Pubdate: Wed, 18 Nov 2015
Source: Alaska Dispatch News (AK)
Copyright: 2015 Alaska Dispatch Publishing
Contact:  http://www.adn.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/18
Note: Anchorage Daily News until July '14
Author: Elise Patkotak
Note: Elise Patkotak's latest book, "Coming Into the City," is 
available atAlaskaBooksandCalendars.com and at local bookstores.

ALASKA NEEDS NARCAN TO FIGHT BACK THE RISE OF HEROIN ADDICTION

Back in my misspent youth, I was a registered nurse for a nanosecond. 
Then I realized that real nurses had something I didn't have ... a 
desire to be a nurse.

So I got out of the profession. But before I did, I spent more than 
my fair share of nights in the emergency room of Long Island College 
Hospital, a hospital that handled some of the meaner streets of 
Brooklyn. Overdoses were pretty much a daily routine.

On the weekends, overdoses became something close to a marathon.

We could hardly push some Narcan into one overdose patient before the 
next was carried in. Narcan (the brand name for naloxone) is an 
instant cure. Within moments of injection the almost dead overdosed 
person is sitting up and mad at you for dumping the rest of their 
stash while he or she was out.

Yeah, that was the sucky part of the job. These addicts didn't wake 
up and say thank you. No, they woke up and wanted to know what you 
did with the rest of their stuff.

And when you explained that you disposed of it so they would neither 
get arrested for possession nor manage to actually die with the next 
injection, they were not amused. Heroin is like that. It makes life 
with it seem more attractive than life without it. Better to die in 
the ecstasy of a high than to live in the dull, monotone world of sobriety.

Now that heroin is resurgent here in Alaska, everyone is sitting up 
and taking notice of just how horrible it can be. Heroin is an equal 
opportunity drug. It strikes the poor, the middle class and the rich 
with equal ferocity.

Kids raised with all the love and support they would ever need to 
succeed in life make the mistake of trying it once, and suddenly a 
bright future is snuffed in a haze of heroin. Some people can take a 
hit of heroin and never take a second one. It's like Russian 
roulette; there may only be one bullet in the gun, but it isn't wise 
to take the chance.

Is it wise to hope that you aren't the person who will become addicted?

Because teens are not especially known for logical follow-through on 
parental advice, and because teens tend to be much more prone to peer 
pressure than ever before in their lives, the appearance of heroin at 
a party might strike them as just something to do to be part of the 
crowd. And no matter how much great parenting you've done, when the 
pedal hits the metal, you can only hope your kids will remember what 
you taught them and not be overwhelmed by the desire to fit in.

Unlike a parent burying a child who died of natural causes, a parent 
burying a child who died of a heroin overdose, or any overdose on an 
addictive drug, is burying a child who voluntarily chose to use that 
drug. At least, it was voluntary at first.

Then, one day, it wasn't voluntary, but became what your child had to 
do to get through the day. Then one day it simply kills them. Your 
heart breaks knowing they chose the method of their own death the day 
they did their first hit.

With Narcan, your child has a chance to wake up from an overdose and 
maybe, just maybe, reconsider what they are doing with their life. 
Without Narcan nearby and ready for instant use, you may never have a 
chance to know what choice your child might have made. But for all 
the times that Narcan can save them, the day will inevitably come 
when Narcan will be too late. So the only answer is to keep fighting 
for that lost child, because that kid can no longer make reasoned 
decisions. He will probably wake up from his overdose angry that you 
threw the rest of his stash out.

We need to do all we can to help those in our midst who have been 
taken prisoner by an addiction most of us can only dimly comprehend. 
But let's keep that cure nearby so we at least have a fighting chance 
of giving them a fighting chance to change their own path.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom