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We have combed through all the August 27, 2025 Vigil video footage taken by JB Sankara and NCHS film student Yanfer Martinez, and have released higher quality versions of the testimonials from the Vigil. Please click on the following names below to view the YouTube videos, which include the introductions by the speakers’ parents. Alex Smith, Gina Frazier, Pete Thunem

On September 17, 2025, NCPSG hosted a Pathway Session on Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT) to promote recovery from addiction and substance use. The speaker was Charlotte Bareiss, LCSW, founder/owner of Connected Therapy Group, based in Greenwich and NYC. Charlotte started out her presentation labeling ACT as part of a “third wave” of CBT, or cognitive behavioral therapy, that allows

I am still on cloud nine after our successful Community Addiction Awareness Vigil, our 9th. I’m so grateful for everyone involved. Below is the Letter to the Editor, which was released on Tuesday, September 2. Dear Editor: On behalf of the New Canaan Parent Support Group and our co-Host New Canaan Community Foundation, I’d like to thank all those who

In the spring of 2019 one town over from here, I slid my family’s car in between a tree and a telephone pole with less than an inch on either side of the car, crashing into a stone wall, and totaling the car. I was not conscious for this. I was drunk within 48 hours of this event. This did not get me

There seems to be a countertrend taking place against the “mommy wine culture”, with women sharing stories of why they drank, how they stopped, and the joys of being more present in their lives. This book contains many stories of why women drank, how they stopped, and the rewards of being more present in their lives. While AA is a solution cited frequently

Here are answers to your questions about our New Canaan Vigil on August 27, 2025. Answers to your Frequently Asked Questions: [To track us heading into the Vigil, just go to ncparentsupportgroup.org/news.]

Engagement in recovery is one of the most courageous acts for a human being, because one’s entire being is turned—body, mind, AND spirit. In Rise in Recovery, author Kimberly Berlin offers a paradigm shift for recovery from addiction: that spiritual practices rewire and heal the brain. Spirituality, as she defines it, is just a sense of connection to something bigger than ourselves. 

My friend handed me a bottle of bourbon, and I drank it. I didn’t want to drink it. I didn’t want to drink at all. Yet, I still couldn’t stop myself from bringing the bottle to my lips. I had no defenseagainst it; I was powerless against that drink. I had woken up that morning and realized I had no memory of the three days before. I barely remembered

On July 16, 2015, two New Canaan police officers knocked on the door of our house at 25 Heather Drive, to tell my wife and I that my Evan from Heaven, that funny family comedian, had died of an overdose the previous day. That young man, who lighted up the room when he walked in, had passed alone in his

I remember lying awake in my bedroom at my stepmother’s house on Christmas Eve 2015, thinking not about the usual festivities with Rudolph and Santa, but about whether I’d make it another year to witness my nephew Wyatt’s first birthday. He had been born just hours before that evening.  Given the direction I was going, I wasn’t entirely sure I