loha is an ancient spirit that lives and breathes within the Hawaiian Islands. It exudes passion, pulsates with energy, and erupts with joy. It is encircled in light and undaunted by darkness. Aloha is love. Aloha is life. Aloha is empathy. And it’s a mindset that helps with my bipolar disorder.
I was drunker than a frat boy at a jungle juice party. Lollapalooza 2011 revisited.
Jingled. Antifogmatic. Crapulous. Nippitaty. Clearly I went through the thesaurus looking for synonyms for “drunk.” Back in 2012, that’s not only how I was, it was who I was. Five years ago, I was stuck in a whirlwind of alcoholic madness. On my last night of drinking, I went to a Super Bowl party of…
Chances are, if you are questioning whether or not you are an alcoholic, you probably are one. You think you can take it or leave it when it comes to drinking. But can you?
Ben Affleck fell off the wagon. After 12 years of sobriety, the Batman actor decided to imbibe again for his role in Gone Girl, playing a character who is hungover all the time. Affleck is an alcoholic. The Oscar-winner entered rehab in 2001 at the age of 31. Affleck battled alcoholism throughout the 1990s, culminating in his check-in to rehab at Promises, the same rehab that treated Robert Downey, Jr. Affleck was married to fellow Hollywood star Jennifer Garner, but she pulled the plug on the relationship, fed up with Ben’s drinking and gambling.
Creed was a late ‘90s alternative-rock band with a Christian bent. Extreme paranoia gripped Creed lead singer Scott Stapp in November 2014, when he experienced his first major manic episode. He made a cryptic YouTube video documenting his hallucinations.
I’ve been to my fair share of concerts — around 600 according to my estimation, most of them punk shows. And one thing that is always ubiquitous is weed. If you have to be under the influence of drugs or alcohol in order to enjoy a concert, you’re doing it wrong.
Whether it’s showing his support for same-sex marriage or talking candidly about his addiction, Macklemore is one of the most genuine rappers making hip-hop today. Macklemore’s 2012 Grammy-winning album with Ryan Lewis, The Heist, is chock full of references to his drinking days and the demons he fought while trying to get sober.
There are songs that paint a vivid picture of drug and alcohol abuse and there are songs that glorify it. For this list, I focused on the former. These are songs that describe addiction to a T. Most of these artists know what it’s like to be stuck in the spider hole of addiction. They’ve lived to tell these cautionary tales.
There is no cure for alcoholism. Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic. It’s a chronic disease. But it can be confusing to some why us alcoholics always refer to ourselves as recovering even if we’ve been sober a long time. We alcoholics have dark pasts. Some of us have attempted suicide. Stolen. Ostracized people. Acted out sexually. Even exhibited violent behaviors. These acts can never be undone. So an addict or alcoholic is constantly in need of setting things straight.
