While on my way to a dentist’s appointment early in April, I took a short cut, tripped over the curb and banged up a leg. A small and very helpful crowd gathered, we had a short meeting and someone called an ambulance. When it arrived, two, really burly armed guys, dressed in black with flak jackets, got out, gently lifted me into the back of the ambulance on a stretcher, and off we went to Baptist Hospital’s … [Read more...]

  E-cigarettes--sometimes called e-cigs, vaporizers, or hookah pens—are a relatively new form of addiction. They pose cancer, addiction, and intoxication risks. I first learned about e-cigarettes when the 21-year-old son of a friend lit one up, inhaled deeply and exhaled what appeared to be a cloud of steam. My first impression, wrong as it turned out, was that this was perhaps a clean alternative to nicotine-laden smoke. A visit to the Betty Ford Hazelden web site disabused me … [Read more...]

Don’t drink if you are pregnant or may become pregnant. Period. It sounds harsh, but not to those who are paying the price. Cynthia Crone, a former member of the UAMS Partners for Inclusive Communities, the coordinator for the Closing the Addiction Treatment Gap project and a founder of ArkansasCARES is a nurse who knows about the effects of abusing alcohol, prescription drugs and other and other narcotics on individuals and families. Like this family, for instance. Ginny’s mother and … [Read more...]

Tragically, half of American families have been touched by alcohol or other drug addictions. Often our impulse is to comfort rather than confront the afflicted when it would be better to intervene and do what we can to stop the behavior and ultimately save a life. It can be a tough call, but offering comfort contains within it the seeds of destruction we don’t always recognize. It’s called “enabling.” Enabling, at first, seems helpful—doing for others what they can’t seem to do for … [Read more...]

Many years ago, Dr. Robert Lewis, my pastor at Little Rock’s Fellowship Bible Church and founder of the international Men’s Fraternity program, spoke in a sermon about the fruitful life of the prophet Abraham and about his death at a very old but still active age. Dr. Lewis, who helped me a lot with my recovery from alcoholism and the restoration of our family, said with some passion that when Abraham died he was “satisfied.” At the time, I underestimated the power of the message, but now … [Read more...]