Responsability. What is the meaning that we are all responsible? That we are all "guilty"?... Thinking of "guilt" and "guilty ones" is living in the past. The idea of responsability aims at the future, at managing the problem. It is here that we all have a role to play. We must all assume that our cooperation is crucial. And each one's contribution starts by our own conduct and continues with a senseful involvement in the community life. To be responsible is to respect a fulfilling way of life, to cultivate an ethic attitude towards our own way of life and others ways.
Looking at drug addiction from this point of view, it is fundamental to relate it with work. Society is made of the individuals and the organizations that are built from the individuals. And work-related organizations are very important in the society we live in. These organizations also have their responsabilities. To understand and to manage problems such as drug addiction requires the involvement of dedicated organizations but depends on the way people participate in them and relate to each other within them (and vice-versa).
Let us move step by step. What are we talking about afer all? Drugs?
Drug addiction?... We all have a fair idea of what are those about. But
the subject continues to be polemic. There are many controversial ideas
under passionate discussion. To understand each other, some questions and
proposed answers follow. We do not expect full agreement on what we write
here. But we ask that you think on what we write.
The CNS is very important. It has a big influence on the way we perceive
the world around us and on the way we deal with it. Consciousness, orientation,
perception, thinking and reasoning, memory, awareness, time of reaction
and quality of decisions... all can be affected these substances. What
we are, the way we see ourselves and how we stand by others as well. The
feelings, the motivations, the values. The relationship with parents, with
children, with husband/wife, with girl/boyfriends. With the family, with
school, work, and friends. All can be deeply affected by drug consumption.
The essential concept on this influence is addiction.
But the more important is what they have in comon, the addiction they can provoke on those who take them.
Addiction is always a consequence of the way a person relates with the substance. All drugs have positive and negative aspects and can be utilised better or worse by different consumers. Addiction is an inadequate utilization. Then an addicted person might be held responsible for his/her addiction. It is very important to discuss this idea, and we will later, while focusing on addiction as an illness. But finally, what is addiction?
There is physical addiction, as the organism's inadequate adaptation to the regularly consumed drug. When the organism misses the drug, it reacts in a way that triggers a great amount of suffering in the consumer. As is known, not every drug will do that.
There is another form of addiction, one that can be provoked by all psychoactive drugs and is far more threatening: psychological addiction. It is a process whereby the drug progressively takes over the consumer's way of life. Generally it comes with an illusion of power and of control of situations, and a negation of addiction. The consumer is not aware of what is happening inside and rejects all warnings from friends and family. The moment comes when the drug is the only reason for living and being for this person. Family, school, work, friends, everything ceases to count. At this point, recovery is extremely difficult since withdrawing the drug from the person is equal to taking away the reason to live. It is the total void, unbearable for any human being.
When we discuss addiction we should not forget co-addiction. This develops
in some people involved with drug addicts. Friends, colleagues, lovers,
family members can go to the point of becoming addicts in trying to deal
with the addict's problems. They start to live for these problems and give
up their own lives. This reaction is natural in people who become concerned
with others, in particular when they love them deeply. But it ends in worsening
the evolution of the addict's problem and, besides, the co-addicts also
develop their own problems and need help to recover.
Why then is only a minority mentally affected, while living in the same world and with the same pressures and difficulties as the remainder? The obvious answer seems simple: we, the normal people with some balance in our lives, are strong, while they, the disorganised, are weak. Mas human reality always outdo simple and obvious answers. We must admit that we are not like unbeatable fortresses and that these problems will not happen with us. We must admit that there is no "us" and "them", but human beings who, in essence, are a conjugation of particular strengths and weaknesses. And drug addiction gives us a good opportunity to reflect on this reality.
Drug addicts are prime responders for their treadings between life without drugs and life dependent on drugs. So much so for undertaking the essential steps towards their recovery. But when they depend they are ill because they do not control this situation and their lives. They need help, and this means they need treatment. It goes the same way with most of the diseases plaguing the world at the end of this century, which are more and more the result of what we are and what we do, increasingly marked by the dimension mental health/ mental illness. We are partially responsible for our health, a resource we need to cultivate everyday the life through. We are increasingly responsible for the quality of our living, even when we are ill -- note that the diseases of the end of this century tend to be chronic and of prolonged development (AIDS, cancer, vascular and heart diseases, etc.).
Being. Drug addiction is a problem of Being, but the explanations must be sought in the circunstances surrounding it. Drugs, people with problems, their lives and the lives in their families, social institutions such as Family, School, Work or Street. The cities and society. Television and other forms of illusion. Politics and economy.
The drugs. The effects drugs have on each person are a way of looking at an explanation. Drugs produce an illusion of well-being and of power. It is an artificial illusion, but some people become used to "be" like that but require drugs for that.
Dependency and denial, mentioned before, are also strong reasons for explaining this illness.
The people. People who become dependent are another perspective necessary for understanding the problem. Different life histories and ways to be: for example, a weak notion of self, an inadequate expectancy for living, a lust for living and winning fast, a disproportionate fear of the future, suffering from Being that for some can become unbearable...
Family, School and Streets. Disoriented family, torn by present day individualism. Mass schooling offering little and discouraging further searches. Family, School, not coping with the prime mission of educating, building the Person. Lost family, unassuming of responsabilities. The School that cannot replace the Family. For teh youth there remains little room for finding a meaning for their lives, to find the Being. Without a route and a Being, it becomes very dangerous to live in the "Streets".
Work and the Family. Many lose themselves in drug addiction even before it is time for them to get a first job. Another struggle of our time, however, is between Family and Work. Work pushes the Family into the background. We are what we do, we are our work. That is the way things are at present, while we forget our children, who are nothing yet. But to grow in the Family is essential to the Being. It is in the Family that the roots of Being are formed. To grow further, in School, in the Streets and at Work, is possible only from these roots. To balance Family with Work is one of the challenges our time poses to each of us so that we continue to be (recall that we talked about each one's responsibility).
The City. Huge Mass, obliterate, made of persons without identity nor Being. Drugs are the epitome of life in the cities, of life without Being. It is the city mass that is killing the respect humans had for the Being.
Society. Inflated individualism and materialism. Everything is reduced to numbers, to the non-Being. The (human) Being, isolated, is not Being, is a number among numbers. The (human) Being builds and cultivates itself in its relation with other Beings. It is from the respect towards others that a respect for ourselves and the sense for an existence with dignity and responsability is formed.
Television. The illusion. Just like drugs. Life exterior to us, running so fast that does not give enough time to feel and to think. No time for Being, for becoming ourselves.
Politics and Economy. Drugs are a social and global problem, which makes them a political problem. It is the task of politicians to produce the vision, to define the strategy and to promote a mobilization of that same responsability from all and each of us. Unfortunately they have the use of spending time with things that may be more urgent -- but are less important. As to Economy, we all know that drugs make one of the World's biggest trades. Some countries are economically dependent. Anyway, the trading tentacles reach everywhere. We cannot say that politics and aconomy ahve created the problem just by themselves, but we can assert that they contributed to its beginnings and growth. Moreover, we can say that their contribution to dealing with solutions is indispensable.
Illegal drugs are a different matter. Hashish (Cannabis, etc.) is the
one with highest consumption in Portugal, however the one that brings most
trouble is heroin. There is cocain and similar drugs as well. Current estimates
indicate between 50,000 and 150,000 Portuguese people addicted to illegal
drugs. The main consequences of this problem are the destruction of lives
and families. Urban criminality comes next in the row. Directly or indirectly,
drugs are the cause for half of the prison population in Portugal to be
condemned. The health, social and criminal costs from drug consumption
are beyond rating.
Os psicofármacos consumidos sem controlo médico é
um problema menos conhecido mas cuja gravidade tem vindo a aumentar. Os
toxicodependentes usam muitas Vezes os "comprimidos" como alternativa às
outras drogas. Mas os tranquilizantes e anti-depressivos consumidos diariamente
pelo comum dos cidadãos provocam muitas dependências ocultas
em todas as idades e extractos sociais. Pessoas que vivem de forma limitada
sem darem por isso, permanentemente anastesiadas/ alienadas pela droga.
A maioria das pessoas com problemas de consumo de álcool e drogas trabalha. Alguns trabalham de forma "especial", mas trabalham. Por vezes a sua família está desorganizada e os "amigos" vivem também no mundo da droga. O trabalho acaba por ser a única ponte com o mundo davida sem drogas. Por isso, encontrar estas pessoas em contexto profissional é uma oportunidade para ajudar. Como? Não fingindo que não vemos ou que não é nada connosco (a tal responsabilidade).
Fazer o quê? Ser humano no trabalho é o princípio. Não devemos estar no trabalho como meros instrumentos ou peças da engrenagem. Devemos ser humanos e tratar os outros como seres humanos. Estar atento a todos os colegas, em especial aos desadaptados, aos que parecem não estar bem. Dar a mão. Às vezes basta um pouco de atenção, uma palavra, uma ajuda. Não piorar as coisas com "bocas" ou ignorando certas pessoas. Quando estamos seguros que há colegas com problemas, confrontar abertamente. Dizer-lhes que sabemos do seu problema e motiválos para se tratarem. Transmitir a esses colegas confiança na sua recuperação e não os pôr de lado quando eles voltam depois de uma "cura".
Mas o desafio maior que se pode lançar ao mundo do trabalho é a prevenção. Devemos procurar informação. Devemos formar-nos. Divulgar informação no seio da empresa. Falar destas coisas, Organizar um grupo de discussão e de gestão do problema na empresa, na Comissão de Trabalhadores ou no Sindicato. Procurar consultores especializados que ajudem o nosso grupo a funcionar e a produzir trabalho. Contactar organizações especiãlizadas em prevenção e em tratamento. Propôr que a empresa clarifique a sua política nesta área. Propôr à empresa a organização de acções de informação e de formação para os trabalhadores.
Estas são só algumas ideias. Quisemos demonstrar que é possível. Agora estó nas vossas mãos. Força.