Feb 21, 2007

Junkys Can't Get Clean

As the youngest person on the residential treatment unit at the Brattleboro Retreat, I was already feeling insecure. Most of the other patients had already been to some sort of treatment center at least once, usually four or more times. At least half of us were there for a primary self-diagnosis of heroin addiction. My second night there, as I sat on the back porch freezing with a cigarette in my hand, a seasoned veteran of rehabs & fellow junky "M" informed me in a matter-of-fact tone that heroin addicts just plain can’t get sober. That would not be the last time I heard this - it came from discouraged roommates, and plenty of other people during my stay. I even heard it at "outside" AA meetings a few times from disgruntled members, who for whatever reason were terribly misinformed.

I was troubled deeply. If I knew one thing at that point in my life, I knew I didn’t ever want to go back to the way I had been living for the past year or two. So why this terrible curse? Was I doomed forever, no matter how hard I tried? Was recovery all a big lie? Did it only apply to alcoholics, to pill poppers, cokeheads and pot smokers? I refused to believe that I would never be able to keep heroin out of my life. So I started asking WHY.

I realized after not too long that the people who stuck by this prophecy were the ones who were relapsing, leaving treatment before they were released with drugs already in their system. I began to think that maybe they had been defending their right to go back out and do it again. And then I began meeting other junkys - heroin addicts that had been sober for a long, long time. At first I didn’t believe it, my first sober junky friend had been clean for 16 years when I met him, and was working at another treatment center as a counselor. The number astounded me - it seemed impossible. "He must have just tried it once or twice, he can’t be a real addict" I thought. But I heard his story, and realized that he was just like me - worse, actually - he had been homeless, lost his family, everything, was addicted for years and years. Most of what I lost had been self respect.

During the following years, I met many more heroin addicts in long-term successful recovery, as well as watched others get and stay clean and sober, while hearing the same old rumor from time to time that it couldn’t be done.