Another Boy Dead

One day before his 20th birthday, drug addiction claimed the life of yet another young man. This boy was not from a "bad town." He did not come from a "bad family." He grew up in a small, boring town. I remember this boy as a child. He was on my bus route to school. 

After his death, his brother wrote an open letter to the parents of our community. He told them that drug addiction is not a problem "over there." It is a problem here. It is a problem where we live. Yet no one is taking it seriously. In a town like mine, drug problems are swept under the rug. We blame the addicts themselves, or the parents, or the family. We are wrong.

When drugs enter your system, they change you. Drugs literally change the chemistry in your brain. A drug addict is not the same person they were before the drug was introduced. I know. This boy was not the first young man I  have seen die because of an addiction. I watched a member of my own family lose his battle with addiction. And it really is a battle. The drug became his entire life. He lost control of his own body and mind. I know that the world blamed him. I blamed him. Was it stupid for him to take the drug in the first place? Yes. But it was a mistake he only had to make once.

When you lose someone you love to drug addiction, it is like losing someone to Cancer. Once they are addicted, taking the drug is no longer a choice. Drug addiction is not a problem in other communities. It is a problem everywhere. Everyone needs to take some responsibility and fight addiction the same way we fight Cancer. Educate. Advocate. Say something. Learn from the people who have watched loved ones lose this fight.