| ABC Anchor Elizabeth Vargas Checks into Rehab The ’20/20′ anchor checked into a rehab center on Saturday while on vacation in California. Vargas, 51, has been struggling with alcohol addiction for years. She spent several weeks in rehab last fall and is in the midst of a divorce with husband and songwriter Marc Cohen. CONTINUED | | BENCHMARK RECOVERY CENTER | | Russell Brand: Robin Williams’ Divine Madness Will No Longer Disrupt The Sadness of The World Robin Williams could have tapped anyone in the western world on the shoulder and told them he felt down and they would have told him not to worry, that he was great, that they loved him. He must have known that. He must have known his wife and kids loved him, that his mates all thought he was great, that millions of strangers the world over held him in their hearts, a hilarious stranger that we could rely on to anarchically interrupt, the all-encompassing sadness of the world. CONTINUED | | Dr. Carl Hart Debates Kennedy About Legalizing Marijuana On All In With Chris Hayes, Patrick Kennedy, who represents various pharmaceutical companies, explains why his wealthy corporate sponsors want marijuana to remain illegal despite racial disparities in the current application of drug policy.Dr. Carl Hart explains to Chris Hayes why Patrick is wrong. CONTINUED | | The Controversy Continues | | A Misguided Attempt to Bring Addiction Out of The Closet While it may be true that a movement needs something to move against in order to define itself, the charges leveled at Alcoholics Anonymous – surely one of the most inclusive and unlikely-to-retaliate organizations on the planet – by Greg D. Williams’s doc The Anonymous People are so misplaced as to render this otherwise well-meaning full length P.S.A. announcement almost incoherent. CONTINUED | | DR. KREVOY EATING DISORDERS PROGRAM | | Are Gamers Really Addicted, Or Just Not Taking Responsibility? Addiction is a term frequently bandied about to explain all kinds of excessive behaviour, ranging from the use of hard drugs like opiates all the way down to relentless monitoring of Facebook and other social media. As The National reported this week, it has also been used to describe those who succumb to incessant playing of video games. Sometimes excessive gaming is just a symptom of something else. CONTINUED | | EPIC TRANSFORMATION RETREAT | | Vanity Fair Celebrity Journalist Looks for a Comeback He smoked a joint with Heath Ledger in Prague. He interviewed Courtney Love while she soaked in a tub. He crawled into a bed with Cher. Barry Diller and Diane von Furstenberg held a book party for Mr. Sessums at Indochine when he published his 2007 memoir, “Mississippi Sissy.” CONTINUED | | Side Effect of Legalization? | | Cannabis Use Drops Because Teenagers In States Where It Was Legalised Think It’s ‘Uncool’ “Later this month, we’ll launch a youth prevention campaign that encourages kids not to risk damaging their growing brains by experimenting with marijuana. If we want Colorado to be the healthiest state in the nation, then we need to make sure our youngest citizens understand the risks of using potentially harmful substances,” Dr Wolk added. CONTINUED | | THE 2013 REEL Recovery Highlight Reel | REEL Recovery Film Festival HIGHLIGHT
Reel 2013
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 | | Dj Rashad’s Death Confirmed As Drug Overdose Rashad Harden, better known as DJ Rashad, died earlier this year after overdosing on a mix of heroin, cocaine and Xanax, toxicology results have confirmed. An autopsy in the days after Harden’s death proved inconclusive, meaning that medical examiners had to wait for the toxicology results to be returned. Last week they confirmed that it had been a drug-related death. CONTINUED | | The Guardian – Comment by Bridie Jabour | | My Friends Should Know Better: There’s No Pride In Alcoholism Share your sexy anonymous escapades, your tales of teenage shoplifting, your vaguely criminal tax return. I won’t judge you. But don’t you dare flippantly call yourself alcoholic. As inevitably as rumours of Beyonce’s divorce leading to sell-out shows on her tour with Jay Z, on a Friday night my social media feeds will begin to fill with the refrain “I’m such an alcoholic lol”. CONTINUED | | Wrestling with God And Apple Pie | | The Struggle of Recovering From Food Addiction When Food is Everywhere On a warm spring evening, two members of Food Addicts in Recovery Anonymous are contemplating what it is like not to contemplate food all the time. Morgan and Hazel, whose names have been changed at their request, are waiting for the support group’s monthly meeting to begin, an hour from now, at a church in Westwood. CONTINUED | | VISIT OUR NEWSLETTER ARCHIVES | FOR EVERY
Past Issue
of the
Addiction/Recovery eBulletin
| | New Hampshire Declares State Of Emergency: 44 People Overdose On Synthetic Pot The state is working to pull the bubble gum flavor of “Smacked!” from stores after at least 44 people have overdosed on the brand of synthetic marijuana. The man-made product is legally sold as potpourri, but many users smoke it because it mimics the effects of pot. CONTINUED | | Sad Warning Story of the Week | | Woman Found In Bin Had Apparent Cocaine Binge An autopsy report on a woman whose body was found in April on the side of the road in a storage bin indicated that she died from a lethal dose of cocaine. The examiner, Dr. John D. Butts, wrote that an “investigation by the authorities uncovered a history of multiple days of heavy crack cocaine smoking on the part of this decedent and another party.” CONTINUED | | Addict Actress Danniella Westbrook Back on Cocaine VIDEO Shamed actress Danniella Westbrook admitted snorting coke as she struggled to get over her relationship breakdown. The disgusted former soap star has today revealed the depths of her sordid behaviour, sleeping with her drug dealer who then abandoned her on a Maguluf beach. Former EastEnders star Danniella- clean for 12 years – said she was full of self loathing after the seedy fling with a man who gave her cocaine in Spain. CONTINUED | | Media: Book Review-White Russian Anyone | | Alcoholism and Autocracy in Russian History A newly published book highlights the critical role vodka has played in Russian history. The work, titled Alcohol, Autocracy, and the Secret History of the Russian State, sees an enduring connection between vodka and the autocratic political institutions and policies that have characterized Russia for centuries. CONTINUED | | Police Find Cocaine Hiding In Woman’s Breast Implants Police say they have arrested a woman who landed at Madrid’s international airport with 1.7 kilograms (3.7 pounds) of cocaine hidden in her breast implants. Narcotics agents grew suspicious when the 43-year-old Venezuelan woman exhibited unspecified strange behavior during a routine screening of passengers who had just arrived from Bogota, Colombia. The passenger then “became nervous and confessed to carrying cocaine implants,” a police statement said Friday. CONTINUED | | Attention New Yorkers!
Invitation to Receive FREE Passes to our
| | | Robin Williams, 1951-2014, New Yorker Magazine Many leading directors-Barry Levinson, Gus Van Sant, Terry Gilliam, Christopher Nolan, Peter Weir-entrusted him with meaty roles, and such faith is hard to quibble with, just as the warmth with which his admirers clung to films like “Mrs. Doubtfire” and “Dead Poets Society” was lasting and unfeigned. (The climactic scene from the latter-students standing on their classroom desks in worshipful tribute to Williams’s character, their departing English teacher-has been acted out afresh, and posted online, since the news of his death.) CONTINUED | | INDIEGOGO Goes for
REEL Recovery Film Festival,
New York &
Los Angeles
| | DUFFY’S NAPA VALLEY REHAB | | Kardashian Reportedly Agrees To Check Into Rehab! After months of his famous family’sconstant concern for his well-being,Rob Kardashian has finally agreed to check into a treatment facility to cope with his substance abuse issues,InTouch is reporting. “He’s looking at Bridges to Recovery,” an insider reveals, referring to a Beverly Hills treatment center catering to those suffering from mental health and addiction problems.” CONTINUED | | If Alcohol Labels Were Accurate One shot of “Vomit Everywhere,” please. If that’s what Jägermeister were actually called, we’re betting there would be fewer rounds of “Vomit” going around in bars. But if we’re being completely honest. CONTINUED | | COMMUNITY RECOVERY L.A. TREATMENT CENTER | | From Astronaut Buzz Aldrin | | Buzz Aldrin I regarded Robin Williams as a friend and fellow sufferer. His passing is a great loss. The torment of depression and the complications of addiction that accompany it affect millions, including myself and family members before me – my grandfather committed suicide before I was born and my mother the year before I went to the moon – along with hundreds of veterans who come to a similar fate each year. As individuals and as a nation we need to be compassionate and supportive of all who suffer and give them the resources to face life. Robin Williams – RIP | | ON THE PASSING OF ROBIN WILLIAMS… One theory of death is that, upon our passing, we experience our lives again backwards. Whatever I gave or did not give to others, I will experience what they experienced — times ten. That would mean that for every laugh — either a small chuckle or outright guffaw –every smile that Robin Williams caused to occur in others, he is now experiencing tenfold. That would amount to bliss unending. May it be so.
Juxtaposed with both irony and tragedy, of course, is the unspeakable suffering that would have led to his death, and the grief today of those who knew him best and loved him most. Let’s hold both truths in our hearts — a deep appreciation that a comic genius walked among us and shared his gifts with us, thanks for the opportunity we had and still have to enjoy his talent, and prayers of peace for his soul and comfort for his family. Dear God,
May Robin Williams be blessed.
May he find in heaven the peace he could not find on earth.
May he know now the joy that he gave to all of us.
Give comfort to his family,
and rest unto his soul.
Amen | | Mothers Have It Hardest VIDEO | | The Death-Like Life of An Overdose Victim VIDEO He was in a coma for six weeks. He went blind and had no function in his arms or legs. He could not speak or swallow. Hospitalized for 14 months, Alex, who is 6-foot-1, dropped to 90 pounds. One of his doctors said that Alex had come as close to dying as anyone he knew who had not actually died. CONTINUED | | This Is Your Brain on Eggs | | Cooking Crack – Op-Ed Columnist NYT When he opened Zahav in May 2008, he was sleeping just an hour or two many nights, and the reason wasn’t work. It was crack cocaine. He smoked it compulsively. Sometimes he mixed things up and smoked – or snorted – heroin instead. There was also booze: Scotch, vodka, triple sec, whatever was within reach. His reputation was on the rise. He was on the skids. He partied more than he studied. To pay for all the pot he was smoking, he became a dealer. CONTINUED | | Human-Sized Rat Cages Target Teen Marijuana Use VIDEO The $2 million “Don’t Be a Lab Rat” campaign was funded by legal settlements with pharmaceutical companies. It will also feature TV commercials starting Monday that suggest marijuana impairs mental function in teens’ still-developing brains and could cause long-term mental problems. CONTINUED | | Big Pharma Goes for Broke – Medicare | | New Hep C Medication Costs $84,000 for 12 Week Regimen Months before Gilead Sciences’ breakthrough hepatitis C treatment hit the market, Oregon Medicaid official Tom Burns started worrying about how the state could afford to cover every enrollee infected with the disease. He figured the cost might even reach $36,000 per patient. Then the price for the drug was released last December: $84,000 for a 12-week treatment course. CONTINUED | | 14 Faces of Drug Addiction These sobering images created by Rehabs.com, which is an organization dedicated to raising awareness about addiction and seeking help for those in need of treatment, show the before and after effects of the harsh reality of drugs. Sadly, in just a short span of time, users become barely recognizable. Are the photos all legitimate? CONTINUED | | Doctor Pleads Guilty in Overdose Deaths The pain management doctor, pleaded guilty to eight counts of second-degree murder under a deal with Oklahoma County prosecutors, who agreed to drop dozens of drug charges. The deal calls for the 71-year-old Valuck to spend eight years in prison. CONTINUED | | Many Addicts Wrongly Labeled Violent,
by Kevin Jordan, Mt. Olive prison inmate Unfortunately I am an addict who was not in my correct state of mind when I committed my offense eight years ago. There are a significant number of human beings being labeled “violent” in this state instead of being labeled “addict” and sentenced to unruly lengths of time and clogging the penal system as a result. CONTINUED | | DO YOU LIKE OUR eBULLETIN? | We Welcome Your Feedback! If you have any comments, compliments or suggestions for our weekly Addiction/Recovery eBulletin, please contact us at:
Writers In Treatment | REEL RECOVERY FILM FESTIVAL is a social, educational, networking and recovery forum showcasing first-time filmmakers and experienced professionals who make films about addiction and recovery. Our audience is treatment professionals, people in recovery, members of the entertainment industry, media representatives, educated moviegoers and the general public.
| Addiction/Recovery eBulletin Publisher & Editor:
Leonard Buschel – Send an email | | Gene Simmons to Those Suffering from Depression & Substance Abuse: Go Kill Yourselves Simmons further added how those dealing with substance abuse often find fault in a “harsh” world. The legendary bass player cited his mother’s experiences in a Nazi camp as the reason why he could not get along well with such mentally ill people. “My mother was in a concentration camp in Nazi Germany. I don’t want to hear f*** all about ‘the world as a harsh place’,” Simmons said. “She gets up every day, smells the roses, and loves life. CONTINUED | | A Disease With Fatal Consequences | | Texas Father Accused Of Shooting Dead DUI Driver Who Killed His Sons Legal experts acknowledge prosecutors could face a greater challenge than simply proving who committed the shooting, similar to another Texas case from 2012 in which a grand jury declined to indict a father who killed a man who molested his child. CONTINUED | | Do You Have Drug Addict Genes? One day in 2010 her oldest son Joe confessed that he was addicted to heroin. He had been on hard drugs for two years already, the last six to nine months on heroin. Forsyth recalled feeling like her whole world was crumbling apart, falling to the floor and curling up in the fetal position. “It ripped my heart out,” she said, “I just never thought it would happen to me.” CONTINUED | | REEL Recovery Film Festival LAS VEGAS | | |