“If you stop going to AA meetings, you’re going to wind up using again,” he said. “They’re all over the island and they’re all over the world. I express my joy all because of AA.Although he performed before a crowd of 20,000 a few nights ago, rock ‘n’ roll superstar Steven Tyler admitted to a touch of nerves as he addressed 11 Maui Drug Court graduates and their families Thursday afternoon in 2nd Circuit Court. “I’m nervous here because I’m telling you all my truth,” the Aerosmith founding member and lead singer said. “I am also a drug addict and alcoholic and fighting it every day.”
Nikki Myers, founder of Yoga of 12 Step Recovery , found salvation years ago in a 12-step program, and ingraining that wisdom into the cells of her body through a daily yoga practice has allowed her to thrive in her own recovery. Myers formed Y12SR in 2003 as a grassroots “relapse prevention program” to help others in the recovery community. “The theme is ‘the issues live in our tissues,'” Myers says. Her program now includes weekly meetings in communities across the U.S.
Macklemore to Drug Court Grads: ‘I need sobriety in my life’ VIDEO
I’m Ben. I’m an alcoholic.” Tuesday wasn’t Macklemore’s first time in drug court. “This is life or death for me. It’s that serious,” he told a group of drug court participants and graduates. Arrested for the first time at 15 years old, Seattle’s beloved superstar was the same age as Andrew Boux-Cochran when he started using drugs. “My favorite part was shaking his hand,” he said about meeting Macklemore. The two, though strangers, share a similar story of struggle for sobriety, one that started for Boux-Cochran after his arrest on New Year’s Eve.
CONTINUED
Start With Him
France is on a Mission to End Binge Drinking
Encouraging a friend to do a keg stand? That may soon land you in jail in France. According to the Washington Post, a new government proposal could make “inciting binge drinking” punishable by a hefty fine of up to €15,000 ($19,200 USD) or even up to a year in jail. The Guardian notes that the bill is aimed at “combatting alcoholism among the young.” The proposed law will also punish those who sell products that make drinking look fun. French health minister Marisol Touraine told RTL radio that items like “telephone cases or T-shirts that show amusing scenes based on drunkenness” could be targeted.
Unlikely Drug Abusers Becoming New Face of Addiction VIDEO
Some teen athletes that are injured on the field are getting hooked on the drugs that are supposed to help them get better, and those unlikely drug users are becoming the new face of addiction in Massachusetts.
For decades, the United States has tried to punish and shame people out of drug addiction with courts, jails and criminal records. It has been massively unsuccessful, as the nationwide rise in opiate addiction over the last few years demonstrates, and few people are more aware of its failure than the police officers tasked with arresting addicts.
See clips from last year’s Award Winning REEL Recovery Film Festivalwith Paul Williams, Russell Brand, Robert Blake, Barbara Eden and Phillip Seymour Hoffman. SEE VIDEO
SUMMER HOUSE DETOX
Slowly But SURELY
Your Addiction
Is Costing You Your Life
The statistics are quite alarming when you realize that a single day of average cigarette smoking (around 20 sticks) can take 4.6 hours away from your life, or that a night out with friends for beer can cost you 14.1 hours. The numbers are even more shocking for users of hard drugs. A methamphetamine addict can lose 58.8 hours and a heroin addict can lose up to 68.4 hours of their lifespan just from a single day of use.
CA, AA, NA and SMART – Differences and Similarities
In the next part of my interview with Tom, a doctor in recovery, he explores the relationships between different sorts of mutual aid. My experience is that there can sometimes be some friction between the different fellowships. I’m not entirely sure why this happens but I suspect it is due to a degree of fear and tribalism. There is no doubt in my mind that the CA programme works. However I have witnessed the AA, NA and SMART programmes also working.
CONTINUED
The Lost Weekend
Bank Worker Stole Over $100,000 To Fund Gambling Addiction
Egan used the money to fund his “chronic gambling addiction”. All the stolen cash would be used on online gambling sites or in bookies around the town. He would go to different bookmakers to hide the extent of his gambling and would sometimes go without a meal so he could put on a bet. Counsel said that, aside from gambling, Egan wasn’t spending the money on himself and didn’t have a lavish lifestyle. Egan is now receiving help from several sources for his gambling addiction and that he hasn’t put a bet on since 2010.
Teens Open “Haunted House of Addictions” To Raise Awareness of Drugs and Alcohol Abuse
A group of high school students hope to scare youth straight when it comes to drugs and alcohol this Halloween. “Around Halloween, there are plenty of haunted houses, but this one is different because we’re not just trying to scare people,” said co-organizer Tessa Barnes, a sophomore at Monroe Area High School. “We’re trying to teach the dangers of drugs and alcohol to people of all ages, but in a way that’s also fun.”
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Stories Can Heal
Young Girl Shares Tragic Story of Family Addiction
A standing ovation greeted Bella Hibler, an eighth-grade student at Jefferson Junior High School, after she shared the tragic story of losing her mother and brother to drug overdoses within 13 months. Organizers of the Summit said they wanted to put a face to the problem of addiction and make people more aware of the devastating effects of addiction on families. “Stop and think before you pick up the needle or the pills,” she said.
CONTINUED
Bill Moyers, Bill Moyers VIDEO
Mental Illness, Homelessness, Drug Addiction: Do These Sound Like Crimes? VIDEO
These videos focus on solutions that are not only cost effective but actually work in bettering people’s lives and making us less dependent on prisons. These programs could certainly go further, by more effectively keeping these social problems out of the criminal-justice system. But they go a long way toward rethinking the efficacy of treating homelessness, drug addiction and mental illness as nails that can be hammered down simply with more arrests.
Drug Maker Warns That OxyContin Suit Could Be ‘Crippling’
Purdue, which makes the best-selling painkiller OxyContin, has never gone to trial on a case of OxyContin abuse. It has won dismissals in more than 400 personal-injury lawsuits related to the drug. And while it has settled some product-liability cases related to OxyContin under secret terms, Purdue has defeated more than 10 efforts to wage class-actions against it. In this remote county courthouse in southeast Kentucky, the company faces a potential legal reckoning that its own chief financial officer called “crippling.”
Colts Owner Jim Irsay Arrest Sparks Conversation On Substance Abuse VIDEO
It’s the video making headlines across the country. Friday, Hamilton County authorities released dash cam video of Colts owner Jim Irsay’s arrest back in March. Irsay was barely able to stand while being arrested for drugged driving. FOX59 is examining the impact of the video going public. Once again, it’s spurring a lot of conversations about substance abuse.
Talk about serious side effects: they kill nearly 1 per cent of those prescribed them. One might suppose that the deaths in the United States of nearly 17,000 people in 2011 alone from overdose of a group of drugs prescribed without any evidence of their efficacy would have caused a major scandal and investigation. But one would be mistaken. The deaths of more than 100,000 Americans from these drugs since the year 2000 has so far evoked little more than nothing.
Atheist Inmate Settles for $1.95 Million Over 12-Step Drug Rehab
Barry Hazle was paroled after a one-year prison term for methamphetamine possession in 2007 and was ordered to spend the next 90 days in a residential drug treatment program. When he arrived, officials told him it was a 12-step program, modeled on Alcoholics Anonymous, that required participants to confess their powerlessness and submit to a “higher power” through prayer. Hazle, a lifelong atheist, had asked for a secular treatment program. He said he was told this was the only state-approved facility in Shasta County, where he lived, but that it wasn’t a stickler for compliance.
“It took years of sobriety to get my head together”
U.S. rocker Chuck Prophet tells Andrew Johnston about beating the booze and coping with the anxious times we’re living in. Many artists become jaded as they get older, but Chuck is still tackling big themes, though he’s unsure how he manages to stay so passionate. “I guess I’m messed up on some level. I’ve been duct-taped back together so many times, I don’t know what scene I’m a part of. But I live in a vibrant town where there’s a kind of rock ‘n’ roll, psych renaissance at the moment, and I’m very inspired by all this stuff going on here. I love the energy.”
“We say, ‘Just take the medication in case you go drinking,'” he says. “‘Actually, you can even take it the moment you start the first drink.’ This brings some of the responsibility back to the person.” Over six months, they found that those taking the drug reduced the number of heavy drinking days from 19 to eight per month, and effectively cut overall drinking by two-thirds.
CONTINUED
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Nervous Pair Prompts Police Search; 9 Pounds of
Meth Found
When the officer pulled over the vehicle and approached, the driver, “was abnormally nervous, and was shaking.” The officer stated the driver would not maintain eye contact and avoided looking at the officer while talking. The passenger and the driver gave the officer conflicting information regarding their travel plans and relationship. Police, assisted by a K9 unit located about 9 pounds of methamphetamine with an approximate street value of $200,000. Paraphernalia and heroin were also found.
When making decisions about when and how to release a person from drug rehabilitation, doctors might take into account the person’s arrest history or behavior in an interview, but what they don’t consider is perhaps most central to the person’s success: their brains. How a person’s brain reacts to the thought of drugs could reveal whether he or she is ready to face the temptations of the outside world.Brian Knutson is part of an interdisciplinary team of neuroscientists, as well as faculty from economics, law, business and political science, who have created a new initiative called NeuroChoice.
‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ Star Nicholas Brendon Arrested
‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ star, Nicholas Brendon, who played Xander Harris in the hit TV series, was arrested on Friday while attending a Comic- Con event in Boise, Idaho. The 43-year old actor was arrested and charged with ‘Malicious Injury to property’ as well as ‘Restraining or obstructing officers’. His mugshot which was released to the public shows the actor, looking rough with red eyes and muffled hair. He was on the hit show that ran from 1997 to 2003, and said on Facebook that he erred by mixing prescribed pain medication and alcohol.
Camilla Parker-Bowles Allegedly Uses Cocaine In The Buckingham Palace
After being speculated as the one who disseminated rumors of Queen Elizabeth’s Alzheimer’s disease, Camilla Parker-Bowles again made headlines because of an alleged association with drugs. In a Globe magazine issue that’s slated to come out on October 27, one of the Duchess of Cornwall’s unidentified friends talked about the royal family member’s usage of drug. The tabloid headline reads, “Best Friend Tells All: Camilla Caught in Drug Scandal.”
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Opinion: by Alan Cassels
Drug Treatment for Female Sexuality Not About Equality
As a pharmaceutical policy researcher, I’ve been studying the marketing practices of the drug industry for two decades. In that time I have seen many examples where the industry-fuelled medicalization of women’s health has threatened to turn the normal ups and downs of puberty, pregnancy and menopause into ripe fodder for pharmaceutical-enhancement. But there’s one significant frontier in the medicalization of women’s bodies that remains elusive: drug treatment for female sexuality. That may be about to change. On the one hand, led by drug companies wishing to create the first new “Pink Viagra,” surrogate patient groups have started actively lobbying for new drug development under the guise of gender equity.
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Macklemore to Drug Court Grads: ‘I need sobriety in my life’ VIDEO
CA, AA, NA and SMART – Differences and Similarities
Young Girl Shares Tragic Story of Family Addiction
A Pill To Help Alcoholics Drink 
