Albranie: From Being Addicted To Heroin

I don’t let anybody to call him as an addict in front of me as well. When I saw him after four years last holiday, I had more sympathy for him than ever. I used to fight with him in order to make him to change his habit. His excuse was that he works so hard and long hours everyday and the opium helps him to be more energetic and keeps up with his work. However, I used to think that it was only about his weakness. I always looked at his addiction as his weakness, so in my core belief addiction comes from the person’s lack of coping skills especially with reality of the life or even being lazy to risk and try new things in life. All these beliefs made me to have ambivalent feeling toward person with addiction and even my father. Although I love my father and I believe he works so hard to support his family, I denied his job, as a taxi driver and his addiction for most of my life. I never talked about my father’s job in front of others, because in my culture it means you are poor and belong to low socioeconomic status, and then my embarrassment when others see him and recognized his

Active addicts may claim that rehabilitation doesn’t work or that it only works while you are there, but as soon as you leave you re dragged back into that pit of addiction. The parents of people who have passed away because of drug related incidents may think that we shouldn’t be sympathising with them, because they have chosen to throw their life away and their child’s life was taken away without warning and without any fault of their own. The Government may feel that they are providing a lot of free support for recovering addicts and have been cracking down on the

People should know what they are getting themselves in if they are going to choose to go through this bumpy road in life. There are so many consequences that can come from heroin so make sure you are ready to face them. You are harming yourself and the people around you so make sure you inform yourself on what can come from heroin.

Bruce Brandler is a man who lost his son to heroin. Brandler says in an article by the Los Angeles Times, “I want to evaporate the myth that heroin addicts are just homeless derelicts, this epidemic hit’s everyone… I think my situation exemplifies that.”. I think what Brandler meant by this is many people have a certain image in their minds when they think about heroin addicts. This image is often wrong simply because heroin addicts are now the people right in front of us. When society expects all addicts to fit one description it often overlooks those that need

Working at quitting is the only way to be able to not be addicted anymore. Pain killers are the choice of drug for some of these people. It starts off with an injury causing them to need the pain killers, then they get addicted. Then people move onto heroin after pain killers because there both opiates. “It’s important for addicts to know they are not alone”. I believe that is so

When I was 14 years old, my father died of a drug overdose, after spending his life struggling with the disease,. I took care of my niece while my sister was heavily using. I fought with her for years to get sober. Then I found her in a bathroom unconscious, with no pulse, and a needle still stuck in her arm. I gave her C.P.R. for nearly 13 minutes until the paramedics’ arrived. They explained to me that if I had stopped giving her C.P.R., they would have never been able to revive her. In addition to them, I have several other family members and friends that also struggle with addiction. I have watched them try to get, and stay, sober. I have seen the control that addition has over them, and felt the way it affects everyone around them. I have watched the financial burden they cause their families, and our community.

It is documented that a quarter of people who try heroin will become addicted.  Do not become part of that statistic.  The only way to avoid addiction to heroin is to abstain from the drug.  Heroin affects all of us.  Whether you know of someone who is addicted or not, this is a national epidemic that raises health care costs and taxes to imprison convicted drug dealers and users.  This drug is detrimental to our society.  Please join me in taking a stand against heroin.  Make the conscientious decision to abstain from taking the drug.  If you, or someone you know, is struggling with drug addiction or is tempted to try heroin, seek support groups and rehabilitation centers for professional help.  We are the only ones who can protect ourselves and our loved ones.  Act now before it is too late for you or someone you

You likely experience varying emotions dealing with the addict. One moment you fear the addict may die of an overdose; a moment later, you are angry because the addict is wasting money on drugs, sleeping in late, or refusing to work. It’s frustrating and painful to watch helplessly as someone you care about falls prey to the negative and possibly catastrophic consequences of addiction.

On my arrival in the United Kingdom from my native Zimbabwe, I had my first meeting with an individual with a serious heroin addiction when I found myself sharing a flat in an emergency accommodation at the Lady Beck Close in Leeds. Things went missing in the flat and I could not understand what happening until the person responsible was offered to speak to me. He apologised for the theft of my property but explained at length the serious problem with substance misuse that he had and how he would do anything to feed his habit. He went on to tell me how he dropped from University where he was studying dentistry after drugs took a toll on his life. He said has tried and was still trying everything to stop but cannot despite the care, support and help he received from so many professionals.

There are overpowering amounts of different stereotypes that are brought to mind when thinking about people who are dependent on heroin or drugs in general. The majority of these stereotypes make negatively connoted and make assumptions about lifestyles that include substance abuse. One might think that people who abuse substances are typically deviants and don’t engage in society like the rest of the population. They embody different values to mainstream society: skirting the edges, being unemployed and victims of bad upbringings, high

Drug addiction and drug addicts are everywhere. We always see and hear on the news that people on the streets get arrested for possession of drugs. What we don’t see or hear is the person’s story of why they use these drugs, because they’re immediately charged with possession of illegal substances and taken to jail. There are some people that deserve to go to jail for possession of drugs. Most of the people who use drugs use it for personal consumption and most of them are struggling with addiction. Sending a drug addict to jail isn’t going to help him/her because as soon as they serve their time behind bars, the first thing they’re going to do is seek the drug again. It’s a process that is bound to repeat itself. Drug addicts should be sent to rehab, some place where they can get help to become sober and detoxed. Every addict has a reason for using drugs, most of them use drugs to deal with a problem at home, to relieve pain or to feel better because of depression. Maybe they just did them for fun at first but soon found themselves addicted. All they need is help, they need to be sent to rehab so they can find another way to deal with whatever they might be going through. Addictions is the most difficult thing a person can over come.

It tends to be difficult for people to admit that they have a problem. Even when someone realizes that they struggle with addiction, it can be overwhelming and frightening to take the step necessary to make a change and overcome the addiction. As a result, many people simply maintain the status quo, even if it makes them and their loved ones unhappy.

I know a girl named Katie. She is not a drug addict. She is a wife, a mother, a positive part of our community. But before she was happily married, before she was lovingly called Mommy, she was addicted to heroin. Her friends were all addicts and many died. She stopped breathing once too, when she was 21 years old. Her boyfriend gave her CPR. She was even arrested; court mandated outpatient counseling, once a week for three months, NA meetings, one year probation. It did nothing for her. She drank the whole time. The traditional treatments used to treat drug and alcohol addiction was not effective then, nor is it effective now, for the new generation of drug addicts.

Society views heroin addicts in a very negative way. Most people think that heroin addicts are homeless, which they very well could be. People do not see that heroin addicts need help. They just see them as a piece of trash that is always begging for money. People who are addicted to drugs are portrayed in the media (Draus, Roddy, & Greenwald, 2010) which is how society portrays them too. Being addicted to heroin in society’s eyes means that there is an “extreme lack of control over one’s own daily behaviors” (Draus et al, 2010).

We all have a family member, or close friend that has become addicted to one drug or another. A silent robber at first, and then it progresses into something much worse. They become someone else are no longer themselves anymore. They begin to lie, steal and doing whatever is necessary to feed their addiction. All limits are gone, they are willing to do the unthinkable to feed their addiction. They do whatever they need to get their next fix because their body is craving the drug. They go through withdrawals that makes them ill in ways that only a person