Chapter One
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Welcome to the show. You are here today because in your quest to kick your drug addiction, you have found this book. You have said the magic words that often lead to a drug free life style; I need help. Three words that every drug addict uses after realizing that their casual use has blossomed into a chemical dependency problem.  The question is, are you ready to quit? Is kicking your drug addiction the single most important issue in your life right now? If the answer is no, close the book right now and come back to it when you are ready. No big deal.

    This is where we weed out the weaklings, so to speak. Being a drug addict is the easiest thing that anybody can ever do. It requires no effort and supplies you with all of the necessary excuses to be a failure. This is chapter one in a very long and drawn out book that will take you on a journey through every aspect of your drug addiction and help you to understand how and why you became addicted and eventually supply you with everything that you need to know to take away all of the excuses that you require to be a drug addict. In this book you will learn how to detox your body from your drug and together, we will identify and address all of the triggers in your mind that are keeping you addicted. If you decide that you want to be drug free, you will have to read every word of this book. That's a huge commitment for an addict and you have to understand that there are many different levels of want in "I want to quit." You have to want to quit more then you have ever wanted anything before.
  
  I am not funded by any organization or government grant or by any person at all. Unlike other drug treatment programs, I will not lie to you. If I thought that cutting off your arm would help you quit using, I would tell you so. As you already know, things are going to get a lot worse before they get any better. Kicking a drug addiction is hard work and you have to be strong. It is understood that most people who experiment with drugs are not interested in a drug treatment program and in fact assume that they are not even addicted. You can understand this as you have felt this way yourself in the past. It is a common belief that drugs are for recreational use only and can lead to addiction if you do not monitor yourself wisely. I guess you failed that test because you are now suffering from a chemical dependency. The main difference between drug use and a chemical dependency is addiction. Addiction occurs over a period of time when the initial effects of the drug are diminished by the human body's own ability to build up a tolerance for such things as alcohol and drugs. As the body's tolerance level climbs, it requires a larger dose of the drug to reach your intended high. As you raise the quantity of drug consumption, you begin to put toxic levels of the drug into your bloodstream which eventually changes your body's own chemistry. After continued and uninterrupted use, your body adapts to the chemical as if it were intended to operate with it in your system. The problem is that when you attempt to take the chemical away, the body can no longer function without it. It is now dependent on that chemical to function normally or in a normal state. It is that chemical dependency that is keeping you addicted. The cycle is clear. If you try to take the drug away when you are chemical dependent, you will suffer from withdrawal symptoms. This is your body now trying to function without the drug. You have most likely felt these withdrawal symptoms yourself in the past, as this is a big part of the addiction. Quitting becomes a horrible experience with an easy solution. Take your medicine and the pain will go away.
  
  So what now? Now, you need a program to help you clean up and get a grip on your drug dependency. This is nothing to be ashamed of as everybody who kicks a drug addiction followed a program. Even someone who quits on their own has put themselves on some kind of program. Decisions were made and steps were taken to quit, once and for all.
  
  There are really only three ways that you can kick a drug addiction. One is in jail, one is an expensive drug treatment facility where all they are really doing is locking you in a room and the third is to quit on your own. Quitting on your own is the most common of the three and it is also the hardest because you know where you can easily get some of your drug. Quitting in a lock down treatment center or jail is easy because you have no choice. That is where the statement ‘you wanted to get caught’ came from. When you're living in an altered state of consciousness, sometimes your subconscious has to take control of your life. The vicious drug cycle was killing your body off slowly but surely and your subconscious mind had to do something drastic or your body would deteriorate to the point where it might not be able to help the brain with it's drug quest for much longer. If your body could not supply your brain with anymore drugs, your brain would also be suffering the consequences so your brain set you up with this simple strategy; get caught and be forced to rehab, rejuvenate your body and get healthy, get out and start the vicious cycle again. Call it a relapse if you want to but your brain never intended to let you quit anyway. This program will teach you to get a grip on how your brain is manipulating you into being a drug addict so that you can use this information to quit altogether. So, where do we start?
  
  The cure for drug addiction lies within the understanding of how the body and mind are simultaneously influenced by a chemical dependency. Only after gaining this understanding can you put an end to this dependency altogether. In order to solve the puzzle of your own personal drug addiction, you must first take a few steps backwards and try to understand exactly who and what you are.
  
  As a biological entity, you are a consumer. Your body works in conjunction with your brain to achieve its primary goal of being content. Therefore the body's actions must satisfy the brain. As you know, we eat food and drink liquids to supply our body with the necessary supplements to maintain a healthy lifestyle so that we can live a long life. In this process our brain and body work as a team and tend to trust each others instincts unequivocally. When the body is tired, the brain sends us signals and we begin the process of shutting down and getting the necessary rest required to function for the next waking period. When the body is lacking a necessary supplement, the brain figures out what is needed and uses the body to acquire that element. For instance, if your body was lacking a proper supply of vitamin C, the brain might send the body to the store to get an orange, or at least that's how it is supposed to work. Unfortunately, we have entered an age where the orange example has become obsolete. Now, if you required vitamin C, your brain can send you to the kitchen cupboard to take a multivitamin. If the brain is not feeling up to par, it doesn't have to figure out which combination of foods and liquids would relieve the problem. It would just instruct you to take a pill. An aspirin or a cold pill could be a chemical quick fix to a biological problem. Can you see where I'm going with this? With the introduction of chemicals into our bodies in pill form, we have not only figured out how to relieve our illnesses faster and more efficiently but we have also built up a higher level of trust between our body and our mind. It is this degree of trust that has made it so easy for your brain to trick you into your current drug addiction. The big problem is this; your brain cannot be trusted. Your brain has become the equivalent of an easily spoiled and selfish little kid who knows how to manipulate every aspect of your life and uses it's powers to satisfy it's own urges without regard for the ramifications of it's actions. If given the opportunity, your brain would screw your whole life up if it could reach its goal of contentness for today. Remember the old cartoon character named Wimpy from the Popeye cartoons? He always walked around saying "I would gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today." Your brain works on the same principals of ‘what have you done for me lately.’ In the drug world, Wimpy would simply be asking for a front. "I would gladly pay you later for something to get me high right now" he would say. That statement was nothing short of our brain figuring out how to spend money for us that we don't even have yet. As we all learned, it was a lot easier to picture having the money tomorrow then it was to actually acquire it after the fact. Later in this course, you will learn how to gain control of your mind by breaking this link-of-trust and once again start making decisions that are productive for your entire well being.
   
  Drug addiction is not a disease. Just ask anyone who has ever tried to ‘kick’ lung cancer. As an addict you have options that simply are not available to someone suffering from a serious illness. You can quit. You can keep on believing that you are a slave to your drug addiction, that there is no hope, that you will always be a failure or…you can quit. People who believe that drug addiction is a disease are simply at the end of their rope with trying to understand why they or somebody they know is still suffering from a drug addiction when all means of treatment and understanding have been exhausted and the only valid explanation left is that the user is just another victim of a serious illness that is out of their hands. Believe me, the last thing that you need is yet another excuse to be addicted such as you having a disease. If you have already bought into this myth, then your treatment will start the day that you realize that you are not a victim of a drug addiction but yet another willing participant. If nothing else, you should be thankful that you do not have an incurable disease. Also, you should always be skeptical when you here ridiculous statements that simply don't make sense. There is a lot of government funding out there that is targeted for any study or program that has anything to do with the general public figuring out what is going wrong in the drug treatment industry. People who have never been addicted to drugs do not understand how addiction works and rightfully blame the rise in crime and violence on the drug problem. When the public cries out, government programs are funded and a different type of crime begins. I'm referring to what I like to call ‘educated welfare’ where people who have six year college degrees spend their time creating studies to collect government funding instead of finding real jobs that would actually benefit society. Because they call themselves scientists, there conclusions are seldom questioned and their credibility is enhanced just enough to make them eligible for yet another government grant. That is where the statement ‘drug addiction is a disease’ came from. Scientific rhetoric wasn't paying the bills anymore so a conclusion had to made. The true answer of "we have no idea why someone gets addicted to drugs" wouldn't fly. Luckily for you, we have figured out why you are addicted to drugs and I will explain it to you so that you can understand it and kick your drug addiction once and for all.
  
  This program is designed as a self-help drug treatment program for people who are currently fighting with a Methamphetamine or cocaine addiction. Although there are significant differences between Cocaine and Methamphetamine, the treatment methods necessary for kicking these addictions are virtually identical. Unlike Heroin, which is made from opium, cocaine and meth are both from the speed family and have the same effects on the body and the mind. Besides, they already have a detox program for heroin, its called methadone. Methadone is a synthetic drug that was developed with the intention of making the pharmaceutical industry richer by offering heroin addicts an expensive alternative to heroin so that they could detox from their addicted drug without the consequence of withdrawal symptoms. The problem with methadone is that the addict quickly finds out that he can't live without his daily dose of methadone and the cycle of addiction has only taken a new course. Luckily though, the drug profits have been taken out of the hands of the illegal street dealers and put into the hands of the legal drug dealers, our ever-powerful pharmaceutical companies. While the trade off seems bittersweet, the goal of detoxification can be a reality and definitely qualifies as a victory in the ‘lesser of two evils’ argument. In this program, we will attempt to utilize the methadone game plan by mimicking the effects of your addictive drug by using several over-the-counter pharmaceuticals and vitamins to try to relieve the craving for your drug while at the same time detoxing the body and mind from the drug dependency.

    This is a 2 phase, 3 step program that starts in the heat of addiction and guides the user through a 14 day self-detoxification period while employing simple psychological techniques for helping the addict to stay clean forever by learning how to understand the triggers in the mind that often cause a clean addict to relapse.   Trigger is a word that we use to describe the action that takes place in your mind that causes you to relapse after you have been clean for any period of time. It is the realization that certain triggers exist in you that has caused you to figure out that you are addicted to this drug in the first place. What I mean by that is that while there was a time that you thought that you could take it or leave it, you have since learned that there are forces inside your mind that are working against you. At some point you wanted to quit but were unable to because every time you tried, something in your head would take control of you and make you want the drug so bad that you would do anything that you could to get some of it quick. The longer you waited after deciding that you were going to get some, the harder it became to wait patently. That was when you said to yourself "I guess I am a drug addict" for the first time. After that, it became easier for your brain to control you because you had already ‘thrown in the towel’ and decided that you could handle the label ‘drug addict.’ After that, every time that you tried to quit, your brain played on your addiction and used one of several different techniques to ‘trigger’ you back into getting the drug again. There are many different triggers in your brain that you will have to identify before you can beat your drug addiction altogether and I will teach you how to spot them and gain control over them. Understanding how the triggers in your brain are manipulating you softens the attempt and eventually teaches you how to overcome the temptation altogether. I will teach you how to use some simple mind techniques for overcoming your addiction. They are as simple as they are effective.




Prologue:

If you do not already believe in destiny then I strongly urge you to reconsider. In your life there are certain discernable chains of events that cannot be discounted as coincidence.

For the sake of argument there are two distinctive forms of destiny; That which you make happen and that which happens to you. It is easy to speculate in hindsight and determine that given your own personal set of circumstances you were destined to become a drug addict. It happened to you. Notwithstanding the fact that had you known that you would end up an addict, you may have considered altering your path in the early steps of drug experimentation, it happened. Now it's time for you to decide if you are destined to become an ex-drug addict. This is the kind of destiny that you make happen. True destiny, however, lies at the intersection of what happens to you and what you make happen.

In the early 80's, a local rock radio station, KMET in Los Angeles, was hosting an April Fools morning party at the Hollywood Palace which is directly across the street from the famous Capital Records building. I showed up at the building as one of 300 or so contestants in a fools contest because the grand prize was a VIP package that included meeting rock hero Sammy Hagar just before he took the stage at the Fabulous Forum supporting his Three Lock Box tour. I showed up with this great idea of wearing a T-shirt that said ET, The Extra Testicle and had pink balloons protruding from my shorts. To make a long story short, I won the contest and Cheech and Chong stole my bit and put it in their next movie. Cheech had the same design on his shirt and proclaimed "ET the extra testicle" just like I had done. Maybe you've seen it. Anyway, I had always dreamed of being a rock singer and the thought of meeting one of my two favorites (still haven't met Ted Nugent) had easily made this one of the best days of my life to that point. The Palace was a huge venue and I had just "performed" for well over 2000 people and emerged victorious as the crowd favorite. Remember, it was a fools contest.

As the four hour party was nearing the end, my friends and I were heading towards the front door and I stopped and turned around because I felt and intensely overpowering urge to look at the stage one last time. At that point I knew that destiny was going to play a part in my life whether I liked it or not. One of my friends yelled out at me because I was holding them up. "Jay, what the hell are you doing?" he said. I remember my answer as if it were yesterday. "I'm looking at the stage one last time" I said. "I just got a strong feeling that the next time I see it, I'll be on that stage singing with a band." Two of my friends snapped in unison "You don't even have a band" they laughed.

Well, over the years I had told that story to a lot of people and as time worked against me The Palace was eventually closed down and boarded up. I did put together a couple of bands and eventually I helped form a band called Kill Era that held together for over four years and had started to make a pretty good impact in the hard-to-crack LA music scene. We were making a name for ourselves by opening for major bands as they toured the club scenes across the nation and ended up in the LA or Orange County area's. We had worked our way up to the prime-time position with a few bands playing before us and the national act going on after us at about midnight.

Without our knowledge, somebody had bought up the old Palace and completely remodeled it. We had played a show with a band called Pantera three months before I got the call and I couldn't believe it. We were opening for Pantera again at the Grand reopening of the newly renovated Hollywood Palace.

It was a sold out show and everywhere you looked there was somebody you knew from the pages of Who's Who in the music or movie industry. Pantera treated us like VIP's and even paid our bar tab for the night. Our show was at it's peak and the audience acted as if we were the headliners. Destiny realized! Some nine years later my vision had become a reality. I know that had I not formed a band and positioned myself for the call, it would not have happened but divine intervention linked together all of the ifs, AND's or buts. If it were a mer coincidence, then why was I forewarned? Would-of, could-of and should-of, didn't have a chance.

To this day, that was the best day of my life. It was also the last show that I ever did without Meth in my system. The downward spiral was hastened by my bass player getting two ounces a week fronted to him and within six months the band had broken up completely. We played our last show at The Hop in Anaheim, CA and after my bass player showed up 20 minutes after we were supposed to start, the promoter was so mad that he made us set up on the floor in front of the stage. Meth had infested the band members and had eventually made it impossible to function as a unit. Naturally, it wasn't too long before Meth made it impossible for me to function as an individual. I lost everything, just like people had said I would. My house, my car, my wife, my dignity, my pride......somebody stop me!

You can finish the story from here. At this point we all went through the same things exactly. When people say that different people react differently, don't you believe it. We all act the same on Meth and we all do the same things. Only genetic personality traits sometimes make it appear different but it's all the same, believe me. Were all screwed.

Drug addiction is a death wish, straight up. When casual use evolved to chemical dependency, the daily torture of self-medication comes with a somber will to reach an end sooner as opposed to later. One day you realize that the only thing that can save your life is quitting altogether. So you think about the big question. Do I really have anything to live for? Without clear motivation, attempting to quit will never become anything more then an attempt. You must define your motivation.

When I was ready to quit, I looked everywhere for help. With the exception of programs that I could not afford, there was no help. There was little or no help in the library and the Internet was so crammed with unreliable nonsense that it was, at best, humorous. I remember the first time that I turned to a computer for help and I typed in the word "Meth." I got something like 1200 hits with the number one position entitled "How to Manufacture Methamphetamine and several other drugs." It was a dead end. The only thing other then that were several sites that offered horror stories of meth addiction that I was already familiar with from my own personal experiences.

I couldn't believe it. With all of the progressions of our country and the world, nobody was offering a solution for drug addiction. Then I heard that voice again. I decided that somebody had to make available a drug dependency solution for the general public and that somebody was going to be me. I would do it. I would clean up and I would spend all of my time researching existing drug treatment methods and talking with drug addicts who had already kicked the habit on their own and we would develop our own methods.

I believe that one man can make a difference. I know that I can and I know that you can. With the help of my friends I have developed the perfect drug treatment program. I designed the web sites and I wrote every word of it's content. Now, it's time to write the book. A self-help manual that guides the addict through a step-by-step detoxification and offers real usable techniques for staying sober. Shamefully, I am the best man for the job and luckily, it is my destiny.

Jay Hotrum