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Drug abuse
Continued from Page 16
if it's controlled use, you can still be caught
in the cycle."
And to what does Hughes attribute les
bian and gay drug use? "One of the reasons
is the lack of connection that gay men and
lesbians have to society/' she submits, "the
cutoff that we feel as human beings. That
goes back to heterosexism and the oppres
sion that we get from society. If bars are the
only place you have to meet people, then
that's where people end up going."
But what about what Zachary said about
different social settings? Are the circum
stances surrounding drug use different for
lesbians? "I don't want to get into stereo
types," says Hughes, "but generally speak
ing, I'd say that that is true, that there is
much more of a party mentality in the gay
male community than in the lesbian com
munity. Most lesbians that I've worked with
use alone, as opposed to going out and par
tying, although younger lesbians do go out
and party a lot. They just don't get to treat
ment yet. They haven't lost everything yet."
• • •
Dr. Chris Crowe, a gay Atlanta psy
chologist who specializes in anxiety disor
ders and depression, is listing some of the
negative long-term affects of popular drugs.
"Chronic cocaine use can lead to suspi
ciousness or even a paranoid psychosis, and
a certain kind of brain syndrome," he says.
"The patient looks pretty much like a
schizophrenic, and after someone stops us
ing cocaine, you can have a severe depres
sion. Ecstasy is believed to be highly addic-
five psychologically but not necessarily
physically. As for crystal meth, some of the
psychological effects are depression, anxi
ety and irritability. People have a very hard
time getting off of it because they get so de
pressed."
And are these the drugs Dr. Crowe's
patients are using? "In my practice I see a
preponderance of people using crystal and
Ecstasy," he says, "and people who are mix
ing cocaine and crystal together. Research
indicates people with a tendency to have
mood disorders, people who may be prone
to depression, for example, are more likely
to abuse these drugs." Again, why so much
drug use? "It's very prevalent in our
community...it always has been. It's been
sort of associated with the 70s, with the
'disco lifestyle.' I can't help but think, right
now there's so much pathos in our commu
nity because of HIV drat it's a way to try to
escape the grief."
• • •
"It's frustrating that we don't have more
concrete data," says Eleanor Nealy, director
of Project Connect, the alcohol and drug in
tervention program at the Lesbian and Gay
Community Services Center in New York.
"Studies in the late 70s and early '80s
on the lesbian and gay community indicated
that in terms of alcohol and drug abuse, one
out of three lesbians and gay men has some
kind of drug or alcohol-related problem, as
compared to 10% for the larger population.
But there were a lot of methodological prob
lems with the early studies, so there's been
a lot of debate in recent years about how
accurate that figure is."
What accounts for the discrepancy be
tween gay and straight drug use? "One of
the things studies have found," responds
Nealy, "was that drug and alcohol use de
clines significantly with, age in the general
population and that didn't happen in the
lesbian and gay sample."
I ask Nealy if she sees a distinction be
tween lesbian and gay male drug use. "I
don't hear lesbians talking about K, crystal,
and X, the way I hear gay men talking to
me about that," she says, "so I would make
a judgment that lesbians are not using those
drugs the way that gay men are. I hear about
cocaine in both communities." The term
now being used for cocaine—"girlfriend"—
seems very appropriate to me now.
Nealy pauses, then adds, "I don't know
whether the dynamics are different in At
lanta from New York City, but cocaine and
crack run neck and neck with alcohol in
terms of the lesbians we work with."
Nealy adds that "in terms of treatment,
we tend to run gender-specific groups here.
Even in the larger community, men seek
drug and alcohol treatment at much higher
rates than women do, and that seems to play
out in the lesbian and gay community.
Women also drop out at a higher rate than
men."
I wonder aloud why that is. "There's still
more stigma for women around being iden
tified as an alcoholic or addict," says Nealy,
"but rates of alcohol-related problems are
much higher for lesbians—about three times
higher—than heterosexual women."
And Nealy agrees with the notion that
gay male drug use is very socially oriented.
"With the gay men that I see who are into
designer drugs and clubs, there seems to be
a lot of acceptance. If you're spending all
night long Saturday at gay clubs it's ex
pected you're doing crystal or K or some
thing."
• • •
It's Saturday night and I'm dancing at
an Atlanta gay club. Suddenly, there's a
commotion in the middle of the crowd. One
guy has passed out, and his friends are drag
ging his unconscious body across the room.
Instinctively, I run to get help, telling the
doorman to call 911. He seems only vaguely
concerned and dispatches club security to
check out the situation. I rush back to the
dance floor area only to see the guy up on
his feet again, his friends encircled around
him. "Is he O.K.?" 1 ask, "I told them to call
911."
"There was no reason to do that," one
of them snaps, "he's fine now."
And I can see that indeed he is fine.
For now.
