Drug Addiction in Young Girls

I have been watching a soap opera called Emmerdale and there is a character in it called Holly, a 19 year old girl who is addicted to heroin. I think that the storyline is very effective.

Holly was at art college and had a very promising future ahead of her until she got involved in taking drugs. She was kicked out of college and since then she went living with a drug dealer boyfriend until he threw her out and she was forced to return to her parent's farm. Holly attended the GP who directed that she should attend a methadone clinic, get a prescription for the pharmacy and take her methadone on the premises. Her parents were trying to keep a close eye on her but they are farmers and it proved impossible to watch her all the time. One day she went into Hotten, the local town and she sold her body to a horrible old man in order to get the price of the drugs.

Then she was found sitting at the side of the road in the dark by some neighbours who nearly ran over her because they did not see her. They brought her home to her parents and the mother said to the father "What are we going to do? We can't afford to pay for Rehab". The father replied " She was on methadone and she still went out looking to score some heroin. We will deal with this ourselves" and then they decided to lock the girl in her bedroom in order to detox. They took most of the furniture out of the room so that she could not harm herself,.

I think that this is totally crazy. Locking someone up is a breach of their human rights, but more importantly I doubt very much that this method of punishment would actually cure someone of drug dependence/drug addiction. The girl is more likely to be worse off as a result of this treatment.

When I was about 13 our English teacher told us about a book called "Dear Alice". It was written by a 15 year old drug addicted American girl who talked about tearing her own flesh out because she thought that her skin was crawling with worms. It was truly horrific but it had the desired effect of putting me off drugs for life.

Like all parents I worry about the future of my own children. Alcohol is something that is widely accepted/tolerated in Irish society but drugs are all around us, even in small towns and villages. I sincerely hope that I never have to deal with drug addiction/dependence in the family.