Hug your child today, or a PUSHER will

Thus runs a billboard put up by a certain civic organization to warn parents of the menace of drug addiction.

November, is drug addiction awareness month, and chances are that more billboards carrying similar warnings, will be erected in the street corners, cautioning the youth against the dangers of drug use, drug abuse, drug dependence and drug addiction. For drugs have that drawing effect. One takes a dose, a gulp or a whiff at it, to satisfy his curiosity. But it’s almost certain he wont stop there. Once he experience that giddy sensation of floating on pink clouds, he’ll want another dose, until just one dose won’t be enough. From then on, his need increases gradually, and before he knows it, he is in too deep to be able to successfully shake off the habit. It even ceases to be just a habit, but a need – a life-or-death need. And he’ll defy anybody, anything, to fill that need.

As the need increases, so does the damage to his mental and physical stability. He loses weight until he’d appear immaciated and dehydrated. At first, he would experience lapses of memory, but as soon as dependence sets in, the lapses become more frequent and at long periods that sometimes, he’s seen walking like a zombie, with wide un-seeing eyes bulging from it’s sockets.

Speaking about the subject, give’s me a feeling of Déjà vu. For I had stood in front of an audience, talking, yet, not remembering what I had said.

It was during class in Social Science, when I was in college. I was asked to report on any topic I would want to. I chose drug addiction – my instructor didn’t know that at that time I was high on drugs. I had taken an overdose of Ativan, Corex, Mercodol and Tricodeine, taken one after the other, drunk as one would drink a punch. Only this was more than a punch. It delivered a horse-kick on my brain.

If I was rated high for that report, it may not have been for the consiceness, comprehensiveness of detail of the content. It could have been due to the clear illustration of the effects of drugs - myself.

As I mumbled the words, I watched the distorted faces of my classmates. It was as if a warped mirror was between us. There were those who appeared small and thin like clinging to a leaning stalk. Others looked like balloons with bellies ready to burst if pricked with a pin. As they smiled, their mouths opened like huge caves, showing ax-like teeth. Their horrible faces seemed only inches away ready to gnash and devour me and munch me into smithereens.

Some of them may have been saying something, but what I’ve heard were not voices, but the drone of a million bees swarming around me.

Why did I take drugs?

I am not about to make a confession. I’d rather speak on general terms.

Why do people take drugs?

Psychologists, psychiatrists and experts on drug addiction have listed down several reasons why a person is drawn into drug use.

They say that:

a.)a person resorts to drugs to overcome some fears or apprehensions.

b.)Others do it to overcome a feeling of insecurity or a complex.

c.)There are those who use drugs to acquire a little courage or boldness to be able to speak out their minds.

d.)Others do it to shut the world out of his door so he can be alone in his fantasies of glory and fame.

e.)there are those who take drugs as a refuge, or as a companion in their desperation, in their feeling of total helplessness.

f.)others do it because of too much pressure – pressure from work, at home and in school

g.)while others do it for the sake of curiosity

All these maybe true. But if you analyze all these factors, you’ll discover that the reasons are not many. In fact, in all these boil down into only one strong, compelling reason: the need, the thirst, and the hunger for love. One experiences fears and apprehensions only if he does not have the confidence borne out of the love and inspiration from the people around him. He only feels insecure and suffers from an inferiority complex if people in his sorroundings make him feel rejected, unwanted and hated. He wants to shut the world out of his door if he does not find in that world the love, the inspiration, the feeling of belonging, and the acceptance as a human being. He would not experience despair if there is one – just one kind soul who would whisper to him a word of inspiration, affection and “L-O-V-E”.

If a person is deprived of these little but valuable and priceless things, then, he’d look at the bottle of cough syrup, or a stick of grass, or a Mandrax tablet as his only friend.

In the home, as years pass, the little things that count so much are gradually forgotten, or taken for granted. We don’t send the kids off to bed with a kiss anymore. We don’t spend time with them in doing their homework. We spend weekends with friends and cronies instead of taking them to the beach or even a stroll at the park. We may not know it, but right now, they maybe starting to stray. Then, it may be too late when we discover that they are already in too deep in drugs, and we ask ourselves why we allowed it to happen when all that was needed was just a simple, costless hug.

When you left home today, did you kiss your child goodbye? If you did not, then, tomorrow, when he wakes up, give him a hug – or a Pusher will.