Time For a Change Up? – July 23, 2019 – The legendary ex-pitcher known as “Doc” — who has been in and out of rehab for years for drug and alcohol addiction — was a mess when he was picked up on Vincent Street near Ferry Street in the Ironbound section around 11:10 p.m., sources said. “He pissed himself. He was clearly buzzed, really kind of f–ked up,” said an Essex County law enforcement source. Still, Gooden, who lives in Piscataway, “was cooperative and polite,” the source said. The source added that Gooden told cops at the scene that he…
Author: Leonard Buschel
Tackled by Fentanyl Felony – July 22, 2019 – Hatch — who was the chief business development officer for Granite Recovery Centers until Monday — agreed to plead guilty Friday in New Hampshire federal court to a single count of using a telephone to help commit a crime, court records show. He faces up to four years in prison. According to court documents, Hatch, 39, in 2017 picked up about 1,500 grams of the deadly opioid from a supplier in Lawrence, Mass., and brought the stash back to his home in New Hampshire, later doling out smaller amounts to couriers. …
Anti-Social Network – July 11, 2019 – Last year, the World Health Organization added gaming disorder to a draft of its latest revision to the International Classification of Diseases. Gaming disorder is defined as “impaired control over gaming,” which applies to people for who make gaming such a high priority than impairs important aspects of their lives. The addition of gaming disorder will likely come as little surprise to doctors who have worked with patients with gaming addictions. But to the larger public, the issue has still largely escaped attention. Full Story @ Fortune.com
United States of Overconsumption – July 19, 2019 – “It’s great that it’s moving in the right direction,” says Adam Leventhal, director of the University of Southern California’s Institute for Addiction Science. “It’s important that the public and policymakers recognize that the addiction crisis is unfortunately still alive and well. It’s just shifting.” Prescription opioid painkillers, long blamed as the root of the crisis, are fading as a cause of drug overdose deaths. The CDC reported 12,757 overdose deaths from prescription painkillers in 2018, down from 14,926 deaths in 2017. Four other drug categories – methampetamine and other stimulants, cocaine,…
Med School For This? – JULY 12, 2019 – “It is designed to deter anyone from abusing the trust given to them by patients in need,” said Stark County Common Pleas Judge Kristin Farmer. “While this court does not blame you entirely for the opioid epidemic that faces this county, I do blame you for the personal epidemics of each of your clients.” Lazzerini, a physician at Premier Family Practice in Massillon, prescribed opioids and other drugs without a medical reason, according to the State of Ohio Board of Pharmacy. Investigators said those prescriptions resulted in the death of 38-year-old…
Mirror, mirror on the wall… – July 15, 2019 – I try to remember every piece of choreography I’ve been rehearsing — knee slightly forward, angled just right to pull my core muscles taut. A sharp pivot while I keep my eyes on the judges, one single twirl, and a quick wink before I finish my routine. When I competed in pageants throughout high school and college, my life was full of moments like this — balancing delicately in six-inch heels while I smiled at the audience with a seemingly effortless sense of grace. I “caught the bug” for…
What, Me Worry? – JULY 20, 2019 – “Optimism isn’t about pretending to be happy when you’re not, acting like problems don’t exist, or taking chances on blind faith,” explains Dr. Jerabek, president of PsychTests. “It also doesn’t mean that you should repress your negative thoughts. Those are the kind of pie-in-the-sky optimists who refuse to accept reality as it is and can actually be quite reckless. The best outlook is optimism with a dose of realism. These are the optimists who recognize that there is a lesson in every negative situation and every failure. They prepare and plan…
Reversing History – JULY 16, 2019 – The change, which takes effect in 120 days, will apply to the sales of traditional tobacco products as well as electronic cigarettes and vaporizers. Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, said too many children and teens pick up smoking despite decades of efforts to snuff out the habit, in part because of marketing aimed at young people. “By raising the smoking age from 18 to 21, we can stop cigarettes and e-cigarettes from getting into the hands of young people in the first place and prevent an entire generation of New Yorkers from forming…
Addiction’s Not Boring – By Maria Popova – What applies to drugs applies also, within limits, to every kind of excitement. A life too full of excitement is an exhausting life, in which continually stronger stimuli are needed to give the thrill that has come to be thought an essential part of pleasure. A person accustomed to too much excitement is like a person with a morbid craving for pepper, who comes last to be unable even to taste a quantity of pepper which would cause anyone else to choke. There is an element of boredom which is inseparable from…
If You Build It… – July 20, 2019 – Although Mr. Pelli’s office thrived, the MoMA building didn’t. Completed in 1984, a portion of it was torn down in 2002 so that the museum could replace it with a larger structure by the Japanese architect Yoshio Taniguchi. Mr. Pelli said he wasn’t hurt by seeing some of his building disappear, which he understood as motivated by changes in the museum’s mission. “Life is full of surprises,” Mr. Pelli said, adding that he enjoyed more than his share of good ones. Indeed, he considered his entire career improbable. Cesar Pelli…
Feeling Good – July 22, 2019 – It has been over a year since Hayley Holt switched from debating politics as a Green Party candidate to talking news, sport and entertainment on Breakfast each morning, but her passion for the planet certainly hasn’t been left behind. Getting made up for the camera, she gives a big nod of approval to our makeup artist, who washes all her cloths in preference to disposable wipes. “People should care!” she exclaims, when we get talking about the dire state of the environment. “We are kind of dooming the future generations and it will…
Suggested by Andrew Tatarsky – Published on Jul 21, 2019 – What is the best way to respond to all the fear and madness all around us? In this brief video, I offer a better way to approach a world going insane right before our eyes… Full Story @ YouTube.com
Rock ’n’ Soul Sobriety – JULY 19, 2019 – It was thrilling! very fun, one of those things… you get the opportunity to play a show like that in a venue like the Superdome at home, and things just seem to click and go well. We had a blast, I gotta tell you… coming up to the day of the show, waiting to do the show, especially with the storm and all of that, and how it had been postponed before from Jazzfest, the anticipation of doing this gig was nerve-wracking, but once we were in there, we were…
Where Is Yours? – July 19, 2019 – Today, Americans view their smartphones an average of 52 times per day. Eighty-five percent of smartphone users will also check their device in the middle of conversations with friends or family. Dr. Murphy says one of the ways to cut down on becoming addicted to smartphone is to only program in use at specific times, along with balancing in a person’s wants with needs. “I want to know that I’m getting responses from my family friends or whatever,” Dr. Murphy says. “But I do it in a programmed way where I check…
Taming Temptation – July 15, 2019 – “It’s hard to get pain medicine because most doctors are fairly strict about it now, so when you have that addiction being a nurse, it is right there and it is a temptation,” Martin said. She eventually figured out that she could easily sneak Dilaudid out of the medicine dispensing machines at the hospital. She could type in a patient’s name, and even if they weren’t prescribed the drug, the dispensing drawer would pop open with the drug readily available. “So, I wasn’t taking the medication from the patients, but my supervisor figured…
Even Evil Families Love Art – July 18, 2019 – the Tate group of galleries in London have said they will no longer accept Sackler money, and the Sackler Trust has frozen new donations. The Louvre’s president, Jean-Luc Martinez, told RTL radio there’s a 20-year limit on naming rights and the Sackler donation for the wing was in 1996. He did not explain why it had taken three years to remove the signs. Nan Goldin and others staged a protest outside the Louvre on July 1, specifically noting that the Louvre rules left the museum under no obligation to continue…
Higher Muscle Power – JULY 17, 2019, – Founder, and recovering addict, Tom Shanahan, founded Spiritual Adrenaline as a new way to treat addiction by focusing on the body’s overall health. Focusing on nutrition and exercise, the program helps rewire the body from the inside out, Shanahan tells PIX11 News. You can take the Spiritual Adrenaline challenge now at their Facebook page, or head to their official website for more information about the program. Full Story @ Pix11.com
Stick with the Winners! Anna David is the New York Times bestselling author of eight books. She’s been published in The New York Times, Time and The LA Times, among many others, and has appeared repeatedly on The Today Show, The Talk, and The CBS Morning Show, among many other programs. She’s been a featured speaker at three different TedX events and her company, Light Hustle Publishing, helps people write and publish books. Q. If you are in recovery, what was your DOC and when did you discontinue its use? A. Cocaine. Sober date is 11/19/2000 but the last time I…
Burying Their Young – July 20, 2019 – It was the early 2000s, and they usually talked over old-school computer message boards. Occasionally they gathered in person, carrying posters of their children and middle-aged spouses — all dead from OxyContin overdoses. Today we know just how dangerous this drug is. Purdue Pharma, the company that made OxyContin, the first extended-release opioid to be widely prescribed, may finally be held to account. Some 200,000 people have died from overdosing on prescription opioids, and around 2,000 lawsuits attempting to make opioid makers and distributors pay for the damage unleashed by careless overprescribing…
No Extra Innings – JULY 17, 2019 – The story also details Halladay’s struggle with fame and restlessness, and fleshes out what we know about Halladay’s relationship with drugs after he retired from baseball. Halladay died Nov. 7, 2017, when the two-seater plane he was flying crashed into the Gulf of Mexico. The toxicology report from January 2018 noted Halladay had amphetamines in his system when he died – and potentially enough of the drug to produce an overdose. According to the article, Halladay’s problems with drug addiction dated back at least two years before the crash: Full Story @…
Are There No Edens? – July 15, 2019 – Scotland’s biggest challenge is tackling the polydrug habits that see many long-term addicts mix heroin and methadone with alcohol, prescription pills and street drugs that are often manufactured by criminal gangs in makeshift Scottish drugs factories by the million. Campaigner Martin Powell, of Transform, which seeks to decriminalise drugs, said it is astonishing that Scotland’s death toll could overtake that of the US, given the way fentanyl has dramatically driven their numbers upwards. He said: “The US is suffering a drug death crisis – driven by opioids including fentanyl –…
Salesmen of Death – July 19, 2019 – The Controlled Substances Act requires drug companies to control against diversion, and to design and operate systems to identify “suspicious orders,” defined as “orders of unusual size, orders deviating substantially from a normal pattern, and orders of unusual frequency.” The companies are supposed to report such orders to the DEA and refrain from shipping them unless they can determine the drugs are unlikely to be diverted to the black market. The plaintiffs, in the filing, allege that the companies ignored red flags and failed at every level. [76 billion opioid pills: An…
Guilty As Sin – July 19, 2019 – Rattini is accused of distributing powerful narcotic painkillers for other than medical reasons to more than 200 pharmacies across West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and Tennessee. Rattini was charged alongside Miami-Luken’s former compliance officer, James Barclay, and two West Virginia pharmacists who ordered large amounts of the drugs from the company. Prosecutors accuse the Miami-Luken executives of shipping huge quantities of opioid pills to pharmacies in rural towns over several years despite warnings from the Drug Enforcement Administration. They are alleged to have deliberately ignored evidence that the opioids were not being…
Stockholders Rejoice – July 21, 2019 – Federal prosecutors in Ohio indicted a pharmaceutical wholesaler, two former executives, and two pharmacists Thursday for conspiring to illegally distribute millions of addictive prescription painkillers in states that are already rife with opioid addiction. Benjamin C. Glassman, the US Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, said in the indictment that the distribution of oxycodone and hydrocodone pills through local drugstores likely aggravated the opioid epidemic in vulnerable states … The most notable concentration came in the form of Ohio-based distributor Miami-Luken’s distribution of 2.6 million hydrocodone tablets and 2.3 million units of…
AL-ANON ESSAY – July 20, 2019 – She checked herself back into treatment. Detox and recovery were more difficult this time. When I talked to her, she didn’t sound like herself, and I wondered if her beautiful mind had been destroyed forever. My sleepless nights came back in full force. I paced the house during the early morning hours. I cried. I prayed to all the gods I did and didn’t believe in. I felt like I was in a constant state of adrenaline-infused panic that was impossible to shake. I felt angry and helpless, but more than anything,…
Brave Man Speaks Out – July 22, 2019 – Former TV anchor Brandon Lee opens up about his struggles with addiction and his push to change the public perception and stigma surrounding addiction in the US. VIDEO ONLY Full Story @ Coalfield.com
The Talking Cure – July 19, 2019 – Six Vermonters shared their stories with VPR as part of My Heart Still Beats, a podcast series featuring conversations about addiction and original writing from the recovery community around Vermont. Many in that group then came together for a live event in March 2019 at Turning Point Center of Burlington, answering questions before an audience and discussing the power and importance of sharing their stories. At the live event were Writers For Recovery creator and series producer Gary Miller and filmmaker and series producer Bess O’Brien. Among the storytellers were: Full Story…
Fearless and thorough from the very start – July 21, 2019 – An FBI agent once described him in a letter to Life magazine as “a raving, unconfined nut,” a phrase that Mr. Krassner gleefully adapted for the title of his memoir. “The FBI was right,” comedian George Carlin later said. “This man is dangerous — and funny, and necessary.” … A former contributor to Mad magazine, Mr. Krassner founded the Realist in 1958 and ran the publication almost single-handedly for 16 years, growing a subscription list of 600 names into a reported readership of about 100,000 that helped lay…
Green Showers – July 9, 2019 – Kyle Ryan Marcotte, 36, of Jacksonville Beach, Florida, pleaded guilty before U.S. Magistrate Judge Joel Toomey of the Middle District of Florida to a one-count information charging him with conspiracy to commit money laundering. As part of his guilty plea, Marcotte agreed to a forfeiture judgment of $10,220,281.42. Sentencing before U.S. District Judge Timothy Corrigan of the Middle District of Florida has not yet been scheduled. According to admissions made as part of his guilty plea, Marcotte was the owner of a substance abuse treatment facility in Jacksonville Beach, Florida. In approximately 2015,…
50 Years – Walking on the Moon – July 15, 2019 – Tuesday marked the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission and in light of that, a series of stories and documents have been released to mark the event. Although the mission was a complete success, Sky News have reported that Mr Armstrong almost made a fatal error after landing on the Moon. Full Story @ Express.co.uk