do you ever get into one of those moods where your heart aches and longs for something so deeply but you dont know what and your heart is like a stubborn toddler screaming i want it !!!! please give it to me !!!! And you’re desperately like i don’t know what kind of emotionally fulfilling experience to give you at 3 PM on a Wednesday !!!!!!!!!
It’s 2018 and literally people can’t get it in their head that drug addiction is a disease.
It results from a permanently altered brain that isn’t functioning properly. The brain’s reward centers are messed up. There are studies that even show that the person’s DNA is affected. Their personality is affected. Their actions and behavior is affected. It’s a real fucking disease.
Yeah, it’s easy to say “well their choice to do drugs got them there, so why should I care?”
Well, this argument can be used for a lot of diseases. “Well it’s their choice to not get the hpv vaccine so why should I care that they got cervical cancer.” “Well it’s their choice to go hiking so why should I care that a tick bit them and they got lymes disease?” “Well it’s their choice to eat fatty foods so why should I care that they have heart disease?” Etc.
Chances are, we all have done something that is detrimental to our health at some point in their lives. It doesn’t mean if it results in a disease, we are less deserving of help or compassion because we made choices that contributed to the disease.
There are many reasons why people start doing drugs in the first place. Sometimes it’s a coping mechanism, sometimes it’s self medication, and or sometimes it’s out of sheer curiousity. All of these reasons still warrant compassion and aid.
Shaming and vilifying addicts is not the way to help them. If you really truly cared you would be trying to create a world that is better for addicts to thrive (voting and supporting measures for affordable housing, minimum wage increases, better access to education and childcare, better access to mental healthcare, universal healthcare, etc) as well as actively fighting the conditions (poverty, abuse, lack of resources, inaccess to metal healthcare, etc.) that create new addicts.
bongdanceking 