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.

At my worst, I even resented Nic because an addict, at least when high, has a momentary respite from his suffering. There is no similar relief for parents or children or husbands or wives or others who love them.

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

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.

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