Am I Living With An Addict

Do you love an addict or an alcoholic? Loving an addict is one of the most painful and traumatic life journeys that any sober-minded person can experience. Feelings of betrayal, powerlessness, anger, fear, desperation and raw grief are an ever constant companion. The person you love disappears as they chase their addiction. People who love an addict inadvertently get drawn in by the addict and their lives begin to revolve around the dysfunctional hell that the addict's life is. According to the World Drug Report, approximately 247million people worldwide were in active addiction during 2016. Statistics on alcohol abuse are not as easily determined because alcohol is a socially accepted drug. It is estimated that 1 in every 12 adults suffer from alcohol abuse and dependence. Alcohol is a drug. There is very little that separates the emotional pain and dysfunction that saturates your life whether you love an alcoholic or a drug addict. Both substances are mind-altering, both substances reprogram the human brain, both substances render the addict powerless over their addiction. The only person who can break an addict's addiction is the addict. No one can convince, force, coerce or threaten an addict to seek professional help. No one can love an addict into sobriety either. This book is about understanding and helping your loved one, and also about helping yourself. You can never 'learn' to live with an addict. You either come to accept the hard truth or you separate yourself from the addict. Separation can sometimes drive an addict to seek professional help, but it's no guarantee. Sometimes you have to just let go. This book will explain how your addict thinks; however, understanding alone does not mean that you can protect them and yourself. You also need the psychological reediness to act and face certain outcomes. Let me show you how.

This book is not about drugs, it is about people. It is about those suffering from addiction and the struggles of the people around them. As well as describing how to identify if a loved one is in addiction, it provides clear information about the solution. With the right treatment addicts can recover. Jackson Oppy has walked the road he describes, knows the pain of addiction and knows the road back to wellness, wholeness and stable family and social life. Am I Living With an Addict? is the route map to wellness. Jackson Oppy used drugs actively for 15 years. He and his family experienced all the pitfalls and trauma that comes with having a loved one in the grip of addiction and the hopelessness of believing that there was no way out. After countless attempts to stop and after losing everything, Jackson entered recovery at age 35 and now lives alcohol- and drug-free. He now uses his experience in both active addiction and in recovery to help others at Hader Clinic in Melbourne. In his current role he deals with addicts and their families everyday, using his intimate knowledge of the problem and the solution.

Are you feeling exasperated and helpless about your family member's addiction? Are you at your wit's end, having tried everything you can think of to make them stop? If someone you love is engaging in addictive behaviors such as alcohol and drug misuse, eating disorders, smoking, gambling, Internet addiction, sex addiction, compulsive overspending, or relationship addiction, you are undoubtedly experiencing unpredictability in your relationship. Some of the most common emotions you will experience include: - Guilt and shame - Anger and anxiety - Confusion and powerlessness Whether the addict in your life is your spouse, partner, parent, child, friend, or colleague, the key to changing this reality for yourself lies in shifting your focus from your loved one's addiction to you own self-care. This book presents a dramatically fresh approach to help you get off the roller-coaster chaos of addiction, maintain your own sanity and serenity, and live your best life.

Through the vivid, true stories of five people who journeyed into and out of addiction, a renowned neuroscientist explains why the “disease model” of addiction is wrong and illuminates the path to recovery. The psychiatric establishment and rehab industry in the Western world have branded addiction a brain disease, based on evidence that brains change with drug use. But in The Biology of Desire, cognitive neuroscientist and former addict Marc Lewis makes a convincing case that addiction is not a disease, and shows why the disease model has become an obstacle to healing. Lewis reveals addiction as an unintended consequence of the brain doing what it’s supposed to do—seek pleasure and relief—in a world that’s not cooperating. Brains are designed to restructure themselves with normal learning and development, but this process is accelerated in addiction when highly attractive rewards are pursued repeatedly. Lewis shows why treatment based on the disease model so often fails, and how treatment can be retooled to achieve lasting recovery, given the realities of brain plasticity. Combining intimate human stories with clearly rendered scientific explanation, The Biology of Desire is enlightening and optimistic reading for anyone who has wrestled with addiction either personally or professionally.

This eminently practical guide presents an empirically supported approach for treating people with substance abuse problems and their spouses or domestic partners. Behavioral couples therapy (BCT) explicitly focuses on both substance use and relationship issues, and is readily compatible with 12-step approaches. Provided are all the materials needed to introduce BCT; implement a recovery contract to support abstinence; work with clients to increase positive activities, improve communication, and reduce relapse risks; and deal with special treatment challenges. Appendices include a session-by-session treatment manual and 70 reproducible checklists, forms, and client education posters. The large-size format and lay-flat binding facilitate photocopying and enhance the book's clinical utility.

Politicians and the media tell us that people who take drugs, including alcohol or nicotine, cannot help themselves. They are supposedly victims of the disease of 'addiciton', and they need 'treatment'. The same goes for sex addicts, shopping addicts, food addicts, gambling addicts, or even addicts to abusive relationships. This theory, which grew out of the Temperance movement and was developed and disseminated by the religious cult known as Alcoholics Anonymous, has not been confirmed by any factual research. Numerous scientific studies show that 'addicts' are in control of their behavior. Contrary to the shrill, mindless propaganda of the 'war on drugs', very few of the people who use alcohol, marijuana, heroin, or cocaine will ever become 'addicted', and of those who do become heavy drug users, most will matrue out of it in time, without treatment. Research indicates that 'treatment' is completely ineffective, an absolute waste of time and money. Instead of looking at drub addiction as a disease, Dr. Schaler proposes that we view it as willful commitment or dedication, akin to joining a religion or pursuing a romantic involvement. While heavy consumption of drugs is often foolish and self-destructive, it is a matter of personal choice.

This autobiography is a true story about the life being ignorant to drugs. It will also reveal to my readers how much pain that I still feel in my heart about my parents’ and grandparents’ deaths. I will continue to show people the struggle that I am still going through today is what I went through for thirty years. How I became the worst alcoholic there was. I was also molested in my younger years, which is still, to this day, very painful. I had to almost watch my mother take her last breath and didn’t even realize what was going on. My grandmother was there for us during those very gloomy and rough days. Because it was so hard, sometimes I did not want to live. Parents need to listen to their kids especially when it comes to molestation; sometimes you may have to ask questions. How I had to kiss my mom on her face, forehead, and hands to tell her good-bye, and she didn’t even know that we were there. I made a very bad mistake when I crossed that street, and the little boy snatched his hand away from me and was hit by a car. How I watched him lie there almost lifeless and could not help him. I was with a man that used drugs, and when the relationship crumbled, the drinking became much worse. How rehab really helped me the second time. How, after seventeen years and no drugs, we are back and even happier. How a person using any kind of substance abuse can alter your mind and the decisions that you may make. When I returned home from rehab, you would not imagine where I found beer bottles and cans. How my cousin was almost killed trying to protect me. How I was beat up by the ones who were supposed to protect and serve. How I had started seeing someone and found out that he was a druggie and dropped him as quickly as I picked him up. How to look for signs when they are on drugs. How drugs can sometimes make a person lose everything that they have. How I have never been so embarrassed in my life until the marshal knocked on my door. How you can try and try again to help a person, but it won’t work unless they want help themselves. How some folks do not want help; they are just going through the motions. How my friend, also an addict, jumped off the subway platform in front of a train. How I know from people in general not to get into a relationship when in a rehab; you are really trying to find yourself again, and you honestly don’t know what you want. This is a must; don’t let a man/woman bring you down. How my surgery made me look at life totally different. How when you really need your family, they are going to be there, no matter what time, day or night. How my brothers became the best fathers ever, and that was because of the positivity that they had in their life. My sisters are fabulous mothers as well as myself. How I learned that through it all, God will stand by you at all times. How I lost my mom on November 5, 1979, and then my father followed her on June 22, 1990, and my grandmother followed on June 13, 1998. How my uncle Junior was there for us from the time my mom was sick; until this day, he has never walked away. How it took me years to step into the hospitals that both my parents passed away in. How we went through everyday problems; the difference was that we had no parents growing up. How you really need to treasure your parents while they are here; don’t wait until they are gone to tell them how much you love them. After all, they gave us life. How I raised kids and was a single parent, and they are okay kids. How I still have bad feelings about the men who molested me. How I am living proof that you can have tremendous fun without a drink in your hands. What made me say “This is it.” How I almost died from being the alcoholic that I was. I would tell you, if you haven’t drank or used drugs, you are not missing anything. You would like to make decisions on a sober conscience. Sometimes the decision you make while using drugs may haunt you for life. How I came to reality to realize that my b

What if you learned that to lead well, you’d need to live like a drug addict? During treatment for drug addiction, Michael Brody-Waite learned three principles that became the difference between life and death: Practice rigorous authenticity Surrender the outcome Do uncomfortable work Leaving rehab, Michael entered the workplace where he was shocked to see most business leaders doing what he had been taught would kill him. He began to see striking similarities between drug addiction and what he calls “mask addiction.” Leaders everywhere were hiding their authentic selves in order to get what they wanted. They were doing things like: Saying yes when they could say no Hiding their weaknesses Avoiding difficult conversations Holding back their unique perspectives Instead of chasing drugs, leaders were chasing professional, financial, and social success from behind a mask—to the detriment of themselves and the people around them. Thanks to his recovery, Michael’s three principles gave him an unlikely competitive advantage throughout his career, resulting in a level of success unexpected for a “drug addict.” In Great Leaders Live Like Drug Addicts, Michael explains what drug addicts do to recover and provides a step-by-step program you can use to break free from your mask addiction to thrive in both work and life. He equips you with the tools you need to live and lead mask-free—tools to enable you to stop following others, lead yourself, and become one of the dynamic, growing, authentic leaders this world desperately needs.