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Rick Ohrstrom is Sober but Pissed
We in the recovery community are digesting with difficulty the stunning news that 180 million prescriptions for anti-depressants were written in the US last year.
The Bulldog has had enough; he had to sit through yet another tedious discussion of the infamous "S" and I don't mean the sex word Stigma. Once again the liberal do-gooders were pleading their case for yet another uniquely (not unique) useless education campaign.
We (the alcohol and addiction field) are surely the only altruistic human endeavor in history to eloquently educate over 70 years without any discernible effect on either public opinion or policy.The facts on the ground remain depressingly similar. There is still absolutely no moral or more importantly political price to be paid for crapping on alcoholics and addicts. Until there is a downside to trampling roughshod over the right of recovering folks the behaviors of those cretins masquerading as policy makers will continue ad nauseam.The two truly successful social movements of the late 20th century, HIV/AIDS and Mental Health (NAMI) only gained traction when they started to literally and metaphysically throw a little pig's blood around. We must do the same. It is time for us (the Recovering Community -- strike that there is no such thing) to "Get Mad, Get Smart and Get Even." If some cowering, cringing AA pseudo historian - Nazi big book basher brings up Anonymity, I will rip their head off -- just kidding -- maybe. The two founders of AA, Bill W and Dr. Bob, were both on the original board of the NCA, founded by Marty Mann, the first woman to get sober in AA and a personal protégé of Bill W's. The NCA was founded to advocate for the rights of recovering folks in a way consistent with the principals of AA. Stigma is the kind face of the problem -- the truly ugly, operational face of Stigma is the daily discrimination in every area of their lives that folks suffering or in recovery from Addiction face.There is little or no excuse that any of us who have benefited from the efforts of our predecessors have for not acting to pass along the benefits of their labors to our succeeding generations. Didn't I hear "Pass it on" somewhere? Not if the panicking panjandrums of upper Riverside Avenue would have anything to do with it. They have allowed real twelve stepping, and by that I mean the twelve-stepping that takes place outside the rooms, to be expunged from the AA vocabulary. Shame on them and shame on us who sit here contentedly thinking "I got mine. Screw them."
