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Permalink Reply by Melissa J. Roth on June 13, 2008 at 1:38pm

I do not want to take your addictions class but I'm afraid I will have to. I am getting too many clients who are functional alcoholics or functional drug abusers. They are not your hard core addicts but they need and deserve help just as much as a hard core addict or alcoholic. I got another one today--a boy that I have worked with off and on since he was 15. When he was 15 he came to me for study skills enhancement.

He's 21 now and got kicked out of college because he was stoned in class too often. (We are in the deep South, remember). As a result, his parents shipped him off to a fundamentalist Christian boot camp for a year. He was totally isolated from the outside world, had only the Bible and a few Christian books to read, no TV, no radio, NO music except Christian music and no outside contact. He quickly learned how to play the game and did his time. However, when he got out he developed panic attacks and post traumatic stress syndrome. He had been in isolation for one year and then thrown back into a regular teenage society suddenly with no transition. They brought him back to me because I am the only one he would agree to talk to. He is dissociative, deeply depressed and has a lot of anger. ( I can't believe his parents were surprised at that?!) He is afraid to talk to anyone. It takes all he has to sit in class 2 hours a day. Then he runs to the safety of his home and doesn't leave. Before he was the cutest, most gregarious kid I've seen. When he was 16 I told his mother he would be a gazillionaire if he went into sales. It broke my heart to see him this way today. So, when and where are you teaching next? I've got to offer an alternative to other kids like him.

Permalink Reply by Hugh Cole on May 16, 2009 at 10:51am

Hi Melissa,
Sounds a lot like poorly done brain washing to me. It never ceases to amaze me how loving caring concerned parents can make that mistake, It has a bunch of the earmarks of "cult indoctrination",

Scott,
The addiction class is really valuable, I would be out there to take it in a heartbeat. Melissa's observation is quite valid. I am seeing more "soft" addiction problems then I ever imagined,


Hugh Cole
Texas Tranceman