He made it out of the battle, but came back for his friends and fought with them.
“T” is a drug surrenderee who grew up in Pasil. As a little boy he had big dreams, but growing up, the dreams his younger self had were slowly desolated by his use and addiction of illegal drugs.
“I never thought I’d be a troublemaker in our barangay and that I’d fall into vice. The older I became, the deeper my addiction to drugs was. Until it came to a point where I couldn’t finish studying,” T said.
He married early thinking that marriage could straighten him out; but even after matrimony, he remained dependent on illegal substances.
“I couldn’t focus on my family. I was putting myself and my addiction first,” he painfully admitted. “It didn’t matter whether there was food on the table, as long as I could take in drugs.”
His life was a mess. His family relations were unstable and T blames himself, to this day, for not making a home for his wife and children. He couldn’t stop thinking about drugs and to satiate his addiction, he even went to extreme lengths such as swindling and stealing.
But despite the shame and ruin he brought home, his wife stood by him and took care of him. “It didn’t matter how abusive I got, she endured it all. She patiently waited for me to realize what I’ve been doing wrong.”
Winning The Battle
After struggling for two decades, first trying out drugs when he was 12 years old, T finally won his battle against addiction.
The victory was unexpected, according to him. “On the evening of September 22, I told myself I would quit using drugs. I thought I was just kidding myself, I never could have imagined I’d stand by that statement.”
Days turned to weeks, weeks turned to months, months turned to years and then a decade. He endured his addiction and now, seven years sober, he attributes his change to his faith and his community in LABANG.
Lahat Bangon (LABANG) is a community-based recovery program for drug dependents. Initiated by the Ugnayan ng Barangay at Simbahan (Ubas) and Salesians of Don Bosco, LABANG aims to help surrenderers from the Oplan Tokhang in their rehabilitation and reintegration in society. It first operated on June 2016 in Barangay Subangdaku, Mandaue City.
T confesses that it wasn’t easy staying clean especially in an environment where illegal substances are fairly easy to procure.
“Changing and sticking to that change is difficult. I’m just staying at home, not in a rehabilitation center. Everyday I see temptation. I just look away, knowing that God is guiding me.”
Right now, he’s staying at his neighborhood and running his own kwek-kwek business. “When I encounter a problem, I no longer run to drugs. I’m happy where I am now.”
Returning for the Fallen Comrades
One of his friends, R, a fellow drug surrenderee from the same barangay and a fellow “graduate” of the LABANG program also started using illegal drugs at a young age. R realized how difficult it was to raise his seven children alone after his wife passed away while he battled with his reliance on illegal drugs.
“I was overwhelmed. I kept thinking ‘how am I going to raise my children without my wife?’ Truthfully, I depended on her on everything. I’m miserable now that she’s gone but I still continue taking drugs.”
After surrendering to the authorities, he went home to his province in Carcar and stayed there for 2 months to distract himself. After some time, he received a letter from their barangay encouraging all drug surrenderees in the area to join the LABANG program.
Thirty surrenderees joined, but only 10 graduated. “Every single one of us made a vow to change for the better. But there are those who returned, falling back into addiction,” R said.
Some of their batchmates who relapsed went back to being drug mules while some ended up in jail. After the Salesian priest who used to lead Labang was relocated to another community, a good number of those who went into relapse have turned to T to ask for an informal rehabilitation session in his house.
Their informal session and program includes sharing when they last relapsed, and adopts the Narcotics Anonymous (NA) 12-step recovery program, applying one step every session, according to R.
In their own way, they are replicating the program that has helped them through. T is standing up to the task and taking responsibility over his friends' lives.
Looking back, T added how thankful he was for not contracting diseases during his addiction. “Even then, I was blessed by God. When I was still using illegal drugs, I was healthy — He kept me healthy, maybe because He wanted me to be here, helping out.”