There has been a lot of focus over the years on what the “gold standard” of addiction treatment is. The simple truth is that the gold standard of addiction treatment is the one that most effectively fosters the conditions in which recovery flourishes over the long term. When we begin to think about it in … Continue reading The Real Gold Standard Addiction Treatment

Jason Schwartz recommended that I start posting new episodes of my podcast The Peer Support Professional's Guide. Earlier this year I was approached by the Mountain Plains Addiction Technology Transfer Center (ATTC) about doing a podcast. They didn't give me many parameters initially, besides wanting something for peer specialists. I thought, with all the outstanding … Continue reading Peer Podcast: How do I become a peer specialist?

I was introduced to Darren McGarvey's work a few years ago. I haven't followed him closely, but he seems to have a knack for putting his finger on very salient contradictions and tensions in public and professional discourse about addiction and recovery. I came across this Instagram post yesterday that touches upon the uses and … Continue reading “Today, I live in the shadow of a character I created.”

The Minneapolis Times published a provocative column on harm reduction from a writer who previously worked in a social service agency. Harm reduction made sense to me as a way of managing an immediate danger. Somewhere along the way, it seemed to become an end in itself. The question was no longer only how to … Continue reading When survival becomes the endpoint

When I started working in addiction treatment to reliably access residential rehab in Scotland you had to live in the right area, be wealthy or just plain lucky. I heard it too often from patients and families who could see what was needed and, despite their best efforts, couldn't get near it. When we argued … Continue reading Mission Accomplished? Rehab in Scotland, Five Years On

This phenomenon is extensively documented in the professional literature under such descriptors as maturing out (Winick, 1962, 1964), autoremission (Vaillant, 1983; Klingeman, 1992), self-initiated change (Biernacki, 1986), unassisted change (McMurran, 1994), spontaneous remission (Tuchfield, 1981; Anthony & Helzer, 1991), de-addiction (Frykholm, 1985; Klingeman, 1991), self-change (Sobell, Sobell, & Toneatto, 1991), self-managed change (Copeland, 1988), and … Continue reading Sentences to Ponder (more about “solo recovery”)

Solo (natural) recovery involves the use of one’s own intrapersonal and interpersonal resources (family, kinship, and social networks) to resolve AOD problems without benefit of professional treatment or involvement in a recovery mutual aid community. White, W. & Kurtz, E. (2006). The varieties of recovery experience. International Journal ofSelf Help and Self Care, 3(1-2), 21-61.

Learn more and join Voices of the Unheard through NACoA’s campaign page This blog has shared thousands of posts about drug use, addiction, treatment, and recovery over the last 20 years. Very few of those posts focused on the effects of adult substance use problems on children. All of our contributors tend to focus on … Continue reading Children Deserve Recovery Too