3-29-2008

Brian: Good afternoon Atlanta and welcome to the Breakthrough Addition Recovery Hour. My name is Brian Fujii and my cohost is Jill Mattingly, and again we have with us our Director of Psychiatric Services, Dr. Neil Johnston. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

Jill: Hey Brian, nice rainy day. I hope you all are listening to the radio today – well obviously you are because you’re hearing us.

Brian: Absolutely, and what a great team to listen to.

3-22-2008

Brian: Welcome to the Breakthrough Addition Recovery Hour. My name is Brian Fujii and we have with us today Jill Mattingly, my co-host, and also Dr. Neil Johnston is back with us again and we’re very excited about this afternoon.

Jill: Happy Easter everyone out there, and thanks for joining us today on Breakthrough Addiction Recovery Hour and we are going to talk a little bit later on about bipolar, about co-occurring disorders. And before we go there, I do want to go back to last week again. We started talking briefly about the new legislation about Sunday alcohol sales. We had such a huge response from the listening audience. A lot of opinions out there about this.

Brian: Very strong opinions.

Jill: And it seems like it’s kind of laying low right now. There’s no new movement from what I’ve seen. So when there is, we will be talking about it on our show. However, there’s a couple of other things coming out in the news that you start to see this time of year and it centers on the subject of spring break, and revelry, and binge drinking which seems to be, unfortunately in some cases, a right of passage for several young adults. And I thought, let’s talk about that just for a few minutes. Maybe we give the young adults out there listening, or parents listening, some information about binge drinking and how to educate yourself or your loved ones about this.

Brian: And if you’d like to be a part of this program, we’d love to invite you to call in at 770-226-0920. If you’re outside the listening area, 1-888-920-2665 and join us. We’d love to have your input at this time.

Jill: Right, and so Brian, you have a little bit of a definition there on binge drinking.

Brian: Well, the formalized definition says, and we all know that once you give a definition it doesn’t necessarily mean that was the only definition, but usually the definition is having 5 or more standard drinks on one occasion. What’s the definition of a standard drink? Well it is a shot of whiskey, a glass of wine, or a 12 oz. bottle of beer.

Jill: So 5 beers is binge drinking? I don’t think that that is exactly what is happening down in Florida.

Brian: They do load up with 6-packs though, I don’t see many 5-packs.

Neil: I’m pretty sure that a lot of businessmen go to dinner and over the course of dinner and discussions have 5 drinks at one time. So the binge drinking we’re probably focusing on is more the pint of alcohol, the 10 drinks, 15 drinks, etc., not the 5 drinks a day.

Jill: Filling up your hat with beer and putting a straw into your mouth from your hat, I think that’s probably binge drinking if it’s continuous. But it can be pretty dangerous. In recent years we’ve heard a lot of tragedies that occur because of drunkenness, and unfortunately young women tend to get into trouble because of not being aware of their surroundings or because of the people that they’re with, and finding out that they have made a terrible mistake after coming to. So I think that binge drinking has been something that very much has been on people’s minds, especially if they’re packing up their young son or daughter to go down to Panama City Beach with the guys or the girls for the week. I’m sure there’s a lot of people out there thinking about this.

Neil: And there’s the other worry about absolute alcohol toxicity, where people die from binge drinking. The usual occurrence is that someone will drink to the point that they either vomit and remove the alcohol from their system or that they pass out and sleep it off. But if people are using grain alcohol, which is 100% alcohol or 200 proof, they can drink a sufficient quantity to cause themselves to pass out, to go into respiratory depression, possibly vomit, aspirate it and choke to death from that or just from the respiratory depression from the alcohol itself. So alcohol poisoning is a real concern, both on college campuses during the rest of the year and during spring break when people are drinking more heavily.

Jill: So it’s not just accidents that can occur more readily, but obviously it can be a physiological problem that can happen too. I was reading a little bit about binge drinking in the last couple of days and some people look at it as possibly a reversal of seasonal affective disorder. I think that’s kind of interesting because seasonal affective disorder, Dr. Neil, can you give me a little bit of background on that?

Neil: Well seasonal affective disorder, or SAD, is a depression that typically happens more in the northern latitudes where people become more depressed as the days become shorter and shorter and shorter. And as the days lengthen, people’s moods do generally elevate and improve. Now one thing that would support this hypothesis is the fact that when this occurs in the more northern latitudes, say in Alaska and in the Scandinavian countries, and during their summers they have prolonged periods of sunlight, some of them can actually become manic or hypermanic, their judgment can be impaired, they can be more energetic, they can feel that they’re more invincible. So that might correlate with people drinking more, but also just the environment . . . it’s beautiful outside, you’re outside enjoying yourself with a cocktail in-hand.

Jill: Kind of like a teenage point of view – no parents, nobody telling me what to do, I’m just going to behave accordingly because I’ve been under a lot of pressure in college, school, or something like that. But we do want to encourage you to really think about the changes that can occur with binge drinking. Of course the possibility of alcohol poisoning, but also in looking at some of the research out there, there can be brain changes that occur when an adolescent or young adult is drinking heavily, like say they’re doing it every weekend, like because they are in a fraternity of something like that, that there have been studies that show that they can actually harm the part of the brain, the hippocampus, that is actually important for memory and memory formation. It doesn’t seem to affect them as terribly with sedation and motor control, however the memory is affected. So this could go on into adulthood that there is a problem with memory formation because of damage to the brain from binge drinking. And you had another interesting point about binge drinking and memory also, Neil.

Neil: People don’t realize that the human brain continues to develop and mature well into the early 20’s, so alcohol or any other drug that impairs the functioning of the brain may interfere with the maturation of the brain ultimately. So doing damage to someone when they’re in their prime developmental years is obviously not a good idea. They can recover from it better than older folks, but they’re more susceptible than older folks as well.

Another issue that’s been on the national news recently about binge drinking, is the controversy over people considering trying to lower the age back to 18 for alcohol consumption. It’s something that I feel has always not made sense, that you can be 18 years of age and vote, drive a car – which can be a deadly weapon, especially for some adolescents – and go to war and be subject to all the violence and trauma there, but you can’t legally buy a beer. That just always seems very ironic to me. But the people who are now talking about changing this are hoping that if they lower the drinking age to 18, that college students would then go out to a bar, out to a party, drink legally and not have to do what they’re doing now which is often times stocking up on alcohol, drinking very, very heavily before they go out so that they can be drunk, buzzed, and then go out and then not drink because it’s illegal.

Brian: That sounds like a very interesting point of view and we’ve heard many of those types of argument about lowering the drinking age, if this is a topic that is of deep concern or of interest to you, give us a call at 770-226-0920 or 1-888-920-2665. Jill, it looks like we’re coming up to a break here in a few minutes.

Jill: I do want to say something to Neil just for a minute, and I bet you do too, I taught high school a long time ago and I had 18 year-olds in my class, as seniors, and I don’t know if I’d like to go back to seeing them go out in their jacked-up cars and all that and buy their 6-pack and be going down the road that I’m going down. I just knew too many 18 year-olds who had very poor judgment, and yes they can be drafted into the Army, but still . . . I don’t know Neil.

Brian: Okay, we’re coming up to the break. This sounds almost like Crossfire. So if you want to be part of the discussion, give us a call, 770-226-0920 and we’ll be right back.

Jill: Welcome back to Breakthrough Addiction Recovery Hour. My name is Jill Mattingly, and I’m here with my co-host, Brian Fujii, and our Director of Psychiatric Services, Dr. Neil Johnston is joining us in the studio today. And we’ve been talking a little bit about some interesting subjects, one of which we were talking about before the break about the lowering of the drinking age back to 18 years old and how that could possibly result in a little less problematic behavior.

Neil: I would ask you in retort Jill, let’s say 18 year olds that you don’t feel are responsible enough to drink – and I agree that there are plenty that aren’t, and there are plenty of 20, 30, and 40 year olds that aren’t responsible enough to be drinking and I don’t want them on the highway either, but if that same 18 year old that’s not responsible enough to buy beer and drink, are they responsible enough to be voting on who’s going to be the leader of the most powerful nation in the world? Are they responsible enough to go off to war and make the decision to risk their lives? Are they responsible enough to do all of those things? We can’t do a responsibility test on every individual. So I think we agree ultimately that excess drinking is bad, drinking in moderation is obviously going to be less likely in immature younger people, but where do we draw the line? And that’s something that we could argue about forever.

Jill: Well, I think what I’m going to do right now is give out the number, because if anyone else wants to get in on this discussion or conversation . . . I still do believe that Mothers Against Drunk Driving agree with me that 21 has seen an improvement in highway fatalities and things like that, but I do see your point too. Our number . . . 770-226-0920, and if you would like to call from outside the listening area, 1-888-920-2665. We have a website. We’re not talking about underage drinking or what the drinking age should be on the website, but it is full of information about drug addiction and alcohol dependency, and that website is BreakthroughAddictionRecovery.com, and if you’d like to call us, please do. And Brain, do you have a dog in this fight?

Brian: No, I was very nominal when I was going to college at that time. I think Coca Cola was the only thing I really drunk. Sad isn’t it, sad. Well one of the interesting things about binge drinking, and I noticed one of the statistics that you had shared with us is that it indicates that a lot of folks that have been doing a lot of binge drinking also have a lot of mental health disorders, like compulsiveness, or depression anxiety, and we see a lot of that in the people at our clinic, especially those that are really struggling with alcohol.

Look, we have a call in from Rick in Marietta, Welcome Rick, to the Breakthrough Addiction Recovery Hour.

Rick: Hey guys, I’m 50 years old and I’m just sitting here listening to your show, thinking how when the drinking age was 18, that was when I was first able to go out and buy alcohol. And I used to go on spring breaks . . . we used to go to Ft. Lauderdale rather than Panama City back in ancient history. But binge drinking was when you tried to down a whole pitcher of beer all at one time or what we called punch-punch, when you tried to kill a large quantity in a short period of time. This having 5 drinks, I thought binge drinking was just trying to zap yourself in the shortest period of time possible.

Neil: Well Rick, I agree with you. We academics and we intellectual psychiatrists, we get together and put these arbitrary definitions down, and that’s the professional accepted definition for binge drinking in what we call our statistical manual of diagnostic criteria, but what we’re talking about as far as the college student on spring break is what you’re saying, the drinking of grain alcohol, is incredible volumes of drinking, so that really is what we’re talking about when we say binge drinking.

Rick: Well it is dangerous to drink that much because I can remember, the worst thing that ever happened to me is to get drunk and throw up, but I could remember seeing some people get really sick especially when they would mix different types of alcohol and that’s what my concern is. I hear these stories now about people drinking wine and beer and liquor together, and that’s just under no circumstances, is that a healthy thing for any young person to do.

Neil: Well your body was doing what is healthy by causing you to throw up. We appreciate your call and your comment, and we’ve got other callers, so thanks Rick for calling.

Rick: Thanks.

Jill: Hey, it looks like we have Bill in Marietta. Hey Bill, welcome to the Breakthrough Addiction Recovery Hour.

Bill: My pleasure, very interesting program. I’m a 67 year old father of 3 boys, 2 of which were permanently damaged in drunk driving accidents, and you would think I would be against alcohol in most any form for what we’ve suffered, but the interesting thing was that both my boys were teenagers when they were in the accidents and the harm to them was caused by drunks who were in their 20’s and 30’s. And so it kind of causes me to pause before I have a generalistic view about it, but it came to me conceivably that when we’re talking about the paradigm that’s always used in this discussion . . . are we old enough to sign up for the draft, vote for president, and so on. Those usually are decisions that are made at a conscious level with a lot of thought. My concern is that youngsters, and I think automotive surveys will show you that you don’t have a risk assessment capability until you’re somewhere around 25, fully matured in that ability. But when you’ve had 2 or 3 drinks and you’re down on the beach, your decision-making is impaired. So I think the fact that we’re talking about decision-making, whether it’s valid or not, when you’re sober it’s valid, so those other two areas of argument are ones when they have the best of their faculties to their utilization but when they’ve had 2 or 3 drinks and peer pressure, it’s a totally different story.

Brian: Absolutely, I really agree with that thinking process because when a person is under the influence, and then driving, and them making the other kinds of activity decisions, this certainly is something that’s different than when you’re logically thinking about who to vote for or whether you’re going to sign up for the Army, Navy, or Air Force, or Marines, that’s certainly done on a conscious level and I really understand that. I believe that there is a difference between conscious decision-making when you’re clean and sober versus that when under the influence.

Neil: Bill, and I want to say I’m so sorry for your losses, for what you’ve been through, and I agree with you on a lot of that as well, but before you take that first drink you also have that responsibility to decide whether you’re going to take it or not. And to designate a driver and do all of those types of things as well.

Bill: I agree with you. Good comments, great show, I’m listening to it intently, and I think these are issues of major importance.

Brian: Thanks, Bill. Hey, we’ve got another call. John from Marietta. Welcome to the Breakthrough Addiction Recovery Hour.

John: Hey, how ya doing. I appreciate you talking about this topic. I grew up in New York, an Irish-Catholic family, both parents alcoholics, extended family alcoholics. My mom ended up taking her own life in her 60’s, about 10 years ago, and I actually have the perfect example of why not to drink and I never have really. Once in a while I go out and do a shot or something, but I saw my mom who grew up in the south and never had any emotional or mental illness at all and then started drinking more being around my dad’s family. The whole had this problem. I moved down here about 15 years ago. My father’s family was very wealthy and my mother’s was very poor and the way the alcoholism ran across and I work in a high school now and I see – we just had a prom last week – and I see these kids and how they came to the prom lit up. Like the other gentleman said, it’s a different situation when you’re drinking, you’re judgment is impaired. I tell some of the kids where I teach about the things I went though as a child and sometimes it scares them a little, sometimes they laugh it off, with car wrecks and things, the way it destroys families and things. I wouldn’t be here today if I was drinking.

Jill: And you’re talking about coaching, and I was a high school teacher back when, and I remember a lot of times I said things or just made comments about things and I know that they were listening and I know they wanted to be the person that I saw them as. And so I really do appreciate that you are living your life in front of these young people and letting them know where you came from. I think that is huge because they’re dealing with peer pressure when they leave your classroom, when the leave your field.

John: They don’t see things the way we did though. I’ve got three children, and they don’t see things the way I did. I’m sure a lot of these kids have the same problem.

Jill: Hey John, we are coming down to the end of the segment and I think that is an excellent statement. Thank you so much for calling in. We’re going to continue talking a little bit more about this – this is obviously a very intense topic. But thank you so much for calling. And we’re going to be right back – stay with us.

Brian: Welcome back to the Breakthrough Addiction Recovery Hour. My name is Brian Fujii, and I have with me Jill Mattingly and Dr. Neil Johnston and we’ve been having a lively discussion here this afternoon, especially as it comes to the issue about lowering the drinking age, but one of the things I’d like to segue into is, we’ve said some of the studies indicate that when people get into strong binge drinking that it has some very severe mental health consequences and we begin to see people with high compulsiveness and depression and anxiety and of course what Dr. Johnston also said, alcohol poisonings, and there are some big issues tied around here. And we kind of want to look again at how alcoholism really impacts the body as well as the brain and of course we have a lot of this information on our website at BreakthroughAddictionRecovery.com. If you would like to be part of the discussion, give us a call at 770-226-0920.

One of the things I see, Dr. Johnston, is many of our clients now seem to be having issues with alcoholism and bipolar disorder. And I do know that one of the big issues, especially in being able to accurately diagnose bipolar disorder is that we have to find some way to get them clean and sober so that we can really make an accurate diagnosis. How is that issue when a person is coming in, maybe they need some drug detoxing, but they’re experiencing maybe some mania and when they finally begin drug detoxing, I’d see some severe depression. How do we make that distinction whether it is just alcohol induced depression, or maybe they’re experiencing bipolar?

Neil: Well that’s a very good question Brian. It is a difficult decision to make in that, which came first – the chicken or the egg? Indeed, the alcoholism or the bipolar disorder. Bipolar disorder just so happens to have its age of onset in late teenage to early 20’s, the same time where the drinking for many people is starting out.

What I tend to is try to ask the patient about their history before they were using alcohol on a regular basis and see if I can glean anything from that. If I can and can substantiate a diagnosis of bipolar disorder, I will go ahead and begin addiction treatment for that while we drug detox them and get them off the alcohol. If once they’re off the alcohol and their moods have evened out – and by the way for those of you listening for the first time, bipolar disorder means “two poles” and it’s synonymous with manic depression – just so you’ll know what we’re talking about there. So I will treat both – drug detox the patient off the alcohol or other substances and treat the bipolar disorder at the same time. If they get better with regards to mood swings from the bipolar disorder, then maybe we’ll pull them off the addiction treatment for bipolar disorder and see how they do off the alcohol and off the bipolar. Bipolar disorder can be such a dangerous disease in some people, I don’t want to leave that for 6 weeks of sobriety just to see if it’s still there, not to mention that it may impairing their ability to stay sober. I think we have a phone call, Jill.

Jill: Yeah, looks like we have Arthur in Atlanta. Hey, thanks for calling the Breakthrough Addiction Recovery Hour.

Arthur: Hi. You talk about youngsters drinking and driving, and you say that they’re not really old enough to make a decision about whether to drive after they drunk or not. Well, these same 18 year olds have going into the military and they’re making that decision at 18 years old, and I’ve spent 20 years in the military both during the draft period and after the draft period, and you watch one of these 18 year olds bleed out after a fire-fight or in a battle zone and there’s nothing you can do about it. And this same kid can’t buy beer legally in some states. I fail to see where there’s a difference between them being mature enough to make the decision to join the military and fight for this country and die, and being mature enough to decide whether or not they want to drink.

Neil: Well you know Arthur, that is exactly the debate that’s going on right now. The legislators are looking at that and people are weighing their opinions on it and in both directions.

Arthur: I feel like if you want to deny them the right to drink, then you should deny them the military at 18, wait until they are 21 before they go off and decide to die for this country as well. Okay, I’m going to hang up and listen to the discussion from this point.

Brian: Thank you for calling, Arthur. When you take a look at the ability for people to make that kind of decision Arthur, about going to war and being able to make that decision to drink, we have to take a look at the way that the mind is being influenced, and I know we have some issues about being able to drink versus being able to go to war, but we also know that so many times, as people tend to drink at an earlier and earlier age, the tendency is that their emotional decision-making process seems to take over more so than probably their logical thought process. And that is always a challenge. There’s not going to be a clear-cut answer to this. That’s why it’s an ongoing concern, and again that’s just my opinion and I certainly know we have others.

Neil: I’d like to comment that we’re coming on a break right now.

Jill: Yeah, we’re coming on a break. Let’s make some more comments when we come back after this break. Stay with us, interesting information coming.

Jill: Welcome back to Breakthrough Addiction Recovery hour. My name is Jill Mattingly, and my co-host Brian Fujii, and we have with us Dr. Neil Johnston, and we’re having a pretty lively discussion and there was another comment I think Dr. Johnston, you were wanting to make for Arthur.

Neil: Yes Arthur, and I do appreciate what you’re saying about the thought that we should wait until people are 21 to allow them to make such an important decision in their life, but for so many people when they are 18 when they graduate from high school, the military is their career choice, and they want to make their life and they go into military wanting to serve their country and I personally think that they are responsible to make that decision. If they are responsible enough to make a decision of which college to go to, I’m saying I think they’re also responsible enough to make a decision about whether to drink a beer. I’m not in any way trying to suggest that we should hold off on the military, but I do understand where you’re coming from and why you’re saying that, because it would have to have been hard to be where you’ve been and go through what you’ve gone through.

We were also talking about bipolar disorder . . .

Brian: Right Dr. Johnston, and one of the things that might be helpful for our listening audience, is we understand that it’s “two poles”. One is feelings of mania and then also feelings of depression. Could you help us define what would be some manic types of behaviors that loved ones would be absorbing, possibly this might be the first time, because we know between like it’s like 18 years old maybe up to 25 or 26 they actually begin to find this being manifested. So if someone is out there with some young family members, what would be some behaviors that they might be observing that could be defined as that?

Neil: Sure, and let me throw out that bipolar disorder can occur even as young as childhood, so that’s just the peak time of incidence of bipolar disorder. But mania is defined as someone who is having expansive, or elated mood, or irritable moods. Those are sort of the threshold symptoms that have to be there. And then some of the other symptoms that people will have are increased energy, decreased sleep, feeling grandiose – in that they are very special in some ways – they’re more talkative, their speech is also very pressured, very fast, sometimes they’re sleeping less, their thought processes sometimes don’t make sense, they will jump from idea to idea to idea and no one can follow what they’re talking about. Sometimes also they will have increase in goal-directed activity, such as working harder, doing more activities at home, cleaning the house, etc. Sometimes they can get caught up into risk-taking or dangerous behaviors, such as excess spending, speeding on the highway, things of that nature. All of those things are tied up in a manic episode. And also we talk about hypomania. The difference between mania and hypomania is that mania is much more severe and tends to interfere with every aspect of life in a very severe way, whereas hypomania tends to interfere with functioning, often times more so with family or mildly with jobs where the individual can be irritable because they’re is talking so much or because they are a little bit more boisterous, etc. So those are roughly some of the symptoms and some of the definitions there.

Brian: That’s great. And again even when people start to feeling that depression, they can be having lack of interest in a lot of things that normally meant something for them, we call it “anhedonia” where they’re not really feeling happy about anything, they start feeling a sense of worthlessness or helplessness. If someone is experiencing some of this, then some of these characteristics could possibly, not that it means definitively, but possibly could be issues of a bipolar disorder. I know our time’s getting real short, but what are some medicines that typically could help an individual who is struggling with this?

Neil: We have a whole gamut of medications. The classic ones are Lithium, Depakote, we don’t always start with those anymore, but Lithium really is the gold standard. It probably works the best. It also has a lot of side effects – can cause damage to certain organs, have to monitor blood levels, etc. It’s a little bit harder to work with. Other medicines include Tegritol, a newer one onto the market is Lamisil that’s showing quite a bit of promise, and the Depakote, Lamisil, Tegritol are all anti-convulsive medications. The theory behind those medications are that they may lower the seizure threshold, or the level at which the brain may experience a seizure at deep levels of the brain which might be affecting those states. Another group of drugs are called atypical antipsychotic drugs, such as Seroquel, Geodon, Risperdal, Abilify. This whole group of medications also helps to stabilize moods and if bipolar disorder has gotten bad enough, and occasionally it can where the patient becomes psychotic and beings hearing voices, seeing visions, etc., it controls those symptoms as well. Studies have also shown that using a medicine such as Lamisil or Lithium or Depakote along with one of these atypicals, improves people’s long-term wellness, because they stay well from the illness longer than just the Lamisil, Depakote or Lithium alone.

Jill: Okay, so when people are coming into Breakthrough Addiction Recovery and they may not even have a diagnosis of bipolar and what are some of the things that you see – I’ll just toss this back to you Dr, Johnston – what are some of the substances that they tend to gravitate towards? Alcohol? Prescription drug use? What?

Neil: It depends on the stages of whether they’re manic or depressed. In the manic stages often times some sort of downer – alcohol, benzodiazapines, things of that nature. In the depressed stage sometimes it will be cocaine, or stimulants. Now throughout all of this, we see alcohol being used as some sort of numbing agent no matter which state they’re in. So it can be any one of the drugs at any time, but that often times will be what they’re doing when they’re trying to treat themselves.

Brian: Well Jill, it looks like we are coming to our last break here. And if you are interested in joining us in this discussion and you might have some questions or concerns to express to Dr. Johnston, give us a call here at 770-226-0920. And we will be right back.

Jill: 770-226-0920, that’s the number to call if you’d like to do one last comment about our show today. It’s been pretty lively here at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery Hour. And we were talking about bipolar disorder and some of the problems with addiction.

Brian: That’s right, Jill. And we had wonderful information here from Dr. Johnston about wonderful new medication that we have in to be able to help people who are suffering from the mental illness of bipolar disorder. We know it’s a very destructive and a disease that disrupts lots of lives, and with the medications we also provide other support systems at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery. We provide things like individual therapy, group therapy, and also a very intensive day addiction treatment program that really helps people understand the disease process of alcoholism and also integrating that with the information related to mental illness. We do know that if people are not addressing both of these issues – the alcoholism or drug addiction along with taking the right medications for their mental illness that usually that’s not going to work very well because so many times people are using their drugs or alcohol to self-medicate and to avoid those very, very uncomfortable feelings.

Neil: And Brain, that’s a pattern that a lot of people have that they continue even into addiction treatment. They continue trying to self-medicate and make the decisions for themselves, feel better and stop taking their medicines. Frankly, if you don’t do what your doctor says, don’t work the program, don’t invest yourself, then you’re probably not going to get better. You got to make a person commitment to do what you need to do.

Brian: Absolutely. And that’s the real challenge that we as therapists have, is constantly trying to remind them that when they come in, ‘Oh this medicine is not working,’ or, ‘I feel real miserable,’ and what we need to say is hey listen – you got to give the medicine some time. And we do know that that is the case with these medications don’t just take perfect action immediately. We really have to educate our clients and help them under that the medication is going to work – you have to give it some time, you may have some side effects, that’s what we need to find out.

Jill: And you think about it, they’ve been drinking alcohol for an immediate effect, to help to medicate the mania or something and then you give them a medication and tell them it may not work for 3 or 4 weeks, you’re dealing with someone that’s going to be at a high frustration level for quite some time. And that makes it a challenge for not only the medical personnel dealing with them, but also the clinical, the therapists.

Brian: Yeah, because we try to help them understand it take time.

Jill: And the family.

Brian: Oh absolutely. How many times do we have family members coming and saying how much longer is this going to take to work?

Neil: Not to be flip, but if we had a pill that worked overnight, we’d all be on an island someplace in Fiji, we wouldn’t be here.

Jill: I really do want to encourage family members, if you are noticing these symptoms that Brian and Dr. Johnston are talking about, it is well worth it to get your loved one to investigate and see if there are some underlying mental health issues going on, and it could be in a young person like we were talking about, you know they’re binge drinking, they’re doing at-risk behaviors, they’re doing things that just seem crazy. But there could be an underlying problem. And that brings us to a good subject we could do next week, which is ADD. I think a lot of parents are out there going, ‘Oh yes, oh yes. Let’s talk about ADD. I need to hear more about that.’

What would you say about that? Would you want to do a show like that?

Brian: We definitely could do that. And again, you’re so right about the way that people are looking a their loved ones and trying to figure out what is happening to them and because at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery, we do offer a free consultation. Because I know people are listening today and they’re going, ‘You know, that’s just sounds just like one of my loved ones out there. I don’t know what to do.’ I get this call a lot. ‘What do I do?’

Bring them in, let’s get a chance to do a free consultation. Let’s get them appropriately screened. Let’s find out what’s going on. And then we can help them provide the right types of support, maybe the right kinds of medications to get them back on track and really help them get their lives back. And again, we have some great information at our website at BreakthroughAddictionRecovery.com, and you can reach us at our local office at 770-734-8091.

It looks like we’re coming to the end of our show, Jill.

Jill: We just want to say from the family at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery, happy Easter, have a wonderful time with your loved ones this weekend and enjoy this fantastic weather.

Neil: And this is a family at Breakthrough Recovery. Anything that Jill and I have said to each other today is all in fun. We’re just trying to get people involved, get them to call in and ask questions.

Jill: Well tune in next week. We’ll be back at 3 o’clock next Saturday, we’re probably going to talk a little bit about ADD and whatever else is in the news that might get people to get in on the discussion.

Brian: See you next week, and thanks for listening.

Jill: Yeah, happy Easter!

Brian: And especially as it relates to pain medications. So I hope that those of you who are listening out there will gather around this radio, and if you have some questions or comments or some concerns, give us a call here at 770-226-0920. Or if you’re outside the Atlanta area, you can reach us at 1-888-920-2665. Well, Jill, you know…

Jill: Brian…

Brian: …we’ve been looking at a few things in the newspapers recently have come up with quite a few situations with high schools and even sometimes in the middle schools where we’re dealing with drug issues. And, you know, most of the schools, in fact all of the schools have zero tolerance for drugs. It’s a drug-free zone. And so we know that this topic is going to be very important for the listening parent.

Jill: Yeah, I think, you know, let’s bring that more… we’ll talk about it a little bit more after the first break. I just want parents to start to think about who they can call, or if they wanna listen to it with their teen, this would be a good time to gather around, like you said, and listen. Cause there’s some very interesting things going on out there in terms of pain medication use and adolescence and as it goes into young adulthood. And we’re going to try to bring out, out from the closet if you will, so people can understand that this is going on and how to deal with it. But, um, it is good to see you, Brian. I haven’t seen you in a while.

Brian: It has. It’s great to be back as a team once again.

Jill: I know.

Brian: We’ve had some great holiday shows…

Jill: Right.

Brian: …and it’s been very exciting.

Jill: Hey, listen, last Saturday you and Terry were talking about resolutions. I thought maybe, let’s talk a little bit about, have your resolutions failed in the last four or five days…

Brian: Already? This is just the beginning of the year, Jill. You know, we did talk about at the beginning that approximately only 3 percent of individuals who make new year’s resolutions actually keep them. But, you know, one of the things we understand is if resolutions aren’t written down, they probably aren’t going to be kept.

Jill: Right.

Brian: And we do know that. And we have to kind of make sure that we choose our resolutions carefully. I know sometimes we get the generic thing, I’m going to lose weight, I’m going to take, study harder at school, I’m going to get better grades, or for adults, maybe I’m just gonna eat better, exercise more… lose weight, yes. For our listeners, drink less, or don’t drink at all.

Jill: Well, that’s why I wanted to bring it up. I’ve noticed that a lot of people that do have a problem drinking get caught up in let’s make a resolution. Maybe this is the year I’m going to stop drinking, and yet they don’t realize the amount that they’re drinking daily can put them at risk if they try to just go cold turkey after January first. I’m sure that those who are daily drinkers, I’m not going to have that bottle and a half of wine every night, and I’m going to start January first, and then probably by today, January, what are we, fifth?

Brian: Fifth.

Jill: …they’ve already experienced withdrawal symptoms, or they’ve gone back to drinking.

Brian: Right.

Jill: And that is when you realize, that there’s probably a problem with the dependency on alcohol, like we’ve discussed in the past.

Brian: Because they are probably at that point going through that withdrawal we know that if they are already experiencing tolerance when they’re drinking more and more, and enjoying it less and less.

Jill: But you know there probably are people who have put down the alcohol and are white knuckling it. You know, it doesn’t have to be that way though. There is help out there…

Brian: They don’t need to suffer. I think that’s really a good point you’re bringing up, Jill. Of course the medications, you help our clients to get on, especially like the naltrexone, some of this new FDA-approved medication that help individuals to decrease the desire and the craving to drink…

Jill: Right.

Brian: And at the same time, on my side of the house, the clinical, they can really learn some really great skills to be able to help them manage and change that lifestyle a little bit.

Jill: And you know historically in what we do in addiction, we find that we don’t really get a lot of calls the first week of the year, where people think, oh, people are going to start calling right after the new year. Actually, we get calls after the resolutions fail

Brian: Well, but it makes sense, doesn’t it?

Jill: …and usually its five to ten days, and then the phone starts to ring, and they say, I tried to stop taking the meds, I tried to stop drinking, you know, or doing something associated with a dependency, and they found out they didn’t have the ability. And that is why, during this radio program, if you want to find out more information, about how to get a free consultation, and come in and really talk about how to put down in writing and put down on your calendar how you are going to work through this dependency.

Brian: I’m glad you kind of did a segueway… let me give them maybe just four, sometimes when you give them twelve or ten, it’s hard to remember. Well, let me give four very concrete ways that people can really work on some goals and make it effective. The first one I said of course is select them carefully, but also write them down. That’s two. Write them down. And tied to that is, when you write them down, be realistic. I love what you just said at the beginning, I’m going to just stop drinking. Well, maybe that’s not realistic. Maybe I need to cut back. Maybe I need to taper off. If they are able to. And in some way, because we understand there are people who use alcohol and do it responsibly. There are others who addiction it, and they’re getting in difficulty, and then there’s the area of dependence where they just can’t quit even if they wanted to.

Jill: Right. And that is definitely the person that can benefit greatly from the programs we have at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery.

Brian: Exactly.

Jill: We have a website. If you’re listening, you wanna go to the website, www.breakthroughaddictionrecovery.com. We addressed just about every substance out there, and how to look at coming out of a dependency or addiction of that substance. This is crucial. You need information and you need help to stop using those substances. And, I mean, once you fail at your resolution, maybe that will, you’ll wake up and say, or a loved one will wake up and say, I need some help, where can I go? Well, we are there. We offer all of that.

Brian: I’m glad you said that too. And we are available not only for the consultation, and then also to really provide addiction treatment options. It’s not always just one way. There…

Jill: Exactly.

Brian: We really try to customize that. And you know also as our listening audience is tuning in today, although our program doesn’t necessarily treat adolescents, we treat adults, but we also know, don’t we, Jill, that, you know, sixteen, seventeen, fifteen year olds, as long as they continue to use, by the time they are nineteen, twenty, twenty-one, they’re really at that point where they’re probably really struggling with either a strong addiction where they are abusing it or actually becoming dependent on it.

Jill: That’s right. And parents, listen, I want you to turn up the radio, get your teenager, talk to your teenager about what we’re going to be discussing today. This is very, very important. Things that you may not even believe are going on in terms of pain medications in high schools, alcohol, marijuana, things like that. You can call us and join in on this discussion, ask questions, tell us we’re crazy, whatever you want to do, you can call 770-226-0920. If you are outside the listening area, or say, your husband is outside the listening area and you want them to tune in also, they can tune in by going online to www.920wgka.com, 920wgka.com, hit listen now, and they can call from the outside area, 1-888-920-2665. I know I’ve given you a lot of info, but we’ll keep giving you that phone number throughout this show so you can join in on this conversation, crucial conversation.

Brian: Jill, I’d like to just give our listening audience a really interesting statistic here. We’re talking about, how do I prevent my child, are they all destined to use drugs or alcohol. Here’s an interesting statistic I just read recently in a brochure: a child who gets through age twenty-one without using illegal drugs, smoking, or abusing alcohol is virtually certain never to do so. So you can almost look at this program as kind of a harm-reduction program.

Jill: Oh, that’s a good way to put it.

Brian: The more the listening audience has information about how to avoid or to address or to be able to confront situations that seem to become problematic, they can the sooner they do it, the less chance that their loved one, that adolescent, or that child, will actually become dependent upon drugs or alcohol.

Jill: So think about this: we are Breakthrough Addiction Recovery. We have free consultations for those of you who want to strengthen your new year’s resolutions to stop using or abusing alcohol or any other type of drugs, and we’ll bring up the number and we’ll bring up the website throughout this program. But when we come back from this break, we’re going to start talking a little bit about a news article that was in the AJC right before Christmas. I wanted to bring it up then, but I just decided, let’s do a whole show around that. So when we get back, Brian, let’s start talking about the adolescence and pain medication use.

Brian: Give us a call, 770-226-0920. We’ll be right back.

<commercial break>

Jill: Yeah, welcome back to Breakthrough Addiction Recovery. We’re going to talk about teens and pain medication addiction and dependency. Last month there was an article in the AJC, and I brought this up in conversation in the last few weeks. A lot of people saw this article about a young woman who was a student at a metro area high school who was actually caught giving a fellow student a hydrocodone and another medication. She was caught doing this on the cameras that are in the hallway, and when they talked to her about it, they decided they were going to bring charges and make it pretty much the zero tolerance you brought up at the beginning of the hour, Brian…

Brian: Right, Jill…

Jill: with the drug zero tolerance, and they also decided, I think, to make it into a felony cause they said she was attempting to sell the medication to a fellow student. Well, as it all comes down, she actually, you know, came clean and said, yes, I was giving this to a student who was in need, in pain, but I bring this up on the air today not to vilify this student, or the student that was in need, but just bring this to the forefront. Parents, if you are listening, I really want you to think about what’s going on in the high schools in terms of pain medication addiction. This young lady was in a passing conversation with another student, and she mentioned her mother was taking hydrocodone, which is what the other student said she was using for her pain, which was not specified what kind of pain it was. The student turned and said, can you get one of your mother’s hydrocodones and bring it to me. And the girl refused, which, you know, most upper-level kids that have a head on their shoulders would say, no way, I’m not going to get my mom’s med for you. And she said, however, I think a few days later, the student called her in the morning, told her she was in pain, she was sick, and, you know, begged her, called her a few times, and then finally the girl relented, went up, took one of her mother’s hydrocodones, also took one of her mother’s fenergans, which, if you don’t know what that is, that is a medicine for nausea, put it in a baggie, dropped it in the girl’s purse during the change of classes. It was caught on tape, and thus the battle begins. Now this was a, you know, people read that and say, oh, wow, I can’t believe she would do that. But what we need to bring up today is the fact this is going on a lot more than what this article is telling us.

Brian: Right, this is just the tip of the iceberg…

Jill: Tip of the iceberg…

Brian: …and all of the schools around. That’s true.

Jill: And, you know, I started thinking about this and I’m like, one of the things that was the red flag in the story is the fact that the girl was in pain, now probably not specifying that this pain is probably related to her not getting the drug, which made her go into withdrawals from opiate, which we’ve highlighted on this show many times. As the girl is going into withdrawal one of the earmark symptoms is to have severe nausea, flu-like symptoms. So her friend who took the, her mom’s hydrocodone, grabbed a fenergan. So that tells me right there that the girl knew she was grabbing something to help get her friend out of withdrawal. You know, she didn’t just grab a hydrocodone, she grabbed a hydrocodone and a fenergan for the nausea. So that tells me there was a lot more than meets the eye in terms of what the understanding was between these students. I believe that maybe this girl did get caught up in I can keep this girl as my friend if I help her out. Or I don’t want to say no because of maybe peer pressures or things like that. I don’t know, Brian, did that kind of strike you that way in that story?

Brian: I think that is true, because remember, in adolescence especially there is a great need for acceptance, and to be part of the group, and that peer pressure is very strong. And given the benefit of the doubt, maybe indeed she thought that she was helping.

Jill: Yeah, and that was her thing she said in the story, I was helping out a friend…

Brian: …I was helping out a friend, but you know there’s one way to help out in a positive way and then there’s another way in which… again, the thinking process, and I think also the article said this, you know, judgment, poor judgment…

Jill: Poor judgment, yeah, and she has a great track record. She had never been in trouble before, and I believe that yes, dropping the higher charges, the more stiffer charges for just, you know, misdemeanor was a good way to go, but I do believe I wish this story would have highlighted more what the problem is in the high schools…

Brian: But, you know, it also goes to show, the article talked about needing more drug education and so forth, and I think what we have to be aware is that many times people don’t listen or hear it until there’s a real need…

Jill: Yes. Exactly.

Brian: …and that can be for adults as well as adolescents. We pick up and we listen to what we want to hear. And so this situation may have had a lot of times where they understood, maybe they had a lot of education about it, but it just went in one ear and out the other, until it really hit home and hey, this gets me really in trouble when I don’t pay attention to the information I have already related to drugs.

Jill: As I read this story I started to do a bit more research on addiction of pain medications, and one of the highest percentage reasons, when asked about why kids were using pain medication, the number one answer was, it’s easy to get from parents’ medicine cabinets. Now parents, if you’re listening, and you know in your medicine cabinet you have 84 vicodin sitting there in your medicine cabinet, because you only used six of them after you got your sprained ankle playing football on the weekend, and you left them in your medicine cabinet, do you know how easy they are to get? And how, what Brian just said, peer pressure, I mean, in passing this child could say to a peer, yeah, my mom, you know, we have vicodin in our medicine cabinet, and the kid by pressure might feel like if they got that vicodin out of the medicine cabinet, gave it to their classmates they’d be cool.

Brian: Mmm hmm.

Jill: Or they’d be accepted. So, I mean, that’s another thing to really think about when you leave these types of medications…

Brian: And I’m so glad you’re saying that too, Jill, because we always think in terms of protecting, you know, we have child-proof lids, right, on so many things…

Jill: …that doesn’t work for fifteen year olds…

Brian: That’s exactly what I was going to say…exactly. We think in terms of three to five year olds… I mean, we’re looking at situations here… so, although that cap is obviously able to be opened by older teens, the idea is that we still need to be protective of the medications we know that can become dangerous toward others. So, as we take a look at what we need to do as protective, sometimes that means locking it up in such a way we have control over that medication.

Jill: Right. And I think let’s bring that up often during the show, in case people are tuning in late. And you can call and join us in this conversation, 770-226-0920. And right now I’m going to bring up to the mike a very special person to me. This is actually my niece. Her name is Jensen Earl, and she is 16 years old. When I started reading about this issue, I said, you know what, I’m going to ask someone who is actually in the high school. You know what, Brian, you might know this about me, but I was a high-school teacher at one time, so I was in the know, but that was ten years ago, so…

Brian: And times have changed.

Jill: I know, times have changed. So I decided, you know what, I’m going to ask someone that’s right in the middle of it, in the high schools, and Jensen agreed to come on the air with us today. And she said, well, what I am going to say? And I said, don’t worry, I’m going to ask you the questions and you’re just going to talk to us about what’s going on in the high school… Jensen Earl.

Brian: Well, welcome to the show, Jensen.

Jensen: Thank you.

Jill: She goes to a metro area high school, and she’s really cool, everybody, so… anyways, Jensen, thanks so much You know, when we talked about this I was so surprised that you said it was a common occurrence in your high school for people to be using pain medication. How did you become aware of this, that it was going on?

Jensen: A situation that happened to me was, I was standing at my locker with some of my friends, and these guys came up asked if we wanted some stuff, and we said no…

Jill: Stuff, huh?

Jensen: And they pulled out a pen, which is the most common way to pass the drugs around, which is normally oxycontin, things like that. And they crushed up the pills, and take out the ink inside of the pen and put the pills inside.

Jill: Ok, so they’re not giving you full, it’s not a full pill…

Jensen: Right…

Jill: …it’s crushed up. And then they just take the guts out of the pen…

Jensen: Mmm hmm.

Jill: Oh, wow. So, I mean, how are they using this then?

Brian: A lot of times they’ll snort it or they’ll put it in their drinks at school and drink the sodas throughout the day.

Jill: Wow. So they’re actually taking it while they’re at school

Jensen: Right.

Jill: And have you witnessed anyone using drugs like this at school?

Jensen: Oh, yeah. In the bathrooms at my high school, there’s girls drinking water out of the sink and putting the pills in and things like that, yeah…

Jill: Oh, wow. Have you ever heard any bad effects from the drugs or anything like that?

Jensen: I’ve walked in the bathroom before and seen girls passed out, or something like that, after using oxycontin and stuff like that.

Jill: Wow, so oxycontin is kinda the drug du jour?

Jensen: Yeah.

Jill: ..in the high school. It just, Brian, this is just, you know, that’s amazing me right there…

Brian: Yeah.

Jill: is that oxycontin, which we know as one of the most potent…

Brian: Addictive…

Jill: …and addictive drugs is being passed around the high schools, and these are for 15 and 16 year old brains that really, you talk about the developing brain being at risk…

Brian: Absolutely. And especially at that age when we know they’re both the thought processes and emotional processes is really at risk.

Jill: Jensen, you know, I was going to ask you, why do you think they’re using at school? I mean, this is kind of an interesting effect, that they’re using right there in the bathroom where people can see.

Jensen: The only thing that I can really think of is that their peers are at school, and its more of a status type of thing, um, popularity and stuff like that, cause they know it’s a way to make friends.

Jill: Ok. And so you think one way to make fast friends in a high school is to tell people you can get oxycontins…

Jensen: Yeah.Right.

Jill: Wow. You know, to me that’s really kind of scary, that it’s oxycontin, like I just said. But let me ask you something, don’t you guys get that classes, and as a high-school teacher back in the day I know that we did a lot of drug awareness, because just say no and all of those things, but, you know, I saw that glazed look in their eyes when we would talk about drugs, but to me are they giving you any type of more information about pain medications or anything?

Jensen: Um, they make you go through a drug awareness program, but they mostly just talk about alcohol and marijuana and things like that, they never talk about pain killers or…

Jill: …the more obvious stuff…

Jensen: Right.

Jill: And so oxycontin, hydrocodone, lortabs, they really don’t talk about the addictive qualities or how dangerous that is?

Jensen: No.

Jill: Yeah. Well, you know what’s interesting is, you know, having an addictive quality like they do, you use those over and over, it does not take long before you will be dependent, tissue dependent, and then start to experience withdrawal symptoms if you stop cold turkey. And that means that if you’re seeing your loved one or your adolescent having the flu four to six times a year, that’s not normal. Now the flu may be if you get it once a year, that can happen. But if your teen is saying, I’m throwing up, I’ve got the flu, I’m sweating, everything else, that doesn’t happen four to five times a year. It’s not possible. So, flu-like symptoms, which are the hallmark of opiate withdrawal are something very important to look at. And Brian, I guess when we come back from this break, you’re going to talk a little bit more about what parents should be looking for, is that right?

Brian: Yes, especially at some of the changes that they can be observing, especially if they see some radical behavioral changes that could be something indicative that something’s going on, maybe they’re doing drugs or alcohol.

Jill: Jensen, you’re so cool, I’m so glad, not just because you’re my niece, but you really helped us out, I hope that people are listening and they can really relate to what you’re saying. Hey teens out there, talk to your parents, tell them what’s going on. Call us, 770-226-0920. We’ll be right back.

<commercial break>

Brian: Welcome back from the break to Addiction Recovery hour, My name is Brian Fujii, and I have Jill Mattingly as my cohost. And today we’re talking on the topic of adolescence and drug addiction. And Jill, we’ve got a call from Lee in Midtown. Welcome, Lee, how are you today?

Jill: Welcome, Lee.

Lee: I’m excellent.

Brian: Great. What’s your comment today?

Lee: Well, I’m thinking about high school today 18 years in recovery.

Brian: Wonderful.

Lee: When I was in high school the level of drug usage was like marijuana and beer.

Jill: Oh gosh. You’re my age.

Lee: And today we’re talking oxycontin, opiates, I mean…

Jill: Yeah, it’s changed.

Lee: There’s not a gateway drug anymore, they’re just going straight to, you know, heroin…

Brian: The hard stuff.

Jill: And you bring up a great point, Lee, because what we are seeing now is who I treat medically at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery and people in their 20s are shooting heroin because they started with oxycontin at 16 and 17. And you’re right, when we were, you know, many years ago when we were in high school, pot was, you know, oh my gosh, don’t start pot and now, you know, they are cutting to the chase, and going straight for it.

Lee: Where are teenagers getting these drugs? Are they most of their supply, like, their parents’ drug, bathroom?

Jill: Exactly.

Brian: And you can buy it on the street.

Jill: Yeah.

Brian: Really can.

Jill: Really.

Brian: And until these people have their own dealers out there, Lee, and its just amazing the connectivity that individuals have even at that young age.

Jill: Plus, internet. Internet’s easy, but a lot of people that age and high school is you get it from your friends, and your friends get it from their friends, or you know, we were talking earlier, and I’ve had hydrocodone in my medicine cabinet before for after I had knee surgery, and I didn’t even think about, you know, that I had half a bottle there, and what if I had had someone, a guest in my house, that was using my restroom.. it’s wide open, it’s right there for them to take. So…

Lee: The other ironic thing about like, doctors, and not all doctors and pharmacies is that you can walk in and get, you know, 50 Percocets or oxycontin in a heartbeat and nobody thinks about it.

Jill: Yeah, exactly. It’s such…

Lee: …Three refills.

Jill: Well, Lee, thanks a lot. You’ve brought up a great point because that’s really what is going on

Lee: It has to start somewhere further up.

Jill: Congratulations on your recovery, too.

Lee: Thank you.

Jill: Eighteen years.

Lee: Take care.

Brian: Thanks for your call.

Jill: Hey, and it looks like we have another call. This is Pam, oh, it’s Pam in Acworth. Hey, Pam. How are you?

Brian: Welcome, Pam, to the Breakthrough Addiction Recovery hour.

Pam: Hi.

Jill: And Pam, I’m going to go ahead and tell our listening audience, you and I had had a discussion a few weeks ago about this very issue, and I had asked Pam to call in, and kinda talk a little bit about what she is experiencing in her own family, knowing that we were going to discuss this. You know, Pam, I know that your son I struggling with opiate addiction, and that the most, this is very heartwrenching for you, and I really do believe the parents that are listening out there by hearing a couple of the things that you can highlight for them is going to be very beneficial. Thank you so much for calling.

Pam: Oh, you’re welcome.

Jill: So your son, when did he start to have a problem with substance addiction?

Pam: Um, it started at 16, in high school. And we knew there was some pot involved and some other things and then as we were, of course, asking around what the other friends there was a group, and other parents didn’t think it wasn’t anything they wouldn’t grow out of. But the pattern changed shortly after that, and he wouldn’t come home for three or four days at a time…

Jill: As a teenager?

Pam: As a teenager.

Jill: Wow. Ok.

Pam: At 16 and 17.And there has to be something other than just pot at this point. And we never could find out exactly what it was they were doing. We tried to get help from other parents to professional help. And when we got him professional help, the counselor all he could do is one visit, and all he is doing is pot, and we can’t treat pot. It’s not an addiction.

Brian: Well, you know, it’s really interesting you say that, Pam, but, it’s, I think, a lot of times people think its not really an addictive substance, and yet we know that the substance today, which pot back in the 60s, the intensity and purity of pot today is about 25 times more potent than what you were getting in the 60s, that’s what the most recent things have shown.

Jill: Wow.

Brian: And a lot of people say, you don’t even go through withdrawal. Well, the major reason you don’t see withdrawal immediately is because pot stays in the body for between 30 days or a little bit longer. And as result, it’s only until such time that the body begins to leach out that THC that you actually begin experiencing some withdrawal.

Jill: And it’s interesting that they didn’t say that it was a problem, that they really couldn’t do anything for pot, but you believe there was something else involved.

Pam: Oh yes.

Brian: Oh yeah.

Pam: His personality, the change that I seen in him,

Brian: Yes. And did you find kind of an increased lethargy, we call pot the dream killer, because it really does cause people to just get to the point where they could care less about anything. Their drive just diminishes.

Pam: Right. He was very, always cared about how he looked, how he dressed…

Jill: …and that all changed.

Brian: That all changed.

Pam: Yes. To the day.

Brian: Pam, let me ask you a question, we’re getting close to our break, at this point. Can you hang on the line and just be with us, because we sure want to continue this discussion, but we’re at the break right now. We’d love for you to hang on the line and we’ll be right back. Can you do that with us?

Pam: I will.

Jill: Thank you, Pam.

Brian: That’s great. Alright, we’ll be right back. Give us a call at 770-226-0920. Or outside the Atlanta area, 1-888-920-2665. We’ll be right back.

<commercial break>

Jill: Hey, welcome back. We’re the Breakthrough Addiction Recovery hour. My name is Jill Mattingly, my cohost, Brian Fujii. And we’re talking about adolescence and pain medication us and addiction and dependency. Um, I have on the line right now a friend of mine, her name is Pam. And she is willing to discuss a little bit about her struggle that she’s having with her son who is struggling with a dependency to opiates. And Pam, you talked a little bit about his… hey, Pam, are you there?

Pam: Yes, I am.

Jill: Ok, just making sure I’m not talking into space. Anyways, you talk a little about his teenage years, he had problems, something obviously was going on, you couldn’t find the help. You had said something that struck me about him, or you being told, well, it’s just a phase, he’s going to grow out of this. And that is the scariest thing I think you can believe when you’re a parent. Because what if, he’s forming a dependency. You don’t grow out of a dependency; it worsens. Is that correct?

Pam: That is correct. It is proof as of today, as a 24 year old, young adult. And at the 16, 17 age, we were being told by other parents, um, even professional help that we would seek, what little bit we could find, that calm down, it’s just a phase he’s going through, he’ll grow out of it. And after a while I was told so much I’d think, well maybe it’s me, maybe I’m overreacting. I wasn’t, cause I knew in my heart that I wasn’t right. And if we didn’t try, whatever we could, if we couldn’t get the professional help, you know, or other parents look at this, they’re all hanging out together, there’s just not one doing it. We had, we actually used a little bit of the law of the land to help us, thinking that that would help. We were struggling parents of, this is our son, and we wanted to help him…

Jill: Right.

Pam: …and we told him when he took the car, and he took it again, he could go out, but if he come up missing for days again, I couldn’t go through those sleepless nights and pacing the floor… we’d report the car as stolen. We did. He did it and we reported it. They picked him up. He spent, we left him in there for a few days, four days, and it was very hard not to, as a parent, answer that call.

Jill: Right, I can imagine.

Brian: And you set some good limits. And you know that’s probably one of the best things you could have done, as hard, as difficult as it is as a parent to do, it is something that they need to understand the negative consequences of that behavior. Just briefly, you know you said they saw it as a phase, and that’s where we’re different at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery, Pam, because we don’t see it just as a phase. We see it actually as a brain disease. Something went on as your son kept on taking those opiates. His brain literally got rewired. It changed. And that’s the reason why he couldn’t stop.

Pam: Right.

Jill: When did it become evident that he had a true dependency on opiates?

Pam: I would suggest, say, probably in the last three years we really noticed…

Jill: He’s 24 now?

Pam: Yes.

Jill: Ok.

Pam: About 21 we still knew there was something going on, he did, he does currently live in another state, and when we would see him, it was very obvious he was on something.

Jill: Mmm hmm.

Pam: The pupils were very small, he just relaxed and didn’t care about how he dresses, and currently, recently seeing him this fall, we were there, and he would be talking to you, standing talking to you, and he talks a lot when he’s on whatever, cause he was very comfortable, and he was talking and he was going to sleep as he talked to you.

Jill: Wow. And…

Pam: And… go ahead…

Jill: And have you noticed that he is trying to talk about this addiction, or have you confronted him with this information that you have?

Pam: I haven’t confronted him. He did call me in November… it was a few days… November 2nd. He apparently had taken something. Well, he told me he smoked some bad pot…

Jill: Mmm hmm.

Pam: He was taken to the emergency room. It was considered an OD, him and another friend of his.

Jill: Wow.

Pam: And he was actually in ICU. I didn’t know for three days until he was out, and he called and told me he had smoked some bad pot.

Jill: And that’s probably not what it was, you realize that…

Brian: Right, exactly. I mean…

Pam: No.

Jill: Have you seen him recently, and has he discussed this with you?

Pam: I did see him over the holidays, but he wouldn’t discuss what had happened in November. But I did find out from his fiancée that it was, apparently they had went out of the state where he’s currently living and they bought some Lortab…

Jill: I see.

Brian: Mmm hmm. That makes more sense. Well again, this is where an individual is really in denial about what he’s trying to deal with right here. You know, we hear all these excuses all the time, but they’re not willing to own up. That’s part of the disease. They do not want to be able to own up to what is really going on with them. And I think you can have as much excuses, but until they begin to understand the strong, negative consequences, it’s very difficult. Has he experienced any job problems, additional, additional legal problems, anything that could really motivate him, to be brought to his attention, to maybe seek some help or at least talk to someone about this?

Pam: He has lost some good jobs.

Jill: Wow.

Brian: Mmm hmm. But the consequences haven’t been hard enough, I guess…

Pam: No. I have looked back at the pattern since he has lived out of state, and it’s been a continuous something and he always blames someone else, never him.

Brian: Well, Pam, we really appreciate your call today. And I just know there’s a lot of parents out there listening to what you have to say, and their hearts are broken just like yours, but don’t give up hope. Continue to talk with him, and we’re here. And if some way he might be willing to just talk with us for a few minutes, maybe we might be able to talk some sense into him. Really appreciate your call today. And listening audience, I hope you hear the heartbreak, and if there’s something going on there, out there with you, feel free to take a look at our website, www.breakthroughaddictionrecovery.com. Well, we’re coming up to our break again.

Jill: Pam, thank you. We’ll be back

Brian: We’re coming up to our break. Give us a call, 770-226-0920, or 1-888-920-2665. We’ll be right back after the break.

<commercial break>

Jill: Hey, welcome back. We’ve been talking about adolescence and pain medication addiction and dependency. What a powerful message it is when you hear that this is going on so much more than you ever thought in the lives of the adolescents that you know. I really do want to thank my dear niece Jensen for joining us today as being the voice of the 16 year old and the high school student. And I think, Brian, the most important thing to take out of this is, parents, and grandparents, grandparents tend to have a lot more pain medication on hand. Cause you know what, when we get up there, we get the aches and pains a little bit more, have viable reasons to have hydrocodone or lortab on hand…

Brian: That’s right.

Jill: You know, I want the parents and grandparents to listen: go up to your medicine cabinet, take those medications, and put them in a safe, secure place. We’re not saying your child, or your adolescent, or your young adult is going to be taking those from your medicine cabinet, but there are people that come to your house that may be invited…

Brian: That’s correct…

Jill: …that may have a problem that you don’t know about. They go into your medicine cabinet and they are purposefully looking for a couple lortab here or there.

Brian: Well said. That’s exactly correct. And we don’t have a lot of control over that. But we can certainly make sure they control the access…

Jill: Exactly.

Brian: …controlling the access.

Jill: Safe and secure, keeping those things in a place where a person that is not yourself or another responsible adult can get to them.

Brian: You know, before we, I know we only have about 30 seconds, let me just give three ideas that teens can do to maybe help themselves feel good.

Jill: Ok.

Brian: First of all, let go of that past. If you had a problem, let it go. Let go of that old past. Don’t live in disappointment. Secondly, let go of unrealistic expectations. I think so many times, maybe friends or family put too many high, unrealistic expectations. And then, also, exercise, and if you got a problem, talk to that school counselor. These will help.

Jill: Right. Listen, you can go to breakthroughaddictionrecovery.com and get a lot more information, and we’ll link you up to even more information. We appreciate you joining us today. We’re going to keep going next week.

January 12, 2008

Welcome to the Breakthrough Addiction recovery hour. During this hour we will be discussing topics on addiction as it relates to alcoholism and other drugs. Our phone lines are now open, so call us at 770-226-0920 with your questions and comments.

Brian: Welcome to the Breakthrough Addiction recovery hour. My name is Brian Fujii, and, our colleague here is Gail Mattingly, and we are going to be talking today, a little bit of a continuation on our…

Jill: Did you just forget my name, Brian? (laughs)

Brian: No.

Jill: It looks like you just forgot my name. Well, I’ll wear a nametag.

Brian: Jill Mattingly.

Jill: Ok, thank you, thank you.

Brian: We’re going to be continuing our discussion on the topic of opiates, and especially as it related to adolescents. And then we’re going to be looking at how we can deal with addictions and opiates and how we might be able to truly get through some problems about maybe even outpatient detoxing and hopefully be able to help people letting people know there are some ways that people can overcome the addiction to opiates.

Jill: Yes.

Brian: So what did we talk about last week? We had some situations with an adolescent who was stealing stuff out of their mom’s cabinet.

Jill: Yeah, there was a story in the AJC back in Dec. and I brought that in and I was kinda thinking about it for almost 2 to 3 weeks and thinking I really need to address this, because at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery we see the fallout from a person that has started abusing opiates such as pain meds in high school, you know, or college—adolescence. So I decided to bring that story in and we started talking about it and I actually brought my niece in last week You were here. And she did a great job.

Brian: She did a fantastic job.

Jill: But she actually opened my eyes quite a bit to what was going on in the high school and how easy it is for you to find oxycontins, hydrocodones, vicodins, xanax, those types of things. While you’re standing at your locker someone might offer something to you. And we also brought up the fact that if you’re a high-school student and you have a parent or grandparent that you know has a huge big gigantic bottle of 120 of these pills in your medicine cabinet at home, what a great way to make friends, to say, hey man, I can get some of those for you and bring them to school.

Brian: Exactly. And you know, that’s where we were talking about last week is, it’s so easy to for some of these young people, even down in probably the middle school, not only just the high school, but how people are approaching them. I was very amazed, uh, when you know your niece was saying, hey, they approached me at my locker.

Jill: Yeah. Mmm hmm.

Brian: And we’re sitting there, my goodness, using a pen as a way to pass off that drug.

Jill: Right. Yeah, they clear out the inside of an ink pen and crush up oxycontin, put the oxycontin in there. They actually snort it while they’re at school. Ah, my niece was saying, you know, she’s seen girls leaning over the sinks in the bathroom taking a pill, you know, even found one of her classmates passed out in the bathroom, which was probably not necessarily an overdose, but too much oxycontin can make you very sleepy and depress your respiration to where you don’t feel like you can get up off the floor. So obviously this is a very big problem. We talked about this last week, we started to look at the fact that maybe parents need to take a look at what’s going on in their own home. Now, it doesn’t mean it’s just teenagers. Not at all. And what we’re finding out is that, uh, most people, they go to the doctor, they’ve pulled a muscle, you know, maybe they’re cleaning out the garage, pulled a muscle and…

Brian: Right.

Jill: The doctor…

Brian: Weekend warriors…

Jill: Right. The doctor, the doctor offers them, lemme give you a 90 Lortab to help you thru that, and just take this many and taper off them over the next couple day. Take a long hot bath and get massage and things like that. And you go home and you take one, and you realize it makes you a little nauseous. So it doesn’t really help; you just decide I’m gonna take naproxen instead. But, um, you leave that bottle in your medicine cabinet, and you know, maybe you have a dinner party where there’s 8 to 10 couples there at your house, and it’d be interesting to know if someone was looking in your medicine cabinet when they were in your bathroom.

Brian: Indeed… not just your family but your guests…

Jill: That’s right. And you know what’s interesting is that a lot of our clients have told me that one of the ways that they got their Lortabs and hydrocodones and oxycontins is they’d have a friend that would say, yeah, my girlfriend just had surgery and they would say, hey, I’ll come over and watch the game with you, and you know, they go to the bathroom and they raid the girlfriend’s oxycontins or lortabs in their bathroom. I mean they’re always looking for someone… or grandparents, that’s a very, very commonplace… you know older people have a lot of aches and pains and doctors don’t have a problem giving oxycontins, Lortabs, hydrocodones to older people if they’re complaining of severe arthritic pains. So that is something that sends a red flag up for a lot of people who are addicted to these. Who can I go to their house and without them knowing, just take maybe a handful, you know.

Brian: Well, you know, especially you mentioned that Jill and that is so many times, one of the things we do forget maybe there are a lot of people out there trying to sell their homes, for example.

Jill: Mmm hmm.

Brian: And you know it really behooves those individuals to put those medications up in a very safe place because who knows based upon what you were saying they could be going through someone’s medicine cabinet as they’re trying to figure out whether they like this bathroom or not…

Jill: You know what, I need to use the bathroom.

Brian: That’s right, that’s right.

Jill: They probably… That’s a great place to go and try to figure out you know if you can get a few more oxycontin, lortabs in a person’s home. A lot of times you know a real estate agent will ask you to lock those types of things up, but what we want to do today, as in the start of this show, as a recap of last week’s show everyone out there within this listening range if you have a opiate medication, pain medication in your bathroom, you know in a place where it’s obvious you are keeping your medicines and things like that.

Brian: And has easy access.

Jill: And easy access.

Brian: Mmm hmm.

Jill: It is a very good idea to take up those medications… you can leave the Tylenol and the Advil and things like that in the medicine cabinet, but take the medications, take the xanaxs, the klonopins, the even some muscle relaxers people look for.

Brian: Right.

Jill: And all of your pain medications and put them in a separate, locked area, especially if you have teenagers. Now we’re not saying your teenagers are taking your oxycontin, no, not at all, but don’t teenagers have friends over quite a bit, and it takes one comment at school for your teenager to say, hey, my mom takes that, just like that article we looked at to have the other kids say, ah, yeah, you know, let’s go do homework at your house, you know, that kind of thing. So never know, so hopefully this will changes people’s habits, you know, of keeping medications in their bathrooms and things like that. And then we’ve done our job, if people go home and change that, Brian.

Brian: That’s right. That’s exactly correct. You know as we take a look at these situations…I know you say something very interesting on the TV show…

Jill: Oh yeah.

Brian: It was interesting about how this mother ended up selling her son’s car because she found some alcohol in it.

Jill: You know this is a parent who is really on top of it. She is saying, ok, I know what it is like to be a teenager and I know what my son is going to be offered and I know what we may do to get friends and keep So this kid it looks like got a car and she soon found some alcohol under the front seat and she put an ad in the paper to sell this car. But the best part of it, and the reason she was on Good Morning America is the ad and the way it reads. I’m going to read it over the air right now: This is an ad in the for sale section, and it says, Olds 1999 Intrigue, totally uncool parent who obviously don’t love teenage son, selling his car. Only driven for 3 weeks before snoopy mom who needs to get a life found booze under the front seat. $3,700 offer or best offer. Call the meanest mom on the planet and then gives her number. (laughs)

Brian: (laughs) That’s fantastic. They probably got $307 for the car.

Jill: I know…

Brian: Listen, if this particular topic is touching a nerve and really something that you’ve been thinking about and you have maybe teenagers or maybe young adults in your home and this is troubling you, give us a call here at 770-226-0920, and if you’re outside the Atlanta area, 1-888-920-2665. You know, as we continue we know many times this is not just for children. Obviously we’re seeing a tremendous epidemic of the use of pain medications as ways that people use to get high.

Jill: It’s huge.

Brian: Both those that are legally prescribed medication as well as the ones that are being obtained through illegal means. And so as you take a look at we look at some of these issues maybe it’s a little more technical, but sometimes parents when you’re out there you see some strange things going on with your child or perhaps even with one of your loved ones, you might wanna take a look and say maybe something’s going on. You know, uh, if you’ve see a person this could actually be going through withdrawal, couldn’t it? For example, if they’re having flu-like symptoms, all the time, and like you said last week, you shouldn’t be having the flu once every two weeks. (laughs)

Jill: Yes. Yeah, you should not have the flu more than one time a year.

Brian: That’s right. So just some things, to be observant, to look for, or maybe if you’re seeing watery eyes or runny noses, or constant yawning or sweating, things like that, that may be coming about because perhaps you might wanna be asking some questions…

Jill: Right.

Brian: …about what’s going on.

Jill: So let’s talk a little more about the withdrawal symptoms. I think that’s really good for someone to understand, what a withdrawal really is.

Brian: Mmm hmm.

Jill: Because if you don’t know, you really do think someone’s just got the flu.

Brian: Just being sick.

Jill: Let’s, when we come back from this break, let’s talk a little bit more about this… 770-226-0920. Stay with us, we’ll be right back.

<commercial break>

Jill: Hey, welcome back to breakthrough addiction recovery hour. My name is Jill Mattingly.

Brian: and I’m Brian Fagee.

Jill: Yes, he is. And we are talking about pain medications, and especially addiction and dependency to pain medications such as opiates. And we really have a lot to talk about and helping the general public how to spot what’s going on that might even be happening in your household where someone is using pain medication not just using it, I want to clarify that, but abusing it to the point of being dependent on it. And one of the things I noticed in my research was we talked about this before was the sale of narcotics, of drugs for pain, such as opiates, has just skyrocketed…

Brian: Yes.

Jill: …in the past ten years. And a lot of that has to do with our aging population, has to do with, you know, the philosophy of pain, taking care of pain, and doctors, you know, are encouraged to keep people out of pain, so much more liberal riding practices are out there with many doctors. But I actually spoke to a pharmacist that I use and we started discussing this and he’s like, oh, Jill, you just don’t understand, I actually have friends that have these small pharmacies and if it wasn’t for the sale of oxy, not oxycontin, but hydrocodone, they wouldn’t be able to stay in business. They literally order barrels of…

Brian: Barrels?

Jill: (laughs) Yes, of hydrocodone, and usually have it, you know, fill prescriptions with it and it’s gone in less than a week.

Brian: That’s a lot of pain out there…

Jill: And a lot of cash, because a lot of people are coming in paying cash, and we know that probably why they’re doing that is because they want the insurance companies to see how much, how many prescriptions they’re filling of the pain medication. Because that’s going to go in to that insurance company, raise a flag, and they’re going to see that you’ve gotten three hydrocodone prescriptions filled in the last twenty days… something’s up.

Brian: Right.

Jill: They’ll send letters to your doctors and to the doctors prescribing it, so interesting little aside from the pharmacists out there and what actually is happening. But anyways, we were going to just talk a little bit maybe about how to recognize if a loved one or coworker or someone is struggling with addiction.

Brian: That is true. And there are some basic things to look for, and this doesn’t mean you have to be a psychologist to know this. If you begin to see some really major changes in the behavior of your loved one, something such as they start isolating a lot more…

Jill: Mmm hmm.

Brian: Or they actually start they find that the relationship is starting to diminish in the home… whereas maybe at one point they were talkative and engaged in conversation, and now they’re less talkative, or maybe they’re becoming more irritable…

Jill: Right.

Brian: Or they’re becoming more argumentative. These are some very clear signs that something is going on, doesn’t mean that’s the case, but it certainly might be something. Certainly find out if they had enough sleep the night before.

Jill: Mmm hmm.

Brian: Or if this keeps going on for a period of time. Or you begin, especially with an adolescent, finding things missing in your home, it could be that they may be taking things and selling it in order that they might be able to obtain their drugs.

Jill: Mmm hmm.

Brian: So these are some of the behaviors that parents or also husbands and wives can begin looking for, because we know that when people are moving into the area, especially of addiction, or they’re moving into addiction or also dependence, obviously they are spending more and more time trying to find their drug of choice, using that drug of choice…

Jill: Yeah, so preoccupied.

Brian: …and overcoming the issue. Preoccupation is a big issue.

Jill: You know, I had one of our clients that came through and went through outpatient detox, got on Suboxone, was doing very, very well, and one of the things he came in and his follow-up, he was so excited because for the first time he didn’t have to concentrate on where his next bottle of pills was going to come from, and he was going to be able to see his son, have his, he must be divorced, and his wife was going to let him have his son for the weekend, and he was so excited, he goes, for the first time I’m not going to be afraid my son’ll find the stash, and I’m going to play with him, because I won’t be preoccupied. I won’t be on the phone. I won’t be checking emails, so that I thought was a very interesting thing to say too.

Brian: It is. Hey, we got a call from Judy in Acworth.

Jill: Oh great.

Brian: Welcome, Judy, to the Breakthrough Addiction Recovery hour.

Judy: Thank you.

Brian: And you have a comment.

Judy: Well, I do. I, uh, you mentioned some of what I had said to your screener. I don’t live here, we are going to relocate eventually, but I had surgery over a year ago and I was sent home with some Vicodin for pain, but it made me sick. So my husband strained his back doing some yard work and I gave him my Vicodin. And there must’ve been fifty-million pills in that bottle…I have no idea how many were in there… but he began to like it very much, and the next thing I know the bottle is empty because it wasn’t just straining his back doing yard work, it was then the excuse of something else. Whether it was a wrist, or an ankle, or his back or his head. And I guess in all honesty I just went along with it, and he began I guess to go thru some type of withdrawal because he didn’t have any anymore. And then he got hold of some, and he, it was very obvious that he was an addict. And it was having a serious effect on our marriage, and the work that we do. We do church work. So everything was falling apart. And we sought some help in our town… you mentioned Suboxone?…

Jill: Suboxone, mmm hmm…

Judy: So that is what he did. We sought out addiction treatment. They sent us to an addiction addiction treatment facility and he received the Suboxone addiction treatment. But that alone wasn’t enough, because we needed counseling.

Brian: That’s so true.

Judy: So he found out it was behavioral and he was predisposed in so many ways in his life to be an addict. And, um, I never looked at it that way, you know. He didn’t buy just one pair of sneakers; he’d buy three. He didn’t have one beer; he had five. As I look back on it now, it’s just been a very freeing experience for us. We’re coming up on a year that he has been… well, he had a small relapse, but we didn’t panic. And it was like a bump in the road, we felt like because that was exactly what we needed to do.

Brian: Is he getting some support now?

Judy: Absolutely.

Brian: Seeing a counselor, and working through that?

Judy: And we don’t hide about it. He doesn’t hide. He’s not ashamed. Because we found out there are so many other people, even in our church, that have been dealing with this type of problem.

Brian: It is.

Jill: Wow.

Judy: So we’ve got the help we need, you know, we have the doctors that we need, but we also have the support of family and friends. But I would say to your listeners the behavioral counseling was key for us.

Jill: Wow.

Brian: You know, that’s so true, because so many times, Judy, that after a person actually comes off and gets outpatient detoxed, off that opiate, the psychological dependence is very complex and also lasts a long time… can be up to maybe a few months, up to maybe a year or two. They really do need that support.

Judy: And now when I look at labels, you know, it does mean take it if you need it for pain, don’t just take it. And, uh, we have found out there are things you can take for pain that are over the counter that work sometimes just as well. But we’ve also found that he doesn’t have as much pain as he used to think he did.

Jill: How has this been for you, Judy? I mean, the family member goes through it as well as the person who’s dependent.

Judy: Well, I saw myself as part of it. I mean, truly, I knew he was taking them, how could I not?

Jill: Mmm hmm.

Judy: But, if it was making him feel good, and that’s terrible, but I just went along with it. I had no idea what was happening to his body.

Brian: Well, you know, that is the big thing, Judy, is that many times people look at it that way. Well, it was prescribed by a doctor, it’s filled by a pharmacist…

Judy: Absolutely.

Brian: …and it’s paid by insurance, why not take it? It’s legal.

Judy: Well, I’ll be honest, and when you see…

Brian: It’s so easy.

Judy: …them starting to go through some type of withdrawal… now we didn’t call it withdrawal, I had no clue what was going on, but I did get a refill.

Jill: Mmm hmm.

Judy: I did get some more so, and he took them and then I knew exactly what we were doing.

Brian and Jill: Right.

Judy: And then I was, you know, I guess, enabling, if that’s the word, him to do this. And I needed help. Because I was afraid to not let him take it.

Brian: Well I’m really glad you said that too. We’re coming up on the break, close on this one, that’s why Breakthrough Addiction Recovery, Judy, we offer a program called family education, because it really helps the family to understand what the person who is addicted is going through, and how the family, as you said, sometimes enables, and also really causes the person, or allows the person, to continue to use their drugs of choice.

Judy: That’s right. Oh, so do you, ok, I don’t know about how you do it, but where we are, we can go, um, now, if we need a meeting, we go.

Jill: Yeah.

Brian: Oh, that’s great.

Judy: We call them and say we’re coming in. (laughs)

Jill: Yeah, that s good. And that’s very much how we work also. We use the Suboxone specifically for outpatient detox off of …

Judy: That is phenomenal.

Jill: Yeah. It is. And that is what everyone comes back and says, is that, thank God for Suboxone. Judy, you’ve opened up a whole new topic. We’re going to talk about Suboxone when we come back.

Judy: Well it saved our marriage.

Brian: Keep it up.

Jill: Well, thank you so much for calling in and telling your story.

Judy: Ok. Good luck.

Brian: Have a great day.

Jill: And it looks like we’re coming up on a break, so we’re going to be right back. We’ll talk a little bit more about the medication, Suboxone.

Brian: Indeed.

<Commercial break>

Brian: Welcome back from the break to the Addiction Recovery hour. I’m Brian Fujii.

Jill: And I’m Jill Mattingly.

Brian: And we’re talking today about opiates and the problem of addiction and how people are getting into people’s medicine cabinets and trying to get that drug of choice to be either used personally or shared with others. We got an interesting call just before the break…

Jill: Right…Mmm hmm…

Brian: And I thought Judy did a wonderful piece here in telling us about how she and her family literally moved into this addictive process and we do know it is a family issue. It certainly isn’t just only the person who is having the addiction.

Jill: Absolutely.

Brian: And at that break you mentioned about Suboxone… maybe the group is very interested in learning more about Suboxone. So if this topic is really hitting a nerve, give us a call at 770-226-0920, and outside the Atlanta area, 1-888-920-2665.

Jill: Right, and if you are someone listening to our previous segment and you decided to go to your bathroom and take your pain medications out of the medicine cabinet and put them somewhere else, I want to hear from you. Let us know that you did that. And encourage other people to do the same.

Brian: What a new year’s resolution.

Jill: Absolutely. So we were going to talk a little bit more about how the opiates work. And some of the other things that you know maybe people can be looking for.

Brian: Exactly. Well you know that’s why we here at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery don’t look at addiction just as a problem with will, a problem with character, but we do understand that it is indeed a brain disease.

Jill: Yes it is.

Brian: And we do know the reason is for that is because we understand how the medications work. So especially like with opiates we know that they basically impact one of those major receptor sites. They call it the mu receptor site. That’s because it deals with pain. And so with this medication when people are using it, if they’re having physical pain, then we know that’s going to be a perfect medication to use. However, many people because of longevity years, I’ve heard that people shouldn’t use pain, these types of pain medications for more than 14 days, such as after surgery or if they have a major accident or injury, but yet they continue to use it because it makes them feel so much better.

Jill: Mmm hmm.

Brian: And when you take a look at the fact that brain pathway, which is part of that limbic system, or that lower brain, it’s below that big part of the brain that makes us think logically, you know, when I ask you what time it is, you don’t tell me that the sky is blue.

Jill: Yeah.

Brian: So… if they do tell you the sky is blue when you ask them what time it is, you better send them to us.

Jill: Send them to us…

Brian: Indeed. But, we do understand that that is a major issue, that the brain has now been impacted in such a major way, that no longer is there a rational control of the use. So now the brain is automatically craving and desiring the use of that medication. And there is no choice. So if someone says, why can’t my loved one stop, it’s because they can’t stop, because their brain won’t allow them to.

Jill: Yeah, there’s a couple issues going on… like before you said, because it makes them feel good. And that, a lot of times that’s how you get yourself kind of in a fog in thinking well I’ll just keep using these because they make me feel good. Work is very stressful, my home life is stressful, when I take a couple Vicodin, you know, I start to feel a little bit better, I’m on, I’m performing. And then when you decide, ok, I don’t want to do that anymore, and you start to decrease the use, or stop, you find out that you become in intense pain, which is the withdrawal symptoms. Then the issue becomes, I’m taking these medicines because I don’t want to be in pain. I don’t want to go through the withdrawal pain.

Brian: That’s right.

Jill: And so, I mean, it can start off really rosy, and feeling good, but it is very crucial to know that this medication will imprint itself in your brain function so that you cannot easily come off of it.

Brian: I’m glad that we said that too, Jill. That is so true, because people begin using this, and then the brain literally changes. It’s just kind of a rewiring of that brain.

Jill: But, you know, Brian, everyone is different. You know, the way they respond to medication. I for one had knee surgery, tried one oxycontin and, you know, was physically ill and nauseated for the next two or three hours. So it didn’t appeal to me at all.

Brian: Oh, I’m glad you said that. And that’s kind of the reason why that only five to ten percent of the people who actually try or experiment with drugs actually get into dependence, for exactly the same reason you said…

Jill: Because it just doesn’t appeal…

Brian: It doesn’t work for them. Could you imagine if someone was drinking and every time they drank they had a hangover and they threw up all the time? They probably would not look at alcohol as being a fun thing to do.

Jill: It’s all in the positive reinforcement. Or negative reinforcement.

Brian: That’s right.

Jill: But I think that’s interesting in the fact that not everybody that is taking medications is going to slip into this, and not everyone is going to feel effects if they’ve taken it longer than two weeks. They’ll be able to stop. They might feel a little more pain in the area that they were taking it for, but probably using Naltrexone, not Naltrexone, sorry, naproxen or Advil or something like that, they will feel better.

Brian: A lot better.

Jill: If you want to know what type of medications fall into pain medications, like opiates that we’re talking about, our website is chock full of information about these medications. And our website is www.breakthroughaddictionrecovery.com, and there’s extensive information on not just our program, but all of these drugs of addiction that we talk about. And links to more information that you may be looking for. Please take a look at the website, and if you’re interested in a program with us, with a problem with pain medication, you can also come into our program for a free consultation.

Brian: A free consultation any time. If this program is really striking you, 770-226-0920.

Jill: Stay with us.

Brian: We’ll be right back.

<Commercial break>

Jill: That’s right, 770-226-0920. Call us if you want to comment, question, get in on the conversation that we’re talking about opiate dependency and addiction. Call me if you’ve locked up your bottle of pain pills in the last twenty minutes after what we’ve been talking about. Tell me where you put…no, no, wait a minute, um, but let us know if you’ve really responded to some of the things we’re talking about. Hey, and we also have a line that people listening to us on streaming internet can call, 1-888-920-2665. We’re on www.920wgka.com every Saturday at 3:00. And I promised to talk about Suboxone that Judy that called in earlier talked about. I want to talk about it in terms of some of the clients that I’ve treated at Breakthrough Addiction Recovery with Suboxone. Most people what happens is they’ll call and say, hey, I’m taking twenty to twenty-five Percocet a day…

Brian: That’s a handful

Jill: Yeah, that’s a handful… no, I’m sorry, um, yeah, twenty to twenty-five Percocet a day, and some people even call in saying I’m taking ten to fifteen pills every eight hours, or every six to eight hours. And, you know, you think, ok, how can you take that many pills? Well, it doesn’t take long for tolerance to develop once you’ve started on these medications. You know, so that’s a typical call I get. And we talk about the efficiency of Suboxone in letting you come off of all the other medications, getting on to Suboxone, without the withdrawal that is so painful

Brian: It is.

Jill: And so difficult.

Brian: And that’s one of the major reasons why people have a hard time coming off of those opiates…

Jill: Exactly.

Brian: …because the withdrawal is so miserable. It won’t kill them, but they feel like dying.

Jill: Yes. And sometimes it can last, you know, three to four days, the symptoms. So obviously they are taken out of life for three or four days; you really can’t function when you’re withdrawing from this. So Suboxone becomes a really good tool to help people go from the dependency on the opiates, pain medication, over to functioning. With the medication, Suboxone is a long-acting opiate, but it is much different in the way that it functions in the brain, so it doesn’t allow withdrawals and it allows you to taper it without having problems.

Brian: Mmm hmm.

Jill: And I want to talk a little bit, one of my clients came through in the last few months and I’ll just call him Paul, ok… lemme just call him Paul… well Paul came in and he had gotten to the point where not only was he taking the handfuls every four to six hours, but he was using all of his waking hours trying to find when his next bottle of pills and where it was going to come from. And so he was the type that got on medication because he had a dental procedure, and it was normal, I mean, you get on this pill because dental procedures are very painful. And once he was on the medication he found out how good it made him feel, and then it turns out that the loved one in the house had had surgery so they had bottle of pills so he just decided to take some of theirs. Before he knew it, he was trying to figure out how to go to the doctor and get his next bottle. Well, you know, if you go to one doctor, you’re not going to be able to go back 14 days later and say, I just used the month’s worth, so can you write me more…

Brian: But was he doctor shopping…

Jill: Yeah, so what he started to do, was finding doctors, telling the story to, and kind of not letting each doctor know he was seeing other doctors for his prescription. This is commonly known as doctor shopping and it is illegal to do so. And so you have to be very careful if you’re going to play that game because you can definitely get caught. He said when he had come to see me; he had gotten more than twenty doctors around the area to write him these prescriptions. And he had them all, neither; none of the doctors knew that the other ones existed. So it was very, very dangerous, but not only that, and this is one of the things I want everyone to hear today, is he fell prey to thinking, well, here’s an easy way to get the prescription filled, I’ll do it online. I see those little ads on the internet saying, any pill you want, all’s you need to do, click here, give us your information, we’ll get a doctor to ask you a few questions, and then it’ll get filled in another state and UPS will bring it to your door.

Brian: You know I had one person actually tell me the UPS truck was a real trigger, every time they saw it…

Jill: Oh, absolutely. Well, he started to order this. Now, if anyone has tried that, they’ll find out it is very expensive to do it that way. So a $150 bottle of pills is going to be almost $300. So he started doing that. Now, finally, I think, after a few years he realized this is no way to live. I have no life. And he decided to get help. He had tried methadone, and methadone being the other way to try to come off opiates, it had not worked for him. Suboxone has worked wonderfully. Now here’s the reason why everyone listening should never order pain medications online: once they have your information, there is no way to stop them from contacting you if you do not renew your prescription with them. So, um, I ordered ninety hydrocodone, and I decide I’m not going to do this anymore, I get help. I’m off of the hydrocodone, but then one day my email says, hey, do you want to order more? And then they start to call me on my phone and say, hey, you haven’t refilled, do you want to order more? My client Paul said they were calling him three to four times a day…

Brian: That doesn’t sound like a doctor’s office

Jill: No, no…

Brian: That sounds like someone trying to push something…

Jill: It didn’t sound like an American voice either…

Brian: No, it certainly wasn’t.

Jill: And what had happened was, he really had a lot of hard, hard times with these calls. These calls coming through every single day, emails, his Blackberry going off, telling him he needs to reorder. Talk about triggers and alcohol cravings. He was having a very tough time.

Brian: You know, it’s interesting you mention about that trigger, and talking about having a tough time, I’m sure he was under a lot of stress. And you know if anyone tries to stop using especially opiates, do you know what the number one trigger is to use? Stress. So can you imagine if someone is constantly badgering you about wanting to use, you’re sitting there, and you’re getting these email flashes and all these phone calls, you can imagine that is going to be a significant trigger to use.

Jill: Well, I want to talk a little bit more about Paul and these triggers that can come from unexpected places, even when you are off the medication. Call us if you want to join in on this conversation. 770-226-0920. We’ll be right back.

<Commercial break>

Brian: Welcome back to the Breakthrough Addiction Recovery Hour. I’m Brian Fujii, and I have with me Jill Mattingly. And today we are talking about opiate, opiate addiction, and addiction treatment At the break we just got through talking about Suboxone, and how that impacts a person’s ability to overcome the issues of opiate addiction. What we’re trying to do now is really help us to understand something about the Suboxone is a wonderful drug that really helps people to overcome the addiction to opiates but at the same time, it’s not a silver bullet. And we do know that people do need some other kinds of addiction treatment. We heard this earlier from Judy when she said that she and her husband was involved with some form of addiction treatment. And we understand that if a person’s going to really be able to get through addiction, it is more than just medicine. And we understand that persons do need to be involved in some kind of addiction treatment of psychosocial support. I know one of the things that we do, Jill, at our office is when we work with individuals, we help them to understand that many times they are dealing with feelings of guilt, or they’re dealing with shame, and they’re also trying to deal with some self-esteem. And I know that many times when people are using drugs, they are trying to find some way to overcome that emotional pain.

Jill: Absolutely.

Brian: You know, well, look, we got a call here from Louise, from Tucker. She’s asking the question about what causes pain. Welcome to our show, Louise.

Louise: Uh, yes, thank you. I don’t catch your show often, but I did this afternoon. I was fifteen years old when I lost my dad, so I became a hypochondriac. I have visited every doctor, every hospital, whatever, but as time went by, I realized it was the attention I needed. The pain was, you know, severe at times, when I was just sick, but it was because of the loss. Yesterday I was visiting Krispy Kreme Donut on Ponce de Leon, and there was a young man, a man who obviously stayed in the woods, he’d lost his mind…

Jill: Yeah, I’ve seen a couple of those there too…

Louise: And so I had this great interest in what causes pain. I know that if you cut your hand, you’re going to have pain. But where does it start?

Jill: You have nerve endings that, you know, your a survival machine, your body is and when nerve endings tell the brain that there’s a threat to the survival of the organism, then you have many different releases of hormones and what we call neuropeptides or neurotransmitters. One of the neurotransmitters or one of the substances that transmits pain is called substance-p. Very interesting to look at that if you have access to a computer or a textbook to look at substance-p, and the presence of substance-p allows, if you will, like gates to open up and that causes the brain to become very much aware that there is a problem. And it’s mediated as what we feel as pain. Now opiates close those gates and don’t allow that substance-p to cause that type of situation. But you know it doesn’t work, you know, one dose is not going to work indefinitely. You will find that it takes more and more and more. A lot of the people you see down there on Ponce de Leon Avenue, because a lot of people that are addicted to these substances, you know, cocaine, crack cocaine, and heroin, frequent those areas, and you can tell if they’re in a state of withdrawal, in a state of intoxication, I mean, it’s very difficult to see that, but it’s very interesting. You can tell where their body is at any certain time.

Brian: You know, it’s interesting too, Louise, you mentioned this idea about pain, and many people who are on opiates, especially like the oxycontin and so forth, they not only have a problem with just physical pain, they also have a low tolerance for emotional pain.

Jill: Yes.

Louise: Exactly. Emotional thing and that’s my, that’s what I’m so interested in is the emotional pain, because, see, I’m a practicing Christian, so what I do is I practice renewing my mind, if you will. Because my understanding of Christianity is my identification with Jesus has already taken the pain.

Jill: And a lot of people use that as a very important support system for them. And Louise, we have someone else wanting to ask a question. Thank you so much for calling in and I hope I answered your question.

Louise: You sure did and I appreciate it.

Jill: Yes, and have a wonderful day. It looks like we have Kelly in Marietta. Kelly, you have a question?

Kelly: Yes, I’ve been taking hydrocodone and I don’t take it while I’m working, but on days off I take it. It’s sort of my way of kind of controlling it. But I think I have more of a mental addiction to it, and…

Jill: Kelly, let me do this, I want to talk to you. Can you hold on, we have to stop the show, but I’m going to talk to you off the air. Would you hold on and let me talk to you off the air about this issue?

Kelly: Yes.

Jill: And Kelly, hold on, we so appreciate your call. This is a big issue. Everyone out there listening, thank you, thank you for listening, and join us next week. 3:00, Breakthrough Addiction Recovery. I’m going to go talk to Kelly, Brian, so…

Brian: Have a great afternoon.