Just like the Agreements – May 20, 2020 – I began to wonder what the hell I was doing with my life. And sure, the human experience was depressing as hell: we were all going to die, the earth and sun included, but that didn’t mean that we shouldn’t build a life while we were here. Did it? Cue my twenty-fifth (millionth) existential breakdown. I began to question my beliefs. I sought out therapy to help me. Because whatever I was doing, it was no longer working for me. A new consciousness was trying to assert itself, and it felt…
Author: Leonard Buschel
So Smoke Alone – May 27, 2020 – These slime-cloaks illicit a “huge response from the immune system,” she explains, which could lead to long-term consequences, though the findings are so new that those consequences are unclear right now. WHAT DOES A VAPER’S MOUTH LOOK LIKE? – Kumar and her colleagues collected plaque samples just below the gums of 25 smokers, 25 nonsmokers, 20 vapers, 25 former smokers who had replaced the habit with e-cigarettes, and 28 dual-users. The smokers reported smoking about 10 cigarettes per day. The vapers had used e-cigarettes every day for at least 3 months and…
The Medium is the Message – May 28, 2020 – Those attacks, in turn, have caused meetings to require still more passwords and a host deciding who to let join. That, in turn, means newcomers and people without the secret word and known to the host can’t get in. “And the meetings are an essential part of AA recovery. If, as it’s been said, addiction is a disease of isolation, the meetings offer an end to that isolation; a place to crawl out of the hole of despair and loneliness and spend time with fellow sufferers, people who “understand” precisely…
Real Live Counselors Are Heroes – MAY 26, 2020 – Some people did relapse because they lacked the skills to cope with the unprecedented stressors they we’re facing, he said. While some vital addiction services were getting cut back, so were the supplies of drugs in the local area, said Larry Smith, director of programs at the Cuyahoga County ADAMHS Board. It was an uncertain time for everyone so people hunkered down at home. And many drug dealers were not able to get their usual supply, he said. “Some of the drugs weren’t as available,” Smith said. “And so a…
No parking fees – May 26, 2020 – “Now, more and more people are opting for either home care or telemedicine where they’re not going to be exposed to other people, and they’re able to get care on their schedule in a way that’s not putting themselves at risk.” Treatment centers have “seen a decline” amid the pandemic, according to Malkin, because people are reluctant to go where “they’ll be in contact with other people.” “The home detox business has definitely picked up and people reaching out for virtual care has seen a dramatic increase,” he states. While he gets…
Worth the weight… – May 26, 2020 – James ‘Arg’ Argent has said his drug addiction was a symptom of an eating order after years battling with his weight. The former The Only Way Is Essex star – who recently opened up about suffering a near-fatal cocaine overdose in 2019 – has now told how he turned to binging on drugs and junk food to cope with jokes about his weight. Argent, 32, told The Sun: “The core of my addiction stems from my eating disorder. I binge on food if I hate the way I look… “I’d feel down…
Crocodile Rock – May 26, 2020 – “Now, more and more people are opting for either home care or telemedicine where they’re not going to be exposed to other people, and they’re able to get care on their schedule in a way that’s not putting themselves at risk.” Treatment centers have “seen a decline” amid the pandemic, according to Malkin, because people are reluctant to go where “they’ll be in contact with other people.” “The home detox business has definitely picked up and people reaching out for virtual care has seen a dramatic increase,” he states. While he gets inquiries…
One is too many, and a ton is never enough – May 29, 2020 – “During the development of this phase, when we see that the confiscated tonnes (of cocaine) continues growing and are above the dozens, it allows us to reaffirm that the commitment to multilateralism in the fight against drug trafficking is fundamental,” Duque said during virtual presentation. The confiscated cocaine is equivalent to some 126 million doses and $1.7 billion in earnings for criminal gangs, Defense Minister Carlos Holmes Trujillo said. The operation also confiscated 7 tonnes of marijuana worth about $36.7 million. @NYTimes
Doctors Being Doctors – May 29, 2020 – And I will end by asking anyone, if they need more information specifically about the AMA’s opioid work, and I’m going to read it because I want to make sure that everyone gets the right URL. It’s www.end-opioid-epidemic.org. And they can go there to find any additional information about the great work of the Opioid Task Force and really all of the physicians who are working on the opioid epidemic across this country, physicians and organizations. Unger: Well, Dr. Harris, thank you, and the taskforce for your continued work. And thank you, Dr.…
What would Bill and Bob say? – May 31, 2020 – “Right before everything got shut down, I was at this meeting I go to every week and there was a guy with about two or three months of sobriety. He was doing his 90 in 90 and determined to do it. He asked if I’d be down to meet up. The definition of a meeting in (12-step literature) is that two people constitute a meeting. I was super touched and inspired,” says John. “I’m resourceful and I know how to get around the web, so I organized a meeting…
Stick with the Winners! – May 26, 2020 – She is the author of two books, Falling Up: A Memoir of Renewal and The Definitive Guide to Addiction Interventions: A Collective Strategy and was named by London’s DB Recovery Resources and Harvard’s McLean Hospital an affiliate of Harvard University as the 2019 Interventionist of the year. She is former University faculty at San Diego State University and University of San Diego. A frequent speaker she lives in Indian Wells , Ca with her husband John and their two doodles Teddy and CoCo. Dr. Louise can be reached at 619-507-1699 and…
Good Mourning America – May 27, 2020 – The COVID-19 pandemic has forced millions of Americans into isolation, as doctors continue to look for a cure. It’s unclear if there’s a nationwide trend of drug overdoses happening specifically during the pandemic, though several communities have reported a spike in drug overdose deaths. In Jacksonville, where Chandler lived, the fire and rescue department reported a 20% increase in overdose emergency calls in March alone. In Columbus, Ohio, the county coroner’s office saw a surge in overdose deaths, including 12 in a 24-hour period the first week of April. @GMA
How much worse can it get? – May 30, 2020 – Harris said CPD has seen an increase “in fentanyl and substances that are even stronger than heroin” this year, with some cases of drug users expecting to receive heroin from their dealers, but getting “straight fentanyl” instead. Fentanyl is powerful synthetic opioid that is 80 to 100 times more potent than morphine and is often added heroin to increase its potency or disguise the drug as highly potent heroin, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration says. “People might think they’re getting a particular drug, while in reality not knowing what’s…
Only Seven? – May 25 2020 – Tracy Hutchinson, PhD, LMHC, is a therapist with over 18 years of clinical experience. She is a regular columnist for Psychology Today, and her research on positive psychology, mental health and emotional psychology has been published in dozens of peer reviewed academic journals and textbooks. @CNBC
Tian Dayton PhD does it again! – June 2020 – The idea here is to head trouble off at the pass, to give ourselves the space (and frankly relief) to heal as we go. It’s just so much easier than letting it all pile up on us then feeling stuck and confused at some later date. Post traumatic growth not only alleviates problems later, we feel a “survivor’s pride” knowing that we met a challenging situation well and actually found ways of becoming stronger and more resilient. The workbook actually feels self-caring to do, it will give you a safe…
Be Careful What You Wish For – May 27, 2020 – The U.S Food and Drug Administration said on Wednesday it had found high levels of a possible cancer-causing impurity in some versions of the popular diabetes drug metformin. The agency is reaching out to companies whose drugs had N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) over accepted levels and will take appropriate action, a spokesman for the FDA said in an emailed statement. Bloomberg, which first reported the FDA’s findings, said that some recalls of metformin were expected as soon as this week, citing a person familiar with the matter. Online pharmacy Valisure said…
Silence = Death – May 27, 2020- Larry Kramer, the noted writer whose raucous, antagonistic campaign for an all-out response to the AIDS crisis helped shift national health policy in the 1980s and ’90s, died on Wednesday morning in Manhattan. He was 84. His husband, David Webster, said the cause was pneumonia. Mr. Kramer had weathered illness for much of his adult life. Among other things he had been infected with H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS, contracted liver disease and underwent a successful liver transplant. @NYTimes
Cuarto for Quinto – May 27, 2020 – “The most glaring component that was missing from my life was gratitude … and I had so much for which to be grateful,” explained Quinto. I didn’t lose everything, I didn’t ruin relationships, but there was one day when I was like, I can’t do this anymore.” Quinto, expressing gratitude for his four years sober, didn’t seek emotional solace from tween angst in the bottom of a bottle of single malt scotch. Nope he was never a party person, a heavy drinker or compulsive guzzler of wine, whisky, or rye. “I wasn’t really…
More anxiety and insomnia in USA – May 25, 2020 – Health problems, social isolation and the stress of job loss weigh on people’s well-being. More than a third of Americans say the pandemic is having a “serious impact” on their mental health, according to a poll released March 25 by the American Psychiatric Association. Among parents of children under the age of 18, 46% rated their average pandemic stress level at 8, 9 or 10 on a 10-point scale, according to a survey published by the American Psychological Association on 21 may. The country’s highest mental health official recently…
Stockholders ADDICTED to Profits – May 27, 2020 – • CVS worked with Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, to offer promotional seminars on pain management to its pharmacists so they could reassure patients and doctors about the safety of the drug. • In partnership with Endo Pharmaceuticals, CVS sent letters to patients encouraging them to maintain prescriptions of Opana, a potent opioid so prone to abuse that in 2017 the Food and Drug Administration ordered its extended-release formulation removed from the market. • From 2006 through 2014, the Rite Aid in Painesville, Ohio, a town with a population of…
Rhinestoned Cowboy – May 27, 2020 – In the memoir, Kim, 61, details one particularly scary occasion which occurred after the birth of their first son, Cal, in 1983. Though Glen had agreed at the time to abide by Kim’s mandate of no booze in the house, she had forgotten about a series of collector decanters (which typically hold alcohol like whiskey) she had hidden in their home. “Glen hadn’t,” she writes. “He got hold of the bottles I’d put in the linen closet and drank himself into another crazed rage. This one was bad. This one had him pointing…
Bottom Line – May 29, 2020 – While nurses around the world are being praised as heroes on the frontlines, healthcare workers at an Atlanta drug rehabilitation clinic allege management fired the entire nursing staff after characterizing them as selfish and lazy. ADC executive director Bryan Stephens characterized the layoffs to employees as a reorganization from a full-time nursing staff to using staffing agencies and nurse practitioners. But Warren and another nurse allege the team was terminated because they refused to take medical orders from Stephens, who does not have a medical background. @BusinessInsider
The Serenity Prayer in Action – May 21, 2020 – His reading tells him: He has a choice to make. He can be the man he is or, as Aurelius writes, the man he should be. He quits his job. He writes a self-immolating memoir about the Wild West of digital marketing, “Trust Me: I’m Lying,” which shocks everyone and becomes a bestseller. He moves from New Orleans to New York to a farm outside Austin, Texas, and along the way tells his publisher his follow-up will not be scandalous. It won’t even be a business book. It’ll be about…
It’s a Wrap! – May 31, 2020 – The news comes as Christo was in the midst of one of his most ambitious projects to date, a project involving plans to wrap Paris’s Arc de Triomphe in 269,097 square feet of fabric. First conceived in 1962 by Christo and Jeanne-Claude and titled L’Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped (Project for Paris, Place de l’Étoile – Charles de Gaulle), the project is still expected to be executed in September 2021, the artist’s office confirmed in its death notice. (The Arc de Triomphe wrapping was originally expected to take place this year, but it…
“Let there be space in your togetherness” —Kahlil Gibran
Trailblazing Activist Dies at 84 – May 27, 2020 – Mr. Kramer’s name-calling wasn’t personal, Dr. Fauci explained. “I was the face of the federal government. I was the one out there trying to warn the public, and he was, too. That was his way of saying, ‘Hello? Wake up!’ That was his style. He was iconoclastic, he was theatrical — he wanted to make his point.” @NYTimes
Like Adam Meeting Eve – May 21, 2020 – The 43-minute documentary film traces its origins back to a 2015 interview she conducted with Mary Seiberling Huhn, daughter of Henrietta Seiberling, on her recollections of growing up on the estate of the founding family of Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. and, in particular, the night a movement to help alcoholics was born. Mary Huhn has since passed away, but she shared vivid recollections during the interview of the night that Bill W. and Dr. Bob visited the Gate Lodge where her family lived at the time, Anderson said. The meeting…
How bright do they shine? – MAY 18, 2020 – Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew aired for five seasons, with a sixth season featuring everyday people. Pinsky also worked with high-profile addicts in two Celebrity Rehab spin-offs. Sober House chronicled the post-rehab lives of prior Celebrity Rehab patients as they attempted to juggle freedom and sobriety. The other spin-off, Sex Rehab with Dr. Drew, showed Pinsky providing treatment for sex and/or love addiction. As he told Zach Sang and the Gang (via Today) in 2013, Pinsky ultimately stopped doing these shows because he was “tired of taking all of the…
Therapists – May 20, 2020 – Stating these agreements as clearly as he does gives us the gift of facing them. When we face them, we have an opportunity to see how we do and do not bring these agreements into our lives on a regular basis. That gives us the opportunity to see what’s required to improve our lives. It’s a wonderful guide to identifying issues that can be explored and addressed in psychotherapy. What follows are each of his agreements and the psychological issues that might be indicated in psychotherapy work when you have difficulty honoring them. @Medium
When the student is ready… – May 19, 2020 – These six steps were the things that finally helped me turn it around. I’m not going to pretend it was easy; it wasn’t. But it was worth it. Now we’re living in quarantine and facing the reality of COVID-19, and I can say from experience these six things are still holding me together. I’ve realized that the tools that help us get sober are the same tools that enable us to thrive in our lives, no matter what life throws our way. I had taken steps to get sober before,…