E-mails to Strange and Jubilee
Nov. 28th, 2004 04:31 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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xp_communicationTo: SStrange@columbia.edu.ny
From: AEspinosa@xaviers.edu.ny
Dr. Strange,
I've got a question for you. A couple of weeks ago, I was having a crisis for various reasons, and Amanda - to help me - swore to me on her name that she wouldn't leave here for good without me saying she could go. We both have issues with people leaving, especially with how many people've left for good lately, so I've given her the same promise - but there's nothing I can do to hold myself to that the way I know her name holds her. I don't intend to break the promise, but I don't want her to be at a disadvantage here if I can help it. So. Is there anything you can do, a spell or something, that would make sure I'm held to that promise the way she is?
Angelo
To: [Jubilee]
From: [Angelo]
Jubilee,
Before you go making any judgments about Amanda and addictions - or go on believing the judgments you've already made, rather - there's a few things you should be aware of.
1) Most addicts, at some point, get a choice - to take that first-or-seventeenth drink, to take the first hit, whatever. For Amanda, it was more like - well, it was like a heroin addict - or not even that, because she wasn't addicted to the magic before she got here - like a normal person arriving at a place and suddenly finding they permanently had the effects of a heroin high, without needing or getting to make the choice to inject. Because this place, for some reason, was full of magical energy, and powerful stuff at that, and she couldn't get away from it or not absorb it. And then - I guess people didn't know how deep into it she'd got, because they didn't wean her off it gradual-like, they just cut off the source when they figured out she was drawing power from it. So she went cold-turkey without getting to choose that, either.
2) Most addicts have the option of cutting off whatever they're addicted to altogether, if they so choose. For a lot of addicts, that's the best or only way to beat it. Amanda can't do that - she can't function completely without the magic, ever. So dealing with her addiction is harder for her, because she *can't* give up the magic the way an alcoholic could give up the booze.
She is an innocent victim here, as far as the addiction goes, because she never chose it. Any of it.
Do you see now?
Angelo
From: AEspinosa@xaviers.edu.ny
Dr. Strange,
I've got a question for you. A couple of weeks ago, I was having a crisis for various reasons, and Amanda - to help me - swore to me on her name that she wouldn't leave here for good without me saying she could go. We both have issues with people leaving, especially with how many people've left for good lately, so I've given her the same promise - but there's nothing I can do to hold myself to that the way I know her name holds her. I don't intend to break the promise, but I don't want her to be at a disadvantage here if I can help it. So. Is there anything you can do, a spell or something, that would make sure I'm held to that promise the way she is?
Angelo
To: [Jubilee]
From: [Angelo]
Jubilee,
Before you go making any judgments about Amanda and addictions - or go on believing the judgments you've already made, rather - there's a few things you should be aware of.
1) Most addicts, at some point, get a choice - to take that first-or-seventeenth drink, to take the first hit, whatever. For Amanda, it was more like - well, it was like a heroin addict - or not even that, because she wasn't addicted to the magic before she got here - like a normal person arriving at a place and suddenly finding they permanently had the effects of a heroin high, without needing or getting to make the choice to inject. Because this place, for some reason, was full of magical energy, and powerful stuff at that, and she couldn't get away from it or not absorb it. And then - I guess people didn't know how deep into it she'd got, because they didn't wean her off it gradual-like, they just cut off the source when they figured out she was drawing power from it. So she went cold-turkey without getting to choose that, either.
2) Most addicts have the option of cutting off whatever they're addicted to altogether, if they so choose. For a lot of addicts, that's the best or only way to beat it. Amanda can't do that - she can't function completely without the magic, ever. So dealing with her addiction is harder for her, because she *can't* give up the magic the way an alcoholic could give up the booze.
She is an innocent victim here, as far as the addiction goes, because she never chose it. Any of it.
Do you see now?
Angelo
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no subject
Date: 2004-11-30 11:06 am (UTC)From: [Jubilee]
Firstly, I'm sorry about how I treated you that night. You caught me in a very bad mood and I took it out on you. That was wrong.
As to Amanda, I guess I can see what you're saying. I know my own experience with an addict doesn't make me an expert.
Thing is, why didn't she ask for help? You told me I should have gone to the teachers. And you were right, I should have. It's not a mistake I'll make again. But, just wondering if she was in such a bad way, why she didn't go to someone about it.
~J.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-30 07:12 pm (UTC)Thing is, Jubes, you got every right to hate that foster father of yours. But like I think you know, you can't take what happened with him and apply it to all addicts everywhere. Generalisations don't work.
There were a few reasons, I think. First, she hadn't been here all that long, and she'd been on the streets years before that. You know how hard it is to stop relying on yourself, even when you don't have to anymore. Second, she wasn't exactly in the best mental place. Must've been hard for her even to think straight, when she was withdrawing like that, let alone make the right decision.
And third, they cut her off right after the whole love potion thing. So she thought pretty much everyone hated her - for all I know she thought being cut off was her punishment, if only because she wasn't thinking straight through the withdrawal - and I'm guessing she didn't expect to get any sympathy.
Angelo