We all have urges to do things that aren't in our best interest long term, whether that is overeating, refusing to eat, self harm, suicide or alcohol/drug use. Learning to recognize urges as urges (which may be very strong and compelling) but not as mandates or musts, takes a bit of work. One skill that can be helpful is called Disarm. It stands for Destructive Self-talk Awareness and Refusal Method.  This is a cognitive behavioral technique that asks us to identify the though...

The National Institute on Drug Abuse has a great resource for families. It's called Family Check UP and addresses the 5 following topics, providing resources for how to talk with your family about each:  Communication Encouragement Negotiation Setting Limits SupervisionFrom NIDA's website: "These five questions, developed by the Child and Family Center at the University of Oregon, highlight parenting skills that are important in preventing the initiation and progressi...

In the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, a study was done of videos on YouTube of teens' drinking behavior. The following is quoted from the abstract: Results: There were a total of 333,246,875 views for all videos combined. While 89% of videos involved males, only 49% involved females. The videos had a median of 1,646 (interquartile range [IQR] 300 to 22,969) “like” designations and 33 (IQR 14 to 1,261) “dislike” designations each...

On our website, underneath the tab for this blog is another tab, Resources. On that page we link to both AA and SMART Recovery. I found out about a couple more addiction supports in the community and want to share them. We found these through meetup.com.If you haven't been to meetup.com, you're missing out. This is a website that helps local people to connect with one another through common interests. Of course, there are the Boise Beer lovers-type groups, but there are also groups ...

With the school year in full swing, it's a good time to look at college-age drinking, and specifically binge drinking. Did you know that according to the National Institutes of Health, Each year an estimated 1,825 college students between the ages of 18 and 24 die from alcohol­-related unintentional injuries, including motor vehicle crashes. Further, each year an estimated 696,000 students between the ages of 18 and 24 are assaultedby another student who has been drinking. Finally, ...

It's hard to talk with kids about hard topics--that's why they're hard! SAMHSA (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration) has some videos on YouTube to help parents learn how to start these hard conversations. The campaign is called "Talk. They Hear You." Hope you find them helpful. 

A new study from the University of Zurich released yesterday shows that 4 things improve lifespan. I'm betting you won't be surprised to hear any of them.  Regular Exercise No Cigarettes Low Alcohol Use Healthy DietWhat was interesting to me about this study was while each individual factor affected life expectancy, the one with the most significant effect of the four was cigarette use.  Compared with a group of non-smokers, smokers have a 57 percent hi...

In Nature this week there is a new study predicting who is likely to binge drink. This study looked at brains of 700 teens throughout Europe. Several factors were present, but a big one seemed to be personality. Thrill-seekers and those who were less conscientious were at greater risk. However, brain structure showed a relationship, as well. Here's a quote from NPR which paraphrases the study: Among binge drinkers, the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, which plays a ro...

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention just released new numbers this past month regarding alcohol effects in America. The study looked at data from years 2006-2010 and looked at alcohol-attributable deaths (AAD), as well as years of life potentially lost (YPLL) due to excessive alcohol use.  Here are two quotes from the report:      Excessive drinking accounted for 1 in 10 deaths among working-age adults in the United States.  Among working-a...