***2020 winner of the Christopher Bland Prize*** "Beautifully crafted and written, filled with darkness and light, compelling... She fights addiction with honesty and humour. And, like her, [we] come away changed forever." Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, RSL Christopher Bland Prize When Michele Kirsch's father is killed in a train crash, her mother gets the vapours and Michele gets extremely nervous. By her mid-teens, she has found salvation in valium. Her favourite words on the prescription sheet are "Take As Needed", which she interprets as Take All The Time. Later, as a wife and mother, she adds alcohol into the mix, and before long her life is spinning out of control. Leaving home "for the sake of the family", she takes the scenic route to rehab, redemption and reinvention. But this is no misery memoir. Clean is a darkly comic tale about the difficult choices we have to make as we navigate our lives. While working as a domestic cleaner in her 50s, Michele finds herself living vicariously through other people's messes, tidying her way through early sobriety. As the Duster of Large Things, she taps into her natural nosiness to reveal the absurdities of a seemingly banal job. This is a remarkable, powerful, and often unbearably funny story in which cleaning and getting clean lead to a strange and magical form of redemption.

Don't Forget Me is a survival manual and a lifeline for those whose lives have been touched by substance use and addiction. With the pervasiveness of drugs today and death by overdose as the leading cause of death for people under 50 in the US, almost everyone has been directly or indirectly affected by this drug epidemic. Loving someone with substance abuse can be terrifying. Steve Grant shares what he learned during his own difficult journey to encourage and guide other parents who are living with children who are struggling with substance abuse. Don't Forget Me tells the story of Steve's two sons, Chris and Kelly, who took distinctly different paths to the same outcome: death by overdose. Steve reveals not only a highlight reel of the things he got right but takes an honest look at the mistakes he made along the way to help other parents avoid those same mistakes. Don't Forget Me offers time-tested, practical suggestions to assure family members of those struggling with substance abuse they have not lost their mind and encourages them to find hope-even on the darkest days.

Psychologist to the Hollywood elite Dr. Carder Stout delivers a page-turning memoir about his fall from grace into the gritty underbelly of crack addiction, running drugs for the Shoreline Crips, surviving homelessness, escaping a murder plot, and finding redemption in the most unlikely of places. As a therapist to Hollywood's elite, Dr. Carder Stout's clientele includes Oscar-, Golden Globe-, Emmy-, Tony- and Grammy-winners, bestselling authors, and billionaires. He may not be able to share their dark secrets, but for the first time, everyone will know his. At the age of thirty-four, Carder would have gladly pawned the silver spoon he was born choking on for a rock of crack. His downfall was as swift as his privilege was vast...or had he been falling all along? Raised in a Georgetown mansion and educated at exclusive institutions, Carder ran with a crowd of movers, shakers, and future Oscar-winners in New York City. But words like "promise" and "potential" are meaningless in the face of serious addiction. Lost years and a stint in rehab later, when Carder was a dirty, broke, soon-to-be-homeless crackhead wandering the streets of Venice, California. His lucky break came thanks to his old Ford Taurus: he lands a job of driving for a philosophical drug czar with whom he finds friendship and self-worth as he helps deliver quality product to LA's drug enthusiasts, from trust-fund kids, gang affiliates, trophy wives, hip-hop producers, and Russian pimps. But even his loyalty and protection can't save Carder from the peril of the streets--or the eventual contract on his life. From a youth of affluence to the hit the Shoreline Crips put on his life, Carder delves deep into life on the streets. Lost in Ghost Town is a riveting, raw, and heartfelt look at the power of addiction, the beauty of redemption, and finding truth somewhere in between.

When they were first released in the 1980s, Janet Woititz's groundbreaking works, Adult Children of Alcoholics, Struggle for Intimacy and The Self-Sabotage Syndrome, provided a new message of hope to adult children who had grown up in the shadow of alcoholic parents. Their message today is as profound and timeless as it was two decades ago.

Now, in this complete collection, readers will learn again the insight and healing power of Janet Wotitiz's words. The Complete ACoA Sourcebook is a compilation of three of Dr. Woititz's classic books, addressing head-on the symptoms of The Adult Children of Alcoholics syndrome and providing strategies for living a normal life as an adult. Readers will find help for themselves: at home, in intimate relationships and on the job. They will discover the reasons for the way they think, believe and feel about themselves; ACoAs often feel isolated, have difficulty in relationships, in the workplace and in feeling good about themselves.

Readers who are familiar with Woititz's work will find wisdom once again in this classic collection. Those new to ACoA will gain fresh insight into their behavior patterns and find an avenue for self-love and healing. Noted ACoA expert Dr. Robert Ackerman, author of the best-selling Perfect Daughters and Silent Sons, provides a foreword and explains why Janet Woititz's message will continue to help millions of readers for generations to come.

Packed with information, advice and learning activities, this book tells you what you need to know about drugs, young people's drug use, and how you can help them stay safe. It covers everything from what the effects are and why young people take drugs, to how to negotiate drug rules and ways to prevent and minimise harm. An easy to use section contains factual information about various drugs, covering a description of each drug, street names, a brief history, legal status, availability, extent of use and cost, effects, possible harms, and harm reduction advice. The newest and emerging drugs, such as legal highs, are included, as well as illegal drugs, alcohol, caffeine and tobacco. If you are working with or supporting young people or are a parent or carer, this is the book you need to help you understand drugs and respond positively and effectively to young people's drug use.

Refuge Recovery is a proven practice, a process, a set of tools, a treatment, and a path to healing addiction.

Refuge Recovery is a Buddhist-oriented, nontheistic recovery program that does not ask anyone to believe anything, only to trust the process and do the hard work of recovery. In fact, no previous experience or knowledge of Buddhism is required. Recovery is possible, and this book provides a systematic approach to treating and recovering from all forms of addictions. When sincerely practiced, the program will ensure a full recovery from addiction and a lifelong sense of well-being and happiness.

Designed as an aid for the study of the book, "Alcoholics Anonymous, The Little Red Book" contains many helpful topics for discussion meetings. Drawing from the practical experience of alcoholics who found peace of mind and contented sobriety by following a way of spiritual life set forth in "Alcoholics Anonymous, The Little Red Book" can help members quickly develop an acceptable 24-hour schedule of A.A. living.

Based on the many past study guide formats and beginner classes for "The Little Red Book" and modeled after Twelve Step instruction programs offered at A.A. meetings, this new study guide provides a solid and comprehensive study structure for men and women in A.A. Twelve Step groups and for individuals studying "The Little Red Book" on their own. While "The Little Red Book" interprets the Twelve Steps, the "Guide" gives newcomers to A.A. the structure needed to live them.

Holding a Masters degree in Addiction Studies with an internship at the Alcoholics Anonymous Headquarters Archives, Bill P. has worked in the alcohol/drug addiction field for 18 years as a counselor, historian, educator, and author, including four years with the AA Grapevine Magazine.

This breakthrough new treatment approach by a Harvard psychologist and trauma and addiction expert offers a step-by-step program to help women overcome the often-overlooked core problems that drive their drug and alcohol addictions. Women and girls are now becoming addicted at greater rates than at any other time at history-and until very recently women in recovery were dependent on treatment models based solely on work with men. Harvard addiction and trauma expert Lisa Najavits contends that women often stay addicted because of core, untreated problems that then underlie their addiction. Najavits has now developed a breakthrough new treatment model for women based on specific factors underlying women's addiction and on elements vital to their recovery. In this strengths-building workbook, women pinpoint their core problems and take steps to come to terms with their personal addiction stories. Through exercises that help them overcome these deep-seated problems and break the cycle of "using to forget," readers begin to build newfound strengths and self-respect and go on to learn how to tolerate distress, endure being alone, reach out to others, express needs, and set boundaries. A final chapter offers advice on getting help and a directory of recovery options.

Research and clinical experiences show that people engaging in drug addiction for some years usually embrace severe mental illnesses including schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. Schizophrenia usually occurs in patients with prolonged use of amphetamine and hallucinogens. Borderline personality disorder commonly happens in female addicts who have experienced abandonment and childhood abuse. On the one hand, drug addiction can be used to cope with symptoms of severe mental illness. On the other hand, prolonged drug addiction can also induce severe mental illness. A close look into individuals with chronic drug addiction usually review that they encounter suffering, hardship and traumas. There are two types of traumas encountered by people with drug addiction. The first one is trauma before drug addiction and substance abuse. Many of them may have suffered through abuse, oppression and abandonment in their lives. Another one is drug led traumas because of psychosocial deprivation and medical problems induced by chronic addiction. In this book, apart from describing a comprehensive model in understanding and interpreting the complexity of trauma, mental illness and drug addiction, this model is applied and illustrated in clients with borderline personality disorder and schizophrenia, drug addiction and those who have experience different forms of trauma. Related psychosocial interventions are also thoroughly discussed.

It has been ten years since Rachael Keogh was catapulted into the public consciousness, when a shocking image of her needle-ravaged arms - skin burnt from injecting heroin into her wasted veins - made front pages around the country. Desperate for help, she made a public appeal to get one of 27 detox beds in Ireland so that she could reclaim her life from the drugs that had ravaged it. What followed was an extraordinary story of grit and determination as she embarked on her recovery journey. Her story became an instant bestseller and has resonated with readers ever since. This edition contains a new introduction from Rachael where she reflects on her story and considers what has changed for her and in the drugs culture in Ireland over the last decade. 'The best book by far about the drugs explosion in Dublin' Irish Independent 'This book should be on the school curriculum' Evening Echo