 With tens of thousands of people dying each year from drug and alcohol related deaths, it's time that we start rethinking the way that we think of rock bottom. Stay tuned. What's up everybody? This is Chris from the Rewired Soul, where we talk about the problem but focus on the solution. And today we are going to talk about rock bottom, the myths, the misconceptions, and the massive overdose and death rates when it comes to the disease of addiction. I'll be completely honest with you, after the mass shooting in Las Vegas and as the authorities and the news are trying to put pieces together and seeing what this guy's tendencies were, it's becoming more clear to me that a lot of people don't know what rock bottom looks like. And this is something I teach in treatment all the time and why addiction is so hard to spot. So let's talk about it real quick. Now when I say rock bottom, most of you watching this video, you probably have an idea of rock bottom looks like. You probably think that it's the homeless person on the streets, no family, no loved ones. They're begging for change just to get loaded. They're using, you know, they're selling plasma to get money for heroin or they're turning to prostitution. They've lost everything because of their addiction. While this is very true that many people hit that kind of rock bottom, it is not the standard. In recent years, maybe a little over a decade since the opioid crisis really first began, we started to see how it started to spread into middle America. And every time there's a death or every time somebody becomes an addict, people are so they're shocked. They're like, but he had all this money. She had a family. She had a house. He had a job. She had children. And that's why we need to realize that the disease of addiction doesn't care what you have or what you don't have. I teach my clients in treatment. What I learned when I first got clean, which is that addiction only has two primary symptoms, a mental obsession and a physical craving. Addiction has nothing to do with the amount of money in your bank account, whether you're married or not, whether you have children, whether you have a house, whether you have a job, it does not care. The best way that I can put this into perspective for the average person is let's take a look at some primary examples. Chris Farley, Heath Ledger, Carrie Fisher, Michelle McNamara, what do all of these people have in common? Not only were they all very successful, but they all died of drug overdoses. So looking at these four celebrity deaths, and there are many, many more, we can no longer associate success with lacking a rock bottom. Addiction will kill you or will lead to terrible things whether you have lost things or not. Addiction doesn't discriminate. So when we're talking about this, it's important for anybody out there who's watching whether you're in recovery, whether you're in active addiction, or especially if you have a loved one. Because if the only signs that you're looking for is if the person has hit the rock bottom, which you have a misconception of, this means that that person may die, and it'll come as a shock to you. Two other examples that hit very close to home with me is my mother and my best friend. My mother, when she got clean almost 12 years ago, she managed to get a PhD in psychology while being a full-blown alcoholic. She was very successful. From the outside, everything was going amazing for her, but she hit a mental and spiritual rock bottom. The other example is my best friend. I thought he was going to die. See, for me, when I hit my rock bottom, it was what many people think. I lost everything. Friends hated me. My family hated me. I lost all my money. I couldn't see my son. I was getting evicted from my apartment. I lost my truck. I lost everything. So when it came to my best friend and seeing what addiction was doing to him, but the fact was he was making more money than he's ever made in his life. He was living in a high-rise on the Las Vegas Strip, which cost thousands of dollars a month for a tiny little one bedroom. He was with his then-fiance, who is now his wife. I was like, my friend's going to die because he has not hit what many people believe a rock bottom to be. But luckily, he had the moment of clarity it took to call me up and we got him into treatment and my best friend has over two years sober today. So I really want you to rethink the way that you're looking at what the word rock bottom means, because if we change the way we look at rock bottom, that means we can start noticing the signs earlier on and addiction is a progressive disease, which means it's much easier to treat when it's in the earlier stages. So don't wait till the point until you or someone you know hits that very low rock bottom because the problem with that is sometimes death happens before that rock bottom that we think. And if you would like to learn more about the disease of addiction, how it works, how to overcome addiction, go ahead and check out my course on TheRewiredSoul.com. This is a course that I teach in the treatment center I work at. I teach it to families and it has a lot of information in there. And in the description below, there's a coupon in there for 50% off if you would like to check out this course. Thanks for watching. If you like this video, please give it a thumbs up. And if you haven't yet, click right below on the little round subscribe icon. I'm always doing videos about addiction, mental health, mental illness, and the solutions to help you as well as help the people you know. Also to the left of me, click or tap on the thumbnails. Those are other videos and playlists that I've made to help you with mental health. Thanks for watching. Again, this is Chris from TheRewiredSoul. I'll see you next time.