With all of the celebrities going into Rehab and our prison’s filled with drug offenders, are we really doing what needs to be done to stop this epidemic? I, personally, have been in an addict (Chrystol, pot & alcohol) and I have been clean and sober. I have struggled to figure out why I became an addict and I have struggled to stay clean and sober. I have my opinions about what makes a person become an addict, but not everyone agrees with what I have discovered. I, believe that preventing a person from becoming an addict lies in a person’s awareness of their own pre-disposition due to family history of addiction, early intervention, education and family support. But a lot of people do not believe that heredity plays a part. Some believe it’s a question of weak self esteem or lack of willpower. Hopefully, by now, most have come to understand the incredible strength of character that it takes for an addict to be “clean and sober” and stay “clean and sober”. The question is, are we simply treating and or in prisoning addicts after they have already hit their “bottom”? Why are we still not able to limit our prison population to prisoners who are “real” dangers to society, instead of filling them up with people who, otherwise, would have never broken any laws if it weren’t for their actions while under the influence. I can’t tell you how many people that I have seen go from loving, responsible, law abiding citizens to chronic offenders, simply due to drug addiction. People who were compassionate, responsible and kind, until they were faced with having to go without the one thing that seemed to make their life and it’s problems, bearable, drugs. They lie, manipulate, steal and sometimes, kill, just to be able to not have to “feel”. I honestly believe that many of these people would be living production, happy lives if it weren’t for their vulnerability to addiction. Educating our children to “Just Say No”, frankly, isn’t enough. We need to tell them what would make them want to “say yes”, in the first place. We need to help them develop the skills to deal with their problems and with life in general. Educating someone at a time in which they are faced with making that decision, is too late. Helping them understand how to cope with life, before they are offered drugs, is the key. Our society is so focused on feeling good, having it all, being perfect and beautiful and successful and rich, why aren’t we focusing on being honest and kind and real?
We put our drug offenders in jail and allow them to work out and get very acquainted with the whole “jail” mentality, when we should have separate institutions for drug offenders that simply education and rehabilitate. Maybe I am biased, based on my own personal history, and maybe some of these people simply can’t be rehabilitated, but why aren’t we trying to keep the 2 types of people separate and deal with them differently. Mandatory, hard core, rehabilitation should be mandatory for all offenses where drugs were involved in any way. Spending their time working out and learning how to be a convict, doesn’t seem productive.
I simply don’t see how tougher laws and imprisonment is teaching any of these drug addicts how to be “clean and sober” and productive in our society. We still have a massive “drug problem” in the United States. It is obvious that what we have been doing for the last 10-20 years, has not really solved the problem.
One of the things I have learned in my journey in recovery is that the definition of insanity is “doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results”. Isn’t that exactly what we are doing?