My friend, Lars Schmidt, lost his brother to an opioid addiction.
I always wonder — how does that happen? Where does that begin? If you’re middle-class and generally educated, how do things go wrong?
Well, it goes wrong pretty easily. Or so I’m told.
If you’re interested in learning more about opioid addiction — how you can help, how you can get yourself help, how you can get more information on what it’s doing to our society — check out Lars’s tribute page to his brother. Please read his posts on Medium. And reach out to Lars and wish him the best. He paid tribute to his brother, this week. I’m proud of him, although it sucks to be proud of him for this reason.
Physical pain is real and should be taken seriously. Always. But opioid addiction is real, too. And if it hasn’t affected you, yet, it’s only because you are lucky. Be educated, be compassionate, and have some empathy for opioid addicts. Many of them are just like you.
Addiction is an ever-increasing issue in today’s workplace.