you forever? Being labeled with a chronic disease or disorder forever chains you to a one of the most difficult times in your life unnecessarily. St. Jude's provides solutions, not labels. You are a normal person with normal human struggles. Only in America do we diagnose regular problems as diseases and disorders. St. Jude's brings reality back into focus and allows individuals the freedom to let go of these damaging stereotypes and be free from "treatment." You do not need treatment to overcome your problems because there is no illness to treat. Instead, you need to become informed on your amazing natural abilities to problem solve and find relief, satisfaction and happiness. Allow yourself this incredible gift!

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CBE Certified Credentialed Staff

All our instructors are Cognitive Behavioral Education Certified. No other program can provide this level of credentialing, as it is proprietary to St. Jude Retreats only. For a thorough explanation of this certification, click here.

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Trustworthiness

The BBB (Better Business Bureau) rates St. Jude Retreats as an A+ after more than twenty years of helping people. This is unheard of in the drug and alcohol program arena. Many alcohol and drug program researchers also endorse our program such as Dr. David Hanson, author of Alcohol Education: What we Must Do, and Preventing Alcohol Abuse: Alcohol, Culture, and Control, the late Dr. Joseph Vacca, National Institute of Health Post Doctoral Research Fellow at Harvard Medical School and Boston University Medical School, Dr. David Rudy, the noted 12 step researcher and author of Becoming Alcoholic, Alcoholics Anonymous and the Reality of Alcoholism, and syndicated radio talk show host and noted clinical psychologist, Dr. Joy Browne, among many others. You do not get endorsements like these without building credibility first. St. Jude's built this reputation by making our guests and our results number one, and making the business model secondary to those first two goals. We are proud of our research and our not-for-profit business status.

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Effectiveness / Success Rate

St. Jude's remains the only facility in the nation to continuously track their independently verified success rate. Many other programs advertise high success rates in excess of 70, 80 or 90% but try to get one of them to supply you with an independently verified, publicly published success rate analysis. You will not be able to, because they do not have it! Our latest success rate studies are published on our website and available to you now. (Click here to read or print our independently verified success rate analysis.)

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An Environment that Creates Success

In 1992, when our first retreat was opened the average treatment facility in the US consisted of a converted mental health hospital or clinic, and many remain in this state today with comfort remaining secondary to ease of functionality for the staff, not the patron. St. Jude's researchers asked themselves why people who have drug or alcohol problems should be subjected to such harsh and unpleasant conditions. The answer to this dilemma was to create a home like atmosphere. People enjoy learning in a retreat that feels like home. St. Jude's was, and continues to be, the standard in providing comfortable amenities that enhance social interaction and a lack of loneliness. Our guests say that the program, the home cooking, and the amenities were a fundamental building block to their progress.

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Research

St. Jude's started as a research project in 1988; it was not founded based on a corporate profit motive. This is a completely different motive from every other facility in the country. The first St. Jude Retreat was built (1992) as an alternative to the ineffective treatment model that existed then and still exists in many different forms today. All other programs in America began as a business model first. This can be seen by the low success rates, or non existent success rates of other programs. If you want a program that has helped thousands of people to change their lives and provides the best chance to change your life, then the St. Jude Program is the answer.

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