WATCH – AND FEELING NO PAIN – Oct. 8, 2021 – Meek says that since the deaths of Mac Miller, Lil Peep and Shock G, he now has a “zero tolerance” for Percocets and the widespread of fentanyl which has claimed hundreds of lives around the country. “That shit is fentanyl. If you take Percs right now, you an asshole,” Meek said. “You can die off of just trying to get high, kill half your brain cells in your mind just by trying to get high.” more@TheSource
Author: Leonard Buschel
DRUGS CAN KILL – Oct. 7, 2021 – The medication naloxone is so effective at saving the lives of opioid overdose victims that some people worry that it might make drug users think heroin and related drugs are no longer risky. But a new study suggests that is not the case. Increased access to naloxone didn’t lead Americans, even drug users, to think heroin was less risky, the findings showed. “It is really difficult to change people’s perceptions of how risky heroin is,” said Mike Vuolo, co-author of the study and associate professor of sociology at The Ohio State…
CONFUSING DRAMA – Oct. 4, 2021 – A spokesperson for the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office previously confirmed to Page Six, “[Deputies] were informed that Mr. Margera had an ex parte order, which is a judge’s order for court-ordered rehabilitation. Those are taken out by a third party on behalf of the person.” The reality star told TMZ that he had allegedly been fresh out of another rehab program in Arizona before being transferred to an outpatient facility in Florida. Margera claimed that on the day of the casino outing, he decided to “kill time” as he waited for his…
WATCH – SISTERLY LOVE – Oct 7, 2021 – When Allison Fawcett died 11 years ago this week at age 32, after punching away at the disease for eight long years, Bladt felt like part of her had died. Her feelings of loss intensified, spiraling out of control from grief, to anger, to joylessness, to ultimately complicating matters by trying to blunt the pain with alcohol. She traveled most of America and parts of the world hoping to outrun the pain, but learned grief is a clever stowaway. Four years ago, and just a few days before the seven-year…
HE’S HIT THE BULLSEYE – Oct. 6, 2021 – “I used to blame it on my anxiety or depression issues, but really the root of all my problems was the alcohol and drugs.” Haynes first found widespread fame on 2011’s Teen Wolf. He later got a role as Green Arrow’s sidekick, Roy Harper on the CW show Arrow. After working to get sober, Haynes has been out of the spotlight, but the work continues on his recovery journey. more@ComicSands
AS I RECALL… – Oct. 8, 2021 – The Recovery Incentives Act aimed to legalize the substance use disorder treatment known as “contingency management,” and authorize Medi-Cal to cover it. Contingency management has proven to be the most effective method of treatment for methamphetamine addiction, and is frequently used as a treatment program by the Veterans Affairs Administration. This intervention program gives those struggling with substance use disorder financial rewards if they enter substance use treatment programs, stay in the program, and get and remain sober. This positive reinforcement helps people reduce and even fully stop substance use. “The…
NATURE MAY ONE DAY DO SO… – Oct. 9, 2021 – Those claims have yet to be fully vetted by scientists. The U.S. government has twice tried to restrict kratom’s use by classifying it as a controlled substance, arguing it has high potential for abuse and no known medical benefit. But public outcry and pushback from Congress thwarted those efforts. Now, kratom advocates suggest Washington is behind the WHO’s interest — an attempt to end run the federal regulatory process by taking the international route to finish what it could not accomplish domestically. The WHO’s drug dependence committee will…
WATCH – NO EQUALITY OR FRATERNITY – Oct. 7, 2021 – “Nobody looked like me. That was another barrier that I didn’t think about, you know,” Choi said. “It was like, here’s a Korean American kid in Boynton Beach, Florida, you know, in rehab with faces that don’t look like him, with people that may not understand my family structure, may not understand my culture.” That experience put Choi on the map many years later. He’s now the founder of the Harm Reduction Center in Boynton Beach. “There are other communities and pockets of people that have the same…
WATCH – TEAMMATES – Oct. 6, 2021 – “So, Denise has been in recovery for about 11 years, and I have been in recovery for 14,” said Melissa. She added fitness, especially running, has been a key part of her journey. She works as a recovery coach for Gosnold Incorporated, and she and her wife are running for “Team Gosnold.” Their goal is to help raise money and awareness for substance abuse addiction. When they hit the pavement on Monday, both will be carrying something special to honor those who fell while running their own marathons of addiction. “We…
HEROES! JUST FOR ONE DAY…AT A TIME – Oct. 8, 2021 – Sponsored by Somerset County Drug-Free Communities, Hoover and Updyke spoke as living examples to this year’s theme – “Drug-Free Looks Like Me” sharing their stories to remind the county’s youth that addiction can happen to anyone. And even more importantly, recovery can, too, said Hoover, who now works as a recovery specialist, helping drug users find their own path to sobriety. Friday’s event, held at Somerset County Courthouse, marked the 36th year the county observed Red Ribbon Week. The campaign was created in memory of Enrique “Kiki” …
IS POLITICS A RELAPSE? – Oct. 13, 2021 – During the pandemic, there’s been more stress spurred by job insecurity, job risks, illness and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of loved ones. There’s been less capacity at addiction treatment facilities. And most prevalent, Walsh argued, is that people have felt more isolated. The spread of the coronavirus “hasn’t challenged my sobriety, but I think the pandemic has forced a lot of people to kind of get away from the traditional Alcoholics Anonymous and get away from the traditional supports they have out there,” Walsh said. “And even I…
WHO DO YOU BELIEVE? – Oct. 6, 2021 – Researchers have worked for decades to tease out the relationship between teen media use and mental health. Although there is debate, they tend to agree that the evidence we’ve seen so far is complex, contradictory and ultimately inconclusive. That is equally true of Facebook’s internal marketing data, leaked by Haugen, as it is of the validated studies on the topic. That reliance on self-reporting — the teens’ own opinions — as a single indicator of harm is a problem, says Candice Odgers, a psychologist who studies adolescence at University of…
LIVE AND LET LIVE – Oct. 8, 2021 – Let’s get one thing straight: Someone being sober doesn’t automatically mean they’re in recovery or 12-stepping. Some people don’t like the taste of alcohol, others don’t like the feeling of being tipsy, and others have their own unique reasons. Don’t assume you know this person’s reasoning unless they tell you outright, which they don’t have to do. You can ask, of course, respectfully, but don’t get pushy if they demur. “You have no idea what drove them to be sober. Some have chosen sober life for religious reasons, allergies, prior…
WHO WON THE WAR? – Oct. 8, 2021 – The action was captured in a series of astonishing photographs and interviews by journalists working for Associated Press. “They are our countrymen, they are our family and there are good people inside of them,” said one Taliban fighter. “God willing, the people in the hospital will be good with them and cure them.” The people’s belongings were thrown onto a fire and burned before they were taken to the city’s largest drug rehab centre, the Avicenna Medical Hospital for Drug Treatment, where the new arrivals were stripped, bathed, and had…
WATCH – CELESTIAL COINCIDENCE – Oct. 7, 2021 – “The reality is that if you see someone unresponsive, lying on the street in this country, it’s an opioid overdose until proven otherwise,” Crystal said. More than 760,000 people have died since 1999 from a drug overdose according to the Department of Health and Human Services. Two out of three drug overdose deaths in 2018 involved an opioid, the agency reports. Roger Crystal went to help. Wife Michelle, who was driving the car, called 911. She said her husband carries the nasal spray in a bag. Police and fire departments…
THEY TASTE SUCCESS EVERY DAY – Oct. 3, 2021 – Justin traces his story back to his teenage years when he was a successful 100m athlete – he holds the record in Suffolk to this day. When he quit running at 19 and went to university, Justin “d iscovered a large void in life”, which he filled with drink and drugs. He went on to work for 15 years in bars and nightclubs followed by 10 years in restaurants. “I’ve managed to cleverly position myself in an atmosphere where it was acceptable to be a party animal,” said Justin,…
DRAWING DEADLY CONCLUSIONS – Oct. 2, 2021 – After drawing his portrait, she decided to draw others who suffered from addiction “The goal of this project is to humanize this disease and to help to erase the stigma of drug addiction,” she explains. “It’s not a moral failing. It is a disease, and every single person in all of our exhibits suffered and worked very hard in most cases to overcome it. There’s a connection – an emotional connection – that I have with every single person that I draw, and it’s through their eyes, that I really feel…
EVERY CHAIN IS GUILTY – Oct. 2, 2021 – In a bellwether federal trial starting Monday in Cleveland, Lake and Trumbull counties will try to convince a jury that the retail pharmacy companies played an outsized role in creating a public nuisance in the way they dispensed pain medication into their communities. This will be the first time pharmacy companies, in this case CVS, Walgreens, Giant Eagle and Walmart, have gone to trial to defend themselves in the nation’s ongoing legal reckoning over the opioid crisis. The trial, which is expected to last around six weeks, could set the…
LISTEN – MAYBE, MAYBE NOT – OCT. 7, 2021 – Dr. Michael Tkach is the chief behavioral health officer for Affinity. He oversees the integration of mental health-informed practice and related research initiatives for select divisions of Affinity, as well as leads the Return-to-Work division where Affinity is an industry leader in providing enterprise-wide COVID-19 testing to employers, universities, and other business partners. Tkach has 15+ years of mental health and addiction treatment experience and is a published researcher on addiction treatment, semiotics, mobile therapeutics, employee recruitment and retention, evidence-based practice, and trauma-informed care. He’s also a seasoned presenter…
“You have to do what you dream of doing even while you’re afraid.” —Arianna Huffington
WATCH – MEMORIES OF STRUGGLES – Sept. 30, 2021 – Williams used drugs throughout his time on the set of “The Wire” and would sometimes show up high, according to The New York Times. He finally sought help at a New Jersey area church. “When I came through those doors I was broken. This was, I would say, around the … third season of ‘The Wire,’” Williams told American University radio. “I was on drugs. I was in jeopardy of destroying everything I had worked so hard for, and I came in those doors and I met a man…
PLEASE BIG PHARMA, WE NEED SOME MORE – Sept. 28, 2021 – For her claim, Lynn Wencus of Wretham, Mass., collected a long, painful thread of receipts for prescriptions, urine tests, doctors visits, detox and rehab stays. Now that paper trail will be converted to points on a chart created during the Purdue Pharma settlement. The points will determine how much her son Jeff’s life was worth. He died after an opioid overdose in 2017. “There’s no amount of money that would ease the pain or suffering that he went through, that my family went through,” Lynn Wencus says.…
IRONIC – Sept. 30, 2021 – “I spent nights looking for a warm place to sleep. If you went around the back of the shops on Sauchiehall Street, there was a fan blowing hot air you could sit and huddle there. But it was really rare that no-one was already there. “Usually I slept with a bit of cardboard over me. It was awful knowing it was all my own undoing. “Every morning I woke up, the pain would hit me. I used to just cry. I needed £10 a day of heroin just to feel normal. If I…
LISTEN – IN AN ALTERNATIVE USA UNIVERSE – Oct. 2, 2021 – When the movie opens, Jacinta is 26 years old and serving time in a state prison in Maine for drug use and possession. It turns out that her mother is in the same prison on similar charges. Jacinta has been in prison most of her life since she was 16; her mother has been there more times and longer than her daughter. They’re exceptionally close emotionally, even though they’ve spent most of their lives locked away from each other, and what’s made them close is not necessarily…
HE KNOWS SOBRIETY IS VERY TASTY – Sept. 28, 2021 – Dear Larry, I didn’t always know what I know now. In fact, during the first 32 years of my life, I thought I knew everything. I was a self-centered, self-assured, ego-driven schmuck. The truth was, when left to my own devices and managing my own life, I was almost guaranteed to mess it up. Making my own decisions — the real ones, not the “should I have a toasted or plain bagel this morning” decisions — got me into trouble. I made decisions based on self that would…
NOW HE IS SUPERMAN – Sept. 26, 2021 – What boggles your mind the most? “An actual addiction was created and it infiltrated every class group. This has affected everyone from all walks of life. It’s a tragedy.” You play an honest doctor from a small town. Did you identify with his values? “Yeah, this felt very familiar to me. The town in West Virginia is not too far from where I grew up outside of Pittsburgh. Just to get familiar with the landscape, I took a little road trip and drove really deep into West Virginia to see…
EXTINCTION ISN’T JUST FOR ELEPHANTS – Sept. 26, 2021 – A police search uncovered a hoard of elephant tranquilizers 100 times more powerful than fentanyl in a Southern California home, prosecutors said. Police recovered 21 kilograms of carfentanil, a fentanyl analogue, from a Perris home in August, the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office said in a news release. They also found cocaine and heroin. Investigators later arrested a 30-year-old man and 27-year-old woman on suspicion of possession for sales of fentanyl, cocaine, and heroin, prosecutors said. The two have pleaded not guilty and are being held without bail, the…
LISTEN – PAY TO NOT PLAY – SEPT 28, 2021- DEMBOSKY: Studies show contingency management works. In the San Francisco program Billy Lemon did, 63% of participants stopped using meth entirely, and another 19% reduced their use. The small payments aim to rewire the brain’s reward system, so the person seeks the money or gift card to get a dopamine release instead of meth or coke. LEMON: You’re like, oh, oh, oh, I can feel good without the daily use of that substance. Let me try and go one more week. And then all of a sudden, you’re at…
BALANCING THE SCALES OF JUSTICE – Sept 28, 2021 – In 2018 during President Donald Trump’s administration, Congress passed the First Step Act, which sought to help more lower-level crack cocaine offenders take advantage of the less stringent ratio and apply retroactively for sentence reductions. Earlier this year, however, the Supreme Court ruled that low-level crack cocaine offenders could not retroactively apply to have their sentences reduced. U.S. Sentencing Commission data has showed that 87.5 percent of the people serving federal prison time for drug trafficking offenses primarily involving crack cocaine were Black. An investigation by Ashbury Park Press…
HOW DO THEY TEST? – Sept. 29, 2021 – Kaley Jones was never able to envision her life without alcohol. She would ask herself, “How am I going to get through the things that all the other people could do? Like drink at their weddings and get their nails done with their mom, while drinking a glass of champagne.” Jones was intimidated by what a sober lifestyle was. “I saw sobriety as shameful, shouldn’t be shared, and we shouldn’t call out that we have a problem,” said Jones. Once she was introduced to The Phoenix, she found “her” community.…