Unhealthy Items at the Health Store: Four Reasons to Be Wary of Supplements Who doesn’t want an extra boost to their health that’s as easy as taking one little pill? Although herbal supplements are often touted as a relatively easy way to support your body’s healthy functioning, in reality many of the products that are […]
Six Ways to Maintain Your Sobriety at a Thanksgiving Celebration I first tried to quit drinking on November 11, 1995. By Thanksgiving of that year, I was clean, but I was scared to death of facing a holiday dinner without a drink. I remember standing by the bar in my grandmother’s house, downing Diet Coke […]
We have come a long way in our efforts to treat PTSD and other psychological disorders. Some of the best information has come from veterans themselves. For example, after suffering from the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon, Army veteran John Thurman used his experience with yoga to help others, in a program that packs rooms. […]
Most homeless alcoholics began drinking while they were still children and became alcohol dependent soon after. This is a profound conclusion based on findings from a quantitative study at Bellevue Hospital in New York City. The detailed insights into chronically homeless, alcohol-dependent patients, helps give a better understanding to a tragic social problem. Twenty patients […]
You have probably heard of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), but may not know much about it. PTSD affects not only returning war veterans traumatized by military service, but many people who are exposed to terrorism, violence and natural disasters, shattering their sense of trust and safety. After a traumatic event, everyone experiences some stress symptoms. […]
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), on average 100 people die every day in the United States from drug overdoses. Most involve prescription drugs. This is a huge number of preventable deaths that unfortunately affects close friends and family members, including many children. Prescription drug abuse is a major growing public […]
Do we always learn from our mistakes? New research suggests that alcoholics may not. University of Utah neuroscientists recently published a study that can help us understand behaviors that can influence alcohol addiction. Research in rats suggests that a region in the brain called the lateral habenula controls the ability to learn from an experience. […]
While I was flying home from speaking at a neuroscience conference in Jerusalem, Israel, the book I coauthored, Ending Addiction for Good, went to #1 in the drug dependency category on Amazon.com. When I landed at Newark for a brief layover and checked my email, I danced with joy at the news. Of course, friends […]
I am blessed to have a beautiful garden. My home is surrounded by live oaks, their thick branches protecting my house from the ravages of the Texas sun. Out my bedroom window, I look onto Japanese magnolias and from my office see an array of flowering and fruiting trees. When I moved onto the property, […]
Is it possible to feel happy and sad simultaneously? That is my experience here in Osaka, Japan at the close of the International Academic Forum’s (IAFOR) conference on psychology and the behavioral sciences. As we gathered to take our closing photo, I looked at the faces of my colleagues who have enlivened my days with […]