The grim life of North Jersey’s suburban heroin addicts
MONDAY, MAY 6, 2013 LAST UPDATED: MONDAY MAY 6, 2013, 2:34 AM
BY REBECCA D. O’BRIEN
STAFF WRITER
THE RECORD
At 21 years old, Graham Dooner has the same wit and easy charisma that kept him on the edge of trouble as a student at Ridgewood High School. He cracks jokes, he drops lines like “ipso facto” into conversation, he could talk for hours about the history of the labor movement in Paterson.
But nearly two years of intravenous heroin use have consumed the body of this 6-foot, 4-inch former varsity athlete. His pale arms are lined with track marks, slender yellow bruises from daily injections. Beneath his Knicks cap and a mop of reddish hair, Dooner’s handsome face is gaunt and clammy, haunted by a bluish pallor and spotted with sores. His yellowed teeth are worn along the edges.
“With shooting heroin, people say it is something they would never, never, ever do,” Dooner said. “But, I mean, things change in a flash, especially when you are addicted to opiates. Your levels — your ‘I won’t go past that line’ — they quickly diminish.
https://www.northjersey.com/allendale/The_grim_life_of_North_Jerseys_suburban_heroin_addicts.html
Really good article. There isn’t much more to add. It’s interesting how weed and coke are not even the gateway drugs anymore. The gateway drugs are available at your local pharmacy as long as you can convince a doctor to prescribe them.
These articles just scare the shit out of me.
Me too. I have a small child, and shudder to think this is a possible future.
I also have a close family member who checked out during the late 90’s and didn’t kick the habit until around 2005. It sucked years out of the person’s life, and now the person can’t believe that heroin was such a big part of life. Not everyone is that strong / determined. If you know someone who’s addicted, the most important thing to do is let them know you’re there and will help in any way that doesn’t involve getting them high. Eventually they will come around, or die, sad to say. There is too much variance in potency out on the street…most people who OD just didn’t understand what they were cooking, or, quit for a while and reduced their tolerance and didn’t adjust their dosage accordingly.
Bad stuff on it’s own; add the fact that it’s illegal and sold in bad neighborhoods by bad people and it’s a recipe for a lot of heartbreak.
It is a grim life. All of the people in the photos should get help.
I am a step parent of one of the arrestees, I’ve done 30+ years in law enforcement. The story is on point and extremely accurate the sad part is the people arrested brought this on themsel’ves. The damage they do to their bodies and their minds is miniscule compared to the damage they do to their loved ones. The family begins a “silent or unspoken if you will” countdown until that dreaded phone call or knock on the door your child is dead they suffered cardiac arrest due to an “overingestion of a narcotic substance.” I’ve had to make that notification more than once in my career make no mistake this is a real problem that is not going away.
I have to somewhat disagree that all these kids brought this on themselves. It sounds like the legal heroin that Purdue Pharma makes ridiculous profits off of started some of these people on the road to hell. Certain people are just more prone to the phenomenon of craving than others and it’s hard for most people to understand addiction. No one could possibly bring that look of pain on their faces willingly.
The reason i disagree with you is that there is a conscious decision that the affected party makes to make the jump into the heroin lifestyle. These people know full well they’re in trouble before they make the jump, furthermore many addicts will tell you they never had a scrip for meds in the first place they just “bummed” pills off friends. That is hard to blame on a drug company. There is a game some youths play where they take meds from home everyone throws the pills in a bowl and 1 by 1 they reach in take a pill and swallow it That is how you get started, you cant blame that on the drug companies either, again this is a conscious decision of very risky behaviour. When will we start to see who the problem really begins with.