„You may start taking drugs with others, but to stop taking drugs, you must do it just on your own,“ one girl from my research project said. I think this is an interesting idea not only for the people that are quitting regular methamphetamine use without any formal treatment (which was my concern in the project) but for all the people who want to quit illicit drug use and maybe any kind of harmful behaviour. However, we have to consider the phrase „on your own“ in more detail.
The point is, that the actual exit from the regular use of meth (if we take it as an example) can be facilitated by various circumstances: you can be arrested, your parents may give you your „last chance“ before kicking you out, you may appear at the detox unit, your dealer is out of town or in prison, your friends left,… there are many options. That certainly does not mean that you will stop using forever. Even if you are not using, you may be attached to the image of the drug in your mind and wait as long as the restriction will last. On the other side, there may be much space now for the other things to attach to.
One of the „things“ you may be attached to, is actually „yourself“. You may start an inner dialogue not only with „you as a junkie“ but also with your other possible selves. Your past selves, your future selves. Since these selves themselves were created with other people, these are actually their voices that resonate in your head. This period is really not very pleasant. There is a lot of blame, a lot of fear, a lot of guilt. As one of my informants puts it:
„…(as the bunch of friends broke up) …I started to spend more and more time just with myself and the feel of blame started to penetrate through me. That I really… hurt a lot of people… especially my mother, during the time she had to care about my little sister and had a lot of troubles, she had to have trouble because of me. There was gold, money, disappearing from the house. So as I was just with myself, I started to hate myself. And I knew that I have to do something. That I will either leave the house or I will kick the habit.“
Still, in the inner dialogue, a nucleus of a new self may start to be created. This is how I interpret the common statements of my informants who said that it had to be first of all „their own decision“: as a decision coming from the inner dialogue. Not from the dialogue with the parent, treatment provider, prison officer, friend or anyone else, even if their presence may be very important in this decision. The „I“ which comes from this inner dialogue is not more real or more true than those that come from the other dialogues but it is definitely most close to the person and spends with her/him most of the time. This is the start of the process of the new self development which necessarily requires the other people who confirm and support this self.
So, what I read in the interviews is that there is always this „new self-birth“ needed if the actual quit from regular drug use is to be maintained for longer time. It may take several months or even years until this moment. During the time, the person may be preserved in some reality that is imposed to her but that she does not accept as her own. Then, the „relapse“ can be as immediate as the new chance to take the drug. Of course, the new self is not a guaranty of success but it seems that it is the necessary condition for stepping forth.
