Addicts are people, not problems

aswanny@unm.edu

I can fall in love with pretty much anybody, regardless of their outward appearance. Thus, the city bus has become my prairie, my roaming eyes sampling characters so strange they couldn’t be invented.

One man in particular comes to mind, and I had the pleasure of seeing him many times over the course of a few months. Tall, dark and handsome with a mouth crammed with awkwardly placed teeth. I could tell he was having a terrible day, cursing softly to himself. I hoped he’d look my way but surely he had other things on his mind.

I’d see him when I walked Downtown, always around the Alvarado Transport Center. I did a one-hour people observation there for an anthropology class, during which the security guard pointed out all the drug transactions he sees every day, usually between the same people. My man was always moving quickly, eyes shifting hungrily, though he never did more than glance in my direction.

I knew he was on drugs, but that was OK. Call it a maternal instinct, but I’m attracted to people who need help. My family, close and extended, is peppered with people needing something to get by, but I’ve learned this is nothing unique. I used to think my family had problems, but almost everyone has a problem.

The difference is that some people can get their fix legally, like smokers, alcoholics, shopping and caffeine addicts. Some addicts can rationalize their addiction because the effects make them better contenders in the world, according to our society’s values.

Caffeine and other uppers are a good example, but if our world didn’t demand overstressed, under-rested individuals sacrificing their sanity in the name of a better work ethic, uppers-addicts would appear crazy. So although I’m irritated by people bumming money every time I leave the house, I don’t criticize people for their drug use.

About a month after I first saw my man, he came up to me while I waited at a bus stop. My eyes lit up as he asked to use my phone real quick. He was looking pretty rough, so anything I could do to help … Then he referred to the person he talked to as Biscuit or Kibbles or some other code name, so I knew what he was after. He told the person he’d be there in 20 minutes and took off after returning my phone, caked in sweat, oil and dead skin.

I’ve only passed by him a few times since then, though for the past two months I haven’t seen him at all. I can only imagine what happened, if anything. I think he died or is in jail. I’m guessing he’s a meth head, as evidenced by the scabs and sores all over his body.

I see people like this and I have to wonder what their world is like, especially what it was before they started using drugs. To me, drugs are a way to escape or modify reality. For anyone who tries something socially unacceptable, the reaction to their deemed “misbehavior” can be enough to warrant continued drug use or dabbling in harder drugs commonly known to kill the users sooner or later. What would drive a person to try such a drug?

I always thought meth was the worst drug you could try until “my lady,” the woman who employs me as her caretaker, told me about krokodil, or homemade desomorphine. I watched interviews of users who started cooking it because it is cheaper than morphine and more potent. Because they injected it immediately after cooking it without much of a purification process, the drug causes skin damage, i.e., expansive scabs and infection. They say they hate themselves for doing it but that they can’t stop.

I understand how hard it is to stop something you’re physically addicted to, and I feel for anyone who struggles with a drug addiction. People like my lady are not so sympathetic and would rather addicts be done away with to make room for functioning adults, many of whom function only with the help of socially acceptable drugs.

It makes me sick to hear the way people talk about drug addicts, not just because I have personal experience with such people, but because they’re not treated as humans so much as problems. Their addiction likely started in a moment of weakness in which they felt they’d rather be out of their mind than have to continue dealing with whatever it is that plagued them. Everyone has a weakness, so why is the drug addict despicable? Granted, they’ve got a reputation for doing all they can to get their fix when the cells call out for more, so I understand recognizing that the addiction is a problem. But the people dealing with addiction are still people.

I’ve never had a serious substance abuse problem, but quitting smoking has been enough of a hassle. My nonsmoker friends don’t understand why I couldn’t stop, or why I’d stop and start up again months later. “It’s like trying not to eat when you’re really hungry,” I say, which sounds stupid because food is essential to staying alive while drugs are not. However, you create that need as soon as you take a drug.

The key to stopping resides in our frontal cortex, the part of our brain that facilitates free will. I felt nauseous when I smoked, dizzy and bored. I’d light a cigarette and wonder why. I hated smelling like smoke all the time and knew that if I had to run for my life, then natural selection would certainly rule me out of the surviving group.

Despite the sound reasoning that supports quitting, I still want to smoke. It’s not because it’s cool, nor is it simply because I’m physically addicted. It’s that I don’t really care about my well-being. Anytime I’ve approached total wellness, I get antsy and panicky; it’s so foreign a feeling that it’s uncomfortable.

I still want to feel OK, so I talk myself into quitting and get used to the feeling of breathing easy. Of course, if the decision were between heroin, a drug often compared to the feeling of numerous orgasms, and a life I felt I had no control over, a reality in which I felt unloved or unwanted, the decision would be an easy one.

I believe this is what keeps an addict from committing to sober living. Although the physical addiction is no small hurdle to overcome, it’s not caring about your life that will keep you going back to the thing that promises to take it away.