A large-scale research project involving current and former heavy users of cocaine, conducted by by Dan Waldorf and colleagues, reveals important insights into how people use cocaine and how they stop using the drug. (3,706 words)
Factors That Facilitate Addiction Recovery
March 14, 2023 by
Recovery is something done by the person with the substance use problem, not by a treatment practitioner or anyone else. Whilst there are a multitude of pathways to recovery, there are a number of key factors that facilitate recovery from serious substance use problems. (9,586 words) *
My Journey: 4. Learning About Addiction Treatment – WGCADA Stories
March 13, 2023 by
Three stories from the treatment agency West Glamorgan Council on Alcohol and Drug Abuse (WGCADA) in Swansea describe a medical student’s experiences during a day with community support worker Dave Watkins; a client’s experiences whilst interacting with Arrest Referral worker Becky Hancock, and a client’s experiences in the Primary treatment programme at WGCADA. (4,644 words)
In the previous part of My Journey, I described some of what I learnt through a small group of practitioners (some of whom were in recovery) at the treatment agency WGCADA in Swansea. During my time at WGCADA, my colleagues and I wrote a number of stories, three of which I include here.
1. ’A Day in the Life of Dave’ by Annalie Clark
The first story is written by my daughter Annalie, after she finished her first year of medical training at the University of Edinburgh and worked as a volunteer for Wired In over a period of the summer. One of her projects involved following around WGCADA Community Support Worker Dave Watkins.
Factors Facilitating Addiction Recovery
January 18, 2023 by
In my last blog post, The Nature of Addiction Recovery, I finished by saying that I would describe the key factors that facilitate recovery from addiction in today’s blog post. In fact, I’m going to summarise these factors and provide links to my relevant blog posts of 2022 which provide much more detail. The descriptions linked to have come from a chapter of my eBook Our Recovery Stories: Journeys from Drug and Alcohol Addiction.
Hope: This hope is based on a sense that life can hold more for one than it currently does, and it inspires a desire and motivation to improve one’s lot in life and pursue recovery.
Empowerment: To move forward, recovering people need to have a sense of their own capability, their own power.
Self-Responsibility: Setting one’s own goals and pathways, taking one’s own risks, and learning one’s own lessons are essential parts of a recovery journey.
A Sense of Belonging: People recovering from addiction need to feel the acceptance, care and love of other people, and to be considered a person of value and worth.
(Gaining) Recovery Capital: Recovery capital is the quantity and quality of internal and external resources that one can bring to bear on the initiation and maintenance of recovery.
The everyday lives of recovering drug users
June 21, 2022 by
I recently found this very interesting and important piece of research from 2012, The everyday lives of recovering drug users by Joanne Neale, Sarah Nettleton and Lucy Pickering, which was part of a Royal Society of Arts project focused on addiction recovery. Here is what the RSA Director of Research, Steve Broome, said about the research:
‘This is a fascinating, in places touching, and, most importantly, useful book. Seldom heard personal accounts from 40 recovering heroin users reveal the psychological, physiological, and emotional journeys as they overcome their addiction. Ultimately, they are human stories that reveal simple and modest aspirations: recovering heroin users want to participate and feel valued as productive members of society. In the words of several interviewees, they just want to feel “normal”.
‘Women: Drinking and Recovery’ by Dr David McCartney
June 28, 2021 by
My good friend Michael Scott, of Michael’s Recovery Story, and I attended a Public Awareness Meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) in a Perth suburb today. I was asked to talk for five minutes about my recovery work over the years. I also described some of the factors that facilitate recovery.
We listened to a number of AA members share their stories and I have to say that I was blown away by the high quality of the shares. They were moving, inspirational and insightful. More women than men spoke. It was such a good meeting and I really enjoyed talking to people after the actual meeting ended.
Imagine my surprise when I got home to find that my good friend Dr David McCartney had just uploaded a blog post about women, drinking and recovery.
Factors Facilitating Recovery: (Gaining) Recovery Capital
June 15, 2021 by
Here’s the last of the 11 factors facilitating recovery that I wrote about in my book Our Recovery Stories: Journeys from Drug and Alcohol Addiction. Just because it is last, does not mean it is the least important factor. In fact, it is one of the most important!
Recovery is better predicted by someone’s assets and strengths, rather than their ‘pathologies’, deficits and weaknesses. People can make progress by identifying and building on their personal assets and strengths. Interventions to facilitate recovery must focus on helping individuals build their recovery strengths, more often referred to as ‘recovery capital’.
Recovery capital is the quantity and quality of internal and external resources that one can bring to bear on the initiation and maintenance of recovery [1]. It takes three main forms:
Addiction Recovery
April 27, 2021 by
Here is a section about the nature of addiction recovery from my new eBook, Our Recovery Stories: Journeys from Drug and Alcohol Addiction.
“There have been various definitions of recovery proposed over the years. For the purpose of this chapter, I am going to use a definition proposed by leading addiction recovery advocate William (Bill) L White [1]:
‘Recovery is the experience (a process and a sustained status) through which individuals, families, and communities impacted by severe alcohol and other drug (AOD) problems utilize internal and external resources to voluntarily resolve these problems, heal the wounds inflicted by AOD-related problems, actively manage their continued vulnerability to such problems, and develop a healthy, productive, and meaningful life.’
It’s Not Just About the Drug, Part 3
April 16, 2021 by
I continue my series of blog posts focused on drug, set (the person) and setting (the social context) [Part 1 is here]. Drug, set and setting is not only of relevance to addiction, but also to overcoming addiction.
The path into and out of addiction
The ‘person’ and ‘social context’ factors influence early substance use and the likelihood that a person will develop problematic use and addiction. In general, individuals are less likely to develop substance use problems if they have fewer complicating life problems, more resources (social, personal, educational, economic), and opportunities for alternative sources of reward.
One explanation is that these individuals develop a weaker attachment to the substance in that for them substance use does not serve as many emotional, psychological or social needs.
‘Community Recovery’: Bill White
March 4, 2021 by
An excellent paper by Arthur Evans, Roland Lamb and Bill White, highlighted in a blog by the latter, which I originally posted in December 2013.
‘In the Red Road to Wellbriety, the individual, family and community are not separate; they are one. To injure one is to injure all; to heal one is to heal all.’ The Red Road to Wellbriety, 2002
As a field, we have long known that the effects of personal addiction ripple through families, social networks and organizations. But might whole communities and whole cultures be so wounded by prolonged alcohol and other drug problems that they are themselves in need of a sustained recovery process? This suggestion is the premise of a new paper co-authored by Dr. Arthur Evans, Jr., Roland Lamb and myself just published in Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly.
‘From Trauma to Transformative Recovery’ by Bill White
March 5, 2015 by
‘Between 1986 and 2003, I served as the evaluator of an innovative approach to the treatment of addicted women with histories of neglect or abuse of their children. Project SAFE eventually expanded from four pilot sites to more than 20 Illinois communities using a model that integrated addiction treatment, child welfare, mental health, and domestic violence services. This project garnered considerable professional and public attention, including being profiled within Bill Moyers’ PBS documentary, Moyers on Addiction: Close to Home.
My subsequent writings on recovery management and recovery-oriented systems of care were profoundly influenced by the more than 15 years I spent interviewing the women served by Project SAFE and the Project SAFE outreach workers, therapists, parenting trainers, and child protection case workers. This blog offers a few reflections on what was learned within this project about the role of trauma in addiction and addiction recovery.
‘Experiencing Recovery – Part 10′ by William L. White: Recovery Paradigm and Addiction Treatment
July 17, 2014 by
The last part of Bill White’s 2012 Norman E. Zinberg Memorial Lecture from Harvard. Bill says he is not a teacher of these issues about recovery, but still a student. He encourages us all to be students of this rapidly changing ecology of recovery in the US. Bill also looks at what we need to do in the future in relation to recovery and recovery-based care.
‘A personal and social model of recovery’ by David Best
June 12, 2014 by
Here’s another excellent article from David Best which is essential reading for people trying to facilitate recovery.
‘There has been a subtle change to the role of recovery in UK addictions research, policy and practice in recent years, with a transition from the periphery to centre stage. But it can be argued that, for all the bluster, we still have a limited evidence base and we have not come far in developing an integrated or testable theoretical model.
Humphreys and Lembke (2013) have done a good job in summarising the ‘what works’ of recovery – focusing on three areas: peer-inclusive interventions, recovery housing and mutual-aid groups – so this article will not revisit that evidence.
What I will do is overview three key component parts of a theoretical model of recovery, then draw them together to derive conclusions about what we should do next to make policy and practice stronger in this area.
- Recovery capital – personal and social resources – the journey of growth
- Social identity and social contagion in recovery – the role of friends and connections
- Therapeutic landscapes of recovery – the role of location.
‘Doctors with addictions: double standards?’ by djmac
May 13, 2014 by
‘Doctors get addicted to alcohol and other drugs; there’s plenty of evidence of that. My question is: Do doctors with addictions get the same kind of treatment and outcomes as their patients? The British Medical Association estimates that there are 10,000 to 13,000 addicted doctors in the UK. Most of them will be in practice.
What is the expectation for doctors coming to treatment in the UK? Well, the goal of abstinence is pretty much accepted as a given (even for IV opiate addicts) and their access to quality treatment of adequate duration is greater.
Outcome studies from the USA consistently show recovery rates of 80% and there is evidence from the Practitioner Health Programme (PHP) in London this is also true in the UK. Most doctors in recovery return successfully to work.
‘The Potential of Recovery Capital’ by David Best and Alexandre Laudet
January 22, 2014 by
Here’s a classic text from David Best and Alexandre Laudet on recovery capital. This paper is part of the RSA project on recovery. Here is an introduction to the paper from the RSA.
‘The addictions field is now overflowing with references to ‘recovery’ with service providers and workers increasingly designated as ‘recovery-focused’, although in many areas there is confusion as to what that may mean in practice and what needs to change.
There is an increasing awareness that people do recover, but we have limited knowledge or science of what enables this to happen or at what point in the recovery journey. There is also the recognition that recovery is something that is grounded in the community and that it is a transition that can occur without professional input, and where professional input is involved, the extent of its role is far from clear.
‘Personal Failure or System Failure’ by William White
December 17, 2013 by
‘In my writings to people seeking recovery from addiction, I have advocated a stance of total personal responsibility: Recovery by any means necessary under any circumstances. That position does not alleviate the accountabilities of addiction treatment as a system of care. Each year, more than 13,000 specialized addiction treatment programs in the United States serve between 1.8 and 2.3 million individuals, many of whom are seeking help under external duress. Those who are the source of such pressure are, as they see it, giving the individual a chance – with potentially grave consequences hanging in the balance.
Accepting the mantra that “Treatment Works,” families, varied treatment referral sources and the treatment industry itself believe that responsibility for any resumption of alcohol and other drug use following service completion rests on the shoulders of the individual and not with the treatment program.
