A few years ago, I stumbled on the so-called “faces of meth” online, with disgust.
The faces of meth, as usually presented, are a bunch of mug shots showing people after they were ravaged by years of meth abuse. Subjects in such photos are normally career criminals and/or people who spent years living on the streets. They exist normally with the pretense of being a deterrent from meth use, but really are nothing more than an excuse for low life arseholes to laugh at the misfortune of others.
Ironically, besides the fact that those photos are often so far removed from reality that everybody who uses drugs will actually ignore them, and removed just enough such that people tempted to use drugs will think “that could never be me“, they are often not even truthful. For example, the “before” shot of a pretty teenager before she goes down the road of meth and prostitution… probably shows her after five years or so of meth addiction, because most users start young.
Anyway, I thought I’d switch things around a little, and show you photos of myself, both at the worst of my addiction while at the lowest point in my life, and also now, at five years and one month clean.
My faces of meth
These were taken in May of 2008, with my son when he was one month old and I was 36, and in August of 2008. (Yes, he was born with all that hair.)
My faces after meth
And these were taken earlier this evening, 8th October 2018. Note that there is a ten year age difference. Josh is now ten, and I’ll be 47 in exactly two weeks.
There’s aren’t even great photos. I suck at taking selfies.
Skeptical Exaddict 
I also see a very proud father. And that’s typical of Daddy Bears.
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Well, I was a proud father even back in 2008. But I wasn’t capable of being what I wanted to be. And I looked like shit.
But it’s all good now.
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I don’t know if this comes across loud and clear… my double meanings are sometimes subtle and go unnoticed, so this might be worth mentioning in a comment.
This post isn’t only intended to show my personal photos and emphasize the fact that recovery from meth is possible, and that even people who are ravaged and apparently “lost” to meth addiction can change. Also I’m not ashamed of my past. It happened, and I have no issue with insecurity of self consciousness, so I have no problem sharing images of the mess that I was.
The other message is one of reversing the stereotypes and generalizations often attached to addicts. People look at the “faces of meth” to have a laugh, ironically displaying poor morality in their judgement of people who they assume to have no morals and values. The second paragraph (the one under the introductory line) is intended to turn that on its head. If you’re having a laugh at the misfortune of others, it is not their morality that’s dubious. I hoped that by implying it rather than stating this directly, and then tagging the post with “faces of meth”, I might get readers who came here for just that purpose – and then turn it around in the paragraph. But it might be a stretch to hope that such people are smart enough to get the point.
Furthermore, such photos normally shared are not truthful. They are the worst possible mug shots showing people who abused drugs for probably twenty or thirty years, cherry-picked for those who find such things funny. They don’t deter anyone from using drugs, because nobody identifies with such images. Such caricatures of people only exist on bullshit websites like world news daily report, not it real life. I spent a few years at the beginning of my addiction surrounded by dangerous people and hardened criminals. Trust me – even those guys didn’t look like the “faces of meth”.
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A little bit OT, but I’m curious to know if you and Josh are going to pray the Rosary tonight before going to bed, in order to prevent Satan from acting here on planet Earth to make things worse than ever?
Pope Francis wants all of us to pray the Rosary. Have a look at https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-francis-pray-the-rosary-daily-for-churchs-protection-from-satan-54878 .
Unfortunately I don’t know how the prayer goes, so I can’t help Pope Francis. As you know I’m a heathen.
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Ha! I vaguely remember being taught how to pray the Rosary in Sunday school. It wasn’t very interesting and involved a lot of repetition. On these beads, recite the Hail Mary etc… I chose not to believe in it at the time because I thought it was dumb. I wasn’t a very good Catholic, even as a child.
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You are NOT dumb, Jerome!
Your brain is instead full of logical reasoning. You know that magical thinking is bullshit.
BTW, do you think that these waxwings need to join a 12 Step program:
https://www.popsci.com/drunk-animals-evolution ?
Or they can recover, like you, without any 12 Step program?
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I think they need to pray to a higher power. Cat god is totally benevolent and the fact that he eats them is entirely irrelevant.
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A Cat god? I think you just described YHWH, another mass murderer.
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