Posted 6/2/2016 3:46 AM (GMT 0)
I was horrified to see untreated young people.. 18 and early 20's with HepC going untreated here. We have a quiet Hep C epidemic going on.
I work with these young people and old people who have serious addictions. They are sober and some going through withdrawals. County time is straight up hard time withdrawal. They give Librium for withdrawal and not much else.
One young lady alcoholic having severe liver problems. She's 30 and been drinking since she was five. Yep five. This is Wisconsin and the kids are in the bars with their parents and her parents were bikers.
Heroin is coming up out of Chicago is cheap. But these kids will try anything once addicted to Heroin. Pills, household cleaning supplies mixed with other things.. they are huffing, snorting, injecting..
I give them mental health screenings and they don't even understand what I'm saying.. their brain is not functioning..
That's not all of them.
I work for three jails. Two of them are simply four hours a week crisis type stuff. The third one is progressive and doing four AODA classes there. But the people I serve are there and then gone. I hope to give them some tools. Many have been through every class under the sun. The outlook is grim.
I'm asked do I need a guard with the most violent ones. I ask the person.. and they say no. I sit down on the bench with a man just in on his 13th DUI who is sobbing... and I speak straight talk.. no BS.
I see families, dads, moms, kids... all torn apart mostly by addictions and mental health issues.. so the progressive jails are now providing mental health.. but most counselors don't know how to serve this population. For many counselors have been sitting behind a desk and the young ones well they would get eaten alive by some of the Hannibal Lechner types I meet with.
The long shadow of untreated Hep C hovers over these people and most will not qualify for Harvoni or any treatment due to the depth of their addictions. I don't cry. I pray for strength to keep telling them straight up the truth of their situations and work from a person centered truthful hard hitting AODA stance and for that matter mental health.
For as you recall I have mental health, (newly finished) addiction, and vocational counseling. With this background I will lead a pilot program for re-entry in a jail setting. Most jails aren't doing this. People are simply let out at 2 am and go right to their drug buddy's house and start all over again.
Anyways.. there's no glory in this job. There are destroyed lives and rampant Hep C. For some reason my emotions don't get tangled up. Guess it's my tough love mindset. For I know what these people have at stake.
I'm still trying to grasp the whole picture and know how to help with resource and referral. The county with the most rampant Hep C only has me on four hours a week. It's not enough. Hardly enough.
I will be back. I have to find a way to help those with Hep C and the young gal who has liver damage. I hope to get her to have a liver test done.
What type of test do they do for a person with liver damage? A liver panel??
She was so emotionally restricted during the first sessoin. She is coming out of that shell. I would like to help her. But she has to do the work. I can only point her in the direction of the tools.