Blog

Emilee, now 31 years old, began raiding her parents liquor cabinet at the age of 14. By the time she hit high school, Emilee was smoking marijuana and telling herself that she would never be one of “those people”. It wasn’t long before Emilee was introduced to ecstasy, cocaine, pills, crack, and eventually heroin. Soon she realized she was in the grips of addiction. Losing her brother in 2008 pushed Emilee to new heights and the disease of addiction quickly progressed. She found herself using everyday just to ward off the sickness and to “stay well”.

Recent blogs on this site have featured Bill White’s Blasts from the Past. Also profiles from our Recovering Moms who are in the know and in the now. I contribute from my lived experience of the past and relate it to the now. I noted that an event would be held in the future—January 24— in Los Angeles, featuring a Recovery Ambassador training followed by a dinner and gala fundraiser. Faces & Voices of Recovery is working on a web site page for and about recovery ambassadors after the L.A. training.  We can spotlight all who have taken the training who are now leading recovery advocacy efforts as recovery ambassadors or as recovery carriers. Recovery carriers? Read on for more…

Original Blog Date: September 4, 2015

There is much that the recovery advocacy movement can learn from the LGBT rights movement of recent decades. The latter movement is one of the most successful social movements in history as judged by the speed at which it has elicited broad changes in cultural attitudes and policies of import to the LGBT community.

Original Blog Date: January 25, 2014

Those of you who have been reading my weekly blogs these past six months will recognize two simple and enduring themes: Recovery is contagious and recovery is spread by recovery carriers.  Those notions first came to me on April 14, 2010 when I stood to speak at Northeast Treatment Centers’ (NET) dinner honoring NET’s 40th anniversary and the achievements of NET members.   Here are some of the words that came to me as I stood before a room packed with people filled with hopes of what their newly found recoveries would bring.

Original Blog Date:  March 25, 2016

By the late 1990s, tremendous strides had been achieved in elevating the accessibility and quality of addiction treatment in the U.S., yet leaders in the field were beginning to suggest the need for a radical redesign of addiction treatment—a shift from acute and palliative care models of intervention to models of assertive and sustained recovery management (RM) nested within larger recovery-oriented systems of care (ROSC).

I listen to the radio. The seasonal carols have begun. I Hark!—and sing along. I repeat and repeat the sounding joy. Of course, many stories and carols focus on the news of old, proclaiming, “unto us a child is born.” I recall the words of that grown up child who, it is written, said, “if you don’t believe in me, believe in what I teach.” Of course, the radio also brings snooze news, commercials galore, and talk shows. Beyond the nativity is the negativity.

Caroline’s story is one we hear far too often. At the ripe age of 14, Caroline began drinking and smoking marijuana, quickly taking to pain medication. By the age of 17 she was in full blown addiction. Her parents did what they could, sending her to long-term treatment facilities, but Caroline “had no desire to be in recovery…her parents tried to control it and she only stayed because she had to”. Her first treatment experience was in Florida and when she came back to her home state, she picked up that first drink and soon found herself right back in the grips of addiction. After her second go at treatment, Caroline moved home for good, connecting to a three-quarter recovery house, and her journey began.

Original Blog Date:  August 28, 2013

The suggestion that there are multiple and diverse pathways of long-term addiction recovery has evolved from a heretical statement to a central tenet of an international recovery advocacy movement. As tens of thousands of people representing diverse recovery experiences stand in unison in September’s recovery celebration events, it is perhaps time to explore and then put aside past divisions within and between communities of recovery.

Original Blog Date:  December 15, 2017

Knowledge about the effects of addiction on families and the family recovery process has grown exponentially as a result of scientific studies and cumulative clinical experience. Among the most important conclusions to date that can be drawn from this body of knowledge are the following.

1. Alcohol and other drug (AOD) problems spring from diverse influences; unfold in widely varying patterns of severity, complexity, and duration; and are resolved through multiple pathways and styles of personal and family recovery.

My relationships with White Bison founder Don Coyhis and with the Native American Wellbriety Movement are among the most important influences on my recovery advocacy and recovery research activities. I first met Don in the late 1990s as rumblings of a new addiction recovery advocacy movement in the United States were just beginning. In the years that followed, Don and I had innumerable opportunities to collaborate. We served together on boards of recovery advocacy organizations, shared speaking platforms at national conferences, and co-authored numerous articles and a book on the history of recovery in Native America. Through those years we mentored each other and became endeared friends—brothers of another mother, as is sometimes said.