VistaTaos

Before you can get really excited about knowing there’s a 12-step group for codependents, you have to know if you or someone in your family suffers from codependency. Are you a codependent?

Many of the people who need treatment for substance abuse struggle with the cravings that compel them to use, and they also face the well-intentioned assistance from family members who cover up and excuse everything they do.

Let’s say it more clearly: If you are a codependent family member, you may be prolonging your loved one’s substance abuse because you constantly find ways to minimize his use, you make excuses for his use, and you cover up his use.  He will never accept the need to stop using and work toward recovery as long as he has you to save the day.

Codependent people exhibit tendencies such as:

• Minimizing what they value, so that their loved one who uses drugs will not be angry at them or reject them.
• Low self-esteem, which makes them feel that if their drug-using loved one rejects them, then they have no worth.
• Oversensitivity, which means they overreact in situations that the drug user should handle on his own.
• Loyalty, so that they never draw boundaries for the drug user.
• Control, because helping the drug user boosts their feelings of importance. 

The tendency to take control of situations was purposefully noted last:  People who exert control generally are considered to be strong-willed people. The other qualities of the codependent may seem to be more often associated with weaker personalities.  The codependent—not a weak person—is  endlessly driven to control the person who is using, because it validates his own sense of worth. He is frustrated when his struggle to control the situation continually results in disaster because the drug user keeps using.

If you know someone who needs treatment for substance abuse, you need to conduct your own fearless moral inventory–Step 4 of Alcoholics Anonymous— and ask yourself if you are really helping the person you love. Maybe you need to step back and quit making excuses for them. If you have trouble with that, then Co-Dependents Anonymous (CoDA) can help.

CoDA holds meetings, just like Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous.  All over the country, including Colorado, Texas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico, there are CoDA meetings. CoDA also promotes a 12-step philosophy adapted from that of AA, with the first step discussing the need to admit that you are powerless over others, and that your life has become unmanageable because you have not accepted this.

If you are the loved one of someone who needs treatment for substance abuse, it’s vital to acknowledge that your own responsibility ends with letting that person achieve sobriety and work on recovery with a licensed, certified substance abuse counselor. Your job, while that goes on, is to participate in family counseling and learn ways to let go. You have to let go of the need to control this other person, to make excuses for him, to let him stand or fall on his own.

Maybe you’re not the codependent or the addict in the family—but you see it going on within the family. If that’s the case, you can turn to Co-Anon. This is an organization patterned after Al-Anon, intended to provide strength and support to the helpless onlookers—because substance abuse, after all, is a family problem.

For more information on CoDA, visit www.coda.org. You can learn more about Co-Anon at www.co-anon.org.

Studies touted by government experts last year prove that abuse of cocaine and methamphetamine has decreased. Cocaine abuse is down 40 percent, and methamphetamine use is happening only half as often as it once did. However, if you are among the many people still using one of those drugs—or if you know someone who is—those figures aren’t very comforting.

Just in March, people using cocaine in Texas were biting their nails over a decreased supply when a 16-year-old girl was arrested for smuggling 50 pounds of cocaine into El Paso from Mexico. Sure, our government experts tell us; cocaine production is down by 3 percent in this country. But when you hear about a shipment like that coming into the country, it has to make you wonder about the ones that police didn’t manage to stop.

Just how much is 50 pounds of cocaine worth?  It sells for about $9,000 a pound in South America, but here in the good old USA, that amount of cocaine in Texas or New York or anywhere is possibly worth $30,000. Once dealers get it on this side of the border, they cut it about five or six times. The ultimate value of the product depends on how many times it’s been stepped on and whether it’s sold as injectable product or just as crack rocks.  Officials estimated its real worth at anywhere between $280,000 and $700,000.

The teenager who brought the cocaine into Texas faces a stiff penalty if prosecutors get their way. The county attorney requested clearance to prosecute her under the Determinate Sentencing Statute that’s on the books in that state. If approved and if the girl is found guilty, her punishment could be set for years beyond the day she turns 21: The maximum punishment could be 40 years.

A team of medical professionals and educators, however, hope to overturn the grand jury’s approval to apply the Determinate Sentencing Statute. They feel that putting this girl away for so many years will rob her of any kind of normal life, and that she is young enough to benefit from a substance abuse rehabilitation program.

Why is the county attorney set on prosecuting this girl with such a stiff sentence? He wants to send a message to people who smuggle marijuana, methamphetamine, heroin, and cocaine in Texas because they think it’s a fast way to make easy bucks. The county juvenile court reports that 14 minors have been arrested for smuggling in a controlled substance over the course of the last seven years.

Why are teens such a target for dealers who want to smuggle drugs into Texas, New Mexico, or other border states? Are the teens jumping at such a fun opportunity because they see it as an easy way to get high?  Or are they taken advantage of by adults who want to use them because they think that these kids, if arrested, will get off with just a slap on the wrist?

Despite reportedly lower figures on cocaine abuse, there are still frightening numbers of people who use it. Brain scans performed on three dozen cocaine addicts compared with scans performed on alcoholics demonstrated them to be more motivated to use when presented with drug-related scenarios. The study, done at Yale School of Medicine, also showed that women benefit more from stress reduction therapies, while men respond to cognitive behavioral therapy.

Finding the right substance abuse treatment center can play a huge role in your success at beating an addiction to cocaine or any substance.  Treatment just gets started when you quit using your drug of choice; it must include addressing triggers and psychosocial reasons for using, among other factors. It’s important to undertake therapy at a place that addresses the whole person and takes them beyond addiction to find a place of renewal.

Substance abuse counselors have known for years based on their experience with their patients that there is a link between childhood traumas and drug or alcohol addiction. A recent collaboration between physicians from the University of Texas and Tennessee’s Meharry Medical College focused on the connection between childhood trauma and the development of depressive disorders or substance abuse.

The study involved teens—a small group, to be sure, tracking only 19 youngsters with known childhood traumas against a control group of 13 teens with no known traumas. Their progress was documented every six months for up to five years to assess the need for drug addiction treatment or psychotherapy for depression. 

Imaging studies of the brain were performed on each of the children at the outset of the study, with repeat examinations conducted as follow-up. While only one of the teens in the control group experienced substance abuse problems and one suffered from depression, four among the traumatized group required drug addiction treatment and five of them needed psychotherapy for depression.  Results showed diminished integrity of the brain’s white matter, the inner brain material, especially in the parts of the brain that help with making decisions about behavior and also in the control of emotions.

What Constitutes Childhood Trauma?

Most people think of trauma as something injurious, something that physically injures a person. It’s true that children or anybody suffering from physical violence experiences that very common definition of trauma.

However, there are additional traumas that affect us as we grow. A physician from the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, speaking to several hundred mental health professionals, enlarged the definition of trauma to include not just physical but sexual and psychological abuse, verbal mistreatment, and deprivation related to poverty. Children who witness domestic violence or see their parents being arrested or suffer from their parents’ addiction issues are victims of childhood trauma.

The much-larger Ohio study went a bit further by calculating reports of abuse according to the number of traumas experienced. Those who experienced at least three of the traumas demonstrated a sevenfold increase in alcohol abuse. They were ten times more likely to experiment with intravenous drugs. Those extrapolated figures clearly document the evidence between childhood trauma and addiction.

Looking at Treatment Options

What hope is there for people who have experienced one of more of these childhood trauma? After all, you can’t erase the past.

Substance abuse treatment professionals will tell you, however, that they help their patients to identify the traumas and recognize that they had no control over or responsibility for the traumas they underwent. For some people—someone with an addicted or abusive parent, for example—abuse continues into adulthood, and at some point they have to learn to draw boundaries so that the abuse is separated from the positive aspects of their lives.

Many people have to learn that they can’t change a negative past, and they can’t change negative parents or other family members who caused them trauma. They can, however, change themselves.  They can learn how to say, “That’s what happened, and it wasn’t my fault.” They can learn to move forward from the darkness of those days into the light of recovery.

That’s just one aspect of recovery—addressing the issues of the past that take a person into addiction in the first place. If you know someone who suffered trauma during their childhood who needs alcohol or drug addiction treatment now, or if that person is you, it’s important to find a place that will help the addict work on all aspects of himself. A residential drug treatment center offers much more than abstinence therapy: There are opportunities to face the ghosts of the past, and therapeutic options that help a person open up to the positive benefits of treatment.  Contact an admission counselor at Vista Taos Renewal Center today for more information at 1.800.245.8267.

People hold incorrect ideas that the nefarious criminals who bring illegal drugs in from south of our border are stereotypical despicable Mexican drug runners. The Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR) cites statistics demonstrating that 75 percent of those busted for transporting illegal drugs into the country are actually Americans. Of all border drug arrests, approximately 80 percent of them involve at least one American.

Consider these solid citizens, who are responsible for keeping rehab treatment centers busy with their dastardly deeds:

• Todd Britton-Harr, a 36-year-old graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, arrested in 2010 complete with trailer full of 1,100 pounds of marijuana.
• Laura Lynn Farris, an innocuous 52-year-old female transporting her dogs to be washed at the vet’s office, along with a laundry basket—and 162 pounds of marijuana beneath the laundry.
• A 54-year-old unemployed mechanical engineer from Texas, who admitted to law enforcement officials, under guarantee of anonymity, that he had completed 17 successful transfers of marijuana from Mexico into Texas.

Police with the Border Patrol will be redeploying their suspicions toward Americans, especially if they have the look of a young and wholesome college student or a middle-aged career professional.  

Why are so many more Americans being caught these days? For starters, the Obama administration has doubled the size of the Border Patrol in the last two or three years. There are now approximately 21,000 agents hard at work these days to stop drug trafficking. Another reason is the difficult economy. With high unemployment numbers troubling the nation for the past five years, people who can’t find work say yes to drug-running—it seems like a fast and easy way to make a buck. Some people agree to run drugs because they are, themselves, users, and instead of seeking help in drug rehab treatment centers they get a cut of the drugs they smuggle into the country.

It seems like an easy job: Pick up a car in Mexico, drive it through the checkpoint, and deliver the car to someone on the American side of the border who will take over the drug distribution process.  One Arizona attorney who has defended many of these so-called mules states that often they agree to drive the car with very little information about the operation. Recruitment takes place at casinos where it seems like a simple way to recover gambling losses.

Some of the Americans bringing drugs into the country have permission to use medicinal marijuana. Ronald Colman, who retired from the Border Patrol in 2009, says it’s not uncommon to see someone “rolling up, smoke puffing out the window” and claiming “Dude, this is for medicinal use.” That doesn’t mean, police have discovered, that they aren’t carrying in a little something extra.

How will law enforcement officials put a stop to this? Increased vigilance and targeting even those who don’t look like they would be carrying will put a dent in these figures. About half of all arrests come from routine traffic checks.

Dogs are also effective in sniffing out drugs—the lady with the laundry and the guy with the trailer both were caught by dogs. Numbers of both canine and human agents will continue to be increased.

Dealing with anger during recovery is a real Catch-22. You feel angry about the need for recovery from substance abuse, and so you’re likely to use your substance of choice as a way to assuage that anger. On the other hand, you can’t really give clear thought to handling your anger unless your mind is clear.

As you embark on recovery, you need to realize that it’s natural to feel anger. Everybody gets angry: Whether or not a person is in recovery, he will have days when he feels simply overwhelmed by annoyance, irritation, and all the other synonyms you can think of for this frustrating, negative feeling. However, anger can be very destructive, but learning about it can abate its damage.

There are three components to your anger:

• First you experience cognition, the actual thought process of knowing that you are irate, whether or not you know the reason.
• Second, you will feel a physical reaction to your anger, such as an increased heart rate, gulping in air, or even breaking out in hives.
• The third aspect of anger brings out your negative behaviors, whether you slam a door, pound a table, or shout.

It’s easy to understand why you’re riding this rollercoaster of emotions as you work on your recovery. When you were using, you were doing something that felt good—even if it wasn’t healthy for you, physically or legally. Whenever you became angry, the feelings were muted or anesthetized by the drugs you were using.  If you had things in your life that provoked your anger, you could mask those emotions by using. Now that you’re not using, the things that get on your nerves throughout the course of a normal day are compounded by the cravings you feel from not using drugs.

Many people use anger as reason for relapse. Let’s correct that: Many people use anger as an excuse for relapse! It’s easy to see why. Besides the fact that you’re missing your drug of choice as well as the partying, you also feel resentment toward the people who urged you to go into rehab. Even if you recognize that this was something you needed to do to get your life back in order, you can’t help wondering why you had to be among the percentage of the population afflicted with a challenging addiction disorder.

Now that you are changing your life by participating in treatment in an alcohol or drug rehab center, you’ve also got to find new ways to manage negative emotions.  Your rehab counselor can help you with the issues that make you feel angry at yourself. You will also need help in understanding why you bear so much hostility toward certain people in your life. Whether or not those feelings are justified, you have to learn that you can’t change the past, and you probably can’t change other people. You have to move forward from the hurts of the past, and you can only change yourself.

What are the dangers of anger? If you don’t learn how to control negative emotions, you run the risk of increased health problems, including insomnia, fatigue, headaches, nausea, and even cardiac complications.  You may end up destroying relationships or losing your job. People who live with strong negative emotions are statistically more likely to commit a crime, and they are also more likely to be the victim of a crime.

As you develop a relationship with your counselor, the two of you can discuss the anger you feel.  Your counselor will help you learn ways to combat anger so that its impact on your recovery diminishes to a manageable aspect. You will always have days when you get angry—we all do—but you will learn how to deal with anger during recovery from substance abuse and as you move forward in your life.

You’ve already learned how your thoughts can cause you to relapse.  Counselors in drug rehabilitation centers teach you to recognize the thoughts that can endanger your recovery, and you’ll find some information about that on this website.

All addicts use excuses at one time or another as justification for relapse.  Once you’re aware of these common rationalizations, you can put your knowledge to work. You can prevent relapse by developing some positive coping skills to stay sober. Try some of them, try all of them—just try them!

Call Someone

When you’re working on recovery, one of the things you do is put together a support network. The idea is to assemble the names and phone numbers of several people, so that if you can’t reach one person you can reach someone else. Another reason for developing multiple contacts is because each person in your recovery network has some kind of specific knowledge about you as a person. Call a friend. Call a counselor. Call a sponsor from your 12-step group. Just call someone.

Exercise

If you’re already in recovery, then you know the way that substances affect the neurotransmitters in the brain. One thing you can do to defeat thoughts of using is to exercise. Exercise releases endorphins and can increase levels of dopamine. One of the reasons substance abuse becomes so compelling is because it likewise increases levels of dopamine. With exercise, you are catching that wonderful wave of euphoria but it’s being generated by something healthy like exercise instead of negative, dangerous activities.  Many doctors are seriously looking at exercise programs as ways to defeat addictive behaviors and enhance positive coping skills.

Meditation and Prayer

Meditation helps because it takes you to a place where you sit back and think about placing value on yourself. But there’s more to it than that: Most cravings are rooted in anxiety and stress, and learning positive coping skills through meditation provides you with a natural outlet. You will be less likely to give in to your urges if you can leverage an emotional calmness at such times. In addition, studies are showing that meditation can increase dopamine levels and reduce cortisol production. Meditation can be a way to stop thinking about bad things that have happened to you in the past. Meditation can help you remember what a worthwhile person you are. Counselors in top-notch drug rehabilitation centers spend time teaching meditation skills; time well spent.

Journaling

Keeping a journal about your thoughts can be a tremendous way to stay focused on your recovery goals. When you were using regularly, you gave no thought to the idea of writing down your feelings because you were focused on your next high. Now is a good time to start a journal, whether you write in it daily or weekly, to keep track of how you feel. If you don’t like to write, maybe you should invest in a sketch pad, or maybe music is your thing. The recovery process helps you to relearn your natural skills, and practicing them regularly will help you move past difficult thoughts.

12-Step Meetings

No matter what substance you’ve been using, there are no coping skills more positive than a 12-step meeting. It’s true that groups like AA and NA bear a little competitive edge toward one another. It’s also true that every addict is willing to help another addict, no matter what his substance of choice is. As part of your recovery process, you will assemble a list of 12-step meetings available in your area. Go to meetings often. Try out different groups; you’ll find that you like some better than others. When you are worrying about how to prevent relapse, take time out of your schedule to visit a 12-step.  Just take it one day at a time. Easy does it.

No licensed and certified counselor believes that an addict can achieve recovery based on individual, group, and family therapy alone. While they are essential components of any treatment program, it’s also important to engage a person’s emotional and behavioral self and teach him how to be comfortable, once again, in his or her own skin. The Rosen Method of bodywork is one way to do that.

Meet Marion Rosen

The Rosen Method of movement was initially developed by a physical therapist named Marion Rosen, who lived in Germany up until 1940. At that time she was forced to emigrate because of her religion, and she came to California. With her she brought her knowledge of bodywork and relaxation techniques, trained to make a connection between a person’s physicality and emotional state. She loved dance, and she incorporated music into her therapeutic regimens.  Her main focus was the development of bodywork that anybody could do, without stressing joints or hurting muscles.

Rosen worked at the Kaiser Medical Center in California and then started her own private practice, and the Rosen Institute opened up in the 1970s. Gradually, Rosen Method became an accepted form of treatment to help people reach inner peace through expression of the outer body. Marion Rosen passed away in 2012, but the bodywork techniques that help a person rediscover his body are her legacy.

Why Rosen Method Works

Unlike typical exercise routines that can actually cause pain, the movements are simple and basic, and they are a great way to keep the body moving and flexible.  A typical Rosen Method class utilizes movement routines set to music, taking patients through motions that stretch every muscle and move every joint, but slowly and without any pain.

Focusing on breathing is an essential part of Rosen Method bodywork. People who are stressed out from the challenges of life often forget to take those long, slow, deep breaths that relax us. They have lost the ability to express their true emotions.

The techniques that retrain people to taking those revitalizing breaths are so important because deep breathing carries many benefits. It triggers the release of endorphins into the brain. Deep exhalations rid the body of toxins. Improved blood flow means boosted energy levels.

Breathe In, Breathe Out

Breathing exercises also help the person to respond to the right-side of his brain, the emotional and artistic part. Some studies indicate that addicts struggle with the more creative right side of the brain: Normal right-brain function occluded by norepinephrine and serotonin levels mixed in with the experiences of pleasure can stymie the addict’s recovery efforts. When breathing exercises take a person into that deep, quiet part of himself that recognize his emotions, he can regain a sense of rediscovering or renewing himself.

Looking inward and reaching a point of renewal is so important to recovery from substance abuse or addiction. A person loses a sense of who he is when he’s struggling to regain a sober balance in his life. Besides the physical and mental effects of his substance of choice, there are the conflicts with family members and the battle to maintain his position in society, with his career and his social network.  

Therapeutic experiences such as equine therapy, massage, art or music therapy, acupuncture, and bodywork like the Rosen Method take the patient to the right side of the brain, so that he can explore and relate to his inner self without the conflict that comes with addiction. It’s a real way to regain the essence of one’s own personality. For more information on the Rosen Method at Vista Taos Renewal Center, call 1.800.245.8267

References:

Deans, Emily. Dopamine, the Left Brain, Women, and Men. Psychology Today, 5/17/2011. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolutionary-psychiatry/201105/dopamine-the-left-brain-women-and-men

Sober Recovery.com. What Side of Your Brain Are You Using? Left or Right? http://www.soberrecovery.com/alcoholdrugtreatment/article/drug-treatment/what-side-of-brain-you-are-using-left-or-right-brain.html

People seldom go into drug or alcohol treatment unless there is some imminent threat to the status quo of their daily lives: Maybe the spouse is giving up on them, an employer has required substance abuse treatment, or the person is backed into a legal corner, to name a few reasons. Anybody who goes into treatment deserves credit for admitting the need for help. If you know why some people drop out early, you can be forearmed with knowledge that will keep you from doing the same.

Once someone enters treatment, whether it’s outpatient or residential, he has to understand that the treatment will last over a period of many weeks and even months. One of the most common questions that people ask is, “If I do well, can I get out of treatment early?”

Even if treatment is undertaken with reluctance, it’s not a punishment. Most rehab centers will not accept someone as a patient unless he says that he wants to go. Even if he is faced with legal consequences, he is still making a choice for treatment, because the fact is that many people choose jail.

So the answer to that question is that there is no “early release” for treatment. Treatment programs comprise a series of therapy topics that the patient must complete before he is ready to move to a new level of care. They include things like understanding the full effects of the drug of choice, recognizing the role of family in the recovery process, understanding triggers, putting together a support network and an aftercare plan, and much more.  If the person has been admitted to a 90-day residential treatment center, then it will take 90 days to get through all the material that the counselor wants to cover with him.

Most Common Reasons People Give Up

• Most people drop out because they believe that once the drugs are out of their system they will be fine. The truth is that they need to work on understanding those triggers that make them use plus the neurobiological effects of drug use or they will be right back where they started.

• Many people fear they will lose their jobs if they go into treatment. The fact is they are more likely to lose their jobs if they discontinue treatment. The boss will be less likely to tolerate the next relapse, and the person’s benefits and insurance, protected while he is on the job, will evaporate.

• Women with children drop out more often than their male counterparts or women without children. They feel the pull to go home and take care of their family, but the reality is they are putting their family at risk to suffer during their next relapse, and they are also modeling poor behavior to their youngsters.

• Those addicted to stimulants such as amphetamines or cocaine have a higher level of difficulty. Facilities that provide alternative therapies such as acupuncture, biofeedback, massage, or other regimens often help such patients maintain focus on recovery.

• A majority of patients suffer from a co-occurring diagnosis such as depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, or some other mental health issue. It’s important to find a treatment center that will work on both diagnoses in order to make the person feel well again.

The profile of the person most likely to stay in treatment is the employed, educated, affluent male over the age of 40. Whether or not you fit that profile, you can withstand risk factors that may paint you as a potential drop-out. The first week to 10 days of treatment are very difficult. The patient has to get to know his counselor, the staff, and the other patients. A rehabilitation center that can help you work on your entire self, on a plan for renewal, will provide the best chance of success.  Once you leave the treatment center, it’s important to attend 12-step meetings and work your aftercare plan. Staying in treatment for the full course is the only way to reach that all-important stage of aftercare.

Does a person with a mental health diagnosis become an addict because of the medication he needs to help his illness? Can an addict be the victim of medications with side effects that go awry and spark mental health problems? The answer to both questions can be yes. Addiction treatment specialists are looking at the very real challenges of addressing co-occurring diagnoses of mental health problems and addiction.

You’ve Heard About the Chicken and the Egg…

Even with everything that addiction specialists know today, they still cannot agree on what comes first—addiction or mental health problems. Sometimes there is a clear timeline that allows doctors or counselors to recognize that a person suffered from emotional disorders long before he was abusing drugs, but often there is no unambiguous distinction.

Possibly someone with an underlying mental health disorder begins taking drugs to make himself feel calmer or happier. Maybe a person functions well with no obvious problems until his experimentation with drugs brings to the surface the symptoms that he was genetically in danger of developing. In many cases, nobody really knows for certain.

Unfortunately, both of these problems frequently co-exist or co-occur. Politicians, insurance administrators, and people involved in the legal system insist that they are separate issues, and so mental health and addiction treatment specialists are stymied in their attempts to formulate coordinated treatments for affected individuals.  

When Drugs Come First

People who use drugs experience a wide spectrum of mental health symptoms even if there is no underlying mental health problem. For drugs as commonplace as cocaine and amphetamines, symptoms can range from paranoia to anxiety and agitation to aggression. Sometimes a person will see and hear things that aren’t there. Drug-related psychoses come into play when you consider that methamphetamine users often report hearing voices and seeing things. Even with marijuana, now approved for recreational use in Colorado and Washington, scientists are connecting the dots between a gene variant (catechol-o-methyltransferase) and schizophrenia.

Specialists do know that when someone is predisposed to develop mental health problems such as manic depression or even schizophrenia, once he begins to take drugs the symptoms of the mental health disorder will come to the surface sooner had the person not used drugs.  An older person might accept a warning that he should avoid drugs for that reason, but somebody who is in his teens or early 20s figures that he’s invincible and he will typically scoff at any warnings.

When Mental Health Comes First

Someone who suffers from a mental health diagnosis is at a very real risk of drug abuse. In younger people or in people without a regular family physician, depression or mood disorders may go undiagnosed for years. Attention deficit disorder may be written off as a behavioral problem. The person goes untreated, and he discovers that he feels better if he smokes a joint or takes a pill that he finds in the family medicine cabinet.

Treatment Is Possible

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, about 26 percent of the general population suffers from some kind of mental health disorder.  Substance abuse professionals realize that just by statistical default, 26 percent of their patients seeking substance abuse help will suffer from a mental health disorder.

Licensed and accredited substance abuse treatment centers, like Vista Taos Renewal Center, can help the person become whole even if he suffers from the dual diagnoses of mental health problems and addiction. Both illnesses should be treated together, but even if relapse occurs the patient should maintain focus on working toward recovery. The counselor will educate the patient so the he understands both of his illnesses and becomes empowered to develop coping skills and strategies. With patience and perseverance, recovery from a dual diagnosis is possible.   Get help today, call 1.800.245.8267 to learn more.

The Texas courts are working out a deal for Ryan Leaf, convicted of abusing pain medication in Texas when he was coaching the quarterbacks at West Texas A&M way back in 2008. It’s possible this former QB, identified by the NFL network as the biggest all-time NFL quarterback bust, will be permitted to serve his sentence concomitantly with the sentence he is now serving in his home state of Montana.

Leaf’s career took off like a rocket during his junior year at Washington State University—he quit his senior year to be signed by the San Diego Chargers. However, his cocky attitude garnered him little favor among his teammates. Winning his first two games in the NFL, he completed only one of fifteen passes in his third game and then was caught on film hollering at a camera operator after the game.  The next day, he screamed at a reporter. After his fourth game he was benched. The next season, he missed the start because of a shoulder injury. He was fined and suspended shortly afterward for hollering obscenities at his team’s general manager.

His third season saw him with a wrist injury, ironically sustained while throwing an interception, which plagued him for the next couple years and eventually required surgery. He played for Tampa Bay, Dallas, and Seattle—seeing little actual time on the field—and retired just before training camp got underway in 2002. He had only four career wins and fifteen losses.

Some speculate that his unrelenting, overall poor attitude resulted in a reluctance on the part of coaches to help him with physical therapy that could have helped him come back from his injuries.  Regardless of the truth in that, he ended up on pain medication therapy that graduated into addiction.

Leaf eventually returned to Washington State, earned his degree, and worked as a financial consultant in San Diego. However, he took a job coaching Texas A&M’s quarterbacks in 2006. In 2008, he resigned when a story broke that he asked a player to give him a pain pill.

In the spring of 2009, still in Texas, Leaf was arrested for burglary and for attempting to obtain a controlled substance fraudulently. He was doctor-hopping in the hopes of getting enough hydrocodone to satisfy his addiction, and there was evidence he had burgled an apartment, although this latter charge eventually was dropped. By the time the indictment was issued, he had conveniently checked himself into a rehab center in Canada.  When he returned to Washington, he was arrested, and he posted bond for his charges in Texas. In 2010, he received ten years’ probation for the felony charges.

Early in 2012 in Montana, he was arrested twice in a four-day span for burglary, theft, and drug charges. He plea-bargained this down to one felony for burglary and one count of criminal possession of a dangerous drug.  His prison sentence of nine years included nine months of lock-down residential substance abuse treatment, and if he complied with treatment, two years of his sentence would be suspended.

However, toward the end of his treatment period, he violated the rules of the facility and then in his typical blustery fashion threatened a staff person at the facility, which won him a ticket back to the state prison.  Leaf is a shining example of the immature personality with passive-aggressive (in Leaf’s case, mostly aggressive) behaviors that often accompany addiction issues. Maybe in addition to settling on a sentence for abusing pain killers in Texas, the court will finally order some treatment for his co-occurring emotional disorders.