LEGALIZE IT – March 3, 2023 – Ibogaine By David Dardashti, an organization focusing on providing ibogaine treatment to those afflicted with opiate addiction, recently visited Ohio to explore the potential economic benefits if the state were to legalize the substance. “Ibogaine Legislation” Led by David Dardashti, a successful real estate entrepreneur since his 26th year, and Chief Operations Officer Cole Barressi, Ibogaine By David Dardashti flew out to Cleveland to discuss potential opportunities that would arise if the state of Ohio were to pass ibogaine legislation. With the housing market in Cleveland becoming increasingly inexpensive, this could prove to…
Author: Leonard Buschel
INCLUDING PROTEIN BARS – Feb. 29, 2024 – Research involving almost 10 million people has found a direct association between eating too many ultra-processed foods — those breads, cereals, snacks and frozen meals that have been industrially manufactured with flavors and additives to make them more palatable — and more than 30 health conditions, including heart disease, anxiety and early death. In recent years, dozens of studies have found that people who consume a lot of ultra-processed foods have higher rates of weight gain, obesity, cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes and other chronic diseases. Now, a team of international researchers…
AND THOSE LEFT BEHIND – March 6, 2024 – “The black balloon is a symbolism of death, and today is Black Balloon Day,” said Tahira Malik, founder of Samad’s House. “Historically, when you go to a funeral, you’re wearing colors of black because you’re in mourning. We commemorate the lives that were lost due to overdose deaths because it did not have to happen. We do have the power to not let it happen. We do have the power to recognize the signs of a drug overdose. We do have the power to come together as a community to give…
“Remember that just because you hit bottom doesn’t mean you have to stay there.” – Robert Downey, Jr., Academy Award winner
VIDEO – A CONVERSATION – March 6, 2024 – Leonard Lee Buschel is California Certified Substance Abuse Counselor. He is an influential treatment navigator and a seasoned writer, editor, publisher and author of the memoir,’ HIGH: Confessions of a Cannabis Addict’. Watch this fascinating and enthralling interview with the author. Catch our live shows streaming via Facebook and find edited episodes archived on our website. Can’t be there in real-time? Subscribe to our podcasts at https://www.transformationtalkradio.com and take the transformative journey with you wherever you go. WATCH@YouTube
LEADING THE WAY – Feb. 29, 2024 – Most knew Victoria Burns as an ace student securing straight A’s at one of the country’s most prestigious universities. But underneath the McGill student’s intellectual sharpness was a part of her she kept closely guarded. There were times she did seek help, but whenever she shared about her alcohol addiction, she said she was turned away. She wished students like her had more support. In the end, it was a fellow graduate student who sparked her desire to recover from alcoholism. That was more than a decade ago. On Wednesday, the…
VIDEO – THE MAGIC OF A SOBER LIFE – Feb. 29, 2024 – Laura McKowen has been sober for more than a decade, but her difficult journey to recovery took years and an escalating series of crises caused by her alcohol use. After her first Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, she spent a year working on her sobriety. Her first book We Are The Luckiest: The Surprising Magic of a Sober Life hit store shelves in early 2020. She gained a significant following on social media and soon launched her own online sobriety support community The Luckiest Club. In 2023, McKowen released…
THE MELODY OF THE GODS – Feb. 24, 2024 – Discover how artists like Sam Canty and Tyler Childers are reshaping the music industry narrative by embracing sobriety, highlighting the strength and creativity of the sober artist. In a world where the glitz and glamour of the music industry often overshadow the personal battles of those within it, a new narrative is emerging, one that is both inspiring and sobering. February witnessed an unexpected yet impactful declaration from Sam Canty of Treaty Oak Revival during a performance, as he announced his sobriety of over a year. This revelation, unexpected…
IS PEACE OF MIND – Feb. 20, 2024 – After what he described as a routine surgery, Chapman developed an opioid addiction and, at one point, was taking up to 50 painkillers a day. He says the drug addiction was a gateway to a gambling addiction which cost him nearly all of the $40 million he earned during his career. “Sports and addiction kind of go hand-in-hand because most people that do anything just really great in this lifetime, no matter what it is … Most of those people have sacrificed a little bit of sanity to get there,” the…
IT’S A LONG SHOT – Feb. 26, 2024 – “Sports betting used to be taboo, now it’s openly promoted and easily accessible through phones,” says Dr. Louise Stanger, an interventionist and gambling addiction expert. “Young people are especially vulnerable as their prefrontal cortex isn’t fully developed. They’re seeking excitement and peer validation, not recognizing the downsides.” While gambling is illegal for those under 18 or 21, depending on the state, access has never been easier with offshore websites and apps that have lax age verification. The stakes go beyond money – a 2022 study showed that “Suicide is among…
LONG TERM LONGEVITY – Feb. 26, 2024 – Sid Korn should be dead. First came encephalitic polio as a baby. Next, binge drinking, a mood-altering habit acquired in college to beat loneliness, became routine as an adult for decades. Then came two cancer scares that left doctors scratching their heads, wondering…??? Korn, who lives in Madison with his family, shares his health-life journey with anyone who is willing to listen. A participant in the historic All of UsResearch Program-UW + an active member of its local community advisory board, Korn is fervently devoted to leaving the world better than…
WARNING! – Feb. 24. 2024 – Dietary supplement products sold across the nation are being recalled as they have been found to contain a poisonous plant, posing a serious health risks to those who’ve purchased the pills. The FDA says TejoRoot and Brazil Seed were sold through online sources such as Amazon and www.handnatural.com. This also includes Walmart’s online shopping site. Dietary supplement products sold across the nation are being recalled as they have been found to contain a poisonous plant, posing a serious health risks to those who’ve purchased the pills. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA)…
CHARITY vs. GREED – Feb. 24, 2024 – Municipal Police in Porto, Portugal regularly patrol areas used by drug consumers. Police in Portugal don’t arrest people who use drugs. Instead they have a strong track record referring people in addiction to counseling and treatment. Talk to people addicted to street drugs in Lisbon, Portugal’s capital, and you hear confusion and dismay over the carnage of overdose deaths taking place an ocean away in the U.S. Ana Batista, a soft-spoken woman in her 50s who’s been addicted to heroin for years, said she hasn’t lost a single friend or family member…
THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE – Feb. 25, 2024 – On a narrow North Philadelphia street lined with row houses and a busy auto body shop, Marsella Elie climbs the front steps of a private residence and knocks hard on the front door. A middle-aged man appears with a wary look on his face. “Hello sir, how are you doing today?” asks Elie. She wears a royal blue jacket embroidered with the city government’s Liberty Bell logo. “Hold on, two seconds. My name is Marsella. I’m working with the city. You heard about the overdoses that are going around…
A MATTER OF OPINION – Feb. 24, 2024 – I am but a humble writer, a scribe of the soul, whose artistic vitality derives most fervently from that enticing she-demon, the imbibable spirit. I am “just a lazy fucking asshole who blew all the rent money on Stella Artois and Johnnie Walker.” My literary works is my humble submission to the great library of profundity: Hemingway, Bukowski, Camus, and me. Each day I endeavor to fulfill my duty-bound sacrifice when I alight to enshrine the universal truths of man: that suffering is inevitable; that life is a constant negotiation between…
FILMS FOR LIFE – Feb. 26, 2026 – Critic Roger Ebert, himself a recovering alcoholic, gave When a Man Loves a Woman four stars and wrote that it was: “a wise and ambitious film about the way alcoholism affects the fabric of a marriage.” “So many movies about the disease simplify it into a three-step process: Gradual onset, spectacular bottom, eventual recovery,” he wrote. “It isn’t that simple; most alcoholics never even give themselves a chance to recover. And recovery is a beginning, not an end.” READ@MovieMaker
VIDEO – THE SYMBOLISM OF LOSS – Feb. 26, 2024 – Gabi Deaton’s The Black Balloon Project shares the stories of people who have died of an overdose through photos of their loved ones. Each photo is paired with a paragraph about the person lost, written by a friend or family member. She says the project is to help break the stigma surrounding substance use disorder. “I’m so grateful for these families to be willing to tell their stories, but I know that they don’t want to know me, and I don’t want them to have to know me on…
VIDEO – USED, NOT DAMAGED – Feb. 25, 2024 – Secondhand clothing is giving people a second chance at life. Two thrift stores sell gently used clothes, shoes and other items and the proceeds go to the non-profit Hannah’s Haven. It’s a residential recovery home for women battling addiction and other issues. Women enroll in the program for two years. Each woman working at Hannah’s Bridge Thrift Boutique has her own story of how she became part of Hannah’s Haven. For Chelsey Johnson, her battle was addiction. “I was addicted to crack cocaine,” she said. “I had lost custody…
ONLY VIDEO – TWO TRIBES – Feb. 28. 2024 – Two First Nations men from Calgary share their thoughts on the opioid crisis. They talk about their journey through addiction and treatment, and the importance of friendship. WATCH@YouTube
FYI – Feb. 29, 2024 – That is even if his disability was the reason for the conduct, according to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Although unpublished (meaning it shouldn’t be cited as binding precedent), this ruling reinforces the principle that employers may hold employees with disabilities accountable for performance and conduct standards. In Harrison v. Sheriff, Holmes County Florida, a lieutenant with a sheriff’s department suffered from mental health issues and alcoholism, which were known to his employer. One day, while working on call, the employee called a colleague (with whom he had an…
NON-GUILTY AS CHARGED – March 2, 2024 – Buprenorphine had changed Scott’s life — it gave him a sense of normalcy, he said, and set him on the path to law school. His future, however, would come to hinge on a choice that didn’t feel like much of a choice at all: get off the medication that protected him from relapse and attend abstinence-only treatment, or lose his chance to become a lawyer. On his bar application, Scott disclosed that he had been convicted of three misdemeanors nearly two decades earlier, as well as accused of other criminal charges…
PERU MUST BE HAPPY – Feb. 25, 2024 – “Cocaine abuse will not only cause physical and mental harm, but will also cost abusers their life savings, and burden them with enormous debts since they cannot get rid of the addiction to the drug.” The dangers of cocaine abuse would figure in television and radio advertisements put out by the Security Bureau’s narcotics division this year. The committee said it was also concerned about online drug traps, which included various groups that invited people to join drug-taking activities through instant messaging and dating applications. “In some cases, drugs would also…
AND SOBER SINCE 1999 – Feb. 25, 2024 – The 63-year-old drag queen and reality competition host revealed that he had been getting high ‘every day I could’ going back to when he was just 10 years old. He is giving his fans an intimate look at his decades-long battle with addiction in his upcoming memoir The House Of Hidden Meanings. Although he spoke openly of his struggles with substance abuse, it took RuPaul’s then-partner and future husband Georges LeBar’s own addiction to help him realize he had a problem. RuPaul (full name: RuPaul Andre Charles) recounted how he was…
CARRYING THE MESSAGE – Feb. 24, 2024 – The beloved actress and former star of “Pretty Little Liars,” marked a significant milestone in her journey towards sobriety. In a touching Instagram post the 34-year-old reflected on the transformative impact of her decision to prioritize her health and well-being, offering words of encouragement and support to others struggling with addiction. With unwavering honesty and vulnerability, Hale expressed gratitude for the profound changes that sobriety has brought into her life, describing it as “the greatest gift” she has ever given herself. “I remain so grateful for another year of growth, growing pains,…
HOW MANY MORE? – March 3. 2024 – The drug that helped Alex Cottam turn his life around was also the one that ended up killing him. Alex, a 27-year-old software engineer, had been prescribed pregabalin to help him with the anxiety and depression that he had been battling with ever since his father James died 14 years earlier. At first pregabalin helped him feel normal and thrive at work. But Cottam soon became reliant on its powerful effects, which led to dependency and the use of other prescription drugs. He died of an unintentional overdose two years after first…
WHERE THERE IS SMOKE… – Feb. 23, 2024 – Aracely is addicted to electronic cigarettes. Not only has this addiction been expensive, it’s also been hazardous, affecting her lungs and sending her to the hospital. Unfortunately, vaping isn’t the only health issue Aracely is dealing with. She was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder … Aracely, 22, is battling an addiction that has already put her in the hospital, saddled her with medical debt and continues to drain two-thirds of her budget every month. Seeking help, she appeared on a recent episode of Caleb Hammer’s YouTube show…
ONLY IF YOU DO TOO MANY – Feb. 26, 2024 – Are you curious about the buzz around magic mushrooms but worried about how much is too much? It’s a valid concern—after all, psilocybin mushrooms carry the potential for an out-of-this-world experience. Don’t worry; our guide dives into the world of shrooms to help you understand both their wonders and risks. Keep reading, let’s make sense… Venturing into the world of shrooms can be like stepping onto a roller coaster in the dark; you may not see every twist and turn. While seeking euphoria, it’s crucial to recognize the ride…
VIDEO – HE WILL BE MISSED – Feb. 28, 2024 – Lewis, who revealed he had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2023, died at his home in Los Angeles on Tuesday night after suffering a heart attack. After getting sober from drugs and alcohol in 1994, Lewis put out his 2008 memoir, “The Other Great Depression” — a collection of fearless, essay style riffs on his life — and “Reflections from Hell.” A regular performer in clubs and on late-night TV for decades, Lewis also played Marty Gold, the romantic co-lead opposite Jamie Lee Curtis, in the ABC…
PASSING IT ON – Feb. 28, 2024 – Ellen DeGeneres Show” producer Andy Lassner — who struggled with addiction in the past — says the late comedian Richard Lewis saved his life. Lassner posted a touching tribute to the “Curb Your Enthusiasm” star after news of his death broke Wednesday. He was one of the many angels in my life who saved me.” Lassner posted that within a year of moving to Los Angeles in 1998, addiction had “once again ravaged” his life. “I was a mess,” he wrote, adding that he barely remembers being taken to a 12-step meeting…
AUDIO – LAUGHTER INCLUDED AT NO EXTRA COST – Feb. 29, 2024 – Tributes that poured in for comedian Richard Lewis, who died late Tuesday at the age of 76, highlighted his comedic presence and stalwart friendship, but he played another major role in others’ lives as well — helping people get sober. “He helped me. I am forever grateful for him for that act of grace alone,” Jamie Lee Curtis said. Curtis said his sobriety was one of the two most important things in Lewis’s life, along with his wife of nearly 20 years, Joyce Lapinsky. Meanwhile, Andy…