How social stigmas hinder recovering drug addicts

It has been years since Yamin (not his real name) has attended a wedding or a family event. His extended family members would bring up his history of substance abuse whenever they could.  

"At family gatherings, they would ask me things like what I am doing these days, where I am working and so on, even though they are completely aware that I am not doing anything and may have just gotten out of rehab," he said. 

Yamin has been working hard to remain sober for the last few months, but when people point out the 'mistakes' in his life, it impacts his path to recovery. "I feel constantly judged. But I know I have wasted so many things, and I am not where I am supposed to be in life," he said.  

What Yamin faces is not unusual in our society. Those who indulge in substance abuse, even when they become sober, are frowned upon and judged based on their past. The social stigma always haunts them.  

According to Dr Satprakash, director of Prottoy Medical Clinic — a de-addiction and psychiatry clinic in Dhaka — substance abuse or drug addiction is a disease. 

"Someone who takes drugs is not a bad person. It is not about being good or bad. All of us have different personalities and those who take drugs tend to have addictive personalities," he said. 

After using drugs for years, Rahat (not his real name) went to rehab for six months and sobered up. He has maintained sobriety for a year. His family was not supportive in the beginning because he tried a few times before and relapsed. "They said, what is the point? You will simply go back to taking drugs."

He has maintained sobriety for a year but even then, there are instances where he is suspected of doing things he no longer does. "Once my mother was panicking over some money she thought was stolen. She was frantically looking for the money, thinking obviously I had taken it," Rahat said.

Instead of getting upset, Rahat sat down with her and calmly showed her how she had actually spent the money and it was not with her. "She was so relieved afterwards. I knew if I got upset, it might make me sad and I might relapse again. Instead, I chose to deal with it in a healthy way," he said.

Sometimes when he is in the bathroom for too long, his mother knocks on the door, thinking he is up to something. "She even takes a quick peek inside, just to confirm," he said.

"Earlier, anything and everything would be a reason for me to use [drugs]," said Rahat. Although things have changed, he has a hard time establishing boundaries and making people respect his sobriety. 

"Sometimes friends casually ask me to drink with them or smoke weed saying, 'You are used to taking drugs, these shouldn't be a problem'," he said.   

At the age of 16, Raisa (Not her real name) smoked weed for the first time and liked the experience. "It helped elevate my senses, I was feeling euphoric." At one point in her life, she became addicted to yaba pills and was sent to rehab.  

When she was trying to become sober, people around her were generally supportive. Her parents, when they saw her effort, said they trusted her. "But I had to work hard to regain their trust."

Raisa feels that her openness about her past, and the fact that she can freely talk about it, helped ensure that people did not judge her. "I am sure I was called a 'druggie' plenty of times but at the same time, there were people who showed me my potential. And I decided I am going to wear my vulnerability on my sleeve."

Once Yamin was taken from his home and sent to rehab. "Everyone in my building saw me being taken away and that felt really humiliating." But from then on, he stopped caring about what others said about him as he felt his addiction was now out in the open.   

He said that as he grew older, he understood more about how people reacted differently to him. Although the lack of respect in their behaviour hurts him, he is trying to get over it. "When the security guard downstairs does not greet me anymore, I get hurt but it doesn't make me angry."

Sakib (not his real name) started taking yaba (methamphetamine pills) when he was 14 or 15 years old. 

According to him, because he and his friends kept their addiction limited to only themselves, they "were very secretive about it," and it wasn't something they "bragged" about. 

"If we were offered it at parties, we didn't do it and took the pills only on weekends," he said. He did not get judged by people as much as others. Strangely, "I was judged for drinking alcohol, but not so much for doing drugs."   

Sakib said even though he feels he was not judged for using drugs, he has friends who faced the stigma, especially those who came back from rehab. 

"For a long time, they were isolated — self-imposed or otherwise. You see, you are not the same after coming back from rehab. I stopped hanging out with them because I knew we would have nothing to talk about," he said.   

These days, however, he usually avoids meeting friends who were previously doing drugs. He says there is a trust issue. 

"If an ex-addict friend wants to meet, either that friend or I will bail out eventually or not show up. Because we suspect each other — is he doing it again? Even friends suspect that maybe I am back to doing it; that is something that will always stay with you." 

'We can reduce the chance of relapses by increasing support'

Dr Helal Uddin, associate professor of the Child, Adolescent and Family Psychiatry Department at the National Institute of Mental Health said the stigma comes from two places: one, when the family does not take the person for treatment until the addiction becomes severe; and two, when after becoming sober, the person is still suspected of doing drugs or bullied for their past. 

He said that sometimes, sober people are still suspected of doing drugs for having something as trivial as red eyes, which could happen for numerous reasons other than drugs. 

"They are told 'Oh, you sleep so late at night! Are you still doing drugs? Statements like these can make a sober person frustrated and eventually push them into a relapse. We must always remember that drug addiction is a disease and it should be treated like one," the doctor said.  

"The social stigma also makes families avoid addiction in the beginning. It becomes a challenge for us when patients are brought in after they reach the worst possible stages of addiction," he said. 

Dr Hasanin Zafar Sheikh Sanim from Prottoy Medical Clinic suggested that the stigma attached to substance abuse can be removed through awareness programmes, and then family members can make reintegration easier for those who suffer from substance use disorder. "We can reduce the chance of relapses by increasing support," he said.

Raisa feels it is more harmful to us as a society to stigmatise addiction and the use of drugs. We need to open up our minds and eyes and see that these things do exist and they need to be addressed. 

"We need to talk about mental health and the effects of trauma. There are so many people around us battling with all kinds of addiction, and the root of that really is the trauma that they have experienced," she opined.