From Publishers Weekly
For a Jane magazine article, Lyon bought Vicodin illegally over the Internet. After devouring the painkillers he immediately ordered more, his journalistic research turning into a full-fledged addiction. Lyon had company in his opiate abuse—more than 33 million Americans have used prescription painkillers nonmedically, he notes. The seven million currently abusing Vicodin, Oxycontin, Percocet, et al., are more than those who use cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens, Ecstasy and meth combined. As Lyon researched his book—and fed his continuing addiction—he explored the latest permutation of the American drug culture, one that has snared everyone from doctors and schoolkids to grandmothers on social security. Lyon interpolates memoir segments between interviews with experts and profiles of other abusers. The fact that he also strongly advocates certain policy and treatment strategies adds another element to an already broad approach. The resulting swirl of characters, story lines and perspectives at first makes it difficult to find a narrative thread. Yet Lyon writes powerfully about his own experiences as a young, troubled gay man in New York City, and it's this human story that stays with the reader. (July)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Product Description
Joshua Lyon was no stranger to substance abuse. By the time he was seventeen, he had already found sanctuary in pot, cocaine, Ecstasy, and mushrooms--just to name a few. Ten years later, on assignment for Jane magazine, he found himself with a two-inch-thick bottle of Vicodin in his hands and only one decision to make: dispose of the bottle or give in to his curiosity. He chose the latter. In a matter of weeks he'd found his perfect drug.
In the early half of this decade, purchasing painkillers without a doctor was as easy as going online and checking the spam filter in your inbox. The accessibility of these drugs--paired with a false perception of their safety--contributed to their epidemic-like spread throughout America's twenty-something youth, a group dubbed Generation Rx. Pill Head is Joshua Lyon's harrowing and bold account of this generation, and it's also a memoir about his own struggle to recover from his addiction to painkillers. The story of so many who have shared this experience--from discovery to addiction to rehabilitation--Pill Head follows the lives of several young people much like Joshua and dares to blow open the cultural phenomena of America's newest pill-popping generation.
Marrying the journalist's eye with the addict's mind, Joshua takes readers through the shocking and often painful profiles of recreational users and suffering addicts as they fight to recover. Pill Headis not only a memoir of descent, but of endurance and of determination. Ultimately, it is a story of encouragement for anyone who is wrestling to overcome addiction, and anyone who is looking for the strength to heal.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
21 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Pill Head:Prescribed for all those who have suffered a pill addiction or for those who want to understand the U.S. pill epidemic,
By
This review is from: Pill Head: The Secret Life of a Painkiller Addict (Hardcover)
Joshua Lyon, author of Pill Head, has penned a book that could not be more timely. Pill Head is part drug addled memoir and part thoughtful, investigative journalism; it is the story of a pill addict told with unflinching honesty, from first pill to detox. The book weaves together the stories of addicts, doctors, and governmental agents--effectively demonstrating how the lives and decisions of each are intertwined in America's new drug epidemic--prescription pills.
Lyon admits that prior to his Vicodin use, he had sampled plenty of goodies from the recreational drug grab bag; ecstasy, coke, mushrooms, marijuana and LSD. While he might have been a self professed "expert at escapism," he wasn't an addict. He was a young, experimental, gay man with social anxiety; living and working in New York City as an editor of the popular magazine Jane. He, not unlike thousands of people, partied just hard enough one night a week to be left incapacitated the rest of the weekend. But when he first got a hold of Vicodin, as research for a magazine assignment in 2003, all prior dabbling paled in sensation to this new wonder drug. That pivotal night, instead of flushing the pills as instructed by his editor, Lyon found himself defiantly taking three Vicodin and later professing out loud, "This is what I've been waiting for my whole life." Lyon escorts us into the lives of other pill heads who were also entranced by that feeling, even as addiction led them into emotional, spiritual, physical and financial despair. We meet addicts like Jared, whose introduction to pills came from a high school inside connection at the local pharmacy and later escalated into a $45,000 habit; Caleb, whose first big OxyContin supply came from a stolen tractor trailer shipment; Heather, who doctor shopped and eventually stole prescription pads; and James Dean, charged with manslaughter because his own son overdosed from the very pills they sold together. Through Lyon's own exploits and those of others, we discover the secret trades sustaining this rampant market, Also interspersed throughout the book are interviews with experts, like Carol Boyd, a research scientist for the Substance Abuse Research Center. who explains several factors that account for our current national level of painkiller abuse. There are currently 7 million who abuse them, which surpasses use of cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens, Ecstasy, and inhalants combined. 33 million Americans admitted that they have non-medically used prescription painkillers. After all, this is a nation of pill poppers--one for every ailment--no wonder the rates of prescription pill abuse have skyrocketed. DEA agent Mark Caverly acknowledges that the increase in painkiller abuse is related to "societal influences," and that "we turn to pharmaceuticals for everything." Lyon points out that with Generation RX, parents need to lock up their medicine cabinets, not their liquor cabinets. Not only are prescription pills popular among youth because they are easy to get but they also represent a more socially acceptable way of getting high than taking street drugs. It isn't as taboo to pop a pill, that someone "pharmed" from their mother's medicine cabinet, as it is to buy street heroin. However less taboo, it is just as deadly and the pills sometimes stronger than street drugs. Ironically, as Lyon's points out in a recent Huffington Post op-ed, there is surge in heroin use as pill heads now desperately resort to the once taboo street deals as a result of the DEA crackdown on pharmaceuticals. Because our country has such an outdated way of understanding addiction, and drug control gets confused with pain control, there is what Lyon refers to as, "the witch hunt going on in the United States for doctors prescribing pain medication." Pill Head deftly tackles this discussion, introducing us to physicians like Dr. Hurwitz, whose lives have been ruined now that the DEA struggles to suppress the burgeoning pill epidemic. This is a current hot topic, as the DEA proceeds to take the authority to determine the legitimacy and appropriateness of a doctor's practice and doses prescribed, often at the costs of patient needs. While addicts and thieves flood the market by looting trucks full of pills, the DEA chooses to focus on diversion of pills from doctor to patient. Lyon is not just an addict, or a journalist, but an empathetic writer sharing his story in hopes of raising public awareness. He is adept at orchestrating the many voices and layers involved in such a broad endeavor like Pill Head. The honest, raw chronicle of Lyon's own pill abuse unfolds and it becomes clear that the initial appeal of Vicodin, like "no apparent side effects" or feeling "fantastic, even when the high was over," was just a seductive illusion that slowly took over Lyon's life. A sudden illness brought Lyon to the road of recovery, eventually landing him in detox. His ability to divulge the most intimate details grips the reader. It isn't always pretty, and the content might be intense for readers, especially recovering addicts, but the book offers us a necessary, compelling look at pill abuse; an addiciton affecting every demographic in the nation. Readers will find themselves in detox with him at the book's conclusion, anxiously hopeful and heartfelt that Lyon's illusion will finally shatter and he will take back his life. Pill Head is written with intensity, wit and is a message of hope. [...]
21 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
What book were they reading ?,
This review is from: Pill Head: The Secret Life of a Painkiller Addict (Hardcover)
After reading all these reviews I bought Pill Head straight away. I guess it is true there is no accounting for taste. A recovering addict myself, I read lots of books about addiction. This one reads like a series of routine cheap magazine pieces strung together. Much of the time the process is glamorized, except when the addict hits bottom. There is nearly no introspection, no motivation, no attempt to discover why all these addicts are taking these drugs. It is simply: she did this, and took that, then did this, etc. etc . A big disappointment.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Therapeutic and Educational,
By L. Read (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Pill Head: The Secret Life of a Painkiller Addict (Hardcover)
I would love to thank Joshua Lyon for writing this. This book was a huge comfort and also confirmed so many of the things I have personally gone through, researched, wondered and felt. I would like to read a book about Emily's story as well! Some of her quotes felt as if they were echoed from my own mind. I am already going through and highlighting my favorite parts, and will definitely be reading it again.
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Opiate addicts tend to be suffering from the most severe forms of depressionthey feel totally empty inside, he told me. The pills act as a security blanket, a protective bubble from all that hurts.
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The reason why opiates can be so addictive is because after the brain starts getting them consistently, it stops producing endorphins on its own.
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Addiction, which seems to have a genetic component, is characterized by an escalating loss of control as physical tolerance develops.
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