Looking for something more specific?
Enter a search term here:
Enter a search term here:
 THE EXECUTIVE COST Addiction Behind the Scenes Personal Story by Yuly Grosman Disclosure: This is not science. This is not medical advice. This is not a recommendation or a call to action. What follows is personal experience lived, observed, and paid for over years. Addiction is complex and deeply individual. This is one story, not a rule. When I was asked to write about addiction, I hesitated. I could have written a “proper” article reference, studies, statistics, reliable sources. I could have combined science with personal reflection. Instead, I chose a third option. No science. Just life. Because when you have a flat tire and you’re late for a flight, you don’t calculate air pressure or engineering tolerances. You don’t reach for theory. You act. You use experience. You make things work. Addiction lives there not in textbooks, but in moments. The Addictions We Don’t Like to Name If I list my addictions, I’m confident you’ll recognize at least one of yours. I started smoking early and quite 3 times. Last 6 years ago. I became addicted to strong painkillers as a disabled veteran. I was addicted to work emails, calls, constant availability and was rewarded for it. I was considered an overachiever. Over the years, I’ve worked closely with burned-out executives, first responders, law enforcement, survivors of domestic violence, and people under chronic stress. And I’m going to say something many people strongly disagree with: In my experience, addiction is often a choice. Including domestic violence. That statement has triggered long debates with scientists, professionals, and people I respect. Some agree. Many don’t. Here is what I mean. Addiction, as I understand it, is a comfort zone. A behaviour or substance that makes the body or more accurately, the brain feel safe. That comfort can be:
It can be a relationship that hurts but feels known. It can be work that consumes everything but gives identity. It can be cigarettes that make you feel “cool” not to others, but to yourself. There’s a quote often attributed to Mark Twain: “Quitting smoking is easy. I’ve done it a hundred times.” Exactly. Quitting is easy. Not returning is hard. The Magic Pill I get my medical condition during military service in the late 1990s in Israel. Painkillers became part of my daily life. The first surgery didn’t change much. Same pain. Same struggle. The second surgery almost a decade later changed everything. I woke up with almost no pain. I asked my doctor what I was feeling. He said, “A stronger painkiller. Oxycodone.” That name stayed with me for nearly seven years. As a disabled veteran, the system took care of me equipment, treatment, medication. Efficiently. Completely. When I was discharged, I was sent home with prescriptions for 5mg, 10mg, even 20mg pills, plus syrup. I took them several times a day. When the supply ran low, I called. New prescriptions arrived in a day or two. No one explained how powerful the drug was. No one warned me how addictive it could be. The only clear memory I have is two doctors one man, one woman telling me not to stop suddenly. That tapering must be supervised. That was it. Functioning While Disappearing At the time, I was already running international operations, managing global trade, launching major projects in Kenya. I had to work. I’m not someone who stays in bed. After surgery, I was walking, exercising, doing more than prescribed. The medication created a dangerous combination:
To this day 17 years later I cannot remember how I used to drive to my office. I remember getting into my car at home. I remember being at work. Nothing in between. But yet very functional and business deliverable. That was the “magic.” I travelled constantly. Flew internationally. Ran meetings. Made decisions. I don’t remember the flights. In my book, The Most Beautiful and Dangerous Business, I describe how one of those trips cost me nearly $20,000 due to a customs mistake. A small error with serious consequences. Why did it happen? Long flights were physically painful for me. The solution was simple: oxycodone. A small pill or a cup of syrup made the flight easy. Combined with airline upgrades, it almost felt comfortable. On one trip, I was carrying cash collected from clients. I filed customs paperwork at departure, took the medication, and boarded the flight. The next clear memory is being stopped by customs officers on arrival. “Do you have money with you?” “Yes.” “Did you declare it?” “Yes.” “This declaration is from departure. Where is the arrival declaration?” There wasn’t one. The result: confiscated money, wasted time, stress, and nearly missing a critical meeting. The good thing is I usually do not blame situations and others. I knew the medication could cause it, but I also knew that I should be more aware. The Turning Point About a year later, my then-wife noticed how much I was consuming. I was more nervous, less patient not aggressive, but altered. We were in our home in Kenya when she poured my medication down the sink, I didn’t argue. I hid the rest. That was the moment. Why was she hiding it from me? Why was I hiding it from her? Those questions forced awareness. I paused (something I now teach others to do). I asked myself what was happening. I began researching oxycodone addiction. What I discovered scared me. I didn’t want that future for myself or for my family. Or in the worse case a lack of future at all. A close friend, a doctor in Kenya, helped me reframe pain. “Wait 30 minutes,” he said. “Observe it. Measure it. If it drops, wait again.” A very similar method I used twice before quite smoking. It was extremely difficult. I live with chronic pain. I don’t have pain-free days. But I noticed something disturbing. Often, when I thought my pain was level nine, it wasn’t. It was level 6. It was withdrawal. Taking My Life Back In 2015 eight years after my second surgery I finally said it out loud. I was addicted, and I wanted my life back. I didn’t announce it. I didn’t dramatize it. I threw away the hidden supply. Kept only enough to taper safely. Then came weeks of shaking, sweating, insomnia. My body demanded more. My mind screamed for relief. And something deeper said no. That wasn’t discipline. It was clarity. Why This Matters Beyond Addiction That experience addiction, pressure, performance, and recovery is not separate from my professional work today. It is the foundation of it. The Most Beautiful and Dangerous Business was written because too many executives are asked to lead in environments where mistakes are costly, information is incomplete, and the human element is ignored until it fails. This book is not optional reading, and it is not reflective entertainment. It is a field manual for leaders who must make decisions under pressure and live with the consequences. The lessons come from global supply chains, security operations, crisis environments, and years of leadership where judgment mattered more than process and timing mattered more than intent. That same work continues today through speaking engagements and closed-door workshops with senior leadership teams. These are not motivational sessions or theoretical discussions. They are working conversations focused on situational intelligence, escalation prevention, human behaviour under pressure, and resilience as an operational capability. Executives don’t engage this work out of curiosity. They engage it because something is at stake people, capital, reputation, or continuity. The patterns that drive addiction are the same patterns that quietly erode leadership: numbing through activity, avoidance disguised as productivity, and the slow loss of awareness. Left unexamined, those patterns don’t disappear. They compound. My work exists to interrupt that trajectory early while leaders still have room to choose differently. The Cost We Rarely Measure Addiction doesn’t always look like collapse. Sometimes it looks like success. Sometimes it wears authority. Sometimes it’s praised. The most dangerous addictions are often the ones that allow us to function until they quietly take over our inner life. They cost us presence. They cost us memory. They cost us choice. I’m not writing this to condemn medication, ambition, or relief. Pain is real. Pressure is real. I’m writing to suggest a different question: Not what helps me function, but what is replacing me while I function? Awareness doesn’t fix everything. But it opens the door. And sometimes, that is enough to start walking back into your own life. The only advice I would offer, based on my experience with addiction and in helping many others, is this: You can win the fight only if you fight for yourself — not because someone else asked or demanded it. ∎
1 Comment
Giulio Quarta
1/28/2026 09:46:02 am
A poignant and open portrayal of one person's struggle. Thank you for being so open and honest. Your comment will be posted after it is approved.
Leave a Reply. |
