"So what does one take from this interesting historical footnote? History promises us important lessons if we sit at her feet and listen carefully to her stories.” – William White, Can Recovering People Drink? I recently ran across a 2007 Paper by William White, Can Recovering People Drink? A Historical Footnote. He documents facets of … Continue reading Revisiting William White: Can Recovering People Drink? – A Historical Footnote with Current World Relevance – William Stauffer
Tag: addiction
On the Loss of a Great American and Formidable Recovery Advocate
This morning, I woke up to learn of the loss of a great American who I never met but who had a significant influence over the course of my life and the lives of millions of other Americans. We lost Bill Moyers yesterday. I would encourage readers to read what Jeremiah Gardner wrote last evening … Continue reading On the Loss of a Great American and Formidable Recovery Advocate
The Tragic & Predictable Known Unknown Challenges of Medetomidine and Xylazine – William Stauffer
Medetomidine and Xylazine have been in our drug supply for years, but their use is becoming increasingly prevalent on streets across America. They are typically being mixed with short acting opioids, primarily Fentanyl in order to enhance the synergistic effects. For readers, this is two plus two equals eight as anyone who ever had a … Continue reading The Tragic & Predictable Known Unknown Challenges of Medetomidine and Xylazine – William Stauffer
The AI Mirror: “take that small hit, and you’ll be fine”
A few weeks ago, an article in Futurism described a troubling exchange between an AI chatbot and a user identifying as Pedro, a person identified as having methamphetamine addiction seeking advice about how to make it through his work shifts when he's feeling exhausted and has abstained from methamphetamine for 3 days. The chatbot encourages … Continue reading The AI Mirror: “take that small hit, and you’ll be fine”
C-CHIME: Seeing the connected forest through the individual trees – A cascade model of building recovery capital through community and connections – Dr David Best, Bill Stauffer June 2025
We can think about the people in recovery like individual trees in a forest. A forest is not just a group of individual trees; they are interconnected in what has been termed the “wood wide web.” All the trees, plants and microbial organisms in a forest are in reality connected to each other. The wood … Continue reading C-CHIME: Seeing the connected forest through the individual trees – A cascade model of building recovery capital through community and connections – Dr David Best, Bill Stauffer June 2025
Tobacco Recovery in the Addiction Recovery Space: Time for Action!
“For decades, people in recovery from addictions to other drugs have their lives cut short by tobacco-related diseases. Their drear friends, patients, and colleagues died from nicotine addiction, but it could also be said they died from blindness – the failure to see nicotine as an addictive drug and the failure to see smoking cessation … Continue reading Tobacco Recovery in the Addiction Recovery Space: Time for Action!
Constricted Ways of Knowing and the Loss of Recovery as a Focus of Our Institutions
“The experts on recovery are people in recovery” – Rallying Cry from the Era of the New Recovery Advocacy Movement. We once, not long ago, had a movement in America embraced broadly across our society in which people in recovery began to inform the fledgling research on our healing. It influenced a strengths orientation within … Continue reading Constricted Ways of Knowing and the Loss of Recovery as a Focus of Our Institutions
The Arc of Recovery Movement History Ultimately Bends Towards Expansion – William Stauffer & Dr David Best
I recently wrote a piece, Considering the Facets of Whites Laws of Recovery Dynamics to further the dialogue on how the New Recovery Advocacy movement fits into a broader dynamic of cresting and ebbing efforts to expand long term recovery in America as the norm in our society. As an aside and to be candid, … Continue reading The Arc of Recovery Movement History Ultimately Bends Towards Expansion – William Stauffer & Dr David Best
Throwback Thursday; Revisiting a Critical Theory of Addiction and Recovery (CETAR)
My original theoretical drawing circa 2014 Notes: This post features an AI-aided summary that condenses my 70-page master's thesis, written in 2016, into a manageable 7,000-word essay. I never published the thesis, though I handed out copies to coworkers and friends. This was because, like many of my ideas, it grew voluminous rather quickly, and … Continue reading Throwback Thursday; Revisiting a Critical Theory of Addiction and Recovery (CETAR)
Building Bridges Between Islands of Healing – Revised from Jan 2022
“Let us use whatever power and influence we have, working with whatever resources are already available, mobilizing the people who are with us to work for what they care about.” – Margaret Wheatley I have reposted this from time to time and in this version corrected some wording and added citations. The title of this … Continue reading Building Bridges Between Islands of Healing – Revised from Jan 2022
Recovery Review 