I just finished watching couple episodes of the award-winning* television show Intervention on A&E today. What a powerful, powerful program. It showed the struggles of a loved one and their family and friends' fight to pull them back from the brink of whatever life threatening addictions they were battling.
The two episodes had parallels in some ways. Both involved young women who were addicted to drugs and both had underlying mental health issues. So, to make matters worse, they were battling two problems at the same time - the addiction and mental illness**.
A further parallel was that both young women grew up in dysfunctional families. Now I'm not sure how big a part this played in their downward spiral, but I do think it did have a negative affect on their lives. Not to say that living in a dysfunctional household will necessarily drive you to drugs or alcohol or any other destructive behavior because both women had siblings who turned out fine. But, if you are emotionally fragile it may just push you past your breaking point.
The first episode dealt with Marci. She grew up in a family where her father was an alcoholic. Her mother was out most of the time working to support the family. Because of her work commitments, Marci says her mother wasn't there to support her and her brother from their father's drunken verbal abuse when they needed her.
When Marci graduated high school she went to college where she first started drinking and doing drugs. After two years of schooling she dropped out. At age 24 she got pregnant with her first child, a daughter, and was pressed into marriage by her mother. She had a second child, a son, a few years later. Not long after she got into drugs again and her marriage failed.
The second episode dealt with a young woman named Linda. She too had what she considered a tough upbringing. It wasn't that her parents were abusive or outright cruel. But, like many Asian parents, they pushed their children at a very young age. This included Linda and her brothers working many long hours at the family-owned laundromat. She longed for the life she saw many of her other young friends living at that age.
After graduating college Linda left home and headed to L.A. where she found happiness working as an extra in movies and television shows. It was at this time she came down with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a disorder characterized by joint dislocations. To fight the pain she started taking Fentanyl, a pain-killer 100X stronger than morphine. Quite often she would take twice the daily suggested dosage. Among the side effects were the rotting of her teeth and damage to her internal organs. In relation to her mental health issues, Linda claims much of her pain was caused by electrical energy discharged by flowers, certain colours and even specific people.
To stop both women from ultimately killing themselves an Intervention was planned. The families got together with the producers of the show and other health experts to confront Marci and Linda about their problems and offer treatment to them. To emphasize the seriousness of the interventions the consequences of refusing treatment would have to be severe. This would include disownment by their families. For both girls this meant, to some extent, the funding for their addictions would be cut off as well.
In Marci's case, her mother would always help her financially if she came over in need. She was her mother after all. How could she refuse her daughter's plea for help? In Linda's case, the problem was similar. Her parents poured their life savings into renting a home for her and helping her buy drugs to ease her pain (real or imagined).
In both cases their parents were unwittingly contributing to their children's problems. Because they loved them so much they would step in to help monetarily any time their daughters asked. And in both cases their mothers were serious stumbling blocks in trying to provide help at the interventions. For some reason it was hard for them to believe their daughters had these problems. As well, they felt deeply pained at the prospect of possibly turning their backs on them if they refused treatments.
In the end both Marci and Linda agreed to get treatment. With all my heart I hope it works out for them. Not only for their sake, but for their family's sake too. Both families (parents, siblings, friend and relatives) had gone through hell and back in their ordeals.
I believe there are two underlying problems here. One, the lack of diagnosis and treatment options for the mentally ill. And, two, easy access to highly addictive drugs (legal or otherwise) in our society today. Marci was able to score Crystal Methamphetamine at will. Linda was able to visit many different doctors to get multiple prescriptions of Fentanyl.
We have to shape up or face dealing with more problems like this in relation to addicts and the people who love them.
*2009 Emmy Award Winner
** The show stated that in many cases drug abusers do have some degree of mental illness
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