David Altshuler, M.S.
(305) 978-8917 | [email protected]

Category: Substance Use Disorder

The Dread Pirate Roberts Wins the Super Bowl

Kansas City won the Super Bowl last month. You probably already knew that. Whether you watched multiple replays of every down or just tuned in for a few commercials, it’s hard not to be aware. But there are people who don’t know who won. There are folks in this country

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Rehab

Visiting rehab programs in Sedona, Flagstaff, and Prescott, Arizona last week, I connected with a number of extraordinary young adults. Some had been clean for a few weeks, some had been sober for several years. Most attended Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous meetings. A number of the graduates—my own clients

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You May Find Your Son Behind the Wheel of a Large Automobile

A chicken, it is frequently remarked, is an egg’s way of making another egg. Or something like that. Assigning causality, that one thing is directly responsible for another thing, is tougher than just noting correlation, that two things frequently go together. That my favorite sports teams seem to lose an

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Block Heads

To withstand the 156 mile per hour winds of Category Five hurricanes, homes in South Florida are built with CBS blocks. Even our garages have a lot in common with bomb shelters. So three of my running buddies and I knew we had our work cut out for us when

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Addiction One, Two, Three

Our understanding of and treatment for substance use disorder has evolved over the past half century. Moral failing and weakness of will were where we started. Imprisonment, punishment, and public humiliation were supposed to cure craving. Blood letting is a comparable example of the cure being worse than the disease.

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Paying your Housekeeper to Keep your Kids off Drugs

“Just say no way there is anything more important than my communicating my unequivocal, unconditional positive regard and connection to my child“ is, admittedly, less concise, but the 40-year old slogan may benefit from updating. Just shy of 70,000 drug related deaths last year is a familiar figure to my

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Class Action

That we are a social species is not news. Indeed, the bunch of us who were plodding along together at Mile 11 the other day were beyond pleased to see a cadre of running buddies who had come out to cheer for us and 20,000 of our closest friends. It’s

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Don’t Step on the Caterpillar

Adolescence is typically characterized by magical thinking. “I can stay up until two in the morning playing Fortnite and still be present and attentive for my 9 o’clock pre-calculus class.“ Whereas responsible adults, those of the parenting persuasion in particular, know better. Grown-ups, having some familiarity with the past, acknowledge

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Get in the Car

My colleague, Clark, has a residual skill left over from his years of using alcohol. Clean and sober for 29 years, he can still walk into any bar in any city and by the time his eyes have adjusted to the dim light, he can point to which people are

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Clubbing

I like the gym because there are people who look like me. Some of us could lose a few pounds. Many of us require some gentle motivation. None of us is able to lift as much as we did decades ago. Wanna know who will be standing on the podium

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Copyright © David Altshuler 1980 – 2024    |    Miami, FL • Charlotte, NC     |    (305) 978-8917    |    [email protected]