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Drug addictions are more than just a personal problem, they're a DISEASE. Drug addicts are just like you and I. They have families, jobs, children, friends, etc. They had a mother who raised them, taught them how to walk, a father that went to their first baseball game...they had first dances, first kisses, and are completely beautiful people.

Until the day when they make a mistake because they're young and naiive. They make a mistake and then it haunts them for the rest of their lives. They weren't planning to spend the span of their life in and out of rehabs...they didn't dream as a five-year old of someday lying passed out in a dark alley with not the slightest clue of where they might be. One never does see a mother who dreams about her child growing up and prostituting, stealing, or killing in order to get money for their next fix. One never sees a perfectly healthy human being wake up one morning and decide that they would like to overdose.

Suppose a drug addict came from a completely different background, as is often the case. They are orphans, rape victims, victims of domestic violence, etc. They had a Mother that was never around and/or maybe a father that liked to beat them. They grew up in a neighborhood drowning in drugs, spending their early childhood years running in and out of their friends houses whilst at play. Sometimes oblivious to the fact that their friends' family and possibly even their own aswell, were dealing heroin, or marijuanna, or prescription pills right out of their house. Many times while a baby sleeps quietly in the corner.

They grow up witnesses to arson, robberies, shoout-outs, drive bys, murders, thefts, rapes, gang violence, and so much more. To survive they must learn the language of the street, and the way to play the game of it aswell. They begin to become an active member of a gang, for survival. They get involved with drugs, for survival. They commint crimes and felonies, for survival.

Perhaps they are those who are on the other spectrum of the problem, they are the ones being affected by these crimes. They are the ones being raped, stolen from and such. They have deep emotional problems and very much pain. And so in a moment of weakness they may try something new to them, to try to ease the pain, to maybe not feel as much for a little while, or to feel different entirely, whatever they feel would make things liveable for a little while.

The problem is, is that it works. It works and it is great and beautiful, and they wonder why they never went about it this way from the beginning. And then after some time, it starts to not work, and so they need to try more and more to make it keep working, until eventually they can't even get out of bed in the morning without it.

THEY PHYSICALLY CANNOT FUNCTION WITHOUT IT,
AND YET THEY MENTALLY CANNOT FUNCTION WITH IT.

It is a vicious, dark, and ugly circle. And for what reason? Because we are human, we make mistakes. It doesn't matter how big or small they are still mistakes and they only make us more human. Who are we to judge these people for letting themselves fall into such a deep hole? After all, aren't we human aswell? These people NEED HELP, LIGHT, LOVE and SUPPORT.

There shouldn't even have to BE a Layne Staley fund. We shouldn't have to have rehabilitation centers. We shouldn't have to have prisons and law enforcement and self defence classes. The world should just be a beautiful place where everybody gets along and loves one another.

But the world isn't like that.

The world is beautiful, but hideous at the same time, just as we humans are. There are always going to be problems, there are always going to be dark and depressing places.

So why even bother trying to stop anything?

Because the more we try, the closer we can get to that perfect world, that utopia. And although we might never fully reach it, we can still make the place a little more inhabitable.

One less mother wuld lose her child that she fed and clothed and bathed to some huge ugly monster. She wouldn't have to watch him decay for years before he actually died. She wouldn't have to feel the pain and the guilt of how his life turned out. She wouldnt have to never see his eyes, or his lips, or his smile ever again because he died too young to have any children to pass his traits on to.

She would watch him grow up and fall in love. She would know what it feels like to be a grandmother. She could greive over a more natural death of his or even not greive his death at all because he outlived her, which is traditionally the way things are supposed to be.

Please keep an open mind.
Please know that these people DO need help.
They cannot do this alone.
They need YOU.