Author: Leonard Buschel

WATCH – STORY OF HIS LIFE –    June 8, 2021 – Payne catapulted to fame at age 16 in “One Direction” alongside Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Louis Tomlinson, and Zayn Malik in 2010 when the group competed on “The X Factor,” after unsuccessfully competing as solo artists. The group, one of the best-selling boy bands of all time, went on hiatus in 2015. “The day the band ended, I was like, ‘Thank the Lord,’” Payne said. “I know a lot of people are going to be mad at me for saying that, but I needed to stop or it…

WATCH – NOW HE RUNS TOWARDS, NOT AWAY – June 7, 2021 – At the beginning of the pandemic, like so many other Americans, he joined TikTok. He brings people into his training and shares his message about mental health. “You’re never stuck in your situation,” Mulkey said. “I never thought this was what I’d be doing now. I feel like it needs to be talked about 100 percent.” Noel says he’s constantly hearing from people dealing with addiction and other issues. He even has a post office box where he regularly receives mail. Some ask about his training…

SECOND CHANCES – June 10, 2021 – In prison, Celeste has thrown herself into helping other women live lives deserving of a second chance. Now 50, she won’t be free until she is 71 – unless she gets a second chance herself.”he told me she was going shopping and never came back. I remember finding presents in a hall closet that she’d wrapped for Christmas, but it was summer. Daddy was so sad and emotional, then he got really sick. I think he had hepatitis. Aunt Cindy came and brought stews for me to feed him and I rolled…

LISTEN – GIRLS JUST WANNA HAVE FUN…WITH PROBLEMS – June 9, 2021 – And the latest U.S. data from 2019 shows that women in their teens and early 20s reported drinking and getting drunk at higher rates than their male peers — in some cases for the first time since researchers began measuring such behavior. This trend parallels the rise in mental health concerns among young women, and researchers worry that the long-term effects of the COVID-19 pandemic could amplify both patterns. “It’s not only that we’re seeing women drinking more, but that they’re really being affected by this…

POLLOCK SHOULD HAVE TRIED THIS – June 8, 2021 – Originally from Memphis, Brannon was discovered during her senior year of high school by a modeling scout in 2014. Her refined look immediately struck a chord with casting directors, and what followed was five years of nonstop modeling and travel. In 2019 a rare break in Paris gave her a moment to decompress and take stock of her life. “I was changing,” she shared on the phone from New York. “I’d started to be moved by certain things and looking closer at my daily life, the people around me,…

WASTING AWAY IN SILENCE – June , 9 2021 – Experts are concerned about a dramatic rise in eating disorders among teenagers over the past year. Possible explanations for the increase include teens’ loss of familiar routines and regular connections with friends, anxiety about the COVID-19 pandemic, boredom, and food insecurity at home. Bryn Austin, professor in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and director of the Strategic Training Initiative for the Prevention of Eating Disorders, said in an April 28, 2021, New York Times article that the demand for eating…

“As I’d found time and again throughout my life – and would continue to find – you do what you can, say your prayers, and hope for the best.” –Dick Van Dyke

TAKING A SIP, NOT TAKING A SIP – June 10, 2021 – The last time Christina Kimbrough had a drink was Feb. 3, 2020. The 32-year-old writer and grad student, who readily identifies as an alcoholic, checked into an intensive outpatient treatment center in Cleveland last winter. The coronavirus lockdown hit on her last day of therapy, and she was abruptly sent home to Chesapeake, Virginia. Alcoholics Anonymous meetings had shut down. A hand sanitizer shortage left people stockpiling bottles of vodka. Between April and June 2020, booze sales were up 34 percent from the previous year. One Johns Hopkins…

WATCH – SOBER RAINBOW PARTIES ALL OVER 5 BOROUGHS – June 7, 2021 – Fun for him, and others in the LGBTQ community also in recovery, does not have to involve alcohol. “We wanted something for the sober community that wasn’t sponsored by an alcohol beverage company. We wanted to do something to really bring the party to them,” Parker noted. Eager to celebrate his Pride, Parker threw his first event in 2010 by spreading word on a recovery Facebook page he had started. Six years later the group organized into the nonprofit “Gay & Sober”, creating a twist on…

SHE GOT A CLUE – June 3, 2021 – Clueless star Elisa Donovan says starring in the iconic film helped her “stay on the recovery path” from an eating disorder. The actor has been open about suffering from anorexia at the time Clueless was filming in the 1990s. “I certainly kept any of my eating disorder issues to myself because I wasn’t even able to handle them myself,” she told Yahoo! Entertainment in a recent interview. “So I certainly wasn’t sharing them with anyone else.” Donovan explained she now looks at the work she did around that time “as kind…

STICK WITH THE WINNERS –  June 3, 2021 – A proposed new law would allow for supervised injection sites in some California counties. Supporters say it would reduce drug overdoses while critics say it would just normalize drug addiction. More than 81,000 people died of drug overdoses in the U.S. from June 2019 to May 2020, according to provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That is the highest number ever recorded in a 12-month period. A proposed new law would allow for supervised injection sites in some California counties. Supporters say it would reduce drug overdoses…

STAYING SOBER NO MATTER WHAT – May 30, 2021 – I started gardening and thrifting and DIY’ing all over my home. I read and played games and practiced yoga and wrote a book. It took some experimentation and a lot of letting go—but I found a more authentic version of myself. Of course, there are times when I’m tempted to backslide. But I think about how bad alcohol made me feel in the past and how much better I feel now. I no longer lie in bed with anxious thoughts. I care about who I spend time with. I’ve always…

TRUE PATRIOTISM – June 3, 2021 – Working with two already-established homeless outreach programs—Just Believe and New Life Addiction Services—Jeff’s Camp will feature an 8,000-square-foot facility incorporating a thrift store and a sober living residence providing treatment, rehabilitation, and vocational training—all in a serene, wooded setting. “While (New Life) is working with them on the medical side, we can work on the rehabilitative/vocation side, getting them back into society, touching people, getting back into that public eye, and getting people what they need. That’s what the store is going to do,” Just Believe director Paul Hulse told NJ.com. In…

DAMAGE CONTROL – June 4, 2021 – “We want mothers to be successful in spite of their substance use issues, by providing them with helpful resources to support their ongoing recovery,” County Executive Armond Budish said in a Friday press conference. The RISE programs at CWRU are part of the school’s infant mortality reduction efforts alongside First Year Cleveland, a coalition of organizations aimed at reducing the infant mortality rate in Cuyahoga County. “The goal of our RISE program is to surround mom with a team of experts throughout her journey, while keeping mom and baby together as much as…

100 YEARS TOO FEW – June 4, 2021 – Knowing they would be used for illicit street use, Dr. Capistrano and his associate, Tameka Lachelle Noel, MD, issued prescriptions for a number of drugs, including hydrocodone and oxycodone, the DOJ said. Mr. Capistrano wrote prescriptions for more than 524,000 doses of hydrocodone, 430,000 doses of carisoprodol, 77,000 doses of alprazolam and more than 2 million doses of promethazine with codeine during a nine-year period of running the conspiracy. The physicians would sometimes pair the prescriptions with non-controlled substances to make them seem legitimate, according to the DOJ. As part of…

IT WOULD BE HYPOCRITICAL NOT TO –   May 30, 2021- They say it is hypocritical for the NHS in Scotland, where the drug death toll is Europe’s highest, to be supported by profits from a drug linked to the biggest addiction scandal in the United States. The Sacklers made £8 billion from the drug, launched in the late-1990s and wrongly marketed as being safer than alternative painkillers. A new book by investigative journalist Patrick Radden Keefe exposes how the company – and the family – continued to profit from the powerful painkiller despite damning and conclusive evidence it was…

ALWAYS THE BEST FRIEND –  May 30, 2021 – The light at the end of the tunnel. For years, Matthew Perry has been making fans laugh. Most known for his role as Chandler Bing in Friends, which aired from 1994 to 2004, Perry has never shied away from opening up about his struggles. “When [fame] happens, it’s kind of like Disneyland for a while. For me it lasted about eight months, this feeling of ‘I’ve made it, I’m thrilled, there’s no problem in the world.’ And then you realize that it doesn’t accomplish anything, it’s certainly not filling any holes…

FILM REVIEW ARTICLE – May 27, 2021 – So where did my aversion come from? I can’t point to a specific piece of media or any one encounter that made me think 12-step programs wouldn’t be right for me. (Well, maybe the episode of South Park when Randy gets sober, and the boys eventually show him that he became more addicted to being sober than he had been to drinking.) Somehow, across many films and television shows and cultural references, I had absorbed the idea that 12-step programs were sad, gray rooms filled with sad, boring people who introduced…

A MORE DEADLY DEATH – June 6, 2021- “Folks that are using heroin and fentanyl are transitioning to (Xylazine),” said Shea Madden, executive director of the West Branch Drug and Alcohol Abuse Commission. “I think it’s predominantly injected.” West Branch caseworkers, who process roughly 2,000 individuals each year, have talked with multiple people who have used it, according to Madden. A drug used by veterinarians, primarily on horses, it didn’t become popular among humans until the early 2000s in Puerto Rico. It causes heavy sedation and is known on the street as “tranq” or “sleep cut.” In Puerto Rico, the…

AND WALKS OUT WITH A GREATER LOVE OF GOD – June 5, 2021 – One young man, relatively new to recovery, talked about how he always saw religion, God and prayer as something for the weak, for those who need a crutch and can’t do it on their own. Each time he stumbled, each time he fell, he continued to choose fear over faith. Only when he hit rock bottom did he realize that surrendering and submitting to God is a sign of strength, not of weakness. He began to pray daily and though he was an atheist his…

MUSICAL INTERLUDE – June 3, 2021 – Live Moby concert performance featuring Canadian singer-songwriter, Nelly Furtado – South Side from March 2007. more@YouTube

STICK WITH THE WINNERS! June 2, 2021 – Bruce Boardman is the Chief Executive Officer for Social Model Recovery Systems (SMRS). With over 30 years of service to SMRS, he has been responsible for the development and expansion of the organization. Mr. Boardman has held a multitude of positions within SMRS with his primary emphasis on management.Initially, he was educated as a Certified Substance Abuse Counselor at Glendale Community College, upon completion he took a position with SMRS. Mr. Boardman has subsequently furthered his education with certifications from UCLA as a Dual Diagnosis Specialist as well as the USC Treatment…

YOUR LIFE IS YOUR OWN – June 1, 2021 – Most would keep such skeletons secreted in the closet, but Jake discusses it openly believing it will inspire change, hope and healing among those grappling with the worst of life’s circumstances. His retelling of the journey is as raw, unadulterated and unapologetic as a big city tabloid. Alcohol became a routine part of Jake’s life early in his enlisted years. He joined the military in 1983, married in 1985 and eventually fathered three daughters. Drinking at home never got out of hand because of “self-regulation,” as he put it.…

WATCH – #RECOVERYISPOSSIBLE – June 3, 2021 – At six years old, Burton says she was introduced to marijuana by her mother. At the age of 12, she says she got into methamphetamine and cocaine. By 14, she was smoking crack and getting blackout drunk. It’s hard to believe, she knows, but all the while she wanted to stop using. “I’ll be really honest with you I didn’t care whether I was killed, whether I successfully committed suicide or whether I went to prison,” Burton said. “Any one of those options was just fine for me because I just…

WHAT GOES AROUND… – July/August 2021 – George Washington first won elected office, in 1758, by getting voters soused. (He is said to have given them 144 gallons of alcohol, enough to win him 307 votes and a seat in Virginia’s House of Burgesses.) During the Revolutionary War, he used the same tactic to keep troops happy, and he later became one of the country’s leading whiskey distillers. But he nonetheless took to moralizing when it came to other people’s drinking, which in 1789 he called “the ruin of half the workmen in this Country.” Hypocritical though he was,…

IT’S A FULL-TIME JOB –  June 3, 2021 – ‘During the 19th century the neighbourhood of Kensington in north Philadelphia was a strong working-class district, a national leader of the textile industry and home to a diverse population of immigrants. Like many rust belt cities, industrial restructuring of the mid 20th century led to a sharp economic decline including high unemployment and a significant population loss. When the jobs disappeared, the drugs moved in’ – Jeffrey Stockbridge more@TheGuardian

PINNED TO FREEDOM – June 4, 2021 – “…When I got fired from WWE for a drinking related thing, for touching a cop … For one, I was arrogant and I was in a good position, I thought ‘Oh, I’ll be fine.” Because I’d already been arrested before that, when I’d first signed with WWE, for a DUI. So they already knew I had a drinking problem. I was oblivious to it … because I wasn’t drinking every day, I was drinking occasionally. But when I’d drink that one time, I’d end up in trouble. So when they released me,…

SWEET TOOTH – June 4, 2021 – Susan Nicole Downey, born Susan Levin is an American film producer. She was born on 6th November 1973 in Illinois, USA to parents Rosie and Elliott. Susan graduated from the University of Southern California with a degree in cinematic arts. She began her career in cinema as a developer and producer for Threshold Entertainment and later went on to work as vice president of production and Silver Pictures at the same time as being co-president of Dark Castle Entertainment. Her first credited film role as co-producer was on the 2002 film ‘Ghost…

WATCH – TELLING IT LIKE IT IS –  June 3, 2021 – David said he and his brother haven’t always had the relationship they have now. “My brother used to be somebody that I didn’t know, and now he’s my best friend,” said David Pass, COO of Eagles Bridge Intervention Team. When TJ was 15, he turned to drugs. “Within two weeks, I was arrested,” TJ said. “I tried cocaine, acid, alcohol, and had a possession with intent to distribute charge.” TJ told News4Jax it just progressed after that. His mom and stepdad were addicts. The Pass brothers lost their…

WATCH – AN APP THAT CAN KILL? – June 4, 2021 – She lost her son Alexander nearly a year ago and led the charge Friday in a march toward Snapchat’s headquarters in Santa Monica. But she was not alone. Across the country there were rallies in 30 cities organized by the Association of People Against Lethal Drugs, including one in Riverside. “There’s kids dying everywhere from this right now,” Sharleena Antunez, a mother, said. “And I lost my baby because of this.” Snapchat said it was trying to combat the problem by cooperating with law enforcement. In a…