Heroin Helper Blog

hey Dr H, its no lie. i think ive told you by now im in NYC, but, you know - first of all, isn't it kind of funny how those of us who have the understandings that we have & have lived the lives we have lived, sort of find ourselves on a completely different wave length than the so called 'normal' person - what i sorta mean is, when i tell you, well im in NYC now, and this is where i've been for the past few years thats fine, and, not abnormal whatsoever, but if i were go on to tell you about living in warehouses, heated train station waiting booths, living in oregon, florida, utah, massachussetts (sp), california, trying to live in england, kiev (yes, ukraine), montreal, calgary, etc. etc. it's a completely understandable thing - whereas, you tell that, and your telling the total truth, and its so foreign to the so called "normal" person - they can't fathom it, assume at best it's job related (and i guess it sort of is "job" related) or something else.

But i was born in Portland, Oregon, though I pretty much grew up in NYC, in my teenage years i did so much moving around (on my own - for lol, 'job' purposes, right?) but NYC has always been my home base to come back to. This is where I am now and have been regularly/irregularly since 07 (i was in pennsylvania for two years before coming back) but anyway NYC's handbook, well heres the story on that from a NYC resident perspective more importantly a legitimate full time NYC junkies perspective

it came out of nowhere first of all and it was to the junkie community, just like most things state, federal gov't considers progressive (with one exception - needle exchange) a big joke. First of all, like as im pretty sure you would know Dr H, you know how the dumbass clinic deal goes, so you go to get your waste of time juice and they have all the stupid pamphlets there and condoms and everything else. That's the kind of place you would have to get one. Just like the candy jars full of massive amounts of condoms (with NYC logo made out like train station letters) nobody bothered with them. Ill put it to you like this, if your in a group of bangers and everybody has money early that day then maybe to be cute somebody would grab one and you guys would flip through it and joke about it, maybe compare the states suggested methods to the actual methods. The public, unfortunately, really didn't seem to care - the non drug using public (which, horribly is the same public that has no idea about anything and yet all the freaking power and sway to further ruin our lives) infact, unfortunately, if the general public was ever pressed to give an opinion it was usually negative but i want to say this too dr H, first of all i totally agree with your opinion about the public wanting us all to "just die" and your right. I think in the case of the how to bang dope safetly pamphlet the anger was partially that but more so general frustration with NYC residents because at that time (and still) Albany was in a mess of partisan politics that was freezing the budget, and just in general there is major discontent among the general public about politics and what they do and do not spend money on. I'm not sure the majority of the anger was so much about us junkies though i will say that was definitely the surface but just like we didnt care about the pamphlets i dont think the people really cared about us but more so the govt spending money on it at the time. Again, this was actually a few years ago and it did get paper attention in the tabloids like the post and the daily news NOT

front page and only like two stories in total. The tabloids of course were against us they are so pro drug war and so ignorant that was to be expected. But yeah, it was a few years ago and the pamphlets were honestly only in places that junkies that play the game would actually be, i.e the clinics and certain sections of hospitals. It wasn't like people were on the corner handing them out. Infact, one of my best friends at the time who was into it neck and neck with me for years and has since gone on to his second act with AA which was all spawned off him being tricked into getting arrested by his PO (the same day he was suposedly going to try to steal my stuff and the 700$ i'd wired to him to get my stuff but again we had been thru everything together for years, working across the street from eachother for years talking all day long, visitin eachother at work, helping eachother all the time to sharing the same warehouse for months when we were homeless, but i mean, it was a good reminder that in this world, with prohibition running rampant, you cant trust anyone. needless to say, he got arrested before he could steal anything and is now saved by AA and going strong for almost a year now but i dont talk to him anymore, refuse to speak with him, its been 10 months now and as far as im concerned hes dead to me, he said some bad things about heroin and thats all anybody has to do to be dead to me) but at the time i called him when the story about the pamphlets had just come out and i remember he was actually just reading the story too in the Post and we joked about it. And i mean, Dr H, you know how it is man basically if your banging dope, you have a pretty good idea about what your doing, you dont just slip and fall and find a belt around your arm and a set of works filled with blood fused with dope in your vein you know what i mean? to be honest it kind of is an indictment of just how completely out of touch they are with the honest situation going on in the junkie world. Infact, the most political of junkies may have even been angry about it cause it could have been perceived as an insult and not only that but a waste of time and money where if the govt was willing to actually take a harm reduction step forward they shouldve done it with something more important and meaningful (needle exchange, insite, hydromorphone/heroin maintenance experiment which is the only legitimate way to help a junkie get a so called productive, happy healthy life) and as of now i think that it is looked at as sort of a failure for those who did it. clinics wash their hands of it and those pamphlets are nowhere to be found. They want to pretend that never happened. But the jars full of condoms are still available like any junkie really wants one of those. they should give us jars of cotton lol

@CJ - I didn't see the video; I overheard it. However, I didn't get the idea that the guy was from New York or that his problem was that the government had poor public health policy. But I just can't watch the video. I'm already angry as hell.

Generally, such pamphlets are given out at needle exchanges. That is a good place for them. HRC used to publish a lot of good material. I've been around a ton of people injecting, I can tell you, almost all of them could use a few pointers. I think the pamphlets are a good idea.

I wouldn't be too hard on your friend. People get tired. Being a junkie (as you well know) is not easy. Junkies are the most self-actualized people around. Just the same, I wish your friend had managed to change course without NA, because the fact is, NA is worse than useless. If you can do it with NA, you can definitely do it without.

You are right about true harm reduction, although I do think methadone clinics do a lot of good. I don't think they should be privately run. And I don't think they should control people's lives as they do. But they are helpful to a lot of people.

Not everyone has your energy. Be safe.