David Sheff is an award-winning author of many
books, including Beautiful Boy, a New
York Times best-seller. Beautiful Boy
is a memoir; in it, Sheff tells a grim and gripping family story. He writes
about his son Nic’s addiction.
It is not an easy book to read, because readers have
to wrestle, along with Sheff, with issues we would rather not confront. Were
the signs always there? Surely there must have been signs--that the 11-year-old
child had started using alcohol and drugs, that the 14-year-old was a seasoned
addict. And confronted by the truth, what does a parent do? How far does he go?
How can he balance the needs of the son in addiction with the needs of his
other children? When, if ever, does a parent turn away, giving up?
Nic is now in recovery; a writer himself, he
sometimes joins his father on the speaking circuit. And the elder Sheff has
learned, through his life, and his own research, and through the sharing of
those people who have reached out to him, a hellacious lot about addiction. He
has sorted through years of research, he has assimilated the hard-learned facts
that people shared, and he has written a new book, Clean. This book’s subtitle is Overcoming
addiction and ending America’s greatest tragedy.
The thing about Sheff is that he brings hope. Against all odds, Nic emerged into recovery. Beautiful Boy is not a pretty story, but
it is a hopeful one.
Clean doesn’t paint a pretty picture
either, but it is girded by Sheff’s belief that addiction can be confronted. He
believes that confrontation is a battle we can win.
As he wrestled with his research into addiction, as
he talked to parents and siblings and spouses of addicts, Sheff refined his
knowledge about addiction, and he developed six precepts that he presents in
the preface to Clean. These are those
precepts:
1. Most drug use isn’t about drugs;
it’s about life.
2. Addiction is a disease.
3. This disease is preventable.
4. This disease is treatable.
5. As with any other illness, the
prevention strategies and treatments most likely to work aren’t based on
tradition, wishful thinking, or faith, but on science.
6. Drug abusers and addicts can do
more than get off drugs; they can achieve mental health.
This year, David Sheff is coming to Zanesville on
September 13th. He’ll be talking to youth; he’ll be talking to
families and friends of those suffering from addiction. And, in the evening,
he’ll talk to all of us, to any of the community who gathers at Secrest
Auditorium to hear his message. He’ll talk about Beautiful Boy and he’ll talk about Clean, and he’ll share the knowledge and the hope that he has won,
at great cost.
Afterward, a panel of people from our community will
share their own hard-won knowledge. Like Sheff’s books, the knowledge isn’t
always pleasant. It is, however, essential.
Sheff’s visit is made possible by all kinds of community
collaboration. The Mental Health and Recovery Services Board—the MHRSB--gathered
a group together last year to bring Sam Quinones, author of Dreamland, to the area. Quinones,
another award-winning journalist, told us about the heroin pipeline, about the
devastation that it wrought in one nearby city, Portsmouth, Ohio. And he told us
about how Portsmouth is fighting back. After that presentation too, people from
the community—family members, medical personnel, social workers, and addicts in
recovery, took the stage. For many of us, those panelists made the problem immediate
and real.
After Quinones’ visit, people asked, “What next?”
So the MHRSB gathered its group of planners back
together and arranged for Sheff’s visit. A local reading initiative, On the
Same Page Muskingum—OTSPM--, determined to join them. Itself a collaborative, OTSPM
will distribute Sheff’s books in the community. They will also distribute books
for teens and children, and coordinate activities, some for adults and many for
kids. The kids’ activities aim to build self-esteem, helping kids be strong
enough to resist the awful temptation to take that first hit…
As we prepare for Sheff’s visit, we’ll explore the
precepts he presents. Some local experts—those who’ve worked with addiction,
and those who’ve lived with it in their families—will share their thoughts and experiences
in this blog.
We hope you’ll read and respond and share the posts
with people who would benefit from reading them, or whose shared perspective
would benefit others. We hope the community can unite in understanding, a
solid, strong force against the plague of addiction.
Here’s a link to an article, “My Addicted Son,” by David
Sheff: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/06/magazine/my-addicted-son.html
For more information on local initiatives and
Sheff’s upcoming visit, please contact Misty Cromwell at the MHRSB (mistyc@mhrsb.org), or like On the Same Page
Muskingum’s FaceBook page (https://www.facebook.com/OntheSamePageMuskingum/).
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