CAUGHT IN THE GRIND

Home Life Crushed By OxyContin

There are probably few things more frightening than seeing a parent in pain.
No matter our age, we all like to think that our parents are invincible,
that evil can't really touch them because if it can reach them, it can get
us, too. To have that belief shattered especially at an early age is
devastating.

I can still remember seeing my mother in horrible pain and beyond any help I
could give her, and I feel the panic of the moment. I saw her in the depths
of drug withdrawal, fluctuating between exhaustion and near-hysteria,
desperate for the drugs that would quiet the storm raging inside her.

At those moments, she often tried to bargain with me, asking for drugs,
insisting that I must know someone who could supply them. I could only stand
there helplessly, wishing I were somewhere more sane.

This is how I was first introduced to OxyContin, and from that moment it
became a permanent part of my vocabulary. I spent two years of high school
dealing with its effects, witnessing its devastation. It shaped the lives of
everyone in my family.

It wasn't until months after the drug first entered my life that I found out
what it really was and what it was for. That's because in the few weeks that
it took the drug to gain a stranglehold on my family and during the painful
months that followed, I never once saw it mentioned, even in passing, in a
news broadcast or article.

But in recent weeks, OxyContin has been making headlines as the latest in a
never-ending list of plagues on Kentucky's most impoverished areas. Drug
abuse is nothing new in Eastern Kentucky. In an area with high unemployment
rates, rampant poverty and an ever-present sense of hopelessness, the casual
use of illicit drugs and under-the-counter sale of nerve pills is a fact of
life. With no hope of an improved quality of life, many residents turn to
drugs to fill the void.

But even in an area where the drug trade has continued to flourish,
OxyContin has earned its high profile. Experts have been blown away by the
drug's sudden rise in popularity, as well as its potency and ability to hook
even the most casual users, sending them into a tailspin of all-consuming
addiction. Drug detox beds are filling up with increasing frequency in a
region already stretched beyond its limit to help addicts, and authorities
are left baffled in its wake.

So comments like those made by Tom Collins, the interim head of Kentucky's
program to combat IV-drug abuse, and Dr. Rice Leach, the state health
commissioner, are a slap in the face to anyone forced to deal with a missing
brother, an overdosed parent, a rehabbed but impoverished daughter. Both
officials don't seem to believe that OxyContin abuse is a serious issue in
the state; Collins even went so far as to say he had never heard of it until
recently.

The fact that the very officials who should know about OxyContin claim
ignorance is a disgraceful commentary on our government it is their job to
investigate these issues, yet they remain unaware of the extent of the
problem.

It's also evidence of the strong stigma that drug abuse carries in the state
even those whose jobs directly relate to the issue are loathe to confront it
directly. Is it any wonder that Kentucky's drug-treatment programs and detox
centers fall woefully short of meeting the demand? Such apathy is readily
apparent to the addicts, who are being turned away in greater numbers from
treatment, only to return to the downward spiral of abuse.

My mother is an exception. Unlike so many others who are now statistics, she
was able to escape from her OxyContin addiction. Although it was a slow
process, her faith in God and family support have restored her, and she
looks to the future with a renewed spirit and hope.

Although she has cleansed herself of addiction, she faces the setbacks and
the Catch-22s of re-entering normal, drug-free life. (She needs a job to get
her life back on track, yet her felony drug conviction severely limits her
job opportunities.) But she knows she is lucky. So do I.

Yet for every success story, there is another whose ending isn't as happy.
Just as my mother was ultimately pulled from her spiral, I am sure there is
another mother who didn't make it. But the real tragedy isn't just the ruin
of so many lives; it's the missed opportunity to make good on our obligation
to our fellow citizens, whose circumstances can make them seem worlds apart.

Southeastern Kentucky is trapped in an epidemic in the truest sense of the
word, and those affected are our brothers and sisters, parents and even
grandparents, and they are owed more than the life and legacy they've been
given.