Your Personal Heroin

A raucous pounding shook the building, shattering the monotonous drone of beeps from the ICU ward. A quick glance at the security monitor showed a frantic woman slamming her fist against the glass on the front door, a limp dog hanging from the other arm.

I am not normally at the hospital during the wee hours of the morning, but I was driving by on my way to the airport and needed to stop in. Although we are a 24-hour facility, for security reasons we keep the front door locked between midnight and 6:30 am. The tech and I rushed to the front door, our ears ringing from the constant pounding and litany of F-bombs piercing the morning calm.

“Open the f’in door g’dmanit! F’in open the door!” The woman clutched a Pomeranian in the crook of an anorectic arm while she slammed the door with raw knuckles on the other hand. Her face was gaunt and pale, her eyes black like squid ink. Dried blood crusted around her left nostril and caked in the wrinkles of her lips. Her hair, a greasy blond, was pulled back with a pale blue rubber band that had just about slipped off. Tattoos darkened her arms, blending in with the bruises on her neck and face. She wore a blood-splattered asparagus green t-shirt and beltless, dirty jeans that hung off her boney hips. Her feet were bare.

The tech fumbled with the key, the whole time being yelled at through the door. As soon as the latch opened, the stranger pushed her way into the clinic, launching into a tirade as she pushed past us heading directly toward the back of the hospital, almost as if she knew where she was going.

“My f’in, g’dam boyfriend kicked my f’in dog. I’m gonna f’in kill him.” She went directly into the treatment room and put her dog on the exam table. Her behavior suggested that she had been here before. Yet try as I might, I could not recall her. The woman was an exercise in kinetic motion – constantly rocking back and forth, eyes darting around the room, alternating holding or stroking the dog with one boney hand, the other crossing her chest. The dog just lay on the table, mouth agape, panting, staring blankly off into space.

It did not take long for the commotion to attract the attention of the early morning staff. Most gathered in the treatment room or just outside the window to watch the drama.

My receptionist, a local born and raised, whispered to me “Do you know who that is?”

I studied the sad girl. I suspected she was younger, but it appeared that life had been hard and she looked years older.

“No, should I?”

“She used to be a volunteer here, not that long ago.” My receptionist looked up at me; I could see the deep sadness in her eyes. “She was in my class. She was the homecoming queen.”

As hard as I tried, I could not recall her. My employee told me how the former high school beauty had followed the wrong crowd and gotten into drugs, specifically ice and heroin. Since the ER doc had the situation under control, we walked up to the reception area and pulled up photos of her graduation class on the Internet. As soon as I saw the photos I remembered the young girl – a smile that would steal your heart, curly blonde locks, little cross earrings and eyes full of life.

How does this happen? It seems so simple to see the warning signs – how can you not stay away from that poison, that lifestyle? Have you ever heard that ice and heroin are good for you? That they will make your day easier? Solve your problems? Get you ahead at work? For me, there is no way I would ever make the same choices that she had.

That night, after a long day of travel I was pretty wound up. I was reliving the early morning events over and over in my head. I could not help but feel sorrow for that young, formerly beautiful girl whose life had been so full of promise. Not being able to sleep, I went downstairs to the bar and had a nice glass of port – a great way to relax and take the edge off of a long day.

The next morning, after an okay hotel sleep, I was reasonably rested but still needed a pick-me-up. Not being a coffee drinker, I stopped at the vending area next to the elevator and got a Diet Coke. Almost as an afterthought, I grabbed another, just in case I needed that extra edge.

Riding in the cab on the way to my lecture I had an epiphany: alcohol to sleep and caffeine to wake...my own personal heroin!

What about you? Do you take Ambien to sleep? Smoke a joint after a long day? How do you get started in the morning? Are you a coffee drinker? Red Bull, Jolt – what settles you down or gets you going? And where do you draw the line?