But awareness of that concept grew slowly.

People didn’t stop laughing at drunk acts like Dean Martin and Foster Brooks until after Betty Ford opened her chemical dependency treatment center in Rancho Mirage, Calif., in 1982.

Ford, who died Friday at age 93, helped create a new sobering reality for America by lending her name, energy and experience as a recovering addict to the center.

“The fact that Betty Ford lent her name to the center had a profound effect on the treatment of alcoholism,” said Dr. James West, a medical director at the Betty Ford Center from its opening until his April 2007 retirement.

“When she made it clear that she was the head of this place and a recovering person herself, that had a very profound effect on the whole system throughout the country.”

Ford embraced the 12-step Alcoholics Anonymousprogram while being treated at the Long Beach Naval Hospital’s Alcohol and Drug Rehabilitation Service in 1978.

The Navy pioneered alcohol and drug treatment when it discovered its sailors were abusing drugs during theVietnam War.

“The leader of the whole thing was a (chief of naval operations) named Adm. Elmo Zumwalt,” said retired Rear Adm. Bill Narva, a physician who became anEisenhower Medical Center and Barbara Sinatra Children’s Center board member.

“He was interested in people and personnel and women and minorities, and the use of drugs and alcohol on the ships.

“I was his staff medical officer, and went through that with him in ’70-’74. There was a medical officer in Long Beach who had a clinic on one of the piers. Zumwalt said, ‘Put the damn thing in the hospital.’ That’s how it all began at Long Beach.”

Ford was admitted to the hospital’s treatment center after her daughter, Susan, told their mutual gynecologist, Dr. Joseph Cruse, her mother had a drug and alcohol problem.

Cruse was a recovering alcoholic who worked with addicted teens at a Desert Hot Springs facility called Turnoff. He contacted Dr. Joe Pursch of the Long Beach Naval Hospital, and they planned an intervention with Ford’s family. Pursch arranged for her to be detoxed in at home before being admitted to the Navy hospital as the spouse of a commander-in-chief.

Her hospital stay required rooming with three other recovering alcoholics, with no special treatment. Then she was released to an AA program. Her sponsor was the late Meri Bell, who received an acknowledgement in Ford’s book, “Betty: A Glad Awakening.”

Ford was encouraged to help other drug and alcohol addicts as part of her therapy, but Bell’s husband, the late Del Sharbutt, Eisenhower board President John Sinn and Chairwoman Dolores Hope sought to integrally involve the Fords in their medical center.

“After she got out of treatment,” Sharbutt told The Desert Sun in the 1990s, “Dolores called her and said, ‘You’re the new kid on the block. Do you see anything around here that we’re not doing that we ought to be doing?’

Read the full article at USATODAY.

According to NBC’s Today show, Gore told NBC that he and his wife love their son very much and that they want to keep the whole situation as private as possible.

The arrest of Al Gore’s son on Wednesday overshadowed the work Gore was doing on the Live Earth concerts.   Gore has been planning the even in order to raise awareness of the environment and to raise funds for the Alliance for Climate Protection, which is a organization he leads.

Al Gore III is the youngest of Al Gore’s four children.  Gore had completed substance abuse counseling previously as part of a program to settle the charge he received back in 2003 for marijuana.

Lindsay recently opened up to Allure magazine for its May issue and said that her biggest concern was of the paparazzi. She says that when she woke up one morning last Jan. 17, her house was surrounded by paparazzi.

A drug rehab facility was suggested to her by her therapist. Lindsay only accepted the offer to go to rehab once she knew that the paparazzi would be kept out.

Once arriving, Lindsay picked out a room. Lindsay says she found “a quiet room, all white, with parquet, and it was different! I just felt safe”, ” I thought ‘I’m going to stay here tonight.’ And I stayed there. For a month. It was great.”

Even though Lindsay Lohan attended an addiction center, she still claims that she is not an addict. “It’s so weird that I went to rehab. I always said I would die before I went to rehab.”, “I don’t know that I’m necessarily an addict.”

Treatment Centers are supposed to be a place of comfort and security. If you or a loved one is in need of help, please contact a treatment center today.