Is The System dealing properly with the Addiction Epidemic?
People are dying, lives
and families destroyed!
Is Prison Really all we
can come up with!?
I have struggled with
addiction my entire adult life. Approximately
20 years of Chaos, Misery and Destruction.
Now that the fog has finally lifted, I want to share my experience
pertaining to addiction with others and I have started this site so others may
do the same if they so choose to.
My goal here is to
bring awareness to the devastation that addiction causes. Devastation in the lives of addicts and in
the lives of their families and loved ones.
This is a serious dilemma! I do
not feel that prison is the solution. It’s
like putting a Band-Aid on skin cancer.
It just gets covered up while the problem still grows underneath. People are dying here!
Good People!
I’m not going to go
into great detail here about the specifics of my story. I just want to get the point across that
something needs to be done… Badly! Or
people are going to continue to die, continue to wreak devastation on
themselves and on those around them, and continue to commit crimes to fuel their sickness. And this IS a sickness, it is not a moral
issue or an issue of will power. I’m
pretty sure that has been scientifically proven already with PET (BrainScans), but for some reason it is still not treated as such!
Whether our brains were
different beforehand or the drugs caused the changes and made it worse, makes no
difference to me. It is a biological issue at
that point and needs to be treated medically, which in many states, especially
our state (MAINE), proper treatment and care is severely lacking.
Take away the barber
shops and everyone will be running around with long hair. Take away proper clinical treatment centers,
rehabs and detoxes, and people are going to be running around with serious
addiction problems. It’s that simple.
I was 15 when I started
using drugs. I don’t blame it on any particular life event, I just did it at first to fit in and I liked it. It made me feel more comfortable. I then began to use it as an escape and as a way to
cope.
Then it had me!
The process of changing my brain began, and
it would continue that way for 20 or so years.
I tried detox many times. Many
places would kick me out before I was even done detoxing due to insurance issues. I mean really! At least give a person a fighting
chance! I never had the ability to get
into proper, long term treatment for my addiction. I destroyed my life and the lives of those
around me for many of those 20 years. I
never learned how to cope and deal with life's problems because I was always relying on the
substance that my brain became hard-wired to rely on in order to cope. It knew nothing else.
This last go around
with my addiction involved close to 10 years on Methadone! Now that’s a topic in it of itself.
Methadone should be banned! These
companies that make money off of the disease of addiction in this way are despicable and
should be outlawed. Now I am not saying that some of these treatments don't have some benefits. I did begin to get my life
back together on Methadone but I was still not learning how to properly deal with
the underlying causes and conditions of my disease. These places are more than happy to up your
dose whenever you want because doing so just made the ball and chain that Methadone
is, that much heavier, which means money in their pockets!
Suboxone treatment can
be helpful but also needs to be properly prescribed and regulated. Then tapered down as quickly as possible
while a person is undergoing proper treatment.
By treatment I mean learning how to live life without the use of
drugs. I say this because when it comes
down to it, that is what is needed.
Treatment and education about the disease: relapse, triggers, co-occurring
disorders, etc.. are important, but that is not going to keep someone
sober. I needed to learn how to live
again, all over, without relying on a substance to get me through.
Sorry I went off on a
tangent for a minute there, where was I?
Oh yeah, Methadone...Bad.
Anyway.
I had a wife, children,
good job, a house, everything I ever wanted in my life after using the crutch
of methadone and suboxone, and then I made a mistake. I released my addiction again. I say this because my brain, the brain of an
addict, has a Monster inside of it, and when I put a substance into my body this Monster can get released. When it does,
all the logic, desire, willpower and intelligence in the world is not going to
stop it. Reason being is that this Monster resides in my brain, and IT then begins pulling all the strings.
“Am I headed in a bad
direction”, nah, it’s not that bad, “Should I stop”, well maybe, but can
I. The answer is NO. The answer is NO because this Monster is
running around in my head making all my decisions for me, using tools like
self-manipulation, denial, rationalization, justification, and outright lies. It does this so it can keep going. Why?
I have no idea, it’s just the way it is!
I lived it for many years.
So, moving on, I made this mistake. I decided I would get on a
prescription for some problem I thought I had?
I realized later that this was the Monster rattling its cage… It does this from time to time and if I am not present, and aware, and ready for it, it will get out! And it did! Boy did it ever! I went to a doctor that was more than willing
to “help” me with my “problem”, with the help of BigPharma (that’s another topic all-together).
So I got on these meds., released the Monster, made a bunch of very bad
decisions and ended up serving a 4 year sentence in prison (That’s the short
version)
I feel lucky that I
made it to prison, many don’t make it, they die or live a miserable existence
until they die, or commit suicide from all the seemingly inescapable pain. I also feel lucky because while I was in
there I finally made a decision to surrender. I surrendered to the fact that this Monster was real, and I finally got to the point where I knew I couldn’t do drugs anymore without
running the serious risk that This terrible Monster would take over. I did A lot of soul searching, reflecting on my past, and
reading while I was there. I read and
learned A lot about the psychology of addictive behavior and the biology of the
addicted brain. I also read many books on spirituality, about living and coping
with life in a way that many “normal” un-addicted people learn just through
the natural process of growing up. I didn’t
allow myself to have that luxury so I had to go to prison and read about
it. But I’m glad I did. I’m grateful for the time I had to work on
myself. But many people aren’t given
this opportunity. Some are stuck and don’t
even know it. Some know and don’t know how
to go about changing it. Change is a difficult
thing, especially when your brain is being run by an outside entity. Addiction
literally hijacks the brain!
My effort is to bring
awareness to the fact that we need to focus more on prevention, education and treatment of
this problem, and stop sweeping the problem under the proverbial rug (prison)! Lets do a better job at teaching our children about this disease and its ramifications so that they do not need to go down this road in the first place. It's A lot harder to treat than it is to educate and prevent. Treatment CAN work, but there needs to be places to go. I have been in the emergency room with addiction related problems more than once, and they could not help me. There was just nowhere for them to send me! This to me is very sad!!!
Please share your
stories. Even if you are not an addict,
chances are you know someone who is dealing with this problem. A loved one a
friend? Many people have been affected
in one way or another by this disease and it needs to be dealt with
differently! People shouldn’t have to live
in misery for years on end! Families shouldn’t
have to suffer and watch while their loved ones destroy their lives or end up
dead!
Please Help and share
what you can. I hope you will pass this
along. There is power in numbers and it
is my hope that we can all work together to help initiate some sort of positive change!
