addictions : page 2.......... .Talent Development Resources..home page

.. .. As usual, Dr. Silkworth gave Bill belladonna and barbiturates, and as the alcohol wore off Bill sank into a deep depression.  Ebby visited him again and went over points from the Oxford Group that he said had helped him to stop drinking: admit you are licked, get honest, talk it out, make restitution, give of yourself, and pray.  Bill listened, but the darkness of his mood seemed to close in on him.

He reached some kind of bottom. Although he didn't believe in God, although he believed only in the power of his own mind, he found himself begging God for help.  "If there be a God, let him show himself!" he cried.  The response was amazing. "Suddenly my room blazed with an indescribably white light. I was seized with an ecstasy beyond description. Every joy I had known was pale by comparison," he wrote later.  "Then, seen in the mind's eye, there was a mountain. I stood upon its summit where a great wind blew. A wind, not of air but of spirit. In great, clean strength it blew right through me. Then came the blazing thought, 'you are a free man.'" > from Spirituality and Recovery / Speaking of Faith radio ...excerpt from book : My Name Is Bill :  Bill Wilson -- His Life and the Creation of  Alcoholics Anonymous - by Susan Cheever

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.. .. Tatum O'Neal earned an Academy Award for best supporting actress in Paper Moon, starring opposite her father, Ryan O'Neal. Only 10 years old, she became the youngest Oscar winner. But Tatum did not live a charmed life. Growing up, Tatum says few people realize that offscreen she and her brother Griffin had been shuttled back and forth between their mentally unstable mother and their father who Tatum says was volatile and unpredictable.  Tatum claims they were living in a world full of drugs, neglect, and physical and mental abuse. By age 20, she says she was addicted to cocaine.  And later, when her 10-year marriage to tennis star John McEnroe ended in an explosive divorce, she turned to heroin, eventually losing custody of her three children. Now, at age 40, Tatum reveals the untold stories behind her notorious Hollywood life in her new book, A Paper Life.  "I mean, I have to be honest about what happened in my life," says Tatum. "Now people know what happened to me. I didn't just fall off the side of the road and decide to do drugs and, you know, terrible things happened to me. Terrible."

.. .. After her divorce, when she was in her 30s, Tatum's drug use progressed to heroin. However, when her 7-year-old daughter walked into her bedroom and found a syringe, Tatum says she had hit "rock bottom." "That's what happens when you're in the disease of addiction," says Tatum. "That's when you know that you need help and that's when I called John [McEnroe], and I said, 'You need to take the kids, and I need to get help.' … And it wasn't the first treatment and I went to many more after that." Tatum says becoming sober was a struggle filled with guilt. "[I had] lots of conversations with [my daughter] and lots of heartaches and lots of shame and lots of regret. "I think it's really hard for mothers to get sober and to get clean. It's very hard for us because we have a lot of shame. We have a lot of maternal guilt."  > The Oprah Winfrey Show Oct 12 2004 > related page : shame

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Some 18 million Americans abuse or are addicted to alcohol. Tobacco causes 400,000 deaths each year, killing more people than AIDS, alcohol, drug abuse, car crashes, suicides, and fires combined.  And nearly half of all Americans say they know someone with a drug problem. Each year there are more deaths and disabilities from substance abuse than from any other preventable cause. Of 2 million US deaths each year, one in four is attributable to alcohol, illicit drug, or tobacco use.  > from Join Together - a project of the Boston University School of Public Health

 

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.. .. If you engage in any behavior (i.e.: brushing your teeth) long enough, it will become a learned habit. It will become familiar, comfortable and you will never totally forget how to do it. Habits are normal and an essential for survival and growth. Habits cover a spectrum of severity -- from very healthy to somewhat destructive to life-threatening.  At Addiction Alternatives, we refer to destructive habits as "unwanted repetitive behaviors" -- that is, undesirable activities, repeated over and over and that interfere with the quality of life.

Altering one's state of consciousness is also normal (for instance, children like to spin or swing on a swing, adults go to amusement parks and movies). Your present destructive habit or addiction is now mostly an unconscious strategy -- which you started to develop at a naive, much earlier stage of life -- to enjoy the feelings it brought on or to help cope with uncomfortable emotions or feelings.  It is simply an adaptation that has gone awry. > from Basic Principles of Addiction Alternatives (AA2) - a specialized program "dedicated solely to assisting individuals self-manage destructive habits such as problem drinking, drug abuse and other excessive behaviors." > "The Great Wheel of Paris" - lithograph by Albert Dorfinant created to publicize the Exposition Universelle of 1900 -  see visual arts : page 2

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.. .. But many who try 12-step programs often don’t stick with them. Even AA estimates that 95 percent of those who begin going to meetings drop out.  In other clinics, the relapse rate ranges from 50 to 70 percent. Dr. Alan Marlatt, psychologist and alcoholism expert at the University of Washington, says such programs are too rigid and outdated.  “They’re a little resistant to those of us who are doing scientific research that might challenge or question some of the basic assumptions that they have come up with,” he says. “It would be like trying to challenge the Ten Commandments or something.” After struggling with severe alcohol and drug problems, Richard Banton followed the AA program for six years. “They told me that I had a disease and that I was powerless over alcohol and drugs and I could never drink again,” he says.  Although sober, he was uncomfortable with the AA methodology and the “alcoholic” label. “I just thought it was ridiculous,” he says. “Any time you say anything that conflicts with their model, then you’re in denial.”

Searching for his own solution, Banton found some experts who did not subscribe to the disease theory of alcoholism. Instead, they considered alcoholism a behavior that could be changed. “I strongly believed that I would be able to control myself,” says Banton, who has been drinking occasionally for the last three years without getting drunk. “People can change behaviors. People do and I have,” he says. “That’s an empowering message.”  Likewise, Marc Kern, Ph.D. [above], whose alcohol dependence and drug problems began in college and continued for 10 years, tried AA. For him, it was not the solution. “There’s nothing medical being conveyed in there,” he says of AA “It’s a social, psychological support group -- what kind of disease is treated that way?”  One sip at a time, Kern found that he could devise his own way out of his problem. For the past 20 years, he has been enjoying an occasional glass of wine -- living proof, he says, that some, although not all, alcoholics can learn to drink responsibly.  Kern, who went back to school for a Ph.D., has started a new career helping others with addictions, providing them with alternatives to 12-step programs that advocate abstinence.  from article New Roads to Sobriety - A Controversial Look at Alcohol Abuse and Treatment Options - By Rebecca Raphael, ABC News ~ ~ ~ Marc F. Kern, PhD, is Founder and Director of the sites Addiction Alternatives - and - habitdoc and author of : ...Take Control Now  /  Responsible Drinking

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.. .. According to the leading addiction researcher at Harvard, George Vaillant, M.D., the reptilian brain is the seat of addiction.  Anything going on in this brain is uber-powerful because it pertains to survival. It is also automatic, outside our control, and sometimes said to be unconscious. "The best intentions in the world don't help you with addiction" says Vaillant. "Will power is not a prognostic factor in recovery.  "Addiction resides in what is often referred to as our reptilian brain, and -- well, alligators don't come when they're called."

If addiction -- alcoholism, for instance -- has an underlying dynamic of suppressed rage at helplessness, as some believe, and is a compromise between doing nothing, and doing something constructive, as others believe, certainly increasing your EQ [emotional intelligence] skills such as Personal Power, Anger Management, Intentionality and Self-Regard would allow you to consider the latter alternative instead of the former, and to make it happen.  And Optimism, an EQ facilitator which can be learned, is the opposite of "learned helplessness." from article Emotional Intelligence and Addiction -  by Susan Dunn .> book : .The Natural History of Alcoholism Revisited -  by George E. Vaillant

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.. .. We define ourselves by the way we relate to other people. We get deep, lasting, and meaningful satisfaction from giving selflessly to, and being present with, others ... My patients can't do that. They're struggling with the effects of trauma suffered early in life when they were still developing the brain mechanisms that allow them to relate to other people and the world in general.

Unable to trust, they grow up without a sense of self. They're overwhelmed by feelings, unable to cope, always out of control. Their brains tell them to manage the pain by getting loaded.  Then, when they find their way to us, we ask them to go back and experience that powerlessness, the very thing that sent them off the rails in the first place. No wonder they resist. ...from Cracked: Putting Broken Lives Together Again  by Drew Pinsky photo from Dr. Drew

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Books always glamorize [addiction or alcoholism] or romanticize or make it seem cool. It is not glamorous. It is not romantic. It is not cool or even close, it is just f***ing awful. ...  I survived my addictions. I lived through them and past them. I did not do it the way most are told is the only way. I did not use God or a Higher Power or a Twelve Step Group of any kind.  I used my will, my heart, my friends, my family. Most people who use God or a Higher Power or a Twelve Step Group fail. There is another way that might work. It worked for me. I want to share it. from essay by James Frey[on randomhouse.com]   ~ ~ ~ The Taoist emblem for life blossoms in dark ink on his left shoulder, and on his left inner wrist, the letters "s p c d h c" are inscribed.  They stand, he explains, for serenity, patience, compassion, discipline, honesty and courage, traits he's learned from the Tao Te Ching, a book of wisdom written 25 centuries ago by Lao Tsu, which his brother gave him while in rehab. Skeptical at first, Frey says the book has become the road map that helped him gain and hold onto sobriety.

.. .. "When I read the Tao, it helps me feel better," he says. "My process is really simple: If I want to do something, I have a decision to make. The decision is either yes or no.  "Oftentimes, the decision I want to make is yes, but the decision I know I have to make is no.  "What do I do? If I sit and wait, I know I'll feel better, and know that saying no will cease to become a decision, it'll just be something that I can do."  from review article [LA Times, May 20 2003] by Bernadette Murphy  about book by James Frey - a former screenwriter **Tao Te Ching -- by Lao Tsu James Frey. A Million Little Pieces

*related pages:......spirituality......nurturing mental health resources

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Study: Girls More Easily Addicted to Drugs [Associated Press, Feb 5, 2003] Girls and young women get hooked on cigarettes, alcohol and drugs more quickly and for different reasons than boys, and should receive specialized treatment that reflects that, according to a study released Wednesday.  Teenage girls often begin smoking and drinking to relieve stress or alleviate depression, while boys do it for thrills or heightened social status, according to the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University. "(Girls) get hooked faster, they get hooked using lesser amounts of alcohol and drugs and cocaine, and they suffer the consequences faster and more severely," said Joseph A. Califano Jr., chairman of the center. ...  Florida first lady Columba Bush, whose daughter Noelle is struggling with substance abuse, said that if parents and educators understand girls are more vulnerable and need different treatments, "we can save millions of young girls and women from the agony of addiction." ...  The study, based on a nationwide survey of more than 1,200 females age 8 to 22, found little difference in the percentage of boys and girls who smoke, drink and use drugs. Approximately 45 percent of high school girls drink alcohol, compared with 49 percent of boys, and girls outpace boys in the use of prescription drugs, the study found.  Researchers determined girls are also more likely to abuse substances if they reached puberty early, had eating disorders or were ever physically or sexually abused. Their likelihood of using cigarettes, alcohol or drugs also increases if their families move often or when girls advance from middle school to high school or from high school to college.  As they reach puberty and develop into teenagers, "girls are likelier than boys to compare themselves physically and academically to their new peers, increasing the doubts they feel about themselves," the study said.

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I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to work anymore if I quit drinking and drugging, but I decided.. that I would trade writing for staying married and watching the kids grow up. ... If it came to that. It didn't, of course. The idea that creative endeavor and mind-altering substances are entwined is one of the great pop-intellectual myths of our time. Substance abusing writers are just substance abusers -- common garden-variety drunks and druggies, in other words. Any claims that the drugs and alcohol are necessary to dull a finer sensibility are just the usual self-serving bullsh*t. ... Creative people probably do run a greater risk of alcoholism and addiction than those in some other jobs, but so what? We all look pretty much the same when we're puking in the gutter.  Stephen King  - from his book: On Writing

 

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"Drugs made me feel more normal," she says. "They contained me."  But her addictions were serious. At her worst, she took 30 Percodan a day.  "You don't even get high. It's like a job, you punch in," she recalls. "I was lying to doctors and looking through people's drawers for drugs."  ... "I overdosed at 28, at which point I began to accept the bipolar diagnosis.  "It was [Richard] Dreyfuss who came to the hospital and said, 'You're a drug addict, but I have to tell you that I've observed this other thing in you: You're a manic-depressive.' So maybe I was taking drugs to keep the monster in the box." ...

.. .. She eventually found a psychiatrist, proper medication, and a support group for manic depressives.  from article: "Carrie Fisher" by Lybi Ma,  Psychology Today, Dec. 2001 **Carrie Fisher.  Postcards from the Edge

*related book:

 Sisters of the Extreme: Women Writing on the Drug Experience, Including
Charlotte Bronte, Louisa May Alcott, Anais Nin, Maya Angelou, Billie Holiday, Nina Hagen,
Carrie Fisher, and Others   by Michael Horowitz, editor

*related page:  depression

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.. .. Kirstie Alley successfully conquered her own dependence to cocaine through the Narconon Program. Today she is Narconon's International Spokesperson. Kirstie presented the 1994 Narconon Drug Free Hero awards and spoke of the "Bad Guys" who make drug addicts of children.

Still tearful over the death of rock star Kurt Cobain, she quoted a People magazine report that Cobain, who committed suicide, had been a bright and active child who liked to sing Beatles tunes, until he was labeled "hyperactive" and put on the controversial drug Ritalin. He was then given sedatives to counter the side effects. "They set him up for drug addiction when he was in kindergarten" Alley said. "Through my own experience with Narconon," she said, "I know it is possible to end any dependency upon alcohol and other drugs and to build a new, successful drug-free life for oneself.  "Addiction need not be a one-way street of no return. Drugs are a hell that our children do not need to go through." from Drug RehabNarconon site

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[interviewer: What makes your film Due East great, and makes you such a good director / filmmaker?]  Twenty-five years of being on a film set, of observing, of watching movies, and, also, my study from the beginning of my time has been humanity. I am fascinated by human behaviour. It's my metier. The other thing is, I've come to a place in my own life where I'm very willing to be present.  That's what makes a good director and actor. I have found delight and incredible freedom and richness in the unaltered presence of being here, of sitting here, talking to you [the interviewer].  [That used to be hard then?]  Oh, I spent a lot of time fearing intimacy, fearing lack of control. I dealt with my fear in lots of ways. I used drugs and alcohol very successfully. I haven't had a drug or a drink for 21-and-a-half years.  Helen Shaver****[from Globe and Mail interview, Nov. 3, 2001, posted on helen-shaver.com]

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The son of a friend of mine is 17, tall, good-looking, quiet -- and a prime example of how much and yet how little many kids know about illegal drugs.  Asked what he has used, the teen rattles off pot, alcohol and 'shrooms (mushrooms).. acid (LSD), crack (cocaine), crystal meth.. prescription tranquilizers and painkillers... GHB, Ecstasy and mescaline. Asked if he wants to get clean, he says, "Not right now. My use is just recreational." And perhaps it is. But the latest government figures released in September show that illegal drug use is up among young adults between 18 and 25. There may be much that my friend's son, and America's other 16 million illicit drug users, don't know about how street drugs affect the brain. ... In the brain.. amphetamines and methamphetamines act as "releasers" of neurotransmitters, forcing the brain to pump out 30 to 40 times the normal levels...  The immediate effect is to activate the brain's "reward" circuits. But over-revving this circuitry can also cause violent behavior. Chronic stimulation depletes brain cells so that they can no longer produce neurotransmitters. ...

.. .. Cocaine, a psychostimulant, works in yet a different way, notes Dr. Marc Kaufman, a research pharmacologist at McLean Hospital in Belmont, Mass. ... from article: The other effects of getting high - by Judy Foreman

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.. .. Hannah Green [Katie Holmes]: Grady, you know how in class you're always telling us that writers make choices?  Grady Tripp [Michael Douglas]: Yeah. Hannah Green: And even though you're book is really beautiful, I mean, amazingly beautiful, it's... it's at times... it's... very detailed. You know, with the genealogies of everyone's horses, and the dental records, and so on. And... I could be wrong, but it sort of reads in places like you didn't make any choices. At all.

.. .. And I was just wondering if it might not be different if... if when you wrote you weren't always... under the influence.  Grady Tripp: Well... thank you for the thought, but shocking as it may sound, I am not the first writer to sip a little weed.  Furthermore, it might surprise you to know that one book I wrote, as you say, "under the influence," just happened to win a little something called the Pen Award. Which, by the way, I accepted under the influence.  from Wonder Boys (2000) - based on the book by Michael Chabon

 

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The film is about avoiding reality through various escape routes that become addictions and lead to Hell. My character is addicted to television, chocolate, coffee, to her dream of her son, which has no basis in reality.  And then she latches onto the fantasy of celebrity, being on television, and finally, to diet pills. She goes from one addiction to another. All are ways for her to not feel her feelings.  Ellen Burstyn[bbc online interview 16th January 2001] - about her film: Requiem for a Dream  [dvd]

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"Yeah -- in rehab you're an addict; on a sound stage you're a tortured genius."

movie studio exec Peter Dragon (Jay Mohr) in TV series "Action"
 

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It took a long time to find myself as a musician. I'm a good musical chameleon and a good copycat. I had fun doing other people's songs and playing in all these various styles.  I didn't have the confidence to try and find my own musical identity until I stopped drinking around 1983. I suffered from this biochemical depression and anxiety disorder,  and I thought drinking made me feel better about myself.  But it wasn't until I stopped drinking that I started to believe I might really have something to say.            singer/songwriter Shawn Colvin   [LA Times 3.24.01]

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"It wasn't about being sober and cleaning up. It was about learning how to live.  How do we not hurt ourselves? How do we not hurt those around us? When I  came out of there, I felt so full of wisdom, so peaceful."  Drew Barrymore - about her rehab experience  [Premiere.com interview]  *----her book: Little Girl Lost

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If you want to be a musician, be a musician, be a poet, be a goddess, be a god.
Work on your art. Keep your focus. The rest of it--living on the edge, sex, drugs,
and rock and roll--is not about music."            Courtney Love

(promoting TV spots by the Partnership for a Drug-Free America) [mrshowbiz.go.com]
 

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I still do basically think of... addiction as a disease if someone else has it -- and if I have it, it's a moral failing. I have to try really hard to be as understanding about myself as someone else. It was either that or I'm dumber than a dog. ... I lost a lot and created a great deal of wreckage and don't have anybody to blame for myself.   Brett Butler  [Studio Briefing 10.29.99]   [her book: Knee Deep in Paradise]

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When you are a sugar addict, saying no is not an issue of willpower.
Your biochemistry has a direct effect on your behavior. Your craving
and desire for sugar are profoundly affected by your brain chemistry,
and even more significant, by what and when you eat.

You are a sugar addict because you are sugar sensitive. Sugar addiction
is a primary symptom of sugar sensitivity. If you are sugar sensitive
and your meals are erratic, if you skip breakfast, eat lots of sweet things,
drink quarts of diet soda or eat pounds of pasta and bread, then you will be
depressed, moody, erratic, volatile, forgetful, and impulsive.

You may have a short fuse, a short attention span, and a reputation for being
all over the place. You may have trouble with your weight, you may have
an eating disorder, or you may have a problem with aggression. ...

Once you start to think of yourself as having a unique brain and body chemistry,
you can start on the road to recovery.

  Kathleen DesMaisons Ph.D.

from book: The Sugar Addict's Total Recovery Program

site: Radiant Recovery - Simple solutions for sugar sensitivity
 

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I used to do quite a few drugs... But you know Bill, drugs are no good for anybody. I've seen a lot of people get really messed up on drugs, I've seen people die on drugs...  (Lights cigarette, inhales deeply) I was saying to Trevor just the other day - I said, "Trevor, how is it that we managed to survive?"  After Jimi died and Janis died and John died, I said to myself, "Why didn't we die?"  We shoulda died. All the stuff we used to do. I got straight while I was on tour. Woke up one morning... typical tour situation: luxury hotel room, I don't even know where I am.. beautiful naked girl lying next to me in the bed, I don't know who she is, I don't know how she got there... champagne bottles all over the floor, cocaine on every horizontal surface.  I hardly have the strength to pick up my head. So I pick up the remote control and I flip on the telly. And I was saved, Bill, I was saved.

.. .. You have a man on in this country, on TV all the time. Saved my life. White hair. A genius... Donahue, Donahue was on...  What he said really hit me. He said: "If you haven't met your full potential in this life, you're not really alive." The profoundness struck me like a thunderbolt. I thought, "That man is talking about me. He's talking about me." Because here I was, young, talented, intelligent, wealthy, good-looking, very intelligent... and what am I doing with my life? I'm on drugs, day and night. ... Such a waste of human potential. Such a waste. ***Eric Bogosian ***[from his site ericbogosian.com]  /  excerpt from his book: Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll

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"I was a guy who wanted to become famous," says Mr. [Matthew] Perry. "There was steam coming out of my ears, I wanted to be famous so badly. You want the attention, you want the bucks, and you want the best seat in the restaurant. I didn't think what the repercussions would be."  Mr. Perry, who has a well-documented history of alcohol and drug addiction, does not blame his troubles on fame. But his career, which reached a nadir in February 2001 when he abruptly left the set of "Serving Sara" and went into rehab, has been almost a parody of the perils of answered prayers.  "When it happens, it's kind of like Disneyland for a while," Mr. Perry says of hitting it big after "Friends" started in 1994. "For me it lasted about eight months, this feeling of `I've made it, I'm thrilled, there's no problem in the world.' And then you realize that it doesn't accomplish anything, it's certainly not filling any holes in your life." Neither did the drugs and alcohol, he discovered. "I didn't get sober because I felt like it," Mr. Perry says. "I got sober because I was worried I was going to die the next day." He says he hasn't had a drink since February 2001. [The New York Times, Aug. 18, 2002]****/****photo: Matthew Perry with Elizabeth Hurley in "Serving Sara"

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.. .. Columnist Harriet Rubin [left] notes there can be harmful aspects to pursuing leadership: "Many people are reaching the top, using all of their means to get money, power, and glory - and then self-destructing."  ("Success and Excess", Fast Company, Oct.98)

Rubin goes on to quote Mary Bell... about achievement being addictive: "People brag to me that they're working 80 hours a week, giving their lives to the company store,"  Bell says. "It's heartbreaking. Those people are prime candidates for self-destruction."      from article: Women of Talent - Power and Leadership

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