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

Once and for all, people must understand that addiction is a disease. It’s critical if we’re going to effectively prevent and treat addiction. Accepting that addiction is an illness will transform our approach to public policy, research, insurance, and criminality; it will change how we feel about addicts, and how they feel about themselves. There’s another essential reason why we must understand that addiction is an illness and not just bad behavior: We punish bad behavior. We treat illness.

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

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.

I didn't cause it. I can't control it. I can't cure it.

How can both Nics, the loving and considerate and generous one, and the self-obsessed and self-destructive one, be the same person?

We deny the severity of our loved one's problem not because we are naive, but because we can't know.