Brandy Bower once believed guilt and shame were the same. Recovery taught her that guilt can focus on harmful choices and invite accountability, while shame attacks identity and fuels isolation. She shares how facing her past without condemning herself finally made healing possible.

Robert Kent argues that Purdue Pharma settlement money should be treated differently from other opioid funds. He calls for affected families to review spending decisions and urges governments to direct the money toward families carrying the trauma, loss, and generational consequences of the opioid epidemic.

Real victimization exists, and Diane Russell Chrestman does not minimize that truth. But in this candid reflection, she explores what can happen when suffering becomes an identity. Using lived experience, ACE awareness, and Internal Family Systems language, she examines the victim role as a protector, the relief it can offer, and the courage it takes to build a life beyond the worst things that happened to us.