VIDEO: Students discuss addiction and the problems it creates.

Scotty was my best friend my first year of college, the first real friend I made here at Sacramento State.

He was brilliant and could make anyone laugh. He was great at math. We did everything together.

We drank and smoked a lot, but it didn’t affect our grades. Weekends were indulgent, but hard drugs didn’t feel like a big deal. Everything felt like an adventure, or an exercise in self-discovery.

We started to see each other less because we both moved on. I stopped messing around with drugs every day and he didn’t.

It’s easy to write off overenthusiastic drug use because we’re young and feel untouchable. I’ve known a lot of people who get caught up with substances. Most of them grew out of the desire to experiment, and say the abuse was “just a phase.”

But the line between abuse and addiction is rarely bold, and Scotty stumbled over it very quickly.

I wrote him a letter last September, because I missed him and autumns on campus always remind me of freshman year.

“I swear I saw you on campus, but then I remembered you killed yourself last year,” I wrote.

When he realized that rehab hadn’t worked, Scotty used a gun to put himself out of his misery. In his place, he left an unquantifiable sorrow.

Scotty’s little brother idolized him. His professors could tell he was extraordinary. His fraternity brothers were broken when he died.

In the end, his addiction alienated him from everything.

It isn’t always easy to be around someone self-destructive, and it’s hard to know when someone needs help to get clean.

Scotty had been seduced by heroin and a litany of other drugs. He tried to get clean but felt he’d already lost what he had. He made a series of bad choices, the worst one being the decision to take his own life.

Jenna Smith is a former Sacramento State student and an addict. She serves as both a chair and secretary at many Alcoholics and Narcotics Anonymous meetings. Her real name is being withheld in compliance with AA and NA standards.

“People think that once you stop doing drugs, all the problems stop, but you still have to rebuild so much,” Smith said. “(I tell new members) it’s really important to be with other people who are actively involved in their recovery.”

Smith’s addiction affected everything in her life. Her drug use and alcoholism nearly destroyed her relationship with her parents.

Through her sobriety, she has been able to rebuild and strengthen family bonds. Her recovery was a process they all went through.

When the ones we love need our support, it’s our duty to stay as strong as we can to help them recover. We are as involved as the recovering addict, and we deserve to take care of ourselves just as much.

John Simmons, a senior computer engineering major, did not know his mom was abusing meth until she was arrested.

“I had no idea. I was busy with school and work,” Simmons said. “She and my step-dad were having problems so she started using. After the DUI, she had court-mandated rehab. It was hard for all of us – her, me and my little sister, she was nine.”

Simmons was left trying to take care of his sister and make sure his mom was going to stay sober.

“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever dealt with … All of a sudden, I was the one responsible for making sure everything was OK,” Simmons said. “I didn’t know what to do with that kind of pressure. I had to start counseling.”

When someone becomes addicted to drugs, the addict is not the only one who suffers.

Now I don’t get to introduce Scotty to my boyfriend or to group members for class projects who come over to study while he’s hanging out.

“I hope you weren’t too sad those last days though I doubt it’s true,” I wrote. “I hope you died knowing you were and still are very fucking loved.”

We all wonder if there was more we could have done. But in the end, we are the ones who are still here. We’re in recovery, too.

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