THE HARSH REALITY OF DRUGS

At some point in a teenager's life there comes a fateful decision that's
for good or ill.

For Mary's sister, that decision was to take the prescription painkiller
Oxycontin at a party.

That's all it took for her to become an addict.

"She did not say no. That was her first bad decision. She basically became
addicted right away," said Mary (not her real name).

A South Shore resident, Mary spoke about her family's ordeal with 50
eighth-graders last week at Galvin Middle School.

"It can happen to anybody. It's real," she said.

The 45-minute talk in the school library was part of a pilot program
sponsored by the Norfolk District Attorney's office in conjunction with the
school district's wellness program.

Mary agreed to give the talk with the hope that students will learn from
her family's harsh experience and make right choices.

"We're not up here creating these stories. This is for real," said school
district Wellness Coordinator Karen Costa. "Don't sit there and say this
can't happen to you unless you have the strength and the resiliency to
resist drugs."

Mary said she couldn't explain her younger sister's drug addition in terms
of family history. She described her parents as loving and supportive. Her
sister got good grades in school, had friends, loved animals, although she
did not have a life goal after graduation.

Five years later, she is now a heroin addict, and she has lost several
friends to drug overdoses and drunk driving accidents. Out of a class of
170 graduates, she was among the distinguished 5 percent of her class who
went on to become addicts.

One time, her mother found her convulsing and foaming at the mouth at home
in the cellar as a friend lied about her whereabouts.

"He was just going to watch her die because he didn't want to get caught
with the needles," Mary said.

The next day after her recovery, she began using again.

"That's how sick in the mind you are," Mary said.

The financial cost of her sister's drug addiction has taken a toll on her
family in the thousands of dollars spent on hospital bills. It had gotten
to he point where she was stealing from her mother and grandmother to
support her drug habit and driving people on robberies in exchange for
drugs. She's also forged checks to raise money to buy heroin, a much
cheaper drug than Oxycontin.

"My mother cries almost every day. I just get so frustrated," said Mary, 25.

To drug enforcement officials, Mary's 22-year-old sister is a statistic -
one of thousands of drug addicts who began using heroin between the age of
12 and 17. Most users begin shooting up before their 26th birthday.

Her father, a quiet and patient man by nature, became so angry that he
punched a wall at work and broke his fingers.

"How many times do you give a person a chance? How many times can we put
ourselves through this?" Mary said.

For a while it looked as though her sister was making a recovery. Recently
she got a full-time and job, and she enrolled in cosmetology classes. But
looks have been deceptive. While earning $500 a week from her job, $100
goes to her mother for rent, $400 to her boyfriend, a drug user.

"My sister is on the couch right now, I just found out," Mary said.

School officials declined student interviews for this story, but the
worried looks on students' faces said it all.

Mary said her sister also has the distinction of being able to open her
yearbook, look at the student photographs, and say, "Dead. Dead. Dead."

"How many of you want to do that?" she said.

The talk at Galvin Middle School is a part of a pilot program developed by
the Heroin Task Force, made up of law enforcement officials, clinicians and
parents of addicts. It is speared by the Norfolk County District Attorney's
office.

Kevin Bowe, spokesman for the district attorney's office, said there is a
push away from having recovering addicts as speakers at schools.

"... because inevitably, it is only a recovering addict. So the thinking
is, "Well you're OK, so I can be OK after a couple of years of good
partying,'" he explained.

District Attorney William R. Keating proposed bringing in family member to
illustrate there isn't always a happy ending.

"It gives (students) a sense of how it breaks down family trust," Bowe
said. "In this case, her sister is still not doing well. This is designed
to show it doesn't all work out."