Josh Gordon Stepping Away?

[Palm Beach Pats Fan]

I wonder if there is a way to genetically determine if a person has an addictive predisposition to drugs or alcohol.

There's a lot of work going on in this area and there are some clear genetic and epigentic markers. Probably will result in genetic profiling for such risks being both doable & affordable in the next 10 years.

Study finds acquired genetic markers for addiction

 

[TheRainMaker]

This season is getting weird. That MIA loss gets more painful to think about as KC is starting to fall off the wagon, HOU choking and of course.....LA Chargers choked away an opportunity to get the #1 seed. But all the Pats have to do is beat the Jest and the #2 seed is theirs at worst.

I was impressed how the Pats run D showed up Sunday and hope it continues. This was my main concern. Passing game is 2nd. Too much Burkhead is 3rd.

 

[Kontradiction]

I did not say I had a lot of confidence in 92. I said I had more confidence in 92 then you do now.

Ah, so you quit on the team back then too?

You seem to think maybe or some small doubt and season over is the same thing. You are trying to say we are expressing the same thing which is weird because I keep saying I think they will win the SB and you keep repeating "season over".

No, you said you think they will *maybe* win the Super Bowl or *maybe* fall a game or two short. That's doubt, bud. You either fully like their chances or you don't. When pressed with the simplest question and comparison, you couldn't say without a shadow of a doubt that you still think they'll win the Super Bowl. You added the qualifier. So you doubt their chances as well. Therefore, since we've successfully ruled out your definition of "quit" being a crap one, we're left to conclude that you, too, have quit on the team. That's how that works. Either that, or maybe you should reevaluate the definition and work from there. If I were you, I'd just hit the eject button. You're getting turned into a pretzel.

 

[RobertWeathers]

He knows this. He's just gone full blown butthurt because I said that a good amount of homers are actually fair weather fans/front runners.

It'll be interesting to see who really is a fan of the uniform after BB/Tom leave and they are 6-10 for a couple of years...

It's a interesting societal dynamic. There is an entire generation of Patriots fans (Gen Z) who have never cognitively experienced a losing season.

Depending on the age at least the Millenials went through 1995 and 2000.

 

[signbabybrady]

Sure but they weren't a SB contender in 1992. Not even close.

All Kontra is saying is he thinks they are playoff quality, he doesn't think they are SB quality this year. I don't agree with him as the AFC is a mess and there is no dominant team but there is no question the 2018 team aren't exactly world beaters.

There's not much to question about what Kontra said, he's repeated it a few times, "season over." What I can't figure out is why he insists that everyone else must have this same opinion or they are "clowning". And actually worse despite my stating I am confident in this team he insists on saying we have the same opinion.

 

[Kontradiction]

This season is getting weird. That MIA loss gets more painful to think about as KC is starting to fall off the wagon, HOU choking and of course.....LA Chargers choked away an opportunity to get the #1 seed. But all the Pats have to do is beat the Jest and the #2 seed is theirs at worst.

I was impressed how the Pats run D showed up Sunday and hope it continues. This was my main concern. Passing game is 2nd.

I liked what I saw with the run D as well. I would ultimately want to keep seeing it before my confidence in the team to take home the Lombardi goes up. They still have issues running the ball in the red zone and they still have a ton of question marks at WR aside from Edelman, however.

 

[Kontradiction]

It'll be interesting to see who really is a fan of the uniform after BB/Tom leave and they are 6-10 for a couple of years...

It's a interesting societal dynamic. There is an entire generation of Patriots fans (Gen Z) who have never cognitively experienced a losing season.

Depending on the age at least the Millenials went through 1995 and 2000.

It'll be the majority of the people that we consider homers that abandon ship when the team falls off. They're the ones that seem to be fans of the coach or the QB over the laundry. That's why the majority of posters that disappear for a while after a tough loss (like the Super Bowl last season) are typically said homers.

 

[RobertWeathers]

There's not much to question about what Kontra said, he's repeated it a few times, "season over." What I can't figure out is why he insists that everyone else must have this same opinion or they are "clowning". And actually worse despite my stating I am confident in this team he insists on saying we have the same opinion.

I haven't kept track of all that has been said.

What do know is Kontra is not a pink hat but is certainly not a believer in this team's chances of winning the SB.

I just don't view that as "quitting" on the team. You can be a hard core fan and view your team's chances as hopeless.

 

[TheRainMaker]

It'll be interesting to see who really is a fan of the uniform after BB/Tom leave and they are 6-10 for a couple of years...

It's a interesting societal dynamic. There is an entire generation of Patriots fans (Gen Z) who have never cognitively experienced a losing season.

Depending on the age at least the Millenials went through 1995 and 2000.

I’ll admit, I’ve questioned myself how I’ll respond once Brady and BB are both gone.

 

[Kontradiction]

I haven't kept track of all that has been said.

What do know is Kontra is not a pink hat but is certainly not a believer in this team's chances of winning the SB.

I just don't view that as "quitting" on the team. You can be a hard core fan and view your team's chances as hopeless.

And me, being the quitter that I am, just expressed confidence in this team's ability to beat Indy, Baltimore, or Houston in the divisional round in another thread. My questions about this team come in its ability to win a AFCCG on the road or a Super Bowl in a neutral stadium against the NFC's best. But you can't have an honest convo with most of the homers in this forum about the team's shortcomings. They lose their minds and accuse you of things like "quitting on the team." Hence why I've theorized that the majority of them are fair weather/front runner types. There's a good reason why people can't objectively see and talk about the team maybe falling back to the pack a bit.

 

[signbabybrady]

I haven't kept track of all that has been said.

What do know is Kontra is not a pink hat but is certainly not a believer in this team's chances of winning the SB.

I just don't view that as "quitting" on the team. You can be a hard core fan and view your team's chances as hopeless.

Funny thing is not once have I said the word pink hat or question wether he would remain after Brady is gone. I've just made sure that as he mocks us homers and questions where our loyalty will be post Brady that it is clear he's stated this season is over.

 

[RobertWeathers]

I’ll admit, I’ve questioned myself how I’ll respond once Brady and BB are both gone.

It's gonna be a fandom test for a lot of fans.

There are a lot of fans who can't differentiate BB/Tom with "The Patriots" as it's all they know and identify with. I get it. I think for us older fans it might be a little easier.

With that said I might be the biggest BB Apologist on this board and I know I'll struggle when BB is gone. It'll take some time.

For me, it's all about the succession plan for the HC and FO. If Kraft winds up bringing in bozos that run this thing into the ground i'll be pretty pissed.

 

[RobertWeathers]

And me, being the quitter that I am, just expressed confidence in this team's ability to beat Indy, Baltimore, or Houston in the divisional round in another thread. My questions about this team come in its ability to win a AFCCG on the road or a Super Bowl in a neutral stadium against the NFC's best. But you can't have an honest convo with most of the homers in this forum about the team's shortcomings. They lose their minds and accuse you of things like "quitting on the team." Hence why I've theorized that the majority of them are fair weather/front runner types. There's a good reason why people can't objectively see and talk about the team maybe falling back to the pack a bit.

For a lot of fans, it's blasphemy to think this team is mortal.

 

[Kontradiction]

there is no answer, Ken. We live in a drug fueled culture.The only answer I've found in my life is my own personal change. I used to smoke cigarettes. I finally quit cold turkey and put it behind me for good 25 years ago.I developed a severe monkey in the 70's & 80's that lasted into the 90's..multiple substance abuse primarily centered around alcohol and cocaine. I was a monster. Never thought about it as a problem until I finally took a hard look at myself in my mid 40's. Stopped drinking, which stopped the coke reflex, which alleviated the cigarette addiction., I watched as most of my social circle continued on living with multiple addictions, with many adding opiates to the mix. There's been a lot a early deaths associated within this social circle of friends. Artists, musicians, lawyers, business owners, cops, dealers..you name it...it crosscuts our society.

Here's my take on it all...YOU are the only person that can change YOU. YOU are the only one going out that door at the end of the life movie. You can try all the programs and all the remedies and all the advice others have to offer but in the end it's YOUR decision and yours only. The brain chemistry involved in substance addiction is PERNICIOUS. I read people saying "I've been sober two years and things are going good". I know from personal experience that giving myself badges of accomplishment and revering "sobriety" is, in the end, a self delusion. YOU have to make that decision to stop using brain altering substance...and then you have to wait, for years and years, for your brain to rewire the electrical exchanges across your synapses to original firing patterns you were born with. I suspect it's different for everyone. In my case it took over seven years but it did happen.

To illustrate,here's a short look into what happened. I decided to go completely straight when I was 43.I stopped cold. It was hard at first, like it is for everyone/anyone but I managed to move forward. Five years later I'm at a family holiday gathering and one of my cousins offers me a Beck's beer at the Thanksgiving family dinner. My entire adult family drinks alcohol in moderation. I figured "hey, it's been 5 years, I can handle this.." I had that ONE beer and ten minutes later I wanted to run out an score an 8 ball. Scared the living bejeezus out of me. I left abruptly, drove home, jumped in bed and pulled the covers over me. Petrified. FIVE YEARS sober and the dual addiction reflex was still there like it was yesterday. The next day I began researching the effects of cocaine/alcohol on the brain and read research being done in Europe that detailed the swift changes in neural transmission between synapses in the brain. Coke rewires the brain in as little as a month! Your brain is a bunch of nerve cells...we all know how long it takes for nerves to regenerate when altered or injured, it's the same for electrical transmissions across the synaptic gaps. NO ONE ever said anything about this to me as I was staying sober. When I found out that the research showed it takes close to a decade for the brain to rewire, I knew I'd have to wait another few years before my brain chemistry came back to normal. Here's the kicker. It did. I was off Block Island ten years later fishing in mid summer. It was blazing hot. I had some guys that chartered my boat to fish for stripers. They brought a cooler of Bud with them. I decided to try one to see if the reflex was still there. THAT was the best goddamned beer I EVER drank in my life. One measly run of the mill Budweiser. At that moment out there on the water in the drenching heat, I realized the coke reflex was gone.

It took nearly ten years but I finally came free from the chemical reflex I had established in my brain from years of abuse. I CAN drink alcohol now and can do it in moderation. I do not drink alcohol because I really prefer not to. I enjoy living in my skin today, just the way I am. I have a number of medical conditions that require I take prescribed heart meds. Other than that, I refuse all attempts by my doctors to get me to begin using pain meds, sleep meds, anxiety meds. We live in this drug culture today, where it's normal to address the aches and pains of life with a pill. This is NOT normal IMO. What is normal is, if you're having trouble sleeping, go out an do anything to get yourself tired...guess what? You'll sleep like a baby. If you have anxiety and find yourself in a brain loop of negative thoughts, take up a behaviour that focuses your mind on something else...learn music, take up painting,ride a bike, go out for a walk...jeezus,I'm as rough and tumble as they come yet I feed birds and watch them every morning like some old lady out on a farm in the woods. It WORKS.

Of course, for better or worse, arguing on a message board daily about the NEP works wonders too. "We're all bozos on this bus" an extremely perceptive individual once said. Enjoy the ride.

First of all - way to go. I don’t care what you say, that’s a hell of an accomplishment. I went through a phase in roughly 2012-2014 where I had what I guess I would describe now as depression. Without diving too deeply into it, I was having a rough go of it. Broke up with my girlfriend at the time and I was working 40-50 hours a week in a job that topped out around $40k while going through my MBA. The stress during that time was so bad that I was having either fainting spells or seizures (they never got diagnosed but the onset - intense feelings of deja vu coupled with completely losing consciousness to the point where my dog would lick my face until I came to - is what I have read about seizures). Anyway, to cope, I took up drinking every night of the week and heavily binge drinking from day to the early hours of dawn on the weekends. I just had a friend that went through his own bad break up so it was easy. My two drugs of choice were blow and Molly. The yay, in particular, was easy because my dealer used to deliver it. He sold $50 Gs, which was the typical stepped on ****, and $80 Gs which were solid rock. I used to buy the $80 variety. Face would go numb and you would gag off one little bump of it. At the end of the bag, I would usually pop a Xanax (or snort that too) and go to bed for a few hours before getting back after it again. I thought I was happy at the time but, looking back, it was the saddest time of my life.

Anyway, what you say is true. I was never a “true addict” considering what you described yourself as being. I didn’t do it during the week (for the most part), but I was HEAVILY into that and Molly on the weekends. You have to decide to change for yourself. Since then, I’ve only done one line maybe two years ago at a party and hated it. I still drink but my days of drinking all day and night are over. Sadly, I have friends that are still into it and have increased their consumption to include week nights. I still go out to the bar with them at night on the weekends here and there but end up leaving when they want to go back to their house and buy a bag. I’ve made my peace with the fact that they’re probably never going to get over it and will probably be dead long before me and my other friends that put that habit away will.

Anyway, congrats on your sobriety, man. That’s a hell of a story.

EDIT: Heh, a couple of years ago shortly after I kicked the habits, I visited a new dentist and he said he saw evidence of “heavy grinding.” He asked if I grind my teeth at night in my sleep and I said, “uhhh yeah... something like that.”

 

[Deus Irae]

 

[Patjew]

there is no answer, Ken. We live in a drug fueled culture.The only answer I've found in my life is my own personal change. I used to smoke cigarettes. I finally quit cold turkey and put it behind me for good 25 years ago.I developed a severe monkey in the 70's & 80's that lasted into the 90's..multiple substance abuse primarily centered around alcohol and cocaine. I was a monster. Never thought about it as a problem until I finally took a hard look at myself in my mid 40's. Stopped drinking, which stopped the coke reflex, which alleviated the cigarette addiction., I watched as most of my social circle continued on living with multiple addictions, with many adding opiates to the mix. There's been a lot a early deaths associated within this social circle of friends. Artists, musicians, lawyers, business owners, cops, dealers..you name it...it crosscuts our society.

Here's my take on it all...YOU are the only person that can change YOU. YOU are the only one going out that door at the end of the life movie. You can try all the programs and all the remedies and all the advice others have to offer but in the end it's YOUR decision and yours only. The brain chemistry involved in substance addiction is PERNICIOUS. I read people saying "I've been sober two years and things are going good". I know from personal experience that giving myself badges of accomplishment and revering "sobriety" is, in the end, a self delusion. YOU have to make that decision to stop using brain altering substance...and then you have to wait, for years and years, for your brain to rewire the electrical exchanges across your synapses to original firing patterns you were born with. I suspect it's different for everyone. In my case it took over seven years but it did happen.

To illustrate,here's a short look into what happened. I decided to go completely straight when I was 43.I stopped cold. It was hard at first, like it is for everyone/anyone but I managed to move forward. Five years later I'm at a family holiday gathering and one of my cousins offers me a Beck's beer at the Thanksgiving family dinner. My entire adult family drinks alcohol in moderation. I figured "hey, it's been 5 years, I can handle this.." I had that ONE beer and ten minutes later I wanted to run out an score an 8 ball. Scared the living bejeezus out of me. I left abruptly, drove home, jumped in bed and pulled the covers over me. Petrified. FIVE YEARS sober and the dual addiction reflex was still there like it was yesterday. The next day I began researching the effects of cocaine/alcohol on the brain and read research being done in Europe that detailed the swift changes in neural transmission between synapses in the brain. Coke rewires the brain in as little as a month! Your brain is a bunch of nerve cells...we all know how long it takes for nerves to regenerate when altered or injured, it's the same for electrical transmissions across the synaptic gaps. NO ONE ever said anything about this to me as I was staying sober. When I found out that the research showed it takes close to a decade for the brain to rewire, I knew I'd have to wait another few years before my brain chemistry came back to normal. Here's the kicker. It did. I was off Block Island ten years later fishing in mid summer. It was blazing hot. I had some guys that chartered my boat to fish for stripers. They brought a cooler of Bud with them. I decided to try one to see if the reflex was still there. THAT was the best goddamned beer I EVER drank in my life. One measly run of the mill Budweiser. At that moment out there on the water in the drenching heat, I realized the coke reflex was gone.

It took nearly ten years but I finally came free from the chemical reflex I had established in my brain from years of abuse. I CAN drink alcohol now and can do it in moderation. I do not drink alcohol because I really prefer not to. I enjoy living in my skin today, just the way I am. I have a number of medical conditions that require I take prescribed heart meds. Other than that, I refuse all attempts by my doctors to get me to begin using pain meds, sleep meds, anxiety meds. We live in this drug culture today, where it's normal to address the aches and pains of life with a pill. This is NOT normal IMO. What is normal is, if you're having trouble sleeping, go out an do anything to get yourself tired...guess what? You'll sleep like a baby. If you have anxiety and find yourself in a brain loop of negative thoughts, take up a behaviour that focuses your mind on something else...learn music, take up painting,ride a bike, go out for a walk...jeezus,I'm as rough and tumble as they come yet I feed birds and watch them every morning like some old lady out on a farm in the woods. It WORKS.

Of course, for better or worse, arguing on a message board daily about the NEP works wonders too. "We're all bozos on this bus" an extremely perceptive individual once said. Enjoy the ride.

Just when I thought I couldn’t love you any more than I already did...

Thank you so much for this bravely honest and illuminating post. I’m so glad you’re doing well.

 

[JetFan79]

Just when I thought I couldn’t love you any more than I already did...

Thank you so much for this bravely honest and illuminating post. I’m so glad you’re doing well.

Hard to believe that's the same Joker from the Jets Suck thread.

 

[supafly]

Hard to believe that's the same Joker from the Jets Suck thread.

He’s a solid dude. Real footage of Joker and Tune in the Jets suck thread.

 

[Joker]

My mustache is not white and I still have all my hair. Otherwise, bullseye Supa...

 

[PP2]

On the other hand, one must never remain silent. To be silent is to be complicit, or to endorse. I try to avoid inciting, or cause conflict, but I will never shy away from pointing out the truth.

When you debate with someone, there is always someone listening and you never know whose minds you will change, even if it's not the person you're debating with.