A few blog entries ago, I shared random picture files from my computer. One of them was a comic strip I had created using Pixton.com. That random moment of sharing made me re-examine my interest in designing comics, and so I logged back into my Pixton account and started traveling down my old creative pathways. I left so many comics unfinished. This was one of them.
Call it karma. Call it destiny. Call it luck. I had created this comic about addiction because I had a friend dealing with a drug addiction back in 2013. I thought the metaphor of someone drowning in the ocean but refusing any extended hand was apt to describe how addicts went through life. There is a famous saying about how you cannot help someone who is unwilling to help himself. I had lived through that, and thought using a comic was a useful way to deal with that struggle.
Now there’s another person in my life addicted to a bad relationship. That is not my opinion; it is how she described her own relationship with her emotionally abusive husband. Whenever I extend a hand, she refuses it. So seeing this comic just sitting in my unpublished projects on a website I had not visited for almost two years, at this moment in time, just called to me. I finished the comic, obviously, and I want to be very clear with the message.
You are dealing with an addiction.
It is up to you to take the help to get out of a bad situation.
If you continue to choose to stay in your situation, you are not just hurting yourself:
- You’re hurting your children.
- You’re hurting your family.
- You’re hurting me.
In other words… you’re hurting everyone who loves you, whether they know what’s going on or not.
But that is your choice. Here is mine: I will still care. I will still extend my hand. I will still love. People question that methodology sometimes. “You’re just enabling him/her by giving him/her attention while he/she self-destructs.” You might be right. But I cannot be the type of person who walks away or ignores the wrongs he sees. I wish I could. But perhaps there is a truth about me in that comic too: I am addicted to being thought of as a “hero.”
If you are struggling with an addiction, whether it be to a drug, relationship, unhealthy habit, or need to be a hero… I hope you accept the help that is being offered. If you are trying to help an addict… I hope you are granted the patience and serenity to continue offering that help.
I guess sometimes comics are not that funny.
WTF Press 