The Frontline special was almost two hours last night but I missed the first 15 mins. Most of the show was about heroin addiction in the pacific northwest. But the first example in it was a surburban housewife who got addicted to the Vicodin her doctor prescribed for her. Her addiction spun out of control, fast, but she was able to hide it from her kids for about two years and semi-function … until she couldn’t anymore. She ended up getting arrested for prescription forgery and trying to pick up someone else’s prescription at Walgreen’s, who called the police. She was in and out of “drug court” from there, got clean and then fell into meth addiction with a new partner (after leaving her spouse and kids). She ended up having to do time and wasn’t the same physically or mentally after her release.
Her life before Vicodin was solidly “middle class,” even perhaps “upper middle-class.”
The most shocking parts of the show to me was the sheer beauty of the Seattle and Bremerton areas (I’ve never been there) and the sheer numbers of addicts on their streets. Does anyone know why are there so many hard-core addicts in the State of WA?
scaredy, did you see this Frontline special last night on KPBS? If not, you should watch it online. The Piggs would love to hear your “expert” comments … especially on Seattle’s “LEAD experiment.”
