Hearts of Hope - Articles of Interest

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant. They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Then after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.

As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, booster seats, seat belts or air bags. Riding in the back of a pick up on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle. We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank Kool-Aid made with sugar, but we weren't overweight because WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVD's, no surround-sound, CD's or Ipods, no cell phones!, no personal computers , no Internet or chat rooms.......

WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls and, although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them!

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!! The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of.

They actually sided with the law!

These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever!

The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned

HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL!

If YOU are one of them, CONGRATULATIONS!

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives for our own good.

And while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave (and lucky) their parents were.

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?!

The quote of the month is by Jay Leno:

"With hurricanes, tornados, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to another, and with the threat of bird flu and terrorist attacks, are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?"

For those that prefer to think that God is not watching over us....go ahead and delete this. For the rest of us.....pass this on.

Drug Addiction Seminar to Educate Parents

By Michele du Vair

Special to the beacon news

Not many parents of adolescent children know that heroin comes in a gum wrapper or that users can snort it like cocaine or that a child can get high on it for only $10. Not many know that vomiting, diarrhea, weight loss and pinpoint pupils are the signs of heroin addiction. Suburban parents who think this information is irrelevant to them are wrong, maybe even dead wrong.

"You always think of heroin addicts as the person in the gutter, or you see them after they've been an addict for a long time and they look horrible," says Gail, an area mother of an underage heroin addict who asked that her full name not be used. "But my son's gorgeous. He's creative, intelligent, entertaining. He can carry on a conversation with anyone."

Gail found out about it the hard way – from the police. Her son's high school counselor knew about his addiction for eight months, but never told her because it was against the school's confidentiality policy. "My son could have died in the meantime," she says. "He was endangering his life. He was ingesting heroin and they weren't telling me."

Three area organizations are hoping to help people like Gail by spreading the word about drug addiction in an upcoming seminar. Drug Abuse Education for Parents and Family Members is scheduled for 7 p.m. Wednesday on the campus of the Rush-Copley Medical Center in the second floor conference room of the Rush-Copley Heart Institute, 2088 Ogden Avenue in Aurora. The seminar is free. Preregistration is not required.

Guest speakers include Mark Warpness, a special agent with the Chicago Office of the Drug Enforcement Agency, Judge Thomas E. Mueller of the Kane County Drug Court and Dr. Martin Doot, an addiction specialist with the Advocate Medical Group.

Sponsors include the Aurora Public Library, Dreyer Community Health Fund within the Advocate Charitable Foundation, and Hearts of Hope, an Illinois, not-for-profit Corporation that assists Illinois families struggling with addiction.

"It's for the families, because when you get into this it's so foreign to you," says Jill Steinmetz, reference and popular materials librarian at the Aurora Public Library. "A person who doesn't use drugs, or have this problem, can in no way comprehend what's going on with their child."

Kerri Danek, of St. Charles, believes seminars like this are crucial to fighting addiction. "So many parents are unaware," Danek says. "They don't have a clue." And the longer their kids consume drugs, undetected by their parents, the harder it will be for them to stop, she says.

Danek should know. One of her children began smoking marijuana in sixth grade. By eighth grade he was smoking once a month. In high school he increased consumption from once a week, to once a day, to his peak of five times a day. Danek's son has spent time in two juvenile facilities, served time in the Kane County Jail, been enrolled in the Kane County Drug Court Program and was just released from the hospital for depression.

"His drug of choice is marijuana," says Danek. "It's not like the marijuana of the seventies. It's very addictive and most parents still don't know that."

Gail doesn't know if earlier knowledge of her son's heroin addiction would have helped because it's impossible to tell if her son was hooked the first or the tenth time he ingested it. She does know that he was once found "blue and unresponsive" on a suburban sidewalk, resuscitated by an ambulance crew, but still couldn't quit. And she does know that her son is now on his third rehab program at only 17, that she's ruined herself financially by taking out a second mortgage on her house to pay for all this and that he might never recover.

The (Posh) Path to Recovery

By Valerie Kuklenski, Staff Writer U-Entertainment Article Launched:10/09/2006 01:00:00 AM PDT

The gate buzzes and opens, revealing a secluded street winding its way up a Malibu hillside marked by lavish homes and lush landscapes. Up one driveway, between the marble columns and carved stone lions and just past the koi pond, is the front door of what could be a palatial residence or a very exclusive ocean-view resort.

But Passages is neither. It is a highly successful drug and alcohol rehabilitation center, according to proprietors Chris and Pax Prentiss, and possibly the most expensive facility of its kind in the nation.

It's not just the high price — $57,550 for 30 days of intensive therapy ñ and the reported 84 percent of its clients overcoming their bad habits that distinguishes this facility. It's that it claims that success while flatly rejecting the widely accepted 12-step model created by Alcoholics Anonymous.

As tabloid headlines announce this or that celebrity returning to rehab after falling off the wagon, this father and son are bringing clients through a system they developed themselves, without professional training but with the knowledge that comes from Chris having helped Pax overcome a long, life-threatening dependency.

"Basically I was hooked on heroin and cocaine and alcohol for 10 years," said Pax, who at 32 looks like he hasn't been sick a day in his life. "I've tried the 12-step program many times; I've probably been to thousands of meetings.

"And it wasn't until my dad and I started looking for underlying problems in my own life and found them and started to work on healing those that I was able to get sober and stay sober."

His grueling story of escalating drug use, being beaten by dealers over unpaid debts, desperate fixes and, ultimately, resolution and sobriety are recounted in a chapter he wrote for Chris' book "The Alcoholism and Addiction Cure: A Holistic Approach to Total Recovery." The book also details their treatment approach and their argument against 12-step programs as demoralizing and too often hopeless endeavors.

"Ninety-five percent of the people go to one (12-step) meeting and never go back again," Chris said. "I can understand why. They hate them.

"Most people don't like to stand up and declare themselves an alcoholic or an addict. Alcoholism is not a disease. Alcoholism is merely a symptom of an underlying condition.

"You can best understand it if someone had a chronic headache and they were taking aspirin all the time. Would they be an aspirinholic? And if they went to a physician for treatment, would he treat them for aspirinism? Of course not. He'd try to find out the cause of the headache and treat that."

Chris, now 70, stood by his son through his multiple attempts to get clean.

"We went to meetings, we went to doctors, we went to psychiatrists, psychologists, drug and alcohol therapists, addiction specialists, rehab. Ninety-day, 60-day, 30-day programs," Chris recalled from his second-floor office overlooking the Pacific.

"They were all ineffective. And they were not only ineffective for Pax, they were ineffective for most of the people in the program. They were relapsing. They'd leave the program, two days later be back."

Passages is more than comfortable for its mostly well-heeled patients. Among its three houses and three guest houses, there is a tennis court, a pool, an expansive lawn overlooking the ocean, a 24/7 gym, surf gear at the ready and therapy rooms for massage and acupuncture that compare to those in any high-end day spa. The residents' rooms could be in a nice hotel, and a chef formerly with Spago prepares meals aimed at pleasing sophisticated palates while healing often malnourished bodies.

But all those creature comforts are in support of a rigorous program of 20 hours per week per client of one-on-one therapy aimed at getting to the reason he or she turned to drugs or alcohol in the first place. (It is all those specialists on staff ñ 34 counselors for up to 29 patients ñ that requires the high fee.)

"There are only four causes of addiction and alcoholism," Chris explained. "Chemical imbalance, events of the past they haven't been able to cope with, current conditions they haven't been able to deal with, and things they believe that aren't true."

In Pax's case it was a feeling that he couldn't measure up to the expectations of a successful father he adored. For one man, it was dealing with a mugging injury that made him reliant on painkillers, until he learned to manage his chronic pain with acupuncture. One woman had been sedating herself nightly for decades by drinking, until a physical exam at Passages determined she had an elevated heart rate, which they remedied with a prescription in order to eliminate the need for alcohol.

During a recent visit residents were in different stages of recovery. One had a spring in his step and clear eyes and greeted visitors warmly. Another slinked out of a therapy room, her hair rumpled and her eyes looking weary and clouded. But both would be expected to attend the next graduation ceremony, a gathering in the living room where nearly everyone sits on floor cushions and a large brass gong is sounded while incense wafts through the air.

Chris Prentiss says many addiction specialists denounce his program as "snake oil." But Passages is part of a trend toward at least downplaying 12-step therapy, which requires in part turning to God or a higher power, and looking at the bigger picture of the addict's overall health.

Psychotherapist and family counselor Steven M. Orenstein worked in addiction treatment at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center before opening New Seasons, a residential treatment center in Port Hueneme, eight months ago. It uses 12-step and intensive one-on-one therapy as well as brain mapping and neurocognitive rehabilitation.

He says studies have shown that treatment facilities working on the "mind-body-spirit package" have greater success rates than more conventional methods.

New Seasons uses 12-step group sessions along with personal counseling because Orenstein sees a benefit in working out those issues with peers without a leader dominating the discussion.

"It's not the perfect solution," he says of 12-step. "Their success rates are low. But the people that do participate in it tend to do well.

"The success rate of treatment overall is not phenomenal, and we're still trying to work on that," Orenstein added. "I think taking an integrated approach and trying to integrate the best of every type of modality that's offered out there is the best thing we can do at this point."

Rachel Ballon, a marriage and family therapist whose West Los Angeles practice includes addiction treatment, says she refers her patients to 12-step programs because she likes the personal accountability involved.

"Therapy alone — and I've been a therapist for 26 years — can't stop people from being alcoholics, overeaters, or whatever the issue is," Ballon said. "I think the tools of the 12-step program are wonderful, if they don't become an addiction in themselves."

Twelve-step programs didn't break John Higholt's habit. He had been on heroin for six years, and then abused Oxycontin and marijuana, scoring the pills from hospice workers who stole leftover medications after their patients died.

"That was my 16th treatment facility," said Higholt, 31, an L.A. resident and recent Passages graduate. "Every other time there was a guy in a big black robe who told me I had to go. This time I went on my own."

A few sessions with the right therapists were eye-opening for him. "I spent a long time in the victim role," he said. "My mom committed suicide when I was 4 and I went into an abusive boarding school.

"But I learned I am responsible for what happens now. I was powerless over events in my childhood, but I have no one to blame for what happens to me now but myself," Higholt said. "It was like getting hit over the head with a hammer ñ in a very good way."

He knows of a couple of individuals who attended Passages with him who have relapsed, but he is looking ahead with another graduate toward opening a clean-and-sober recording studio and label.

The strongest testimonial probably comes from Pax, whose idea it was to open Passages. Every Friday night, while his old acquaintances likely are scrounging for drugs, he is leading a group session in which he talks frankly about his dark past.

"I was using heroin to cope with my problems. So once I got my problems handled and healed, I no longer needed the heroin," he said. "I've been sober for six years and I do not get cravings. And I'm telling you I tried to get sober for 10 years and I couldn't do it. And I used to struggle with cravings on a day in, day out basis. It was like white-knuckling it.

"Ten years of drugs. It was a long time," Pax said.

"I'll say it was," Chris added.

Article Name

Hearts of Hope
P.O. Box 3314
St. Charles, IL 60174

Tel: (630) 327-9937
Fax: (630) 232-9240

Email: Info@HeartsOfHope.Net

Contact Hearts of Hope for a Drug Free Community!.