Monday, June 15, 2015

A Benefit to Help Fight Addiction- Here is a printable flyer for the music fest and will be available to download from the Music Fest website. Please share


Bob Sofronski, Executive Director
Christian Life Prison and Recovery Ministries, Inc.
Po Box 1624
Southampton, PA 18966
Jeremiah 29:11
Sent from my T-Mobile 4G LTE Device


-------- Original message --------
From: Bob Sofronski <bobsofronski@live.com>
Date:06/13/2015 10:26 AM (GMT-05:00)
To: Bob Sofronski <bobsofronski@live.com>
Cc:
Subject: Official 2015 Music Fest Flyer

Bob Sofronski, Executive Director
Christian Life Prison and Recovery Ministries, Inc.
Po Box 1624
Southampton, PA 18966
www.clprm.org
www.musicfest2015.org
Phone: 215-833-2512
Fax: 267-988-4629
bobsofronski@live.com

Saturday, June 13, 2015

June 13 CHP 106 v 13 TWELVE STEPPING WITH STRENGTH FROM THE PSALMS


But soon they forgot what He had done and did not wait for His plan to unfold.
(GODS BIG BOOK)


STEP 6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.


Is that just like us! We get free from the chains and horrors of addiction only too get complacent and reckless only too find ourselves on the relapse roller coaster screaming for help again .Through self discovery this is one of my worse character defects (Impatience ,pride ). Complacency leads to impatience and that will turn into forgetfulness and forgetfulness becomes ungratefulness and Pride . We must never forget the hell we once lived and the pain we swam and almost drowned in. Waiting for Gods plan is a must and that plan is for our lifetime. Never become ungrateful and whatever you do train yourself to pray and wait it works and God will direct you ! Stay  thankful in every situation and watch how peaceful your life will become.

Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.

(GODS BIG BOOK) BY Joseph Dickerson


    

 Recovery Coach Training in Williamstown, NJ 
The next Recovery Coach class will be June 22 - June 28 in Gloucester County, NJ.
For more details, or to register for this class, click here.
 
Developed by the Connecticut Community for Addiction Recovery (CCAR), the CCAR Recovery Coach Academy at COA is a week-long training opportunity designed for those interested in serving as a recovery coach. It is the first peer-based recovery coaching and training program designed for people interested in guiding individuals into and through long-term recovery from alcohol and/or drug addiction.
 
Since January 2013, COA has trained more than 120 Recovery Coaches. To visit COA's Recovery Coach webpage, click here.
Take This Survey, Help Fight Addiction!

The Prevention Coalition of Mercer County (PCMC) needs your help in battling drug addiction!

This voluntary survey will take about five minutes of your time and will help the Prevention Coalition's efforts to strengthen our community's capacity to address substance abuse issues across the lifespan for residents of Mercer County.  We can see if we are making a difference by tracking community change over time.To take the survey, click here.

The PCMC is a community group made up of representatives from treatment centers, government, the healthcare system, the school system, parents, the recovery community and others. Its mission is to reduce substance abuse through collaboration and sharing of resources. COA is an active member. To learn more about PCMC, click here.
New on COA Recovery Radio

This week's "Saving Lives" is a special tribute to the lives that have recently been lost....35 overdoses in the past 7 days, and counting....in it, Jessi, Keith & Rob talk about super-pure dope, barriers to treatment, summertime triggers, the stigma of addiction and why, despite all the challenges & temptations, recovery is worth it! "It's sad but I have hope, because for each person we lose, dozens more are in treatment," says Rob, who is COA's Director of Community Outreach as well as a certified interventionist and Recovery Coach. 

If you missed this EXCELLENT show when it aired live, you can listen to it on demand...click here to tune in!

Community Forum on Opioid Addiction in NJ

The Rescue Mission of Trenton 

Tuesday June 16th at - 8 am to 10 am


Last year, opioid abuse claimed nearly 800 lives in the State of New Jersey. New Jersey is among the growing number of states where first responders can administer life-saving medication to reverse an overdose. What happens after?


As a co-sponsor of this event, COA will have an information table at this event. For more details, click here.
 
Drug Reality Forum

Best of the week from Choose Help

Avoiding Methadone Overdose During the Dangerous First 2 Weeks

Avoiding Methadone Overdose During the Dangerous First 2 Weeks
Your risk of overdose is higher during the first 2 weeks on methadone than it was before you started. Learn how to stay safe until you get stabilized.
No two people react the same way to methadone, it’s impossible to predict in advance what dosage you’ll need for optimum results and it takes about 5 days on any dose for bloodstream levels to stabilize – and until they do, methadone levels in your body increase by the hour.
Methadone saves lives, but it’s a potent drug with a narrow margin of error. If you abuse opioids then switching to methadone reduces your risks of fatal overdose. However, during the first induction phase, methadone treatment actually raises your risk of accidental death.
Don't get scared off by manageable risks; just be careful, understand how it works and use it with respect. Read on to learn more about:
  • The dangers of the induction period.
  • Why methadone is so dangerous in the first 2 weeks (and much less dangerous after that).
  • Warning signs of dangerous over-medication (knowing what to look for can save a life).

What Are the Dangers?

Methadone is an addiction treatment lifesaver, but you're at elevated risk of overdose until you get stabilized on a steady dose. Consider the following sobering statistics:1
  • In one study, researchers found that people were 7 times more likely to die during the first 2 weeks of treatment than they were while still abusing street opioids.
  • In another study, researchers found that people were 98 times more likely to die during the first 2 weeks of methadone treatment than in the period after the first 2 weeks.
  • People have been known to overdose during induction with starting doses as low as 30 mg per day.
So once stabilized on methadone the risk of accidental death drops substantially,however, during the first weeks of treatment, accidental overdose risks actually increase.
Three variables that may increase your risks of overdose are:
  1. Higher starting doses and quicker dosage raises.
  2. Using other drugs or alcohol during the initial methadone induction phase.
  3. Poor health, especially cardiac, neurological  or respiratory problems, or genetic factors that result in abnormal methadone metabolism.
Deaths are most likely during the first 3 to 10 days of treatment. People who overdose commonly do so at home, while asleep.

Why Are the First Weeks so Dangerous?

  1. Methadone has a very long half life, typically between 24 and 36 hours. This means that after 24 hours, you still have half (or more) of yesterday’s methadone in your bloodstream.
  2. So if you took 30 mg on your first day, you would still have 15 mg or more in your bloodstream when you took 30 mg again the next day, bumping your total up to 45 mg. The next day, you would have 30 mg + 15 mg from the day before and + 7.5 mg from the first day…
  3. Because the half life is typically more than 24 hours, the amount of methadone in your bloodstream will continue to increase for 5 to 7 days, even when you take the same dose every day. After a week, blood plasma levels can be up to 7 times higher than they were on the first day, even when taking the same dose every day.
  4. After 5 to 7 days, your plasma levels stabilize and you achieve a steady state. At this point, continuing to take the same dose once a day will no longer cause progressive increases in blood plasma levels.
So, for example, if you notice that you’re feeling a little over-medicated after your second daily dose, continuing to take the same dose on the following days could put you at overdose risk. Or, if you found that the first day’s dose provided a full 24 hours of withdrawal symptoms relief, this would also indicate a dangerously-high starting point.

Warning Signs of Over-Medication

During the induction phase, be on the lookout for signs of dangerous over-medication, and if possible, ask a loved one or housemate to also stay vigilant for any of the following warning signs. Although over-medication can feel pleasant, due to methadone’s long half life and the way it causes rising blood plasma levels for days until stabilization, what feels pleasant at one minute can turn deadly in the following days (or even later as you sleep).
Warning signs of over-medication include:2
  • Feeling high or drugged
  • Feeling unsteady
  • Nodding off
  • Unusual snoring
  • Being hard to wake up from sleep
  • Slow breathing or difficult breathing
  • Pinpoint pupils
  • Itching and scratching
  • Low blood pressure
  • Slowed heartbeat
  • Mental confusion
  • An unusual feeling of extra energy and the ability to stay awake for longer than usual without needing sleep.

Don’t Let a Loved-One Sleep It Off

Most methadone-induction overdose deaths occur at home after the victim first went to sleep. Loved ones need to know that methadone over-medication is a medical emergency that demands immediate intervention.
  • Don’t let a person you love try to sleep-off methadone over-medication.
  • Remember that blood plasma levels will continue to rise during the night and that by morning it could be too late.

Don’t Mislead for a Higher Dose

No one wants to feel withdrawal symptoms, so there’s a temptation, when starting with methadone, to under-report withdrawal symptoms relief to get a higher daily dose.3
  1. Zeroing in the correct dosage is tricky and dangerous. If you lie about how methadone makes you feel you put yourself at higher risk of over-medication and fatal overdose.
  2. Remember, methadone levels build slowly in your body and you can’t easily predict how higher doses will affect you. The little dosage bump that you try to get could be the bump that puts you over a dangerous edge.

Do You Need a Higher Dose?

Methadone dosage-needs are very individualized and what works for one person might not work for another, even if these people seem to have very similar characteristics.
If, after a week on a steady daily dose you experience signs of under-medication, then you likely need a dose increase. Signs of under-medication include drug cravings, insomnia, anxiety and depression, irritability, nausea and vomiting, diarrhea, cramping and other common opioid withdrawal symptoms.

Maybe Your Dose Is OK - You Just Need to Give it Time

  • If you feel OK at 3 or 4 hours after your daily dose but sick later in the day or over night, then you probably just need more time for methadone to accumulate in your body, rather than a higher daily dose.

Avoiding Overdose (Don't Top-Up)

To avoid overdose during the induction period:
  • Keep increases low and slow.
  • Your provider should assess you daily for any warning signs of over-medication.
  • Stay vigilant for signs of over-medication.
  • Avoid topping up with other opioids or other medications, drugs or alcohol.
So for safety, when starting with methadone, you have to start low and go slow. Though many people eventually find optimal therapeutic effects at between 80 and 120 mg per day (after several weeks or months of induction) federal regulations prohibit first day doses of more than 30 mg (plus 10 mg more if necessary) and in many situations, doctors will advise starting-doses that are lower than 30 -  40 mg per day.4
Unfortunately, this means that for the first days or weeks you likely won’t get all-day relief from withdrawal symptoms and drug cravings; you typically feel a little better peaking at 3 to 8 hours after your daily dose and then levels start to drop down at about 12 hours after dosing. if you feel good at 3 to 8 hours after dosing, this is a sign that your daily dose is about right).
  1. As levels drop down, you will experience increased withdrawal symptoms, though with some methadone in your bloodstream, these should be tolerable.
  2. As methadone levels drop and as you experience increased withdrawal symptoms and drug cravings, you may feel tempted to top up with additional opioids, or with alcohol or benzodiazepines.
  3. Do not do this! Using other drugs or alcohol with methadone increases the overdose risks at any time. When you do this during the induction phase, the risk of accidental death goes up substantially. In one study, researchers found that 92% of methadone overdose deaths involved methadone and another drug (benzodiazepines are particularly lethal when mixed with methadone).5

Take Home Message

  • Methadone is dangerous during the induction phase, but once you get past the first couple of weeks overdose risks drop substantially.
  • Although you may feel under-medicated at first, methadone levels in the bloodstream can multiply 7-fold over a week on the same daily dose, so it’s very important to begin cautiously with low starting doses and slow dosage increases.
  • You may not get all-day withdrawal symptoms relief during the first week or two of methadone induction. This is normal, and the methadone in your bloodstream should be sufficient to make withdrawal symptoms tolerable. The first 2 weeks of methadone are a high risk period for overdose and you elevate your risks substantially by using supplementary opioids, benzodiazepines or other substances on top of your methadone.

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Recent featured articles:

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And, as always, thank you for reading!
All the best to you and yours,


Martin Schoel,
founder of Choose Help
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Experts Discuss How to Quiet Self-Doubt

Thursday, June 11, 2015

UK: Kids and Drinking
Girl aged just 13 destroys liver through binge drinking     
A girl aged only 13 knocked back so much alcohol she gave herself liver ­disease, aSunday People investigation reveals. The troubled teen suffered cirrhosis of the liver after drinking the equivalent of nearly a bottle of vodka a day. Cirrhosis is so serious that a patient may need a transplant to stay alive. Staggeringly, the girl, treated at London's King's College Hospital in 2011, was not an isolated case. She was just one of at least 13 child alcoholics treated in Britain's hospitals for liver disease due to heavy drinking in the past five years.
National Conversation
Presidential candidates are talking about black tar heroin    
When aspiring presidential candidates step into the mayor's office here, he doesn't let them leave without telling them about what he calls one of the most pressing, dire issues his city faces: heroin. "Every candidate that comes in here, what I say to them is, 'It's not only an issue here in New Hampshire. It's a national issue,' " said Gatsas (R). "If we don't get our arms around it, it's going to take over our country." The nation is in the throes of an epidemic of prescription-drug and heroin abuse - a wave that's leaving its mark on the 2016 presidential campaign, too. Hillary Rodham Clinton has told supporters that drug abuse and mental health will be key issues in her Democratic presidential campaign ... New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) recently participated in a round-table discussion
Mommy Dearest
Daughter of Queen of Versailles found dead of overdose at $65m mansion     
Victoria Siegel, 18, was found unresponsive at her parent's Seagull Island mansion on Green Island Cove on Saturdayafternoon. She was the second eldest of the couple's eight children and is reported to have died of a drug overdose. Her parents recently appeared on Celebrity Wife Swap and admitted they don't spend much time with their kids and leave that to their large staff. The family and their extravagant lifestyle gained international attention after the release of the 2012 documentary The Queen Of Versailles.
ABROAD: Easy Does It
Why hardly anyone dies from a drug overdose in Portugal    
Perhaps more significantly, the report notes that the use of "legal highs" - like so-called "synthetic" marijuana, "bath salts" and the like - is lower in Portugal than in any of the other countries for which reliable data exists. This makes a lot of intuitive sense : why bother with fake weed or dangerous designer drugs when you can get the real stuff? This is arguably a positive development for public health in the sense that many of the designer drugs that people develop to skirt existing drug laws have terrible and often deadly side effects.

Counterfeit Drug Makers Use Call Centers for Sales - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Counterfeit Drug Makers Use Call Centers for Sales - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Abuse-Deterrent Formulations of Painkillers Aren’t Risk-Free, Experts Caution - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Abuse-Deterrent Formulations of Painkillers Aren’t Risk-Free, Experts Caution - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Tuesday, June 9, 2015


June 9 CHP 38 v 4 TWELVE STEPPING WITH STRENGTH FROM THE PSALMS


For my iniquities have gone over my head ; Like a heavy burden they are too heavy for me.(GODS BIG BOOK)


Iniquities - The Bible (GODS BIG BOOK) uses words such as iniquity,transgression, and trespass to indicate levels of  disobedience to God. They are all categorized as “sin Micah 2;1 says, “Woe to those who plan iniquity, to those who plot evil on their beds! At morning’s light they carry it out because it is in their power to do it.”

STEP 3 - Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

Living life your way will bring you to rock bottom and you will get on Gods program eventually .

Dead or alive God will have His way ,and rightfully so He created you ! Addiction is rebellion against GODS plan for your life ! Addiction took control of me and I became its slave. Addiction was put on a pedestal in my life and I worshiped it . It commanded me to do whatever it takes too feed it .I lied , cheated, stole , hurt , maimed , and many other evils to keep it happy .In return it left me sick , sad , broken , afraid , ashamed , and dead inside and out . 


1 Samuel 12:14-15 "If you will fear the LORD and serve Him, and listen to His voice and not rebel against the command of the LORD, then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the LORD your God. "If you will not listen to the voice of the LORD, but rebel against the command of the LORD, then the hand of the LORD will be against you, as it was against your fathers.(GODS BIG BOOK) By Joseph Dickerson

Monday, June 8, 2015

14 Percent of Americans Have Alcohol Use Disorder - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

14 Percent of Americans Have Alcohol Use Disorder - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Announcement from Seacrest Resources Accreditation Training http://www.behavioralhealthnetworkresources.com/
 
announcerFullName
 
Charles Davis
👔 Large Addiction/BH Event In S. FL. 6/24 & 6/25 Great Speakers, 12 CEUs & MORE ONLY $109/Attend, $450 Exhibit & 2 FREE
 
 
Group Members,

This is a special invitation to the 💃 Addiction/BH VIP Symposium II onJune 24th and 25th in Ft. Lauderdale, FL.

This is a two day event with exceptional pricing that includes two days of breakfasts and lunches (Exhibit $450 with two free passes, or Attend at $109) with great speakers (Jeffrey Lynne, Tracy Strawberry, Celebrities, and more...), CEU's, Gala for Addiction Professional Woman of the Year-Linda Potere, and networking for referrals.

http://www.behavioralhealthnetworkresources.com/.

You can check out Addiction/BH VIP Symposium I SOLD OUT event in January that also raised $250,000 in scholarships for The Addicts Mom.that received national attention from the FIX;

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/sold-out-addiction-event-raises-250k-addictionbh-charles-davis?trk=mp-reader-card.

Feel free to reach out to Charles Davis at 561.235.6195, orbhnrcharles@gmail.com with any questions. You can view his LinkedIn profile at; https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlesdavis1.

All the best,

PS. BHNR has one of the nation's LARGEST Addiction and Behavioral Health audiences in the nation. We have over 60,000 Addiction and Behavioral Health Professionals Nationwide. We connect addiction and behavioral health professionals for reciprocal referral relationships.

Get in our VIP Room where we frequently connect addiction and behavioral health professionals for referrals. BHNR is on the national pulse with addiction and behavioral health professionals, wanting to connect to increase their referrals, hiring quality professionals, searching for new employment, gaining exposure on a national level, and much more.

CLICK HERE to join our email list today http://email.coachingbysubjectexperts.com/h/d/3710C07B22559EDA

Teens Who Misuse ADHD Drugs Most Likely to Start Between Ages of 16 and 19 - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Teens Who Misuse ADHD Drugs Most Likely to Start Between Ages of 16 and 19 - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Teens Who Misuse ADHD Drugs Most Likely to Start Between Ages of 16 and 19 - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Teens Who Misuse ADHD Drugs Most Likely to Start Between Ages of 16 and 19 - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Presence of Volunteer Sober Groups Spreading at Music Festivals - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids

Presence of Volunteer Sober Groups Spreading at Music Festivals - Partnership for Drug-Free Kids