‘Harder to get off than heroin’

A DUNDEE mum whose son died of a drug overdose said he refused methadone treatment, fearing it was more addictive than the heroin he was hooked on.

Her son began taking heroin when he was 21 after being offered it by a workmate who said it would make him feel “all right” after a family dispute.

She said: “Before that he hadn’t tried anything. He had good money, his own house and his bairns were dressed in the most beautiful clothes.

“He approached the system and there was nothing they could offer apart from methadone. He didn’t want it at that point because it’s worse than heroin. A ll he wanted was help. It was horrible. A ddicts also say it’s another addiction and it’s harder to get off that than get off your drugs. By the time he was through the system he was a full-time addict.

“He didn’t want methadone, he just wanted support to get off of the drug he was on. This was only two or three months into it at this time, he wasn’t a full-blown addict then.”

The woman and her son went to a local clinic but it was 18 months later that he received help.

She said: “He was totally off the scale by then. I know it’s totally different now, but at the time I said they should have got him at two months, not 18 months down the line, because he would have got out of it.

“I speak to a lot of addicts who don’t believe that methadone keeps them off the drugs because it doesn’t. It just keeps the monkey off their back, that’s how they refer to it. What that means is when they get up in the morning they don’t need to steal, they get their methadone, which takes the soreness away. But a couple of hours later they’re struggling.

“Ninety-five per cent are still using other drugs.” Sadly, her son died aged just 28. She said: “Most addicts hate how they are and what they’ve become. You have to get people to understand they are not horrible, they do horrible things. They are living in places you wouldn’t put your dog in. We need to get these kids safe and secure environment.

“If someone is on methadone and has not kept appointments, they take the methadone away. What do they expect these people to do? I know they’ll have a reason. But at the end of the day you can’t take their lifeline away.”