text: This is just a write up of my experience's in addiction centers when I was admitted twice, for four weeks at the age of 17. I've been to youth custody, to adult minimum security, to psych wards several times. All before I was 18. So here is my thoughts and insight I learned or didn't learn. Addiction Centers. My opinion on centers like these is that the people that get admitted, don’t receive proper help when leaving the centers. Again, this goes with my personal belief that having someone secluded from society in one way or another, or an extended period of time can lead to more issues than what you even initially started with. You may have the insight, the group learnings and people trained to support you. At the end, it's all up to you. That's where the flaw is. We desire what we want, not what we need. Pleasure will overcome the state of null-ness that many of the people I met in the centers were. Filled with emotions but could only state out one, or act out with one emotion unless induced by drugs, the feeling of null. The past is persistent more than the present, and the future seems non-existent. We are talking about people who have endured enough problems in their life to never ever think of a future that is worth living. It's truly heartbreaking observing these people at the age they were, 15-50 year old's all under the same broken system bombarding them of being taken away due to being a “danger” to our “precious” society. Regardless people do what they want, or what they don’t; they have that option. The whole idea of locking people up to try and help them just to lead them right out the same door they came in, seems redundant to me. Maybe I'm speaking negatively and naivety. But I lived this, I was there when a dude had a heart attack next to me in a small hallway while he was talking to his mother. He was probably in his late 30s, but looked mid 50s. The next day I see him in the reading room which is usually empty as druggies would rather smoke a pack a day rather than read. I asked him about the heart attack and if he was doing alright, he said “not really an issue at all, happens quite often, i just can’t stop doing meth” I didn’t really say anything after that, and he looked back down at his book pretending I wasn’t even there. Its a scary thought, that someone is so disconnected from the world and his surroundings that even life threatening issues are abound, he’s a bliss with himself. I don’t understand. These people we’re probably the most caring people (at the moment) I’ve ever met, I’ve lived in various cities across southern Ontario and still, it’s hard not to think about who these people would have become if they didn’t experience certain events that lead to where they are now. I hope they’re all doing well. Every meeting someone would bring me a coffee, or a cigarette. Now mind you, I really didn’t like smoking cigs at the time, especially dirty old, hand rolled butts or native cigs. But how absurd and rude of me to not accept something from someone who just wants to feel something. A feeling that helps them realize they are human, either it be trading conversation or coffee, obviously we all connect in a way that most people can’t understand. Maybe they’re lucky for that, I just hope that the people I met in the places I've been, are in a much better place. Either that be heaven or hell, wherever they were then, just wasn’t for them. They couldn’t cope with it. It's not right that this is a common phenomenon within these practices and centers. Yes, to contradict what I’m saying, there are support buddies that can be at your side when you need it, when you crave. But let me remind you, you can lead a horse to water, but it’ll still take a piss in the lake. Morally, this is confusing for the average person who hasn’t endured the experiences that addicts have, in forms of drugs, impulsiveness or even too much coffee. Once an individual clings onto an “object” in the tune of the embodiment, that's where addiction is withheld by its own prisoner, the warden, you. It's really contradicting because we have so many of these centers that actually help people, you see progress, you see the one or two people that have achieved years of sobriety. But yet I still see the same people, time after time, go to the same meetings to only have a few hours sober. Everyone still claps because in the end.. a minute or a second sober is a milestone for an addict. Part of me was childish, because I was a child. 17. Watching these seemingly older and wiser people than I could ever be, but being stuck within the same prison they won’t allow themselves to leave. They have the key, they can get out of the cuffs. But our society doesn’t allow it, actually, more or less, doesn’t accept it. No one wants to see a half naked man on-top of a Tim Hortons screaming “God is mighty! I love spider man!” while being on a 3 day meth binge. I often wondered about their kids. If they did have any, because it seems like it's a common phenomenon that people with low self esteem and confusion in their own lives, at a younger age, with drugs or trauma involved is evident. You’ll see 17-23 year old's with multiple kids, multiple baby-daddies and relying on the government.. I’ve never understood that part, and maybe I never will. How can you bring a child into a prison you’ve created? You didn’t even give him the keys that you keep in your pocket? This is what upsets me the most, when it comes to the addictions of the older generations, is the outcome of the newer generations to come. I witnessed a man with a cyst on his arm, about the size of a golf ball because he kept injecting meth and wasn’t hitting a vein, just created a giant cyst. He had kids too, everyone has a family. The addiction is what drives the individual from their family and closest to them, because even themselves know, they are in a prison in which they created. How do you suppose you get out of this prison? Self help and living day- moment- second every day. The moment you stop doing something, you stop. Simple? Well, that's the case for your coffee addict, or your mother who won't stop buying wall art on Amazon, but for serious drug addictions the only rescuer is the individual himself. It really bothers me because I'm at conflicting thoughts with these types of methods as well. I’m a pure addict, impulsive as can be. I can relate to these people, try and understand, but I can’t hold it to me to empathize. They are their own play dough, they are their own sculpture. Nothing I say or do, will change someone else's addictions. You can move, you can love, you can hide.. you can become homeless. But you’re always an addict.