To addiction hell and back
Niagara doctor pens book about his struggle with opioids to help others
Dr. Christian Proulx knows all too well how an opioid addiction can rip apart communities and lead people to do unimaginable things in order to feed their habit.
The family physician not only prescribed the powerful pain medication to patients at his thriving practice in St. Catharines, but he also became addicted to them.
The doctor, who practised medicine in Port Colborne and St. Catharines, was prescribed pain medication after the removal of an infected wisdom tooth.
Before long, he was hooked.
“The leading pathway to the opioid crisis is the legitimate prescription,” he said.
“I developed an addiction to prescription pain killers, and alcohol. I nearly died from it.”
Proulx resigned his membership with the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario in 2016. Two years later, a college disciplinary hearing found that he committed an act of professional misconduct and had failed to maintain the standard of practice of the profession.
“The need to have it (narcotics) can drive people to do horrible things,” he said.
Proulx sought outpatient addiction treatment for alcohol and substance abuse after he resigned. He also began to question what led him down such a destructive path.
“The behaviours associated with addiction are very, very strange,” he said. “When you’re going through it, you don’t understand what’s happened to you.”
“I needed to know why I acted the way I did.”
The psychology of addictions wasn’t on the curriculum when he attended medical school in the 1990s.
“In all my years of medical school, I can recall a two-hour lecture on alcoholism and addiction,” he recalled. “We learned all about the effects, how to treat liver disease and things like that, but that was it.”
As he underwent treatment to manage his demons, he also embarked on an
ambitious research project in an attempt to answer not only his own questions about addiction, but also the questions of others in the grip of dependence.
He took an ethnographic approach to his research, which is a method of study whereby “you immerse yourself into the population you’re studying,” he explained.
He interviewed more than 400 alcoholics and addicts, some of whom were in recovery and some who were still using.
The research culminated with the release of his book, “The Alcoholic/Addict Within.”
Drug addiction, he said, is a disorder of biology and not a failing of morality.
His book explores the brain changes, genetics and psychology that cause addiction and how people can use that information to manage their addictions.
“Everyone thinks addicts are people who were raised by a mother who was an addict, or who were poor and malnourished,” the author said. “Those are risk factors, yes, but you can’t predict who will become addicted. There are a lot of addicts who have everything, everything was just fine with their lives.”
Regardless of how someone becomes an addict, he says everyone can recover, with the right help.
Proulx, now 51, is in his third year of sobriety.
His book incorporates a 12step-style program as a framework for applying the science to recovery. Recovery issues such as self-esteem, coming to terms with past traumas, dealing with anger, self-forgiveness, and mastering cravings are addressed. Also explored are the links between addiction and mental illness
Proulx is working on a second book, and also works as a consultant, discussing addiction and recovery with health-care professionals.
“I want them (doctors) to be able to recognize when this is happening to patients in their practice,” he said.
“I look back and — knowing what I know now — I missed people who were drinking or using drugs. It’s just so secretive. It just didn’t click for me at the time, but I have a radar now.”
The Alcoholic/Addict Within is available on amazon.com and through the author at recovery.folio@gmail.com.