Whether it’s affecting celebrities, artists, business leaders, a local lawmaker, a child, someone you love or you yourself, the mysterious power of addiction, which can destroy careers and lives, deserves a closer look and better understanding from the public eye.

As The Mining Journal prepares to release an in-depth local analysis of the growing problem, reporters like myself are receiving a sobering education.

We are talking to family members of the deceased, people that have overcome their illness, people that work in the trenches as counselors, health professionals, police and others, and the picture forming can be hard to swallow.

A landscape emerges of growing need, inadequate funding, shrinking treatment times, unwilling insurance companies, overflowing prisons, homelessness, fear and preventable loss in a system that can’t seem to address the root of the issue.

The most staggering aspect for me is how hard individuals with addiction fight – not only against a relentless chemical adversary, but against the illusory and pervasive force of stigma.

Implicit in the language around addiction is the connotation of some kind of moral deficiency. People associate addicts with poor judgment or self-indulgence. We don’t have compassionate language to talk about a complex illness that – with the rising prevalence of prescription drugs in particular – has grown to epidemic proportions.

And while a thing that alters one’s brain chemistry and behavior, sometimes drastically, is scary and dangerous, neither the issue nor the solution is black and white.

Recovery Services Specialist Tim Connors, who is the longest-serving staff member at Great Lakes Recovery Center after 29 years, said these days, it’s hard to find people who haven’t been touched by addiction.

“Some of the brightest, kindest people I’ve met drank or drugged themselves to death,” Connors said. “No one is immune. It cuts across all strata – social, economic.”

As a recovering alcoholic decades clean, Connors knows how arduous the path to recovery can be. And he sees the damaging effects of stigma and criminalization every day.

In obituaries and news reports, silence or an air of disapproval reigns. This has the effect of concealing the issue and driving the addicted into isolation.

People that battle cancer or heart disease or any other illness – even when it’s associated with their choices and behaviors – are not also burdened with the same kind of judgment.

People do not make a choice to become or stay addicted. Shaming them has the adverse effect of obscuring their own self-worth and path to recovery.

“(Addicts) think they’re weak,” Connors said, “When it’s just the other way around. I know drug addicts that go to work when a normal person would go to the ER.”

But recovery is always possible.

Deaths from drugs and alcohol are 100 percent preventable, Connors said.

But what people need most is candid support, compassion and treatment services. They must feel worthwhile as they make the difficult journey toward sobriety.

They deserve to have a place to stay and food to eat. Statistics show when those struggling with addiction – which too often leads to homelessness – have basic human services, their chances of recovery drastically improve. And the cost to taxpayers – when money is spent on needs instead of court costs, prison and emergency room visits – is much lower.

“These drugs of abuse I watch absolutely destroy people,” Connors said. “Everybody pays. We’re all touched by this. I think this is one of the biggest problems that exist, that we have in this country.”

Yet the biggest mental health care provider in Michigan is the corrections department, Connors said, who works at a prison half the week.

As a peer support leader, Connors counsels individuals from all walks of life, and he’s seen recovery as well as its antagonist.

“I’ve known a lot of dead folks,” he said.

But Connors also knows what lies on the flipside for those with the support, resources and courage to face their fears, break through dependence and find peace.

He said it took him a while to finally see the gifts hiding in the everyday mundane, but now he finds comfort in a sense of gratitude.

“As a result of recovery, the world I live in is enough,” Connors said. “I’m amazed by things every day, commonplace things I see that I have an appreciation for – people that go over-and-above, and work hard, and are kind to each other. That’s the world I live in.”

My hope is that as a culture, we begin to see our war on drugs hasn’t worked. It has not solved the problem, but has shoved the issue underground and magnified pain and violence. My hope is we can be more honest with each other and learn to see people as people, not so different than ourselves, and deserving of compassion, dignity and respect.

Editor’s note: Mary Wardell can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 248.