Drugs Are Not The Problem, Addiction Is

The disease of addiction affects millions of Americans every year, leaving its mark on family, friends, and the individual. Its outcomes can be tragic, recovery can be elusive, and many people follow their addiction to their deaths. 

I learned this awful truth from first-hand experience.

I remember when I was sitting across from a nurse, learning this vital information. Information about how relatives I have never met, and experiences that weren’t my fault, put me at a high risk of addiction. 

I had family members on both sides of the family who died from addiction, great grandparents, and cousins respectively. In addition to this family history, the nurse also asked me whether or not I had any “traumatic experiences” as a child. 

I was a victim of an internet predator at the tender age of thirteen and was repeatedly groomed, molested, and then eventually raped. This didn’t stop until roughly the age of fifteen. But, I explained, I got extensive counseling and went on to have a relatively normal rest of my teenage years.

“Well, based on your family history dealing with addiction, as well as your personal history with sexual assault, based on my cursory observations it looks as if you have a 90%+ chance of becoming addicted to alcohol or drugs in your lifetime.” She said.

I wish I could tell you I learned this vitally crucial information at perhaps a relevant time, say, before I went away to college, leaving my parents' house for the first time. After all, college is where most people have their first experience with alcohol.

But sadly this is not the case. What actually happened is that this conversation took place at an outpatient rehab facility. 

I had a choice: to go down the road of my ancestors, and die an early death, or simply abstain from drinking alcohol, with the help of a higher power and group meetings. I recently celebrated eight years of sobriety.

So why am I telling you this? 

Well, my motivations are simple. My first motivation is that hopefully, after reading this, people with similar backgrounds might think twice about experimenting with King Alcohol, deeming it “safe” because it is far more socially acceptable than heroin. 

After all, roughly 11.3% of those ages 18 and older have an “alcohol use disorder” in 2021. Alcohol, a particularly vicious substance, is one of the few drugs that can kill you if you try to stop drinking it. Symptoms of withdrawal include hallucinations, shaking, shivering, a racing heart rate, high blood pressure (which can be fatal), and seizures.

In 2021, 28.6 million adults aged 18 and older had an alcohol use disorder (alcoholism), but only 1.3 million of them received any type of treatment. Drunk driving killed 36,096 people in 2019. 

Addiction is in fact considered a disease, and like most diseases is part personal choices, part genetics. Yet no one ever asked me about my family history or warned me about how it may affect my life until it was far too late. 

So what do I suggest to help reduce addiction in this country?

For starters, doctors need to start talking to their patients. You know how a doctor asks you about your family history of heart disease, cancer, and diabetes?

They should be asking you about your family history of addiction too. And if you have this history, they need to talk to you about the dangers, not just of illegal drugs, but legal ones (and alcohol) too. 

They need to especially stress the importance of someone with your history following the prescribing instructions exactly. And talking to you about strategies to ensure dosing instructions are adhered to, as well as discussing treatment options that may have less of a propensity for addiction. 

For example, many years ago after I became sober I ended up with a nerve injury in my neck, that caused shooting pain, numbness, and tingling down both my arms and hands.

I didn’t want to go down the prescription route because I didn’t want to risk what I had fought so hard to achieve, sobriety. I decided to do physical therapy and capsaicin cream instead. Years later all I need is wrist braces at night and a monthly chiropractor appointment to stay pain-free.

It’s a lot easier to refrain from using drugs/alcohol than it is to stop once you’ve become addicted, and over the years I have watched many people fail to stop and die. I am one of the lucky ones.

Choosing to simply not consume alcohol, based on relevant medical information given to me, would have been one of the simplest decisions I could have ever made. 

Maybe patients will decide to drink or abuse prescription drugs anyway. But even if one patient decides not to, that’s one less victim of the disease of addiction. 

Wrong Speak is a free-expression platform that allows varying viewpoints. All views expressed in this article are the author's own.