Another stellar entry from the Junky’s Wife. Check out her captivating blog here.

Monday, January 14, 2008
My Will Be Done.

I’ve been praying lately, a lot. Most of the time, my prayers are kind of trench prayers…”Help me. Help me. Help me,” but sometimes, I get a little more sophisticated:

“Help me. I am afraid. I am trapped, and I need guidance. Please help me to know what I am supposed to do. Please show me what you want for me.”

I realized this weekend in my step group while working on the Sixth Step that I might be standing firmly in the way…

Hooked: Illegal Drugs and How They Got That Way, a History Channel special that explores the world of illegal drugs, meeting with pharmacologists and scientists to learn exactly what effect they have on us and exploring the social and legislative changes that have transformed (and, some would argue, created) the drug culture of the 20th century.

TIMES SQUARE RABBI
By Yehudah Fine
Reviewed by Ginger B.

Yehudah Fine is not your typical rabbi. After creating a school for children of migrant farm workers in California, Yehudah moved to Brooklyn, founded the Jewish Family Institute and, of course, began working with adolescents in crisis in the recesses of Manhattan, Queens and the Bronx. Donning jeans and a New York Yankees baseball cap, the unconventional teacher would roam what he called “The Way Beyond” looking for kids whose lives have ended up as desolate as the streets on which they are found.

Yehudah’s spiritual message is based on the 8 steps of…

Where A Few Might Benefit Many

By Thomas G. Durham, PhD, LADC

There have been many changes in China over the last several decades and, not surprisingly, this has included an increase in alcohol consumption. China is on the verge of having one of the highest per-capita rates of addiction among major world economies.

Limited Help
Drug addiction is not new to China. At one time it was estimated that 27% of the male population was addicted to opium. However, this figure dropped significantly from its peak in 1906 to the establishment of the People’s Republic in 1949. Changes in Chinese society in recent…

By William C. Moyers

When it comes to stories of the struggles with addiction, it’s important not to kill the message — or the messenger, either.

Dear Mr. Moyers: It’s hard to know if you or my daughter is more responsible for my anger. We heard you speak in Pittsburgh last month. She’s 22 years old, a good girl with a college education who seemed committed to the road of recovery back from the hell of her alcoholism.

She’d just been discharged from rehab (her first), but what you said about relapse in your speech set her off again. On New Year’s Day,…

Last Wednesday, January 9, 2008, I attended a 12 step meeting and picked up a medallion. I have been in 12 step programs for over 15 years. I did not pick up a 15 year medallion. I did not pick up a 10 year medallion. I did not pick up a 5 year medallion. I picked up a 1 year medallion. One year ago I had a fling with a bottle of pills. Why? I had been clean for quite a long time before that infamous evening. What could have possibly happened that allowed me to throw away all my…

Blogger In Repair presents us a wonderful entry…

Wednesday, January 9, 2008
Stepping over Our Wounds

Sometimes we have to “step over” our anger, our jealousy, or our feelings of rejection and move on. The temptation is to get stuck in our negative emotions, poking around in them as if we belong there. Then we become the “offended one,” “the forgotten one,” or the “discarded one.” Yes, we can get attached to these negative identities and even take morbid pleasure in them.

It might be good to have a look at these dark feelings and explore where they come from, but there comes a moment…

January 2, 2008
By Associated Press

HOUSTON - Two Baylor College of Medicine researchers in Houston are working on a cocaine vaccine they hope will become the first-ever medication to treat people hooked on the drug. “For people who have a desire to stop using, the vaccine should be very useful,” said Dr. Tom Kosten, a psychiatry professor who is being assisted in the research by his wife, Therese, a psychologist and neuroscientist. “At some point, most users will give in to temptation and relapse, but those for whom the vaccine is effective won’t get high and will lose interest.”

The vaccine, currently…

The Positive Project is “an non-profit endeavor with a mission to use the stories of people infected/affected by HIV/AIDS to: Raise Awareness, reduce stigma, promote prevention, encourage testing, enhance care and improve quality of life.”

The Positive Project has an enormous amount of video material that is worth taking a look at. Here is a little more about them…

This work has grown from the conversations of two mental health professionals who have worked collectively for more than 30 years with people infected and affected by HIV disease. We were often struck by the power of the accounts and comments we heard in privacy…

An article from Technology Review published by MIT.

Wednesday, January 09, 2008
Gene Therapy for Alcoholics
An interesting approach to curbing alcoholism is tested on rats.
By Anna Davison

Researchers in Chile have succeeded in keeping the drinking habits of alcoholic rats in check using gene therapy. The treatment mimics a natural mutation common in East Asian people, which lowers their tolerance to alcohol, making them less likely to become alcoholics.

According to the National Institutes of Health, 17.6 million people abuse alcohol or are alcohol dependent in the United States alone. If the gene-therapy technique could be applied to humans, scientists say that it may be…

by Mark Harris

Recently in headlines in our local paper, two people claimed that being forced by the courts into 12-Step based treatment, was tantamount to being forced in the Christian religion. These particular relapsing patients, claimed this was violating their First Amendment rights to freedom of religion. There are a number of effective recovery frameworks for addictions of all kinds. Their basic common bottom line is stopping addictive behavior, and replacing the addictive behavior with a non-addictive lifeway, often involving some sort of cultural or spiritual framework.

While bearing a superficial resemblance to Quaker’s meetings, or Unitarian support meetings, with its…

Check out this controversial video from CNN out…

Chris and Pax Prentiss, co-founders of Passages Addiction Cure Center, explain through a series of CNN and other TV news interviews how drug addiction and alcoholism can be cured by acknowledging it is not a disease and utilizing one on one counseling with the right people, in the right environment. More information can be found on the website at http://www.passagesmalibu.com

An interesting public service video on addictions…

A fast paced, image rich video that examines the biological and environmental causes of addiction as well as the conflict between old brain cravings and new brain reasoning. Legal substances like alcohol, tobacco, and prescription medications are addressed along with illegal drugs such as cocaine, heroin, and marijuana. The video also explores compulsive eating disorders, obsessive sexual activity, and habitual gambling. Using illustrations from medical science along with real-world dialogue from individual users, Roots of Addiction demonstrates that any addiction is an inherited, learned, and practiced set of behaviors, which can be treated and…

Recovery, there’s always a first time, as tells blogger What Winners Do…

January 7 2008
Go After Addiction Recovery Like A Newcomer

Do you remember what it was like when you were a newcomer to addiction recovery? If you were anything like me, you pursued recovery. You went after it, you studied it and you spent a lot of time building up your addiction recovery fundamental skills.

As time goes on, you feel a little more comfortable in your addiction recovery. You feel that you can take on some new things that aren’t directly related to addiction recovery. You have begun to develop some…

Check out the rest of this great blog entry at The Last Chance Texaco…

There’s a Light in the Darkness
January 3, 2008
We should learn just to stick our hand out and whoever it touches that is alone, engage them, in whatever way is helpful. There is joy to be had, in that.
- Anonymous
It’s not surprising that with the new year there are an unusual number of ‘newcomers’ in the rooms of AA and other programs that offer a spiritual solution to the problems of living. I got sober this time of year. I was in a meeting tonight that was packed…

By William C. Moyers

Each week in this space I field questions from readers who want to know more about addiction and what to do about it.

But in the spirit of the end of the year, I’m using this column to look back at the hurts and hopes of 2007 and make a prediction for what’s ahead in 2008.

Hurt: to Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears and all those Hollywood celebs who kept doing the same thing over and over again, expecting something different but getting the same result. That’s insanity, and their repeated dashes to and from high-end treatment centers only exacerbated…

The other night I had a dream, or maybe it was a message from beyond, but in any case, I do know that it was a vivid reminder about the cunning nature of my disease. It’s the time of year for my anniversary and maybe that’s why my subconscious was peering in dark corners, trying to find some piece of dirt that I had stashed away long ago, and left to fester and rot since my last use. The peripherals of the dream are fading away but the bottle of pills tightly grasped in my right hand is an image…