Many people often refer to addiction as a family disease. This is because everyone in the family, especially the children, are impacted by a loved one’s substance abuse. That’s why for International Childre...
Tag: drug abuse
How Drug Addiction Affects Relationships
After living through an experience and looking back at it, we always see where we made mistakes. When you’re in recovery, it’s easy to look back and see how addiction and substance abuse dictated your life....
Financial Stress and Substance Abuse
The relationship between financial stress and substance abuse exists in many different contexts. It’s a tragically ironic double-edged sword. There are dozens of different ways this association can develop, b...
My Loved One Overdosed, Now What?
Experiencing your loved one suffer an overdose can be terrifying and unexpected. What’s the proper way to respond to the situation? How much do you share with the paramedics and first responders when you ...
Lil Peep Lawsuit Can Have Serious Impact on Drug Use in the Music Industry
It’s been over two years since rapper Lil Peep died from drug overdose. His mother is now suing his management in a case that can have a lasting impact on drug use in the music industry. The 21-year-old Lil P...
West Virginia Daycare for Babies with NAS is Making a Difference
The opioid epidemic has impacted millions of lives, affecting everyone from our nation’s senior citizens to its millions of children that have been displaced and subsequently put into foster care or the care ...
Fatal Drug Overdoses Decline for the First Time in 30 Years
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention CDC reports that there were around 68,557 drug overdose fatalities in the United States in 2018. While it seems like the height of lunacy to regard this number as ...
Managing the Outcome of Florida’s Pill Mills
Anyone familiar with the current opioid crisis in the United States has heard of the impact that Florida’s “pill mills” have had in compounding the problem, but the reality is that not many understand the...
HBO Series Euphoria Follows Woman Suffering from Drug Addiction in a World that’s Leaving her behind
Euphoria, HBO’s newest drama, revolves around Rue Bennett, a 17-year-old woman struggling with drug addiction, depression and anxiety who turns to drugs to cope with the feeling that she is just existing in a...
Should Fentanyl Testing Kits Be Allowed at Music Festivals?
Music festivals are known to captivate the masses with bright lights and a unique array of music; unfortunately, festival grounds are also often populated with illegal substances, increasing the potential for o...
A May Day Message for Workers Struggling with Alcohol and Drug Abuse
The May Day holiday has taken different forms and has been associated with many different events throughout history, one of the most prominent of which is International Workers Day. The relationship between May...
Musician John Schreiner Talks New Album and Music after Drug Abuse
Seconds after engaging Virginia songwriter John Schreiner in conversation, it becomes crystal-clear that you’re in the presence of a devoted student and evangelist of music; a proverbial true believer whose l...
Employers Feel Effects of Increased Marijuana and Opioid Use
Do you know someone at work from whom you can easily score marijuana or prescription painkillers? Have you seen someone die from overdose on the job from opioids? Have you witnessed someone noticeably impaired ...
Is Your Career Making You Use?: Jobs with the Highest Rates of Alcohol and Drug Addiction
Everyone’s job is stressful, right? Even the people who beat the alarm clock every morning and race with enthusiasm to the most rewarding of jobs occasionally find themselves checking their blood pressure wit...
Addiction in Families: The Lesser-Discussed Casualties of Drug and Alcohol Abuse
Addiction in families is becoming an increasingly common reality. Last year over 72,000 Americans succumbed to fatal drug overdose. Countless others escaped with their lives after overdosing, and more still wal...
Mac Miller Dead of An Apparent Overdose
Mac Miller was found dead in his San Fernando Valley home just hours ago from an apparent overdose. A friend called the police from Mac’s house and was pronounced dead when they arrived at the scene. The 26-y...
Contaminated Molly Reinforces Dangers of Designer Drugs
Last Sunday, police in the UK issued a regional warning after a batch contaminated molly (MDMA) sent a group of teenage girls to the hospital. The incident is only the latest in a series of hospitalizations and...
Nearly Every American Dealing with Drug Addiction in some form, Pew Report Says
It’s official: drug addiction now impacts practically every American in some way. We often say that drug abuse is everyone’s problem; a recent survey from the Pew Research Center has taken this assertion fr...
K2 Part 2: Synthetic Marijuana Overdoses Making a Comeback
Last week more than 25 people were hospitalized in Brooklyn after they had apparently overdosed on K2, a form of synthetic marijuana that has been a persistent public health threat for the past few years. Polic...
New Study Reveals Shocking Data on References to Drugs in Music
Rock and roll and hip-hop have been closely linked to counterculture over the past few decades. They have developed an association with sex, substance abuse and violence, as have genres like heavy metal, jazz a...
Make It Count: What Happens after Narcan Deployment?
Narcan saves lives and that’s really all there is too it…or is it? It’s true that the widely used anti-overdose drug has saved thousands of lives since its introduction into the opioid and heroin treatmen...
Venezuela VP Named as Drug Trafficker by Treasury
Venezuela and the United States have, for a long time, had a difficult and contentious relationship. Going back decades, even before the inflammatory back-and-forth between the Bush and Chavez Administrations, ...
The Long-Term Impact of Florida’s Pill Mills
A few years ago, it seemed like Floridians couldn’t look in any direction without spotting a pill mill. These fly-by-night “pain management clinics” where addicts could get pills from doctors looking to c...
A Victim of Geography: Where Is Texas’ Drug Supply Coming From?
As Texas continues to reel from rampant alcohol and drug addiction, and as more and more residents succumb to overdose and other substance abuse-related causes of death, the state’s elected officials, law enf...
The Legacy of Lean
Some know it as “lean,” some know it as codeine-promethazine and many don’t know it at all. Although blues musicians were mixing cough syrup and alcohol back in the 1960’s, that doesn’t mean they had ...
2016 Red Ribbon Week Spreads Awareness of Drug Addiction
October 31st marked the conclusion of this year’s Red Ribbon Week, a nine-day event meant to spread awareness and education regarding the dangers of drug abuse and addiction. Red Ribbon Week was established b...
Recovery Unplugged Releases New eBook on the Impact of Addiction on Families
Families are the lesser-discussed casualties of addiction. For practically every one of the over 23 million Americans suffering from chemical dependency, there is a whole separate group of people suffering righ...
A SAFE and Happy Halloween: Alcohol and Halloween’s Burgeoning Relationship
This year Americans will have spent approximately $8.5 billion on Halloween. Translation: it’s not just a kids’ holiday anymore. While many of us still celebrate the occasion by taking our children or niec...
Supervised Injection Sites: Compassion or Complacency?
A recent study conducted by NYU regarding the use of heroin in New York City’s public bathrooms is further reinforcing calls for a new, and arguably radical anti-overdose tool: supervised injection centers. A...
Macklemore’s New Single “Drug Dealer” Takes Aim at Big Pharma
It’s subject matter that is seldom, if ever, seen in a music video; however, given the unprecedented scale of prescription opioid addiction currently plaguing the United States, it should come as no surprise ...
A Lesser-Discussed Threat: Synthetic Drugs and Their Impact
By now we’re all aware of the widespread devastation caused by heroin and prescription opioids. If we haven’t experienced it in our own personal lives, we’ve heard second-hand accounts of people whose liv...
What Election Day Means for Recreational Marijuana Use
There is a political sea change coming any way you slice it. In what can be charitably described as one of the most unorthodox presidential campaigns in American history, a variety of policy issues stand to und...
Recovery Unplugged Medical Director Featured in TMA Article
Earlier this month, Recovery Unplugged Texas’ very own Dr. Carlos Tirado weighed on the availability and accessibility of naloxone (Narcan) in an article published by the Texas Medical Association. The piece ...
Recovery Unplugged Celebrates National Recovery Month
A day after recognizing International Awareness Day, Recovery Unplugged is now fittingly observer another important event within the recovery community. This September marks the 27th annual National Recovery...
Recovery Unplugged Austin Celebrates National Recovery Month
September has been designated National Recovery Month by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). Now in its 27th year, the 30-day event was established to educate communities all...
Inhalants: Not a Drug of the Past
It seems like a long time ago that our news broadcasts were filled with stories of teens getting in trouble for ‘huffing’ permanent markers and spray paint. Unfortunately, while these stories may not inunda...
Taking Time On Veterans Day
Veterans Day is an official United States public holiday, observed annually on November 11, that honors military veterans, that is, persons who served in the United States Armed Forces. It coincides with other ...
Substance Abuse Study by Surgeon General
Big Shout out to the Dr Vivek Murthy the U.S. Surgeon General for planning to release the first-ever “substance use, addiction and health” report next year. He revealed strategies for this at this past wee...
The Drug Czar and Forward Thinking
“Locking people up for minor drug offenses, and especially people with substance-use disorders, is not the answer,” Mr. Botticelli said. “It’s cruel. It’s costly. And it doesn’t make the public any ...
What is Flakka?
If you are here in South Florida all anyone is talking about is the new street drug that is sweeping the streets of South Florida called Falkka. Flakka’s technical name is- Alpha Pyrrolidinopentiophene (A-PV...
Recovery Unplugged’s NCAD 15 Plenary Speaker
It was announced yesterday that Richie Supa, Recovery Unplugged Treatment Center’s (a Florida drug rehab) Director of Creative Recovery, will be the Opening Plenary Speaker for the 2015 National Conference ...
Molly: Not the girl next door
Molly. It sounds extremely harmless and reminiscent of a childhood friend or the girl next door. Unfortunately this couldn’t be further from the truth as “Molly” is sweeping through college campuses aroun...
Physical Side Effects of Addiction
Drug addiction is a very serious situation that often has severe physical side effects. After extensive drug use, a person can begin to look very different from their pre-addiction selves. Weight loss and weig...
Goal Setting
Everyone, at some point in their life, has hopes and aspirations. Growing up, everyone wants to be a professional athlete, astronaut or maybe a fireman. Dreams and goals don’t have an expiration date. In orde...
The Role of Stress
I do not want to suggest that it is OK to make excuses for addictions, but it is important to understand situations and triggers that can aggravate addiction or rehabilitation. In this case, let’s examine the...
Planning an Intervention
Confronting a family member or loved one about alcohol or drug addiction is hard, no matter how you approach the topic. It is important to remember that while you are approaching them in love, they still may fe...
Continuing Treatment
When a person ends drug rehabilitation, the process of recovery isn’t over. The time after a person leaves a rehab facility is just as important as their time in the program. There are ways to continue healin...
Reading the Signs of Drug Addiction
When you suspect a child, parent or loved one is struggling with addiction, it is hard to know what to do. There is always a risk of damaging a relationship and many do not know how to be sure addiction is pres...