Andrew Drummond does a pretty good writeup on Simon Gunn, drug and alcohol treatment guru to the stars, and his being caught on tape smoking ice with a prostitute.  

Who would want to be counselled by someone who hasn't taken any drugs, anyway.

If anything this guy at least knows what he's talking about.

Besides, it's not as if what he does IS important

'including the ‘Ting Tong Bar’, run by a guy called Ting Tong Tony, possibly not his real name'

Laughed at this bit!

Interesting article and I do, to an extent, agree with Phil, that former users can make great counsellors.

However, if you are still using and are at management level, then perhaps a greater level of discretion is called for.

I actually had an application form for a job at Channah, but was put off by the vast difference between fees paid for services and wages paid to staff. The post of counsellor was only offering GBP 12.5 K. Board was included but I felt this wage was an insult considering my experiece,training and qalifications, and this is perhaps reflected in the fact they seem to have unqualified staff and other staff who operate via Skype (incidentally imo I think this i ridiculous as observation of body language is often an integral part of work with a client)

I am also rather dubious about the way they claim 'success'. They make much of a 92% 'treatment completion' rate, but completing treatment does not equal abstinence or recovery!

They are also now saying that drug and alcohol addictions are not the same and cannot be treated the same, and although there are differences in the way you approach the two, the foundation of your work is basically the same.

Great post Bill

I love the thumbs up pic.

Is he smoking ice WHEN he's already working as a drug counsellor? If he is, then it's a classical case of not practising what one preaches... I for one will not want to see a counsellor who's (currently) into drugs, if my aim is to go clean... Probably it goes easier on my pocket too if I were to lock myself up in a room and go cold turkey than to see a drug-using counsellor, not to say about efficiency of treatment. Then again, the ability of most drug users who wanna quit, to remain locked up in a room and going cold turkey is another story altogether

But of course, if the drug abusing thingy was his history before he started working as the drug counsellor and he has stopped since, well, then that's a thing of the past and maybe it can help him to be a better drug counsellor, since he has "been there, done that" and this bit of history may enable him to better understand what the clients are going through...

Yanyan; at the point of this picture, not only was he a counsellor, but was GM of Channah Thailand.

And cold turkey is the most difficult option. Often it is not enough to just stop using the drug, you need to examine the reasons for drug use and, where possible, put solutions in place for those underlying issues.

That's why the part of the cold turkey was said with a smiling face, meaning in jest It worked for some people, though probably not for all or even many, and I guess 'soft drugs' will be easier to use the cold turkey than 'hard drugs'... What's Channah Thailand, anyway? Is it a rehab centre?

Yes, for those who can afford it!

You don't really need to do cold trukey for soft drugs as addiction is rarely an issue, and where there is dependency, it is psychological rather than physical, so there are no withdrawal sypmtoms.

I know a few people who have managed to do cold trukey, but it is maintaining the abstinence that is difficult.

Okie dokie, so Channah is the rich folks' rehab... Kudos to those few who can do the turkey plus maintain it... So best not to start since it's so hard to quit... Is ice considered hard or soft drugs?

Hard

Maybe the Gunn 'guru' got addicted to it then, and tried to hide his double life...