Our Silence Has Allowed Others To Define Us

I often wished that state legislators who knew the most about addiction would band together and speak out as one during budget debates. Who better to advocate for treatment and chip away at public denial than the recovering alcoholics I knew who were also members of the General Assembly?

Yet the answer was as close as my nearest mirror. Despite being a journalist and writing opinion for years, I was no more likely to publish a column about my own 20-plus years' recovery from alcoholism than lawmakers were prepared to out themselves on the floor of the legislature.

[continues 592 words]