Clean: Overcoming Addiction and Ending America's Greatest Tragedy - Hardcover

Sheff, David

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 054784865X ISBN 13: 9780547848655

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013

Synopsis

Addiction is a preventable, treatable disease, not a moral failing. As with other illnesses, the approaches most likely to work are based on science — not on faith, tradition, contrition, or wishful thinking.

These facts are the foundation of Clean, a myth-shattering look at drug abuse by the author of Beautiful Boy. Based on the latest research in psychology, neuroscience, and medicine, Clean is a leap beyond the traditional approaches to prevention and treatment of addiction and the mental illnesses that usually accompany it. The existing treatment system, including Twelve Step programs and rehabs, has helped some, but it has failed to help many more, and David Sheff explains why. He spent time with scores of scientists, doctors, counselors, and addicts and their families to learn how addiction works and what can effectively treat it. Clean offers clear, cogent counsel for parents and others who want to prevent drug problems and for addicts and their loved ones no matter what stage of the illness they’re in. But it is also a book for all of us — a powerful rethinking of the greatest public health challenge of our time.

About this title

About the Author

DAVID SHEFF is the author of several books, including the #1 New York Times best-selling memoir Beautiful Boy. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, the New York Times Magazine, Rolling Stone, Playboy, Wired, and many other publications. His ongoing research and reporting on the science of addiction earned him a place on Time magazine's list of the World's Most Influential People. Sheff and his family live in the San Francisco Bay Area. Visit David at DavidSheff.com, and on Twitter @david_sheff.

 

From the Back Cover

In Beautiful Boy, David Sheff gave voice to the silent the millions of addicts and their families. Now, in Clean, he offers them a path toward healing. Our nation is sinking into an epidemic. This book offers realistic hope for recovery from addiction for those who suffer the disease. Drew Pinsky, MD

David Sheff is one of our strongest and most compassionate voices on the profound costs of addiction to the family and to society. Clean should be read by anyone affected by the number-one public health issue in America, which means it should be read by everybody. Christopher Kennedy Lawford, author of Recover to Live and Symptoms of Withdrawal

From the Inside Flap

Addiction is a preventable, treatable disease, not a moral failing. As with other illnesses, the approaches most likely to work are based on science not on faith, tradition, contrition, or wishful thinking.

These facts are the foundation of Clean, a myth-shattering look at drug abuse by the author of Beautiful Boy. Based on the latest research in psychology, neuroscience, and medicine, Clean is a leap beyond the traditional approaches to prevention and treatment of addiction and the mental illnesses that usually accompany it. The existing treatment system, including Twelve Step programs and rehabs, has helped some, but it has failed to help many more, and David Sheff explains why. He spent time with scores of scientists, doctors, counselors, and addicts and their families to learn how addiction works and what can effectively treat it. Clean offers clear, cogent counsel for parents and others who want to prevent drug problems and for addicts and their loved ones no matter what stage of the illness they re in. But it is also a book for all of us a powerful rethinking of the greatest public health challenge of our time.

Reviews

The statistics are sobering: drugs kill more than 300 people in the U.S. every day. Almost 10 percent of Americans older than 12 are addicted to drugs. About 90 percent of those who require treatment for addiction never get it. Sheff evaluates our nation’s approach to the problem of drug abuse and finds it sorely lacking. Drug addiction is a chronic illness—like diabetes, cancer, and heart disease—but doesn’t get treated as one. It doesn’t afflict only bad people or just those who lack willpower. It is treatable and preventable. Once we acknowledge that drug addiction is indeed a disease, our public policy, research, and treatment will profoundly change. Sheff chronicled his oldest son’s drug addiction in the memoir Beautiful Boy (2007). Here he lashes out at “the pseudoscience, moralizing, and scare tactics that characterize the current system.” He shares addicts’ stories and information from researchers and experts and reports on his visits to treatment programs. Sadly, no surefire treatment presently exists for all types of addiction. In Clean, Sheff advocates not for punishing drug addicts but for treating them. --Tony Miksanek

Edition details

• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 054784865X
• ISBN 13: 9780547848655
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 374