Beyond Addiction from Creators Syndicate

Blowback for 10/24/2009

Sat, 24 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Based on the paucity of responses, I wonder sometimes whether anyone reads the words in this space. And then there are those weeks when it seems everybody does, especially when most of them disagree with my point of view.

Such is the fallout from my column a few weeks ago about a groundbreaking poll of teenagers and their parents and how they talk to one another about their use of alcoho ...

Updated: Sat Oct 24, 2009

Token of Gratitude for 10/31/2009

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

For his 17th birthday, I gave my eldest son, Henry, a gift certificate to fill up the truck with gasoline a couple of times. He drives an old Chevy Tahoe, so the card won't take him very far. But with some cash he got from his grandparents and his job mowing a neighbor's lawn, he's got a reserve to keep him rolling along for a couple of months.

What I hope he'll get more mileage out of i ...

Updated: Sat Oct 31, 2009

Middle of the Goal for 11/07/2009

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

A dear friend of mine was diagnosed with breast cancer. The experts told her that a mastectomy was needed to eliminate the disease but that nothing else was necessary. She had the breast removed and also chose to undergo the rigors of chemotherapy. She went to any length to improve her chances. It meant losing her hair and suffering the debilitating side effects. But six years later, she is he ...

Updated: Sat Nov 07, 2009

Medicine Jar for 11/14/2009

Sat, 14 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

One of Paul McCartney's many songs about drug use included this bottom line: "Dead on your feet, you won't get far, if you keep on sticking your hand in the medicine jar."

So just what's in that medicine jar in your bathroom cabinet? You may not be the only one who knows.

Dear Mr. Moyers: This correspondence comes your way via a heavy heart. Our youngest daughter ...

Updated: Sat Nov 14, 2009

Broadway Debut for 11/21/2009

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

It took 13 years, but I finally appeared on a stage in front of an audience on Broadway.

The Capri Theater on Broadway Avenue in a gritty stretch of North Minneapolis was filled with politicians and civic leaders, ministers and a couple of donors with deep pockets. My real affinity was for everyone else in the crowd — the crack addicts and alcoholics, who share my illness.

& ...

Updated: Sat Nov 21, 2009

Founding Wisdom for 12/05/2009

Sat, 05 Dec 2009 00:00:00 -0800

For sale: a letter written in 1787 by George Washington in support of the adoption of the proposed new Constitution. In four pages of tight script, the letter has been touted by Sotheby's as "the most important Washington letter to ever come to auction." The estimated price: $1.5 million to $2.5 million.

What better man to defend the Constitution's power to unite the 13 states ...

Updated: Sat Dec 05, 2009

Good Living for 12/12/2009

Sat, 12 Dec 2009 00:00:00 -0800

The sky was crystal clear, but it was 8 degrees, and a biting wind made it feel even colder when I tentatively ventured outdoors for a jog. "Winter in Minnesota" isn't a satisfying excuse when the treadmill in the basement has logged its last mile and doesn't work anymore. I still needed my adrenaline fix.

Near the Salvation Army shelter on West Seventh Street in St. Paul, I pa ...

Updated: Sat Dec 12, 2009

Home for the Holidays for 12/19/2009

Sat, 19 Dec 2009 00:00:00 -0800

Twenty years ago this month, I experienced my first Christmas in sobriety in what had been a long time. Granted a five-day leave of absence from the halfway house Fellowship Club — my home away from home after residential treatment — I met up with my family in Vermont for what we all hoped would be a joyous reunion. Instead, I recall the awkwardness of it all. To me, at least, it se ...

Updated: Sat Dec 19, 2009

Resolution With a Backbone for 01/02/2010

Sat, 02 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Most of us start off the new year with a commitment to change or want to fix some troubling aspect of our lives. For millions of Americans who wake up with a hangover on Jan. 1 and vow to quit drinking or taking drugs, their resolve this year comes with an unprecedented resource: their own health insurance.

Named for the former U.S. senators who championed the legislation in Congress, th ...

Updated: Sat Jan 02, 2010

Walking in Circles for 01/09/2010

Sat, 09 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Mazes aren't my forte. My pencil gets lost whenever I put it to paper and try to draw an uninterrupted line from start to finish through the branching puzzle. Usually my course leads to a dead end or doubles back along the same path until the pencil's wake abruptly disappears, marking yet another failed and frustrating engagement with a design that is easier seen than done.

Fortunately, ...

Updated: Sat Jan 09, 2010

Stay or Go for 01/16/2010

Sat, 16 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

The first month of a new year always comes with a flurry of concerns and questions from people who, like the calendar, have changed.

Dear Mr. Moyers: Right or wrong, I forced my girlfriend to get help last year because she partied too much. I guess you could say it was an ultimatum; she had to stop it, or I was going to break up with her. Well, she started going to church, and sh ...

Updated: Sat Jan 16, 2010

Together It Adds Up for 01/23/2010

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

A few months ago in this space, I focused on the struggle of people who are "counting days" early in recovery. Stringing together hours or days or even a few weeks since that last drink or drug makes sustainable recovery seem insurmountable at first, especially when the craving is as relentless as waves against the beach.

But Tuesday night reminded me that the formula for trans ...

Updated: Sat Jan 23, 2010

BlackBerry-aholic for 01/30/2010

Sat, 30 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

For dinner the other night, I ate too much, and my stomach growled. Instinctively, I reached for the BlackBerry on my belt. I thought it was buzzing. It wasn't.

A few days later, I was waiting impatiently for an e-mail reply from a colleague at work. I kept gazing at the flashing light on my electronic appendage, until I was convinced it was flashing red to alert me to the incoming messa ...

Updated: Sat Jan 30, 2010

Aware and Ignorant for 02/06/2010

Sat, 06 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Nothing else I've written this past year has garnered reader response like my column on my unhealthy dependence on a BlackBerry. And for once, nobody disagreed with my perspective. Our society has become addicted to mobile devices and what they do for us and to us.

I got dozens of e-mails and text messages (via my BlackBerry) from people, mostly parents. I even got one from my boss. Of a ...

Updated: Sat Feb 06, 2010

Catch-22 for 02/13/2010

Sat, 13 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0800

When somebody I haven't heard from in decades calls or sends me an e-mail out of the blue, I don't guess why.

"Hi There," heralded the subject line in one such e-mail that popped into my inbox this week. "It's been too long, but I've been keeping up with your story ever since, and the guy I knew in college sure isn't who you are today, so I am happy for you and your recove ...

Updated: Sat Feb 13, 2010

Contract for Deeds for 02/20/2010

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0800

When conversation between worried parents and their troubled children is not enough — or maybe too much — consider a written contract.

A no-nonsense colleague of mine at Hazelden whose 17-year-old daughter has struggled with alcohol and drug-related problems showed me a contract she used to set firm boundaries for when the teenager is living at her home. The mother was at her ...

Updated: Sat Feb 20, 2010

Tiger's Time for 02/27/2010

Sat, 27 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0800

A prime spot to take the public's pulse is on a stool in a sports bar. Everybody's got opinions on everything, especially when bravado is bolstered by a couple of beers or when cheap wine softens inhibition.

Because I don't drink and I prefer to watch the Olympics or football at home, I avoid such places. So I find a haircut to be my best opportunity to gauge what people are thinking. It ...

Updated: Sat Feb 27, 2010

Abstinence vs. Recovery for 03/06/2010

Sat, 06 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Maybe it was last week's full moon or the train of winter storms rolling across the country, but an awful lot of readers were provoked in a not-so-gentle way by my recent column on Tiger Woods' sexual addiction. Here is one of the few printable opinions.

Dear Mr. Moyers: You can't have it both ways. You always harp on the "disease" of addiction to suggest abstinence is ...

Updated: Sat Mar 06, 2010

Defining Addiction for 03/13/2010

Sat, 13 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Alcohol. Sex. Cocaine. BlackBerrys.

When does the excessive use of any of these actually become a full-blown addiction?

Dr. Paul Earley helped to save my life in 1994, after I had relapsed and was struggling to find recovery from my addiction to alcohol and other drugs. I am forever grateful to him. So I'm not quite objective in asking for his professional opinion today.

Bu ...

Updated: Sat Mar 13, 2010

The Best Sunset for 03/20/2010

Sat, 20 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0700

On the last day I visited him at the nursing home, Paul Lawson — a World War II combat veteran, a former newspaper reporter and my mentor in recovery — sent me on my way with his standard adieu: "Go carefully. And remember, my friend, the best any of us have ever done is today."

Put another way, Paul wanted to remind me that yesterday is gone. Tomorrow isn't here. S ...

Updated: Sat Mar 20, 2010