Addiction is one of the most talked about and known diseases this planet has to offer. Some believe it's a choice, other believe it's a disease. However, this article is not going to be about those opinions, more likely the impact I have seen on others who dealt with it. There are many ways addiction takes form. It can be through drugs or alcohol. Going through high school was a rough time for a lot of people, some would cope with it in healthy and unhealthy ways.

I, for one, was never into drugs or alcohol during that time, but some people I was close with started to fall into that habit. There are so many ways people get into it. It can be from buying them on the streets, to having a surgery that requires the prescription drugs and starting a habit of taking too many at a time. My sophomore year of high school, there was one person I grew close to and started to take prescription drugs.

After about two months of my friend using them on a daily basis, I started to see the toll it took on them physically and mentally. Physically, their appearance started to go down. They would come to school wearing the same exact outfit, not grooming themselves and had a sadness in their eyes.

Mentally, they would become outraged at the smallest things or not having a care in the world. Slowly I saw them caring less and less about the beautiful things this world has to offer. Keep in mind this person had such a gorgeous outlook on life before he became addicted.

After six months of continuous use of the drug, he began to steal from others just to get money to afford to buy more. When his parents found out, he was "grounded" and due to that he didn't have the drugs any more.

I was able to see the withdrawals happening to him. He would have continuous grand mal seizures, fainting and flu like symptoms. After two weeks of these symptoms and getting treated at a rehab facility for it, he began to start these drugs over again even after he saw what happened to him. More and more of close friends started this awful cycle. They started to become distant from me and I saw them sinking into a huge depression.

College started to roll around and my old friends, were in and out of rehab, while I began to start my dream time at school. Even though I don't keep in contact with these people anymore, I still think about them time to time and wonder if they are doing okay and fulfilling their dreams they had before.

Addiction doesn't make some one a bad person or a "loser". The most impactful thing you can do for them is support the person with finding care and realizing how many amazing things they can do for this world. As the years go on, addiction is definitely getting more recognized compared to how it was in the mid 1900s. If you see someone who is struggling, in any type of way, please help them out, you will never know how far it will go for them.