Heroin Before and After

Here's some before and after pictures of Rhonda Bye, a woman who I read about in this San Francisco Chronicle article explaining how she died in spite of her attempts to recover from her heroin addiction. She was smart and beautiful, and had a career modeling for Nordstrom and working on computers. Her addictions landed her on the street, panhandling for money to support her habits.

I shouldn't be so partial to beautiful women. It's sad when addiction ravages ugly people, too...but it's just so awful to see someone who was so pretty, so smart, and who seemed to have so much going for her destroy herself over a feeling. That's the part that constantly throws me...it's just a feeling...a good feeling for a few minutes. That's it.

My man is so handsome, but the drugs definitely took their toll on him. Hopefully, it's not too late for him to get back to himself. His skin is a mess and he lost weight and just generally stopped caring about his appearance. He'd always been such a fop, too...so particular about how he dressed, making sure his shoes matched and his hair was artfully careless. It's sad watching someone let those kinds of things go and just stop caring.


I remember when I first saw him last year after he'd gotten out of jail, he was so big and handsome. He'd been in jail for two months, and it had done his body so much good. I was overcome by how big he seemed...he thought that he was fat, but he looked so good and healthy and strong.

Maybe his vanity will make him act right. One of our guests this past weekend noticed how big he looked in the picture of us from our wedding. It wasn't even a year ago, but he did look markedly different. I wish we had more pictures.