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Lived Experience & Community

Recovery culture, stigma, family, faith, workplace recovery.

Cocaine Got $300 More Expensive an Ounce. Nobody's Demand Went Anywhere — It Went Shopping.

In South Florida, a cocaine shortage didn't shrink the stimulant market. It just handed it to methamphetamine — and the psychology underneath that switch says more about addiction than either drug's chemistry does.

DEA agents in Palm Beach County say they've never seen this much meth. The reason isn't a new addiction — it's a $300-an-ounce price gap with cocaine. What the switch reveals about how dependency actually works.

Jul 316 minRead

More in Lived Experience & Community

38 total in this section

02Lived Experience & CommunityJul 30

Peer Support Workers Are Recovery's Best Technology. Their Employers Still Manage Them Like a Risk.

A new qualitative study of 36 peer and clinical workers in Australia's addiction and mental health services finds that lived experience is the credential clients trust most — and the one workplaces are least equipped to support.

03Lived Experience & CommunityJul 29

Nobody Warns You That Year Six of Recovery Has Its Own Crisis. It Just Looks Nothing Like Year One's.

Long-term recovery brings a distinct set of psychological challenges — identity, purpose, relationships — that early-recovery programs rarely prepare people for.

04Lived Experience & CommunityJul 28

Your Insurance Company Doesn't Think of Itself as Part of Your Recovery Plan. It Is.

A Yale addiction-medicine fellow's STAT essay argues insurance disruption functions as a clinical relapse trigger, not just paperwork — grounded in one patient's premium jump from $40 to $138 a month.

05Lived Experience & Community

The Flatness in Month Two Isn't You Failing at Sobriety. It's Your Brain Trying to Refill Itself.

Jul 272 min

06Lived Experience & Community

Treat the ADHD Underneath the Cocaine

Jul 262 min

07Lived Experience & Community

A Diabetes Drug Just Quieted Cravings Science Couldn't Explain. Washington Just Deleted the Number That Told You How Much Was Too Much.

Jul 229 min

The Log

Earlier in Lived Experience & Community

Every piece in this section, most recent first.

Lived Experience & Community

Cocaine Got $300 More Expensive an Ounce. Nobody's Demand Went Anywhere — It Went Shopping.

More in Lived Experience & Community

Peer Support Workers Are Recovery's Best Technology. Their Employers Still Manage Them Like a Risk.

Nobody Warns You That Year Six of Recovery Has Its Own Crisis. It Just Looks Nothing Like Year One's.

Your Insurance Company Doesn't Think of Itself as Part of Your Recovery Plan. It Is.

The Flatness in Month Two Isn't You Failing at Sobriety. It's Your Brain Trying to Refill Itself.

Treat the ADHD Underneath the Cocaine

A Diabetes Drug Just Quieted Cravings Science Couldn't Explain. Washington Just Deleted the Number That Told You How Much Was Too Much.

Earlier in Lived Experience & Community

CMS Just Wrote 'Not Sick Enough Yet' Into Federal Medicaid Policy

Heroin Basically Vanished From the Street Supply. The Craving It Built Never Got the Memo.

A New Study Finally Says What Peer Workers Have Known All Along: Having Been There Is a Skill

They Just Know: What Peer Support Workers Prove About Recovery

Your Body Knows You're About to Crave Something Before You Do

Four Landlords Said No. The Fifth Cost Him Two and a Half Years of Prison Wages.

She Emailed a Stranger 'I Think I'm Dying.' He Wrote Back With the Only Help That Existed.

Clients Can Tell Who's Actually Been There. A New Study Explains Why That Matters.

Losing an Apartment, Not Losing Willpower, Sent Jeff Noland's Friend Back to the Street

Your Worst Years Just Got Confirmed as a Professional Qualification. The Study Also Explains Why That Job Wrecks People.

New Study Confirms What Every Peer Worker Already Knew: They Just Get It, and the Job Is Wrecking Them Anyway

Three People Got Better Without Ever Saying 'Never Again'

Your Craving Isn't a Character Flaw. Yale Just Built a Model of It.

Ten People Broke the Only Rule Anyone Ever Gave Them About Drinking. Most of Them Are Fine.

The People HAMS Helped Aren't All Sober — And HAMS Calls That a Win

Your Brain Learns Faster From a Craving Than From a Rule — That's Why 'One Slip, Total Failure' Backfires

The Relapse Trigger Nobody Screens For: Your Mailbox

Marcus Has Been Sober Eight Months. Nothing Feels Good Yet. His Brain Is Doing Exactly What It Should.

Insurance Changed Its Mind. Her Recovery Didn't Get the Memo.

HHS Opioid Crisis Statistics

No Pill, No Shot, No Patch: The People Left Behind by the Cocaine Treatment Desert

500 Peer Specialist Jobs and the Psychology That Explains Why They Work

Buprenorphine Is Now a Foster Care Prevention Tool. That's Worth Sitting With.

Recovery Is Their Credential. It's Also Their Vulnerability.

The Peer Recovery Workers Who Got Their Grants Back — and Still Don't Know If They'll Have a Job in September

Ryan Hampton Made TIME's 100 Most Influential in Health. Ask Him Why Peer Support Works.

The Opposite of Addiction Is Community — And We Keep Defunding It

No Pill for This: The Lived Reality of Cocaine and Meth Recovery

The substance class we haven't talked about: inhalants, and why nitrous oxide is in the headlines for the worst reason

The 'wounded healer paradox': what a new study tells us about peer support and relapse risk

If Someone You Love Has a Substance Use Disorder: The Family Guide