AHS Views

It’s amazing to hear stories of recovery, even more amazing to hear about a former addict’s background. It’s often nothing like you would expect. Fortunately, addiction help can really turn lives around.

One recent story is about a woman who came from an even better than normal childhood. She was a member of the student council, and getting ready for college when she started using alcohol and marijuana. That was in her early teens.

By the time she was further on in high school, she started with cocaine and prescription drugs. Then, while in college, ended up on heroin.

It’s not unusual for people who have taken prescription drugs – especially painkillers – to wind up on heroin. An OxyContin addiction, for example, can be extremely expensive. The pills can cost up to $60 each, and it’s common to take a few every day. Obviously, most college kids can’t afford that. Heroin, on the other hand, can be purchased for $5 a hit. Most heroin addicts have two or three hits a day, sometimes more.

So .. it’s a lot less expensive, but even $30 or $45 a day is still more than most people can afford to spend on drugs. Thank heaven for small blessings.

For this girl, who called herself Jamie, not her real name, it was too expensive. She was caught stealing at work – she supported her habit with theft – lost her job, and wound up going before a judge in drug court. Fortunately, she was given the opportunity to go to drug rehab rather than going to prison.

Jamie is now drug free, has a new job, is reunited with her family, and life is back to normal.

Do you have a son, daughter, spouse or good friend with a drug problem?

Don’t wait for them to wind up in court, get them into an addiction help program now.

Of course, there has been a flurry of reactions in the media to Whitney Houston’s death. Some journalists are talking about ‘enablers,’ specifically those who bent over backwards to get Whitney whatever drugs or alcohol she wanted, whenever she wanted them, and despite the fact that she was obviously out of control and needed addiction help.

Another interesting article was on alcohol taxes. This subject came up because some reports say Whitney died from a combination of alcohol and Xanax. Despite Whitney’s alcohol-related death, and that of Amy Winehouse and many, many others, no one’s really talking about raising the tax on alcohol specifically to reduce the number of people who die or get very ill because of alcohol. A New York Times article notes how little public alarm and government reaction there is against alcohol abuse as compared to tobacco and other agents harmful to health. Good question. Why IS alcohol so acceptable?

But one of the most appropriate reactions, in my opinion, was that of Bill O’Reilly. He commented that the press don’t know how to cover Whitney’s death. Why?

Primarily because alcohol and drug abuse is now considered a ‘disease.’ He remembers the days of Nancy Regan, when she encouraged people to ‘reject narcotics,’ and says that doing such a thing these days would be ‘uncool.’ Now that it’s a ‘disease,’ saying people should ‘reject narcotics’ is like making fun of someone who’s physically or mentally handicapped and indicating that it’s their fault that they have a problem.

But when it comes to alcohol and drugs, it’s usually true. There are some exceptions, of course – people who are on addictive prescription drugs for a legitimate life-threatening reason or children who, without their consent, are given drugs by their parents – but for the most part, people make the decision to drink or take drugs, or not.

As O’Reilly points out, “Houston, however, was an adult who made a decision to embrace the drug life. Once a person decides to dabble in cocaine, or opiates such as heroin and OxyContin, they are putting themselves at grave risk. And they know it.”

It’s a decision made by each individual. You can’t go through years of living and still think that alcohol or drugs are harmless, innocent and fun – you know you’re taking a risk. And if you embrace the life of alcohol and drug abuse, there’s a very good chance that the consequences could be dire.

One very good thing about his viewpoint is that it recognizes that, unlike REAL diseases, alcohol and drug problems are under the control of the individual. And with the help of a good drug rehab program, he can get his life back.

The lead medical examiner in Brevard County, Florida recently said that when he is called out to investigate a death that does not involve a shooting, stabbing or motor vehicle accident, there’s a good chance that drugs are involved. But he’s not referring to street drugs like heroin, cocaine, or meth – he’s talking about oxycodone (trade name OxyContin.) In fact, he said that it’s so common, “You can almost guess when you go to the scene” that oxycodone was a factor. Prescription drug addiction help could have prevented many of these deaths.

In the last few years, hundreds of deaths in his county have been directly attributed to OxyContin, and hundreds more have involved OxyContin although the drug was not listed as the cause of death.

And that’s just one of Florida’s 67 counties, and not necessarily the worst one.

Here we are, spending $ billions on the War on Drugs – with the focus on illegal drug manufacture, transport, sales, etc. etc. – and the worst enemy we have is turning out to be the drugs made legally and prescribed for literally millions of people every day.

In fact, these drugs present a far more dangerous situation than illegal drugs ever have – especially because people consider that, since they are prescribed by doctors, they are safe. And people are not properly warned of just how addictive these drugs are.

Another factor creating this problem is the drug culture that has been created by the medical establishment. It’s an unfortunate fact that drugs have become the solution to many problems that could be – and should be – addressed successfully without drugs.

The “Just Say No’ campaign focuses on street drugs. You’re supposed to just say no when someone approaches you in the schoolyard or at a party or on the street. But what about just saying no to your doctor? What about demanding that your doctor come up with a less dangerous solution to your problems?

Really, there are so many people who are dealing with OxyContin addiction, and addiction to other prescription painkillers as well as other prescription drugs, that it could make a huge difference if we just said no when our doctors suggest drugs as the only solution.

It would also create a huge, and positive, effect on kids if they didn’t watch their parents taking drugs as solutions to pain, sleeplessness, anxiety, stress, tension, and so on. What if those parents were teaching kids to find the root cause of and deal with their problems? What if parents set that kind of example and, at the same time, educated their kids on why drugs shouldn’t be a solution.

It’s a proven fact that kids whose parents educate them like this are 50 percent less likely to get involved in drugs themselves.

It’s time to broaden the “Just Say No” concept. Start with yourself. Start with your doctor. If we demand better solutions, doctors will be forced to find them, and to refer us to health practitioners who can really help. We can then start turning around the prescription drug addiction epidemic.

If someone in your family already had a problem with prescription drugs, get them into drug rehab before they become one of the statistics.

Ecstasy and other club drugs – so many people are taking them, and think they are just ‘fun.’ But, in fact, they are among the most dangerous drugs around. Anyone who is taking them needs to know the truth about these drugs and, if they don’t stop taking them when they find out the truth, they should really get some addiction help as soon as possible.

Why are club drugs so dangerous? Ecstasy, for example, is supposed to consist of an active ingredient called MDMA (3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine). MDMA is bad enough in itself, but at least if you know what you’re taking you have some control over it and know what to expect – although different people react to it differently.

But, in fact, a lot of Ecstasy has next to no MDMA content. Instead, you have ingredients like PMMA (para-methoxymethamphetamine) or PMA (para-methoxyamphetamine) – both of which have been around since the early ‘70s, both of which are addictive, and both of which have some disastrous side effects, including:

• severe hyperthermia, which is an increase in body temperature, even at low doses
• increase in blood pressure and in heart rate
• heightened visual stimulation
• rapid and irregular eye movement
• motion sickness
• muscle spasms
• difficulty breathing
• death, at high dosages

When combined with other drugs, alcohol, or caffeine – not an unusual scenario – the effects are more intense.

One of the worst things about these chemicals is that little is know about the toxicity of either of these chemicals, the interaction of them with other substances, how they are metabolized, and so on.

In other words, you never really know how an individual is going to react to them.

PMA is nicknamed ‘Death’, and for good reason. Doses of more than 50 milligrams, PMA are potentially deadly. It can cause heart failure, kidney failure, brain seizures, sudden collapse, and an rise in body temperature up to 115 degrees! Temperatures that high can cause convulsions, coma, and a complete shutdown of the organs of the body – at which point, of course, the person dies. This rise in body temperature can happen within 30 to 40 minutes of taking the drug.

Ecstasy and other club drugs are common at ‘raves,’ in clubs, and at other parties. Teenagers and young adults are exposed to them all the time.

Make sure your kids are educated about Ecstasy. And make sure they know that, no matter what someone who offers it to them tells them, only the people who made the drug really know what’s in it. If they are still tempted, a good drug rehab program will sort them out.

There’s a new, nasty, so-called ‘designer drug’ in town. It’s known as Cloud 9, or C-9. Why it’s called Cloud 9 is beyond me – because the effects of it are anything but what we would normally think of when someone says they’re ‘on Cloud 9.’ It’s dangerous, addictive and deadly, and anyone using it should get addiction help as soon as possible.

What is Cloud 9? It’s a chemical similar to ‘bath salts.” It’s a hallucinogen and stimulant. It’s sometimes marketed as plant food, insect repellent or fertilizer. It is, in fact, none of those, but if you hang those labels on it and make it look legitimate you can get it into a headshop or convenience store.

Here’s what someone taking it can expect:

• erratic behavior
• serious injuries
• addiction
• agitation
• abnormal heart beat
• delusions
• hallucinations

It is being touted as a replacement for Ecstasy. But according to Dr. David Withers, associate medical director of the Marworth Alcohol and Chemical Dependency Center in Waverly, “”When you buy this bath salt you are getting many hundreds more. For a very few dollars, $50 or less, you can get a tremendous amount of MDPV (a similar chemical in ‘bath salts’). But MDPV is many times more potent than Ecstasy. When (users) lay out a line, they can be taking 20 to 25 hits of Ecstasy.”

He also said that people take it compulsively: “They may be awake for days and may exhibit symptoms of psychosis. Like seeing things and hearing things.”

Geisinger Wyoming Valley Medical Center sees about two or three cases of Cloud Nine intoxication a day.

The law is constantly trying to keep up with these ‘desinger drugs’ as they hit the street, but Cloud 9, which contains the illegal Mephedrone, is sold on the Internet.

This stuff is serious poison – as are most drugs.

If you hear anyone around you talking about being on Cloud 9, or you hear C-9, be aware that they may well be talking about this drug. And get them into drug rehab right away.

A website called Screen Junkies recently published a list of movies that are sure to discourage people from taking drugs. Most people who haven’t really gotten involved with drugs, or are considering it, think it’s going to be fun. But the problem is that you never really know what’s going to happen. People take drugs to ‘have a good time’, and next thing you know their lives are ruined and they’re desperately in need of addiction help.

One way to deter them is to show them what the drug scene is really like – and to show them how easy it is to get that involved. In fact, anyone who is worried about their kids taking drugs should see these movies as part of their own education, and make sure their kids see them – although you don’t want to do that when they’re very young because these are hard-hitting movies. But some teens will need something this drastic to have an impact on them.

Of course, they’re also good for adults – if you have an older child, spouse, brother, sister, friend that’s involved with drugs or drinking, the movies may help you get them into drug rehab.

The movies are:

28 Days. Sandra Bullock, who plays a role of someone who is taking drugs but still living a life that looks somewhat normal, crashes a car and is given the choice of jail time or rehab. She chooses rehab and, while she’s in there, meets some people who really have serious problems – and it could happen to her.

Trainspotting. The gruesome life of heroin addicts – including one who has a horrible time trying to get off the drug, and another who dies.

Act of Worship. A heroin and cocaine addict is thrown out of her apartment by her boyfriend, becomes homeless, and gets into even more trouble.

Basketball Diaries. What happens to a promising athlete and his family when he starts taking drugs and then becomes addicted.

Traffic. A film involving with a large cast of characters in the drug world – from the big picture of a drug ‘kingpin’ to what happens to the life of a teenage girl.

Clean & Sober. A successful businessman loses everything, and wakes up one morning with a dead girl in his bed who overdosed on cocaine. He goes into rehab, not so much to handle his problem as to hide from police, and realizes he really does have a problem. Again, there’s plenty of interaction with others in his situation.

Thanks to Screen Junkies for putting this list together. Use it – you may save the life of someone you care about.

A blog I read recently talked about how parents feel helpless when it comes to their kids drinking or taking drugs. They feel they can’t control it at all. The author’s solution was to start having dinner together. And, believe it or not, actual studies have shown that kids in families who have dinner together are significantly less likely to abuse alcohol, take drugs, and wind up needing addiction help.

Why is having dinner together so effective? Because you are doing something as a family – hopefully, it’s something you all enjoy – and you can have fun, laugh, talk about your day, and so on.

Doing that opens the door to deeper conversations about the important things in life, and to real parenting. Unfortunately our hectic lives leave little time for parenting. Sure, there’s lots of talk and interaction in good homes, but it’s mostly rushed – on the way to one thing or another, trying to get your kids to get ready faster, dropping them off at school or social and extra-curricular activities, , and so on.

But there’s generally not much actual communication: Not much in the way of sit-down discussions where parents and kids are talking about things that matter. Where parents are finding out how their kids feel about certain things, what’s really going on in their lives, who they’re hanging out with, who and what they like and dislike and why, what their goals and aspirations are.

These talks should include discussions about things that can get kids into trouble – including alcohol and drugs – and what will help them succeed in life.

Talks about drugs should include their exposure to drugs – do they know kids who take drugs or drink, have they been offered drugs or alcohol, and so on – and how they feel about them and what they know about them.

Parents are responsible for learning about drugs and educating their kids – not lecturing them, but educating with facts. Facts about the perils of drugs and alcohol are easy to come by, and are dramatic enough to be pretty convincing and have an effect. Gradually teach them more and more, and occasionally, when you see news stories about something bad happening from alcohol or drugs – especially to someone the kids might admire like a sports figure or musician – let them know about it.

When do you start having these discussions? Really, it’s never too early. Kids are exposed to drugs and alcohol by the time they’re 9 or 10 years old. There are 13-year-old addicts. And don’t wait until there is trouble. Statistics show that kids are involved in drugs for about two years before parents find out about it.

The other important thing to remember is that the earlier kids get involved in drugs or alcohol, the greater the chances are that they’ll become addicts and eventually need a drug rehab program. So, as I said, it’s never really too soon to educate them. And the more they know, the more able they’ll be to make an informed decision about drugs when they’re exposed to them. And they will be – no matter what kind of home, school or environment they grow up in.

So, start with dinner. If you’re not already having dinner together, make it a household rule. And take it from there.

It’s the day after Christmas. I’ll bet there are millions of people in the U.S. – and around the world – who wish they’d made sure that someone in their family had gotten addiction help before the holidays. Well, it’s not too late, and it’s never too early, to make it happen.

I remember many Christmases from my young years. Although the mornings were great – basically a happy family having breakfast, opening presents and so on – as the day wore on and the drinking started, the spirit was kind of ruined for some of us. Either someone in the household or someone who was visiting got nasty or way too melancholy – sometimes to the point of crying over everything they regret or how nice people were being to them and they didn’t deserve it – or there were fights, upsets, and so on.

This wasn’t just my family – it was also the families of many of my friends in our middle class neighborhood.

And then there was me when I was older. Showing up at my parent’s place stoned on one drug or another, or leaving early because I couldn’t stand going without drugs any longer.

Sometimes there were no drugs on Christmas day but, since my mother didn’t see me that often in those bad times, she wanted to talk about it. She was so happy to see me straight – but, at the same time, you could see the sadness behind her smile, she knew things were ‘normal’ just for the day.

It broke her heart. And worried her to no end.

Fortunately, I got off drugs shortly thereafter and that was followed by decades of a very good relationship. I never got into trouble after that, never gave her anything to worry about. It was my mother who first took the initiative to get me into drug rehab for the addiction help I needed. And once I got off drugs, I never went back. The treatment program was excellent, very successful, and deserves a lot of the credit for my never relapsing. And that’s why it’s important to choose the right drug rehab program.

But several years were wasted. Frankly, I was lucky to have lived through those drugs days. Many of my friends and acquaintances didn’t. And many of those who did were never able to re-establish their family and other relationship – they’d burned their bridges.

Do you want to save your kids? Your spouse? Your family? Your marriage? Your relationships?

Call Addiction Help Services – our experienced counselors have helped thousands of people from all walks of life and with all different types of alcohol and drug problems. They will help you find the right alcohol and drug addiction treatment program for your situation. And do it now, don’t delay as you probably have so many times in the past. Things aren’t going to change, except to get worse, unless something is done.

Do it now, and next year’s holidays will be what you really want them to be.

You would think that schools would be a relatively safe place when it comes to drugs and alcohol. At the very least, you would expect that if you can educate and protect your kids from other kids who drink and take drugs, and sell them, you wouldn’t have much to worry about. And if you can stop them from drinking and taking drugs early in life, there’s a far less chance you’ll have to find alcohol or drug addiction help for them when they get older.

But, unfortunately, protecting your kids from other kids who drink and take drugs is not the only problem – even teachers sometimes give student alcohol and drugs.

Almost every week in the news you see teachers involved with selling drugs to students.

This week it was a special education teacher (of all things) who was also a softball coach. A woman.

According to the report: “This was all after hours, off school property. It was with the presence of this teacher on a couple of occasions and then also at another third location where the teacher was actually given the money and brought alcohol and then also was there while alcohol was being consumed by these minor students,” said Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill.

One of the parents found text messages between their daughter and the teacher and reported it to the authorities. After investigation, the teacher was charged with five different offenses. She has now resigned and is awaiting trial – out on $5,000 bail.

Another report was about a teacher addicted to heroin. Another woman, and only 25 years old. She and a partner stole 22 computers from Pittsburgh’s Creative and Performing Arts high school to buy drugs.

She wasn’t caught until she and the same partner, an ex-boyfriend, tried to rob a bank. She then confessed to the computer thefts as well as some thefts of personal items from neighbor’s homes.

We used to be able to look up to teachers. They were the go-to people when there was any trouble. And they could be depended upon to set a good example to our kids. Now we know that they might need drug rehab as badly as some of their students – or worse.

Some teachers in universities and colleges even condone the use of prescription drugs – so called ‘study drugs’ like Adderall and Ritalin.

So when you’re educating your kids about drugs, don’t just paint the picture of drug dealers and drug users being unsavory characters that hang out in dark alleys.

Drug abusers come in all shapes and sizes, and from every walk of life.

Until now, the new designer drug, Meow Meow (mephedrone) was not considered addictive. It was just one of the many club drugs that people take when they’re out ‘having fun’. But according to a new study, that’s definitely not the case. In fact, more than one third of the people who use Meow Meow should be seeking addiction help.

According to the study, which was conducted by doing a survey on 100 people to use Meow Meow, more than one third of every ten people who take the drug have the symptoms of addiction. What are those symptoms?

• they can’t cut back or stop using it
• they withdrawal symptoms when they try
• they take more of the drug than they intended to
• spend a lot of time taking the drug or recovering from it
• they give up other activities and neglect parts of their life because of it
• they keep taking the drug despite any related health problems they may experience or are likely to experience
• they need to take larger and larger doses to get the same high

On top of being addictive, nearly one in four people said they have a strong urge to take Meow Meow and the urge doesn’t really go away. Many also said that their family or friends said they were worried about them taking the drug, but they still continued to take it.

That’s a lot different than having fun.

Meow Meow is just one of the many ‘designer drugs’ out there. It’s important for friends, parents and other family members to watch out for new drugs. There are some pretty nasty people out there – they figure out how to get around the law by manufacturing or dealing really dangerous chemicals. People find out the drug is not illegal and get the impression that they must be okay. But, they’re not. They’re just new, and the law hasn’t caught up with them yet.

Getting into a drug rehab program can help those taking Meow Meow, and the sooner the better.