California, Here We Come – September 09, 2019 – Sierra Tucson announced last week that it has expanded into California by assuming the management of a pair of California treatment centers. Sober Living by the Sea in Newport Beach and Sunrise Recovery Ranch in Riverside are now part of the Sierra Tucson portfolio and will operate as Sierra by the Sea and Sunrise Ranch, respectively. Sierra by the Sea provides detox, inpatient, residential, partial hospitalization and intensive outpatient services at its multiple beach front locations. Sunrise offers substance use disorder programming, and plans to add equine psychotherapy to its treatment…
Author: Leonard Buschel
Crisis or Conspiracy? – Sept. 9, 2019 – by Ryan Hampton. As we move forward and seek justice for the families and survivors of the drug epidemic, we have to remember that people with substance use disorder are people, too. We must connect every single settlement, verdict, or bankruptcy asset to ending the crisis. We don’t need to reinvent recovery: we have resources and proven pathways that will save lives. We don’t have a single day to waste. The real “nuisance” is Big Pharma’s unwillingness to clean up the wreckage they caused. If these lawsuits inconvenience them, they’re welcome to…
Please Ask for Help – SEPTEMBER 10, 2019 – “Look at the trees, look at the birds, look at the clouds, look at the stars… and if you have eyes you will be able to see that the whole existence is joyful. Everything is simply happy. Trees are happy for no reason; they are not going to become prime ministers or presidents and they are not going to become rich and they will never have any bank balance. Look at the flowers – for no reason. It is simply unbelievable how happy flowers are.” — Osho Full Story @ Newsweek.com
Please Don’t Die – Sept. 6, 2019 – Many chemicals and additives are present in e-cigarettes, according to officials on the call. They do not know what chemicals, or combination of chemicals, could lead to getting sick and dying. The findings are preliminary, said Jennifer Layden, chief medical officer and state epidemiologist for the Illinois Department of Public Health where one of the confirmed deaths has occurred. She said an increase of cases began to appear in May and June, compared to the previous year, suggesting something new is happening. In Illinois, X-rays revealed abnormalities in patient lungs, and…
Can’t answer, my mouth is full… – September 6, 2019 – If you’re a big fan of sugary snacks and desserts, or you love fried foods, for example, you know how strong the urge can be to devour extra helpings of “forbidden” foods. You may even joke about your cravings as you find yourself thinking about little other than your next indulgence and feeling as though you have no control over how much you eat. Does that mean that food is your “drug of choice,” as Oprah once admitted about herself? Are you a “food addict” if you knowingly…
If It’s Good Enough for Malaysia… – Sept. 8, 2019 – Data from the National Anti-Drugs Agency (AADK) made available to Sunday Star reveals that a total of 124,466 drug addicts were recorded between 2014 and June this year. The most common type of drugs consumed are opiates like morphine and heroin (47.5%), followed by syabu (43.9%) and others including ganja (5.2%). Kedah topped the list as the state with the highest number of drug addicts, making up 11.7% (14,522) of the total. Kelantan comes second at 11.2% (13,950), followed by Penang at 11% (13,686) and Selangor at 10.4%…
Take the Money and Run – September 8, 2019 – OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma and lawyers representing local governments both said Sunday that they’re interested in continuing negotiations to settle lawsuits over the toll of the opioid crisis a day after two state attorneys general told colleagues that their talks with the company were at an impasse and that they expected the company to file imminently for bankruptcy. The statements add another layer of uncertainty to attempts to strike a deal with a company that’s portrayed as a prime villain in the national opioid crisis. In a statement, the company…
Like Anyone Still Drinks This Poison – September 4, 2019 – For sugar-sweetened soft drinks, one or more glasses a day were associated with deaths from digestive diseases, including diseases of the liver, appendix, pancreas and intestines. The researchers recruited people from Britain, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and Sweden between 1992 and 2000, surveying them on their food and drink consumption. Participants were excluded if they reported incidents of cancer, heart disease, stroke or diabetes. Mean age was 50.8, and 71.1 percent of participants were women. Similar results have been shown in several recent…
To Live and Die in LA – September 5, 2019 – Three-quarters of the way into a year in which deaths of homeless people in LA County are on a record-setting pace to top 1,000. Bodies are being found in virtually every corner of the county, a grim consequence of the intensifying epidemic of homelessness. On Jan. 1, a 37-year-old African American woman died at Providence St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank after being found unresponsive a day earlier on a sidewalk in North Hollywood, one week after giving birth to a girl. The woman had a history of…
Is CVS Next? – September 6, 2019 – …facing the two counties in a test case of whether the drug industry should be forced to pay for the prescription opioid epidemic, which has killed more than 200,000 people since 1999. The Washington Post reported in July that a Mallinckrodt subsidiary, SpecGX, was the single largest manufacturer of the more than 76 billion opioids distributed across the United States between 2006 and 2012. The data came from a Drug Enforcement Administration database that was released after The Post and HD Media, which publishes the Charleston Gazette-Mail in West Virginia, waged a…
Does It Matter? – September 9, 2019 – “We don’t know how often fentanyl is being mixed with methamphetamine, or if people are intentionally taking both drugs together.”Ray is currently researching the situation in Indiana by collecting samples of drugs found at overdose scenes, chemically analyzing them, then comparing the results with toxicology reports. He hopes to better understand how many different drugs are being found containing fentanyl, and in what proportions. “The levels of fentanyl are so high in peoples’ systems when they die, that we don’t think there was just a small amount of it that contaminated their…
Not for the Love of money! – September 8, 2019 – The emails add, “The brand has no relation to Purdue … other than Joss is married to the family.” David was on the board of Purdue, manages some of the family wealth, and is the de-facto Purdue spokesperson as they face lawsuits for billions of dollars. Purdue may file for bankruptcy protection to avoid paying plaintiffs. Love — who has been open about her addictions to drugs including OxyContin and Benzos (tranquilizers) and just celebrated a year sober — exclusively told Page Six, “I am one of the most…
“The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the greatest intention.” —Kahlil Gibran
Visiting Consciousness – Sept. 5, 2019 – Pilgrims and seekers, scholars and pupils, the restless and the curious — for more than 50 years, they’ve all made their way to the Esalen Institute in search of some kind of enlightenment, or at least a small insight or two about being human. Neither a church nor a university nor a think tank, Esalen was designed more than 50 years ago as a kind of spiritual and cultural crossroads to explore the frontiers of human knowledge, to entertain bold or even transgressive ideas, from drug-induced mysticism to the mind’s potential to survive…
Rigorous Honesty & Gratitude – Sept. 4, 2019 – With starring roles in two of 2019’s biggest movies, “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” and “Ad Astra,” Brad Pitt spoke to the New York Times about a particularly cathartic experience that contributed to his health and success this year, when he quit drinking and began going to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. “I had taken things as far as I could take it, so I removed my drinking privileges,” he said, before praising his AA group, which was comprised solely of men. “You had all these men sitting around being open…
MEDIA: BOOK RECOMMENDATION! – September 3, 2019 – “Martin Jacobson’s journey is a very personal one, but it uniquely intersects with two of the largest global issues of our time. We have an opioid epidemic that tears families apart and kills thousands every year alongside the largest human migration in the history of the world forced from their homes by war, gang violence, ‘ethnic cleansing,’ and economic devastation. For Martin, soccer became the key that helped unlock both his getting and staying clean and giving hundreds of immigrant kids from nations around the world an opportunity to have a future.…
And Then There is Always the Booze – August 27, 2019 – People ages 25 to 34 represent the greatest increase in deaths driven by alcohol-related liver cirrhosis — a nearly 11% increase per year from 2009 to 2017, according to research published last year in The BMJ and updated in August. “Every day on rounds, all of America’s liver specialists are seeing multiple young people in various states of liver failure. In clinics, we experience more and more young people being referred,” said liver specialist Elliot B. Tapper, an assistant professor with the University of Michigan Medical School…
Everyone Loves Money – August 28, 2019 – In pleading guilty to charges of conspiring to commit money laundering and health-care fraud, Gerner, 46, of Shamong, Burlington County, told a federal judge that he and his partners were responsible for nearly $17 million in fraudulent insurance billings between 2015 and 2016. He could face years in prison. Gerner’s admission of guilt comes five months after he and 10 other executives were charged in a joint investigation by the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office and federal authorities in Philadelphia that highlighted Liberation Way’s dubious history in a state where opioid addiction is…
Reaching Home Too Early – AUG. 30, 2019 – We will not rest until we learn the truth about how Tyler came into possession of these narcotics, including who supplied them. To that end, we have hired attorney Rusty Hardin to assist us.” Major League Baseball plans to assign its investigative unit to probe the claim that an Angels employee might have been involved in Skaggs’ death. “We were unaware of this allegation and will investigate,” MLB spokesman Pat Courtney said. The Angels have hired Fort Worth trial attorney John Cayce to represent them, according to a person familiar…
Book of The New Month – Sept. 2019 – We live in an age of unprecedented anxiety. Spending all our time trying to anticipate and plan for the future and to lamenting the past, we forget to embrace the here and now. We are so concerned with tomorrow that we forget to enjoy today. Drawing from Eastern philosophy and religion, Alan Watts shows that it is only by acknowledging what we do not—and cannot—know that we can learn … Full Story @ Amazon.com
Stick with the Winners! September 3, 2019 In the Fall of 2018, Martin Luther King Jr. High School’s boys soccer program won its 18th New York City public school championship to culminate a 19–0 season in which it was ranked no. 3 in the country. Martin Jacobson, whose first championship team was in 1996, three years after he became head coach, had put together yet another winning squad, continuing to make history in the process. But Coach Jake’s story is more than just a soccer tale. In his time as coach at MLK, he has given hundreds of immigrants—from places…
By Tracey Anne Duncan – Aug. 22, 2019 -Y12SR, or Yoga for 12-Step Recovery, is a yoga-centered holistic recovery program that has both the physical postures and philosophy of yoga as its foundation. It is an up-and-coming approach to recovery that integrates somatic trauma recovery techniques with 12 step-inspired group support techniques. Founded by Nikki Meyers, it’s also the only internationally recognized recovery group created by a woman of color. Y12SR is free for individuals, and while there aren’t as many meetings as some other options, new groups are constantly forming. Full Story @ Mic.com
You Can Sleep When You’re Dead – Aug. 26, 2019 – As a recovering over-achiever, I know the dangers of attaching my self-worth to how much I get done. I’ve worked hard to overcome my type A tendencies — so why do I still adopt one of the most salient habits of type A people? I’ve been on a steady diet of yoga and meditation for decades and yoga is the reason I wake up early. In yoga and its accompanying holistic healing belief system, Ayurveda, the time before dawn is called Brahmamuhurta, which means “the time of pure consciousness”…
The Re-Framer – Sept. 1, 2019 – Anxiety disorders are commonly associated with being a purely negative thing. It’s no surprise, since anxiety, especially in its severe forms, can make one’s life difficult. Whatever type of anxiety disorder you may be suffering from, it’s for sure that it causes you troubles, making you unable to handle the challenges of everyday life and preventing you from enjoying some simple things that are natural to most people. Full Story @ MindBodyCare.com
Discussions Are Good – Aug. 29, 2019 – It Has Never Been Just Opioids The idea that North America is facing an “opioid crisis” does not accurately describe reality. Most drug-related deaths involve drug combinations, with interactions between different drugs greatly increasing risks. So the word “overdose,” which implies too much of a single drug, can be a misnomer. Almost half of drug-related deaths (48 percent) involved two or moresubstances, according to 2016 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) data. And in 2016, nearly 80 percent of all synthetic opioid-related deaths involved another drug, often alcohol or benzodiazepines.…
What’s Behind the Curtain? – August 31, 2019 – “I thought he was going to die,” Cheryl says. “He was reaching for things, and he was talking to Bill Gates and he was talking to somebody else I’m just certain he hasn’t met,” his mother, says. She remembers finding Jason lying on the floor of the treatment center in late 2016. “I would just bring him blankets because they didn’t have beds or anything.” Cheryl had taken Jason to the clinic out of desperation. Cheryl saw his drug use escalate after he was prescribed a benzodiazepine for his anxiety, and…
But No Poison Ever Felt This Good – SEP. 1, 2019 – America’s fentanyl problem is far deadlier than past crises with other illegal drugs. It also has a fundamentally different character. For most victims, fentanyl was not their drug of choice. Rather, they were poisoned by dealers who mixed it into baggies of heroin or pressed into fake-opioid tablets. What is happening with fentanyl is unlike the trajectory of previous drug epidemics. Those typically involved “contagious” spread of initial use — primarily among those who may have been ignorant of the drug’s risks. This was the case with prescription…
Don’t Worry, Be Happy – September 1, 2019 – Researchers already knew from previous work that optimistic individuals tend to have a reduced risk of depression, heart disease and other chronic diseases. But might optimism also be linked to exceptional longevity? Lee looked at medical records from two long term research studies — one involving female nurses and the other involving men, mostly veterans … The study included 69,744 women and 1,429 men. Both groups completed survey measures to assess their level of optimism, as well as their overall health and health habits such as diet, smoking and alcohol…
A Worthy Question – September 1, 2019 – 13 Reasons Why has entered its third and penultimate season with an Agatha Christie-inspired plotline set over a Days of Our Lives tone. In other words, murder meets melodrama, as teens face addiction, body image issues, suicide, rape, and more. The series is not for the faint of heart, as it shows teens struggling with trauma, bearing multiple painstaking internal conflicts, all while trying to discover who murdered Bryce Walker. While 13 Reasons Why brings several issues — that teenagers often face in isolation — forward, many believe the show does more…
MEDIA: Film Review – AUGUST 28, 2019 – Between the directorial overdoing of Sam Taylor-Johnson — the film is a husband-and-wife operation — and the dubious nature of the source material, unreality pervades. The on-screen Taylor-Johnson scowls and pouts while James is told his drug intake would have killed a lesser man, reminded that he is wanted in three states and, as you might expect, becomes the love interest of a fellow addict he will later try to save from herself. Squint and it might almost pass for meta-commentary, poking fun at the scale of Frey’s tall stories. Or not.…