Attorneys and Addiction

Rates of addiction are particularly high with certain associated jobs. Attorneys, unfortunately, suffer from rates of addiction that are much higher than the national average. Addiction afflicts about 10% of all Americans, but the rate approaches 20% with attorneys.

I don't have that answer as to why there is a higher prevelance of addiction with attorneys. I could guess that people who go into law, medicine, and other "exacting" fields are generally Type A personalities. They have to be Type A in order to be great at their line of work. After all, would you want an attorney who did not pay attention to detail working on your case, or a careless surgeon operating on you? Of course not!

However, the character type that makes for successful attorneys, doctors, pilots, etc., probably comes at a price. Of course, attorneys tend to be difficult to treat. Why? For many of the same reasons that they are successful attorneys. You have to be willing to let go to some extent and trust in the expertise of others in order to begin to get well from addiction. This is quite challenging for many. Paradise Recovery is a drug rehab and alcohol rehab that has a lot of success treating attorneys. It takes a special group of people to understand and treat the unique needs that attorneys present. They have a HelpLine that can give you more information: 866-241-7463.

Paradise Recovery: The Graduate School of Alcohol and Drug Rehabs

When choosing the right treatment center you need to determine what are your needs and what can a program offer you and more importantly, what are you prepared to offer yourself!

A Graduate Program in any University is an opportunity for a student to dedicate time and efforts to furthering their knowledge, experience and being able to articulate their learning with others. A typical Graduate program is not interested in "passive learners". They are seeking individuals who actively participate in their learning and are beginning to contribute to their chosen profession (e.g. nursing, social work, psychology, or computer science). Also, a good Graduate Program gives you more individual attention, more than your undergraduate program.

Our program was described as the "Graduate School of all Rehabs" by one of our former clients and after several re-admissions to a program in California, he came to Paradise! At Paradise Recovery, we expect a great deal from our clients and our clients hopefully expect a lot from us and themselves. Our program offers personalized care, which helps you to work on YOUR core issues that contributes to your disease of addiction.

If you, or someone you know is seriously considering recovery from addiction, please speak with one of our recovery counselors at (866)478-9898.

"The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed." Carl Jung

Recuperatio Primoris!

Dr. Bill Heran

The True Cure of Addiction

A rehab in Malibu, California, falsely advertises they have a "cure" for addiction. Their processes and interventions, most people would agree, are helpful and would aid someone with an authentic desire to stay clean and sober from addictions of any kind. However, their program does NOT offer a cure. I know this. I've treated individuals who have completed this particular program, and they were far from "cured!"

What is the cure from addiction? The cure, in my opinion, is your daily surrender that you are not in control of your addiction and when you relapse you and your life becomes chaotic and unmanageable. Ever heard that logic in the past? I hope so. It is the First Step of Alcoholics Anonymous. You don't have to subscribe to AA or NA to benefit from its wisdom.

To surrender, submit, make humble yourself and believe that if you do not drink, pop pills, snort, or shoot up today then you life will be less chaotic and more manageable. Now, for the addict that is a BIG STEP, since the drug of choice has "helped" them through some tough times. Believe me, I've been to too many funerals of addicts and alcoholics, including my 42 year-old brother's, to deny the effects of prolonged addictive behaviors.

What is the TRUE cure of addiction? Transformation. Addiction requires your full attention and wants nothing less than your total destruction and death (whatever that means and looks like in your life). In turn, recovery requires nothing less than your full attention towards health and recovery! So, there is a cure, but its not in some book or in some "passage" in Malibu.

If you, or someone you know is in need of quality private rehab services, then please call our 24-Hour HelpLine and speak with one of our recovery counselors today. Call (866) 478-9898 today!


Recuperatio Primoris!

Drug Rehab Success Rates

I see a number of drug rehabs claiming that they have the highest success rates in the country. Some say "76% success rate", some "83%", and I think I saw one that said 90%+.

The question that I have is, how did each of those facilities define "success"? That is a really important question. The industry standard is sobriety at the 6 month mark. Is that the number they are using? Also, why aren't their studies published anywhere? If they really have done these studies that show great success rates, why not publish them? Could I take a look at your study?

I can answer most of these questions. The drug rehabs that celebrate their success rates don't want to show you their study. They don't want to publish it. Why? Because the study is not good. It won't qualify as a scientific study, either because they are using lousy definitions of "success", they used a very small number of hand-picked people to include in the study, or the results are not real. It is possible that they really don't have a study. If you have a study, why not let me see it?

Here is the truth about drug rehabs: the best drug rehabs take an integrative, holistic approach to treatment that is individualized based on your core issues and particular needs. That is being borne out in the real scientific studies that are being published in the scientific literature. Those truly are the drug rehabs with the highest success rates.

Being an integrative, holistic treatment program is easier said than done. Most drug and alcohol rehabs don't understand the real meaning of those words. It is very difficult to set up a drug rehab to operate this way, but it is simple and life-changing to receive the benefits of it!

There are some good drug rehabs out there. However, not all of them are what they say they are. Don't settle for less.

DUIs and Living on Borrowed Time: Getting Help Today for Addictions

When an alcoholic or drug addict is caught driving while intoxicated (DUI) there often is a sudden fear and exposure of a self-destructive path that prefers going unknown by others. A phone call to your spouse or parent, spending a night in jail, the legal processes, etc. are all disturbing events for professional women and men who are drinking or using drugs and deciding to operate a vehicle.

Some sources state there have been 250,000 fatalities associated with DUIs in the past ten years in the U.S. More and more states are instituting ignition interlock systems for drivers charged with a DUI. The dangers of driving while intoxicated are countless and the physical, emotional and spiritual costs are significant.

Some people see a DUI as a proverbial "wake-up call" and seek help. Before you lose your privilege to drive and loss your license, which often makes your ability to work difficult, it is wise to seek a rehab stay today and begin to embrace recovery!

If you, or someone you know is manipulating the legal system secondary to a DUI, please have them call our 24-hour HelpLine at (866) 478-9898 and speak with one of our recovery counselors.

Recuperatio Primoris!

Dr. Bill Heran
CEO and Co-Founder
Paradise Recovery, LLC

Salvia Divinorum: A harmless herb?

Salvia Divinorum, or commonly known as "Salvia", "Lady Salvia," "Sally-D," or "Magic Mint" is a powerful hallucinogenic and psychoactive herb with a long religious use with Mazatec shamans to induce a "religious experience". It is sold in the U.S. in small bags with varying strengths, and it is TOTALLY LEGAL. Yes, even your 10 year-old can buy Salvia at a local store. It can be chewed, smoked, or taken as a tincture. A search on YouTube can offer you video proof of the bizarre and scary looking effects of the herb.

Some of its bizarre effects are: uncontrollable laughter, altered mental states, dysphoria, confusion, or visual illusions. The duration of the high is about 3-4 minutes depending on the strength. Ironically, Salvia reportedly has been used to curb addiction cravings and can put a depressed person in an elevated, less depressed mood.

The herb may be non-addictive, but the use of Salvia with other drugs and alcohol may be deadly. Of course, who is the first in line to try Salvia? You've guessed it...adolecsents and addicts! Both groups have a great deal of difficulty handling affect and mood. Adolescents have enough to worry about regarding mood stabilization and control. Salvia is not going to assist in the emotional control department. Addicts have already put Salvia on their radar, since it another way to "run away," even for a few minutes, from life's happenings and responsibilities.

So, if you or someone you know if regularly using Salvia along with other drugs, please call our 24-Hour HelpLine at (866) 478-9898 and speak with one of our counselors in recovery.

Lets keep its use to Mexican shammans and restrict its use to growing adolescents and addicts, who may be convinced that Salvia is another "weed type high" and it can't be further from the truth!

Salvia Divinorum. Hmmm...personally, I prefer another Latin phrase:
Recuperatio Primoris! (Recovery above all else!)

Alcoholic and Addicts New In Recovery: The Challenge With Rules

Alcoholics and addicts new in recovery are a notoriously undisciplined bunch. They have difficulty accepting rules enforced on them by others and are quick to buck any type of external authority. It would seem that this can be for many a manifestation of their addictive disease, and once through with alcohol detoxification or drug withdrawal, they must begin to accept rules that have been set down by others.

Sometimes these rules are those set forth by drug rehabilitation centers. Others must face up to rules designed and implemented by the courts or the probation officer. On occasion, the family attempts to exert increasing control on the alcoholic/addict by creating specified instructions for acceptable behavior.

Regardless of where the rules come from, newly recovering alcoholics and addicts have a difficult time adhering or complying. Part of the disease of alcoholism and addiction is an unnerving and continuous self-absorption. It is, by its very nature, a disease that insists that the sufferer (the alcoholic/addict) attend only to their needs. This should be obvious--we're talking about people whose primary drive is to get and stay drunk or high, regardless of the consequences.

True recovery begins when sober alcoholics recognize this tendency to put themselves first and to put themselves above whatever laws that should direct their behavior. These misdirected souls need to accept direction. As recovery continues, they may begin to internalize a sense of immediate right and wrong, but until that time, others have to set down the rules, to lay down the law. And all should expect the alcoholic/addict to try and find their way around these very same rules.

A Surprising New Substance... Jenkam

As an addictions counselor, it is rare that I'm truly amazed at the extent to which addicts will go in order to achieve a high. It almost seems too familiar when I hear about people ingesting dozens of cold tablets or drinking hand sanitizer in order to escape themselves. The recent fad of Jenkam has taken me a bit by surprise, however.

In the case you are unfamiliar, in case you haven't heard, Jenkam is a high that is induced by inhaling the fumes of feces. To be specific, a combination of human feces and urine is kept in a sealed container and allowed to ferment, often for days in the sun. When ripe, the cap is removed and the person inhales deeply holding their breathe repeatedly until high. I can't say it's exactly "all the rage" with the kids, but it has been mentioned in the popular press. And it appears to be spreading

I can't quite understand how someone was able to determine that this combination would be able to produce a high. I can't imagine the level of desperation that would lead someone to try it in the first place.

I take that last statement back, actually maybe I can. Drug addiction has little to do with substance and everything to do with the result. The addict has an enduring and incessant need to get and stay high. Maybe it's not surprising that the same disease that leads people to violate their basic moral codes--that leads them to betray friends, steal from employers, rob family members, sell their bodies--would lead them to try anything to give them that high. Even if that meant inhaling their own feces--and holding their breath.

The Natural Order of Things

One can't live on the planet without observing some of the standard overarching laws by which everything must exist. Some very basic principles guide the planet and it's ability to sustain life: gravity, for example. If the planet wasn't stuck in it's orbit, there might be no life. If the planet didn't exert it's own gravity, everything would float off. The simple physics of gravity keeps us bound to the earth--it's the natural order. An inescapable truth.

Yet we have found over the last century that we can overcome gravity. We can launch massive barrels of steel into the air, filled with thousands of tons of equipment and humans, and bring it all down on the other side of the globe. We can thrust building sized rockets into outer space, and hold building sized spacecraft in orbit around our planet.

Of course this takes a monumental effort. But the natural order of some things can be surmounted.

The natural order for the alcoholic/addict is as clear as the law of gravity. The natural state--the most comfortable state of being--for the alcoholic/addict is to be using, high, or drunk. Anything else for someone suffering from untreated alcoholism or drug addiction is an unnatural state. Strange as this may sound, it is a truth; until the disease is arrested or the person dies, an alcoholic/addict must use and will.

But just as with the law of gravity, this natural order can be overcome. Alcohol treatment and drug treatment is available, support can be found. The diseases of alcoholism and addiction can be arrested. The person need not die.

We can fly massive planes. We can launch and construct space stations. And with the right kind of effort, with appropriate detoxification, with alcohol and drug rehabilitation, with caring and nurturing support, the natural order can be reversed.