Trauma and Drug Addiction

We often do not realize that trauma sets off things in our life that we simple do not anticipate. Rather that be feelings, emotions, events, endings, trauma is the one unexpected visitor that we never can anticipate. We look at our community now and a lot of the youth and adults are addicted to some type of drug. But where does this all start? Is it the constant bickering between parents that causes the child to search for an escape or the neglectful parenting that makes one run to another source for just .... anything? Could he be the young girl who was placed in a custody battle but ended up with the wrong parent? I mean I could go on, a lot of times we talk about the drugs in communities but we don’t associate the trauma.

If there were ever a war on drugs there should have been a war on family healing and reconciliation. For those things tend to be the root of escapism and adddicitive behavior. Parents often imply so much pressure on the assumption of who one should be and forget that their children have their own lives, dreams and aspirations. Treating your children well or not based on their accomplishments is a dangerous game, it causes the child to constantly seek approval and if the goal is not reached then the child not only feels like they fail the parent, they end up with a sense of falling, as if in a dream, you know the scary one that wakes you when you have fallen from the highest cliff or soaring plane. It is a dreadful feeling one that if your are not cognizant as a parent you will inflict this type of trauma on your child when you feel as if you are just “disciplining” them.

The child that failed their parents will run to the next thing that doesn’t make them feel less if they fail. Which sets a wave off, of being around people with lower standards for yourself and them. Someone how in your trauma the universe will bring a friend that understands where your coming from, someone who sees the world and hurt in it as you do, the trauma in it. Leaning on one another but nothing building each other up just leaning.

Typically people who deal with trauma or have experienced it will find themselves in groups of friends with the same trauma. Here’s is little story, a girl lost her mother at 4 years old, another girl was separated from her mother at 9 and another girl her mother left at 7. At 10, each of these girls became friends with the common denominators of losing a mother and being raised by fathers. The loss was like a bind and was understood with these three. They stayed together for years (15-16 years) however everyone was hurt and the maternal love was amiss so they all seemed rebellious each of them began to smoke marijuana, found love or lust in wrong places, some exceeding in school others didn’t. But trauma is what brought them together, the hurt, marijuana eased the trauma with these three, especially as they got older. So as years went by they separated from each other as trauma subsided however whenever something traumatic was amiss they called each other. One lady decided she no longer wanted to smoke marijuana anymore and that her life was fine and once that decision was made she no longer vibed on the same frequency as the other woman still dealing with the same trauma. Walking away didn’t seem so hard because the only thing that brought them together was trauma and drugs. Trauma and drugs.

All this to say if you know someone who is addicted to any type of drug instead of being accusatory, understand them. If they were scholars and athletic then suddenly changes understand there may be some trauma. Trauma could be school bullying, parent distinction, verbal abuse, loss, rape, separation from family, witnessing death or near death experiences, witnessing birth as a child is traumatic lol.

I noticed a change in my sons behavior when we lived in Texas and he would not speak but eventually I found he was being bullied and called the “n-word” and he even had scares I couldn’t explain luckily I listened and held him and cried and went and made it right on his behalf. But this type of parenting is far and in between.

Sometimes as parents we have stop and listen to what our children are saying verbally and I verbally. Addressing trauma and preventing it is the number one war on drugs. So many stories are untold but I guarantee anyone addicted to anything will link their addiction to a traumatic experience. Locking people up who have drug addictions is not helping them it’s just inducing them into more trauma.