Another celebrity died due to a drug overdose this
weekend. Cory Monteith who played the
role of Finn Hudson on the popular television series Glee passed away on
Saturday. It was confirmed that he died
as the result of a heroin and alcohol overdose.
Cory now joins actors like Heath Ledger, Corey Haim and River Phoenix, who
all battled with substance abuse and died as a result of their addiction in
their early twenties and thirties. In
recent years we have also seen many well know celebrities tragically succumb to
drug addiction. More recently there were
Whitney Houston, Amy Winehouse and even Michael Jackson (although technically
his doctor killed him).
The
drugs most frequently found in these reported deaths were cocaine, heroin,
alcohol, diazepam, alprazolam, hydrocodone and methamphetamine, to mention but
the top 7. We would be fools to believe
that drug addiction is only secluded to poor communities, the homeless and
prostitutes on the streets. We would
also be even more ignorant to believe that only the super rich and famous can
become addicts. Addiction affects
everybody and chances are that even you have been affected by addiction in one
form or another. So this led me to
wonder, why we are so afraid to talk about it.
For many years drug addiction was believed to only be
associated with the illegal substances we all are familiar with today. Alcohol and nicotine addiction are also still
common and are also responsible for numerous deaths each year. But, in recent years new trends developed –
people started abusing and getting addicted to prescription and over the
counter medication: The most common
being Opioids (painkillers like Oxycontin or Vicodin), Depressants (tranquilizers
and sleeping pills like Xanax or Valium) and Stimulants (mood stabilizers like
Adderall or Ritalin). Today people can
buy these drugs from their drug dealer right alongside cocaine, crack, heroine,
ecstasy and marijuana. But I don’t want
to bore you with a lesson in drugs with this blog post. I want to share with you my story about being
affected by addiction. I want to tell
you about alcoholism.
You cannot always tell if a person is an addict. It could be the housewife down the street, a
colleague at work, a professor at college and even a family member. My father is an alcoholic and one thing I
have learned growing up in a home with him is that addicts can hide their
addictions very well. I also learned
that addiction is not something that happens over night (not with alcoholism
anyway) and it is a gradual process sliding towards a precipice, and once the
addict has slid over it, coming back from it is very difficult if not
impossible for some people. My father’s
drinking started when I was about six or seven (or at least that’s when I
became aware of it). It started off with
him and my mother having a sundowner after work. Then it progressed to my father drinking too
much at every social function he attended, most times driving us home as drunk
as a skunk. As I grew older his drinking
increased resulting in innumerable fights between him and my mother. Fights I still remember to this day.
My father would come home from work functions drunk, too inebriated
to make sense. Sometimes my mother would
lock him out of the house resulting in him once breaking down a door. None of their fights were particularly pleasant
and luckily my father was not the type of alcoholic who got aggressive and
physically abused us. The first time he
went to rehab for his addiction was when I was in my late teens. He came home and drove his car into the gate
of our house. He was too drunk to get
out of the car and my boyfriend, at the time, and I had to carry him to the
bedroom. It was embarrassing as hell as
the accident drew quite a crowd in our street.
The following day my dad was admitted to a rehab facility. After a long time being treated physically
and receiving therapy he finally came out clean. Or so we thought.
Addicts are extremely manipulative and they are proficient
liars. For a few years after my father
came out of rehab we believed that he was finally clean and that he was a
recovering alcoholic, but we were deceived.
As it happens my father never stopped drinking. He just did it in secret. After my mother was diagnosed with terminal
cancer and with her passing eight months later, I discovered a journal my
mother had kept. From reading it I
learned how bad my father’s drinking really was and how my mother tried to
protect my sister and I from the truth about the man my father truly was. I was shocked but being naïve, my sister and I
wanted to believe that my father had changed.
We were in for a rude surprise.
It seems that after my mother died there was nobody left to keep him in
check and his addiction got out of control.
After my mother’s passing my father lived with my sister and
her husband and he stayed in the garden cottage on their property. My sister noticed that sometimes at 4am the
lights in his cottage would still be on.
During that time my father also got into all kinds of accidents with his
car. Then one day their housekeeper
pulled my sister aside and told her about all the whiskey bottles she had to
throw away from to garden cottage every week.
Naturally my sister was shocked, upset and felt bitterly disappointed. So she and her husband decided to collect a
week’s worth of discarded bottles (which were many) and prepared for an
intervention. Unfortunately, I could not
make it as hubby and I had left for our honeymoon to Egypt. When we returned my sister informed me that
my father had voluntarily admitted himself to a rehabilitation facility. This was his second stint in rehab. All was well for a couple months, but again
things would turn for the worst.
My father met his new wife a couple months after he came out
of rehab. I met his new wife three times
in my life. Once for breakfast when my
father first introduced her to us, then at their wedding and the last time was
at a BBQ at my sister’s house. I cannot
really say that I know her well, but soon after they got married she started
phoning my sister and I wanting to know why we never warned her that my father
had a drinking problem. Both my sister
and I were quite taken aback seeing as we asked my father on numerous occasions
if he had told her that he had been to rehab.
He said he had. But he lied. Just as he lied when he told us that he had stopped
drinking. I knew that he started again
because as hubby and I left my father’s wedding reception the first thing he
did was to go to the bar and ordered a whiskey.
His addiction won yet again and he continued to lie about it.
I once also got a frantic call from my father’s new wife
saying that he had fallen down the stairs, landed on a vase and had a bad cut
on his arm. I asked her if he was drunk when
it happened and she said no. Later in
hospital it was determined that he was.
He got her to lie for him. I have
not seen or spoken to my father in over six years and my sister and I currently
have no contact with him. It is sad to
think that my father chose his addiction over his own children and
grandchildren. It is even more distressing
to think that from the age of five that I never had a real father as alcohol not
only took him away from me but also took him from his family. My father has also broken off all contact
with his own brothers and sister. So all
family he has left is his new wife, her children, alcohol, and as they would
like us to believe, Jesus Christ.
Because you know, Jesus made wine out of water so wine is not bad for
you.
Addiction ruins lives, destroys families and even kills. Is it really worth sacrificing everything you
have, everyone you love, your dignity and self-respect and in some cases even your
life for a drink, a pill, a pipe, a needle or a drug laced joint? If my husband and I are ever to have children
I will do my damnedest to make sure my marriage and child are never exposed to
or have to endure the evils of drug abuse.
Having lived through it and experienced it firsthand I know how much pain
it causes for those people around the addict.
I know how selfish addicts are, how they lie, manipulate and I know that
if they do not really want to get help sending them to rehab will accomplish
nothing. I know this sounds harsh, but
this is my experience with addiction and it’s painful and there are always casualties. If you are reading this
today and if you are an addict, I plead with you to take a long hard look at your life
and ask yourself – Is this addiction really worth it? If your answer is No, please save your own
life and seek help. Your life is worth
more than what you might think and there
are people out there who love you.
Till next time.
