Only days before this year’s Thanksgiving holiday, a Kentucky county approved a controversial ordinance placing strict limits on where many new addiction treatment facilities can operate. The law, which confines new facilities to shopping centers, raises important issues about the legality and prudence of such decisions that target addicted populations or organizations that serve them.
Breathitt County arrived at the new legislation after a previous version was struck down by a circuit court judge, who found the original ordinance to be in violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act. That ordinance from 2015 had brazenly barred any new drug treatment centers from opening in the county. The revised ordinance backs away from out-and-out banning of new treatment centers. Instead, it requires facilities that provide medications like methadone or Suboxone to be situated in shopping centers. Although it’s easy to see this as an improvement on the wholesale outlawing of addiction treatment, is it really more defensible? At best, the ordinance is a counterproductive measure that will likely have negative consequences for all involved.
Thanksgiving Day gives us a timely opportunity to think about practicing gratitude in recovery. Many people use the holiday to think about what they’re thankful for in their lives. Of course, sometimes that goal is lost in the bustle of family get-togethers. People settle back into the familiar rhythms of their family relationships or end up stressing out about the Thanksgiving dinner spread.
For those in recovery, the holiday can be a little difficult. Visiting with extended family or attending parties can present triggers or high levels of stress for the recovering drinker or drug user. That’s why using the holiday as an opportunity for reflection and self-care is vital! Gratitude—one of the reasons for this particular season—can be a tool for strengthening your recovery from drugs or alcohol. Let’s talk about why.
If you have a family member or friend who is struggling with addiction, you’ve probably worried that they might experience a drug overdose. Maybe your loved one has already overdosed before, and you’re concerned it will happen again. Anyone who has seen recent headlines about the epidemic of opioid abuse in the United States knows that drug overdoses are becoming more common and more deadly.
You should know that there are warning signs that can indicate far in advance that someone you know is at risk for overdose. Let’s talk about four major risk factors for drug overdose. These four signs could mean that trouble is on the way and your loved one might require intervention to prevent the worst-case scenario of overdose.
What is addiction and why does it happen? At first glance that could seem like a simple question, but in reality, a lot of people struggle to find an answer that makes sense. Some mistakenly get the idea that addiction is a sign of a person’s bad character or some moral failing. That’s not true, although individual choices and responsibility do come into play. Others believe that addiction is an inherited condition that can’t be changed. That’s also mistaken. People who think this might have heard that addiction is a brain disease. Now we’re getting closer to the facts! Recognizing that addiction is a brain disease is just the first step. Understanding why it’s a disease helps us to get a clear picture of how addiction works and what we can do about it. Let’s look at three essential keys to this understanding.
We know that addiction is a family disease because of its negative effects on family relationships. But a new study reported by The New York Times suggests that parents who use opioids might actually experience suppressed parental instincts in the brain. The findings suggest that there is a neurochemical reason behind the common-sense knowledge that severe drug abuse can result in neglect of those we love the most.
This week, a video campaign showing stories of heroin addiction was unveiled by the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Kentucky, according to WKYT. The initial campaign includes four videos providing unique, personal perspectives on how heroin and opioid addiction affects lives. These stories of substance use, dependency, and recovery have the chance of speaking to those who don’t know the risks of the heroin epidemic or haven’t yet faced up to an active addiction.
According to the reporting by WKYT, the US Attorney’s Office hopes the initiative will succeed in educating those in Eastern Kentucky about the scope of the opioid and heroin crisis. The videos are being distributed to thousands in the eastern portion of the state, with the hope that they will receive wide exposure in schools and local communities.
The videos showcase different perspectives from real people who have had life-altering experiences with heroin use. One of the videos, titled, “Heroin is Hell,” shows the story Blake Gumm, whose prospects for a professional football career were closed off after an arrest related to heroin use. In his story, he offers profound testimony on the potential consequences of heroin addiction and how a relapse can turn your life upside down. The video also shows another man who avoided jail time and made the decision to seek treatment, showing what’s possible with hope and the desire for change.
Some of the videos in the initiative focus on particular issues or perspectives. The video “Heroin Hurts” looks at a tragic and uncomfortable subject: heroin overdose deaths. These stories are devastating, but facing the reality of drug addiction might help others change before it’s too late. The video “Heroin is Here” looks at the heroin epidemic from the perspective of officials in the legal and law enforcement fields, taking a broader factual view. Finally, “Heroin’s Hold” is a long-form video that incorporates the interviewees from all three short videos, going deeper into how the heroin and opioid epidemic is affecting Eastern Kentucky.
After you watch these videos, we’d love to get your take. Did you learn something about heroin or addiction that you didn’t know before? Do you think this campaign will help others to seek treatment for addiction? Get involved in the conversation on our Facebook page! This is a subject that affects all of us.
How does addiction affect families? There have been more and more incidents reported in which families have been put at risk by the epidemic of heroin and prescription opioid drug use across the country. One recent incident out of Pennsylvania illustrates how serious the problem of family addiction has become. It led to the destruction of a family and a sister’s plea to others in similar circumstances to do everything possible to help a loved one overcome addiction.
This story in The Washington Post tells about how a seven-year-old girl woke one day to find both of her parents unresponsive from a drug overdose. The girl had tried to wake her parents without success before going to school. Later, her comment to a bus driver about her parents led authorities to discover both parents dead from overdose in their home. There were three other young children in the house.
Even more tragic, other family members were aware of the adult couple’s drug dependency and had tried to get help for them and their children. The sister of the mother who died from overdose had attempted to intervene by getting the couple to seek drug treatment or removing the couple’s four children from the dangerous home situation. In a video embedded in the article, the sister talked about how drugs had changed her addicted family member, making it a challenge to help her. “She wasn’t the person I knew. It was like the drugs had taken over,” she said.
The stakes are too high—get help for family addiction
A sad truth about addiction is that it never affects one person alone. Addiction is a family disease. This family addiction to heroin resulted in the most tragic of consequences and left their young children vulnerable until authorities discovered what had happened. Before that, their addiction had already created a risky situation at home: photos shared by the overdose victim’s sister showed a house in disarray, and the use of injection drugs also carries the risk of spreading disease and bacterial infection.
On top of those health risks, addiction is a family disease in how it changes, damages, or destroys family relationships. The behavior and personality changes of an addicted family member that come from heavy drug use often alienate loved ones—those who might be the best chance of helping their addicted family member find treatment for their drug problem. Speaking out to others trying to get a loved one to seek help for addiction, the sister of the victim urged persistence. “Just don’t stop trying,” she said. “Make them understand…that you’re doing this because you love them.”
If you have a loved one struggling with a drug addiction—and especially if your addicted family member is at risk of heroin or prescription opioid overdose—help them find treatment for addiction. Even if it strains a family relationship, getting help for a loved one is the first step toward healing a damaged family.
“Those we are losing to the opioid epidemic are our children, our siblings, our friends, our neighbors and our fellow Americans,” Attorney General Loretta Lynch said, in prepared remarks to an audience at the University of Kentucky on Tuesday. The head of the Justice Department was in Kentucky for two events organized to galvanize public support for a renewed campaign to end the national heroin and prescription opioid epidemic.
Casey’s Law has been on the books for 12 years, but it remains a little-understood resource for making loved ones find treatment for addiction. The Kentucky law hasn’t been used widely, because even if people are aware of it, they can be daunted by the legal process they’re thinking about setting in motion. Whether or not one ends up making use of the law, it’s important that more people understand what it is and how it works. In this Stepworks blog post, we’ve compiled some recent news stories and explainers that shed light on many important Casey’s Law questions.
This helpful article attempts to dispel some of the common Casey’s Law questions people have when thinking about filing a petition. It provides some answers to loved ones’ questions about the extent of their responsibilities once they decide to file. This is a good place to start if you’ve heard of Casey’s Law but don’t know much about the process of filing a petition and securing treatment.
Over the summer Louisville’s Courier-Journal hosted a public forum on Kentucky’s heroin crisis, where experts fielded questions from members of the community. In this article, the paper has collected the Casey’s Law questions and answers from the event. One of the answers highlights the gap in implementation of the law across the state, as well as how County Attorney Mike O’Connell is attempting to encourage wider understanding and use of this tool for loved ones. Take a look at this article for a wider scope on the current use of Casey’s Law, as well as for questions about what you can do to encourage long-term recovery after court-ordered treatment.
Filing a Casey’s Law petition to get a loved one into treatment is often a last resort for concerned parents, family members, or friends of drug users. That’s partly explained by the lack of knowledge and education about the law, but there are also real hurdles to consider. This article covers a recent meeting between a Danville public attorney and the group Families Into Getting Help Together, or FIGHT, which addressed Casey’s Law questions. It urges readers to be aware that there can be high costs involved in the process from court fees, in addition to the cost of treatment itself. Although there are resources in the state for those who can’t afford to pay for treatment, there’s not always a guarantee that free or low-cost treatment will be available to the petitioner. Read this article for a sober understanding of why Casey’s Law isn’t in very wide use.
Casey’s Law might not be the easiest path to recovery for a loved one struggling with addiction, but for many people it may be a life-saving intervention. Lately the heroin crisis appears to have deepened, with recent waves of heroin overdoses and prescription opioid overdoses. It’s created a new urgency to steer people into treatment, even if that comes at some cost. This article provides a personal account of a Kenton County family’s struggle with the decision to petition to have their daughter court-ordered to get treatment for drug use. Reading this piece provides perspective into the thoughts and internal struggles of both the petitioner and the person for whom treatment is being sought.
If you’re thinking about filing a Casey’s Law petition to make a loved one enter treatment for drug dependency, and you’re interested in learning about addiction treatment at one of Stepworks’ 30-day residential facilities in Kentucky, please call our intake line at (800) 545-9031.
In the upcoming week, Lexington police officers plan to begin carrying a potentially life-saving medication to counteract Kentucky drug overdoses, according The Lexington Herald-Leader.
In past weeks there have been numerous reports of increases in drug overdoses, in the state of Kentucky and beyond its borders. Over the long Labor Day weekend, 15 Kentuckians were reported to have suffered from a heroin overdose. Although that number may not be as high as some officials expected given the recent surge in overdoses, a tragic fact remained: 12 of the 15 people who overdosed died as a consequence. And these are the known cases. This story provides some information about why we don’t know the exact number of Kentucky drug overdoses treated due to the process of reporting patient data.
