Addiction

Gav and I are, no pun intended, addicted, to the show Intervention, on A&E. This is a heart-wrenching show that follows addicts through their daily lives, tells the stories of their family members, ends with an intervention, and, hopefully, their journey to recovery.

You see people suffocated by their addiction, drowning themselves in order to keep from knowing themselves. The thing that has stunned me in watching each story is to see the spiritual side of each person's struggle--the war being waged against us humans, the bearers of the Image.

Let me explain myself more fully. It is unbelievable to see individuals using drugs that 'should' have killed them at any point: addictions to PCP (Miriam, a sexual abuse survivor) or inhalants; drugs that regularly kill users after any one-time use. It is unbelievable to hear an alcoholic (Adam, an Iraqi War vet) speak of vomiting blood, bleeding from the nose or eyes, and registering fatal blood-alcohol levels at his most recent hospital visit. It is heart-wrenching to see bodies emaciated, crippled, and scarred, families torn apart, and the sins of the father taking up residence his children. It is paralyzing to see how effectively this method of warfare works for The Enemy. It is enraging to realize how much we are hated and pursued in this war.

And yet, in the midst of each horrific story, it is incredible and impossible not to think a litany of things: 1) "If it is worth 'this much' to keep these individuals out of commission, how much must they have to offer, how much power must their story carry, how much impact could they have on the world, how much damage could they inflict on The Enemy's camp?," 2) "There is a 'reason' they are still alive. Their life, their journey was not an accident, and was not a mistake. They are a miracle.," and 3) "Mustn't the same be true of every one of us, addict or not, each having chosen a different pain-management technique."

Have you been an addict? Are you one? Lived with one? Been abused by one?



If I find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world. - C.S. Lewis