Meg...

"This is an excellent piece on drug addicts- but what makes you write it?I grew up in the 80's - a time when anti-drug advertising was at its peak. The programs must have worked, because everytime that I think about anything involving illegal drug usage, I think about brains and eggs frying on pans, little pills singing, "We can make you delirious", and cracked-out totally spaced-out people living in abandoned buildings with missing teeth, dirty clothes, HIV infected sharing dirty needles, and with no money prostituting themselves."

I wrote it because I recently learned that a person for whom I care deeply is a drug addict. I knew there was a "problem", but I had absolutely no clue how bad it was.

Yes, many addicts are exactly as you portray them. But, they all have a few things in common and that's what I was referring to when I wrote:

"...They had dreams of being a teacher, a lawyer or an actor. They went out to play, walked to school and played hide and go seek..."

They start out just like everyone else. I don't know what goes wrong, but something does and if left alone, they will eventually end up as you described.

Almost all of us go through a "party" period in our lives. Most of us eventually outgrow it. I certainly had my fun back in the day...but as with most people, life takes over, children are born and maturity occurs. But occasionally, that growth doesn't occur and the party never stops. Well, it does...but with a funeral, a prison sentence or just your average run of the mill street person.

I'm trying to help someone but I'm realizing that there isn't much that I can do at all. This person (let's call them Gene), has taught me something that I haven't been able to learn in close to 50 years...how to say "No."

Gene asked me for some money around the holidays and I was happy to turn it over. All that bought me was repeated requests for more money with increasingly creative stories behind the requests. Then, I set my purse down and Gene looked down into it and saw a prescription bottle. Gene picked it up and said, "Oooh! Morphine...can I have some?" Then Gene reached in and pulled out my hydrocodone and my Xanax. I had my heart and blood pressure meds in there as well, but Gene knew what the "good stuff" was. Now I represent not only an ATM, but a pharmacy as well. I've had to keep things hidden that I would have never thought to hide before. And, the repeated requests for money and my medicine (Which I NEED!) have taught me, for once in my life, to say no.

I've been a sucker my entire life, I have never been very good at saying no to anyone. From my siblings to my scheduler at work...I can't say no when someone asks me for something. Well, I've said "No." numerous times over the past few days. So, Gene has accomplished something that many, many bums, users and cheats have not been able to accomplish over the past 48 1/2 years...I can say "No." without hesitation.

OK...now I'm going to try to do that "drastic" thing that I spoke of earlier.

Meg