On the way to work this morning the radio reported that Kirsten Dunst had checked into rehab and that Heath Ledger's death had given her a wake up call. I think it is good that she did since she obviously needed to. However, I find it a bit irritating that Heath's death is being given for a reason. As far as reports are concerned there is no connection between what Kirsten does compared to what Heath was doing. Kirsten is out partying and intentionally abusing substances. Heath, as far as we know, was taking prescription medicine which had been prescribed by doctors and was not intentionally abusing them. I think if anything doctors and how they prescribe medicine is what Heath's death should be prompting. I know for a fact that doctors prescribe way too many pills for way too many people. A pill is always the answer. Take this pill for this and take that pill for that. The drug companies make lots of money and so do the doctors. It also doesn't help any that the media is constantly advertising pills and telling us that we should ask our doctors for this and that. I think it is high time for all of this to be heavily scrutinized. After all there is a very good chance Heath would still be with us if doctors had not tried to treat everything he had with pills.
And believe me he is not the only one going through this type of doctor abuse. To take this to a more personal level the guy I was in a relationship who is also no longer alive was being prescribed multiple anxiety, antidepressant, sleeping, and pain medications. These were coming from the same doctor too. In fact, I would bet on the fact that he was taking many more pills than Heath had ever thought about taking. His tolerance was amazing and would definitely do most people in. I saw him take a whole bottle of sleeping pills once on top of pain medications and xanax, valium, and ativan. Believe this or not, this combination did not put him to sleep. In fact it had the reverse effect of making him very wide awake. However, this guy was truly a drug abuser and had been since high school or earlier. I do not believe Heath was a drug abuser. The guy I am talking about also would take acid, cocaine, crack, meth, and any other drug that would come along. He was a drug addict and an alcoholic. I truly believe his brain was pickled and the prescription medicines may have had a lot to do with how he ended up. That is not what killed him though. From what I know it was instead abuse of crack and a gun to the head. However, there is the question of what years and years of prescription drug abuse had caused.
So I do wish Kirsten the best of luck, but I think her reasons for going to rehab have little to do with what happened to Heath. It has become quite glamorous for the rich and famous to do their stints in rehab. It is almost like a fashion statement and someone is nobody if they have not been to one. They have been set up to be like a fancy relaxing vacation for the stars. Delta Burke goes to one every so often to get her medications adjusted. It's turned into a revolving door for these people. Isn't rehab supposed to help someone get off alcohol and drugs instead of just providing a break for them? It seems that they go in, stop doing their drugs for awhile, and then come out to take more for their next visit to rehab.