Category: From Addiction Recovery Bulletin

Addiction Recovery Bulletin

…AND PLEASURABLE – 

March 8, 2021 – The road to recovery

McCallum said he’s hopeful that his story can help people better understand the reality of overcoming substance addiction, and what they can do to help.

“My addiction started while in high school, changing the trajectory of my life,” McCallum said in an email. “I was a ‘straight A’ student in ninth grade and was very anti-drugs. I was raised as a Jehovah’s witness, and I was educated in school to the dangers of alcohol and other substances.”

He said it was around that time that many of his close friends began drinking and smoking.

“It looked fun, and they did not appear to have any negative consequences,” he said. “Soon, I began using these substances also. I quickly lost interest in attending school or studying, and I dropped out from Stevenson High School.”

That’s when he began to develop symptoms of anxiety and depression, which led him to see a doctor who prescribed narcotic medications. He was also prescribed opioid medications around the same time, after a dental procedure — his first introduction to opioids and the start of what would become a long-term dependence with many consequences.

McCallum’s recovery began shortly after he was accepted into a sobriety program at Warren’s 37th District Court, which included participation in a 12-step program, counseling and recovery coaching. He and his mother also began attending meetings of Families Against Narcotics, hearing the stories of other people with family members who were struggling with addiction.

“I understand now that addiction is a family disease, because the impact the disease has extends to the entire family,”…

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Addiction Recovery Bulletin

BOOK REVIEW – 

MARCH 11, 2021 – “I wouldn’t have written ‘Model Citizen’ if I hadn’t had the fourth stroke,” Mohr recalls in a phone conversation from his home in Seattle. In 2015, Mohr learned that he has an 8-millimeter hole in his heart, which dramatically increases the odds that a blood clot will travel to his brain. Adding irony to injury: Following surgery to repair his heart, he is prescribed fentanyl. It’s not for nothing that the second part of “Model Citizen” is called “The Freelapse.” After moving with his family from San Francisco to Seattle, Mohr suffers a fourth stroke, which he describes as chillingly mundane: At home watching a John Cassavetes film one afternoon, he feels his arm go numb. Following another round of treatment, doctors tell him he’s unlikely to live past his 40s. For Mohr, it’s a reason to double down on what he’s accomplished: being a good husband and father and a dedicated writer.

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Addiction Recovery Bulletin

STRENGTH AND BEAUTY – 

March 10, 2021 – Talking about her struggles with addiction isn’t new for Kristen Johnston, but the “3rd Rock from the Sun” actor is now approaching 14 years of sobriety and is sharing some of the hard lessons she’s learned along the way. In a new interview with journalist Elizabeth Vargas on her “Heart of the Matter” podcast, the 53-year-old reflected on what it was like to be a “functioning alcoholic/addict” early on in her career.

“Just thinking about that time in my life, it gives me chills,” she said.The actor described her addiction as an “off-and-on relationship” and said it worsened after she wrapped the hit series in 2001. “Certainly I struggled with it on that show but not to the extent where I missed stuff or was high during the show taping. So I was able to keep a lid on it for a couple of years and then we became married (me and my opiates) a couple years after ‘3rd Rock’ and it was a very abusive relationship,” she said.  Johnston, whose sister died in August 2020 after battling addiction, said it was challenging to watch her sister struggle while she, herself, was in recovery.  “It was just a very painful thing for my family,” she said. “So I connect to (the loved ones) of addicts and the addict because I’ve been both. I really understand how painful it is to love an addict. I don’t know which one is a greater hell.” The actor admitted that it took a lot of time, energy and money to keep up her addiction and said she’s relieved that she found the strength to seek out help when she did.  “The thing I’m happiest about in my life is that I’m no longer using,” she said.

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Addiction Recovery Bulletin

NO NAMES or PET NAMES? – 

Feb. 18, 2021 – A quote I like by Dr. Pat Allen is, “Anyone can have sex. Not everyone can make love. Some people only have sex, but those who can make love can do both.”

https://www.communicatewithjoi.com/blog/do-it-sober-sex-and-making-love

So, however long you are sober, are you up for some great sex and making love? If yes, get ready for some juicy experiences. Some of you, I realize, may be abstaining for awhile, or don’t have a partner at the moment. That’s okay. This information will serve to desensitize you for when the time comes. For those of you in sexual relationships now, or anyone about to embark on any new sexual activity, here are some tips on how to create a rich and fulfilling sex/love life in recovery … For anyone who wants a deeper dive into this subject, many books abound. For sober people sex can be addictive, confusing or taboo, so gathering information is a good idea. Honestly sharing any troubling thoughts with a professional or other trustworthy, sober people you admire will be key. If you are openminded and willing to to be a new YOU in the bedroom (or in the kitchen or wherever), you will discover the freedom and joy in your ability to have sex and make love.

In recovery, you’ve got your brain back, and have reconnected to your heart. This means you can learn to make love. YOU can make love. How freaking amazing is that? 

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Addiction Recovery Bulletin

DRIVING HOME SOBER – 

March 12, 2021 – My father was an alcoholic and he, too, appeared to anyone outside of our home as one of the friendliest, happiest guys around. The people on the outside didn’t see how the demons of alcohol affected him and our family before he got sober and saved his life and our family.

These were the things Kirk, who’s married with three boys ages 3, 7 and 9 years old, faced.

So, on April 29, 2019, in a hotel room in, of all places, New Orleans — the party capital of America — Kirk experienced his come-to-Jesus moment. He decided enough was enough, that he could no longer control and hide his drinking.

Less than two years removed from that lonely — but brave and powerful — moment, Kirk enters the weekend of The Players Championship two shots behind leader Lee Westwood at 7-under after shooting 65 on Friday, the low round of the tournament.

“There was a time when I’d be on the 15th hole at a tournament and I couldn’t wait to finish so I could go get a drink,’’ Kirk told The Post on Friday. “It became medication for anxiety, fear, some occasional depression and feeling pretty worthless. I couldn’t live a functional life without [alcohol]. I couldn’t wait to get done playing golf so I could get back on it. It was a bad cycle.’’

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Addiction Recovery Bulletin

LISTEN – WHAT’S UP DOC? PROFITS? – 

March 8, 2021 – At one time, 73 percent of the prescriptions from two Tennessee drug-treatment clinics involved in the case were filled in Kentucky, a federal agent said.

The company named in the indictment is EHC Medical Offices, PLLC, which had clinics in Harriman and Jacksboro. Robert Taylor, a Tennessee doctor, owned the clinics during the time covered in the charges but sold them in 2018, according to court documents.

Taylor faces the most charges in the case, including conspiracy to illegally distribute buprenorphine and anti-anxiety drugs; conspiracy to falsify medical records, to launder money and to commit wire fraud and health fraud; money laundering; and taking part in transactions involving property derived from criminal activity.

Buprenorphine, often called by the trade name Suboxone, is a drug used to help people deal with an addiction to opioid drugs.

It is often diverted from legal sources and sold illegally. People addicted to drugs often use it to keep from getting sick from withdrawal when they can’t get drugs such as pain pills, but the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration has said it can also be abused to get high.

The others charged in the case are physicians Evann Herrell, Mark Grenkoski, Kari McFarlane, Helen Bidawid, Stephen Cirelli, Eva Misra and Matthew Rasberry; nurse Lori Barnett, who managed EHC; and Kentucky residents Elmer Powers and Brian Bunch.

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Addiction Recovery Bulletin

OPINIONS ARE SPLIFFED – 

March 11, 2021 – Mr Green’s case is (sadly) all too familiar for clinical practitioners in psychiatry. Substance use comorbidity in psychotic disorders has been described as the rule rather than the exception, and it is often deleterious to the clinical course of illness.1 Cannabis (marijuana) is one of the most commonly used substances by patients with schizophrenia and related psychoses. Modulation of the endocannabinoid system by the main psychoactive component in marijuana, Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol, can induce acute psychosis and cognitive impairment.2 Over the past 2 decades, there has been extensive research on the association between cannabis and psychosis.

To better understand the relationship, it is important to synthesize recent research—through the lens of systematic quantitative reviews—including associations between cannabis and psychosis risk; the epidemiology and phenomenology of psychosis and comorbid cannabis use; associations between cannabis use and clinical course; and outcomes in psychosis. Dichotomous outcomes are reported as odds ratios (OR) with 95% confidence intervals (95% CI). Continuous measures are reported as effect sizes (ES), where an ES of 0.2 is small, 0.5 is medium, and 0.8 is large.

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Addiction Recovery Bulletin

EASY AS RIDING A BIKE – 

March 4, 2021 – To cope with my father going missing, I started drinking nonstop. I couldn’t find any way to maintain happiness. I went on like that for two or three years, and I was let go from my job—I was a bike fitter at a bike shop—for drinking while working.

Once when I was coming off a binge, and I hadn’t had a drink for maybe 18 hours, I started violently convulsing; I had a grand mal seizure. I knew at that point that I was physically addicted and needed medical help. I met with a doctor who diagnosed me with severe depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). My family helped check me into a three-month recovery program, and after that, I moved into a sober-living house.

I didn’t have a driver’s license, so I bought a blue fixie to ride to my job washing and waxing boats at Dana Point Harbor in Dana Point, California. I would ride it all the way from the house near Angels Stadium to the train station, and from the station to the harbor, and back again at night. I’d always loved riding bikes, as did my brother and dad, so these rides brought me a sliver of peace while everything else in my life felt out of control.

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Addiction Recovery Bulletin

HIGH ON ARRIVAL – 

March 11, 2021 – Phillips, whose parents were both in popular 1960s folk rock band the Mamas & the Papas, described her struggles with addiction after her tumultuous childhood during the annual Conference on Addiction at Utah Valley University on Thursday.

While attending a screening for “American Graffiti,” the early George Lucas film that Phillips acted in when she was 12, Phillips said she learned shocking details of her youth — ones she’d forgotten.

At the time of the screening years after the film’s initial release, Phillips was by then a mother in her 30s. A producer on the film asked her if she remembered when she got off a plane to film the movie, carrying a “fake leather suitcase” and all by herself. “And we said to you, ‘Where’s your guardian? You’re only 12. You can’t be all alone,’” Phillips remembered the filmmaker asking.

“And my heart started to pound. My hands started to shake,” Phillips said.

She learned the producer had needed to scramble to become her legal guardian for the duration of the film, and Phillips lived with his family.

“I had literally, absolutely no recollection and I still don’t to this day. I tell you that story because it gives a practical representation of how trauma lives … Trauma survivors don’t necessarily have memories,” Phillips said.

“But I have symptoms that have taken me throughout my whole life. Restlessness, irritability, trouble sleeping. All of these things,” she said.

That was just one example of a childhood with parents who suffered addiction Phillips shared during the conference, which took place virtually this year after being canceled last year due to the pandemic. Phillips appeared in her home in California over videoconferencing.

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Addiction Recovery Bulletin

MARKETING? – 

March 8, 2021 – When Margaret and John Millington’s son Simon was in the grips of an opioid addiction, his parents wanted to send him to a rehabilitation program. The only one available was called Narconon.

When he emerged at the end of three months he was better than they had ever seen, but he relapsed soon after and four years later died from an overdose, leaving his five-year-old daughter Maddie without a father. … Mrs Millington said “if there had been options, we wouldn’t have paid [for Simon] to go to Narconon”.

“It was the only option we had at the time. There were absolutely no government-funded rehabs around,” she said.

“We were happy to try anything to save his life, we just wanted to get Simon well.”

Narconon’s Yarra Ranges facility suspended operations in Victoria in 2019. Parks Victoria confirmed the group’s lease of its site, O’Shannassy Lodge, ended in June 2020. A new organisation under the Narcanon name was registered in March 2020, but a spokesperson from its parent organisation, the Association for Better Living and Education, said the future of the residential program and its current site was “uncertain”.

more@TheAge

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