“Nature never sends a great man into the ground without confiding the secret to another soul.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines “confide” as follows: ‘to trust’ And it defines “trust” as: ‘reliance on the character, ability, strength or truth of someone or something’ So, what does confiding in someone, trusting someone,…
“In family relationships, love is really spelled T.I.M.E.” – Dieter Uchtdorf When I was relatively new in recovery, it was pointed out to me I would do well to choose wisely who I spent time with, in order to more readily heal and strengthen—certainly not toxify or stress out further—my mind, emotions and spirit.…
“If we have trouble seeing the miracle of recovery, we’d better look again.” – Just For Today[1] I recall vividly how quietly scared I was when I first came into recovery. One of my foremost fears was simply that I was never going to get free from the grip addiction had on me – it…
It is commonly held in modern science that a person’s genetics influence the risk of psychiatric disorders. But while genetic factors underlying addiction—i.e., alcohol and substance abuse disorder—clearly play an important role in the disease’s development, it can be hard figuring out the specifics of those factors in any given individual’s case (e.g., how does…
A report by data firm Protenus reveals an alarming problem in the midst of the opioid epidemic, and it’s called “opioid diversion.”[1] The report states that in 2018, over 47 million doses of legally prescribed opioids were “lost” due to healthcare employee theft and misuse, a startling increase of 126 percent from the previous year.…
“The concerns we have are related to the big challenges people are facing right now with COVID-19: isolation and uncertainty resulting in very high levels of stress.” — Nora Volkow, Director of the National Institute for Drug Abuse (NIDA) According to a White House drug policy office analysis, there was a significant rise (11.4%)…
Sometimes, when we finally commit to looking for help, what we find just complicates things. Indeed, what most people know about therapy, they’ve learned from TV and movies. In films, whenever someone needs help with addiction or mental health treatment, they see a psychiatrist or therapist. It doesn’t matter what title the script gives to…
Fentanyl is a powerful opiate drug that artificially raises dopamine levels in the user’s brain
I once told someone in my addiction recovery network about a guy who would brag about the length of his clean time, but always seemed angry. My friend’s reply was, “I actually know who you’re talking about. He may be abstinent, but that’s not the same as recovery.” I’ve seen over the years just how…
“Change is never painful. Only the resistance to change is painful.” – Buddha So often in early addiction recovery (or later for that matter, after months and years of being sober/clean), we find ourselves facing either relationship issues, work-related matters or other “life situations” that require us to change how we’ve approached them in the…