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Show Drags availalble in area, say former 'lasers Dayspring graduates tell stories of addiction, desperation in Utah Valley Ms are readily available in Valley - and you don't have to " far to locate them, according to '""women who are now "straight." He women, all area residents, ve graduated" from Dayspring, ,"8 and alcohol rehabilitation '"!c at Provo's Utah Valley nal Medical Center. y agreed to tell their story on ; condition their names not be Mmri6'6 WCre Plice on every J .officers wouldn't be able to J etlow of drugs, onesaid. "If r 'ooking for it, you'll find it." C?lnlinaeefrom 17 to 32, the CS,tallstartedusir,gdru6sin early teens or before. vaS Kgh, have come from wL ,ground sma town. CilieT0politan areas, well-to-do Nlies' .u middle income Perienolj " they have all ex-addiction. ex-addiction. ftBS'f'.an using drugs at Calif ornia i1Vmg ln the Bay area of 'ten 1 turned t0 cocaine t0 utah Valley asnot " j.rS of choice, heroin, N. i'111 liable. inevSefmed t0 be Plenty of 5Sdable" she said, adding s early teT Users of all ages - from 'Seitwack 6 to individuals whose tbejj H to tell. e SatS "g mnl in her life came Nthing hen she was "out of S5 wPnng 3 l0t of Prescription everv,L as cocaine and ran out "tilled L g tnat Saturday," she SaseUnye,the weekend was over Ifa'v ,t0 work and termed "My Wreck." Srinn"1" ?me and took me to She said' 2 said- when she first started on drugs, there wasn't much education on the effects of drugs, and her parents weren't very informed. After they found out she was on them, there "was one problem after 'There's a lot available on campus . . . they (the officials) just don't want to talk about it.' another and I ended up running away." ' She has been clean from drugs for 11 months now, and says she salvaged herself but not her marriage. , "I got off drugs but my husband didn't," she said of the divorce. While "A" got her drugs in local bars, "B" found them on campus of Brigham Young University. Now 28 years old, she had been on drugs for about 13 years - having started when she was 15 - when she made the decision to quit. She holds a masters degree from BYU and says she could buy cocaine within an hour in almost any building on the college campus. "I even bought it in the bookstore," she said. "There's a lot available on campus . . . they (the officials) just don't want to talk about it." She says it cost her about $500 a week when she was on "coke (cocaine) - money she obtained from her job and from her parents. "I always told my parents it was for something else . . . they never questioned me." "B," who came from California to attend school, said all the police in , the world aren't going to stop drug abuse, but maybe experience and a desire to stop will help. She says her employer knows about her problem and is very supportive but the other employees don't know. "C," 17, dropped out of high school during her sophomore year, and was kicked out in her junior year because of truancy and drunkeness problems. She began on drugs at age 11. "I baby-sitted (sic) for a lady who did drugs. I started smoking pot with 1 her," she says. Eventually she began meeting other users. To pay for her habit, she she stole from her parents and grandparents adding that to money she received from a job she had. "I always had enough money. I'd get paid every two weeks . . . and it'd be gone in a week. I'd buy drugs for everybody." Her drugs of choice were the psychodelics - LSD, mushrooms. "Cocaine was too expensive." "Drugs are easily available in this county, in every school," she said, even in the middle school she attended. at-tended. She came into the Dayspring program through the courts, and says now she can't go back to her high school because there are "just too many drugs there. I can't put myself into those kind of situations." She does plan to complete her high school education, however, and says her family are "really, really supportive." "D" moved with her parents to this "god-forsaken-state" from Georgia as a teenager, bringing her habit of popping pills with her. Her drug problem got "progressively worse" in Utah, and her habit got her in a "lot of trouble." Totally frustrated and not knowing how to handle it, her parents finally put her into a group home where she started pulling down good grades and even got on the honor roll. She moved to St. George where she got her GED certificate but also got involved with "coke," then came back to the area. "I got totally spaced out. When my father carried me into Dayspring both my feet were straight out, each pointing in a different direction." She still doesn't like Utah, she says, and sees the LDS Church pressure in Utah Valley especially as being a "negative influence" on "jack Mormons and non-Mormons." "But eventually you have to grow up." 'Drugs are easily in this county, in every school. I can't put myself into those kinds of situations' Rehabilitation helped and she is planning on starting school in January with the goal of getting a Ph.D. in psychology. "I can do it. All I have to do is set my mind to it," she says. Her family is helping with her young twin boys. She says "there's no way to avoid the traps (the temptation for drug abuse) but I will tell my little boys what I went through and hope they'll learn from it. "If you're going to do it, you will do it," she says. "I like me better this way (off drugs), she says. "I'm a lot nicer person . . . and I can remember what I did the night before." What started them on drugs? "Peer pressure, anyone of a lot of different reasons at the beginning, then you're addicted, said "A." "I did it for rebellion," said another. "You do it to see what it's like, because everybody else is doing it." Don Ely, director of Dayspring, believes officials are going to "see more and more addiction." For one thing, he says, addiction is recognized earlier now. Another reason is that addiction to drugs, prescription as well as street drugs, and alcoholism, is more prevalent now than ever before. "We used to see pockets of it 16 years ago . . . now it's everywhere." He says drug addiction knows no bounds. The youngest patient he has seen was nine years old - the oldest 67. The nine year old wasn't in this state, he said, adding the last six months of her chemical dependence she supported herself by prostition. Detoxing a patient from drugs takes from one to five days with the average about three days, Ely said. "It takes longer to get over dependence craving." Most treatments take three to six weeks, with programs providing support systems after that. Any family who has a question about what their youngster is doing with chemicals should seek professional help. "It's impossible for parents to be objective." Some of the signs of drug use are preoccupation, loss of control and denial. "When the drug becomes more important than other things -- work, school, family - something is wrong." Many try cocaine, Ely said, 'We used to see pockets of it 16 years ago . . . now it's . everywhere.' believing it is non-addictive. "We now know that if you take either cocaine or heroin over a period of time, you are addicted. We just don't know how long it takes. Some are hooked the first time." Although the four interviewed were women, Ely says chemical dependency and abuse is not gender-specific. gender-specific. About 60 percent of the 320 who have gone through the program since 1984 were male. Family involvement is important in combating the program, Ely said. "The salvation of this whole thing lies in the family unit," he said, adding the family must recognize there is a problem and encourage the user to seek help, then provide support throughout the remainder of the users life. Individuals can get help through Dayspring by calling 375-HELP. Other hospitals in the area also conduct similar programs. |