A Life in Pieces
SAN DIEGO, Calif. (KFSN) — When Dan Kruger talks about racing motorcycles, his voice still carries the thrill. “It is so fast and so close and you’re just like, that’s insane,” he says. But the adrenaline came at a cost: broken wrists, shattered ankles, fractured ribs, five concussions, and a back so damaged his discs are “completely degenerated.”
“Doctors would write me anything I wanted,” Kruger admits. “I had access to everything.” For decades, opioids were his lifeline-and his prison. “I probably had five, six hundred pills in my safe. I was stockpiling them.”
I knew I was taking them because I didn’t want to go through withdrawals.
Dan Kruger, motorcycle athlete
From age 30 to 52, Kruger lived in a haze of pills and alcohol, using them to mask pain, celebrate wins, and even sleep. “That’s a very dangerous position to be in,” he says. “And I kept progressing even further.”
Rewiring the Brain with Mindfulness
At UC San Diego, Dr. Eric Garland is pioneering a therapy that sounds deceptively simple: mindfulness. His program, Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement (MORE), retrains the brain to rediscover natural rewards-joy, meaning, and peace-lost to addiction.
“During addiction, the brain becomes more sensitive to drugs and less sensitive to healthy pleasure,” Garland explains. MORE uses meditation and cognitive techniques to reverse that imbalance. Delivered in eight sessions, the therapy asks patients to practice at home, strengthening what Garland calls “the muscle of the mind.”
Clinical trials show MORE delivers powerful results, reducing opioid cravings by 50%, lowering drug relapse by 42%, and cutting treatment dropout by 59%.
We found MORE reduced opioid craving by 50% and relapse by 42%.
Dr. Eric Garland, UCSD professor
Kruger discovered Garland’s work through a podcast. “We did a 20-minute guided meditation, and I got deep, deep, deep-like transcendent,” he recalls. Nine months later, he was opioid-free. “It was the biggest tool in my tool chest.”
The Human Side of Recovery
While science pushes boundaries, Nolan Burchett, COO of Touchstone Recovery Center, focuses on the human element. His clients often arrive in crisis-facing divorce, custody battles, or shattered careers.
“Early recovery is pretty painful,” Burchett says. “Until we want it for ourselves, there’s not a very high chance of success.” For him, the future of treatment is holistic: mind, body, spirit, and family.
Addiction is learned behavior. Breaking that cycle takes time.
Nolen Burchett, COO Touchstone Recovery Center
Burchett envisions programs that combine medication, therapy, and education. “The future is making sure we’re addressing every facet,” he says.
Engineering the Next Frontier
Contrast that with Dr. Scott Sternson, also at UC San Diego, whose lab is tackling addiction at the molecular level. His team is developing artificial receptors that blunt the brain’s response to drugs without disrupting natural rewards.
“Addiction is a self-reinforcing cycle,” Sternson explains. “Our idea was to create receptors that bind specifically to addictive drugs, reversing their effects.” In animal studies, rats with these receptors dramatically reduced cocaine use-while still enjoying food.
If we block dopamine, we’d feel nothing. Our approach avoids that.
Scott Sternson, UCSD professor
It’s a radical concept, but one that could become a “last resort therapy” for chronic relapsers. The timeline? At least a decade of testing to ensure safety and efficacy.
Hope on the Horizon
From meditation to molecular engineering, the fight against addiction is evolving. For Kruger, the transformation is personal. “It gives me hope,” Garland says. “We can help people heal and reclaim meaning in their lives.”
Burchett agrees: “Recovery is a process. It’s hard. But it’s possible.” And Sternson sees promise in science: “We’re changing the way the brain responds to addictive drugs.”
The future of addiction medicine isn’t one path-it’s many. And for those caught in the cycle, that future can’t come soon enough.
