Jodie McKewan tells the Daily Record, “I said to Colin, ‘I heard you were in recovery’ and he was really open and honest with me. He said, ‘I have been in recovery for about 10 years. What about yourself?’ I told him I was 13 months cleanand sober. I explained a bit about myself and he just gave me some inspiring words.”
Florida’s reputation as America’s sleaze capital rests securely on a foundation of real estate scammers, spray-tanned strippers and fast-buck artists eager to separate retirees from their life savings. It’s the second-chance state where a lifetime of failures elsewhere can be washed away by driving south toward the sun on I-95 or I-75..Purdue Pharma, which “wanted OxyContin to be prescribed to a much broader array of patients and for a longer period of time.”
Although current drinking was associated with a 24 percent reduced risk of heart attack, there was no reduction in risk of mortality or stroke. High alcohol intake and heavy episodic drinking were both associated with significant increases in risk of overall mortality. For higher-income countries, current drinking was associated with a 16 percent reduced risk of combined disease outcome…
CONTINUED @ FocusNews.com
Taking It To The Next Level
Recovery Day Seeks to End the Stigma
For years, the stigma attached to addiction kept Annie McCullough from seeking treatment for her 23-year battle with alcoholism. That’s why McCullough, sober for seven years now, says it’s so important for those recovering from addiction to attend Toronto’s third Annual Recovery Day.
67-year-old grandmother who got into the methamphetamine business to bolster her retirement account will be spending her golden years in prison. Sandra Lee Resterhouse, a mother of four grown children, was sentenced Friday to 10 years in federal prison and ordered to pay a $1,500 fine.
CONTINUED @ WZZM13.com
Do Anything
Obama Admin, Makes Announcement Addressing Heroin Epidemic
The Obama administration announced a major policy shift Thursday in its efforts to combat the nation’s opioid abuse epidemic.. Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell said her agency would rewrite regulations to remove some of the obstacles that have prevented greater involvement from doctors in treating those addicted to heroin or prescription painkillers.
Writer Andrew Livingstone’s on the wagon, waking up happy and surrounded by a supportive community he may never leave…”There’s this thing with substance abuse where we kind of shame it in society and make people hide it because why would you want to make it known if people are going to chastise you for it or look at you different. Why would you talk about it?” Now, he has talked about it. With family, friends and perfect strangers…
Imagine if the media covered alcohol like other drugs
“It actually starts to rewire the brain chemistry,” one law enforcement official said. “They have no control over their thoughts. They can’t control their actions. It’s just a dangerous, dangerous drug.” US public health officials have linked alcohol to much graver effects, including domestic abuse, sexual assault in college campuses, 40 percent of violent crimes in the US, and more than 4.6 million emergency room visits in 2010.
Thomas Van Wagner, 90, devoted his life to alcoholism recovery
In March 1968, he joined Alcoholics Anonymous and became sober for the remaining 47 years of his life, his son said. That began his lifelong dedication to helping others in their recovery and treatment. He was on the board of directors of the Long Island Council on Alcoholism and past president and founder of Friends of the Council, which raised funds for the council.
This Man’s Comics About The Reality of Depression Are So True
Each person with a mental illness experiences it differently — and for Kristian Nygård, the only way he could make sense of his personal plight was to illustrate it. After being diagnosed with depression, the 38-year-old artist from Norway created a series of comics for his website to explain to others what it’s really like to have the disorder.
Eat to Beat Drug Addiction Organization Hosts Film Screening and Fundraiser
Rutgers senior Ryan Morris is using food to fight New Jersey’s drug epidemic. Morris is the founder of the Eat to Beat Foundation, which seeks to “educate and spread awareness about the dangers of drug addiction amongst today’s youth.” The experts attending are: – Michael DeLeon, the founder of Steered Straight – Lisa Latnan of Rutgers’s Alcohol and Other Drug Assistance program – Kim Kelly Seber, the founder of Roots to Addiction
CONTINUED @ NewBrunswickToday.com
12th Stepping the Scholars
UCLA employee inspires positivity in students after battling addiction
In 2011, Damone Brown thought he had it all – an apartment of his own and a well-paying social service job that allowed him to help the homeless. Within a year, he became homeless himself, unemployed and dependent on drugs. After years of battling addiction and homelessness, Brown began to rebuild his lifeby working at Il Tramezzino, an Italian cafe located in the Anderson School of Management that specializes in panini sandwiches.
Warning about drinking during pregnancy from chief medical officer for Wales
The Welsh Government’s Change4Life Wales website provides advice on alcohol and pregnancy and also encourages men to think about how much alcohol they are drinking when trying for a baby. In the past year, the alcohol and pregnancy section of the website has received the most page views. Dr Hussey added: “In practice it can be easy to underestimate the quantity in a glass and difficult to measure units of alcohol accurately.
Watching Porn Is OK. Believing In Porn Addiction Is Not VIDEO
The authors also suggest that some of the psychological distress reported by many self-declared porn addicts may result not from viewing pornography but from believing that they are addicted to it. In fact, they note, perceived porn addiction “may impact well-being more than the use of pornography itself.”
#6. Recovery is about becoming comfortable with who I am. How would I ever be able to like the person I am if I’m always hiding the reason I’ve become that person? Sobriety and AA have made me a better, happier, kinder person and I feel the need to give credit where credit is due.
Fourteen years ago, the drug maker published a study showing that the antidepressant Paxil was safe and effective for teenagers…a major medical journal posted a new analysis of the same data concluding that the opposite is true. Over the years, thousands of people taking or withdrawing from Paxil or other psychiatric drugs have committed violent acts, including suicide…
The news wasn’t completely unexpected. Lori had been battling addictions for years. She had been in and out of rehab three times. As anyone who has loved someone with an addiction knows, you can force someone into rehab, but you can’t make her well. ..Whatever she did, whether it was tending bar or marketing pharmaceuticals, she was the best… Lori began abusing prescription drugs…She was 34 years old.
Universal Health Services Pays $350M For Foundations Recovery Network
The Pritzker family, one of the richest in the US, owns majority of Foundations Recovery Network. Jay Pritzker founded the Hyatt Hotels Corporation in 1957. His niece, Penny Pritzker is a business executive and philanthropist. Nominated by President Barack Obama, Penny serves as the US Secretary of Commerce since June 2013.
CONTINUED @ TechTimes.com
MEDIA: Book Review
Transformational Chairwork: Using Psychotherapeutic Dialogues in Clinical Practice
“Scott Kellogg is a masterful psychotherapist who brings intelligence, passion, creativity, and love to his commitment to reducing suffering in the world. His inspiring and useful book, Transformational Chairwork: Using Psychotherapeutic Dialogues in Clinical Practice, resurrects and refines the lost art of Chairwork, as originally pioneered by Jacob Moreno and Fritz Perls…”
Pet owners know that dogs will eat just about anything they can get their paws on. A Denver, Colorado woman learned that lesson the hard way after she says her dog ate a marijuana edible at a local park. On Tuesday evening, Catherine Edwards took Bodhi for a walk around Cheesman Park. Toward the end of their loop, the five-year-old, 90-pound Weimaraner got into something. “His behavior was really scary. He was twitching. He lost function in his legs”, said Edwards, “I thought he was going to die.”
Customized Care in Alcohol and Drug Addiction Treatment
According to Manny Rodriguez, founder and executive director of La Fuente Hollywood Treatment Center: “Customized care within the world of alcohol and drug addiction involves much more than a good bedside manner. If a treatment center is not conversant in the individual needs of LGBT patients, then generic approaches to addiction — treatment planning that ignores the personal dynamic between a heterosexual methamphetamine user and a gay or lesbian addict of the same drug — will have a much higher incidence of failure.”
Doctor acquitted in overdose death gets bail for drug sale
Former doctor Gerald Klein could be out of jail as early as Friday night while he awaits sentencing on a Xanax sale charge that was a jury’s only conviction against him this week in a case where he was accused of causing the overdose death of a patient. Klein was indicted, along with George and clinic manager Theodore Obermeyer, as authorities dismantled Jeff and twin brother Chris George’s $40 million illegal pill network with nearly three dozen arrests.
CONTINUED @ PalmBeachPost.com
Enlightenment
Amnesty for drug addicts?
A Massachusetts police chief who is making national headlines – and getting results – for his unconventional approach to the opioid epidemic told an enthusiastic crowd of about 100 people….”The war on drugs, forget it,” the plain-spoken police chief said. “It’s over. It’s time to start a new war. Fight the drugs, not the addicted person. We can’t be lemmings and say we’re fighting it by arresting everyone.”
Prescription opioid use has increased drastically across the United States in the past 16 years. The number of prescription opioids sold nationally quadrupled between 1999 and 2013. Coincidentally, the number of deaths due to overdoses of prescription opioids also quadrupled during the same time period In 2013, 16,000 Americans died from a prescription drug overdose, while 8,000 died from heroin overdoses. The number of heroin overdoses in 2013 represents a three-fold increase from 2010.
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