CINTRA FEELS YOUR PAIN: ADDICTED TO PLEASURE AND TO PAIN

Dearest Dope-sick and Dry-heaving Readers:

The following is an excerpt from a much longer letter (that, if not hurting
for space, I would have loved to print in full), from the wise and extreme
soul of one Carl L., who offers another refreshingly amoral view of the
heroin topic:

My Wise, Lovely and Compassionate Cintra: I used heroin, opium and various
other opiates continually for 15 years. After eight years in N.A., I
renounced abstinence from drugs. It's difficult to write about without
turning it into an autobiography or philosophical manifesto; it opens up too
many basic questions regarding the nature of good and evil, the meaning of
"life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" in the political philosophy of
liberal democracy vs. social engineering. Are hedonistic drug vices somehow
inherently dehumanizing, worthy of criminalizing in order to save
civilization from some eventual collective suicidal speedball run?

I would like to add some experience-based perspectives to some of what was
written in last Friday's column. Regarding methadone: It sucks! I was on it
for 2“ years. Only about 10 percent of chronic dope fiends are on the
program at any given time, and most drink or use other drugs with it. In
your last column, it was stated: "Research shows that ... methadone is the
most successful treatment for opiate addiction." The reason this is so is
because methadone maintenance is opiate addiction -- however, it is an
opiate few find satisfying enough to trade for heroin.

I found long-term use of methadone to be, unlike heroin, debilitating and
draining of my energy and ambition. Methadone is far more complex than
organic opiates. It is synthesized from petroleum. It is not quickly
processed and expelled from the body, and methadone withdrawal is
longer-lasting and more severe than withdrawal from organic opiates. I do
not believe that the physiological effects of its long-term use are as
benign as those of heroin.

Considering the (illegal) context in which heroin use occurs, methadone is a
far safer and saner alternative that does save lives. Using heroin also
means using drugs of varying quality in unknown doses adulterated with a
host of different "cuts," most of which are more physiologically damaging
than the drug. I once nearly died from shooting dope cut with shoe polish. I
never felt quite the same after that unpleasant experience.

In your last column, a reader writes of falling into depression in her
seventh year clean and turning to antidepressants. My story is very similar;
after seven years I went on Prozac. People in recovery commonly voice this
same view and speak of having to confront frustrations and personal demons
after the first five years and some kind of painful existential abyss during
the second five. The antidepressant effects (of Prozac) pretty much ceased
for me after a year. Seven years of loneliness and sexual frustration
prompted a rational though very passionate decision to inject a jolt of
straight-up euphoria and ecstasy into my life: I fixed.

To call heroin an antidepressant is an understatement. Within perhaps 30
seconds of a "mainline" injection I become mentally healthy in the extreme.
Fear, pain, neuroses and frustration do not exist in this universe; only
pleasure, euphoria and optimism. All wants and needs are met. This effect is
rather short-lived, and the harder one chases that euphoria the more
fleeting it becomes.

Narcotics are simple compounds. Human beings, on the other hand, are
extremely complex and variable in chemistry and personality, and the result
of the mix is highly variable. To suggest that narcotics might have some
beneficial therapeutic effects in raising the level of mental health in some
individuals would surely infuriate moralists, with their seeming inability
to grasp concepts like "complexity" or "variability" in regard to questions
they feel are moral in nature. Heroin addiction clearly is a form of
self-medication. Junkies (myself included) seem to suffer from low
self-esteem, social ineptitude and an inability to handle life on its own
terms. But to call drug use or drug addiction simply self-medication is to
present an incomplete picture. Heroin is great for running from pain, but
even better for chasing pleasure in an extreme form. The sensation a dope
fiend is chasing is more like that which for me is also available through
sex and romantic passion. Had medication of pain been my only objective,
some low-class drug like alcohol or Valium would have sufficed.

Cintra! How I suffer from, and how I enjoy my tragic romantic personality
disorder! I do love pleasure and pain. Both make me feel so alive. So human.
I believe many, if not most, addicts suffer from and revel in this
affliction. Just listen to the Velvet Underground or to Jim Carroll's
"Catholic Boy" album. This angle should be considered in understanding why
some people voluntarily make unwise choices. Mental health bores me to
death. -- Carl L.

Drug users! Tell your happy tales. Please write to: CINTRA WILSON FEELS YOUR
PAIN, San Francisco Examiner, P.O. Box 7260, San Francisco, CA 94120, or
e-mail the Psychic Supergenius at zintra@aol.com
©1998 San Francisco Examiner

Checked-by: Melodi Cornett