For the past three years the suicide rate of veterans returning back home after active duty has risen sharply.  

Some observations of a counselor speaking about the problem noted that he had never seen such traumatization in the returning vets he was treating.   The level of destruction that these soldiers are experiencing while in active duty is beyond anything one could imagine.  The types of weaponry are so massively destructive and (noting use of DEPLETED URANIUM) have such widespread destructive outcomes that soldiers are coming back completely traumatized by the experience.  Adding to the trouble is the “stop-loss” system of extending tours of duty making the tour years longer than expected. 

On returning home,  soldiers are still reeling from the death and destruction,  and the constant stress of having to be on guard and expecting to be attacked and killed at any waking moment.  They often turn to drugs and alcohol,  and in fact drugs are the main treatment offered by the VA hospitals.   Drug them up. 

It is well documented that drugs and the ensuing degradation of physical and mental health cause suicidal ideation.   Add that to a recent exposure to death and on-going destruction under the stressful conditions present during active war,  and you have a recipe for disaster. 

This would be for any lay person a predictable outcome. 

The solution lies in the statement of the problem.  Too many vets are killing themselves after being subjected to a war that is seemingly endless and ovder-the-top tyrannically destructive,  and too many vets are suiciding after drugs are added to their already unstable condition.

Once you get your prescription for the substance,  you then have to find a licensed dealer in the state.

I was curious as to who licenses the dealers.  Turns out it is the State Dept of REVENUE.  Ah yes,  that would make sense.  Not the State Dept of Health,  not the State Dept of Drug Regulators,  but the State Dept of REVENUE.  Well ,  I guess it’s tough times everywhere even in the state coffers. 

You can get medical marijuana if you have a terminal or chronic disease,  like CANCER,  AIDS,  or ALZHEIMERS.  Or if you have chronic pain issues.  Yes, let’s pump the money into legally dealing drugs to mitigate pain issues and dull the mind because that’s a LOT easier than actually finding or distributing effective therapies and let’s not even mention promoting a known cure.  

Actually we could go one step further,  because there are actually known CURES for these chronic diseases,  but somehow I think that if these CURES were revealed,  it would be quite upsetting to the coffers of the  medical industry of disease.  The medical/disease industry in mainstream society lives off the money earned by mitigating or masking symptoms.  If CURES were to be revealed and promoted, well there goes the industry.  Right? 

What an upside down world this can be .

This reminds me of the story I saw not too long ago about the resurrection of “THALIDOMIDE” (relabelled of course to avoid bad publicity)   for patients dieing of AIDS and CANCER.   Who’s going to notice,  huh?   Who’s going to care?  Whatever makes a penny profit no matter the devious means.

Seniors in nursing homes have been subjected to a sales pitch that says “5 at 5″,   meaning if you dope up your clients at 5 pm with 5 mg of antipsychotic drugs,  they’ll go to bed early,  and they’ll sleep through the night.  So now drugs are being used as a substitute for care and live staffing.  I know times are tough financially,  but that is no excuse not to provide actual care for the clientele . 

Just as notoriously bad is the parent who plunks their kid(s) in front of the hypno-box to “keep them quiet”.   This type of parenting is what makes prozak the drug of choice for parents who have limited parenting skills or patience,  or even interest in their children’s minds and future. 

But I digress.  So even though the pharmaceutical company was found guilty in a court of law and fined a fairly hefty fine,  they keep on going.  Keep on selling their poisonous wares to an unsuspecting client base.  Is this the Twilight Zone we are living in?  I’m disgusted with the pharmaceutical industry’s penchant for the sick, disabled, very young,  and elderly.   Like money hungry vultures they  survive on death or the promise of it.

Testing the wastewater in and around populated areas has been touted as an extremely accurate way to measure how much drug use whether illegal or legal by measuring  the metabolytes left in the wastewater.    A scary thought but one which deserves some focused attention.  

The arrest rate may or may not reflect accurately the amount of drug use in an area.  Some areas may see high arrest rate and low drug use,  and vice versa.  There are too many cross factors to consider,  that make that type of direct ratio measurement inaccurate.  But testing the waste water is a foolproof method of ascertaining the facts of the matter.   Metabolytes tested in various areas have already shown a trend where meth use is seen to have higher levels of use in poorer areas,  outside the city centers,  whereas cocaine for instance is seen to be more prevalent in the more affluent city center population. 

As there is so much secrecy involved in drug abuse,  it may be a way to earmark  an area for more agressive surveillance.   

Additionally,  when testing can show accurately the amount of legal drug residue going back into the system – this might provide useful information for ecologically minded groups who want to do something to clean up the environment from such toxic waste material. 

Perhaps pharmaceutical companies should be required to pay penance for the damage done ecologically.   When I turn on my tap I don’t want to be receiving the left over remains of several hundred thousand drug users metabolytes.   The added expense of removing these metabolytes from my drinking water might be considered a pharma-tax to be paid by the very same corporations who are producing the toxic substances for human consumption.   With the money saved in this way,  perhaps municipalities and towns and cities will have enough money left over in their budget to implement more effective education programs to turn young people away from the growing trend of using drugs.  Indeed, if this trend is not corrected immediately,  I would go so far as to say we are about to enter another “medieval age”  where the wine was safer to drink than the water.  Surely we’ve come a far cry from those dark days.   Or have we?

I hate to begin with a cliche, but I’m going to do it anyways.  When I was in elementary school,  there were no such things as ritalin, or prozak or any sort of idea present that drugs were a way to help kids in school.   If you weren’t making the grade,  you weren’t working hard enough.  That got most of us through.  The fear of failing was enough of an incentive to hit the books and try your best.

Now I did not always pass my exams.  In particular,  one science class was just so beyond my ken,  I never did get the gist of any of what was being taught.  All I can recall is that it was something about “nature”  but wow,  I could never see the connection between the concepts that were being chalked up on the blackboard,  and the life and nature around me – and i was in  quite a rural area.  Anyways,  I am sure that taking Ritalin to help me with my grades, would NOT have worked in my favour. 

It seemed to me that all through school there were kind of different “groups”  of kids,  not that any labels were used – but some kids were just “The Brilliant Ones”.   Some,  most i suppose, were “trying their best and getting along with passing grades for the most part”.   And then there were always a few of what we now call “special needs”  – I mean maybe 1 out of 100 kids,  who needed special tutoring,  or had speech troubles,  or the like.  There was no classification given,  we just called them “Joey”,  or “Renee”  or whatever their name was.  In a small town you can keep things like that simple.   They were given a looser leash than the rest of us,  more time to complete projects,  less attention on marks and more on “trying”.   More options to do what we figured were the “fun” classes -  more crafts or wood working etc.   I think we envied their situation in many ways.  I did,  not being especially suited to sitting for hours in a chair at a desk when i would have much preferred to be outside skipping or finding new birds down by the lake.

Fast forward to today – wow,   we have apparently spawned a whole majority population of kids at risk.   And the accompanying philosophy is “YOU MUST DRUG KIDS AT RISK”.   Why?  I don’t know.  Well I do know.  But i didn’t want to get into pharma bashing here.   For instance 60% of the male kids in school in a suburb near Vancouver BC are BEINBG DRUGGED.   No-one can tell me with half a hope of convincing me that 60% of the male population is “AT RISK”.   Or that 60% are “SPECIAL NEEDS”.   These days,  special needs is a pretty broad brushstroke of a name for “KIDS WHO WE WANT TO PUT ON DRUGS”. 

I am pretty fed up with this whole sham of labelling kids this that and the other.  I don’t see it having any positive effects (oh yes I know there is always one or two parents who will stand up and say how little Johnnie doesn’t chew up the carpet anymore since being put on ritalin)  but the MAJORITY of these kids perhaps are not being challenged enough.  Look at what they get on TV and INTERNET resources.   If they live in any sort of urban locale,  there are MULTITUDES of entertainment and educational resources in their local town or city.   And then think of them having to stay tied to a chair and a desk for – what – 6 hours a day? 

Who wouldn’t get a little bored,  inattentive,  etc.  That’s what bored kids do.  They get into being their own entertainers, otherwise known as class clowns,  or troublemakers.   I think it’s time to stop all the mass drugging of our youth,  and start overhauling the educational resources we are offering them.   Let’s look at the whole picture.  Prescription drugs have NO PLACE in the school system.   No charlatan sales campaign (no matter how deviously brilliant)  will ever make sense of cranking out drug addicts from our schools at the age of 7 , 10 or 12.  Prescription drugs do NOT belong in school.  Period.

In the year 2000,  the US Geological Survey surveyed 139 streams in 30 different states in the US.   What was found was an alarming 95% of these sources were contaminated with traceable amounts of  pharmaceuticals.   It was also reported that the amount of drug contamination in the water and groundwater in the US is equivalent to the amount of pesticide contamination. 

Since pesticides have been in use for approximately the same number of years as psych meds have been,  I suppose that is not an unexpected comparative statitistic.   What is most alarming about these statistics is that they are accumulating on a daily basis !  Not only do drugs get dumped (excreted/peed)  into the waste water system,  they are disposed of in haphazard ways  by private consumers dumping pills into the toilet,  etc.  Considering that more than 100 million people are taking these types of medications daily,  and that farming as an industry is a huge user of meds to tranquilize and medicate livestock and poultry before sending to market,   it is a scary thought indeed how much has and will continue to accumulate in our ground water and soil.   These statistics were compiled in the year 2000.    It is now ten years later.  Frankly I’m a little scared to research and find the current amounts of contaminants in the groundwater.  But logic tells me its certainly not going to be less,  and I would not be surprised if the levels have even doubled those of this decade ago study. 

This is a problem of such a magnitude,  that I do not know if we will actually be able to solve it in time. 

For now,  I will continue to drink my purified water never letting a drop from the tap touch my lips.   As much as possible i will continue to eat agricultral products that are produced on clean farms,  and those that do not use meds on their animals or crops.  And as much as possible I will continue to spread the word to raise awareness of this ongoing problem.

Since illegal drugs are not advertised on radio,  tv or in the newpapers,  how can it be possible to have such a successful marketing and sales campaign?   Imagine trying to market something without any advertising media to carry your promotional materials to a wide audience of potential buyers?  Even with the use of these media outlets,  companies often enough go broke from lack of sales.  So how is it that the drug business is doing so well? 

These drugs are being produced and distributed  by the drug banditos,  who have arms and are quite willing to use them to intimidate and control their territory and the shipping routes commonly used to get them across the border into the USA. 

Currently one of the largest cartels in Mexico called  “la famillia”  has more or less successfully cornered the illegal drug trade in and out of Mexico.    Where are their recruits garnered from?   Youth who have no other jobs,  no other possibilities,  seemingly no other way to make a living.   These youth get recruited into gangs,  and are quickly indoctrinated into the belief systems of the cartel.  The leader of the cartel has even written his own bible,  and the cartel personnel consider themselves devout Christians.   They even have patron saints to protect their shipments as they cross the border,  and who can be prayed to,  to prevent getting killed by a police officer’s bullet. 

Politicians are fighting two opponents in the drug trafficking trade.   One is the strong militia arm of the trafficking trade,  the other is fear of retribution.   Gangland style killings are common.  Intimidation of those in power who themselves want to stay alive,  are willing to turn a blind eye to avoid direct confrontation.  Live and let live seems to be the adopted philosophy. 

So the problem must be solved deeper to the source.   A country whose youngest generation has very little hope of building a decent life through honest means,  must realize that the youngest generation is the ONLY hope for a better future.   Putting education and cultural development at the highest levels of importance would put some hope there for a better and drug free future. 

Since most of Arizona street drugs come from Mexico,  a wise approach to this problem might include some cross border meetings by heads of state of both countries to find a peaceful ways to open doors to a brighter future through supporting education and cultural development.  In this way both Mexico and it’s border neighbors can both regain footing on the very slippery slope of fighting these militia style drug cartels,  and the youth of both countries can be diverted from the cartels’ negative influences upon them.

In all,  from 2003 to 2007  more than $$ 50 Million Dollars  have  been spent on various PDMP’s across 33 states in the USA,  including Arizona.   The program is designed to inhibit a person who is addicted to prescription drugs from being able to “doctor shop” and get multiple prescriptions filled in various pharmacies.  

At the end of the day,  while this program is designed to curb prescription drug addiction,  can anyone say that 50 Million dollars toward MONITORING abuse was a wise investment?   Perhaps it was a step in the right direction.   But monitoring addiction has the end product of knowing how much doctor shopping has been going on.   It doesn’t do a thing, sadly,   to help persons who are addicted to the point where they would have to stoop to such tactics to satisfy their addiction.  

Would not a better program be to allow for voluntary disclosure of prescription drug addiction and a discreet and fully or partially funded recovery program for persons so addicted?   Why does criminality enter in to addiction when addiction is regarded as a disease in the mainstream of treatment protocols in use?  I don’t happen to believe that addiction is a disease,  but neither do i think it is a crime -  rather I would say addiction is a result of ingesting addictive substances.    These are legal substances.   They are made and promoted and marketed  by trillion dollar industry pharma companies. 

Maybe instead of personal or class action lawsuits against the drug makers,  I would prefer to see a program where hefty amounts like $50 million are procured through  mandatory “drug makers tax “  not taxing the citizens who aren’t causing the problem.   This tax money could be used to provide tapering and healing recovery programs for the addicted victims of these substances. 

The amount of $50 million dollars could finance 2500 to 5000  individual drug rehab programs for people who want to end their prescription addiction.   As it is now,  these funds are scooped from the pockets of tax payers,  and spent on a MONITORING program that is designed to “catch criminal activities”   -  this is about as ineffective  a solution as you could possibly find.    

Prescription Drug Monitoring Programs have possibly done some good in shining the spotlight on a problem that needs to be made more well known.   But simply monitoring a problem (especially at the high cost  mentioned)  doesn’t go anywhere near solving the problem.   To pretend that prescription drugs are not addictive is probly THE MOST criminal intent in the scenario,  and that promotional line is coming straight from the manufacturers of these toxic drugs.   

 So  it seems plain enough that the problem is not “doctor shopping”  per se.   That is a SYMPTOM.  When it comes to drugs versus disease and symptoms,  there seems to be quite a lot of confusion regarding which is which.  Clearly,  doctor shopping is a symptom of addiction,  and the solution is TREATMENT rather than JAIL TIME.   Perhaps the idea of taxing the drug makers would cause them to take responsibility for the number of ruined lives they have created.  That is the blood on the hands of those who make the huge profits off the addictions they are creating.

It is well known that excercise has many benefits to general health and well-being.   Toning up the muscles by jogging,  stretching,  bouncing on a rebounder,  swimming,  hiking,  walking,  is a great way to start the day.  It strengthens the whole body,  and leaves you with an increased capacity for doing work.  It also can help provide you with an increased tolerance for  normal ordinary stress, which is sort of like having extra insurance for staying well as opposed to getting too rattled by the little things that can open the door to  relapse.     

When should you exercise? Apart from the morning jog or walk,  why not try  taking an exercise break during the day,  or even after work  to help shake off the stress that may have accumulated during your day to day activities.

There are hormone-like chemicals that a body produces during exercise, called “ENDORPHINS”.   Endorphins act like natural pain killers/mood lifters when released.   So during exercise,  one will sometimes feel a natural high. That is a sign that the body is healthy and responding to the increased oxygen intake,  and increased circulation through the blood vessels as a result of the exercise.   If you have ever experienced a “runners high”,  you will already know what this feels like.  It is a great way to naturally  promote very  positive feelings,  and even a mild euphoria can result.   But it is a natural feeling,  and will not cause negative side effects like artificial substances do. 

One slight word of caution:  because endorphins do act as natural pain killers,  be sure not to overdo the exercise.  If you have ever had the experience of having injured a shoulder or knee joint for instance, and then you continued to exercise,  did you ever have the pain disappear as you continued to exercise?   That is because the Endorphin levels in your body rose as you continued to exercise,  and numbed the pain.   You will want to be aware of this phenomenon so that you can properly gauge how long or how hard to exercise.  You don’t want to overdo it  to the point where you have  aggravated an injury that should have been allowed to heal before any very strenuous exercise. 

For more helpful information on how to stay well after drug rehab,  or how you can help yourself or a loved one to stay well after rehab,   call any of our helpful counselors at the addicted.org website.

Are there advantages to selecting a facility that is close to home?  Yes,  in part.  It may seem like a convenience to choose a drug rehab facility that is a short drive from home.  In some cases,  this would be a benefit perhaps where transportation is limited,  or resources are limited.  However looking at the broad picture,  one should note that if it is easy to “get to” the facility, it is equally easy to “return home”  at a critical point before the program is complete. 

Very important points to remember:   the person entering rehab is doing so to make a change.  This is not a little change.  This is a life changing experience.  The program must be allowed to run its course.   One very common phenomenon is a person enters a rehab program usually in a bit of a dazed or possibly fearful state.  It takes a bit of time for the person to settle in,  meet and become familiar with the staff handling their case,  and other clients as well.   Coming off drugs or alcohol leaves a person feeling somewhat vulnerable,  irritable and cranky,  and generally anxious.  This is to be expected.  If it were all that easy to come off and stay off their substance anyone could just take a couple weeks off work, stay home,  and that would be enough.

However,  that is not the reality.  The reality is any person will generally hit a point in their program when suddenly it seems like an unsurmountable goal to finish.  At that very critical point,  the phone calls home can get quite disturbing,  complaints are a dime a dozen,  and pleas to be taken back home are very very common.   It is clear that if the facility is very close to home,  a short taxi ride or worse yet,  a family member coming to rescue the person ( part of the prior pattern obviously that still needs to be broken) is going to sabotage any chance the person may have had for recovery.

For this reason,   our experience has proven time and time again that the best scenario for drug or alcohol rehab is to have the facility chosen at least a plane ride away,  and in so doing there is that much more of a guarantee that the program can run its course.   The idea is  not to be cruel and force a person through a program,  but to be kind and give every chance to support the process and continue a program even through the rougher weather.   Our many success stories bear this out as a successful rule of thumb in deciding on whether to do a local program,  or get the person out of their “comfort zone”  and give it every chance possible of a successful outcome. 

For more helpful advice you can contact any of our counselors at addicted.org  who can help you in making the final decisions in choosing a drug or alcohol rehab facility.