Sorry it took awhile to get back to this, my friend:
I was responding to a comment where a poster claimed that they were raised in such a way that led them to moderate their own usage of things like opioids. It was instilled in them largely by their upbringing. I also wrote that personal responsibility plays a part in rehab which should address your claim that I am simply viewing addicts as victims. I think that victimization, due largely to corporate predation, is very real and my state is a good example of that. I understand that addicts have a responsibility to complete rehabilitation and fight to stay clean. Like many people in our country I know, and am personally close to, recovering addicts. They believe in personal strength in the recovery process as well.
Well then, it sounds like we both have some experience in addiction & recovery. I'm not going to deny that substance abuse at its entry level is a learned behaviour, nor will I deny one's environment can have some influence on one's predilection to substance use & abuse.
But yeah, to overcome addiction requires one to take responsibility for their actions completely, and use brutal honesty with themselves.
Your last comment about moving away from areas with problems is something that happens here all of the time. Young people leave this state regularly. The only answer I can give you as to why I have decided to plant my flag in this state is because I can drive just two hours a way and walk the same trails my great great grandfather did. I have an attachment to the physical state itself which inspires me to want better for the future. That may seem stupid to you, but I think it's a pretty common feeling here. I have a belief that businesses should be held accountable for polluting the water, the air, and the soil. They should also be held accountable for flooding small areas with millions of highly addictive pills.
Yeah, I can understand. I was very much an old school
"neighborhood guy", in a very large northern city where I had three generations of family. Unfortunately the neighborhood went into total decline, and like my grandfather before me leaving Europe, I had to move for the betterment of my wife & young family.
Trust me, I shed tears when I left my old neighborhood; actual tears for my family that had gone before me that were not with me now. I knew I was leaving the physically tangible things of my memories of them, and those tangibilities would now be gone from my life. It was hard.
But I did it as my grandfather before me, and I never regretted the decision. My moving gave me kids a great life, and I can see that in my kids' successes, and in who they've become as persons as they enter young adulthood. I always put family first. And as I married and had a family of my own, I put my own new family that my wife & I formed as first amongst my larger family. I came to realize my putting them first was a maturing & growing process in my life, and my responsibility to them was greater & higher than my love of my old neighborhood & the friends and family there.
It sounds like you and I have the same feelings about family, and have had good grandfathers in our lives that we want to keep alive in our memories. I commend that, and can say that I'm only the man I am because of the love & guidance of a good father and having had good grandfathers and uncles that kept me on the right path! I don't know if you have your own family & kids, nor do you need to share that. But once that happens (marriage), things change. Your highest calling then becomes your new family and their well being. And in my case, as much as I love & respect my larger family, I put all my energies & efforts into providing the best I can for my now wife & kids. It's not even close. So if I'm living in a place or situation that is detrimental to them, I'm outta' there!
Gotta' roll with the changes ...
(Anyway, thanks for the reply)
