CRYSTAL USERS REFLECT ON WRECKED LIVES

From Wall St. Exec to Homeless in Three Years

Crystal methamphetamine helped Jack, a 36-year-old D.C. man who asked
to remain anonymous, cope with his HIV-positive status. The drug was a
pure escape from reality. It increased a level of selfishness that he
had never known and left him a man with a "huge ego and no-self
confidence."

His personality, once under control, was no longer, thanks to what he
refers to as the "devil's drug." On Sept. 11, 2001, he remained holed
up in a Boston hotel room with crystal meth, a "club drug" also known
by nicknames like Tina, T, crank and speed. He smoked all day,
paranoid that the police would soon break down his door.

Jack didn't stop thinking of himself until he read in the Wall Street
Journal a few days later that a Brooks Brothers clothing store near
his old office on Wall Street had been turned into a morgue for
victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Jack, who describes himself as
a "space cadet" who frequently forgets and loses things, patronized
the store. The news about the clothing store saddened him, and he
vowed to clean up his act.

He tried to sober up after Sept. 11, but soon relapsed. He lost his
job, his home and was $50,000 in debt. Destitute, he received some
financial help from an acquaintance and checked himself in to
Cumberland Heights, an in-patient rehab center in Tennessee. When he
first met with one of the counselors at the recovery center, the most
difficult question he had to answer was, "What is your address?"

"I had lost my apartment two weeks ago, and I was homeless without a
job," Jack said. "It was terribly humbling and humiliating."

Jack had gone from working as a Wall Street executive to pouring
coffee at Starbucks in three years -- all because of his crystal meth
addiction.

"Crystal wants to get us alone where it does the most damage," Jack
said. "It robbed my soul of what I thought was so important. It's the
devil's drug."

Alex Loses His Friends

Alex, a 25 year-old gay man who also asked to remain anonymous, said
he views his addiction to crystal as a "choice," but he began using
abusively because "everyone around me was doing it, and I wanted to
feel that I belonged." It was never a physical craving, he said, but
more like a social obligation.

"I honestly believe that I did [crystal] because everyone around me
was doing it," Alex said. "If everyone else was doing it, why
shouldn't I? People would look at me differently if I wasn't going to
do crystal."

Alex said he had never experimented with any drugs other than
marijuana and ecstasy before he began using crystal meth two years
ago. He said that early on he would use nine dosages, or "blows," out
of a quarter bag in one evening, but that eventually he would take
double that, or a half-bag, over one extended period of use.

"I also did it for the fun of it," Alex said. "The music in clubs
became more intense, it made me all horny. It gave me this high that I
didn't have to think about anything else."

But when he went sober, Alex lost all of his "friends," because they
continued to use crystal. He tried to hang out with his old
acquaintances, but said no one wanted to hang out with the "sober kid."

"There was a core group that I was kind of close to, and they would
say, 'Oh, we are here for you,' but in reality, they were placating
me," Alex said. "They were happy for me, but they were still getting
fucked up. So, with me being sober, and everyone else remaining fucked
up around me, I recognized the situation and wanted to get out."

Descending into Paranoia

At the height of his addiction, Clinton, a 31-year-old gay man, was
extraordinarily paranoid. He was taking crystal at work to "keep
himself going," thinking that if he could get through the workday, he
would be able to get home and sleep for 15 hours.

One evening, after going without sleep for days, his paranoia
intensified after he returned home from work. He was convinced for
eight straight hours that the police were going to raid his home. He
ran around his house and flushed all his drugs down the toilet.

When he realized that that the police weren't coming, he decided that
lesbians in the neighborhood were playing a "huge joke" on him. With
his mental capacity severely impaired, he began to pace his house,
stare out of his windows and run outside to "try to catch them."

During this time, sex for Clinton, in all its raw, uninhibited glory,
became routine and comfortable. Clinton would meet men online, at
clubs and at a local sex club. He describes the sex as "never safe"
but "by the grace of God," he remained HIV-negative.

"I should be positive," Clinton said. "As far as I'm concerned, I won
the lottery. I'd say that roughly 60 percent of the individuals who I
know [from crystal meth anonymous meetings] are positive."

Slim Data on Gay Use

There is very little statistical data to show that crystal affects
gays disproportionately. But many treatment specialists and former
users have their own theories about why so many gay men fall victim to
Tina's addiction.

Marc Cohen, president of the United Foundation for AIDS and head of
the Crystal Meth Community Educational Forum in South Florida, said he
believes that gays are disproportionately affected by crystal because
it reduces inhibitions, provides the "biggest bang for the buck,"
heightens levels of arousal and provides a sense of connection.

"It's the stigma amongst gay men themselves that drives people to the
drug," Cohen said. "The positives discriminate against those who are
negative. If someone is HIV negative, they aren't invited to the
barebacking party. A positive person might not feel comfortable having
bareback sex with a negative guy. But when meth becomes a part of the
equation, it breaks down discrimination and, as a result, with meth
around, discrimination doesn't exist."

Some activists have argued that gays are drawn to crystal because of
an intolerant society. Clinton scoffed at that notion and said the
"worst enemies of gay men are gay men."

"It's not the religious right or Republicans pushing us away, we have
more or less assumed a place in society," Clinton said. "We've passed
the tipping point, in the sense that people have accepted that we are
now a part of society. Even the most conservative of people aren't
talking about running us out of the country or firing us all from our
jobs."

Cohen and Clinton agreed that crystal meth provides the user with the
raw, "natural" sexual feelings of the type common in a 17-year-old
male just beginning to sexually mature, which can be attractive lure
for someone seeking to jump-start his sex life.

"When you are young and having sex, you are like a kid in a candy
store," Clinton said. "But as time goes by, you really start, through
your body's own natural process, to come to the realization that with
sex, things aren't new anymore. Sex starts to lose its edge. It
becomes less fun. Crystal can give that edge back to you. That
unadulterated, unbridled sexual charge that you had when you were younger."

But it is this desire to return to a sexual innocence, a clean slate,
that motivates the average crystal user. Cohen said that this craving
is often so strong that many don't even consider the many negative
side effects of the drug until they notice the aesthetic impact of
crystal.

"Many are in a strong state of denial about the side effects and
manifestations of usage," Cohen said. "Only until their health
diminishes, jobs are lost, teeth rotting and sores appear, will they
do something about it."

Rotten Teeth, Sores, Stroke

Cohen described in graphic detail the physical side effects of the
drug. For the user who smokes crystal -- considered by users to
provide a more mellow high but cited by treatment workers as one of
the worst ways to take the drug -- the smoke promotes gum decay and
rots the teeth.

Sores and ulcerations appear inside the mouth, making the crystal user
vulnerable to STD and HIV transmission.

The drug crystallizes in the lungs. Cohen also said that many habitual
users will likely develop "skin eruptions" due to the amount of toxins
in their body.

Cohen said these eruptions begin to break through the skin and the
user, believing that he feels bugs crawling in his skin, will scratch
furiously, thus breaking open the sores and allowing bacteria and
infection to enter the body.

Cohen said that smoking is often the next option of usage for the
crystal user since most of the delicate cells in the nasal cavity are
destroyed after the drug is repeatedly snorted. When the user's mouth
is destroyed, they will often choose to inject or take the drug
through the rectum.

Through any mode of ingestion, the drug creates a frenzied state of
paranoia, causes intense respiratory distress and the user risks a
cardiovascular stroke, Cohen said.

"Taking crystal is like taking your foot and stepping on the gas pedal
on a cold winter morning," Cohen said. "This is especially the case if
you are using needles. The impact is so strong you can have a heart
attack at any moment."

Life of the Party

Randy Pumphrey, the program director for the Lambda Center, which
provides treatment for methamphetamine users in Washington, D.C., said
that gay male culture is often youth-obsessed and crystal falsely
allows them to recapture a bit of their youth. Pumphrey said that it
is a very common drug for the 35- to 40-year-old gay man who doesn't
want to deal with the aging process.

The Lambda Center partners with the Psychiatric Institute of
Washington and the Whitman-Walker Clinic.

"These are guys who can't stay out long enough, feel that they are no
longer the life of the party," Pumphrey said. "Crystal provides the
venues for people to be the life of the party and amps up the
experience of life. They feel virile again."

Pumphrey added that the drug is also a favorite for the gay man just
coming out of the closet because it allows them to feel "comfortable
and intimate."

Dangerous Sexual Experiments

Pumphrey said that a huge danger of crystal meth is that it often
leads users to experiment sexually in dangerous ways.

"Yes, it can be romanticized and an individual can return to a teenage
innocence, but I've had clients who pushed themselves into places
where they wanted to act out fantasies like being gang raped, and more
often than not they were not ready to deal with the implications of
that kind of sex," Pumphrey said. "The drug has a cruel edge. It takes
folks down a path that if they weren't high, they wouldn't go. Or if
they went down that road sober, they would have better prepared
themselves for it.

Pumphrey said that some of his clients have acted out abuse from their
childhood while on crystal. The trauma that they've experienced as a
child and the new trauma they experience with a partner goes beyond
normal sexual boundaries.

"When they come down from being high, they are stuck with the real
memory of what they did," Pumphrey said. They might not be prepared to
handle what that means. There is a lot of guilt and shame then
attached to that experience."

Returning to Sex

Many crystal meth abusers say they have a difficult time understanding
how to have sober sex. Clinton, who has had sex a few times since he
went sober in January, said that now the former user must bring "more
to the table rather than a cute face and nice body."

"You actually have to like their personality," Clinton said. "If
that's missing, I can't have sex with them."

Jack said that meth changed him from being prudish on matters of sex
to taking a promiscuous attitude, and he added that having sex sober
again is something he has to work hard at doing.

"The first time was awkward," Jack said. "It's more about intimacy.
Making out and watching a bad movie on Lifetime. Not about having sex
and going [clubbing]."

Pumphrey said that rehabilitating this mindset is very
difficult.

"It's something they have to learn, and it is difficult," Pumphrey
said. "It's hard to come back to your partner and having sex for 25-30
minutes when you are used to having sex all weekend long. Suddenly,
all of these other relationship issues start surfacing."

Cohen added that many individuals who go into recovery don't want to
commit to having protected sex.

"They want to continue having unprotected sex, ... bareback sex,"
Cohen said. "They will often give up crystal, but in its place they
will still have bareback sex. We see a lot of that."