Am I Addicted to Suboxone?

First Published 7/23/2013 I hear from the anti-buprenorphine people now and then, less than I used to.  I also hear from fans of this blog’s early days, when I routinely lost my temper in response to those people.  Their general line was that things on heroin weren’t all that bad, but Read more…

An Addict's Story

I received the following email last week.  I considered trimming it down, but the story is well-written and describes a history that is similar to that of many of my patients.  As usual, I will write a follow-up post in a week or so. Dear Dr. J, I have read Read more…

Winehouse

By now, everyone who knows of Amy Winehouse is aware of her tragic death. I’ve always liked her music. So much music these days has been digitally processed and reprocessed, and assaults the senses– I’m thinking of Lady Gaga, for example, whose ‘Edge of Glory’ would be pretty boring in Read more…

My Book

Ah yes…. another post about my book… Over the past few years, I’ve taken posts from this blog, posts from other sources that I’ve written, some sections of a ‘memoir’ that I have not gotten around to writing… and combined them in a book about addiction. The book does not Read more…

Another one?

I have no idea what killed Brittany Murphy.  The press are reporting that she had a ‘heart attack’ at age 32, not fully understanding the difference between a ‘heart attack’– which typically refers to a heart that stops functioning because of an inadequate suppy of oxygen, usually from coronary artery blockage– vs. ‘cardiac arrest’, Read more…

Anxiety, step-work, and gratitude

One of the primary insights that I want addicts to gain from reading this blog is the similarity between their own thoughts, feelings, and pattern of use and the thoughts and patterns of use of other opiate addicts.  We are all dealing with the same beast, we have all felt Read more…

SuboxDoc Goes Negative!

I received a couple responses to my youtube videos tonight that are worth responding to.  For people who haven’t stumbled across the videos, you will find them if you go to youtube and search under ‘suboxone’ or ‘suboxdoc’.  They are pretty much the same thing as what you read here—a Read more…

My book

Hi all–   sorry for the infrequent posting lately.  I am trying to finish a book about Suboxone and about addiction, and by the time I finish working in my practice each day I have little time to divide between the blog, the book, and a few other projects.  I just Read more…

A Common Mistake

I brought a note from the ‘comments’ section up here because it presents a topic that comes up over and over with opiate dependence and Suboxone.  I am the expert on MedHelp.org’s addiction forum;  I get questions and comments like this one quite frequently on that site– although I have Read more…

Micrograms, Tapering, and the Ubiquitous Nature of Addiction

One thing I enjoy so much about the blog is that I receive comments from people around the world… hello to my new friend in Holland, and California, and New York… I have also mentioned before how the miserable disease of opiate dependence affects people from all jobs and socioeconomic Read more…

Counseling: Good for Addiction?

When a person asks for help with some issue in his/her life, a safe and relatively common answer is to suggest ‘counseling’. Trouble with your marriage? Get counseling. Depressed? Take an SSRI, sure, but get some counseling too. Kids acting up? Send them for counseling. Wondering about the meaning of Read more…