--Forrest Gump (1994)--

Forrest, Forrest Gump is a simple man with little brain activity but good intentions. He struggles through childhood with his best and only friend Jenny. His 'mama' teaches him the ways of life and leaves him to choose his destiny. Forrest joins the army for service in Vietnam, finding new friends called Dan and Bubba, he wins medals, starts a table tennis craze, creates a famous shrimp fishing fleet, inspires people to jog, create the smiley, write bumper stickers and songs, donating to people and meeting the president several times. However this is all irrelevant to Forrest who can only think of his childhood sweetheart Jenny. Who has messed up her life. Although in the end all he wants to prove is that anyone can love anyone

"Life is like a box of chocolates, Forrest. You never know what you're gonna get"

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Cast
Tom Hanks -- Forrest Gump
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Robin Wright Penn -- Jenny Curran (as Robin Wright)
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Gary Sinise -- Lt. Dan Taylor
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Sally Field -- Mrs. Gump
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~http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0109830/

--BRAIN Test--

You are a right brain dominant student!
You probably get bored during long lectures and prefer to take classes with a lot of freedom of movement and thought. You like to write stories and even tell stories about your funny experiences. You might be a little suspicious of other people's motives sometimes, but that's only because you can usually tell whenever someone is lying or when they're up to no good. You are a little on the dreamy side--or a lot. You plan books or movie plots but you don't always follow through on things you think about. You should work on that. You are fun and spontaneous, and probably active in sports or clubs. Your feelings run deep, and it shows. You have strong instincts, and you solve problems on hunches and feelings. You are artistic in some way. You can believe in things based on experience, without seeing scientific proof. You might be a finalist on Survivor some day, since you know how to read people so well, and you have great survival instincts.
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Do you get bored when teachers lecture too much? Do you feel like you can size up people easily by watching them? If so, you may be right-brain dominant.
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Characteristics of Right-Brain Students

• You take notes but lose them. You may have a hard time keeping track of your research
• You might have a hard time making up your mind
• You are good with people
• You don't fall for practical jokes as easily as some
• You seem dreamy, but you're really deep in thought
• People may have told you you're psychic
• You like to write fiction, draw, or play music
• You might be athletic
• You like mystery stories
• You take time to ponder and you think there are two sides to every story
• You may lose track of time
• You are spontaneous
• You’re fun and witty
• You may find it hard to follow verbal directions
• You are unpredictable
• You get lost
• You are emotional
• You don't like reading directions
• You may listen to music while studying
• You read lying down
• You may be interested in “the unexplained”
• You are philosophical

Advice for Right Brain Students

• Choose to do personal essays
• Watch your daydreaming—keep it under control
• Let your imagination work for you in the arts
• Let your intuition work for you in social situations
• Let your deep thinking work for you during essay tests—but don’t ponder too long
• Be creative with essays. You can use colorful language well
• Use images and charts when you study
• Write down directions
• Try to be more organized!
• Don’t be overly suspicious of others
• Make outlines to organize your thoughts.
• Choose fiction in reading assignments
• Try to avoid teachers who lecture a lot; choose teachers who use activities
• You tell stories well, so write some!
• Put information into categories for better understanding
• Avoid getting bogged down by thinking of all possibilities when answering questions
• Finish things! You have so much talent, but you don’t always complete things.
• You have great instincts and survibal skills. If you study hard, you might be a finalist on Survivor one day!

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~http://homeworktips.about.com/library/brainquiz/bl_leftrightbrainb.htm

--HELP is on THE WAY?--

Ask for help

The first rule of recovery is to be able to ask for help, to reach out and get support from others. If you need assistance there will be plenty of people in recovery only too willing give it. Just ask!

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Eat properly

See the Nutrition and exercise section for tips on how to best take care of your nutritional needs.

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Exercise regularly

Exercise is a mood enhancer and will lift our spirits and give us something else to think about other than our craving or addiction.

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Don’t be isolated

Our addictive side thrives on isolation, so when you find yourself wanting to be alone and not in company most of the time and not in company, ring your own internal alarm bell and get connected swiftly!

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Be honest

Honesty in recovery is paramount; if we lie to ourselves and others it is impossible for us to get well.

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Use positive affirmations

Sadly, our own inner voices or internal dialogues are usually our own worst enemies. Truthfully, if we spoke to our friends the way we speak to ourselves most of the time, they would probably have all deserted us by now! Can you treat yourself as you would a dear friend and say encouraging things to yourself rather than use negative expletives? Remind yourself of your good points, of what you are doing well, of traits and characteristics you like about yourself. You need to learn how to be your own best friend and dump the enemy, who is certainly not helping you.

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Live in the here and now

Addicts have a habit of living in the future or in the past. We disconnect from the present moment and turn our attention instead to our internal dialogue and fantasies. Counter this tendency by making concerted efforts to stay in the present. Keep your thoughts in the moment without projecting into the future or forever re-running the past.

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One final point!

It is imperative that as part of your recovery you learn about the relapse process and devise your own plan to help prevent it happening to you. You need to develop your own strategy and look at ways to avoid your personal triggers and know what warning signs are significant for you. Please look at the relapse prevention planner and questions so that you can design your own recovery plan. This will give you a prevention procedure that will aid your recovery greatly and give you the tools you need to maintain sobriety in the long term.

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~http://www.trntv.co.uk/family-and-friends/relapse-prevention/how-to-recognise-relapse-4/

--How to recognise Relapse--

One of the major challenges in recovery from any addiction is the reality that relapse may occur, particularly in the early months of abstinence when relapse rates are high. At this time, we need to be extra vigilant and highly self-aware in order to stay committed to our newly found path and avoid being tempted back into our old addictive patterns.

Relapse is not a single event, as is often believed, but a process that builds up days, weeks, or even months before the addictive cycle recommences. Relapse is not unusual and indeed is probably better viewed as part of the journey towards recovery. The majority of addicts repeat the cycle of change many times before they are able to sustain long-term sobriety. If you do relapse, learning why may help you avoid it next time.

Signs of relapse
Being clean from any addiction is an ongoing process that requires both abstinence from mood-altering substances and changes in your behaviour, attitudes, feelings and thinking. When we are at risk of relapse, we may allow more negative behaviour, thinking, attitudes and feelings to creep in. Below is a list of relapse symptoms, the list is not exhaustive but may help you recognise whether you are in danger.

Behaviour

• Arguing more frequently for no apparent reason
• Getting angry easily
• Smoking more/increasing caffeine intake
• Eating irregularly or more than before
• Being compulsive in another area, such as cleaning, washing or exercising
• Losing your daily structure
• Attending fewer fellowship meetings or stopping altogether

Attitudes

• Convinced you will never ever use again
• Negative about life
• Lying and manipulating others
• Openly rejecting help from others
• Dissatisfied with life
• Losing confidence in your ability to remain abstinent
• Imposing your recovery on other people
• Adopting a non-structured lifestyle, no boundaries
• Not caring about sobriety

Feelings

• Moody and/or depressed
• Angry with self or others
• Euphoric
• Bored
• Self-pitying with self-defeating beliefs
• Lonely and isolated
• Unresolved guilt and shame
• Unreasonably resentful
• Hopeless, there seem to be no solutions
• Wanting to be happy but not knowing how
• Fearful about the future or life without using
• Hungry, angry, lonely or tired and believing using would relieve the symptoms

Thinking

• Believing you are cured and could now control your intake (reactivation of denial)
• Minimising the effects and consequences of addiction on your life
• Thinking you can drink as long as you stay off cocaine or cross-addicting to another process or substance
• Being unable to concentrate or achieve tasks or goals
• Focusing solely on one area of your life (having tunnel vision)
• Having periods of confusion
• Being less able to plan constructively, inattention to detail
• Daydreaming, always thinking “if only…”
• Believing alcohol/drugs/using is necessary in order to have fun
• Growing impatient with the recovery plan, things aren’t happening fast enough

Typically, relapse progresses from stability through a period of increasing distress that leads to physical or emotional collapse. To understand how warning signs can progress, it is important to look at the interaction between the recovery and relapse processes, both of which have six key stages.

The recovery process

• Abstaining from alcohol, food, drugs, gambling, sex, co-dependent behaviour etc
• Separating from people, places and things that promote the use of addiction and establishing a social network that supports recovery
• Stopping self-defeating behaviours that prevent awareness of painful feelings and irrational thoughts
• Learning how to manage feelings and emotions responsibly without resorting to compulsive behaviour or the use of alcohol, food, drugs, gambling etc
• Learning to change addictive thinking patterns that create painful feelings and self-defeating behaviours
• Identifying and changing the mistaken core beliefs about oneself, others and the world that promote irrational thinking

The relapse process

When people who have had a stable recovery begin the relapse process, they simply reverse the six stages of recovery. Therefore they begin to:

• Have a mistaken belief that causes irrational thoughts
• Return to addictive thinking patterns that cause painful feelings
• Engage in compulsive, self-defeating behaviours as a way of avoiding the feelings
• Seek out situations that involve people who use alcohol, drugs, etc.
• Find themselves in more pain, thinking less rationally and behaving less responsibly
• Manage to find themselves in a situation where using seems like a logical escape from their pain, they return to their addiction

~http://www.trntv.co.uk/family-and-friends/relapse-prevention/how-to-recognise-relapse-1/

--First Step--

‘All addicts are fearful of taking the first step.

Action on Addiction was the bridge that helped me move from the dark to the light.’

~TOM~

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~http://www.actiononaddiction.org.uk/

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~http://www.trntv.co.uk/family-and-friends/useful-links/

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~http://www.addictiontoday.org/addictiontoday/contact-us.html

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~http://www.al-anon.org/contact.html

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--Addict's Family & Friends--

How many people are involved in the life of any one addict? Family, friends, employers, co-workers … we are all affected by addiction – not just the addict. While our loved one struggles to feed his or her addiction, we have to cope with the fallout.

The distress suffered by families and friends of addicts is severely underestimated. Through embarrassment and shame we often become isolated from friends and the wider community. We may start to question our own judgement because we’ve been lied to so many times or have been abused by the addict.

We probably feel like we’re living on a rollercoaster of emotions: anger, frustration, helplessness, confusion, hopelessness, guilt and shame. Stress takes its toll and manifests itself in health problems such as anxiety, depression, headaches and digestive disorders. We may even have suicidal feelings.

Usually we become so focused on the behaviour and problems of the addict that we completely lose sight of ourselves. All our energy is directed into caring for and covering up for the addict so that in the end, all we are doing is enabling him or her to pursue the addiction. The irony is that unless we care for ourselves, the vicious cycle of addiction is likely to continue because we have unwittingly built up a culture of dependency.

Changing our behaviour can be uncomfortable and very difficult, but we need to take responsibility for ourselves and our own recovery. There is evidence to suggest that when we take care of ourselves for our own sake, addicts may begin to seek help.

At The Recovery Network, we are committed to providing support for family members and friends who are often overlooked as victims of this illness.
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~http://www.trntv.co.uk/family%2Dand%2Dfriends/