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Eric Ainge Opens Up About His Years of Drug Abuse and Mental Illness


jetscanes331

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Wow

I'm a drug addict. I was in denial for a long time, but that's who I am. My addiction is with the hardest of hard drugs -- heroin, cocaine and alcohol. During my days of using, I was a really bad drug addict. I would've made Charlie Sheen look like Miss Daisy.

I always thought of myself as a good kid that liked to have fun. We use the term "rationalization" in therapy. I would rationalize my drug use, and make it seem a lot more normal than it was. But it wasn't, because I was using a lot of drugs at a young age.

http://espn.go.com/blog/new-york/jets/post/_/id/4897/the-fall-and-rise-of-erik-ainge?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

I knew about the rehab from reports last year but I didn't know Ainge was into the really hard stuff. That's Freddy Prinze Sr. territory. Damn.

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This is really scummy of the owners. Now, Ainge did these things to himself and he would readily admit it. But it's a realtive pittance to keep his insurance in effect-

"The lockout has caused a lot of problems for me. My substance-abuse insurance through the NFL and CIGNA got canceled as a result of the lockout. If I were a normal player -- let's say I had a broken leg and I was in the hospital -- they'd have forms they would've sent me to continue receiving insurance through the NFL. Since I'm a drug addict in the drug program, my insurance just got canceled, and I didn't like that."

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Illicit narcotics aside, the Brady comparibles coming out of school are there.

I can remember the kid as a freshman. He was splitting time with a Vol QB who name escapes me, but literally Ainge would throw, this guy would run. Ainge would light it up. Big throws down field, late game heroics, pro arm, Stood tall in the pocket...kid looked the part. Its a shame.

The coroner said that if Freddy Prinze Jr. didn't shoot himself he would have died from an OD because of all the sh*t he had in him.

Sad. Either way, I'm sure the intent was the same.

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This is really scummy of the owners. Now, Ainge did these things to himself and he would readily admit it. But it's a realtive pittance to keep his insurance in effect-

"The lockout has caused a lot of problems for me. My substance-abuse insurance through the NFL and CIGNA got canceled as a result of the lockout. If I were a normal player -- let's say I had a broken leg and I was in the hospital -- they'd have forms they would've sent me to continue receiving insurance through the NFL. Since I'm a drug addict in the drug program, my insurance just got canceled, and I didn't like that."

Boo Hoo....he got himself involved with drugs and lost his insurance from the lockout. In most states, families with Autistic kids don't even get insurance to cover the treatments and therapies for Autism.

I have no sympathy for a guy who gets himself involved in drugs. Funny thing about society. You can voluntarily enter a life of drug and alcohol abuse and get insurance to cover your mistakes. Get born with Autism, no dice, sorry about your luck.

I just organized and played in a charity hockey game that I put on every year. This year's cause was an Autism charity in metro Detroit. We cleared $6700 for the charity and they're using the money to grant scholarships to families with ASD to pay for treatments/therapies. They're over 100 applications.

I wish AInge the best, but priorities in this country are FUBAR/.

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Boo Hoo....he got himself involved with drugs and lost his insurance from the lockout. In most states, families with Autistic kids don't even get insurance to cover the treatments and therapies for Autism.

I have no sympathy for a guy who gets himself involved in drugs. Funny thing about society. You can voluntarily enter a life of drug and alcohol abuse and get insurance to cover your mistakes. Get born with Autism, no dice, sorry about your luck.

I just organized and played in a charity hockey game that I put on every year. This year's cause was an Autism charity in metro Detroit. We cleared $6700 for the charity and they're using the money to grant scholarships to families with ASD to pay for treatments/therapies. They're over 100 applications.

I wish AInge the best, but priorities in this country are FUBAR/.

You know it's funny, I was reading this and thought to myself, "wow you could literally insert the quotename as Garb and you really wouldn't know the difference." Then I clicked that little green box in the lower left hand corner. True story.

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You know it's funny, I was reading this and thought to myself, "wow you could literally insert the quotename as Garb and you really wouldn't know the difference." Then I clicked that little green box in the lower left hand corner. True story.

You know, I saw that you posted to this thread and I thought to myself "wow, I bet Rutgers will post something about me once he see's that I agree with GOB" So, I clicked on this thread and I am correct. Predictable story.

For the record, I do feel badly for him. He definitely has demons and is trying to fight the good fight, but I do feel far worse for addicts that have no place to live, never mind Wellesley MA, and no rich relatives to support them, let alone Danny Ainge.

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You know, I saw that you posted to this thread and I thought to myself "wow, I bet Rutgers will post something about me once he see's that I agree with GOB" So, I clicked on this thread and I am correct. Predictable story.

When you can already predict another person figuring you for being up on your high horse in a discussion you've never posted in, and perhaps more importantly actually being correct. That. Is not. A good. Thing.

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When you can already predict another person figuring you for being up on your high horse in a discussion you've never posted in, and perhaps more importantly actually being correct. That. Is not. A good. Thing.

Regrettably, my horse is not as high as yours. Bummer.

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I love the "screw him he has a rich uncle" mentality. It's almost as delicious as the "I don't care if Laveranues Coles was molested by his stepfather, he needs to can it with this attitude problem" notion that was forever constant in years past.

Holy cow, I did not realize that Mr. Ainge was forced to use heroine against his will! My bad.

The real issue here is the availability of prescription pain killers, the recklessness in which they are prescribed and the shamefulness of the programs that silently (or not so silently) condone the practice of numbing someone's pain so they can play.

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Boo Hoo....he got himself involved with drugs and lost his insurance from the lockout. In most states, families with Autistic kids don't even get insurance to cover the treatments and therapies for Autism.

I have no sympathy for a guy who gets himself involved in drugs. Funny thing about society. You can voluntarily enter a life of drug and alcohol abuse and get insurance to cover your mistakes. Get born with Autism, no dice, sorry about your luck.

I just organized and played in a charity hockey game that I put on every year. This year's cause was an Autism charity in metro Detroit. We cleared $6700 for the charity and they're using the money to grant scholarships to families with ASD to pay for treatments/therapies. They're over 100 applications.

I wish AInge the best, but priorities in this country are FUBAR/.

I can see it from both sides, having done legal work on both sides of the courtroom, and had 2 close family members "get help". I don't entirely buy the addiction is an illness, because at some point you cross a line, whether that is the first or the x number time you use. And I'm symapthetic to anyone that has an autistic child.

But still think the owners should be bigger than this. This impacts very few players, so the relative cost is minimal. Ainge will always have to be responsible for himself, but it's a relative pittance in a $ 9 billion industry. heck, At a loss why the NFLPA doesn't cover it either. Comes back to both Smith and Goodell are scumbags.

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This thread is getting good.....

Rich whitey responsibilities differing from poor darkie responsibilities threads always provide good fodder.

Good luck to the kid regardless. Painkillers are the devil. Oxy is as bad as heroin in my eyes. Had too many friends fall victim to it over the years and sadly witnessed a few go down the darker path with it as the starting point. It actually was the downfall of my fraternity house, which sucked for those of us who just liked to drink. Tons of credit to whoever can get their act together after being hooked on it. I have some former friends who years later still haven't recovered from it. Including a former roommate who's getting over having to declare bankruptcy years ago from all the cash advances he had to take out to finance his habit. You're just not in the right state of mind when you get on this stuff. Hate to be a preacher but if you're a parent with a kid going to college, you seriously need to have a talk with your kid about painkillers and the ramifications of experimenting with them. They don't seem as bad when you think about them, but before they know it they're treating it just the same as any other hard drug. But 40-50 year-olds judging teenagers (practically) with this crap is ridiculous.

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Holy cow, I did not realize that Mr. Ainge was forced to use heroine against his will! My bad.

The real issue here is the availability of prescription pain killers, the recklessness in which they are prescribed and the shamefulness of the programs that silently (or not so silently) condone the practice of numbing someone's pain so they can play.

+1....Amen Garby

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I can see it from both sides, having done legal work on both sides of the courtroom, and had 2 close family members "get help". I don't entirely buy the addiction is an illness, because at some point you cross a line, whether that is the first or the x number time you use. And I'm symapthetic to anyone that has an autistic child.

Depends who you ask... To many, addiction isn't a sickness but rather the manifestation of an underlying issue. Most highly functioning individuals don't turn to drugs past a recreational level for no good reason. It's also really easy to look down on the 'other' in judgment when you have no understanding. That's never going to change though.

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