Pubdate: Wed, 05 Oct 2005
Source: Agassiz Harrison Observer (CN BC)
Copyright: 2005 Agassiz Observer
Contact:  http://www.agassizharrisonobserver.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1344
Author: James Baxter

CAUGHT IN THE GRIP OF CRYSTAL METH

Agassiz-Harrison Community Services drug addiction counsellor Bill
Turner wants everyone to realize the enormous threat posed by crystal
meth.

"One day I just decided I wanted to try it, and that was it."

Heather buries her hands a little deeper into the pockets of her
kangaroo jacket as she speaks. Her memories of the past five years are
clear but they're out of sequence and scattered like playing cards
randomly thrown across a table top. Although she has been clean for
almost a year now, it's one of the lingering side-effects.

"It only took that one time and then it was every couple of days," the
Harrison resident explains. "It only probably took two weeks until I
was doing it every day."

Heather [not her real name] was introduced to crystal methamphetamine
when she was attending high school in Hope. She was a late bloomer.
Several of her friends had already been hooked on the highly addictive
synthetic drug for two years, while she was still experimenting with
marijuana and mushrooms.

On occasion, she recalls, some were even clandestinely using it in her
own home, hiding in the bathroom where they would let the drug's stew
of chemicals slam into their brains and seize control of their central
nervous systems. Two seconds, instant high.

Like most teens, Heather didn't get her first crystal meth fix from
the stereo-typical dirty drug dealer standing on the street corner.
She got it from her trusted friends. And, like many teens, she was
ignorant about the potent drug, its contents, and its devastating affects.

The first time she tried it, after snorting the tiny pin-prick of
white powder deep into her lungs, she felt her senses suddenly
heighten. The music on her stereo was more crisp so her finely tuned
mind could grasp every stroke of the guitar, every beat of the drum.
She was energized, sharp and mentally unfettered.

It had her in its grip.

"I couldn't control myself after I tried it once; I loved it so
much."

To comprehend the true ugliness of crystal meth, you merely have to
examine its toxic ingredients. The recipe reads like a hardware store
shopping list: drain cleaner, iodine, battery acid, pseudoephedrine (a
stimulant found in cold pills), corrosives, solvents, anhydrous
ammonia (found in farm fertilizer) and red phosphorous are among the
items commonly used.

The drug, also called 'tina', 'glass' and 'ice', can be produced in
almost any space, provided it's away from prying eyes and roomy enough
to mix and cook the ingredients. The recipe is readily available on
the internet.

The labs - as these spaces are often called - pose their own health
and safety risks. The environment is usually swirling with deadly
chemicals and there is always the inherent risk of fires or explosions.

Crystal meth's glassy shards can be smoked in pipes, snorted or
injected. Upon ingestion, it races to the brain with lightening speed,
quickens the heart rate and delivers its euphoric sensation like a
sledge hammer. Addiction takes root quickly.

The drug is also cheap. A single point of crystal meth (about
one-tenth of a gram) costs only $10 and can last for three days. Over
a very short period of time, Heather's own addiction blossomed into a
$60 to $80 per day habit.

"I needed it," she says. "It was horrible. I was always looking for
more. You were never satisfied. When you came off it, if you didn't
have money, you would be thinking of a way to get money so you could
get that high."

She was soon caught up in crystal speed addict's lifestyle, staying
high for as long as possible to avoid the rock-hard landings of
'coming down.' Although the high from crystal meth can last up to 12
hours from a single small dose, Heather's urges prompted her to take
subsequent hits more often.

A year into her addiction, she gave up snorting the drug and switched
to smoking it. The affect was a more immediate high that packed an
even stronger wallop.

"Just a year ago it was to the point I was taking it all day, every
day, any time I wasn't around anyone else," Heather explains. "And I
was at the point where I isolated myself in my house. When I came home
from work, I'd stay in my apartment and smoke it all day."

Crystal meth is not meth," Bill Turner says emphatically. "Crystal
meth is the core product of methamphetamine that delivers the euphoria
to the brain. It's pure, like taking rocket fuel and ... putting it
into [a] Honda."

The Agassiz-Harrison Community Services Drug and Alcohol Addiction
Counsellor gets intense when he talks about the drug. It's as
devastating as crack cocaine, which is the pure core of cocaine.

He says crystal meth addicts are forever chasing the sensation they
experienced the first time they took it.

"The objective after that first time is to reach that high again and
it doesn't happen," he says. "You never reach it even if you increase
the amount, which leads to overdoses."

Turner sees all manner of drug addicts come through his office door,
but no one on crystal meth. It's not because they aren't out there, he
remarks solemnly, but because it is "rotting their brains so badly
that they can't even walk in here."

"As a counsellour it makes me angry when I see people fluff it off,
when I see people compare it to marijuana. It shouldn't be used in the
same breath," he said.

Addicts may stay awake for days at a time, many develop heart and lung
problems or suffer strokes, and others die. The average life span of a
crystal meth addict is seven years.

"It hasn't reached the same levels here in Agassiz-Harrison as it has
in other Fraser Valley communities but that doesn't mean the potential
isn't there," Turner suggests. "Community stakeholders including
Community Services, the RCMP and local businesses are pulling together
to take a strong proactive approach."

One way is with pre-emptive education programs for all community
members.

"It's easier and more cost-effective to treat the symptoms than the
disease," Turner adds. "It's not bad people, it's addiction in action.
It's a horrific type of drug."

Heather's addiction came with its own side-effects, including
suppressed hunger, loss of concentration and seizures. Once, when she
was driving along Hwy. 7 toward Hope, her hands seized on the steering
wheel and she began to shake uncontrollably. She had to pull over and
beat her push her hands into the hard pavement to open them up.

To feed her habit, Heather found money any way she could. She stole
her father's credit card and snuck to the bank machine with his debit
card in the middle of the night to get cash for her dealer. She pawned
her mother's jewelry and stole money from her purse.

What she couldn't deny, however, were the changes in her behaviour and
her appearance. Early in her addiction, Heather would stand in front
of her mirror for hours and pick at her face, "something you do when
you're on crystal meth."

"I was just really high [and] I couldn't stop," she recalls. "One day
I picked at my face so bad my whole forehead was just messed with
picks. I didn't want to leave my bedroom. I wouldn't let my mom see me
[and] I locked myself in my room."

Heather became "super skinny" due to her suppressed appetite and she
began to look gaunt. She distanced herself from her family, keeping a
locked door between her fading health and their suspicions. She
shuttled back and forth between her separated parents' houses,
exasperating one parent, then the other, with her behaviour. Her teeth
were rotting.

She began to exhibit the symptoms of schizophrenia and acute paranoia.
Sitting at the window, she'd watch the outside world soundlessly. She
became terrified of it, afraid even to go to the local bank where she
was utterly convinced everyone's eyes would be watching her.

"I knew people were talking about me," she said. "I felt like my own
eyes would be really bug-eyed, like you could tell, and that would
make me paranoid that I didn't want people to catch onto me."

She would often stay awake for several days at a time, then succumb to
exhaustion and crash. Her conscious hours became muddled by thoughts
that, although alert and energized, were often disorganized and
fleeting. She constantly lost things in her house and suffered short
term memory loss. Time blurred; the hours rolled into one another
without notice.

"I always wanted to do something about it," she said. "I tried to quit
many times but I couldn't. I didn't have it in me to do it by myself.
I don't think it's possible unless you go away and get extreme help.

"If I wouldn't have hit rock bottom, I don't think I ever would have
been able to quit."

Heather sought help in early 2004, but a car accident later that year
plunged her into a depression and caused her to relapse. She was high
on crystal meth when she was wheeled into surgery to repair her
damaged eyelid.

"I was really paranoid. I thought, what happens if he puts me under
and I'm not really under and he starts operating on me?"

She moved to Harrison Hot Springs, where she nearly burned her
apartment to the ground after getting high and falling asleep while
some of her candles were lit.

"When I hit my bottom, I was living in Harrison," she recalls. "That
was it for me; I didn't want to end up on East Hastings or whatever."

Supported by her father, Heather checked into the Edgewood Clinic in
Nanaimo where her life was regimented and organized. For two months
she attended education lectures about drug abuse and sat in on group
therapies to share her personal story and hear others speak.

She has been clean ever since, but still bears the scars of her
addiction. She estimates she spent more than $100,000 on her habit,
not including the $15,000 cost for Edgewood's help. In addition to her
foggy memory, she now suffers from lung damage and allergies.

"It's scary to even think about having a child one day, knowing how
bad it's going to be in ten years," she remarks. " It is insane what
it's doing to people; it's insane how many people don't make it when
they do actually get help."

If you or a family member needs assistance with drug or alcohol
addiction, contact Community Services at 604-796-2585.
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MAP posted-by: Matt Elrod