THE OTHER WAR IS ONE ON DRUGS

She is 25 years old now and emerging from nine years of hell. She comes
from Long Island, is as pretty as a very pretty picture and blames nobody
but herself for those years of misery and her daily struggle to climb out
of them.

She had the courage the other day to stand before 350 people she does not
know and tell them how it {BT}happened to her and how - and with whose help
- - she is returning to the light.

"Hello," she said. "My name is Stacey Beck. Standing here now, it's hard to
believe that one year ago I was a drug addict. I was hooked on crack and
heroin. I had been arrested, sent by a judge to outpatient treatment in
Amityville.

"But it didn't work. I was too far gone. I couldn't imagine anything
stopping me from taking drugs.

"I come from a good home in Bay Shore. My father is a retired police
detective, and my mother works for a health insurance plan. They had no
problems with drugs or alcohol.

"I was 16 when I tried marijuana. I remember laughing a lot. I never had so
much fun. I went from smoking occasionally to smoking pot every day.

"When I was 18, I sniffed cocaine at a party. I never felt as alive before
- - almost invincible. Once I was into cocaine, I was high most of the time.
That was what my life was about for four years.

"My parents never found out. I somehow got through school and had no
trouble finding entry-level jobs.

"But when I was 22, I fell in love. With heroin. It was something totally
new. It was a high with no edges, warm and glowing.

"At first, I only did it on weekends. In a few months, it was a daily
habit. Soon I was an addict. Without heroin, I went into withdrawal, with
all of its aches and pains, chills and nausea.

"I was sick all the time, and exhausted. I tried crack, just because I felt
so miserable. The next thing I knew, I was smoking crack every day.

"That's when I was arrested and sent to an outpatient program. But after
eight months, I quit and stopped showing up at court. When the police
picked me up again, I went to Rikers Island, where I spent eight days
before I was sent to Phoenix House."

She said she felt so much guilt, shame and anger at herself for what she
had become that she had no idea who she was anymore.

Phoenix House is the leading member of a group of nonprofit anti-drug
therapeutic centers scattered across the country.

Phoenix House runs more than 100 programs in eight states, offering a
substantial and tested hope of dumping addiction, to 5,000 addicts, adults
and children, out- and inpatients. That may seem a large number of slots,
but in fact it is too few to take in all who need treatment that can last
for a year, sometimes more.

There are no magic pills or formulas except, in Phoenix House's words,
"tightly structured, highly disciplined treatment" centering on the
addicts' own confrontation with the cause of their drug abuse. The patients
learn how to change the behavior and attitudes that led them to addiction.

Phoenix House is part of a trio of anti-drug weapons, without which the war
on drugs cannot be won: therapeutic centers; the interdiction of illegal
narcotics meant for America, wherever they are produced, and the
enforcement of drug laws. Without this trio, victory in the war on drugs
becomes a deadly mirage.

Yes, attention should be and is being paid to the possible reduction of
long sentences for nonviolent first-time offenders. But for all the
publicity about them, the nonviolent ones are a small minority of jailed
drug offenders.

Therapeutic communities are not spas. Usually, compulsion from parents or
judges is applied to the addicts. It pays off for the approximately 70% who
shed their addictions and find work by fulfilling the demands of rigid
self-examination.

Ninety percent of the funds come from federal, state, city and/or county
governments. The remaining 10% comes from donations and is critical to the
future of the tens of thousands of addicts for whom there is no room in any
therapeutic communities now.

Stacey Beck told the audience that she was so full of guilt, shame and
anger she had not known who she was. Now she does. She added that when she
leaves Phoenix House in a few months, she will look for a job in
administration and that she will make a great employee, whereupon the
audience cheered agreement.