Intervention Directory

Intervention is Back!

Tonight’s the first episode of the new season! Unfortunately for me I moved across the country and don’t have cable so I’m not going to be able to watch until the next day. I think iTunes lets you buy each episode the day after, is that right?  Anyway I’ll try to have the episode post up with at least some info about it before it airs so that y’all can comment if you want.

In sad news, since the show last aired two of the people from Intervention have passed away. Brittany died of an overdose shortly after returning from treatment and Jeff passed away after struggling with kidney failure. Our condolences to the family of friends of these two kind-hearted, deeply loved people. Thank you for sharing their stories with us.

What’s up with this season?

So here’s the deal on Season 15 so far:

New Intervention episodes return June 19th. Yay!  There hasn’t been a new episode since Daniel/Robert on April 17th.

4 of the episodes that have played this season are NOT new episodes, they’re Intervention Canada episodes from a few years ago (Loren Ep6 ,  Kent Ep10, Conrad Ep8, Barry Ep5)

A&E is weird like that. They like to sneak in these old Canada episodes and sorta pretend like they’re new without actually saying they’re new nor not new, and then wait forever to tell us when actually new episodes are starting.  To make it even more confusing this time they’re putting them in the Season lineup numbering as if they’re new, which just screws everything up for me. Boo. I really wish A&E would hire me to sort this shit out for them.

I don’t cover Canada episodes but there’s a open thread here if you want to read comments & updates.

See ya on the 19th!

Donations, New Season Coming Soon

Hey everyone, sorry the site was down for a little bit.  Totally my fault for not paying the hosting fees on time, but if you’re inclined to help me out by donating to this fund to keep Intervention Directory alive for another year, I’d be very very grateful.    https://www.gofundme.com/tceewg

So Ken Seeley says that the new season starts next month. Woot!

@Ruaca new ones next month

— KenSeeley (@KenSeeley) February 11, 2016

Update: Intervention on A&E Site says new episodes March 6th.

New Episodes!

So new episodes start up again on July 26th on A&E. I can’t tell if they’re considering this a new season (15) or just a continuation of 14.

Also, the A&E site right now has almost all of the episodes available to stream without a cable subscription. There are even ones on there that have been hard to find. (And there are a few that are mysteriously missing). If you haven’t seen them all and are looking for some to watch before the new season starts, here are a few of the episodes that have stuck with me the most over the years.

Laurie and Jessie – Pill addicted mom and severely bulimic college student.
Sonia and Julia – Anorexics twins
Dana – Mother who becomes addicted to pills after tragic loss
Amber – Alcoholic, bulimic mom
Sebastian and Marcel – Young heroin-addicted brothers.
Ed and Bettina – Alcoholic married couple
Kristen – Young heroin addict in Baltimore
Gabe – Heroin addict from India who was adopted into Christian family.
Nicole – Young mom with disturbing eating disorder

Open Thread on Addiction & Recovery

I know that sometimes just having someone tell you that they understand what you’re going through is a huge comfort, and being able to provide support to people suffering from addiction helps keep sober people sober. This page is for us to talk about our experiences with addiction and/or recovery and to offer support to those who are struggling.

Please know that this page, and this whole site, is not staffed by addiction specialists and is not affiliated with Intervention in any way. It’s just a place to talk.  I will do my best to make sure this thread is a safe space by moderating the comments closely. I won’t publish comments from people trolling or being turds.

-Dizzy

About Dizzy

I’m writing this because it occurred to me that you might like to who I am and why I’m so into this Intervention show that I made a friggin website about it. Here are my stories:

My mother was a heroin addict until she was 8 months pregnant with me. I was born a baby addicted to heroin. I’ve been told that if I ever do the drug I will be immediately addicted. This has adequately scared me away from ever doing heroin and I consider myself lucky.

After I was born my mom switched to alcohol and cocaine until she found meth in the late 80’s, which she continues to use today at age 65.

Last year I watched my father die of liver cancer from alcoholism.  I moved to his town to take care of him for the last 6 months of his life. I watched him continue to drink a case of beer everyday, even when he was yellow with jaundice and acted more like someone with advanced dementia than cancer. I was with him when he died.

Mother, father, brother, sister, aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents. Addiction is literally in my blood. I was raised deep in it, I understand it more than I understand most things, and I experience it myself every day.  There is nothing that has affected my relationships and the choices I make more than addiction has.

I come from a small town in Washington State that is primarily known for producing Kurt Cobain. It’s also known for a dramatic de-population due to meth.  I could call my hometown dead, and a quick drive through downtown would make that point, but it’s not dead. It may be populated almost exclusively by meth heads and heroin addicts, but those people are alive and they’re my people. They’re addicts who need help. They are my family and old friends and the family and friends of all the people I know there.

I left there more than 20 years ago, when the meth epidemic was just starting to take hold. Since then, I’ve faced my own addiction battles. In my 20’s I developed the skill/affliction called functional alcoholism. I drank more than any person should ever drink while still making it to work everyday.  I thought that drunk me was the real me, my identity was contingent upon being drunk.  One especially hungover Saturday morning I had the epiphany that all the pain I was experiencing was simply the cost of drinking. I deserved it. This was the price I had to pay for drinking the way I did. And I wondered if what I got from drinking was worth the cost.

I voluntarily went into treatment on Christmas Eve in 2000 because my plan was to drink myself into oblivion for the holiday season.  I decided that rehab would be a better idea than drinking myself to death. It was a good decision.

I was sober for almost 7 years. I was fully in the program, had a sponsor, started meetings for women new to recovery, followed the steps to a tee.  I went back to school and got my degree, with honors. I wrote essays that won awards. I started making art that I enjoyed making and people enjoyed seeing. I knew that I didn’t need alcohol to be the best me.  I became that productive, smart, creative me that I always wanted to be. I was so far removed from who I thought I was when I was drinking and my identity was no longer contingent on being a drinker.  I had found a way, I was happy.

My mother told me she wanted to kick meth. I went up there to help her through withdrawals. We got through them, she started using again a few weeks later. As soon I got home from that trip I started thinking that drinking a cider would be no big deal, I could probably drink like a regular person now right?  I mean I hadn’t drank in almost 7 years, of course I could have a cider and it wouldn’t change anything. I would still be in recovery, it would just be a relapse. I would stop after that one cider. And if not, I wouldn’t drink the next day or anything. And if I did, I would never ever drink like I did before. I’d never be that person again. I had conquered alcoholism! This would not affect me. I get to be a regular person now.

So eight years ago I bought a 6-pack of cider. I haven’t stopped drinking since. I’m once again a functional alcoholic. I’m much better at it now, but I can’t deny the grip alcohol has on me.

I’ve been on most sides of addiction.  There’s a reason why I watch this show, there’s a reason why I feel the need to document it.  It’s not because I want to see people at their worst, exploited, semi-consciously performing for the reality cameras.  It’s because the addicts and the families on Intervention are people I strongly relate to in ways that I can’t even explain. It’s because Intervention is a show that actually saves those peoples’ lives.

I know that I’m not the only one with a complicated relationship to addiction that obsessively watches Intervention. That’s why this site exists.

New Season Open Thread

What did you think of the “I Was There” special?

How do you feel about the production changes on the new season? The Skype element?

Talk about it all here.

(Note: I moved some comments on this topic that were posted on other pages to here)

Update March 2015

Since the last update it’s been confirmed that Ryan Bond, the chef from Season 8, died in December 2014 of cirrhosis.  According to his girlfriend, he was sober for 2 years before relapsing.  My condolences to Melanie and the many people who loved him.

I just found this Reddit AMA with one of the Intervention camera operators.  Interesting stuff.

So yeah, the new season starts on Sunday the 22nd March. Yes, yes it does. And there’s a 10th Anniversary Special that will air right before the premiere that features the interventionists and crew members from the first 10 years. They’re calling it “I Was There.” I’m obviously gonna be there.

Intervention Update Jan 20th

Three things I learned today:

1. The A&E site has 102 full episodes available to watch right now. I don’t know how long this will last so get on over there and catch the ones you’ve missed.

2. Netflix is suddenly streaming a bunch of episodes from the first couple of seasons and calling it Intervention: Collection.  Their license to show Intervention was pulled a couple of years ago, this may mean that they will again get the rights.  Fingers crossed.

3.  A commenter pointed out the A&E will be airing the new season. LMN (A&E’s sister network) was supposed to start airing the new season, but A&E made the announcement that it would be airing it starting March 1st and this post confirmed the switch.  And Jeff, Candy, Ken and Donna will all be back! That’s awesome.

Intervention Update – January 2015

First of all, LMN is still airing Intervention Canada episodes and calling them “all new” and “back-to-back premiere” episodes.  Still no word on when the actual new season will begin.

The real reason for this update is to let you know that I’m moderating the comments a bit harder than I have in the past.  Here’s what happened:

When Brooke died just before Christmas, a lot of people felt the need to comment about how her family were horrible people who didn’t deserve any sympathy because of how they treated Brooke during the show. I let some of the milder comments through but kept quite a few back. Then Brooke’s twin sister Brittany commented, and what she said really stuck with me.

“…The show did not portray us in good light as I am well aware of how people felt about us. Yes, Brooke was in pain, she had been in and out of rehabs when we got to the point of the show. We were all at that tough love stage. We were all trying to force her to get help. Basically, a 45 min show cannot possibly tell the story of her abuse of drugs.”

She’s right.  Who are we to think we know more about their addictions and family dynamics & history than they do just because we watched a HIGHLY edited 45 minutes of video?  We get a glimpse into the lives that they actually live. We do not know more, we do not know better.

What if the person you were once closest to in the world was an addict on this show? How would you be portrayed in the editing in order to make a compelling story? What would people on the internet rush to say about you? And how would you feel reading it?

We can judge these people all we want, rant about how they should have done this instead of that and oh my God what a horrible mother, but who does any of that help exactly?  And does anyone actually want to read other peoples’ opinions or do we all just want to declare our own?

Needless to say, I thought long and hard about what kind of change needs to happen here. I thought about a “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all ” policy, but I can’t adhere to that myself. I pass lotsa critical judgment and offer my opinion in plenty of the posts here, and it’s certainly not all positive.  What I can do, though, is not publish comments that are mean just for the sake of being mean. This goes for comments that are supportive of the addict and hateful towards the family. I’ve said this several times and I’ll say it once more: These are not fictional characters, they’re real people struggling with some of the most intense and traumatic things that humans experience. Remember, as much as we might not like the family, they are willingly participating in a nationally televised intervention in order to save the person they love. Go easy, will ya? They’re doing something right.

So that’s what’s new. I will decide on a case by case basis if a negative comment is worthy of being published. If it’s just a nasty comment full of shit talk, I won’t publish it. Yes, I will be the judge. Hey, it’s my site! I do what I want!  If you have a problem with being “censored” by Dictator Dizzy, you should probably go post on one of the many other Intervention discussion forums. Also, I’m about to embark on the adventure of deleting old comments that this rule applies to. Sorry if you posted a nasty comment, it’s about to disappear.

Mean exists everywhere on the internet, I want this to be just one place where it doesn’t.

Thanks,
Dizzy

Intervention Update – December 2014

Well it’s almost 2015, which means a whole new season of Intervention over on the LMN channel. I haven’t read anything about an actual premiere date but it was reported that it would be in the first quarter of the year.  In the meantime, LMN has been airing older episodes that aren’t found anywhere else without paying.

But LMN has also been pulling some shady “ALL NEW EPISODE” stuff – you may have recently seen an episode that you haven’t seen before and thought it was new. Don’t be fooled! These are not new episodes. They’re from Intervention Canada and have been available to view on YouTube for quite a while. They’re really stretching the notion of ALL NEW by showing old episodes that weren’t ever aired in U.S.  It’s funny, they try to hide the fact that they’re Canadian episodes by never mentioning where the addict lives, I guess hoping we won’t notice the slightly odd accents. But whatever, the network is reviving Intervention and I’m grateful, so I’m gonna let this go. Can’t wait to see how the format and production changes when the new season starts up again. I’ve heard conflicting reports about which interventionists are returning – if anyone knows anything for sure please leave a comment below.

And now the sad news: Commenters have alerted us that two addicts from previous season have recently lost their lives. John Carstens, the young diabetic from season 5, died of a heart attack in September.  And Nik Buckmaster, the heroin addict also profiled in season 5, reportedly died from post-surgery complications in November.  From what I can tell, both John and Nik had a whole lot of people who loved them. My sincerest condolences to their friends and family. I know they will be missed.

Update Dec 22: Sadly, Brooke Boulter, the young pain med addict who struggled with intense chronic pain, died on December 21st. The cause has yet to be announced, but given that the obituary was published the day (in fact, only hours) after her death, I have to think that Brooke’s death was not sudden and the announcement had already been prepared.  My thoughts and prayers are with her family right now. (As much as I found their behavior during her addiction to be very insensitive, they realized during the intervention that her problem was the pain, not the pills, and that she needed their understanding more than anything.  I hope they were able to maintain that level of sympathy for her as she tried to manage her pain without overdoing it on the meds. I’m sure they are devastated with grief right now – please be respectful in your comments).

Housekeeping
New comment policy: Out of respect for my readers, I will no longer publish comments asking about how an addict is doing if that question has been asked and/or answered already. This has become a bit of an issue – it sure clogs up threads and it’s really annoying to read “How is Kaila doing?” or “Whatever happened to Cristy?” 6 different times in one scroll. I expect everyone to read the comments and search around the site for information on someone before asking for an update.  If you post a comment and don’t see it approved, this is probably why.

Big shout to commenter Gregory for supplying me with a whole bunch of photos that I was missing. THANK YOU!  I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the readers of this site, most especially those who post updates and offer me information and photos, etc.  I always wanted this site to be collaborative and current, and so many of you really do contribute to what has become a devoted virtual community of Intervention addicts.  So big thanks to all of you for making this site become what I dreamed it could be when I started it.

Oh yeah, and Happy New Year my fellow fans! Here’s to a healthy and adventure-filled 2015.

Intervention Cancelled

Well, it was bound to happen eventually, but I’m still shocked and saddened. I have a lot to say about Intervention, what is has meant to me over the years, and about all the good I believe it has done, but I will wait until the last episode airs and write some sort of eulogy.

For now: After a show gets cancelled, old episodes are no longer available from its network’s site. Which means they won’t be on Hulu either. There will be no more followup videos. Not sure how long the forums will be around or how long the A&E/intervention site will be up.  No more Where Are They Now episodes. We will never find out who is still sober and who has relapsed, or died, since the show aired. Basically, all things Intervention will come to an end and we will only have internet archives and each other. 🙂

The only place that currently has all episodes of Intervention available for viewing is Amazon Instant Video. Netflix no longer carries it, Hulu only has the ones that are also on the A&E site.

On Amazon, newer episodes are $2.99, older are $1.99, unless you’ve got a Prime membership, in which case everything prior to Season 11 is free. I assume eventually, if Amazon keeps the episodes post-cancellation, all episodes will be free for Prime members. If you’re not yet a Prime member and can afford the yearly $79, I would highly recommend it. Free 2-day shipping on pretty much everything and free access to tons of movies and shows. It pays for itself if, like me, you do a lot of shopping and watching (via Wii) on Amazon.

This blog will stay alive indefinitely and I will keep trying to fill in the episodes that I missed, as I hope that as people find old episodes somewhere or are trying to remember the name of someone they saw on the show, that this site can still be a resource. Please continue to use this space as a place to discuss the episodes and to provide any updates you have on the addicts from Intervention.

Thank you for reading.

-Dizzy