I actually had a revelation one day. That revelation was in regards to the societally dirty taboo word… “Addict”. The word addict is as dark and dirty today as Cancer was 50 years ago, or, AIDS was 25 years ago. Even though the term Addiction has been around for more years than AIDS and probably even Cancer… it is still a dirty word. Why is “Addict” still a dirty word?
The short answer is unlike Cancer and AID’s where no one steals for their disease, Addicts do. Cancer and Aids do not cause the fatalities in auto’s that drugs and alcohol do when mixed with motor vehicles. Lastly, many people still feel Addiction is completely a choice and not a disease.
If you believe addiction is a choice then Aids was in many cases a choice also. Yet today AIDS is not a dirty word, it is considered a disease that needs treatment. It is no longer hidden away in a dark closet. Society and the world has embraced solving the world wide AIDS epidemic. Not keeping AID’ a secret and opening up publicly about AIDS and AIDS Education by famous musicians and the press have helped turned the public’s viewpoint about this horrible disease.
According to the CDC, there are approximately 1.2 million people living with HIV in America age 13 and up. Drug addiction affects 23,5 million people.
Isn’t it time that we started to make addiction a… quite a marked difference. The disease of Addiction has much greater affects to society.
Isn’t it time that we made talking about addiction and not hiding it away neatly in a closet acceptable? Isn’t it time for everyone to support the disease of Addiction like we do AIDS? Only we the parents, children and families of the addict , can begin to solve the problem. Only we can begin to turn the tide and the opinions of the public and government into helping us with the support that they give to many other diseases in our society. We can no longer be afraid to talk about addiction in our families and publicly.
I actually had a revelation one day. that revelation was in regards to the societally dirty taboo word… “Addict”. The word addict is as dark and dirty today as Cancer was 50 years ago, or, AIDS was 25 years ago. Even though the term Addiction has been around for more years than AIDS and probably even Cancer… it is still a dirty word. Why is “Addict” still a dirty word?
The short answer is unlike Cancer and AID’s where no one steals for their disease, Addicts do. Cancer and Aids do not cause the fatalities in auto’s that drugs and alcohol do when mixed with motor vehicles. Lastly, many people still feel Addiction is completely a choice and not a disease.
If you believe addiction is a choice then Aids was in many cases a choice also. Yet today AIDS is not a dirty word, it is considered a disease that needs treatment. It is no longer hidden away in a dark closet. Society and the world has embraced solving the world wide AIDS epidemic. Not keeping AID’ a secret and opening up publicly about AIDS and AIDS Education by famous musicians and the press have helped turned the public’s viewpoint about this horrible disease.
According to the CDC, there are approximately 1.2 million people living with HIV in America age 13 and up. Drug addiction affects 23,5 million people.
Isn’t it time that we started to make addiction a… quite a marked difference. The disease of Addiction has much greater affects to society.
Isn’t it time that we made talking about addiction and not hiding it away neatly in a closet acceptable? Isn’t it time for everyone to support the disease of Addiction like we do AIDS? Only we the parents, children and families of the addict , can begin to solve the problem. Only we can begin to turn the tide and the opinions of the public and government into helping us with the support that they give to many other diseases in our society. We can no longer be afraid to talk about addiction in our families and publicly.
I actually had a revelation one day. that revelation was in regards to the societally dirty taboo word… “Addict”. The word addict is as dark and dirty today as Cancer was 50 years ago, or, AIDS was 25 years ago. Even though the term Addiction has been around for more years than AIDS and probably even Cancer… it is still a dirty word. Why is “Addict” still a dirty word?
The short answer is unlike Cancer and AID’s where no one steals for their disease, Addicts do. Cancer and Aids do not cause the fatalities in auto’s that drugs and alcohol do when mixed with motor vehicles. Lastly, many people still feel Addiction is completely a choice and not a disease.
If you believe addiction is a choice then Aids was in many cases a choice also. Yet today AIDS is not a dirty word, it is considered a disease that needs treatment. It is no longer hidden away in a dark closet. Society and the world has embraced solving the world wide AIDS epidemic. Not keeping AID’ a secret and opening up publicly about AIDS and AIDS Education by famous musicians and the press have helped turned the public’s viewpoint about this horrible disease.
According to the CDC, there are approximately 1.2 million people living with HIV in America age 13 and up. Drug addiction affects 23,5 million people.
Isn’t it time that we started to make addiction a… quite a marked difference. The disease of Addiction has much greater affects to society.
Isn’t it time that we made talking about addiction and not hiding it away neatly in a closet acceptable? Isn’t it time for everyone to support the disease of Addiction like we do AIDS? Only we the parents, children and families of the addict , can begin to solve the problem. Only we can begin to turn the tide and the opinions of the public and government into helping us with the support that they give to many other diseases in our society. We can no longer be afraid to talk about addiction in our families and publicly.
View Comments (1)
I was just speaking with a "normie" last night about why I don't drink. I noticed that she went right to the "oh, so did you drink every day?" kind of assumption. People truly don't understand the brain aspect of addiction, the phenomenon of craving which distinguishes an addict from her/his peers. When it gets down to it, I am not afraid to say that I'm wired differently. But I don't shout this from the roof tops, either? I think that as situations present themselves naturally, people educated in the neuro-biological understanding of addiction can help others understand what it's about.