The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration has already closed offices and could see staff numbers reduced by 50 percent.Every day, Dora Dantzler-Wright and her colleagues distribute overdose reversal drugs on the streets of Chicago. They hold training sessions on using them and help people in recovery from drug and alcohol addiction return to their jobs and families.They work closely with the federal government through an agency that monitors their productivity, connects them with other like-minded groups and dispenses critical funds that keep their work going.But over the last few weeks, Ms. Wright’s phone calls and emails to Washington have gone unanswered. Federal advisers from the agency’s local office — who supervise her group, the Chicago Recovering Communities Coalition, as well as addiction programs throughout six Midwestern states and 34 tribes — are gone.“We just continue to do the work without any updates from the feds at all,” Ms. Wright said. “But we’re lost.”By the end of this week, the staff of the agency, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, could be cut by 50 percent, according to senior staff members at the agency and congressional aides who attended briefings by Trump officials.With just under 900 employees and a budget of $7.2 billion for large state grants and individual nonprofits that address addiction and mental illness, SAMHSA (pronounced SAM-sah) is relatively small. But it addresses two of the nation’s most urgent health problems and has generally had bipartisan support.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

Prescription drugs like lorazepam — used to treat anxiety, panic attacks and sleep disorders — play a role in popular TV shows like ‘The White Lotus’ and ‘The Pitt.’Victoria Ratliff, the wealthy financier’s wife on season 3 of HBO’s “The White Lotus,” has a problem: She keeps popping pills.And her drug of choice, the anti-anxiety medication lorazepam, has left her a little loopy.In the show, which follows guests vacationing at a fictional resort, Victoria pairs her medication with wine, which leads her to nod off at the dinner table. Sometimes she slurs her words.When she notices that her pill supply is mysteriously dwindling, she asks her children if they’re stealing them.“You don’t have enough lorazepam to get through one week at a wellness spa?” her daughter, Piper, asks.“The White Lotus” is not the only show to recently feature these drugs. The new Max series “The Pitt,” which takes place in an emergency department, includes a story line about a benzodiazepine called Librium.This isn’t a case of Hollywood taking dramatic liberties. Benzodiazepines such as lorzepam and chlordiazepoxide are notorious for having the potential to be highly addictive. They may also come with difficult — sometimes fatal — withdrawal symptoms.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

The prescription drugs — used to treat anxiety, panic attacks and sleep disorders — play a role in popular TV shows like “The White Lotus” and “The Pitt.”Victoria Ratliff, the wealthy financier’s wife on season 3 of HBO’s “The White Lotus,” has a problem: She keeps popping pills.And her drug of choice, the anti-anxiety medication lorazepam, has left her a little loopy.In the show, which follows guests vacationing at a fictional resort, Victoria pairs her medication with wine, which leads her to nod off at the dinner table. Sometimes she slurs her words.When she notices that her pill supply is mysteriously dwindling, she asks her children if they’re stealing them.“You don’t have enough lorazepam to get through one week at a wellness spa?” her daughter, Piper, asks.“The White Lotus” is not the only show to recently feature these drugs. The new Max series “The Pitt,” which takes place in an emergency department, includes a story line about a benzodiazepine called Librium.This isn’t a case of Hollywood taking dramatic liberties. Benzodiazepines such as lorzepam and chlordiazepoxide are notorious for having the potential to be highly addictive. They may also come with difficult — sometimes fatal — withdrawal symptoms.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

When one partner wants to cut back, or stops drinking altogether, the changes can reverberate throughout a relationship.Casey and Mike Davidson always enjoyed drinking together.The couple, both 49, met after college while working as consultants at the same firm. Romance blossomed over work happy hours, then time spent lingering over a bottle of wine on long dates.In their mid-20s, the pair moved to Seattle and made a group of friends who were always up for a drink. Afternoons were for hiking, kayaking and sipping beers on Lake Union; evenings were for rollicking, boozy dinner parties.But by their 30s, their drinking habits diverged. Ms. Davidson drank a bottle of wine by herself most nights, and felt increasingly uneasy about it, while Mr. Davidson settled into life as a self-described “single-beer-a-night drinker.”“I was really defensive about my drinking,” Ms. Davidson said, adding, “I didn’t want him watching me every time I poured a third glass of wine.”Like the Davidsons, many couples have had to grapple with the role alcohol plays in their partnership — even if neither party drinks to the point where it causes clear, consistent problems at home, or takes an obvious toll on their health. Their relationship may still receive a shock when one partner decides to cut back or quit altogether.“It can drive a wedge between people in terms of how they socialize, how they relax and unwind, their bedroom activities,” said Ruby Warrington, the author of “Sober Curious.” “It can be really uncomfortable.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

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