Topic: Real Stories
Stories about real people, real successes and real recovery.
“As an ex-heroin addict, I know getting off opioids is near impossible.”
I am a married, middle-aged woman, a taxpaying homeowner. As privilege goes, I have it. Because I’m White, I get treated better in medical settings such as hospitals and rehabs. I have health insurance. I have access to credit. My spouse could not be more supportive. But every day for a couple of years I left my house with a river view and drove downtown in South Yonkers to meet my dealer. I know a letter carrier who once worked that neighborhood. He told me there was a time when you could buy an Uzi on his route. I knew the first time I bought heroin at age 48 that doing so probably meant the end of my life. But compared to withdrawal, that was fine by me.
A Former Alcoholic Tells How Running Helped His Recovery
Part of Mike’s story was being a habitual DUI offender. After being placed on county probation due to multiple DUI offenses, Mike finally realized that the consequences of his drinking could negatively affect his son. He got tired of backtracking his life with law issues, financial issues, and everything else he couldn’t juggle or keep straight because of his relationship with alcohol. Knowing that he needed mandated treatment for himself, Mike did a three-year diversion program that changed his life and he has been sober ever since. The diversion program was more of a life management program to him than a non-drinking program because he learned how to live life in a lot of ways. Mike Grant is now a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and a Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselor. He currently works as an addiction therapist for Kaiser Permanente and as an adjunct professor in the Alcohol and Drug Counseling Program at Portland Community College.is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and a Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselor. Mike currently works as an addiction therapist for Kaiser Permanente and as an adjunct professor in the Alcohol and Drug Counseling Program at Portland Community College.
‘I was scared to get sober’: He dealt heroin, now he’s been clean six years
SUBSCRIBE DONATE NOW Search Posts and/or Pages DONATE NOW Date: | Contributor: Source: ( ) | Category: Summary and Analysis... This is a story in the Courier-Journal chronicling the drug addiction and road to recovery for Erik Gunn. He was helped by a drug rehabilitation program and the support of the community. Mr. Gunn has been drug-free for six years, a success that
Dark Genies, Dark Horizons: The Riddle of Addiction
This is an article by Dr. Sally Satel (bio), practicing psychiatrist and lecturer at the Yale University School of Medicine, published in Culture and Politics Liberties journal. She references the story of the late Anthony Bourdain (celebrity chef and TV host) and his lifetime struggle with addiction. The title for her article was inspired by this story from Bourdain as she recounts in the article: By the time of his (Bourdain’s) visit to Provincetown in 2014, a wave of painkillers had already washed over parts of Massachusetts and a new tide of heroin was rolling in. Bourdain wanted to see it for himself and traveled northwest to Greenfield, a gutted mill town that was a hub of opioid addiction. In a barebones meeting room, he joined a weekly recovery support group. Everyone sat in a circle sharing war stories, and when Bourdain’s turn came he searched for words to describe his attraction to heroin. “It’s like something was missing in me,” he said, “whether it was a self-image situation, whether it was a character flaw. There was some dark genie inside me that I very much hesitate to call a disease that led me to dope.”
New Bay Area Program Emphasizes Abstinence Only Drug Policy
An uprising is taking place in San Francisco. In a city now known as much for its humanitarian crisis and social breakdown as for its steep hills and beautiful bridges, formerly incarcerated people, mostly black men, are refusing to be homeless, addicted, and unprepared for life and success. On September 7, the Positive Directions Treatment, Recovery, and Prevention Academy, an alternative-sentencing program that serves up to 84 formerly incarcerated men, opened its doors. Program participants receive up to 30 months of transformational support in a structured residential setting, at no cost to them. Spearheaded by Steve Adami, director of the Adult Probation Department’s Reentry Division, and in partnership with Westside Community Services and Positive Direction Equals Change, the Academy works to help former prisoners live honorably and independently.
Medication-Assisted Treatment in the Real World
Medication-assisted treatment with products containing buprenorphine seems to be the primary solution encouraged by official sources. But, determining the value of medication-assisted treatment requires considering both peer-reviewed studies and real-life experience in the calculation of risks and rewards. Important aspects of buprenorphine use are its ongoing effects on quality of life and the difficulties people encounter when withdrawing from it.
Buzz A. sharing his Experience, Strength, and Hope in 1983
A recorded Alcoholics Anonymous meeting from 1983 in which Buzz Aldrin talks about his life, his alcoholism and getting sober.
The Drugging of the American Boy
SUBSCRIBE DONATE NOW Search Posts and/or Pages DONATE NOW The Drugging of the American Boy Date: | Contributor: Source: Esquire (3/27/14) | Category: Summary and Analysis... An article from several years ago that points out the disconcertingly high rate at which American boys are drugged for behaviors that previously would have been considered natural. At the time of the article approximately 20% of boys were being prescribed