Yoof of today!
We definitely seem to have entered the silly season in the run up to Christmas. In the past week I have received several inquiries from the press who all seem to think that I must have some kind of crystal ball or arcane knowledge about "young people". I have been asked about young people and AA/NA - “is it trendy for young people to go to 12 step meetings now that Lindsay Lohan has admitted that she is going to meetings?”
Who cares if it is “trendy” or not, they are missing the point – its about saving lives, not fashion! Is coronary care trendy? Are A & E departments trendy? I have to ask myself what kind of rarefied atmosphere do these guys live in? Have they put something in the water in Wapping?
Lindsay Lohan is living in California, I live in South Yorkshire. Young people in California do lots of things that haven't caught on over here – surfing for one – and there are huge cultural differences in the way addiction and recovery are viewed over here and there.
The end result is that young people do go to AA/NA meetings in the US – especially California, while over here in the main they don't.
Most “addicts” seem to turn up in NA at around the age of 30 and it's around 40 for AA. There are of course exceptions to this rule.
I believe that one of the causes of this is the marked reluctance on the part of treatment providers in the UK to properly diagnose alcohol and other drug use in young people.
In the main the attitude seems to be that alcohol and other drug use is symptomatic of developmental problems rather than a condition that requires proper diagnosis and treatment in it's own right. In fact there are very few services in the UK providing proper addiction treatment for “young people”. Our very politically correct practitioners prefer to treat the age rather than the disease.
Then I would say that wouldn't I? I am a grumpy old addict after all!
Who cares if it is “trendy” or not, they are missing the point – its about saving lives, not fashion! Is coronary care trendy? Are A & E departments trendy? I have to ask myself what kind of rarefied atmosphere do these guys live in? Have they put something in the water in Wapping?
Lindsay Lohan is living in California, I live in South Yorkshire. Young people in California do lots of things that haven't caught on over here – surfing for one – and there are huge cultural differences in the way addiction and recovery are viewed over here and there.
The end result is that young people do go to AA/NA meetings in the US – especially California, while over here in the main they don't.
Most “addicts” seem to turn up in NA at around the age of 30 and it's around 40 for AA. There are of course exceptions to this rule.
I believe that one of the causes of this is the marked reluctance on the part of treatment providers in the UK to properly diagnose alcohol and other drug use in young people.
In the main the attitude seems to be that alcohol and other drug use is symptomatic of developmental problems rather than a condition that requires proper diagnosis and treatment in it's own right. In fact there are very few services in the UK providing proper addiction treatment for “young people”. Our very politically correct practitioners prefer to treat the age rather than the disease.
Then I would say that wouldn't I? I am a grumpy old addict after all!
Labels: AA, addiction, alcohol, alcoholism, dependency, drugs, NA, policies, recovery, research, treatment, young people
posted by anaddict @ 12:19 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home