I’m sure we’ve all heard (and sometimes participated in) the snickering and joking when someone we know is on the pipe or smoking ice, crack, batu, ma‘a, crystal, or whatever we call it nowadays.

Our usual response is to first inform everyone we know that he’s hitting the pipe again and that he’s a mess. Next we become fixated on every bad thing that he does and blame all his inexcusable behaviors on his lack of will power, stupidity, and, of course, the drugs; we then focus all our attention on his drug problem and forget all the other reasons that make him a beautiful person. Eventually he pulls through and manages to stay clean for a couple of weeks, months, or even years before he relapses and becomes another mess.

Why do we have certain attitudes about people who use drugs and who just can’t seem to quit? After all, we all continuously use drugs in some form, whether it is sugar, caffeine, nicotine, Tylenol, allergy meds, alcohol, hydrocodone (know what I mean, codeine), or even Xenadrine! Why do we consider some drugs okay and not make such a big huff when someone uses them on an everyday basis? Don’t all drugs make people act in different ways? And why do we have no tolerance for people who just can’t kick the habit?

A lot of our values are shaped by our religious upbringing, the media, our culture, and education. We have chosen to degrade certain things like drugs, prostitution, and HIV, and then lump them all into one category called ‘bad things.’ The people who are associated with these ‘bad things’ are then labeled as ‘bad’ and we ignore them, despise them, or just make fun of them. For someone who uses drugs, relapse is a common thing that affects them on a daily basis. It is seriously hard to quit! And if you don’t believe me, just think about how many times you’ve tried to lose weight or stop smoking. It’s easier said than done! Yet we’re all so supportive when someone has a hard time losing weight. We keep encouraging them to try harder because they’re doing really good. But when bruddah goes off the deep end and just can’t kick the habit, we can’t deal with him anymore and we expect him to just stop. Why is that? A lot of it comes from our views about drugs and the people who use them. We rarely ever think about why someone would want to use drugs in the first place.

If we understand it better, there are many reasons to use drugs, just as there are many harmful effects that come with misusing drugs. People use for many reasons: it gives you a good lift on those down days, it makes you calmer on those hyper days, it helps us deal with stress on our bad days, and it helps us escape life on our sad days. It also helps us eat better, or it helps us lose weight. Many use drugs in order to boost their self esteem or to help them feel better about the world around them. When someone hears devastating news, sometimes drugs are the only way in which they can make sense of everything. In many cases, traumatic childhood experiences such as molestation and physical abuse become a reason for people to self-medicate, helping to drown out the pain.

However, when a drug is misused a person may become overly anxious, paranoid, moody (but who isn’t moody?) and many struggle with extreme depression. Their health may also be affected and sometimes it could lead to death. The media seems to be good at pointing this out and I’m sure we know all the ‘bad things’ associated with drug use.

So what do we do? The most important thing is for us to acknowledge that drugs (all kine) are a part of our society whether we like it or not. Trying to rescue or condemn bruddah from using drugs only makes us feel better, and many times, it only pushes people farther away and creates walls between you and your loved one. Supporting a person’s choice to use drugs is difficult for many of us because we do not understand why people use drugs. We think that just because we’ve quit something, someone else should be able to do the exact same thing. Making bruddah feel worthless for not being able to kick the habit only adds to his and your struggle. Whether it’s weight, work, drug use, or just life in general, having someone who can just be there, often times makes the most difference.