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Tuesday, September 23, 2014  *  THAT WAS THE WEEK THAT WAS  *  Vol. 2, No. 5
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Coming Clean to Help Others

TV Chat Queen Opens Up About 4 Year Addiction To Cannabis And Ecstasy

TV chat queen Trisha Goddard has admitted just one puff on a joint would tip her back into the “big black hole” of her drug addiction misery, writes Olivia Buxton in the Sunday People . The TV presenter who made a career out of listening to people’s problems was hooked on cannabis and ecstasy for four years as she battled her own troubles.And although she beat her demons, Trisha knows she could all too easily fall back over the edge. “It was pretty normal to smoke at least three or four joints every night after work and to get off my face until I passed out, or got the munchies and stuffed my face with junk food.

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Keeping Up With the Jones’

Do You Have a Caffeine Addiction? Journalists, Teachers and Police Officers Down the Most Coffee

‘People who consume caffeine regularly will become dependent on it – if you take caffeine away from them, they will function below par.’ The list of the top ten professions for coffee drinking continued with the nurses and medical staff, company executives and telesales workers who drink, on average, three to four cups a day. ‘On balance, caffeine is not particularly helpful. It triggers withdrawal and increases your blood pressure, which is not a good thing.’

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Family of Origin

Paul Ryan, Chuck Todd Discuss Experience Of Losing Alcoholic Fathers 

“You kind of repress these things,” Ryan said. “You want to think in glorious ways, you want to think of all the good things. It took a while for this to bubble up, and then I didn’t want to talk about it. None of my siblings and I really talked about this. [But] I discussed this with my mom and my siblings and we basically decided that if this is such a big and impactful part of your life […] to not discuss it would be to whitewash it.”

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Tabloids High On Slip Street

Has Recovering Alcoholic Owen Wilson Fallen  

Off The Wagon?

Owen reportedly attended Alcoholics Anonymous meetings in 2004 and attempted suicide in 2007 – those close to the star are especially concerned. “People who know and love him are worried,” a friend says of the Dallas-born actor, who was also spotted partying in Hollywood just weeks before his trip to Italy. “You never know whether it’ll be a single glass of wine or a dozen cocktails. Between his issues with substances and the mental health issues, it’s a slippery slope that no one wants to see him go down.”

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It’s a Twofer

Dr. Oz: Caffeine Powder Kills, and Pat O’Brien’s Alcohol and Drug Addiction

Dr. Oz said a cup of coffee has about 95 mg of caffeine, but a teaspoon of caffeine powder has as much caffeine as 18 cups of coffee. That amount of caffeine can cause heart attacks, seizures, vomiting, diarrhea and death. In May 2014, an 18-year-old Ohio boy, Logan Stiner, made headlines after dying of caffeine powder overdose.

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Is It a Disease or a Crime?

Police Report: Syringe Exchange Encourages Treatment, Lowers Injury and Disease

A recent conference hosted by the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), an independent research organization that focuses on critical issues in policing, covered such important topics as combating the overdose epidemic, law enforcement use of naloxone, and how to respond to changing attitudes towards marijuana.

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Affluenza Overdose

White America’s Drug Problem Is Getting Worse

White people have a painkiller problem. According to new data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, painkiller overdoses accounted for almost 17,000 deaths in 2011. The majority of deaths were among whites, at a rate that’s growing faster than for any other racial group. From 1999 to 2011, drug overdoses involving opioid painkillers increased more than fourfold among white people.

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Was It the Food?

Hundreds of Vietnamese Drug Addicts Escape Rehab

 

More than 400 Vietnamese drug addicts have escaped from a rehabilitation centre where they were detained to receive compulsory treatment, a local official said today. The detainees, many wielding sticks, broke free from the centre near the port city of Haiphong in northeast Vietnam late Sunday. “More than 400 inmates fled after breaking the door and threatened the guards of the centre with sticks.”

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Family of Origin

Husband of Whitney Houston’s Daughter, Arrested for Drunken Crash 

Nick Gordon attempted to change lanes in a BMW sedan this morning in Roswell, Georgia, when the vehicle struck a curb and overturned, police told ABC News. Afterward, Gordon was arrested for DUI, failure to maintain a lane and driving with a suspended license. Brown, 21, announced last year that she was married to her childhood friend, Gordon, who had a longtime relationship with her family. They announced their engagement in 2012.

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Just Not For Teenagers!!!!

New York Could Legalize Recreational Marijuana In 2015

Since 2010, New York City has averaged between 30,000 and 50,000 marijuana arrests each year.  New York is not a referendum state, which means that if next year’s measure gets through the legislature and is signed into law, it will immediately go into effect and will not require a vote by New Yorkers. Colorado and Washington, both of which legalized recreational marijuana in 2012, did so through voter-approved ballot measures. In November, Oregon and Alaska voters will decide if they also want to legalize marijuana for adults.

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At A Slower Pace – Not Slow Enough!

Narcotic Painkillers Overdose Deaths Rising At Slower Pace

Overdose deaths from such drugs rose by 18 percent each year between 1999 and 2006. But they increased by only three percent between 2007 and 2011.

The deaths from overdose of prescription painkiller have conventionally been high and the steadily rising number of cases since the 1990s has been a cause of big concern for the health experts and researchers.

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Just Like the Universe      VIDEO

American Waistlines Are Expanding  VIDEO

American adult waistlines are still spreading, a new study finds. While body mass index, a key measure for obesity, has stabilized, our bellies have increased an inch over the last decade – to a circumference of almost 39 inches. That’s bad news, researchers say.

“[Waist circumference] has kind of been picking up year after year [while] BMI flat-lined a little bit,” says Dr. Earl Ford, a medical officer at the Centers for Disease Control, and an author of the report published in the Journal of the American Medical Association Tuesday.

 
Good Samaritan

Governor Jerry Brown Signs Overdose Law Expanding Naloxone Access in California Pharmacies

Governor Jerry Brown signed Assemblymember Richard Bloom’s pharmacy naloxone bill (AB 1535), which will permit pharmacists to furnish the opiate overdose reversal medicine naloxone hydrochloride upon request. Previously, naloxone was available only by prescription from a healthcare provider or from a handful of naloxone distribution programs throughout the state.
You Want Fries With That?

Teenagers Who Smoke Weed Every Day 60% Less Likely to Finish School Na
Teenagers who use cannabis daily before the age of 17 are more than 60% less likely to complete high school or university compared with those who have never used. Daily teenage users were seven times more likely to attempt suicide and eight times as likely to use other illicit drugs compared with non-users, the research published in journal the Lancet Psychiatry found.
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From Dope To Donuts 

Cocaine to Cupcakes: How to Beat Transfer Addictions
To obtain the same high once achieved by drugs, many turn to sugar to stimulate the receptors. Dr. Pamela Peeke, assistant professor of medicine at the University of Maryland and author of “The Hunger Fix,” says drugs alter the brain’s dopamine receptors — the neurochemicals responsible for detecting pleasure — and it takes a while for the altered receptors to get back to normal.
In Santa Barbara?

Narcotics, Weapons  

and Child   

Endangerment Arrest

Juan Manuel Cisneros Gavia, age 41, of Santa Barbara, was arrested for possession of methamphetamine for sale, possession of heroin for sale, being armed with a firearm in the commission of a drug offense, and child endangerment. Six children are among those who share the home where Gavia resides, including his own 3-year old son.

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STARTS FRIDAY   Printable Schedule
2014 New York  Reel Recovery Film Festival

43 Films 
in 
7 Days

QUAD Cinema  
13th and 6th Ave.    
New York City  
Sept. 26 – Oct. 2
Teaching Not Preaching VIDEO


AMBER VALLETTA  

SHARES  

HER  

STRUGGLES

WITH   

ADDICTION

 

VIDEO  

Attraction and Information

Alcoholics Anonymous  

To Host Public Seminar About Its Work 

Alcoholics Anonymous is holding a public seminar on September 24 at the White Rock Theatre. The seminar is to discuss how AA fits into the mutual aid scheme in East Sussex County Council, Hastings emergency services working with AA and how the NHS can benefit from AA’s work. Weekly AA meetings are as follows: Anyone is welcome at an open meetings and closed meetings are for alcoholics and people with a drinking problem.

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Legalization Rolling Along

Conservative Andrew Sullivan: Marijuana Prohibition ‘based on lies” 

Andrew Sullivan, the prominent writer and blogger, compared the effort to legalize marijuana to the fight for marriage equality in the United States in a talk that highlighted the key factors propelling what he called an “extraordinary leap forward” in cannabis policy. Sullivan, who received a standing ovation after his morning talk, analyzed the rapid social and cultural change that’s moved marijuana from the fringes to a drug that polls show most Americans think should be legal.

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Clues to Addictive Behavior

Types Of People More Prone to Drug Addiction

Addiction is a complicated affliction, affecting people of all ages, intelligence levels, and backgrounds. It’s hard to tell what causes some people to be more prone to addiction than others; it’s usually a mix of many factors, from family background, genetics, environment, stress, and personality traits. Of course, there’s also the link between substance abuse and creative people; musicians, artists, and writers have historically been associated with raging alcoholism, depression, experimenting with drugs, as well as the tragedies of suicide and overdosing.

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Not Tamper Proof, or Not Safe in Hands of Addict?

Kids’ Poisonings Linked to Suboxone  

An anti-addiction drug used to fight the nation’s heroin and painkiller abuse epidemics poses a threat to young children who accidentally swallow relatives’ prescriptions, a federal study says. Some children have died. For every 100,000 patients prescribed buprenorphine, 200 young children were hospitalized for taking it, the study found. Buprenorphine is an opioid up to 50 times more potent as a painkiller than morphine.

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Give Me Liver, or Give Me Death

Dozens of Patients Barred from Liver Transplants for Refusing to Give Up Alcohol

Hundreds of alcoholics have been refused liver transplants in the past five years because they have not been able to stop drinking. More than 160 patients with severe alcohol-induced liver disease have been denied a transplant, including a teenager at King’s College Hospital in London and two people in their twenties. Doctors say liver disease victims are getting younger by the year and that the majority of those refused a liver transplant will soon die.

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Smelled Too Sweet In the Pipe

Man Sells Crushed Pop Tart as Cocaine Prosecuted  

For Fraud

Trying to sell drugs to an undercover police officer is not the best move for an aspiring drug dealer. However attempting to pass off a crushed pop tart as crack cocaine has proved particularly unwise. It has left Cameron Mitchell  facing two fraud charges. Mitchell, 30, attempted to make the transaction while doing his day job – making deliveries to convenience stores. Mitchell then went back to his van fished out a pop tart and crushed a corner of the sweet snack and sold it to the officer for $20.

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Children in Danger

Accidental Prescription Pill Overdoses Are Sending Thousands Of Kids To The Hospital

The CDC reviewed medical data between 2007 and 2011 and found that more than 9,000 U.S. children younger than the age of six went to the hospital after an accidental overdose. Medications mentioned in the CDC study include opioid painkillers – which include Oxycontin, Percocet, and Vicodin – and medicines used to treat high blood pressure.

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It’s A No Brainer  

Teenagers and Cannabis are a Recipe for Disaster
For years the great and the good of the drug legalising world – including members and former members of the Government’s own Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs – have consistently denied that cannabis is a gateway drug or addictive. They have downplayed its devastating consequences for adolescents. They have derided or ignored cannabis prevention campaigners and the evidence presented to them
In the City of Mayor Nutter

Recovery Homes Often Unlicensed and Unhealthy

In a side business he dubbed “Dignity Recovery,” Jackson for years has run shabby “recovery homes” that house former and current clients treated at Addiction Medicine & Health Advocates (AMHA), where he works, and others.

He collects rent even though he has no rental license or zoning permit, and housing officials have repeatedly deemed the properties, including one crammed with as many as 34 beds, “unfit for human habitation,” according to city records.

During the last phone conversation on Friday, Jackson told a reporter, “I have nothing to say. Whatever you gotta do, you gotta do. I don’t think you were fair.”

Only One?

Britons Spend Almost a Year of Their Life Hungover

Macmillan Cancer Support has estimated that people spend 315 days of their lives battling with headaches and nausea caused by drinking. The charity, which is running a Go Sober for October fundraising campaign, surveyed 2,000 British adults and found that one in 14 will have more than 3,000 hangovers in their lifetime. It calculated the figures by multiplying the average amount of time people spend hungover each month with their life expectancy. “That’s why we’re asking people to sign up for Macmillan’s Go Sober fundraising event, abstain from drinking alcohol for the month of October.”

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Will She Sentence Herself to Rehab?

Judge Faces 30-Day Suspension for Intoxication
Judge Emily Dean is proof that prestige is no protection from our inner demons. Though the Fort Madison-based District Associate Judge has certainly found some success with her career, it did not prevent her to succumbing to her disease of alcoholism, which eventually interfered with her job in a big way.
More Rehabs=Less Prisons

Christie, Pelosi Help Launch Drug Rehab Center

Joined by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats at the opening of a drug rehabilitation center here, Gov. Christie continued Monday to advocate for treating nonviolent offenders instead of jailing them, saying that changing attitudes on the topic will require political courage.To break a cycle of recidivism for inmates who do not receive treatment, leaders must articulate the problem, Christie said: “We don’t have enough people saying it.”
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Stonewall, Milk, Kramer and Now This

Oregon’s Hazelden Creates First Treatment Model in Nation for
LGBTQ Community 
The first program in the country to treat addiction specifically tailored for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people has been rolled out in Oregon.

The new program, directed by Buster Ross, is being implemented by Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, the nation’s leading addiction treatment provider, at its Springbrook residential facility just 25 miles southwest of the city.

 
It’s a Good Start

Soberhead Challenge: Videos Posted to Social Media About “Giving Up Addiction”
A young man crushing energy drinks in an auto metal scrapper, another exploding his last pack of cigarettes. A mother pouring wine into her garden fountain. A woman cutting up her credit cards. The Mayor of Waukesha dumping a bottle of beer. All of these gestures of “giving up addiction,” posted in videos on Facebook, Instagram, Youtubeand Twitter are acceptances of “The Soberhead Challenge” in support of Recovery Month and in loving memory of those lost to addiction.
 

September 23 Addiction Recovery eBulletin