Addiction counseling expert lived the nightmare

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MEDIA: New Book is a Waking Dream –

Nov. 3, 2019 – She did so and then completed a recovery program and after some time moved to Texas where, in addition to adhering to the Alcoholics Anonymous 12 steps, she took her first steps in volunteerism. Napier is convinced that, along with her Christian faith, is what saved her. “There is hope for addicts and it lies in giving back,” she said from Tucson. Her own path lay in working with the Jewish Federation in support of Israel. She made friends there who urged her to return to college, which she did, earning undergraduate and graduate degrees in counseling. And that was the start of a career in which she worked with other addicts to turn their lives around. In the process, she learned to listen and talk to families too.

Some of the steps families can take are part of the clinical process of weaning and keeping an addict off drugs. Family members are integral to recovery, she believes. And the more families know, the better they are able to help recovery work and to keep their own lives on track. Addiction issues — the outbursts, the violence, the neglect and so on — place the addict so squarely in the middle that families “are left out in the cold,” she said. “They worry about their loved one. They can’t sleep. They are grieving about their loved one.”