Perceptual Process

Perceptual Process.

Better late than never. Better never late. However, since I cannot travel back in time to post this (Thank you Isaac Asimov). I will just be late and share with all who care my latest experience and the Perceptual Process.

Initially, when I began to think about the perceptual process and what to write, the subjects of racism and stereotyping were the subjects with which I had intended to open. However, that changed.

I think here would be a good place for a little back story to put what comes next in context. It is no secret that I have a past littered with deeds that are less than admirable.

I have shared at one time in class that I was sent to prison for being addicted to drugs and possessing a gun as well. I however- as hypocritical as it sounds- looked down with judgment on other drug users. I was highly critical of heroin users and looked on them with a perceptual evaluation of hatred. I thought myself better than them and couldn't relate, sick right!

Now, I have an experience with which to measure.

Two weeks before the beginning of our course I had spinal decompression surgery and had been taking prescription opiates for two weeks prior to the surgery. Last Friday when I sat down to write the initial post, I stopped taking pain pills.

The hell that I encountered, although not on the level that a heroin user must suffer, my withdrawal was just that, hell. I will not go on about all symptoms that I experienced more than asking you to imagine the flu you cannot do anything to fix. Imagine an extreme disliking of The NHRA (drag racing) and being unable, unwilling to move the two inches to change the channel for seven hours!

This five-day experience, granted not the same, has offered me a more empathetic look at what other drug users must go through. It has given me a chance to sympathize with someone who, knowing they are going to go through more than just the worst hell imaginable, will still go through it again and again willingly. The knowledge has allowed me to feel sadness for them. And not a judgmental sorrow, but one of pain and love for the addict who still suffers today.

Having said all of this I still do stand by my opinion that the answer to quitting all substances is just simply Quit. However, simply that may not be.

-m