- Alliance For Addiction Solutions

Spring 2015
Volume 3, No 2
Official Newsletter of the Alliance for Addiction Solutions
Transforming Addiction Through Nutrition Integrative Therapy and Replace Prevention
Spring 2015 Newsletter
President’s Message………………………………………………………………………………………..pg. 2
Editor’s Note………………………………………………………………………………………………….pg. 3 - 4
Board of Directors………………………………………………………………………………………….pg. 5 - 6
Board Introductions……………………………………………………………………………………….pg. 7 - 9
Chapter News…………………………………………………………………………………………………pg. 10
Tele-Class………………………………………………………………………………………………………pg. 10 - 13
Honored Pioneer…………………………………………………………………………………………….pg. 13 - 15
Expert Advice: Notes on My Clinic’s Experience With Suicidality………………………pg. 16 - 18
Thoughts on Robin Williams……………………………………………………………………………pg. 18 - 19
Clinicians: Free App and Card for Suicide Prevention……………………………………….pg. 20
A Personal Story - The Brain Allergy Connection to Suicidality………………………….pg. 20 - 21
Cartoon…………………………………………………………………………………………………………pg. 22
Do’s and Don’ts For Comforting Grieving Families After Suicidality………………….pg. 22 - 26
Eating Crow: A Beautiful Theory Trumped by Genetic………………………………………pg. 26
Book Review………………………………………………………………………………………………….pg. 27
Review of Sierra Tucson Treatment Center………………………………………………………pg. 28 - 29
Holistic Gourmet’s Recipe………………………………………………………………………………pg. 30
Research Roundup…………………………………………………………………………………………pg. 31 - 37
Announcements…………………………………………………………………………………………….pg. 37
Join the Alliance & AAS on Facebook, Twitter & LinkedIn………………………………..pg. 38 - 40
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Spring 2015
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President’s Message
Happy Spring! New buds on the trees, flowers popping up all around us and fresh beginnings are on the horizon. It is a =me for new growth and o?en a re-­‐inspired hope for humanity. This is certainly my hope for our recovery communi=es. Our focus for this newsleEer is on suicide. A topic many of us would like to avoid. However, in light of the rising suicide rates we can no longer afford “not” to take a deeper look!! As many of us recovery warriors con=nue the quest for sustainably effec=ve solu=ons for addic=on, mental health, and overall wellness may we not forget the pioneers who have paved the way? Just to men=on a few: Carl Pfeiffer, MD, PhD; Joan Mathews-­‐Larson, PhD; Julia Ross, MA, MFT; Charles Gant, MD, PhD, ND; Hyla Cass, MD; Chris=na Veselak, LMFT, CN; Stan Stokes, MS, LPC, CCDC; Lianne AudeEe, LAc; Carolyn Reuben, LAc; Patrick Holford, BSc; Joseph Beasley, MD; Barbara S=E, PhD; Joe Eisele, CACII, NCAC; Daniel Amen, MD; Kathleen DesMaisons, PhD and the many more who have contributed to effec=ve holis=c solu=ons for recovery…I say to them and all the others “thank you”! The integrated approach to health and recovery is making headway…FINALLY!! As I remember from two amazing documentaries, “Origins” and “Hungry for Change,” the state of our overall health, depression, anxiety and addic=on are con=ngent upon our lifestyle, nutri=on, food choices, and managing or even beEer, elimina=ng, STRESS. Educa=on, awareness and community connec=ons are the keys! The Alliance offers that. Let us take our keys and open more doors together. We invite you to join us and become a member if you have not already and be a part of the rising change in recovery, mental health and overall wellness!! Best in health, heart and recovery, Pati Reiss, HHC
President, AAS Board of Director 2
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Editor’s Note
S.R., a Berkeley-­‐based filmmaker and translator, lived in a book-­‐filled apartment on the edge of poverty and in a state of depression for decades. Knowing her grandmother had put aside money for her for when she needed it most in her later years comforted her. And then in 2007, she discovered her mother had spent every cent of the money and there would be no inheritance. Shortly therea?er she called me at my home in Sacramento to say she appreciated what a good friend I had been to her. Knowing she was concerned about finances I assured her she would never be homeless no maEer what her income, as she could always stay with me. Somewhere in the conversa=on I heard the word suicide. I asked her was she thinking of killing herself? She just repeated how thankful she was for our friendship. To this day I regret not bouncing off the phone and into the car to drive the hour and a half to Berkeley to save her from herself, for she had ordered a canister of helium gas to be delivered to her apartment, and a few days a?er our conversa=on, the day that she chose to end her life, a day she made sure her psychiatrist was out of town on vaca=on, she sealed a plas=c bag around her head to shut off oxygen and inhaled the gas. S.R. was far from alone in commieng suicide. There is one suicide in the U.S. every 13 minutes. Last year in March, fashion designer L’Wren ScoE, age 49, and in August actor Robin Williams, age 63, died by their own hands. Most suicides of male adults are over age 75 while most suicides of female adults are ages 45-­‐54. However, there are more suicide aEempts among young people ages 18-­‐29 than any other age group. In fact more teens and young adults die from suicide than from major killers like cancer, heart disease, birth defects, AIDS, pneumonia and chronic lung disease combined www.save.org The press is s=ll wondering why a 27 year old Germanwings pilot with a history of depression took down the en=re airline with 150 innocent people on board rather than just neatly shoot himself with a gun like most men do. The press has not, to my knowledge, even once ques=oned whether something done in treatment itself might have been at least partly to blame. The young man had been in therapy. Look at www.accessdata.fda.gov. You will see this warning: An=depressants increased the risk compared to placebo of suicidal thinking and behavior (suicidality) in children, adolescents, and young adults in short-­‐term studies of major depressive disorder (MDD) and other 3
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Editor’s Note Carolyn Reuben, LAc con8nued psychiatric disorders. Is it possible that the pharmaceu=cals given to this young man whose brain was already malfunc=oning are involved in his homicidal suicide in the French Alps? I suggest my colleagues in the American press look at pages 304 to 312 in Anatomy of An Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America by Robert Whitaker. Whitaker is an inves=ga=onal journalist. Under the heading Silencing Dissent, Whitaker relates how the University of Toronto withdrew its job offer to Irish psychiatrist David Healy to head the University’s Centre for Addic=on and Mental Health a?er Healy presented at a professional mee=ng the results of his study of healthy volunteers given SSRI an=depressant drugs in which two out of twenty became suicidal, and at a colloquium later the same year presented further data that showed Prozac and other SSRIs were linked to higher rates of suicide. This issue of the Alliance newsleEer asks you to look beyond the surface tragedies of loss to see what triggers people to act on violent thoughts of ending the life of themselves and others. We welcome your comments and experience with this devasta=ng phenomenon. It is comfor=ng to know we who are le? with guilt and regret are not alone. Please join the conversa=on at our Facebook Page, where you can find us under “Alliance for Addic=on Solu=ons Member” and mark down these links. I hope you never have to use them. Na=onal Suicide Preven=on Lifeline 1-­‐800-­‐273-­‐TALK (8255). Local hotlines: www.suicide.org/
suicide-­‐hotlines.html Carolyn Reuben, LAc
Execu=ve Editor
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Board of Directors
Lianne Aude9e, LaC East Haven, Connec=cut 619-­‐206-­‐0901 lianneaude9e@gmail.com Pa> Reiss, BA, HHC, NRC The Holis=c Gourmet and High Vibe Recovery Salt Lake City, Utah 801-­‐688-­‐2482 pa>@pa>reiss.com Joan Collins, ND, RN, BA, MH, CNHP CEO, Artesian Wellness & Recovery Centers Stuart, Florida 772-­‐260-­‐6162 – Cell 772-­‐320-­‐1555 – Office joan.collins@artesianrecovery.com 5
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Margaret Glenn, EdD CRC Associate Professor and Coordinator, Rehabilita=on Educa=on West Virginia University Morgantown, West Virginia 304-­‐293-­‐2276 Margaret.glenn@mail.wvu.edu Stan Stokes, MS, LPC, CCDC Fort Pierce, Florida 540-­‐947-­‐1262 standstokes@gmail.com Nataline Cruz, BA, MA, LMT Strawberry Moon Energe=cs, Holis=c Healing & Tradi=onal Medicine Lakewood, Colorado 720-­‐350-­‐2306 cruzlove99@aol.com Joe Eisele, CACIII, NCAC Clinical Director, InnerBalance Health Center Loveland, Colorado 970-­‐689-­‐7575 jerover@gmail.com Michael Kass, MA, of the Love and Trauma Center in Denver, Colorado, has le6 the Board as of March 2015. 6
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Board Introductions
By Carolyn Reuben, LAc The February 2015 Issue of the newsleEer introduced four of our Board of Directors. Here is a chance to get to know the remaining three members: Joan Collins, ND, RN, BA, MH, CNHP Stuart, Florida Joan Collins is a Registered Nurse, Cer=fied Natural Health Professional, Master Herbalist, and Naturopath with an addi=onal degree in psychology and training in the use of homeopathy and other non-­‐pharmaceu=cal approaches to geeng well. She is also the founder-­‐director of Artesian Wellness and Recovery Centers in Stuart, Florida, two separate popula=ons of people eager to find balance emo=onally and physically. Her recovery program, she explains, “is founded upon the belief that at the basis of the majority of addic=on is a brain with damaged neurotransmiEers.” To create successful healing in her clients Collins provides intensive nutri=onal meals and beverages six to eight =mes a day in addi=on to intravenous amino acids and targeted nutrients like high doses of oral sodium ascorbate. If a client is withdrawing from opiate use she will customize their care with acupuncture, homeopathics such as arnica for muscle pain, or other remedies for nerve pain. A pa=ent may receive chiroprac=c care, or specialized supplements to reduce inflamma=on, balance hormones, increase specific vitamin deficiencies, and address methyla=on issues, a gene=c defect that necessitates methylated folic acid for proper metabolism of that B vitamin. While many people in the Alliance begin their work due to family members with addic=on problems, in Collins’ case it was a family member with hypoglycemia that ini=ated her journey. And then, when her husband developed Parkinson’s disease, her search for brain repair became more pressing s=ll. What it came to again and again was intravenous nutrients. “I think people are more afraid of it than they should be,” she said. Though IV nutrients can’t cure Parkinson’s, she found they could help retard its progression by many years and help avoid a muddled brain from pharmaceu=cal drugs. With clients at her recovery center Collins sees the results on their faces in pre and post photos. “ Their brain is clear to set goals and has a sense of wellbeing because their serotonin is working. They have an ability to focus because their dopamine is restored. They can relax because they have enough GABA!” By the third IV and along with an improved diet they don’t have post acute withdrawal syndrome (PAWS). This allows the person in therapy to work on the psychosocial issues that have developed as a result of their addic=on. “ They 7
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Board Introduc8ons Carolyn Reuben, LAc con8nued need the behavioral changes,” she says, “but when the clients are not using anything but medica=ons (most given to them in other treatment centers are addic=ve as well), they leave those other treatment centers with PAWS, experiencing tremendous cravings, and then are expected to go out on their own and not succumb to addic=on. That is the reason for the abysmal results in tradi=onal programs.” In contrast, as a result of her careful individualized brain repair, a?er one year 85% of her clients are s=ll clean and sober. “I love seeing people regaining hope,” says Collins. “It’s almost like a ministry to me.” Nataline Cruz, BA, MA, LMT Lakewood, Colorado When a younger brother in a fit of despair shot himself in the head and the doctors’ prognosis was dire, Nataline Cruz was inspired to put her hands on her brother and will him to survive. Her two younger brothers and father all had alcohol issues and from that moment in the hospital she dedicated herself to save them from themselves and in doing so, as she describes it, “to put the world right again.” Though she has a bachelor’s degree in English and a master’s in English and crea=ve wri=ng, Cruz followed a spiritual path and sought mentors to teach her to use her intui=ve powers of healing through energy, counseling, and what is called in Spanish a placDca or “heart to heart conversa=on.” Her family background is a mixture of Sicilian, Polish, Austrian, French, Na=ve American, Spanish, and Mexican. She calls her business Strawberry Moon Energe=cs, Holis=c Healing & Tradi=onal Medicine a?er the Na=ve American ceremony in June each year that focuses on healing women with all parts of the strawberry plant. Nataline will work on anyone who suffers from mental, emo=onal, and physical distress. Some may call her a curandera or shaman. What she knows, she says, is that she must search for a root cause of blocked energy, a statement overheard or experience from childhood that stunted the soul and was carried in the unconscious, stopping the blossoming of people into their finest self. It frequently expresses itself as addic=on, she finds. “I explain to them how every =me they get high their soul is fragmented.” “What I love about the Alliance is the shame is removed and the first book I give to someone struggling with addic=on. The book Seven Weeks to Sobriety (by Joan Mathews Larson, PhD, Alliance cofounder) is the first book I give them. I say, ‘Check it out’! You are not in this situa=on because you're a bad person. Look at the science! For example, if you have an Indigenous ancestry then you may be allergic to alcohol which would cause you to be more suscep=ble to alcoholism. When they understand their brain chemistry they are empowered.” Cruz says healers tradi=onally work for their community. In the old tradi=on where you lived was your community but now thanks to technology people from all over the United States come to see her. So, now, she says, “the world is my community.” She hopes 8
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Board Introduc8ons Carolyn Reuben, LAc con8nued the Alliance will reach out even farther into the world connec=ng the dots for people in the throes of addic=on who need to know the missing piece for recovery that we know is brain repair. Pa8 Reiss, HHC Salt Lake City, Utah If you can imagine a holis=c addict, that was Pa= Reiss. A Cer=fied Holis=c Health Coach carefully choosing to use organic wine and marijuana and driving herself close to death with her life of addic=on un=l the scaEered elements of food, behavior, will, and supplements came together and recovery truly happened. First came the food piece. Ea=ng organic. Hun=ng for dandelions on the grass of her treatment program in Salt Lake City to add beEer nutri=on to the iceberg leEuce they were serving at meals. And then on a bookshelf in her sober living home she found Potatoes Not Prozac by Kathleen DesMaisons, PhD. It described the brain chemistry connec=on to addic=ve cravings. She dove into the Internet and found The Mood Cure by Julia Ross, MA, MFT (an Alliance co-­‐founder) which further described the symptoms of low blood sugar, the Pro-­‐
Recovery Diet, and the amino acid supplements that could quickly rebuild the brain’s serotonin system with L-­‐tryptophan and eliminate anxiety with GABA. Reiss found out when you are hypoglycemic a good organic vegetable salad isn’t good enough. She followed the advice of her new mentors and ate protein and healthy fat every four hours. Out of treatment, she joined the Alliance and trained in neuronutri=on with Julia Ross and another Alliance co-­‐founder, Chris=na Veselak, LMFT, CN. Now Reiss is President of the Alliance Board of Directors and has helped develop the Core Training provided by the Alliance at conferences in Virginia, Los Angeles, and Denver. She is also par=cipa=ng in Utah Eats, a nonprofit to educate children in the joy of whole foods. And works as a health coach and nutri=on recovery coach and educator, teaches medita=on, and designs pro-­‐recovery menus for a treatment center in Midway, Utah. “My vision for the future of the Alliance,” says our President, “is to help educate people about the powerful connec=on between food, amino acid therapy, mental health, and addic=on. Also bringing in integra=ve modali=es like yoga, medita=on, and exercise. As people take care of themselves and live a healthy lifestyle the magic starts happening crea=ng a happy healthy recovery.” Not an idle dream since it already happened to her. 9
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Chapter News
Denver The Denver Chapter has been quiescent for a few months but is planning some sparkling ac=vi=es this summer. Contact Chris=na Veselak , LMFT, CN at chris>naveselak@gmail.com or 1-­‐303-­‐888-­‐9617. Florida The Florida chapter is in the development, planning, and recrui=ng stage, according to Lyle Fried, CAP, ICADC, CHC who is CEO at Shores Treatment and Recovery in Port St. Lucie. The group is focusing on encouraging the recovery community in South Florida to add holis=c protocols without the fear they have to start new with the unknown. Complementary services can be added on slowly to exis=ng programs. People in Florida interested in networking with the Alliance chapter there can contact Paul Bowman at drpaulbowmanjr@gmail.com or call 386-­‐310-­‐4417. Paul recently moved to the Greater Daytona Beach area. FREE TELE-CLASS FOR MEMBERS
AND SUPPORTERS
You are invited to join us for the Alliance Community Tele-­‐class Series! The tele-­‐classes will offer educa=on, connec=on, inspira=on, direc=on, and hope. There will be two types of tele-­‐classes held, the Inspira=onal Speaker Series and the Success Story Series alterna=ng each month, beginning with the Inspira=onal Speaker Series. Each class will be approximately 45 minutes and audio recorded so members will be able to access all tele-­‐classes if they are unable to par=cipate live. On each day you will need to call this number: 1-­‐605-­‐562-­‐0020 and when prompted enter the mee=ng ID: 968-­‐694-­‐896. •
•
•
•
11:00am PT 12:00pm MT 1:00pm CT 2:00pm ET 10
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Tele-­‐Class con8nued There will be two types of tele-­‐classes held, the Inspira=onal Speaker Series and the Success Story Series alterna=ng each month. Inspira>onal Speaker Series This series highlights those prac==oners and researchers who have experienced great success u=lizing the powerful brain transforming methods the Alliance promotes. Each speaker will highlight a par=cular aspect of this with case presenta=ons and cueng edge informa=on you can easily use in your own prac=ce and life. The Success Story Series This series will focus on real life stories of how people struggling with addic=on or mood disorders have turned their lives around through amino acid therapy and other methods not commonly used by tradi=onal programs. The second half of the call is a Q&A. This is an excellent opportunity to explore the leading edge of addic=on and mood disorder recovery, and is perfect if you are a prac==oner interested in exploring these modali=es in your own work, a family member/friend of someone who is struggling, or you are struggling yourself. Wednesday, June 3, 2015
Dr. Joan Collins, ND, RN, BA, MH, CNHP will be our next guest speaker for The Success Story Series. Dr. Collins, is the founder of Artesian Transi=onal Housing and Artesian Wellness and Recovery Centers, is a registered nurse, has a degree in psychology, and is a naturopathic doctor. Dr. Collins is very dedicated to the wellness of all, especially those with addic=ons. Dr. Collins, will share the success story of a 64-­‐year-­‐old male with lifelong addic=on to alcohol and mul= drug use. He had been to many treatment centers and came to Artesian Wellness and Recovery centers because of the wellness approach to trea=ng addic=on. He presented along with addic=on a complex medical history of diabetes, very high blood pressure, and full body psoriasis: All successfully resolving within his first 30 days using an intensive nutri=onal approach. To learn more about Joan see Board Introduc=ons on page 6-­‐7 or click on this link: h9p://
www.artesianrecovery.com/ 11
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Tele-­‐class continued Wednesday, July 1, 2015
Julia Ross, MA, MFT, will be our next guest speaker for the Inspira8onal Speaker Series. Julia Ross is one of the original envisioners and cofounders of the Alliance, the author of two best sellers, The Diet Cure and The Mood Cure, and a 40 year veteran in the addic=on-­‐
treatment field. h9p://www.dietcure.com/ and h9p://moodcure.com/ Julia will share how she developed her successful non tradi=onal approach star=ng in the 1980s, and how this approach transforms the addic=ve brain. She’ll specifically highlight her work with marijuana, an=depressant, and food-­‐
dependent clients. Wednesday, August 5, 2015
Dr. Chas Gant, M.D., Ph.D., will be our next guest speaker for The Success Story Series. Dr. Gant’s will be speaking on “A New Understanding of the Role of Noradrenaline, Methyla8on and NeurotransmiPers in Addic8on Recovery”. It is becoming clear that addic=on recovery may have more to do with mi=ga=ng the effects of the flight/flight neurotransmiEer Noradrenaline, than it does with replenishment of the stress modifying hormones, such as Seratonin and Dopamine. Learn why this is such an important understanding and how to apply it. Dr. Chas Gant, MD, PhD is an interna=onally known author and integra=ve /func=onal medicine physician. In his clinical prac=ce, he addresses the root causes of chronic medical and psychiatric disorders, which are unique to each pa=ent. He has found that this science-­‐based approach can reverse the biochemical roots of aggression, depression, fa=gue, mood disorders, addic=on, and mental disorders, as well as medical disorders, which brings authen=c healing and recovery. Dr. Gant pioneered many of the nutri=onal and detoxifica=on treatments for the treatment of substance abuse and other mental disorders while serving as the medical director of Tully Hill Hospital, as a medical consultant at Syracuse Behavioral Healthcare, and as a psychiatric consultant at numerous substance abuse and mental health clinics throughout Central New 12
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Tele-­‐class con8nued Dr. Chas Gant, MD, Ph.D con8nued York. These protocols are currently being duplicated around the country. Dr. Gant is ac=ve in providing training for other clinicians, as well as the general public. He is currently the Director of Educa=on and Training for The Academy of Func=onal Medicine and Genomics. He has authored numerous books, including End Your AddicDon Now, End Your NicoDne AddicDon Now, and ADHD Complementary and AlternaDve Medicine SoluDons. To learn more about Dr. Chas Gant please refer to his website at this link h9p://
doctorchas.com The purpose of the website (which is s=ll under construc=on) is to bring his informa=on to the general public. For example, here is a link to a sample mini-­‐video for a general health educa=on series he is crea=ng: h9p://www.doctorchas.com/Dr-­‐Chas-­‐Key-­‐Concepts-­‐1.mp4 HONORED PIONEER
Judith Miller has a PhD in human development and family rela=onships with postgraduate work in neuroscience. It’s a far cry from her childhood chore of milking cows by hand on her family’s dairy farm in Minnesota. In past issues of this newsleEer our Honored Pioneers have been the mentors of our field from 25 to 30 years ago. Miller, the Honored Pioneer in this issue, didn’t open her first treatment center, Courage 2 Change Ranch, un=l January of 2004. However, what qualifies Miller, as our Honored Pioneer is her work the past four years with Low Energy Neurofeedback Systems (LENS). Before LENS while she worked with court cases involving dependency and neglect and high conflict it took =me to discover what really worked was rebalancing his brain 13
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Honored Pioneer Judith Miller, Ph.D con8nued neurotransmiEers with amino acids and nutrient therapy. That ini=ated his con=nuing sobriety and inspired the two of them to open a treatment facility based on what worked for him, adding to intravenous amino acids, oral supplements, and a pro-­‐recovery diet an astonishing array of holis=c pharmaceu=cal-­‐free treatment modali=es including equine therapy, wolf therapy, fishing/hiking/camping/mountain therapy, sweat lodges, talking circles, massage, acupuncture, Emo=onal Freedom Technique (EFT), Eye Movement Desensi=za=on Reprocessing (EMDR), and Bessel van der Kolk, MD’s trauma-­‐sensi=ve yoga. And then, in 2011, she discovered LENS therapy. Low Energy Neurofeedback uses a hand-­‐sized electromedical machine designed by Len Ochs at his OchsLabs in Sebastopol, California. It works on the same 21 standard spots on the skull used by an electroencephalogram (EEG) machine to measure brain waves. However the LENS machine isn’t simply measuring the waves. It is crea=ng new neural pathways. As a result, says Miller, “the brain becomes op=mally func=oning.” Unlike conven=onal biofeedback systems that take mul=ple sessions to alter brain paEerns the LENS technology resets the brain’s neural paEerning without the individual having to struggle to relearn to func=on correctly. For example, it can take as few as three sessions to treat post trauma=c stress disorder. In addi=on to PTSD it is used, says Miller, “for anxiety, depression, memory loss, trauma=c brain injuries, fibromyalgia, au=sm, restless leg syndrome, and almost anything else that has a neurological basis.” Addic=on, birth trauma, sports damage, au=sm, stroke, and other situa=ons can cause the brain to go into a nega=ve loop of dysregula=on that the LENS machine readjusts into a higher func=oning paEern. The most updated version of the system is called a LENSware 3. Can it treat Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s? Miller hasn’t seen cures, though she has seen a slowing down of symptoms for these two condi=ons. ‘I think we are one of the few treatment centers in the whole United States who are using LENSware 3,” says Miller with obvious pride, but she is even prouder of how she and her husband transformed a single family’s crisis into a successful model of integra=ve care. In fact, Miller is now an adjunct assistant professor for Drexel University of Philadelphia teaching nurses through the Internet in Drexel’s complementary integra=ve health care division her model of addic=on treatment. What she teaches them is that the old 12 Step fellowship model is certainly useful for addic=on assistance but first you have to teach your clients to count to 12. In other words, “before you aEempt to change behavior, change brain func=on first!” We honor Judith Miller, PhD, for her pioneering work with Low Energy Neurofeedback Systems and her ability to integrate such a delighyul banquet of choices for a client hungry for relief into a workable model of addic=on treatment. 14
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Honored Pioneer Judith Miller, Ph.D con8nued Courage to Change Ranches includes a facility for men and one for women about an hour’s drive apart in a rural area of Colorado where Miller and her clients can enjoy the great outdoors and a third center in Denver. See h9p://www.c2cranches.org/ for photos and more informa=on on her program. Here are some addi>onal links to the modali>es used at C2C Ranches: LENSware3: www.site.ochslabs.com Emo=onal Freedom Techniques (EFT): www.eZuniverse.com Eye Movement Desensi=za=on and Reprocessing Therapy (EMDR): www.emdr.com Wolf Therapy: www.wolfconnec>on.org Equine Therapy: www.humaninterpersonalservices.com Acupuncture: www.acupuncture.ca.gov and www.nccaom.org Massage and Addic=on: h9p://www.amtamassage.org/ar>cles/3/MTJ/detail/2729 Trauma-­‐sensi=ve Yoga: www.traumacenter.org Expert Advice: Jewels from Julia
Notes On My Clinic’s Experience With Suicidality By Julia Ross, MA, MFT Julia Ross, MA, MFT, is one of the original envisioners and cofounders of the Alliance. Before entering the addicDon field in 1974, Ross had worked as the resident manager of a psychiatric halfway house for three years. There she had her first encounter with a suicide and with several aRempted suicides. In 1980, she became the founding director of several innovaDve outpaDent programs in the San Francisco Bay Area. In 1988 she opened her own program, Recovery Systems, which treated food addicDon and mood problems as well as alcohol and drug addicDons. A6er 2000 she began wriDng well-­‐received books (two ediDons of The Diet Cure and The Mood Cure) on her successful integraDve treatment model. In 2014 she decided to close her brick-­‐and-­‐mortar clinic and begin a new, virtual, program hPp://www.dietcure.com that focuses exclusively on what she sees as the greatest public health crisis of all Dme: our mass addicDon to industrially designed edible drugs. (Her new book on this subject is forthcoming.) JULIA: I’m glad to share here some of the things I’ve learned over the years about suicidality. At my former outpa=ent clinic, between 1988 and 2014, my staff of nutri=onists and psychotherapists saw over a thousand clients who had frequent suicidal thoughts. 15
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Expert Advice: Jewels from Julia Julia Ross, MA, MFT con8nued Most of these clients had no plans and had made no aEempts. We found it easy to help them quickly dispel their “I wish I were dead” thoughts, using targeted amino acid therapy. These clients typically had many obvious symptoms of neurotransmiEer deficiency, primarily a deficit in the natural an=depressant, serotonin. These symptoms, including any suicidal feelings or thoughts, would typically disappear within a week or two on tryptophan or 5-­‐HTP, dietary improvements, and other indicated nutrient supplements. It is important to note that neurotransmiEer deple=on, though capable of genera=ng the wish to be dead, does not seem to be the primary biochemical trigger of actual suicide. Bipolar* and unipolar** depressions, not caused by neurotransmiEer deple=on alone, are more lethal. These depressions are deeper, blacker, and more incapacita=ng, and o?en include serious plans or aEempts. In addi=on, these depressions are not chronic as neurotransmiEer deficiency usually is. They are episodic, periodic, and cyclic. There are two ques=onnaires on the Mood Cure website that we’ve developed to help us dis=nguish simple neurotransmiEer deficits from more complex bipolar or unipolar depressions. The first is a neurotransmiEer deficiency symptom assessment The Mood Type Ques=onnaire. The second assessment, The Fine Tuning Your Mood Ques=onnaire, iden=fies many signs and symptoms of what is known as bipolar spectrum disorder***, which includes bipolar or unipolar suicidality. I hope that you find them helpful. Increasing numbers of people on the bipolar spectrum began coming to our clinic a?er the publica=on of my book, The Mood Cure, in 2004. (This in spite of the fact that I had specifically warned that the book did not address this condi=on, as we had not yet encountered it much.) We soon learned that the use of over the counter lithium orotate (5-­‐15 mg, one to three =mes per day, as needed) and/or Grounded****, along with the indicated aminos, vitamins, minerals, and an improved diet significantly benefiEed most of these new bipolar spectrum clients. Surprisingly, the amino acid glutamine occasionally helped drama=cally with deep depressive phases, probably because it raises glutamate levels. We started with one 500 mg glutamine capsule and went up if needed, as too much was known to trigger mania. (Note: Cau=on is also needed with omega-­‐3 therapy with bipolar people, who may become manic on more than 3 grams a day). The above tools were not as successful with our unipolar clients as with our bipolar ones, and none of them has been strong enough for the few ac=vely suicidal people we’ve seen. As a result, we've worked with suicidal people only if they were willing to also see a psychiatrist, because we found that they typically required “mood stabilizing” medica=ons (at as low a dose as possible), such as lithium carbonate, Abilify, Lamictol, (or Seroquel for the insomniacs). The unipolars, whom we’ve seen much less o?en, have typically needed an=depressants as well. Addic=on to drugs or alcohol, and an=depressant medica=on use can also trigger suicidality, with or without a bipolar spectrum factor. People low in the key mood-­‐regula=ng 16
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Expert Advice: Jewels from Julia Julia Ross, MA, MFT con8nued neurotransmiEers (most Americans!) typically end up on an=depressants and/or addicted to alcohol and street drugs. Fortunately, we’ve found it rela=vely easy to help many of these people successfully withdraw from these addic=ve/harmful substances. But not always. Years ago I lost to suicide a lovely man with a great life who was a benzodiazepine addict. He did not respond to the oral amino acids and refused to go for I.V. amino acids (which, when available in the past, were so effec=ve) or to do a long gradual taper off of the Valium using the Ashton Manual as a guide. My shock a?er his suicide drove me to learn more about this tragically ignored, yet all too common, consequence of benzodiazepine addic=on and withdrawal. There are s=ll far too few effec=ve withdrawal resources for benzodiazepine addicts. The Alliance would love to hear from any of you who know of any proven methods or programs. Joan Mathews-­‐Larson, PhD, in 7 Weeks to Sobriety, reported research showing that the suicide rate for alcoholics rises higher “in sobriety”. Fortunately alcoholics (as well as pot and s=mulant addicts) are typically so much more responsive than benzodiazepine addicts to amino acids and other nutrient therapies. However, when addic=on and neurotransmiEer deficiency or major life stressors combine with condi=ons like bipolar (or unipolar) depression, the danger of actual suicide, as in Robin Williams’ case, is magnified. Robin, a recovering addict in Alcoholics Anonymous who lived near me, was known to stop his psychiatric medica=on because it interfered with his manic comedic style. Since mania can suddenly switch into deep depression, this impulse to drop medica=on, so common among bipolars, can be very dangerous. So many opiate addicts die of overdoses. The line here between suicide and accident is o?en hard to discern. What is certainly their tragedy is never having had the opportunity to build up the levels of their natural opiates, the endorphins, nutri=onally, or to have experienced amino acid-­‐assisted withdrawal (either oral or IV.) To accurately assess the underlying biochemical imbalances of any addict, par=cularly of a periodic drinker or periodic relapser, especially a suicidal one, the possibility of a bipolar spectrum disorder should always be taken into account, along with neurotransmiEer deficits and other factors such as food intolerance, adrenal stress intolerance, and trauma. We’ve found this to be true in all addic=ons, including food addic=on, as well as in all mood problems. Over 90% of our clients of all kinds have done well without medicaDons because of the benefits of the amino acids, other therapeu=c nutrients, and a pro-­‐recovery diet. I wish that we had been able to find reliable nutri=onal alterna=ves to mood stabilizing medica=ons in all cases. But we, at least, have not. We have found that, with the addi=on of nutrient therapy, many severe bipolar and unipolar depressions tend to respond well to lower doses of medica=ons and are therefore spared the side effects of higher doses. I suggest that we make suicidality and medica=on tapering regular topics for our future Alliance member 17
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Expert Advice: Jewels from Julia Julia Ross, MA, MFT con8nued discussion sessions. Any immediate comments to this ar=cle would be Facebook Page, where you can find us under “Alliance for Addic=on Solu=ons Member” * Bipolar depression alternates with some form and severity of “mania” (typically euphoria, racing mind, impulsivity, agita=on, or rage.) ** Unipolar depression consists of periodic episodes of "major depression" (but no mania.) *** Bipolar spectrum disorder includes a wide range of expressions, from moderate to severe, including postpartum depression and hypomania, as well as the more well known manic depression and unipolar depression. These diverse, episodic mood problems cons=tute an increasingly common problem. **** Grounded powder, by Pacific BioLogic at www.pacificbiologic.com can help schizoid symptoms, as well as bipolar ones (as can formula=ons like EMPowerplus from True Hope www.truehope.com and Quiet Mind www.herbalogic.com Thoughts on Robin Williams
By Joan Mathews-­‐Larson, PhD It takes about an hour to drive the 47.5 miles from Pleasant Valley Road in Center City to 3255 Hennepin Avenue South in Minneapolis but the difference could be more than night and day, it might be the difference between death and life. Nobody can say for sure, but those of us who know Joan Mathews-­‐Larson believe Robin Williams might not have commiEed suicide if he’d rested his weary self at Joan’s Health Recovery Center with its biochemical repair techniques of lab tests and intravenous nutrients, oral supplementa=on, and neurotransmiEer regenera=on rather than weeks of talk therapy at the more famous treatment center he chose, instead. Joan is another of our organiza=on’s founders and an inspira=on for all of us in the field of neuro-­‐nutri=on for over thirty years. JOAN: Robin Williams was in Minnesota at Hazelden Treatment Center for depression and alcohol cravings un=l returning to California to commit suicide. He probably was on an=-­‐
depressants over the years and if Hazelden added new an=-­‐depressants, then all these drugs 18
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Thoughts on Robin Williams Joan Mathews-­‐Larson, PhD con8nued were con=nually firing his brain’s supply of serotonin, thus causing exactly what the Physician’s Desk Reference (PDR) describes. The PDR has put a black box around each an=-­‐depressant drug and a statement that it can cause suicidal intent.[1] They do this so they can’t be sued for withholding facts, that without increasing tryptophan which is the raw material that makes serotonin, then drugs finally have nothing le? to fire and now the depression turns to hopelessness. Soon a?er he killed himself I was asked to do 2 radio shows on the tragedy of Robin’s suicide-­‐ one out of Boston, and one out of Hawaii. Believe me, I had plenty to say about treatment programs “solving” addic=on with more drugs! The suicide rate with alcoholism a?er treatment is 1 in 4, usually occurring within the 1st year. There is a long list of studies referenced in my book Seven Weeks to Sobriety on abs=nence one year a?er treatment. In fact a summary of results of 617 follow-­‐up studies on abs=nence achieved through conven=onal treatment is on pages 15 and 16. I strongly feel that one can easily assume when today’s treatment methods add 2 to 5 new psychiatric drugs to brains already short-­‐changed by alcohol and drugs it results in a faster deteriora=on and biochemical collapse into more unstable states. Surely this field will finally wake up to medically inves=ga=ng the underlying causes of the suicidal depression that so many suffer. For 30 years Health Recovery Center in Minneapolis has done these types of labs on our clients and corrected their chemistry to prevent the tragedy of any suicide occurring here. My book Seven Weeks to Sobriety explains how we do it. For more informa=on about Joan Mathews Larson, PhD, her books, and her Health Recovery Center see www.healthrecovery.com 1. The U.S. Food and Drug Administra=on (FDA) reviewed a study of 2,200 children and adolescents treated with SSRI medica=ons between 1988 and 2006 and published the results in the April 18, 2007 Journal of the American Medical Associa=on. About 4% of those taking an SSRI experienced suicidal thinking or behavior, including aEemp=ng suicide, twice the rate of those taking a placebo. In response the FDA placed a “black box” label warning on SSRIs, according to the government “the most serious type of warning in prescrip=on drug labeling.” h9p://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/child-­‐and-­‐adolescent-­‐mental-­‐health/
an>depressant-­‐medica>ons-­‐for-­‐children-­‐and-­‐adolescents-­‐informa>on-­‐for-­‐parents-­‐and-­‐
caregivers.shtml 2. M. Berglund “Suicide in Alcoholism” Archives of General Psychiatry 41 (1984): 888-­‐91. 19
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Clinicians: Free App and Card for Suicide Prevention
According to SAMHSA (the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administra=on), “Almost half (45%) of individuals who die by suicide have visited a primary care provider in the month prior to their death, and 20% have had contact with mental health services,” so SAMHSA created Suicide Safe, a free suicide preven=on app for mobile devices and tablets to help providers integrate suicide preven=on strategies into their prac=ce. See h9p://store.samhsa.gov/apps/suicidesafe/?WT.mc_id=EB_20150422_SuicideSafe_Image SAMHSA also offers a free Suicide Assessment Five-­‐Step Evalua=on and Triage (SAFE-­‐T) pocket card for clinicians. See: h9p://store.samhsa.gov/product/Suicide-­‐Assessment-­‐Five-­‐Step-­‐Evalua>on-­‐and-­‐
Triage-­‐SAFE-­‐T-­‐/SMA09-­‐4432 The Brain Allergy Connection to Suicidality
A Personal Story By Chris>na Veselak, LMFT, CN Those of you who have been in my class are familiar with this story. It clearly demonstrates possible underlying biochemical causes of suicidal idea=on and behavior, which we don't usually think about. I was significantly depressed my whole life, but never suicidal. One summer, when I was 35, I woke up overwhelmed by the strong impulse to kill myself immediately. Life seemed dreadful and worthless, and I had to struggle with myself to not act on the overpowering impulse, which had come out of the blue, but persisted for weeks. A?er several weeks, I started thinking again. I realized that nothing had changed in my environment at all. Life was the same, and nothing bad had happened. So these impulses had to becoming from my biochemistry. I already knew that I was sensi=ve to eggs and they made me depressed, so I asked myself if anything had changed in my diet. It was summer in California and the corn was sweet, tender and juicy. I had switched from ea=ng corn here and there, to having it almost everyday. I love fresh corn! 20
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The Brian Allergy Connec8on to Suicidality Chris8na Veselak, LMFT, CN con8nued According to some sta=s=cs, corn is considered one of the five top food allergens in this country, and over-­‐exposure to an allergen can set off or exacerbate an allergic or sensi=vity reac=on. So, I completely eliminated corn for 4 days. It takes 4 days for an allergen to completely leave the body. On day 5, I woke up and was my normal depressed, non-­‐suicidal self! I was so relieved that I did not touch corn in any form for 3 years. By that =me, I had completely resolved the last of my depression and was happy. Life was going well. Then we went out to dinner at a Mexican restaurant, and I decided to eat some of the luscious, freshly fried corn chips on the table. Some food allergy reac=ons disappear over =me due to lack of exposure, so I wanted to test that out, in case I could go back to ea=ng corn again. It hadn't! Within three hours I was lying on the floor of my bedroom, wailing. It took everything I had to hold onto the idea that this was just a food reac=on, and I shouldn't throw myself into the ice-­‐cold water of the Gulf of Alaska and drown, because life was so horrible! I was fine the next day. A few years later, I had several sessions of NAET, an acupuncture protocol for elimina=ng allergies focused on corn. It resolved it to the point that I am no longer suicidal when I get exposed to corn, I just become a mean, nasty person! So I s=ll avoid corn. However, it occurred to me that suicidal idea=on and aggressiveness can be signs of low serotonin, so the next =me I got exposed to corn by accident (which is very easy to do!), I took 100 mg of 5HTP, and the symptoms disappeared within 15 minutes. Now I have a fallback plan, but I am s=ll careful. There has not been enough research regarding these sorts of reac=ons. However, the book Brain Allergies: The Psycho-­‐Nutrient Connec=on by Dr. William H. PhilpoE and Dwight K. Kalita has a lot of examples of psychiatric symptoms being caused by reac=ons to a variety of foods, and ongoing research is indica=ng that gluten and casein sensi=vi=es definitely cause serious psychiatric symptoms in suscep=ble people. I don't know if it is an IGE or IGG reac=on. However, my hypothesis is that by some means the immune response temporarily significantly lowers serotonin in my brain, leading to these symptoms. If any reader has similar stories, please post them on the Alliance website, or submit them to the editor of this newsleEer. See www.chris>naveselak.com for Chris=na’s services and courses. Chris=na Veselak, LMFT, CN is an Alliance founding member, former President of the Board, and creator of two on-­‐line courses in biochemical and nutri=onal approaches to mental health and addic=on recovery. Editor’s Note: It is possible that Chris=na’s incomplete resolu=on of her corn allergy could be caused by her NAET prac==oner not following standard NAET protocol which is to check for and clear any of 15 specific items that must be cleared as allergens before a pa=ent is cleared for corn. See www.naet.com or Say Goodbye to Illness by Devi S. Nambudripad (Delta, 1993) for details on this allergy elimina=on technique that can address food, environmental, animal, and chemical allergies. 21
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Cartoon
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Do’s and Don’ts for Comforting Grieving
Families After a Suicide
By Dawn Anderson The Chris=an Post September 4, 2014 “What miserable comforters you all are!” (Job 16:2b) A?er my husband died by suicide, most people were wonderful, but a few said inappropriate things that made this difficult =me harder. I'm now a pastor and facilitator for Chris=an Survivors of Suicide support group in Dallas, and have heard many comforter "horror stories" similar to Job's over the years. I believe most "miserable comforters" genuinely want to help the grieving person, but are making the mistaken assump=on that there are "magic words" that relieve pain. This misguided belief causes the would-­‐be comforter to not realize how certain remarks actually feel to a person in deep grief. I asked survivors of loved ones' suicides to tell me the worst things people said to them in their =mes of grief, and have aEempted to categorize those remarks by the feelings they invoked in the survivors. Minimizing the loss: "At least you have other children." "You're strong; you can handle it." "You have so much to be grateful for." "Well he was bipolar, right? Could have seen that coming." These types of comments add to the pain of grief because they aEempt to reduce the loss and make it seem less painful, rather than recognizing the deep suffering the suicide survivor is experiencing. Giving unsolicited advice: "You need to get over it and move on." "Be strong." "You'll find a new girl." As with the minimizing remarks, a grieving person needs to feel sad in the present and not think about the future right now. To grievers, these feeble aEempts to mo=vate or cheer them up feel like the speaker is telling them to ignore the pain they are currently feeling. Spiritualizing the loss: "God doesn't give you more than you can handle." "Everything happens for a reason." 23
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Do’s and Don’ts for Comfor8ng Grieving Families AXer a Suicide Dawn Anderson con8nued "You know she's in hell, don't you?" "He is in a beEer place.” No major religion teaches anymore that death by suicide automa=cally means hell, but this merciless thought persists, inferring that God punishes people for being sick. In our broken world, unspeakable tragedies occur daily, but that doesn't mean God causes or approves of those tragedies. Sadly some grieving people have turned away from God as their ul=mate source of comfort because of such misguided beliefs. Similarly, assuring someone that their loved one is in heaven is not helpful to a survivor in early grief when the mindset is: "BUT I WANT HIM HERE WITH ME!" Asking painful personal ques8ons: "Why do you think he did this?" "How did she do it?" "Did she leave a note?” "Did you have to clean up?" It is human nature to be curious, but probing ques=ons about the in=mate details of the suicide are invasive and huryul. Those who genuinely care about grieving persons should let them decide when and how much they want to tell about their loved one's death. Implying blame: "Did you see this coming?" "What is going on in your family? This sounds hereditary." "Probably [something the survivor did] is what sent him over the edge." To suggest that any of the people le? behind by a suicide contributed to that death in any way is cruel. Suicide survivors almost universally struggle with thoughts like, "If I had only [fill in the blank], my loved one might s=ll be alive." The last thing a person suffering suicide grief needs is a statement implying guilt on their part, or that they or their family is defec=ve. Experts es=mate that 90 percent of people who die by suicide suffer from a mental illness, whether diagnosed or not. It's no more appropriate to assign blame for a death from mental illness than it would be to look for blame in a death from another disease. Saying nega8ve things about the person who died: "What a selfish thing to do." "She chose to leave you." "It's too bad his faith wasn't strong enough." 24
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Do’s and Don’ts for Comfor8ng Grieving Families AXer a Suicide Dawn Anderson con8nued Although anger toward the one who died is o?en part of the grieving process, it is never appropriate to say nega=ve things about the deceased to the grieving family. Any comment that implies suicide was a choice, ra=onal or not, lacks understanding. A person who dies by suicide sees death as the only alterna=ve to unbearable torment — not as a "choice." Sugges=ng that a person in such psychological pain was trying to hurt those le? behind shows a profound lack of compassion and understanding of mental illness. If there was one change I could make in the way we talk about suicide, it would be to remove the word COMMITTED from the usual vocabulary. The word "commiEed" invokes language usually reserved for crimes. Most survivors prefer saying, "died by suicide," to honor their loved one's illness in a more appropriate way. As for comments inferring the person who died by suicide was weak in faith, it's important to realize many devout Chris=ans suffer from mental illness. No one would dream of saying to a diabe=c, "If you prayed harder, you wouldn't have high blood sugar." But it's amazing how o?en Chris=ans at least suggest to those suffering from mental disorders that a stronger faith will "cure" them. Remember how the apostle Paul struggled with the "thorn in his side"? God did not heal him, but rather offered grace. What to say: We've been talking about what NOT to say; let's end with what TO say. I also asked suicide survivors what were the most helpful things people said (or that they wish they'd said) a?er the loss. Here is a sample of those comments. "Tell me a good memory you have of my loved one." "I can't imagine how much pain you're in. We hurt, too, because we loved him." "I love you, and my prayers are with you." "What a terrible loss for your family." "The best thing someone could have said was NOTHING!" "He had value; he will be missed; he was a good person." "Focus on the way they lived and loved, not the way they died." "How can I help you today?" (Following through with errands, grocery shopping, cleaning, going to church with them, etc.) "I am so sorry for your loss. Words fail." "I'm here." And even beEer, many of the survivors I surveyed men=oned that the best reac=on was not words at all, but a hug. They talked about being comforted by the caring presence of friends, and the assurance that others were praying for them. 25
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Do’s and Don’ts for Comfor8ng Grieving Families AXer a Suicide Dawn Anderson con8nued The best advice to anyone who wants to comfort a suicide survivor is: "Show up, let them see you care, and respect the griever's right to feel bad for a while (guilt, anger, sadness, etc.). Too many survivors reported "friends" who avoided them altogether a?er their loved ones' suicides rather than to risk saying the wrong thing. Please don't do that, because that hurts most of all. Dawn Davis Anderson is an associate minister in congregaDonal care at Highland Park United Methodist Church in Dallas, Texas. This arDcle is reprinted with permission from www.ChrisDanPost.com. Eating Crow: A Beautiful Theory Trumped by Genetics
By Chris>na Veselak, LMFT, CN As with most of us in the Alliance, I strongly believe in the importance of a moderate to high protein diet, with protein being spaced evenly throughout the day. This is especially true for people recovering from mental health or addic=ve disorders, and in need of neurotransmiEer replenishment. However, I was recently reminded that we cannot ignore biochemical individuality. My daughter, for instance, can't tolerate more than a few grams of protein at a =me without geeng very =red and brain foggy. I assumed it was due to a lack of hydrochloric acid, but even adding a lot of HCL didn't seem to make a difference. She func=ons beEer on a complete vegan diet, which goes against almost everything I have been taught. And then I ran her gene=cs. It turns out that she has several muta=ons of a gene that controls the rate of ammonia produc=on in her body. People with these par=cular gene=c “snps", (single nucleo=de polymorphisms) produce too much ammonia when on a high protein diet, and need to severely limit the amount of protein they consume at any one =me in order to have energy and a clear brain. So, it is fine to teach our clients to keep their protein intake moderately high, and then pay close aEen=on to what they report. If they func=on beEer, great! If they func=on worse, take it seriously and dig deeper. Happy ea=ng! Chris8na Veselak provides basic and advanced trainings in neuronutriDon in her hometown of Denver, Colorado and at the naDonal conferences sponsored by the Alliance. www.chris8naveselak.com 26
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Book Review
Stop the Thyroid Madness By Joe Eisele, CACIII, NCAC Stop The Thyroid Madness by Janie A. Bowthorpe, M.Ed. is the best and most comprehensive book I have ever read on how to discover and treat condi=ons that accompany hypothyroidism and will make you far more educated and pro-­‐ac=ve when you enter your doctor’s office. It is very user friendly. One of the most important parts of the book that helped me with my own thyroid issues describes how low iron can affect thyroid func=on. Sure enough, when I got my ferri=n results back they were on the low end. A?er taking Iron Response by Innate Formulas my thyroid numbers have improved. This book takes off where Dr. Broda Barnes’ book le? off. Stop the Thyroid Madness is self-­‐published by the author, Janie A. Bowthorpe, M. Ed., through Laughing Grape Publishing: hPp://laughinggrapepublishing.com For more about Broda O. Barnes, M.D., Ph.D., a pioneer in the field of thyroid dysfuncDon and coauthor of Hypothyroidism: The Unsuspected Illness, a seminal book on the subject, see the website of the Broda O. Barnes M.D., Research FoundaDon at hPp://www.brodabarnes.org/
index.html 27
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Review of Sierra Tucson Treatment Center
By Chris>na Veselak, LMFT, CN A month ago I had the privilege of being invited to a Professionals Weekend at Sierra Tucson. Like many other higher end addic=on treatment programs in this country, Sierra Tucson periodically invites mental health and addic=on treatment providers to spend a weekend touring their facility, learning about the programming, engaging in some experien=al programs, and mee=ng staff, all while being lodged in a beau=ful resort and dined extravagantly. This is their way of marke=ng to a select community and veeng their a?ercare referral network. Sierra Tucson is a well-­‐established addic=on treatment program and psychiatric hospital which also treats chronic pain, trauma, mood issues, and ea=ng disorders. It has been moving towards the more integra=ve end of the spectrum for several years. Over the last several years it has become commiEed to a fully integra=ve approach under new management. “Integra=ve” means different things to different people, so I asked my local Sierra Tucson representa=ve to include me on the next Professional Weekend. I was up front with my criteria for pueng a program on my referral list: Along with comprehensive programming, I insist on quality, protein rich food being available all day, with a minimum of junk food around; nutri=onal supplements available and allowed (I want my clients to be able to bring their supplements into the program and stay on the nutrient protocol I created for them); and the inclusion of other modali=es that support brain repair, such as acupuncture and neurotherapy. I would like educa=on about amino acids and healthy diet to be part of the programming, but I can provide that myself. I was pleasantly surprised. The buffet style cafeteria is bright and spacious with a concert piano in the center of it. Along with a variety of hot meals served at breakfast, lunch and dinner, a well-­‐stocked salad bar with chicken, tuna, hard boiled eggs, hummus, and cheese is open all day. I simply don’t remember if soda was available. It wasn’t evident to me. They said they could accommodate gluten and casein free diets if cleared by the medical staff. However, 28
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Review of Sierra Tucson Treatment Center Chris8na Veselak, LMFT, CN con8nued there was so much variety available that I don’t think it would be an issue. There is an aEached dining room for the ea=ng disordered clients. The Medical Director, Dr. Michael J. Genovese, MD, JD stated in his opening remarks that he has been expanding his repertoire of medica=ons to include well-­‐researched herbs such as passionflower, and nutri=onal supplements when recommended by one of the two naturopaths on staff. Very unfortunately, neither naturopath was available that weekend. However I was able to meet one of the pharmacists and go over their natural formulary, which included many of the nutrients we know and love, but not all. The Director was clear with me that my clients could bring in their supplements, if they were in their original, unopened packaging with wriEen explana=on of purpose and direc=on of use. They would prefer that this be set up with the naturopath and pharmacist prior to arrival of the client. Our group was able to receive a massage, listen to a presenta=on by the acupuncturist, and experience neuro feedback and Soma=c Experiencing. We also got to par=cipate in equine therapy and an accessible challenge group exercise. All the bases in an effec=ve program were covered.
I recently was able to speak at length with Dr. Maureen Schwehr, NMD, one of the two naturopaths. She was delighyul and knowledgeable. She was interested in the Alliance and open to learning more about amino acids. She invited any referent to email her at mschwehr@sierratucson.com, or the other naturopath, Stephanie Stark, NMD, at sstark@sierratucson.com to set up the ini=al nutrient schedule for all new pa=ents. I currently have a chronically relapsing alcoholic client at Sierra Tucson. She is doing very well. Dr. Stark has been seeing her and has provided a thorough assessment of her biochemical needs, iden=fying and addressing some crucial areas. She also con=nued the nutrient program I had put this client on, while adding some other items. I think they are well on their way and deserve closer scru=ny. I don’t know how much informa=on is included in their psycho-­‐educa=on on using amino acids to help restore neurotransmiEer balance, or the necessity of keeping blood sugar balanced. Dr. Schwehr was interested in including some of my informa=on in her lectures. However, that is something we can provide our clients ourselves, before and a?er residen=al treatment. I was very impressed by the thoughyul depth, coherency, and excellence of services provided and have placed Sierra Tucson on my short list of referral op=ons. 29
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PATI REISS BA, HHC, NRC
Holistic Nutrition & Recovery Specialist
The Holistic Gourmet Does Tempeh or Chicken Lettuce Wraps
The Holis8c Gourmet & High Vibe Recovery Please use organic local ingredients as much as possible: ✦
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2 packages tempeh (non-­‐GMO), crumbled Or 2 cups chopped cooked chicken 1 small red pepper, chopped 2 stalks celery, chopped 1/4-­‐cup onion, chopped ½ cup fresh cilantro, chopped 1 large carrot, shredded or chopped ½ cup of hemp seeds 1 orange ( juice of) 1 lime ( juice of) Dash of sea salt 1-­‐2 Tbs of tamari (gluten free) or coconut amino, op=onal 10-­‐12 large romaine leEuce leaves, washed Coconut oil or avocado oil for sautéing Direc>ons: ✦
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Sauté onions in oil for 2-­‐3 minutes Add the tempeh. Sauté for about 5 minutes on medium heat Add chopped veggies. Sauté 1-­‐2 minutes Turn heat off and let sit a few minutes Add hemp seeds, juice from orange or lime, tamari, and sea salt Or, veggies can be added raw S=r and serve on leEuce leaves Happy Eats!! Pa8 Reiss, HHC, The HolisDc Gourmet and founder of High Vibe Recovery, teaches classes and counsels individuals in holisDc health and recovery. She is also President of the Board of the Alliance. Read more from her at www.pa8reiss.com 30
Spring 2015
Volume 3, No 2
Research Roundup
(Annotated by Carolyn Reuben, LAc, Execu>ve Editor) Dopamine Similar Dopamine Distor=on in the Brain in ADHD and Au=sm. An underlying biological quirk in the brain chemistry of the neurochemical dopamine seems common between people with AEen=on Deficit Hyperac=vity Disorder (ADHD) and au=sm, says Jean Gehricke, associate professor of pediatrics at UC Irvine’s Center for Au=sm and Neurodevelopmental Disorders. Gehricke in the past has researched the connec=on between au=sm, ADHD, and depression, anxiety, smoking, and drug abuse. In research published in December 2014 he discussed an abnormal allele (form) of the DrD4 gene found over-­‐represented in children with ADHD and au=sm. The allele, called the 7R allele, leads to aggressive and risky behavior. University of California, Irvine. "Exploring the ADHD-­‐Au=sm link." ScienceDaily, 16 April 2015. h9p://
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150416145425.htm. When I asked Kenneth Blum, PhD, who has spent decades researching the spectrum of abnormal behaviors triggered by an abnormal allele on the dopamine D2 receptor, he assured me that “It’s all about dopamine deficiency and D4, D1, and D3 also play important roles.” Opioids, Heroin, Painkillers Heroin Deaths Rose 39% in 2013. Opioids were a major factor in drug poisoning deaths from 2012 to 2013 according to the Centers for Disease Control and Preven=on (CDC). While heroin deaths rose 39%, cocaine deaths rose 12%. However there was only a 1% rise in prescrip=on opioid deaths that year. One cause of the steep rise in heroin deaths could be the common path from prescrip=on painkiller abuse to heroin addic=on thanks to heroin’s greater ease of acquisi=on and lower cost. In a statement on the sta=s=cs released by the White House Office of Na=onal Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) it was noted this was the third year in a row heroin deaths have increased. h9ps://www.whitehouse.gov/ondcp/news-­‐releases/2013-­‐mortality-­‐data And do you want to know why the government can’t get a handle on the problem? 31
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Research Roundup Annotated by Carolyn Reuben, LAc, con8nued They issue statements such as, “Substance use disorders are progressive disease, and, in the case of opioid use disorders, the problem o6en begins with a prescripDon, or taking pills from a home medicine cabinet.” Would somebody please inform Michael Bodcelli, AcDng Director of the ONDCP, that the problem begins with a deficiency of endorphins, which triggers drug-­‐
seeking behavior. UnDl our health care providers switch to non-­‐drug soluDons to drug seeking they are in a vicious cycle of perpetraDng their own headaches. Doctors Blamed for Opioid Crisis Doctors are the new mothers. It used to be mothers were blamed for everything that went wrong with people. Now the Annual Review of Public Health plunks the heroin and prescrip=on opiate epidemic right in the lap of the na=on’s physicians, cri=cizing them for overprescribing pain relievers. We have had a 900% increase in the number of Americans seeking help for addic=on to painkillers since 1997. Lead author of the study is Andrew Kolodny from the Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University. Kolodny calls for beEer access to addic=on treatment. It is so disappoinDng to have the problem highlighted and then have his soluDon be the same old shortsighted focus on public educaDon about addicDon risks, drug monitoring programs statewide, and control of doctor-­‐shopping by paDents. Why not figure out why we have so much chronic pain in America? And suggesDng wider use of acupuncture, which increases pain relieving endorphins, as does the amino acid D-­‐phenylalanine, and meditaDon, a proven pain reliever (see below)? Andrew Kolodny, Caleb Alexander, et al. The Prescrip=on Opioid and Heroin Crisis: A Public Health Approach to an Epidemic of Addic=on. Annual Review of Public Health, 2014; 36 (1): 150112150436006 DOI: 10.1146/annurev-­‐publhealth-­‐031914-­‐122957. ScienceDaily, 4 February 2015. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/02/150204125945.htm 32
Spring 2015
Volume 3, No 2
Research Roundup Annotated by Carolyn Reuben, LAc, con8nued Marijuana Potency of Pot Tripled Back in the 1980s the THC level in marijuana, the most psychoac=ve compound in the herb, was around 4%. In 2012 it was around 15%. Today it averages around 20% but in some cases can be as high as 30%, according to findings by Charas Scien=fic Lab of Denver, Colorado. h9p://www.drugfree.org/join-­‐together/big-­‐
increase-­‐marijuana-­‐potency-­‐since-­‐1980s-­‐colorado-­‐lab-­‐finds/ Medita>on Mindfulness Medita=on For Depression, Anxiety, and Pain Two studies an ocean apart suggest medita=on can replace pharmaceu=cals for common complaints of folks in drug treatment. One study in the United Kingdom’s University of Exeter and published in the pres=gious Bri=sh medical journal The Lancet found mindfulness medita=on training led to a 44% relapse rate while an=depressant medica=on led to a 47% relapse rate. Though the results were similar in terms of relapse rates, the mindfulness training was cheaper and offered par=cipants a new set of skills to use for the rest of their lives without the side effects of medica=on. In the second study, at Wake Forest Bap=st Medical Center in Winston-­‐Salem, North Carolina, par=cipants reported their anxiety dropped up to 39% a?er medita=ng. Scans of their brains while they meditated indicated increased ac=vity in the cor=cal areas responsible for controlling emo=ons and thinking. The study director, Fadel Zeidan, PhD, has also studied the ability of meditators to reduce pain. He found that three 20-­‐minute training sessions in mindfulness medita=on could reduce by 40% the intensity of a pain caused by the hea=ng of an area of par=cipants’ skin. His colleague Rebecca Erwin Wells, MD, found migraine sufferers prac=cing a combina=on of mindfulness medita=on and yoga, called mindfulness-­‐based stress reduc=on, for eight weeks had less frequent headaches and significantly reduced the =me of headaches and the intensity of pain. This is such good news! Policy makers can now point to research suppor=ng training staff and clients in mindfulness medita=on as a part of their response to our painkiller addic=on epidemic. 33
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Research Roundup Annotated by Carolyn Reuben, LAc, con8nued Willem Kuyken, Rachel Hayes, et al; Effec=veness and cost-­‐effec=veness of mindfulness-­‐based cogni=ve therapy compared with maintenance an=depressant treatment in the preven=on of depressive relapse or recurrence (PREVENT): a randomised controlled trial. The Lancet, April 2015 DOI: 10.1016/S0140-­‐6736(14)62222-­‐4. ScienceDaily, 20 April 2015. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150420213918.htm Wake Forest Bap=st Medical Center. "Researchers probing poten=al power of medita=on as therapy." ScienceDaily, 8 April 2015. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/
2015/04/150408085656.htm Selec>ve Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors Which States Are using SSRIs the Most and Least? Want to know where to find the most poten=al clients for your stress reduc=on clinic? Start in West Virginia. Why? Because in West Virginia 28% of people ques=oned by the Gallup Poll confessed to using a drug to improve their mood and relax. According to the Gallup-­‐Healthways Well-­‐Being Index the second highest use of pharmaceu=cals for mood enhancement is in Rhode Island where 26% use mood enhancing drugs, followed by Kentucky at 24.5%, Alabama 24.2%, Louisiana 22.9%, South Carolina 22.9%, Mississippi, Missouri, and Indiana at 22%, and Oregon at 21.9%. Perhaps you’re surprised to learn that in California only 15.8% of the respondents used a relaxing drug. Besides the Sunshine State, the ten states with the lowest figures for pharmaceu=cal mood cures are Maryland 17.3%, Utah 16.8%, Texas 16.7%, New Jersey 16.5%, North Dakota 16.4%, Illinois 16%, Wyoming 15.5%, and lowest of all was Alaska at 13.5%. The survey ques=oned 176,000 adults na=onwide; not detailing what drug was used h9p://
www.gallup.com/poll/182192/mood-­‐altering-­‐drug-­‐highest-­‐west-­‐virginia-­‐lowest-­‐
alaska.aspx As one commenter to this report wryly noted, the survey may be way off since pot smokers probably won’t consider their drug of choice a drug at all, “just a harmless old weed.” 34
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Research Roundup Annotated by Carolyn Reuben, LAc, con8nued SSRI Triples Atherosclerosis in Female Monkeys Heart disease is the leading cause of death in American women, and a quarter of the women in the US are on an=depressant drugs, mostly SSRIs. In a study at Wake Forest Bap=st Medical Center, 42 middle-­‐aged monkeys were fed the standard American diet heavy in fat and cholesterol for 18 months. Some acted depressed, and their mood state was recorded. For 18 months the en=re group was randomized into two groups, one given the SSRI of brand name Zolo?, and the others a placebo. Those given an SSRI were three =mes more likely to develop atherosclerosis than those given a placebo, and within the SSRI group those who were previously iden=fied as depressed had almost six =mes more atherosclerosis than those given the placebo. The report on this study concludes doctors may want to pay more aEen=on to the studies showing “exercise and counseling may be as effec=ve as SSRIs in trea=ng depression for many people.” Wake Forest Bap=st Medical Center. "Common an=depressant increased coronary atherosclerosis in animal model." ScienceDaily, 6 April 2015. www.sciencedaily.com/
releases/2015/04/150406165151.htm Sugar Take One Cookie and See Me in the Morning Here’s why the obese don’t lose weight on diet drinks: sugar suppresses stress but aspartame doesn’t. That’s the result of a study by UC Davis and the US Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service. It makes sense of the 35 % of adult Americans and 17 % of children here who are obese and why half our popula=on is consuming sugar-­‐laden drinks on any one day. We are an up=ght na=on trying to self soothe! In the study 19 women drank either a sugar-­‐laden beverage or an ar=ficially sweetened beverage at breakfast, lunch, and dinner for 12 days and for the three days before and a?er the study were housed at a research center and received func=onal MRIs of their brains and saliva tests of their cor=sol levels. Those who consumed sugar were less stressed by a math test compared to women drinking ar=ficially sweetened beverages and their brains were more ac=ve in the hippocampus area, which is usually suppressed under stress. My guts are knoRed into a fisherman’s net by any math 35
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Research Roundup Annotated by Carolyn Reuben, LAc, con8nued problem but isn’t this study rather sexist? Surely some of those women were math whizzes. Nevertheless it helps explain the indentaDon on the floor from the computer desk to the snack cabinet that deepens every Dme I’m feeling the anxiety of working on a wriDng assignment. MaEhew S. Tryon, Kevin D. Laugero, et al. Excessive Sugar Consump=on May Be a Difficult Habit to Break: A View From the Brain and Body. The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 2015; jc.2014-­‐4353 DOI: 10.1210/jc.2014-­‐4353. From Science Daily, 16 April, 2015 www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150416132015.htm Suicidality Suicide Underreported and More Frequent in the Spring Two grim studies of suicide conclude that Western countries are underrepor=ng suicide due to the s=gma associated with it and more people are successful in killing themselves in the spring than any other season. In the United Kingdom, for example, coroners tend to iden=fy suicides as Undetermined Deaths so as to not upset the family. As a result less money is focused on suicide preven=on within the mental health budget. In the United States, a study published in 2005 reviewed over 865,000 suicides between 1971 and 2000 and found they peaked in April and May! In the ra=ng of states with the highest number of suicides Montana, Alaska, and Wyoming are the top three according to the American Associa=on of Suicidology. In Pennsylvania, their Child Death Review Annual Report for 2014 suggests that as many as 80% of suicides by youth under the age of 21 are probably preventable. Most of those deaths (45%) died from a weapon; 43% died from asphyxia (lack of oxygen). It is cri=cal to pay aEen=on to warning signs such as previous suicide aEempts, a history of depression or another mental health condi=on, alcohol or other drug abuse, feeling along, a stressful life event, a family history of suicide or violence, and easy access to a method to kill oneself. Colin Pritchard, Lars Hansen. Examining Undetermined and Accidental Deaths as Source of ‘Under-­‐Reported-­‐Suicide’ by Age and Sex in Twenty Western Countries. Community Mental Health Journal, 2014; 51 (3): 365 DOI: 10.1007/s10597-­‐014-­‐9810-­‐z. ScienceDaily, 7 April 2015. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150407123056.htm Jong-­‐Min Woo, Olaoluwa Okusaga, Teodor T. Postolache. Seasonality of Suicidal Behavior. Interna=onal Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2012; 9 (12): 531 DOI: 10.3390/
ijerph9020531. ScienceDaily, 2 April 2015. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/
2015/04/150402081623.htm 36
Spring 2015
Volume 3, No 2
Research Roundup Annotated by Carolyn Reuben, LAc, con8nued Almost 5% of the world’s adult popula=on (240 million people) have an alcohol use disorder and more than 20% (1 billion people) smoke tobacco. The number of people injec=ng drugs is es=mated at around 15 million. These sta=s=cs were published in the Journal AddicDon on May 12, 2015. The study, called “Global Sta=s=cs on Addic=ve Behaviours: 2014 Status Report,” was commissioned by the journal and indicates that harm to society from legal drugs is far more than the harm from illegal drugs (257 disability adjusted life year per 100,000 of popula=on for alcohol use compared to 83 for illegal drug use. Most sobering is the comment by the journal’s Editor-­‐in-­‐Chief University College of London Professor Robert West who also coauthored the report: “It is a stark reminder of how the need to create shareholder value can work against global health and wellbeing.” Linda R. Gowing, Robert L. Ali, Steve Allsopp, John Marsden, Elizabeth E. Turf, Robert West, John WiEon. Global sta>s>cs on addic>ve behaviours: 2014 status report. AddicDon, 2015; 110 (6): 904 DOI: 10.1111/add.12899 Wiley. "A sobering thought: One billion smokers and 240 million people with alcohol use disorder, worldwide." ScienceDaily, 12 May 2015. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150512152746.htm ANNOUNCEMENTS
Interested in learning to reduce cravings, improve sleep, and relax anxious clients with ear magnets or needles? Carolyn Reuben, LAc provides 30 CEU hours for licensed acupuncturists (and all others welcome) teaching the Na=onal Acupuncture Detoxifica=on Associa=on (NADA) standard training over two weekends in Oakland in May. Contact www.acchs.edu/2015NADA for more informa=on. 37
Spring 2015
Volume 3, No 2
Join the Alliance
Mission and Vision of Alliance The Alliance for Addic=on Solu=ons envisions a profound transforma=on in the treatment of addic=on, making nutrient therapy and other modali=es for suppor=ng core physical deficits the founda=on for recovery. The goal of treatment will no longer be abs=nence alone, but also the elimina=on of cravings and the crea=on of op=mal well-­‐being through biochemical restora=on. AAS envisions being a widely u=lized and trusted source of informa=on on effec=ve holis=c treatments for addic=ve disorders. AAS envisions widespread, easily accessible treatment centers where nutrient therapy, acupuncture, exercise, dietary counseling, comprehensive detoxifica=on, iden=fica=on and correc=on of allergies, and a broad range of mul=disciplinary approaches is readily available. AAS was founded to promote effec=ve nutri=onal and other natural methods for the treatment of addic=ve disorders. We advocate the use of innova=ve techniques to establish individualized biochemical balancing of the addicted brain and body. On behalf of AAS, we invite you to considering becoming a member and be a part of the important efforts for the upcoming year. We encourage you to advise your peers to become ac=ve members. An associa=on gains its strength from par=cipa=on of its members. It is more important than ever that all voices be heard as we are facing many important issues. Each of our members has a special gi? they bring to the Alliance: scien=fic training, counseling skills, nutri=onal consul=ng knowledge, research experience and much, much more. Over the past year, we have been busy with numerous ac=vi=es to support this mission. I want to take this opportunity to update you about what we are doing and how much we appreciate your involvement in this exci=ng, meaningful work. We invite you to join and benefit as an ac=ve member of our associa=on. Website Our new website is up and ac=ve. Your membership benefits include the following: • Par>cipate in the membership directory, where you can create a profile describing you and/
or your business. You can upload a photograph as well. A chat page to communicate with other members, ask ques=ons and post interes=ng informa=on. 38
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• A Facebook page where you can con=nue in-­‐depth conversa=ons, post ar=cles and read what others have found to be of interest. This is taking the place of the former Yahoo group. You can find our Facebook group under “Alliance for Addic=on Solu=ons Member” • Event Page: Members can list their trainings, workshops, conferences, and/or webinar informa=on on the Alliance website at a discounted rate. • Sponsored Link: Whether you’re looking to bring in new website visitors or grow your business members can now place an ad banner, which will be located on the Alliance homepage at a discounted rate. • Job Board: Members can post job announcements that would be of interest to the Alliance community at a discounted rate. In order to take advantage of these membership benefits please follow the steps below: Visit our website at: h9p://transformingaddic>on.com/ • Located on the right sidebar of the homepage you will find “log in.” In this sidebar you will see “Lost Password” in a blue hyperlink. • Click on this blue hyperlink and you will be redirected to the password recovery page • Enter the email address you provided for your AAS membership applica=on and then click “get new password” buEon. • Your password will be emailed to your account. Please follow the steps to log into the member page and complete your profile Connect with the Alliance
Facebook Alliance has a Facebook page where you can con=nue in-­‐depth conversa=ons, post ar=cles and read what others have found to be of interest. This is taking the place of the former Yahoo group. You can find our Facebook group under “Alliance for Addic>on Solu>ons Member” Twi9er Follow us at A.A.S.@TransformingAAS or you can find us at this link: h9ps://twi9er.com/transformingaas 39
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LinkedIn LinkedIn is a great source to connect with other addic=on recovery professionals interested in the work the Alliance is doing. Have a LinkedIn account? Log into your account and find us at this link: h9ps://www.linkedin.com/grp/home?gid=4409576 The Alliance Forum is an organizational newsletter designed to inform
and simulate discussion about issues pertinent to professional growth of practitioners in
the addiction and mental health field, who utilize the powerful, life transforming tools of
neuro nutrient therapy and the pro-recovery diet.
Submissions to the Alliance Forum are
encouraged!
All materials need to be sent directly to the editor in an electronic format. We encourage the use of web links to useful informa=on and pictures or graphics. These materials will be u=lized at the discre=on of the Editor/Alliance for Addic=ons Solu=ons Board. Please email request to: allianceforaddic>onsolu>ons@gmail.com 40