Paradox Outpatient

The hysteria of the perceived drug menace of the late 1970s and 80s gave birth to legions of elite combatants in the "War On Drugs". Addictions counselors became the new gurus to the thousands who were ushered off to the drug treatment re-education camps. Unwilling to wear tweed and hornrims, these banzai therapists were short on analysis and ling on action, prodding, pressing, pushing their patients down the shortcuts to cure. Along the way, however, these wounded psyche healers would often become tangled in the nets of their own dysfunction.

One such warrior is Michael Altimari. Attempting to juggle dual careers as counselor and rock musician, he is locked into a world of quiet chaos. While he is able to free his patients with words  and his patrons with music, Michael himself suffers the restraints of someone who is trapped, a prisoner in his own life. He comes to Paradox Outpatient Drug Clinic seeking a direction, a renewal of passion, fulfillment, freedom.

He finds plenty of pathology, color and quirkiness- and that's just amongst his fellow staffers! Traveling on his journey, dispensing his own offbeat brand of therapy, he becomes distracted by newly- hired Clinical Director, Pachel Loudon. Rachel offers escape, escape from a pedestrian marriage and a human services career that he fears will leave him as crisp as burnt toast, escape to California and an opportunity to perform with some of the biggest names in the LA musical community.

Will he opt for this major life change? Will he leave his family, his bandmates, his career in drug abuse treatment? Within Paradox Outpatient, you'll see how, with the help of an Asian hypnotist, he decides which path to take. That decision is mysteriously forecast by his six year old daughter, using intuition and logic that can only come from the innocent mind of a child.

We're all voyeurs of sort, curious to peek at what goes on behind the closed therapy room door. Having been a practicing psychotherapist in the addictions field for more then 20 years, I can assure you that true substance abuse treatment bears LITTLE resemblance to the therapeutic pabulum often dished up to us by the popular media. Addiction treatment is full of life, holding both comedy and tragedy, often raw, sometimes achingly soft and sensitive, a compelling interactive dance between patient and therapist.

Paradox Outpatient contains themes that are timely and political. American society is just now recognizing tobacco smoking as an addiction. After years of sitting (and puffing) in the blue haze of the drug therapy groups, the protagonist in Paradox realizes that the PRIMARY drug problem in our world today rests, quite literally, right under our noses!

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