Anyone who has lived through it, or those who are now living through it, knows that caring about an addict is as complex and fraught and debilitating as addiction itself.

A world of contradictions, wherein everything is gray and almost nothing is black and white.

Wherever you be, wherever you may, seek the truth, strive for the beautiful, achieve the good.

I am becoming used to an overwhelming, grinding mixture of anger and worry.

Here's a note to the parents of addicted children: Choose your music carefully...There are millions of treacherous moments.

The hopeful part about that is when you do have that help, you will feel better. It still doesn't make this easy. Nothing makes this easy, but you can make better decisions.

This stigma associated with drug use--the belief that bad kids use, good kids don't, and those with full-blown addiction are weak, dissolute, and pathetic--has contributed to the escalation of use and has hampered treatment more than any single other factor.