Ritchie Sambora Arrested for DUI

KNAC News reports that Ritchie Sambora, the guitarist of one of my favorite bands, Bon Jovi, was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol in Laguana Beach. To add insult to injury (not literally) the police are still investigating and considering charges that might be filed in relation to child endangerment. While driving drunk, Ritchie Sambora had another unidentified adult in the car along with an unidentified child and his own daughter Ava. For the fact that Ritchie Sambora had undergone a 30 day sobriety program in 2007, I would not have expected to see him in the news for DUI. However, a person who has this disease has got to want to change and cannot be forced to.

My father was an alcoholic and growing up in the 70's, the brat of a Naval Chief, my father's down time was spent drinking and fishing. In this time, the laws on drunk driving were not as strict and in addition, seat belt laws were not in effect. In reflection, I am surprised that I had survived my childhood. While I enjoyed time with my father because he was not a mean alcoholic, as I grew and matured he would get worse and through many embarrassing moments my insistence on him changing became the focal point of many arguments in the first years of my teen life which would eventually lead to me leaving the home at 16 with the promise to not come back until he was better.

In my father's case, this was incentive enough to make him want to change. The fact that I had asked him to do so all those years was not enough. But, he had enough love for me to stop drinking. He did not enter a rehabilitation facility but, he got support through family, the church, and AA. He has been recovered for almost 20 years now and I have come to know a whole different person through all of this. However, like I said and in Ritchie Sambora's case, you have to want to change and in being punished by the courts sometimes is not enough compared to the threat of losing the love of a daughter. People can and will only change when they want to. In addition, if they do not have the constant support from friends and families rather than frequenting friends who would be bad influence, could make all the difference in the world.

I am in hopes that this was an isolated incident in Ritchie Sambora's life and that he can again find sobriety but, his life is more demanding and stressful than that of the normal everyday citizen. Residential treatments may be the answer to his solution but, the big issue is that getting better often times requires changing the environment. If the participants in the environments are unwilling to participate and they cannot illuminate the source, than they are surely doomed and I have a feeling that the mother of his daughter Ava (Heather Locklear) is going to be causing problems and additing additional stress due to his actions. While she has the right to do this, the reaction of Ritchie will not be the willingness to enter a treatment program because he wants to, it will be because he has to and again. It will not work.
Good luck Ritchie!