"On Recovery Road"? Which One?" - Part 2

“There are many paths to recovery!” Is your “Recovery GPS” programmed for the direct route?

The “Road” begins with sobriety which may be imposed through family or work interventions. Even by court mandates! Preferably, sobriety is voluntarily attained by the individual for personal reasons. However, the state of sobriety doesn’t speak to the quality and satisfaction of one’s life, does it?

Recovery is another matter. It’s built on sobriety but involves one’s entire human experience.

Though there are numerous ways or paths to establish one’s sobriety, most had their “Recovery GPS” programmed to take the “scenic” route! You’ve been on a scenic route - narrow, windy roads, lower speed limits and many distractions disguised as attractions!

There is a reason for this. Conventional thinking is that you have altered your state with substances so often that you now have an altered state! You can only take so much at one time!

After all . . . . . . . . . . .

YOU ARE NOW DIFFERNET! YOU ARE AN ADDICT/ALCOHOLIC . . . .FOREVER!

The route to recovery? You’ll need life-long treatment! You know -implants, medications & meetings!

Please remember that kind of instruction is , for the most part, well-meaning.

However, a course correction is in order.

Remember who you really are! A human being, being human. magnificent and flawed.

Like every human being! Agree? Great! Now, program your “Recovery GPS”!

On Recovery Road? Which one?

The life-long route measured in years and decades with its medical pit stops and reduced speed limits?

Or the direct route - “Rapid-Release Recovery”, measured in weeks and months?

Thought so!

_________________________________________________________________________________________________

Next offering - “On Recovery Road”? Take this exit: “Rapid-release Recovery”!

#addictiontreatment ed@recoverreality.com

On "Recovery Road"? What Your E.T.A.?

What’s keeping us from arriving at our recovery destination conscious, committed and capable? Why are we so often confused, frustrated and insecure?

We’re not alone . . . .

Could it be our GPS is malfunctioning?

Probably not. But it could be its programming.

Your “Recovery GPS” is programmed by people like me! Addiction specialists!

The sad fact is that we’ve erroneously programmed your starting point , route and and destination!

These bugs are pervasive throughout addiction treatment programs and self-help meetings.

Please permit me to offer an update, a “patch”, to begin to address these issues.

Your Recovery GPS must correctly identify what, not where, you are.

The conventional choices: Addict or Alcoholic. Both identities formulated from B.S. (Bad Science!)

Update Patch: Rejoice! You don’t have a choice!

You are a human being, being human - magnificent and flawed, like every other human being!

Everyone who is in sustained “remission” from their “disease” of addiction, put themselves there!

In remission by permission! Be encouraged! Remission is a decision away!

Realizing one’s true identity is the essential first step for programming your route and destination!

Now, repeat after me - “Once an addict, ONCE an addict, Once an alcoholic, ONCE an alcoholic!:”

#addicitonrecovery - ed@recoverreality.com

The Value of "Lived Experience"

In the culture of addiction recovery, having had lived experience as an addict or alcoholic has morphed into a credential of authority.

The newly sober/clean are oftentimes encouraged to share their story for the mutual benefit of both the speaker and the hearers.

Enmeshed in their stories are advice and insights shared from a grateful heart.

Having had ‘been there” baptizes their message and authenticates their message.

Sound all to familiar, doesn’t it?

Then why is it that so many needy people drop out of these self-help meetings and the lapse/relapse rates are so high? That the stories start to sound the same? That there’s something missing?

Could it be that another perspective is needed? A perspective of addiction that carries its own credential of lived experience but from an untapped source?

I’m referring to people you may know from the same town or city as you but for reasons of their own, did

not suffer as an addict or alcoholic.

How did they resist the temptations, cope with life’s difficulties, party?

What did they do for kicks?

What have they learned? What keeps them straight now?

What can we learn from them?

We need to hear their lived experiences!

We already know what not to do. We need to focus on what to do!

What about the newly sober?

Seat them in the front row to listen so their story has a happy ending.

The value of “lived experience”?

Why, it’s a matter of whose experience we’re listening to.

"Inoculate or Inculcate?"

Should we instruct our children to avoid drug/alcohol misuse by inculcating values or by introducing them to particular hygienic and pharmaceutical protocols so they don’t catch the “disease” of addiction?

If someone you know is misusing substances and their life exhibits disruption, dysfunction or destruction, should you appeal to their common sense or immediately defer to a medical practitioner?

If a loved one is in active addiction, they may need medical intervention to stabilize their condition. After they have regained a measure of stability, should you relegate them to a medical model of treatment as the primary means of supporting their “life-long” recovery? Relabel them addicts/alcoholics thereby circumventing their hopes and dreams. Promote their stigmatization by encouraging them to “come out” as a person in “sustained remission”? To be preoccupied with their sobriety?

Or would you rather see them immersed in a category-transforming program of instruction that restores their self-respect, familial functioning, and active citizenship? To find happiness in being other-centered instead of self-centered.

To understand that being available, which assumes sobriety, is a gateway to personal growth, peppered with opportunities for emotional and spiritual expansion.

Don’t be preoccupied with staying sober! Just be available, 24-7!l

To inoculate against a “disease” or inculcate to choose wisely?

Yeah -me too.

#addictionrecocery

ed@recoverreality.com

"Do NOT Recover!"

Has your drug use or alcohol misuse brought disruption, dysfunction and destruction to your life?

Have loved ones pleaded with you to get into treatment and recover?

Well, DON’T!

If you feel depressed, oppressed and suppressed by addiction, that’s the last thing you want to do is to believe you need to “recover” from it!

I understand why you think it’s what you should do and it would be so if it was a constitutional disease.

But it isn’t. The concept of addiction as a disease is a metaphor for a process.

“The idea that addiction is a brain disease is only a framework. While I consider it the best framework we have based on the latest scientific evidence, there are other ways to understand addiction. Further, this framework that addiction is a brain disease will probably be revised or even completely discarded one day.”

“Mastering the Addicted Brain”, Walther Ling. M.D. (2017)

That day has come! The promotion of addiction and recovery is replete with medical terminology and metaphors that have galvanized theory as fact. The result? The addicted remain afflicted with the notion that their habit of altering their state with drugs or drink has led to an altered state! The best version of themselves is now a “person in sustained remission “ from their ever-present disease!

Ok. So what’s the problem with wanting to recover? Well, it suggests one needs to recover from something that was done to them instead of something that they did to themselves.

If you want to defeat addictive behavior, you should not think of yourself as a patient in need of “treatment”.

Rather, realize you’re in need of information - transformational education!

You don’t have a “condition”. You have a situation! Decisions change situations!

Take action! Make positive decisions! Renew, rejoice, reclaim, reboot, recommit, reconstruct, reconnect, respond, revamp, return, rebuild, renovate, resolve, reconcile, regenerate, rejuvenate, reform, reshape, remake, reestablish, rescue, retrieve, recoup, regain, redeem, refresh, revive, repair, rethink, refuse and repent!

You are not powerless! You are powerful and able to put your “disease in remission” - by your permission!

#addictionrecovery -ed@recoverreality.com

The Paradox of Progress . . . .

There was a time . . . .

when harm reduction didn’t result in harm induction

when MAT meant “Medication Assisted Treatment” instead of being the treatment

when the slave ship of addiction didn’t have an upper deck

when addiction was a result of our actions instead of something that happened to us

when abstinence was thought to be viable option for people in need

when “lived experience” was not a credential to instruct but an opportunity to learn

when self-evident truths didn’t need to be “evidence-based”

The paradox of progress is that it makes things better, until it makes things worse.

#addictionrecovery ed@recoverreality.com

COLD FACT!

Are you sober today? Are your struggling to stay sober?

If so, don’t despair. I’m absolutely sure you can get sober and stay clean! How can I be this confident?

I’ve never met you.

Short answer- it’s the only disease you can refuse to catch! Or if you have it, can decide to put yourself in remission! In fact, everyone you know that is living on the other side of their addiction is in remission by their own permission!

Which makes more sense for you: Living in a fear-fable of being in sustained remission from a behavioral disease or being in “remission” by your own permission?

Yeah, I agree.

Celebrate the fact that as long as you give yourself permission, you’ll be in “remission”!

True, I’ve never met you.

But I know you.

You’re not an alcoholic or an addict. That is not who you are.

You are what I am - a human being, being human.

Magnificent and flawed as all other human beings are.

Cold Fact!

ed@recoverreality.com

What's M.A.T.? Medication-Assisted Treatment or . . . .

Have you heard? The disease of opiate addiction has now metastasized to “pandemic” proportions!

Fentanyl is killing our town! Only medical science can save us!

Medication- Assisted Treatment (M.A.T.) is now touted as the “gold standard “ of opioid addiction treatment.

Doctors are transitioning from their avowed specialties to becoming Addiction Medicine providers!

Others are being certified to dispense M.A.T. (i.e. Methadone & Suboxone) to the needy.

How am I doing? Convinced? Making a dent? No? Not buying?

Good! Very good!

Suboxone was never designed to be a maintenance medication. Its ethical utility is to be measured in weeks and months, not years and decades!

What happened? You know. The newbies were taught that altered states invariably lead to an altered

state! They are now and forever addicts/alcoholics! Behavior is now biology! Of course, a life-long problem warrants a life-long address! The financial incentives to do so have

corrupted the proper stewardship of bridge medicines and transformed them into maintenance drugs.

M.A.T. - Medication-Assisted Treatment or Medically A$$imilated Target$?

Medicine to stabilize, tapering to normalize!

You know it’s true. Reality rules!

- Ed @ recoverreality.com (781) 718-5258

The Benefits of Hindsight

Looking backward, telling your story . . . . .

Yes, you can gain understanding of who you were and how things happened.

A potential drawback? You don’t live forward!

If you only feed on war stories from the past, you’ll never move beyond sobriety.

Once again, you will have imposed a false ceiling on your life.

You’ll regard sobriety as the end game instead of the essential beginning of your renewed life!

Sobriety is positive change but growth is optional!

“Life can only be understood backward, but it must be lived forward.”

- Soren Kierkgaard, (1813-1855), Denmark

• “Oh, you can’t get out backwards.

You’ve gotta go forward to go back. Better press on.”

- Willy Wonka, (1971), Wonkaville

#addictionrecovery - Ed@recoverreality.com

"Recovery is Possible!"

Imagine telling someone who is looking for deliverance from addiction that “recovery is possible!”

Possible? How depressing!

What are the odds? What does the word “possible” suggest? Within the realm of probability?

Doesn’t engender much hope, does it?

How about telling the truth!

Recovery is probable! That’s right!

Recovery from addiction is probable!

It is most likely to happen!

Cold Fact!

#addictionrecovery - Ed@recoverreality.com

How to Stop the Stigma!

The power to label is the power to destroy. Much has been written regarding the stigmatization of the addict and alcoholic - their shaming, their devaluation, their discrimination.

Research has delineated the outcomes of such prejudicial treatment as affecting the mental and physical health of the stigmatized as well as informing national, institutional and organizational policies.

In 2016, the National Academy of Sciences produced a glossary of stigma terminology, together with its types, targets, and suggested interventions. At the top of their infographic pyramid of evidence-based interventions is “Education”. I agree wholeheartedly. Education is of paramount importance. But who should be educated by whom and with what content?

One recent proposal by a well-funded central organization to effect change in the perspective of the stigmatizers is to launch a national movement to “End Addiction Stigma”. Very ambitious and well-meaning. Will it work? How can it! This self-proclaimed “central actor” is singing the same counterintuitive song - that addiction is a life-long disease that can only be managed, not cured.

That this population has an insatiable propensity to misuse illicit substances as well as legal ones. “The opiate epidemic is raging and everyone is at risk!”

“Evidence-based” practices suggest medically-assisted treatment and public enmeshment in the culture of recovery as the panacea.

People in recovery are encouraged and sometimes shamed into attending public events, displays, and conferences with the proclaimed intent of showing their faces and sharing their voices of recovery!

And we wonder why stigma is stronger than ever.

The question of how to stop the stigma remains.

It won’t be stopped by a recovery movement that does not recognize the reality that all human beings are magnificent and flawed.

How to stop the stigma? Answer: Don’t try!

Rather, recover the reality that ALL HUMAN BEINGS ARE flawed! Cold fact!

You don’t “stop the stigma” by others. You make it irrelevant to you!

Irrelevant! You learn to become self-assured of your humanity and that of all others.

You realize that addiction is only one manifestation of our imperfection.

You rejoice in your capacity to enact positive changes!

You dispose of your “addict”/ “alcoholic” label because you now know they are behavioral terms, not identities!

“Once an addict, once an addict!” - because you say so, because you live so!

-Ed@recoverreality.com

#addictionrecovery

"Are You Sober?"

“When scenarios change and deeply ingrained truths start coming apart at the seams, the first to let go of the myth has the advantage.” - (Yongme Moon, Different, 2010)

If you’ve been on the circular “road of recovery” - lapse, relapse, “treatment”, lapse, etc. - you probably need a “cognitive detox”.

When you were weakened and vulnerable from your substance misuse, you may have been subjected to misinformation by well-meaning people but misinformed just the same. You may have been introduced to rituals and mantras which were deemed essential to your treatment at the time.

The field of addiction “treatment” has not advanced itself through the years as other branches of study. The result? Impairment! Intellectual, phycological, emotional impairment.

The following posts will be an attempt to promote hope and healing to those in active addiction while offering direction to the newly sober. Together, we’ll cut through the B.S. (Bad Science), metaphorical language, and empty rituals to recover your reality!

Physical sobriety and sober thinking are essential for a satisfying life. #addictionrecovery

Your insights are welcomed. Please comment! - Ed@recoverreality.com (781) 718-5258

"How Does Addiction Start?"

Is it a matter of brain chemistry? Maybe it’s negative environmental factors - poverty, lack of education, single parent home, lack of mobility, etc.

Certainly powerful detriments to establishing and maintaining a pro-social lifestyle. But are these causes or reasons?

Many years ago, naturalist Henry Thoreau wrote an essay condemning the indifference of the Federal and Massachusetts State governments to the existence of the institution of slavery in our country.

Thoreau described the moral descent which precipitated the established and sustained practice of the enslavement of men, women and children this way:

“After the first blush of sin, comes its indifference and from immoral it becomes, as it were, unmoral, and not quite unnecessary to that life which we have made…” - Thoreau (1847)

Slavery was forcibly imposed man upon man.

Today, it is self-imposed - substances to self.

Yes, Henry Thoreau was a naturalist.

He knew the nature of the natural man. #Addictionrecovery

-ed@recoverreality.com (781) 718-5258

Recovery Road? Take This Exit!

Met a person the other day on Recovery Road. He’s been traveling on it for twenty years!

You know — in perpetual recovery. Focused on sobriety. Sustained by meetings - his “disease” in remission.

He told me his story.

Different but the same. Started young - weed. Just chill’n with friends. Had a sweet spot.

In time, others showed up. Perc 30’s. Social seduction.

Too much coin to continue. Felt the sickness.

Crossroads. What to do? Choices . .

Enter the dragon.

He suffered much, caused more. Bottomed out. Two-year struggle. Finally, got clean.

Today, he’s sober.

By his account, just for today.

A sincere man. Deserves better.

Asked him if he’d like to take a ride.

Leveled off at 1,900 feet. I asked him to look down and see the road he is traveling on. Asked him what shape it is.

Barely heard him, ” Circle.”

That’s right - Recovery Road is circular. A never-ending road traveled by people with a never-ending condition.

“Once an addict, always an addict”, right?

From our aerial view, showed him another road - “Highway of Life”!

The Highway of Life! Its underlayment is sobriety but it’s paved with meaningful work, satisfying relationships, opportunities to create and contribute to family, friends, and community.

Recovery Road is a way of life.

The Highway of Life is the way to live!

#Addicitonrecovery ed@recoverreality.com (781) 718-5258

Aftercare - For Who? You?

The term “aftercare” depicts a continuum of treatment for the addict/alcoholic who has completed a structured

intervention/treatment program. Typically, an aftercare plan is formulated in conference with the patient/client.

What if there was a program that taught that the identity of an addict/alcoholic was disposable? Irrelevant to the client? That the client should not define their identity by their most regrettable behavior?

What if a client was prepared by their treatment program to care for themselves when they transitioned because they were capable of doing so?

What if a person advanced from “Keep It Simple , Stupid!” (K.I.S.S.) to “Keep Increasing Self-Sufficiency!” (K.I.S.S.)?

Then they would be free to provide care for their loved ones ever after.

Now, that’s aftercare!

-ed@recoverreality.com

#Addictionrecovery

Road Kill !

A highway wears out from the top, but it falls apart from the bottom.  This is another way of saying that the road base determines the service-life of a road.  The base supports everything above it, including traffic.

What is the base or "underlayment" of our current addiction recovery policies and treatment? Why, a medical modal, of course! It is usually stated in a declarative sentence such as: "Addiction is a primary, neuro-bio-psycho-social disease of brain reward, motivation, memory and related circuitry. "     

Well? How's it working?  Yeah, I know...a "medical" problem needs a medical address -triage, treatment, MAT (Methadone/Suboxone) and entry into the culture of life-long recovery!  

“Well, at least people won't die with a needle in their arm!” 

True, but they won't truly live without one either.

Addiction: a medical condition (“Evidence-based”)

or a behavioral decision (Self-evident truth) ?

What does your sense of reality tell you?

Yeah, me too. 

#Addictionrecovery - Ed@recoverreality.com

Sobriety - The End Game?

Remember when you thought you were a chess player?

You knew the board, how to get over, how to maneuver or "play" people.  

Come to find out, you were nothing but a chess piece.

You played yourself and you lost.  You were enmeshed in addiction.

You felt the heat.  You moved toward the light.  Sobriety!

 Wonderful!  Now, what? Perpetual "recovery"?

From the culture of addiction to the culture of recovery, with all its own rituals?

Instead, weave your recovery into the fabric of everyday life - with everyday people.

After all, sobriety is a synonym for normality.  - Ed

Be a "Rebel with a Cause"!

What you don't need is another set of directions.

What you do need is a fresh set of insights!

Acquaint yourself with these authors and their websites:

Marc Lewis, Stanton Peele, and Carl Hart!

Soon, you'll be evolving from K.I.S.S. -"Keep It Simple Stupid!"

to

K.I.S.S. - "Keep Increasing Self-Sufficiency!" - Ed

K.I.S.S.* Your Way To Life -Long Sobriety!

If you've had any experience in recovery circles, then you're probably familiar with the acronym K.I.S.S. - "Keep It Simple, Stupid!"  Good advice......for a while. 

This mantra is certainly useful as you may be overwhelmed with all that is in front of you as you rebuild your life.  "K.I.S.S." reminds you that without sobriety, you're rebuilding your life on sinking sand.

As you travel on "Recovery Road",  you must increase your ability to handle daily stress and gain self-confidence.  

To get things done!  To make money honestly and spend it wisely!

In time, "KEEP IT SIMPLE, STUPID!" will become woefully inadequate to be of any use to you.  Your "Recovery Road" needs to evolve from a single-lane, one-way street to a 4-lane superhighway of life!

Let's move from, "Keep It Simple Stupid!" to "Keep Increasing Self-Sufficiency!"

Self-sufficiency!  Staying on a pathway of continued personal growth, establishing positive relationships, making significant contributions to your community, and being a blessing to your family.  

 Take Your Stand in the Sand!

"K.I.S.S." *-  ("Keep Increasing your Self-Sufficiency!"), is an acronym for life!  

#Addictionrecovery

• Ed Bleu. 2016 All rights reserved.

Don't Stop Drug Use to Stop Drug Use!

That's right. That's not the way to the life-long sobriety you're hoping for.

It seems as if it should be.  If substance misuse is hurting my life then I should stop it!  People try that everyday. Everyday, people fail.  What's up with that?

The problem may be that you're too close to the immediate problem- you're drug use. Let me explain.  By being "too close" I mean that you're suffering from the consequences of your drug use here and now!  It makes sense to want relief from the pain "here and now".

That's the problem.  By focusing on "no drug use" as the immediate  goal, it oftentimes becomes the only goal. 

That's why for so many people their relief will prove temporary.  The immediate goal of sobriety should be recovering one's reality.  That is, to create and live the life you were meant to live!  

Strive to connect with positive, productive people!  Get things done that need to be done! Learn to mange your money wisely!  You will soon develop self-confidence and have hope of a better future! 

You will value your life!  You will instinctively protect it! You will be satisfied.

This is why you should attend meetings which feature advice,  insight and recommendations as to how to establish a life you will love to live.     

Get the ultimate pain relief - recover your reality!        - Ed