Sam Simmons

We've seen that coming way before they even tried to have a conversation about it, you know, because it was easier to chase a pill than to do the physical therapy.

and to reorganize your life so you give yourself your body time to relax.

You know, a lot of them, when you talk about the health issues, a lot of them, you know, even though with the folks in the pain clinic, several of them would probably be, probably had issues with alcohol before they had issues with pills, right?

But the biggest thing is, is they didn't know how to slow down.

This was easier.

The doctor tells me to go home and rest for three, four weeks, and I'm a perfectionist, and I'm anal, and it's all or nothing.

I'm not going to go home and relax for three, four weeks.

If there's a pill out there that I can take that will let me get through the day and then suffer that night, then I have to have another pill.

We're talking about folks who

probably had their kind of addictive behavior, but they were covering it up with activity.

They were covering it up.

So addiction, unfortunately, we want to narrow them down.

Again, when you talk about a hardcore caretaker, that's an addiction on other people's misery, right?

And to cover up something that I don't want to deal with.

So a lot of those folks, when you've dealt with them one-on-one,

You wouldn't classify them as being somebody who had a chemical problem, because that's what we do in our society.

We have defined a certain look, and a portion of those folks would have met that criteria, but they probably wouldn't have never been confronted, really, about their use.

or that kind of thing.

And if they had a good relationship with a doctor at the time, they could continue to get the pills and not have a problem compared to my clients of color.

And so when you talk about addiction, you've got various things about addiction.