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Alternative Peer Groups, Successful Recovery Model

March 7, 2012 in Al-Anon Related. . ., Eye on Addiction Radio, Teen Recovery by jherzanek | 2 comments

PDAP: Help and HopeOur guest for Eye On Addiction Radio’s March 10th show is Trish Frye, Program Director for PDAP San Antonio. Below is an article written about the very successful model used by PDAP. As stated on PDAP’s website:

Our mission is to help teens, young adults, and their families overcome the effects of mind-changing chemicals while assisting the community through partnerships in education and prevention.  We are a 12 step, faith-based program that offers group meetings, individual and family counseling, and fun activities that focus on healthy relationships and building life skills. In addition to recovery services for substance abuse and drug addiction, we provide prevention and life skills education. We also work with students in middle schools, high schools, and alternative schools in the greater SA area to help promote prevention.

One of our core competencies is our Family Group services. The family members go through a program just like their kids. They learn from other families by listening to what works and what doesn’t work. They also get to learn from our counselors how to deal with issues that are specific or unique to their situation. The odds for success increase when the family is involved in their kid’s recovery.

Our services are FREE. We are supported by churches, businesses, foundations, United Way-SA / Bexar County, members, and individuals from the greater San Antonio area. We do not accept government funding.

 

The Alternative Peer Group:
A Recovery Model for Teens and Young Adults

~ by Crystal Morrison & Caitlin Bailey

Adolescence is an important developmental phase marked by a multitude of significant psychological, social, and physical changes. These changes can affect adolescent’s emotional and subjective well being and often cause a tremendous amount of stress. Often times, teens fall victim to peer pressure and experiment with alcohol or drugs as a way to cope with their stress. Unfortunately, many of those teens quickly develop dependencies which may have lasting effects in their growing brains. According to Joseph Califano of The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse, teenagers who abuse substances are much more susceptible to developing chronic substance abuse problems later in life. Thus, swift treatment of adolescent alcohol and drug abuse is of the utmost importance. However, there has been much debate about the best way to treat adolescent substance abuse and dependency.

The Alternative Peer Group (APG) model encompasses the necessary ingredients for successful treatment of adolescents struggling with substance abuse or drug addictions. This model was created in Houston, Texas about forty years ago. Alternative Peer Groups were created to address the emotional, psychological, spiritual and social needs of teens struggling with substance abuse.

The APG model integrates important peer connections with clinical practice through intervention, support, education, and parent involvement. The foundation of this model is the basic assumption that peer relationships, much like the ones that initiate and support drug and alcohol use, are necessary to facilitate recovery. The ultimate goal is to remove the teen from a negatively pressured environment and offer them a new group of friends that exert positive peer pressure and provide support for the necessary changes they need to make in order to recover.

Several key factors inherent in the APG model contribute to the recovering adolescent’s success. The first is the fun factor. While enrolled in an APG, the adolescent still gets to be a kid. They are encouraged to learn how to have as much sober fun as possible within healthy boundaries. Alternative Peer Groups strive to develop healthy decision making through fun and challenging activities. The APG incorporates a variety of weekday and weekend social activities into the recovery process so that adolescents can learn how to have fun while remaining sober. Recovery has to be as much fun if not more than using drugs in order to get adolescents “hooked”.

In this model, APG faculty and youth staff reward adolescents for sobriety, honesty, and integrity with fun, sober activities. Staff create safe, loving environments while demanding accountability and enforcing consequences. In this way, the APG environment offers a healthy balance of love and limits.

Unlike other adolescent rehabilitation models, in APGs parents are strongly encouraged to attend their own recovery meetings and help support their teen’s recovery by creating their own program of accountability. The APGs help parents normalize the events and situations they are going through while assisting them to examine any behaviors, patterns, or interactions that could possibly be exacerbating the situation. The APGs not only help change an adolescent’s behavior, but they also offer parents suggestions on how to change problem behaviors within the family in order to best support their teenager in recovery. Thus, changes in the family system help sustain the adolescent’s long-term recovery.

The Houston Alternative Peer Group community offers a variety of services that help aid an adolescent’s recovery. The APGs hold weekly twelve-step meetings for teens and their parents. Individual counseling is often provided to help teens with any specific issues they may be encountering. APGs also encompass the idea that family counseling is a critical component in an adolescent’s recovery. The APGs also provide supportive and intensive outpatient therapy. All of the Houston APGs work closely with residential treatment programs, psychiatrists, school counselors and other mental health professionals to provide the best overall treatment that a teen can get.

History of the APG Model

The APG model was created in 1971 at the Palmer Memorial Episcopal Church in Houston, Texas for a group of young people struggling with alcohol and other substance abuse problems. The model was replicated and new alternative peer group communities sprang up. Currently, there are six alternative peer groups in the greater Houston area for teens and young adults. Although each APG differs in format, location, and cost, they all follow the model’s basic principle: that peer relationships and peer support are key factors for effective adolescent and young adult recovery from substance abuse and dependence.

Following PDAP (Palmer Drug Abuse Program), Lifeway International was founded in 1985. In 2004, Lifeway created Three Oaks Academy, a sober high school that provides a safe and sober educational component for the effective intervention, recovery, and support of young people in early and ongoing recovery. As the movement grew, mental health professionals who wanted to combine the strengths of the APG model with evidence based counseling approaches created Cornerstone Recovery in 1999. In 2002, Teen and Family Services collaborated with Chapelwood United Methodist Church famous for their recovery services known as Mercy Street, to offer alternative peer group services to West Houston and The Villages. To fill the need for continuing care, APG, Inc. began serving young adults ages 18 to 26 in 2007. These communities paved the way for Hope for Today to emerge in 2010, the newest APG in Katy, Texas.

Together, these six APG groups provide the foundation for a network of recovery services for adolescents and young adults in the greater Houston area such as Archway Academy. Established in 2003 and located in the Palmer Memorial Episcopal Church, Archway Academy is an official Recovery High School and member of the National Association of Recovery Schools. In addition, the APG and recovery school network collaborates closely with other community agencies like The Council on Alcohol and Drugs Houston that provide assessments for adolescents and venue space for symposiums and Sober Prom (SPROM). On January 28, 2011, The Council hosted the Teens and High Risk Symposium with keynote speaker Joseph Califano, the Founder and Chairman of The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University.

The first of an annual symposium series showcased Houston’s sober schools and APG community.

Data Supporting Alternative Peer Groups

Dr. Scott Basinger of Baylor College of Medicine has been studying the outcomes of alternative peer groups and recently presented his data at the Teens and High Risk Symposium. He compared the national rates of teen relapse to the rates of teens enrolled in local APGs. The national relapse rate for teens in recovery is between 50-90% (Basinger & Edens, in press). In Houston, for those adolescents participating in APGs between January 2007 and 2010, the relapse rates were between 8%-11% (Basinger & Edens, in press). Overall, since APGs have been in existence, they have a recovery rate greater than 85% versus a nationwide recovery rate of around 30% (Basinger & Edens, in press).

Addiction professionals are aware that one of the toughest populations to treat is adolescent substance abusers. While the initial studies yield positive numbers, finding the right APG and achieving success may take time as well as trial and error. Additionally, this model may not be appropriate for all levels of abuse such as experimentation. However, for those teens who are surrounded by using peers, the Alternative Peer Group model offers recovering teens and young adults an excellent chance at a successful recovery. The APG model surrounds the young person with sober support and accountability in a socially reinforcing environment that allows for skills acquisition and resiliency training. In the words of one APG client, “It’s so much fun!”

 

READ MORE ABOUT PDAP:
PDAP: “An Instant Army, of Love and Support”

Powerless to Prevent:
Trish Frye, Program Director of Palmer Drug Abuse Program, spoke at the funeral of “Brittany” on February 11, 2012.

RETURN:
From “Alternative Peer Groups (APG), Successful Recovery Model for Teens and Young Adults” to Changing Lives Foundation Blog Home


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Alternative Peer Groups, APG, Successful Recovery Model

 

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PDAP: “An Instant Army, of Love and Support”

March 7, 2012 in Addiction Treatment Centers, Al-Anon Related. . ., Eye on Addiction Radio, Real People, Real Stories by jherzanek | 1 comment

Palmer Drug Abuse Program (PDAP), “An instant army of love and support” 

~ Written by grateful San Antonio PDAP Parents

 

In February 2007, we found out our youngest daughter, age 17, was a meth addict. This was of course a complete shock. We cashed in college funds and sent her to a treatment center, thinking that they would fix her. In May 2007, we heard about Palmer Drug Abuse Program of San Antonio (PDAP). We visited and sat in on the meeting of 50 or so parents sitting in a circle talking about boundaries and codependency and enabling, and of all things, the 12 Steps and powerlessness. We both thought it was about the craziest thing we had ever experienced. Surely, we did not need this place since there was nothing wrong with us. Why in the world would someone other than an addict or alcoholic need to work the 12 Steps?

Shortly after this, we found out an older daughter (age 26) was a prescription pill addict. Then, in May 2008, as the youngest daughter was supposedly completing after-care in Oregon, we visited her. She was most certainly not fixed. She was a complete mess and about to be expelled from the program. The older daughter was gradually getting worse and worse, despite stays at treatment centers. We suddenly felt completely powerless over both daughters. Instead of being the usual super-parent rescuers, we felt completely overwhelmed and useless.

We literally flew back to PDAP. We determined quickly that we needed desperately all four critical services that PDAP provides for free: weekly meetings (and social activities) for parents, addicts and siblings of addicts; counseling from experienced and trained counselors; weekly educational workshops; and working the 12 Steps with a sponsor.

We went to hundreds of meetings and got thousands of hugs, attended dozens of counseling sessions and educational workshops, and worked the 12 Steps and helped others work those life-changing Steps over the next 3-1/2 years. We learned how to take care of ourselves and how to use tough love and boundaries with our chemically dependent children. We learned we did not cause their disease, could not cure it and most of all we could not control it. We learned that we forget to love because we are busy trying to control and fix problems that we cannot fix. We learned to let go and let God. We learned that the more we let go, the better they get. We learned that all chemically dependent people have at least one enabler. We learned that choosing not to enable is actually an expression of selfless love.  We learned there are multitudes of families suffering from the effects of this horrible brain disease. We learned that addicts do not want to hurt their loved ones—but drugs eat addicts’ souls.  We learned that chemical dependency is an insidious and powerful disease of the brain and not a moral failing.

We were growing as parents, as Christians, and as spouses–while one daughter had lots of ups and downs and the other continued her gradual downward spiral. Finally in mid 2011, the younger daughter, with some tough love encouragement, tried PDAP. The effect was immediate and gradually we saw the daughter we once knew before drugs re-emerge. It was a complete transformation ultimately. By early 2012, she had a full-time job and was preparing to move into her own apartment, and there was no sign of the past five years of struggle. She loved her Thursday counseling sessions and meeting. She realized how much God had been involved in her life despite her brain being hijacked away from God for so long.

Meanwhile, things were declining for the older daughter, and in February 2012, the phone call that every parent of a chemically dependent child fears above all else, came. Our daughter had passed away from an overdose of prescription pain killers—one of 29,000 Americans who will die from prescription pill overdoses this year.

The first four people to come to the hospital were from PDAP: the executive director, program director, parent counselor and one of our dearest parent group friends. This PDAP friend and we had always joked that PDAP was like a second church. The response to our tragedy from PDAP went far beyond anything we could have ever imagined from a church. Visits filled with tears and hugs, food for 10 days, assistance driving to make arrangements, and on and on. It was an instant army of love and support. Never have we experienced anything like it. The stress on parents of chemically dependent children is immense. We feel strongly that we may not have made it ourselves over the last five years without PDAP. We certainly know that we are much better able to handle the grief of losing our child due to the support of PDAP.

PDAP has been one of the greatest gifts from God that we have ever experienced. PDAP has been caring, compassionate and competent in leading us through this incredible wilderness experience. Despite our tragic loss, we feel strongly that the truth, the real truth, is that hope and healing . . . recovery and redemption . . . are real for those who will seek help from wonderful programs like PDAP.

~ Grateful San Antonio PDAP Parents

 

READ MORE ABOUT PDAP:

Powerless to Prevent:
Trish Frye, Program Director of Palmer Drug Abuse Program, spoke at the funeral of “Brittany” on February 11, 2012.

 

RETURN:
From “PDAP: “An Instant Army, of Love and Support”” to Changing Lives Foundation Blog Home

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Palmer Drug Abuse Center, PDAP, chemical dependency

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Addiction: A Disease Powerless to Prevent“This is a preventable loss
caused by a preventable disease,
that we, as loved ones are powerless to prevent”
~Trish Frye

Trish Frye, Program Director of Palmer Drug Abuse Program, spoke at the funeral of “Brittany” on February 11, 2012.

 

I’m glad others spoke before me because I have been asked to talk about the reason Brittany died . . . and people need to know that her illness was not who she was . . . it is what happened to her.

Mom and dad want good to come from their loss, so what do I say? I hate this disease. It’s a harsh disease and I’m not sure I can speak about it without being a bit harsh. I know I cannot sugar coat things because it is when we refuse to acknowledge the truth that the sickness is allowed to expand.

 

Brittany suffered from an insidious disease called chemical dependency. This was not a moral failure on Brittany’s part. She never intended to hurt anyone. She loved her family. She had a great sense of humor, she wanted to help others, but she was sick . . . along with 12 million other Americans battling drug abuse. She made several attempts to stop using but Brittany’s body had had enough and succumbed to the sickness . . . just as 29,000 other people do each year due to prescription drugs alone.

 

Let me speak for those who have suffered from this illness and anyone who has loved someone with this illness. We will testify to the power of addiction. This truly is a brain disease that affects not only the body but also the mind and spirit.

 

See, Brittany wasn’t just partying and having fun. Her addiction started with a prescription drug. She had some pain and a friend offered a pill. She got positive results and sought a doctor to give her more pills . . . and eventually a line was crossed in her brain where drug use became her source of relief from pain and stress, and over time her brain falsely translated pills as “required for survival”. Drugs are so powerful that I have seen hungry people choose drugs rather than food. It is one of the only things I have ever seen a woman give up her children for. It eats our nature and without help it leads to self-destruction.

 

“She wanted to beat it.
She wanted to be strong.
She wanted to succeed.”


I have worked with addicts for many years and rarely have I seen someone on drugs who wanted to be dependent on them. Brittany did not want to be a slave to her pills, yet she was. Her brain had been hijacked and her mind screamed for relief from the addiction and saw relief as another pill. She wanted to beat it. She wanted to be strong. She wanted to succeed.

 

Earnest Campbell wrote a book titled “Locked in A Room with Open Doors”. Perhaps this is a great explanation of addiction. It is easy to think of people locked in a room with doors shut, but locked in a room with the doors open suggests that sometimes it is not the external barriers that bind. It is the internal barriers that hold us captive. We sometimes fail to experience freedom through the help that is available, because we lie to ourselves with preconceived ideas of who we are, what we can do, and what life has to offer.

 

If there was any failure in this it was Brittany believing the lie that she needed to be strong and that there was something wrong with allowing herself to need help. She couldn’t be honest with herself and accept the fact that her intelligence, kind heart, strong will and beauty weren’t enough. She saw needing this kind of help as weakness just as many people see substance abuse as a mere decision. She had a degree in psychology and thought she knew better and could pull herself out of it and teach others to do the same.

 

“You loved her.
You loved her unconditionally
and you loved her selflessly.”


I tell parents every day that the reality is that substance abuse is deadly and as parents they have to get through this guilt free. This family has nothing to feel guilty about . . . no real guilt will stand because they tried every intervention possible, but like cancer, some forms are just resistant to the chemotherapy while others are healed. There were no stones left unturned when it came to helping Brittany access treatment for her disease. You loved her. You loved her unconditionally and you loved her selflessly.

You gave her to God every day and literally would lift a Brittany doll up in prayer. When I visited the other day the Brittany doll was in the arms of a teddy bear. Just like the doll is in the arms of the teddy bear, Brittany is now resting in the arms of Jesus.

 

Sadly I know I am standing here speaking not just about Brittany but about others who have gone before and others that will go later. Here it is. The ultimate fear for parents became real in this family’s life. They are living our nightmare…everything they have tried to prevent . . . a preventable loss . . . and powerless to prevent it. The battle for this person seems to have brought defeat.

 

I read somewhere recently about how Saint Paul spoke in metaphors and Jesus spoke in parables so perhaps at this point it would benefit us to see not with our eyes of flesh but with eyes of faith when it comes to this disease and loving someone with this disease. Jesus said “I have come that you may have life and life abundant”. To celebrate God’s love is to know that in everything, in life and even in death, God is with us for the Good. There is a certainty that God has been with Brittany as she struggled, and He has been with the family as they watched her struggle, and God is with this family and Brittany now.

 

Instead of viewing this death as a time of finality, perhaps through our faithful eyes this death can be viewed as birth, not as a limitation but as an unfolding possibility . . . the possibility that parents will acknowledge that this can happen to anyone, even their own children regardless of their upbringing . . . the possibility that someone here will not be driven by the lie of shame regarding this issue but rather the promise of hope that recovery is possible if we are willing to access help . . . the possibility that the people here have heard through Brittany’s story that what we are up against is something much too big for us to handle on our own and find the courage to reach out without judgment to help those that are sick . . . the possibility that someone here will stay sober another day because each day really does matter . . . and the possibility that someone here will look deep within and reach out seeking help for their own substance abuse problem, knowing and believing that there is a room full of people waiting to embrace them and point them to a truth that recovery and redemption are real.

 

Trish Frye, PDAPTrish Frye is Program Director at the Palmer Drug Abuse Program (PDAP)
San Antonio, Texas area.

She is our guest expert on the March 10, 2012 “Eye on Addiction Radio” show
and will be speaking on “Help and Hope for Families”

The show will be archived on our website.

READ MORE ABOUT PDAP-
PDAP: “An Instant Army, of Love and Support”

Alternative Peer Groups (APG), Successful Recovery Model for Teens and Young Adults

RETURN:
From “Powerless to Prevent” to Changing Lives Foundation Blog Home


March 6, 2012 by jherzanek | 9 comments

Children of Addicts: The Innocent Victims

January 18, 2012 in Al-Anon Related. . ., Eye on Addiction Radio by jherzanek | 1 comment

 

Eye on Addiction Radio
Show #2

Children of Addicts:
The Innocent Victims

Guest: David Meggitt
Program manager, Betty Ford Colorado Children’s program

Listen to Matthew and his Mom tell their story

Listen Live
Eye on Addiction Radio website and more details

In 2011, we had the honor of sitting in on a portion of the Betty Ford Children’s Program. Needless to say, we were very impressed. Our guest David Meggitt has a genuine passion for children of addicts and alcoholics and has made this his life’s work. Listen to David, along with our very special guests Denise and her son Matthew as they tell their story and give hope to others.
WATCH NOW

Kids of Alcoholics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“My son Matthew and I are glad to help and hope his story reaches someone. This is the episode of Nick News he was on. It won an Emmy. Such a powerful message! Thank for letting him share it.

WATCH NOW

Matthew, Children of Addicts

“I want kids to know it’s not easy when your parent drinks and uses drugs but you can make good choices and you can love your parent and hate the addiction.  I want kids to really understand it’s not their fault and that they don’t have to follow their parent’s footsteps.”


READ MORE ABOUT MATTHEW:
Winning AttitudeSecond 2011-12 Winning Attitude Recipient
CenturyLink, Root Sports and the University of Colorado have named Ranum Middle School (Denver, Colo.) sixth grader Mathew Martinez the second Winning Attitude award winner of 2011-12.  Winners are selected from a pool of written essays submitted by Colorado middle school students explaining how their winning attitude made a difference in their communities.  READ MORE

 

CO Springs GazetteBetty Ford program helps Springs kids cope with addicted parents
He was only 8 years old, but already, he’d been suspended from school for five days. He rarely smiled, and the slightest little aggravation would send him into a rage. Someone warned his mother that one day, he’d end up hurting her.
READ MORE

RELATED:
Siblings: The Forgotten Ones by Joe Herzanek

 

Listen (on your radio or online)
to Matthew and his Mom tell their story

Saturday, Jan 21st at 5:00 pm (Mountain Standard Time)
7:00 Eastern, 6:00 Central, 4:00 Pacific


Call: 303.713.8255 with your comment or question

Listen Live

Eye on Addiction Radio website and more details

 

If you miss the show, listen to it on our
Show Archive

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TO PURCHASE: “Why Don’t They Just Quit? What families and friends need to know about addiction and recovery”

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