In Australia the use of crystal methamphetamines has increased drastically since it first hit our streets in the 1990s. According to the 2012 Global Drug Survey, more than 6000 Australians surveyed had tried methamphetamines– most commonly crystal meth, also known as ice – at least once in their lives. And regional Australia is, quite tragically, becoming the centre of an ice epidemic.
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The room is fairly sparse, bar a few positive affirmations laminated and Blu Tacked to the walls.
But on this particular day the space is also filled with immense guilt and deep, deep regret.
One by one their stories unravel, the narratives of these men. And their words are sad, not aggressive, but raw and, more than anything, vulnerable.
“I’m very frightened because I know what this drug is like. And I love it, just love it.”
At 19, Josh McKenna is the youngest of the men gathered in the room smack, bang in the middle of Rothbury bushland.
Even so, Josh is already five years into his torrid love affair with crystal methamphetamine.
“I up and left home at the age of 12 and I’ve been homeless ever since,” he said.
“I started hanging around the wrong people and I discovered that drugs were my gateway to putting everything behind me.”
Josh – who hails from Maroubra in Sydney’s Eastern Suburbs – took ice for the first time when he was 14.
He quickly came to regard the drug as one of his dearest of friends.
“The first time I took the drug it felt good. My troubles just lifted off my shoulders, my worries, my depression, everything lifted and it became my new friend,” Josh said.
“It made me very high. I wanted to dance, I wanted to drink, I thought I could do anything.”
Of course none of this was real, and when Josh started to come down, he felt like hell.
Like most men in the room, Josh also ended up in jail.
“Coming off ice hurts, you feel scattered and sick then you need it to feel normal again,” he said.
“I was sent to jail for crimes I committed to try and support my habit. But I was glad I was there because then I knew I’d hit rock bottom.
“I’ve been off it for four months now and it’s a bad drug, it wrecks your life.”
In Australia the use of crystal meth has increased drastically since it first hit our streets in the 1990s.
According to the 2012 Global Drug Survey, more than 6000 Australians surveyed had tried methamphetamines – most commonly crystal meth – at least once in their lives.
Crystal meth (the drug can be smoked, injected, snorted, ingested or inserted anally) floods the brain with the pleasure neurotransmitter known as dopamine.
The addicts seated with us say, initially, the drug made them feel euphoric, super-charged and free of inhibition – until it took over their lives.
“I did ice for the high at first. I became everyone’s best friend. I thought I was the life of the party and I thought I looked good, but looking back at it now I could not have been more wrong.”
Joe Gersbach, a young man originally from Orange, has chosen to tell his story.
On February 7 this year Joe stopped taking ice following a
harrowing 16-year addiction that landed him behind bars.
“I was 13 when I first took ice and I stopped when I went to jail,” Joe, now 29, said.
“I’ve robbed people, bashed them for their wallets. I’d smash people with baseball bats. I once tied a lad up and got into him with a cricket bat because I heard he had a couple of eight balls (an eighth of an ounce of crystal meth).
“Inside of me I feel I terrible, to do that to someone, to rob people, to bash people who could be someone’s father, someone’s son, to do that for a drug habit.
“I’ve nearly killed people for a drug that’s gone in 24 hours. It’s disgusting.”
But for many years disgust just wasn’t enough for Joe to kick his habit.
He had to lose the lot for that to happen.
“I have nothing to show for my life. Not long before I got locked up my family left me, my partner took my son,” Joe said.
“I was always saying I was going to give it up, I was even saying that in jail, but as soon as you walk out the gate your thoughts just change and you go searching for the nearest dealer.”
Joe is now a little more than half way through his rehabilitation program, he remains scared and hopeful in equal measures.
“I’m scared to get out there again because it’s all I’ve known for such a long time,” he said.
“But I’m excited about change. I’m excited to start my life over.”
Joining Joe at this table of truth is Rod Stone.
“Ice has taken everything from me. My pride, my dignity, everything,” Rod, 40, from the Central Coast, said.
“I had a pretty good career with the NRL, I have three kids, I owned my own company and I was pretty successful.
“I virtually went from all that to living on the streets with not a cent to my name. I was living in my station wagon and I was working to simply support my ice habit.
“I’ve taken cocaine, speed, stuff like that, but these drugs never stripped me like this. Ice has taken my soul.”
Rod also ended up in jail and described his stay at The Glen Centre Annexe (for drug and alcohol addiction) as his last chance.
“I’m now starting from nothing. I didn’t even own the clothes off my back when I came here. The clothes I’m wearing today aren’t even mine,” Rod said.
“Ice took me to a place I’d never been to before. The potency of that drug is unbelievable. It wouldn’t matter where on the globe we (ice addicts) travel, we’ll suss out the dealers and we seem to attract each other like magnets.
“I firmly believe this drug will wipe out generations. I’d walk to Western Australia right now to pick up ice. It will never leave me, the obsession I have for that drug will be in me until the day I die.
“There is no second chance for me. My last bender went for almost five years.”
Two years ago the number of clients admitting to synthetic drug addiction at The Glen wavered at five per cent.
Last year that figure rose exponentially to 25 per cent.
“We’re thinking the number (of clients using synthetic drugs) is now one in four, which is massive considering two years ago there would have been none,” The Glen assistant co-ordinator Joe Coyte said.
“And to be honest, we are on a learning curve with it. This is not something we can pretend we are on top of because we are not.”
Rico Bonventi smoked marijuana for 25 years before making the leap to speed then ice.
“I was happy to try anything at least once,” Rico, 46, of Foster, said.
“And for quite a while I felt like I was on top of things. I felt superhuman, invincible almost. I was the new and improved Rico. I felt like I was 20 again and I was ready to rumble.”
But of course Rico’s world crumbled.
“I was running on empty all the time and ice props you up. I got to the point where I wouldn’t start the day without it,” he said.
“I never went around wanting to crush people’s heads in, that wasn’t me, but I just loved taking the drug. I felt more complete, but after awhile you definitely don’t.
The catalyst for Rico’s turning point was his children.
“I fell asleep teaching my daughter how to drive,” he said.
“This drug took everything. It took my dignity, I embarrassed my family, my kids too. All I cared about was the next whack . . . then I promised my kids I would change.”
Rico starts to cry.
“Good work Rico, good work brother,” Rod says.
– Earlier this month The Glen Centre Annexe closed. Existing clients were transferred to The Glen’s other facility at Chittaway Bay on the Central Coast.