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Why Drug Addiction Could Happen To Anyone
From the moment addiction takes hold, the person suffering is considered an outsider, however addiction is no longer fringe behaviour. Here's why we should help, not turn a blind eye, because it could happen to any one of us...
If your child had a drug or alcohol dependency, would you rather they were locked up in prison, or helped? No one turns up on careers day in school saying ‘I want to to be powerless over alcohol, and/or addiction and I want my life to become unmanageable by it when I grow up’
‘By the time I was thirteen I had my first drink’, ‘by my fifteenth birthday I had smoked my first spliff’, ‘by seventeen I was injecting heroin‘, ‘I stole off friends’, ‘I sold my body to feed my habit’, ‘they locked me up and put me in a mental institution’, ‘I was repeatedly abused’, ‘I had a blackout and woke up in a cell’, ‘I lost my home’, ‘I slept on a park bench’ are only a few things an addict/alcoholic may say.
The reason why people chose to use drugs are very personal issues and personal choices. The media and community chooses to see a criminal, but unless you know someone who has battled with addiction you have no idea the pain that person has had to suffer. Addiction and alcoholism is a world that only those so close and so involved in will ever truly understand.
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Addiction and alcoholism is like a job, it becomes work. From the moment addiction and alcoholism begin they have started the worst job in the world, with a lunatic of a boss screaming at them from inside of their own mind, without a single moment off. And the more the addict/alcoholic uses/drinks the worse it gets, as the addict/alcoholic then becomes the living dead.
Addiction and alcoholism is a greedy disease, first it will take your money. Then it will take your friends and family, your home, your ability to function in society, then it will start eating away at bits of your body until it takes you alive, body, mind and soul. Very often the addict/alcoholic would prefer to give it’s life away than give up the addiction/alcohol.
Addiction and alcoholism robs an addict of almost all of their psychic energy to love, create and live full, complete lives in harmony with The Universe, God – (whatever you choose to call this force), and others.
It’s no good telling people who suffer from ‘addict brain’, that they shouldn’t have picked up drugs. “Drugs are addictive, so don’t take them”. “Just Say No” approach seems so obvious to outsiders but Addicts operate on a different spectrum from everyone else – and this is what a lot of people can’t understand.
Many addicts/alcoholics who have managed to arrest their core addiction, have embarked upon a spiritual, and metaphysical journey, a Voyage of Self Discovery, that even they say is beyond their wildest dreams. So if you then make drug addiction/alcoholism into a story, it could be a pleasure to hear about. The boy kicks out to the world, the world kicks back a lot harder, he is lost and then he’s found – the happy ever after.
However recovery does not always unfold with a happy ever after, it becomes too ordinary, the daily meetings, going to the doctors, trapped in the revolving door of relapse, getting sick, cleaning up, dealing with shame and resentment, and then using/drinking again. This is how addiction and alcoholism most resembles a disease, because a lot of diseases don’t go away on their own either, you just keep on managing them. A trip to the doctors, exercise, take the medication, – that is the same story as fighting addiction and alcoholism, and telling them it can take a life time.
Stigma, shame and disgust will not solve the problem of addiction and alcoholism, neither will choosing to ignore it. It will not stop the crime, the heartbreak and the damage that the addicts/alcoholic leaves in their wake. Rage, self-righteousness and condemnation never find solutions to problems. Understanding will!
Next time an outsider chooses to judge an addict/alcoholic they see at work, sat on the park bench, pass on the street or read about in the paper maybe they should try and understand rather than judge. Have they themselves never made a mistake? How wonderful it sounds to have no defects of character. To have never made a mistake. To have never gone the wrong way in life. To have never got lost in something that’s got it’s grips on you that’s so tight, and to have no understanding of it. Next time you chooses to judge try and remember that is someones, brother, sister, son, daughter, cousin, friend, parent, colleague or loved one, as everybody has somebody, and anybody can turn to alcohol/drugs when they are vulnerable. Who are you to stand and judge?
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COMMENTS
All very true. I love the irony of some people, usually comfortable middle class middle aged people who sneer at addicts and moan about any cash being spent on rehabilitation. Then you hear them talk or start Tweeting about “wine o clock” at 6 pm. They are just as much addicts as the bloke on the park bench with a bottle of cheap cider. Only difference theirs is the acceptable face of alcoholism. Still addicts though
Interesting article. Addiction is one of the trickiest areas for a GP. It's easy to become complicit and to validate damaging behaviour. I agree with everything that you say by in my opinion the ultimate cure is will power. Without a genuine desire to quit, something which cannot be administered, addiction never goes away.
I like this it's not biased, it's just the truth.
The blunt truth of this article sent a shiver of horror through me but helping is not always acceptable. Written with the heart.
Written from the heart. Made me open my mind and eyes
Famous opium addicts from history Marcus Aurelius Roman Emperor Charles Dickens Author Florence Nitingale Nurse
Good article - shared it
Well written, Gia x
Another Great Article!!!
Dr John Quinn > Couldn't agree more. After battling with heroin addiction for 8 years of my life i finally overcame it, without the help of family and several very understanding GP's/support workers it wouldn't have been possible, however, i've no doubt that key to this was my own desire to get back the life i knew i could lead. I now have a career, prospects and a life worth living. To outsiders it may seem that my previous life is a distant memory but i know how close it really is, a minor stumble can easily lead me onto a path of devastating addiction once more.
Not biased? The use of the word addict is disconcerting, never mind the assumption that every single person with a dependency has absolutely no self control or respect. Pffft.....
All persons are the same. A thread everyday will make a cable which will be imposible to break.
A very good article, that gives a slant that I hadn't thought about previously, as an elder person it was refreshing to read
Very good article.
Absolutely right. We are all so close to becoming addicts that judging and slandering those that are or have been, is pride before a possible fall.
Great piece of writing my opinion is that drugs and there effects are made a hell of a lot worse by criminalising the user My message to anyone dabbling with drugs or alcohol is simply All things in moderation and when it stops being fun have fun do something else instead
this heartfelt article is very thought provoking. It invites you to distinguish between judgement and understanding (what caused it,what keeps you in the grip of an addiction, the pain of it).
Speaking from experience, I have to disagree with some of this. In my teens and 20s I smoked weed daily, did coke a few times a week, a few E's at the weekend... I am well educated and moderately intelligent and have always held down well paid jobs with large corporate firms and to meet me you would never have known my dark secret. I recognised my demons in my early 20s on and knew I had a a problem. The problem being I found drinking dull and getting high amazing. I mean proper fucking amazing. When it was myself and my circle of mates all doing it, it was fine, but one by one they got married, had kids and stopped. This left me, for much of my late 20's getting high alone or with random people. As I entered my 30's and after a number of unsuccessful relationships with women I didn't care enough about to stop, I met my wife. I knew I had met the woman I wanted to spend my life with and within a few weeks I was totally clean, off the party circut and am now a "boring" husband and father. Not a day goes by that I do not wish I could have one last blowout, but I am responsible enough to recognise I had to make a choice and I made it and that's that. I love my wife, my children and my life and know if I ever go back to the drugs I risk losing all that I have. I've known enough junkies in my time to know one thing. Without purpose an addict will never stop being an addict, for there is no reason to stop. Most don't have a job they love or the love of a good woman / man to replace the pure joy they get from getting high. I was fortunate to meet my wife, but I do not want sympathy or understanding, we each make decisions that affect the rest of our lives and we must each take responsibility for those actions and the judgement of others is part of that. Most addicts have had countless opportunities to change their future, but have chosen drugs ahead of everything else, that's their choice and they should not be exempt from judgement by others because of it.
SABOTAGE
