Help for Families | Secondhand Drinking | Codependency
Rituals of the Family Meal
The following is a guest post by Diana “ATL” Winslow, MSW, ACSW, LCSW, in which she reminds us that the rituals surrounding the family meal can be healing for families. Diana is a blogger, writer and historian and is mostly known as a Mom and licensed mental health counselor in her native Oklahoma City. You may…
Read MoreChoosing Not To Drink
Choosing not to drink can be difficult – not because a person necessarily has trouble not drinking, but rather it’s because of the prodding, probing questions of peers, friends and family, such as: “Why aren’t you drinking?” “Come on, just have a beer.” “Let me pour you a glass of wine – one can’t hurt…
Read MoreSeven Kinds of Power
The following is a guest post by Steve Hauptman, LCSW, and therapist practicing in Mount Sinai, New York. Steven is a Gestaltist and leader of Interactive Therapy groups and is currently writing a book titled, The Illusion of Control. Steve also writes Monkeytraps, a blog devoted to the oldest human addiction: control. He can be…
Read More“Where Are the Cocoa Puffs?” A Story of Bipolar Disorder
As you know, I often write about dual diagnosis (co-occurring disorders — having both a mental health illness and an addiction), as well as the fact that mental illness is one of the five key risk factors for developing an addiction (whether it’s to drugs or alcohol). [The other four are childhood trauma, social environment,…
Read MoreWhat is an Intervention?
An intervention is an effort to confront (in a loving manner) a friend or family member’s substance misuse. To help readers understand what’s involved, Rachel Corbett, Business Development Director, and Alexander Tellez, Director of Administration, of Recovery Power Intervention Programs, a professional services organization providing intervention, recovery and care management services, shared the following guest…
Read MoreDisease of Addiction – What New Research Is Telling Us About This Brain Disease
Disease of Addiction — one of the most difficult aspects of this whole “thing” — from substance abuse to addiction to secondhand drinking/drugging — is to understand and accept that addiction (whether it’s to drugs or alcohol) is a chronic, often relapsing brain disease. Disease of Addiction Explained Everything about our body — what we…
Read MoreCoping With Secondhand Drinking | Drugging Can Cause a Young Person to Wire Unhealthy Coping Skills
Coping with secondhand drinking | drugging is especially problematic for a young person because of the brain development that occurs from birth through one’s early 20s – especially if the parent or sibling’s drinking or drug use behaviors involved verbal, physical or emotional abuse. Why is this such a problem? Because it actually changes the…
Read MoreThe First 3 Years of Life
The first three years of life on a blog about alcohol abuse, mental illness, addiction, secondhand drinking…? You betcha! The tremendous, far-reaching brain research being conducted as a result of the advances in imaging technologies, such as SPECT, fMRI and PET, is providing a better understanding of just how/why the first three years of life…
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