Thursday 28 July 2011

What a sad week it was this one with the death of Amy Winehouse, and what a shock of mine when I red so many bad comments about it, things like “she deserved” "

If you are not a monk on the Tibet somehow you also can relate to her struggle in the same way I did in some level. We all have the necessity of escape from time to time, escape from ourselves, for that reason people drink to lose their shyness, change hair colour to express their inner self and change sex to permanently be the person they always have been from inside.

My first real memory of drug use was in London, when living in a flat with 7 people most gay, my house was like this extension of the Rave, where friends comes and go, where everybody keep coming with the wine and the music was loud and everybody took drugs together before our many nights out.

When you are young you have this tendency to try to fit in, you want to belong to something and sometimes not exactly belonging to the group we suppose to belong. My desire to be part of that brand new exciting tribe made me try most of the fashionable drugs of the club scene, from ecstasy, cocaine, speed to amphetamine, to name a few, and what a amazing sensorial experience it was, is like see the world in a completely perspective, and in some moments you even think “uh, if I die right now I will die a happy man” but unfortunately for some of us, that happen.

You know that expression: You never have enough of the good thing? so that is what drugs are about ( when I say drugs that include cigarettes, alcohol ,chocolate, cock or anything that you can’t resist to put in your mouth as much you could )

The problem with drugs is that your never know how your body will react until it react, one of the thing that amazed me about taking ecstasy for the first time was how different me and my friends reacted by the drug, my ex enjoyed himself a lot but was also vomiting ever 20 mins, my best friends got completely calm and sat down enjoying the music but not moving a muscle and I could stop dancing, I was emerged on the song and laser effects from the club, but why I wasn’t in the rush to do it all over again in the next day ? for me was good the way it was ,but in the next day my body was so intoxicated that I couldn’t spare a thought of trying again that week, even that the whole experience was some how all positive.

If it is a psychological thing or just a genetically related I know as much I know the reason why people are gay, but there is actually a common aspect in all the people I met who started with me but end up hooked it.

We all like to escape from ourselves, some of us do it for fun, because is nice to play about being someone else (otherwise the Drag queen wouldn’t have been invented) and in this case we are all glad to back to our normal selves in the next day in the same way that is great go on in a holiday but is equivalent nice to back home.

When the reason for your escape is because you cant cope with your life, that is when things go from bad to worse, because we tend not want to go back, is the reason why people instead of eat a chocolate bar as a treat decide to eat the whole box even they are already becoming morbid obese, we want the instant comfort, we want that moment where we are not thinking anymore.

Another important point is the control, even not being a addicted person in few times I really put my life at serious risk, like taking 8 ecstasy in one night or even mixing 2 different types of drugs with alcohol and the only difference of me and someone that collapse is that I was luck and healthy enough in that night so even putting my body under extreme stress, it could handle, but what would happen if I kept doing that regularly? I wouldn’t be here telling the story I guess.

After the first or second pill you not really in control anymore and you don’t see the risk of trying another drug and that is why you need friends around you and at least one friend that doesn’t do drugs because he will know when is time to make you stop before you kill yourself without knowing.

Is funny how culture can really blur our perception of normality, in the same way that starving models on Vogue can make you think that look like a stick is attractive, the same could be say about the relation of this country with alcohol and drugs, things that used to chock me when I first came here today can pass unnoticed by my eyes.

When I heard about Amy Winehouse death I just could remember when I first saw her in person in Soho, she was friendly but so wasted that couldn’t even make much sense, situation that in any other country it would make people run for help ,but there she was alone with no friends walking in the Soho streets like a homeless that could even make you forget that there was actually a Grammy winner and a remarkable talent in her own way asking for help ,but because there was at least more 5 others vomiting drunkers around her ,it made her look perfectly fine.

Our fight for acceptance and to be loved as equals in our society got a down side, that is depression, low self esteem and a lack of self acceptance, one of the reason why the gay community is by far the most common group of drug users.

Of course in the perfect world it will be better not even try drugs, but if you really want to give a try, do a check up (especially your heart) take from people you really know and already took the same thing you will and the most important have some no drugs user friend around you in case you need and never mix drugs, even alcohol.

R.I.P AMY WINEHOUSE